Chapter 66: Human Body Demining

Chapter 66: Human Body Demining

At four o'clock in the morning, I called several company commanders as ordered and ordered the soldiers to prepare for battle.

In fact, the soldiers had long guessed that there would be an action this morning, so there were no surprises. In a few minutes, several company commanders and instructors gathered in my battalion headquarters.

"This is the situation!" With the light of the flashlight, I pointed to the map hanging on the wall of the cave and said: "The attack time is 6:00 this morning, and the entire army is ready before 4:30. Entering the lurking position at 5:00. At 6:00, half an hour of artillery fire preparation, twenty minutes of artillery fire extending, and charge with three signal flares!"

Speaking of this, I couldn't help but glance at the cadres of the company gathered beside me. None of them had an unexpected look on their faces. In addition to the calmness of the people in their hometown, the others were even looking forward to it, as if they wanted to use this period of training to try their skills on the battlefield.

"Our regiment's mission is..." I nodded secretly and then said: "Along the north bank of the Qiqiong River, we will detour towards Lang San, and cooperate with the 637th Regiment and the 638th Regiment to attack Kokan. Of course, before our army arrived at Kokan Mountain, there were more than ten large and large highlands between this ten-kilometer-long highlands. For these highlands, our army did not know the firepower deployment and military allocation of the Vietnamese army. But one thing is certain that the Vietnamese army will never let us pass easily! Are you confident, comrades?"

"Yes!" the soldiers responded in unison.

Our army lacked enough reconnaissance of the Vietnamese army and did not have much intelligence. This is something that everyone knows long ago, so no one raised too many questions. Anyway, they were reconnaissance and advancing along the way, and the soldiers were all used to it.

"The point we need to remind everyone is..." I continued: "The Vietnamese army has made sufficient preparations during this period, so we can no longer estimate the Vietnamese army at the level of attack and timely attack. Moreover, in order to prevent our army from attacking, the Vietnamese army has laid a wide frontal and large-depth minefield in front of its positions. Although our army has also arranged for engineers and artillery fire to demine mines, there are very likely landmines. The company commanders must remind the soldiers to pay attention to mine detection and demining!"

"Yes!" Several company commanders responded.

"Finally..." I stretched out my right hand to the soldiers and said fiercely: "Kill the Yue Japanese!"

"Kill the Yue Japanese!" The soldiers responded in unison, and dozens of hands were held tightly together.

A brief pre-war meeting was completed like this. We soldiers did not seem to need to know too much strategic ideas and the situation of the battlefield. We seemed to only need to know where to attack which high ground, so half an hour was enough for us to explain all the tasks to the soldiers.

So after the last inspection of the equipment, the soldiers lined up silently outside the station. With my order, the soldiers leaned down and tried to move towards the target position without making any sound.

It was still drizzling outside, and soon wet the soldiers' uniforms. The moonlight shone on the soldiers through the clouds, and the little fluorescent reflected made them look like soldiers wearing silver armor.

At this time, I might be thinking about something, such as how to deal with the Vietnamese army, or how to deal with the poisonous gas from the Vietnamese army... But the fact is that I didn't think about anything at this time. This is actually the case with war. I don't know if I can pass this level in front of me. What's the use of thinking about it? If I really want to say that I think about it, I'm also thinking about whether I can still live to see the sun of tomorrow...

"Battery Commander!" Liu Yun had run to me at some point. I looked behind her and found that Yichen was not far away. They were really Jiao Buli Meng, Meng Buli Jiao!

"What's wrong?" Looking at Liu Yun's nervous look, I asked softly: "Are you a little scared? It's your first time to go to the battlefield!"

"Yeah!" Liu Yun nodded and said, "This is the first time I'm on the battlefield, but I'm not afraid!"

"You still say you're not afraid!" I couldn't help but smile when I heard this, "You really should have taken a mirror to look at it, your whole face turned pale!"

"Really?" Liu Yun touched his face unconsciously.

With a "puff", Yi Chen beside her couldn't help laughing and cursed at Liu Yun in a low voice: "Silly! Do you believe his words? This black and black one can't even tell the nose and eyes, and you will see if your face is white?"

When Liu Yun heard this, he felt it was right and couldn't help but glar at me fiercely.

I couldn't help but laugh. It was better for Ariel Yichen to be smarter. This Liu Yun is like an ignorant child!

"Listen, you two!" After a while, I said seriously at Liu Yun and Yichen, "Don't just rush forward bravely when fighting? Do you know what that sentence is. Only by preserving yourself can you eliminate the enemy. You should understand this! Especially your frontline health workers... I will tell you first. Your mission is to rescue the wounded and rescue the most wounded in the shortest time! If you are all injured, no one will rescue you and no one will rescue the wounded, and you will not be able to complete the task. Do you know? Do you know if you are going to be punished?"

"Yes!" Liu Yun responded very simply, but Yichen followed unwillingly, as if she didn't agree with my fallacies.

The base was not far from the lurking place, and it was almost time to come. I whispered through the intercom and ordered the soldiers to slow down the speed, and spread the formation in the grass two kilometers wide in the battle formation. Then I told Liu Yun and Yichen again: "You can follow the army, listen to the command of the company commander in everything, remember me and be careful!"

"Yes!" This time Yichen should have been very happy, but Liu Yun muttered.

After a while, she whispered as if she had been brave enough: "You...you should be careful too..."

"Go away!" Before she finished speaking, Ariel Yichen pulled her into the grass.

I only laughed at me. The two girls have completely different personalities, so why do they become such good friends on the contrary? Sometimes women's affairs are really difficult to understand.

He shook his head, took the sniper rifle from his back and lie on the ground, then crawled into the grass!

After finding a suitable position in the grass, I raised my telescope and looked into the night. The rain painted a landscape painting in my sight like thin lines - dense jungles, gurgling streams at the foot of the mountain, grass undulating with the wind, and moonlight like fish scales... It was really a poetic landscape, but I knew that in an hour, it would be full of war, blood and death!

"Report to the battalion commander! Discover the target!" At this time, Li Shuibo's voice came from the walkie-talkie: "At seven o'clock, six hundred meters!"

Looking in the direction of the instructions of the people from my hometown, I saw a few black shadows squirming in the grass. Although their movements were very small, they could not escape our eyes.

Then soon, members of the shooting team reported: "At eight o'clock, seven hundred meters!"

“At five o'clock, six hundred meters…”

...

"Don't shoot, don't shoot!" After observing for a while, I hurriedly ordered to the intercom: "Those are our army's engineers, they are clearing obstacles for our charge!"

"Well! It turns out to be a comrade of the engineer unit!"

"I was shocked, I thought it was an enemy..."

...

The soldiers were relieved and heard from the walkie-talkie.

Only then did I realize that the engineers were entering the hidden area to clear mines first. Although Commander Zhang mentioned that the engineers would clear mines for us, he never said that the engineers would enter the hidden area first...

This is the characteristic of our army's combat! The coordination and information exchange between the various units are very poor. Although we cannot expose the target before the war begins at 6 o'clock, what if the engineers and us misunderstand each other!

Fortunately, such a thing did not happen, so I couldn't help but breathe a sigh of relief. If this was really a fight between our own people in front of the Vietnamese position, then the enemy wouldn't laugh too much!

He raised his telescope and looked at the engineers who were concealed and demining in front of him, and ordered: "Communicator, no matter what method you use, try to contact the engineers and troops!"

"Yes!" Someone quickly responded.

It is necessary to contact the engineers. We know them, but they don’t know us yet. These guys are concentrating on dealing with landmines! What if someone suddenly turns around and finds a group of soldiers behind him...

The communications soldier is also capable, and soon contacted the engineer unit.

"Comrades! You are the troops of the Second Battalion!" A nearly inaudible voice came from the intercom.

"Yes!" I replied: "I am the battalion commander of the second battalion, may I ask you..."

"I am the platoon leader of the third row of the engineering battalion!" His answer came from the intercom, "We are carrying out mine clearance operations!"

"Hmm! How is the situation?" I asked.

"The situation is not good!" The engineer platoon leader replied: "There are many mines laid by the Japanese in Vietnam. We have been queuing here for more than three hours, but there are still more than a hundred meters away from the target position..."

"How long will it take to finish the schedule?" This is my most concerned question.

"This..." The engineer platoon leader did not answer my question head-on, but said helplessly: "The enemy has many landmines, and there is no sound in the hidden mine clearance. Therefore, the mine clearance efficiency is quite low, and it can only move forward twenty meters in an hour..."

"What? You can only move forward twenty meters in an hour?" I was stunned when I heard this.

It only takes twenty meters in an hour, which means it takes at least five hours to clear the obstacles for us?

"Can we use artillery fire to clear mines?" I asked.

"The place where we need to clear mines is the dead corner of artillery fire!" The engineer platoon leader's answer made me a little desperate.

Actually, even I know the answer to the question I asked just now. If we can use artillery fire to clear mines, will the engineers risk their lives and the risk of exposing their combat intentions to clear mines?

Moreover, the Vietnamese army did not seem that stupid. After suffering the loss of our artillery fire in the Tongdeng Battle, they would keep throwing landmines into places where our artillery fire could cover...

I looked at the multi-function watch on my wrist. The pointer was already five o'clock, less than an hour before the attack time. I could only move forward twenty meters in an hour... That means there is at least eighty meters of minefield waiting for us...

Can this battle be fought?

If I have the elite soldiers in my hands who fought against the United States and aided Korea, I might still have confidence, because they can step on landmines to rush towards the enemy's positions regardless of their life and death! But now... most of the soldiers in my hands are just new recruits who have only been trained for more than a month!

Can they do this too?

No! No! No!

Even if they can do it, I will not let them do it, because under the firepower of the Vietnamese army, this action is almost like suicide!

"What's the solution?" I asked weakly.

After all, professionals like landmines are more vocal. Although I have also learned to demine mines at a high-level school, I have learned to demine mines from the 1950s...

The engineer platoon leader on the other end of the intercom was silent for a while. After a long time, he replied in a low voice: "Only when our army is preparing for artillery fire... there is no need to secretly clear mines at that time, it will be faster!"

"Yeah!" I nodded, and now it seems that there is only one way!

Time passed by minute by minute, and the progress of mine clearance was still going on slowly. I was anxious, and the engineer platoon leader was also anxious, but the mine clearance thing seemed to be unhurried, because if you are anxious, you will make mistakes, and if you are wrong, you will make a "boom"...

So I could only wait quietly in the grass, waiting for the moment when our army's artillery fire roared!

Finally, when the pointer pointed to six o'clock, three red signal flares rose from the sky. The sound of cannons quickly rang out, and the originally dark sky flashed with lights. With the loud bangs, balls of flames exploded on the enemy's positions. The mines on our lying on the ground were like a big drum, and a violent vibration came.

If this were in the past, I would either use a telescope to observe whether our army's artillery fire had blown up the enemy's fire points or fortifications, or I would also appreciate the pleasure of our army's artillery bombing the enemy...

But today, I always focus on the engineer unit ahead. The reason is very simple. Whether they can complete the task will directly affect our lives!

I saw the sound of cannons, and the engineer soldiers lurking in front of us jumped out of the hidden place as if they were alive. Some were swinging grenades in front of them, and some used detonation cables to open the way... Not to mention, the speed of demining was really much faster. I just watched the engineer soldiers lined up and advanced forward...

However, the speed was much faster, but the time was too short, and the artillery fire preparation was only half an hour. In this half hour, the engineers advanced at least thirty meters forward, but this was far from enough, which meant that we had to face a minefield of more than fifty meters!

Artillery fire has begun to extend and fire. According to the pre-war deployment, the extension of artillery fire indicates that it is only twenty minutes before the charge is launched. Military orders are like mountains. If the mines cannot be eliminated within these twenty minutes, it means that we will face the firepower of the Vietnamese army in the minefield, which will undoubtedly greatly increase the casualties of our army...

"There is not much time!" The engineer platoon leader faintly shouted from the walkie-talkie: "Now I order the whole platoon is organized into four groups, with a distance of 15 meters between groups, and the road is opened in sequence with human bodies!"

"What? Use the human body to open the way?" I thought I had heard this wrong. But when I saw that the engineer troops were indeed organized into four groups and lined up in a straight line, I realized that all this was true.

"Comrade Engineer! Comrade Engineer..." Seeing this, I couldn't help but shout at the walkie-talkie.

But the engineer platoon leader did not answer, and he was the only one who kept shouting in the walkie-talkie: "I'll go first, and the others follow..."

The engineers really started to move. In the fire of the shells, I saw them slapping bamboo poles, chopping with knives, and stepping on their feet... one after another towards the minefield!

Seeing this, I couldn't help but remain silent. I have always thought that the current troops do not have the style of the War to Resist U.S. Aggression and Aid Korea, and I think that they are not as brave as the Volunteer Army. But when I saw the engineer unit in front of me, I realized that I was wrong and it was very wrong!
To be continued...