Chapter 4 The latest training methods (II)

"Li Siming is a very thoughtful person. I don't know if it's all like this, at least he gives me this feeling. He is born with the keenest insight into new military ideas. For example, in our battle against Vietnam, he brought the advantages of special forces to the extreme. Many examples of special forces were written in the textbooks of the entire army, and gave our army the most powerful support many times..."

——Excerpt from the memoirs of the former commander of the 13th Army Army to Vietnam

Yesterday's expansion training had two projects before he had time to do it, so he was pulled by Commander Yan to talk about the "Li Siming Training Method". Li Siming finally tried to persuade him to succeed. If he really did a "Li Siming Training Method", Li Siming would have no shame to see others in the second half of his life. Although we like plagiarism, our plagiarism level must be at least at the international leading level.

However, the only consequence is that Li Siming was forced to give the officers of the 13th Army an expansion training class. So early this morning, Li Siming was taken away by the commander of the guard regiment torture the floor. Yesterday, Commander He of the guard regiment followed the Wolf Tooth Troop for a whole day. At the beginning, he was just curious and thought that the people of the Wolf Tooth Troop were making trouble. However, as the game was developed, he discovered that this so-called "experiential teaching" had a good effect on morale and team building, which was much more effective than usual heart-to-heart talks.

Li Siming felt that it was a rare opportunity to get to know some of the middle and lower-level officers from the 13th Army. Anyway, they would likely fight together in the future.

After the 13th Army received the self-defense counterattack against Vietnam on December 8, 1978, the troops immediately entered a state of comprehensive preparation. Within one week, they set up expansion racks, adjusted their backbones and equipped their leadership teams within ten days. The 38th Division and the 39th Division were expanded from the B Division to the A Division. On January 5, 1979, the 13th Army was fully equipped to the Hekou of Yunnan in the assembly area on time (the transport distance was 1,414 kilometers to 1,891 kilometers, of which 1,075 kilometers to 1,713 kilometers, and the highway transported 1,300 kilometers to 750 kilometers). They immediately entered into tense and orderly training for the pre-war.

In fact, this "expansion training" does not have any fundamental impact on directly improving the combat effectiveness of the troops, but it will give some inspiration to the trainees: this is self-confidence and team consciousness. The 13th Army had more than 35,500 people, including 11,874 new recruits, and the newly promoted and mobilized cadres reached 3,041. It is obvious that each unit of this unit is in a running-in period and does not have much time to familiarize them with each other. Li Siming's "expansion training" can make each unit familiar with each other as soon as possible and cultivate their team combat spirit. This training method was later promoted and more training programs were added as a supplement to daily military training, while Li Siming became the first person to introduce this training method.

Li Siming will not miss this opportunity and take advantage of the situation to talk to these middle and lower-level officers about the future battlefield situation.

"Tropical mountain jungle land facilitates intersecting and division, circle-bound encirclement, facilitates hidden operations and abruptness of attacks, and facilitates troops to defend and conduct ambush and attacks by risk, but command, coordination is inconvenient, and transportation and supply are difficult."

"Just as we experienced on a 12-meter platform just now, when the environment we face changes, we must change our response methods. For example, opposite the Red River, there are mostly mountains and forests. In this case, we must pay attention to the close coordination between Butan and Tan. Don't expect the tank troops to move forward alone, and don't just look at the infantry fighting repeatedly! That's suicide!"

"How to coordinate the infantry and tanks? I think the first is that the method of coordinated between the stomp and tanks must be correct: tanks mainly adopt the method of coordinated between infantry and the mountain attacks and points to capture the infantry. In mountain jungle areas that are not convenient for tank operations, this coordination method should be practical and effective. Second, it is necessary to respond flexibly: In combat, infantry advancement is blocked and the terrain is convenient for tank maneuvers. The tank company decisively changes fire support to guide infantry impact, and timely captures the high ground of the enemy's tight defense. In village battles, infantry and tanks adjust coordination in a timely manner, adopt a mixed formation of the stomp and tanks, thus ensuring the safety of the tank. Third, concentrate troops, attack by fire, seize by point, and defeat the enemy one by one. This is also in line with Chairman Mao's combat method of "annihilation of the enemy with concentrated superior forces."

"Will there be some problems we don't pay much attention to in the future? For example, mainly in the field, the inability to directly establish wireless communication between tanks, which affects the timely and effective support of infantry combat in the tank, and may even almost injure our infantry. In addition, some tank crew members are not skilled in technology, and may trap vehicles and fall into ditches during maneuvering, which affects the actions of the entire team. Everyone should consider these issues so that we can better solve our opponents in the future!"

"I don't have confidence in the People's Army? Joke! Strategically, the Vietnamese authorities are armed and rely on Soviet aid to maintain 1 million troops, but they have to deal with Cambodia, Laos and China. The troops are obviously insufficient. Tactically speaking, the enemy lacks defense depth. Although they are defending according to the danger, the farther they are, the weaker they are. Chairman Mao said that we should despise the enemy strategically, but we should pay attention to the enemy. Therefore, we must flexibly and maneuverably annihilate the enemy according to the tactical characteristics of the enemy!"

Li Siming talked freely. After reading the history of war, he understood that this army had not fought a war in 30 years, and the ten years of Cultural Revolution made this army neglect the training. What was even more terrifying was that it was rigid in tactics, lack of flexibility, and poor in collaborative combat capabilities of various types of troops. He hoped that through his own efforts, the soldiers would bleed less.

Although Li Siming's words did not have much impact on these officers, Commander Yan praised him when he learned about it. So Li Siming was called over by Commander Yan again.

"Captain Li, I heard that you are very knowledgeable about our tactics? Let's hear it!" said Chief Yan.

"This is just my personal opinion, and it is not very mature yet," said Li Siming.

"This is your humility. Don't think I don't know you. I heard about your name before you came! Didn't you write those books? If it weren't for you, I could have made a lot of noise in just a few days?" Commander Yan directly exposed Li Siming's background.

"I'm just talking about military affairs on paper!" Li Siming didn't want to be charged with "discussing military affairs".

"Then you just talk to me?" Commander Yan smiled, "Don't forget, you are currently under my command of the 13th Army!"

"Yes! Don't blame me if I said it wrong!" Li Siming first said the "ugly words".

"Stop talking nonsense!"

"Yes!" Li Siming thought for a while and said his own considerations, "First, from the map in my hand, my front is across the Red River from the enemy. I think our army must cross the river before it can fight with the enemy, but forced crossing will inevitably lead to large casualties and is not sudden, so we'd better be able to smuggle. At present, I don't think the enemy will fight back, and the enemy may rely on the natural obstacle of the Red River, and its thoughts are relatively careless, and smuggling may succeed."

"Well, it's not bad!" Commander Yan nodded and praised, "According to our judgment, the enemy may think that we are mechanized divisions, and their actions cannot be separated from the main roads. They will only seek to break through the estuary and attack the old streets and the front of the Guliu. Our reconnaissance team has repeatedly reconnaissed and learned that the enemy exited the estuary and guarded the river bank in the daytime, and retreated back to the high ground at night. The gap is large and the river bank is overgrown, which makes it easier for our army to hide. Smuggling is feasible."

"Of course yes, it's not weird if you want to write this in the history of war!" Li Siming thought to himself.

Li Siming continued: "Secondly, after our army smuggled, we should build a floating bridge. The forward-bumping troops immediately attack the defenders at the ferry, occupy all important places, and cover the entire army to cross the river. Then concentrate superior firearms to attack and advance, especially the advantages of our army's artillery, and annihilate the enemy's positions. Use artillery groups in a concentrated manner, set up front-line observation centers, directly observe the artillery fire shooting effect, observe the target and call firepower in a timely manner

Third, the enemy will definitely use the dangerous terrain to resist stubbornly. According to the previous experience of the Vietnamese rebelling against the US military, we must be prepared for small jungle troops to fight. The enemy will take advantage of their familiar terrain and small troops to raid us with guerrilla warfare. Therefore, in the current pre-war infantry training, we must pay attention to solving the problem of small roads in the mountains and forests at night and under no road conditions, and move the map azimuth, intersect, detour, surround, and bring the troops to designated locations; learn to correctly judge the enemy situation, study the terrain, make up our minds, arrange troops and firepower, and deal with various situations, and practice close coordination and organizational command of their subordinates and strengthening weapons. I ask our wolf teeth troops to play a role in jungle combat and town combat." The wolf teeth troops cannot charge like infantry, which will only cause unnecessary casualties.

"It's very good! I can agree to you about the use of your Wolf Teeth Force. In fact, this is also the request of the head of the headquarters and the front-line commander of the military region!"

"There is another problem with the joint operation of infantry and tanks. Now we cannot directly connect radio between infantry and tanks, and it is easy to get out of touch. Tanks are not protected by infantry to fight on complex terrain, and infantry does not provide heavy firepower. Charging by flesh and blood will also cause major casualties. I think our army should attach great importance to this issue."

"We also mentioned this issue at the Military Party Committee meeting. We have too many new soldiers now, and we still have many shortcomings in this regard. It seems that we must attach great importance to it." Commander Yan said in a deep voice.

"The last problem is our logistics problem. Modern warfare is the logistics. On the other side of the Red River, the mountains and forests are difficult to mechanize. How to ensure that our ammunition, food, medicine supplies, battlefield rescue, personnel, vehicles, and artillery will be quite dense. How to dispatch is a difficult problem!"

"Well, you can read the problem thoroughly. No wonder this is, not everyone can write those books!" Commander Yan praised.

"The chief has been too much! Actually, I'm just talking on paper. I can only talk. If I were in your position, I would definitely lose!" Li Siming is not omnipotent. Take the Wolf Tooth Army as an example. He is well trained and cannot guarantee that he can command well. Li Siming has never had the experience of commanding combat troops. Thinking of those lively team members, he didn't know if he could let them come back alive. Thinking of this, he felt very worried.
Chapter completed!