Canteen System Assistance Notes

Damn! Wang Tiechui checked his watch. It was a full eight kilometers from here to Yangzhuang River! It had only been a little over 20 minutes. How could anyone from the Nationalist Army have covered these five kilometers so quickly?

According to the previous news from the regimental headquarters, the main vanguard had already abandoned their backpacks, and it would take at least 30 minutes to arrive. Even if the 100 mortars carried by the team were used, it would take at least 15 minutes to bring the Kuomintang headquarters in front of them into range!

Unable to wait any longer, Wang Tiechui decided to exercise the improvisation power of the front-line commander.

In pursuit of flexibility of movement, there is no fixed allocation of 60mm mortars in the Hammer's reconnaissance company - because in order to carry at least a basic number of shells, the 60mm mortar must be moved together with mule and horse carts, or the people in the platoon must help carry the shells, so that the mobility of the entire platoon is tied down by the entire mortar squad.

Well, if they could be equipped with jeeps like the US military, there would be no problem. It’s a pity that the current Eighth Route Army can’t afford it.

Therefore, the "artillery firepower" in Wang Tiechui's hands now only consists of a few "Lao Mo" grenade launchers and some turtle fists that can be tied together: these are not enough to cover the Kuomintang headquarters at the foot of the mountain and provide fire preparation for the two reconnaissance platoons. After all, this place was not included in the pre-war firepower plan at all.

Isn't there a "Mirinda"? He suddenly thought, if the "Mirinda" can't come over, wouldn't it be better to ask them to help call for help?

Wang Tiechui called the telegraph operator over, picked up his intercom, and contacted "Sprite," who had been assigned to follow "Mirinda," Commander Lei Zhende and telegraph operator Guo Shun. "...Yes! That's it, 'Bottle Cap'!"

Wang Tiechui grabbed the telegraph operator's keyboard and, ignoring his reluctance, typed in a long string of code: "This is a Y handshake field covering the frequency band and public key." Deciphered by the microcontroller, it would allow Wang Tiechui's "comprehensive station" to establish a direct connection with a specifically numbered "advanced station," while also sharing the situation with the regimental headquarters codenamed "Pepsi" and the "dealer" command post.

A simple "radio conference" group was established in the wireless frequency band in northern Shaanxi, bringing about high-speed flow of information.

"Mirinda? 'Mirinda?' This is 'Cola,' please reply!"

"'Cola', this is 'Mirinda', I have received it, clear and loud - please report the impact point according to the map, just report the impact point directly, don't worry about the conversion of various elements, leave it to us!" Wang Tiechui spread out the map, pointed to the radio antenna at the foot of the mountain, and handed the earphones to the artillery platoon leader next to him.

"Platoon Leader Lu! It's up to you, report on time!"

Chapter 276: February Incident (5) New Dawn

For the traditional army, long-range artillery needs firepower planning to carry out indirect fire missions. Its main tasks are mainly artillery preparation, artillery

Suppression, artillery extension, etc. As a fixed position, static defense

It is a way of firing at enemy lines and columns, which can kill the enemy's manpower and destroy enemy fortifications, focusing on supporting the infantry at the campaign level.

From a tactical point of view, it is often difficult for the infantry on the front line to obtain support from these long-range artillery and they can only rely on their own artillery, such as the mountain artillery, howitzers or mortars of the regiment. Once the infantry moves away from the effective firing range of these artillery, they can only rely on the fire sticks in their hands.

For land powerhouses like the Soviet Union, the United States, Britain, and Germany, there are many solutions to this problem, and the problem is not that serious: in addition to mechanized infantry that requires self-propelled artillery, they can incorporate support tanks and towed artillery into the infantry system, allowing firepower units to follow the infantry; or control the speed of the infantry's advance to keep their own front line straight and continuous, so that artillery fire can always support the infantry; or simply use their air force as flying artillery, with their deep pockets, to provide a large-scale close support system to drown the opponent.

Unfortunately, the Eighth Route Army was very poor. No matter how many vehicles or tanks they had, they could not afford them in a short time. There were few artillery pieces and vehicles. The infantry of the 11th Route Army ran very fast and attacked flexibly. Even the M1 75mm mountain gun, which had a long range and a light weight among mountain guns, sometimes could not withstand the soldiers' adaptation for an hour or so.

The Eighth Route Army is still trying to solve these problems, but fortunately, the battlefield of the February Incident is inside the border area, and the Eighth Route Army has a natural geographical advantage; and the fire support here is provided by 25-pound artillery with a range of 1.5 kilometers and a good ability of circular firing.

Wang Tiechui didn't know that he was about to become the first unit of our army to leave the artillery observation unit and call for artillery support in actual combat. He also didn't know how this artillery order, which was no longer in the original artillery plan, was used as a case and emphasized at the post-war analysis meeting.

"Longshou Village calibration object, 300 south, 150 west! One test shot!"

Platoon leader Lu Haotian, who had only learned mortar aiming and firing, nervously looked down the mountain at the Nationalist headquarters, repeatedly comparing his numbers with the village tree, and finally reported the numbers. Because they were operating on internal lines, the tall structures in each of the Eighth Route Army's villages had been mapped by the artillery school. They served as landmarks for range-finding training, each assigned a unique number and location on the detailed map of the border area. Using these locations, the 25-pounder batteries, stationed 12 kilometers away, could calculate distance, direction, and elevation differences, converting them into firing parameters.

That’s right, after this round, the calibration objects in Longshou Village must be re-measured, Wang Tiechui thought.

-――—--―—

During the time it took the Eighth Route Army's artillery to react, the Nationalist troops, skilled in running, had already rushed into Longshou Village. The 28th and 8th Divisions, whose headquarters were located there, only then learned of the defeat on the front lines. The 28th Division's replacement regiment, demonstrating excellent skill, quickly secured the entrance to Longshou Village and began apprehending several leading fleeing soldiers for questioning.

What? A single round of artillery fire from the Eighth Route Army wiped out an entire regiment?

What? The Eighth Route Army completely destroyed the regiments ahead? What? The Eighth Route Army knows some magic tricks, like calling down thunder and lightning?

What? They're shouting "Chinese don't fight Chinese"? What a joke!

Many members of the 8th Division were Tao Jichang's soldiers, and they were quite moved by the Eighth Route Army's call to "oppose civil war and unite to resist Japan." However, the 28th Division, a veteran anti-communist pioneer, had lost more than three regiments at the front. Upon hearing this news, Division Commander Li Mengbi felt his blood rushing to his head and his head spinning: These were all his old capital!

Yuan Pu, the division commander who was airborne into the 8th Division and a close confidant of Hu Qinzhai, was even more direct. He ignored Li Mengbi, who was jumping up and down, and ordered his political training department to bring in the guard company to form a supervision team. The team ordered the group of people who had escaped back to simply reorganize, without even reloading their guns, and directly ordered them to charge back!

I believe that these red-headed Eighth Route Army soldiers will definitely take advantage of the situation to pursue and drive back this group of non-direct troops. You, the Eighth Route Army, will have to take care of it! In this way, you will always have time to organize a defense.

Of course, they could also abandon their allies and simply flee. This was something they had done before during the Red Army campaign, so Yuan Pu felt no need to burden himself with selling out these former Hunan Army soldiers. While he organized the elite short-gun soldiers of the guard company into formations, shooting down any fleeing soldiers, he instructed his staff to pack up the headquarters' belongings and be ready to flee at any moment.

However, just as he was making his own calculations, a sharp whistling sound rolled in from the north, and a spark rose on the southern slope of the newt. There was a loud bang, and Yuan Pu shrank his neck in fear.

"Who's playing with fire?" His immediate instinctive reaction was this. Perhaps, in Commander Yuan Pu's mind, the possibility of being directly bombarded by the Red Heads from 12 kilometers away did not exist. Of course, he soon no longer needed to be surprised by this.

Yuan Pu naturally could not hear the voice commands from the artillery position, and he naturally knew nothing about "Mr. De" who was rapidly calculating the various elements and the 12 25-pound guns from the artillery column.

It's not that they were unprepared for the Communist Army's "big guns." Theoretically, the three M1902 Soviet-made field guns left behind by the First Division of the First Army had a range of more than 16 miles, which was enough to suppress the "small mountain guns" in the hands of the Communist Party.

A minute later, a second shell landed, this time plunging directly between several carts. Instantly, a towering column of earth, accompanied by a massive orange fireball, soared into the air, instantly engulfing the horses pulling the carts and hurling wood chips, rags, stones, and even human remains into the air!

That was the mortar shell transport vehicle, and it exploded!

"The Eighth Route Army is firing! The Eighth Route Army is firing again!"

The defeated soldiers who had just been gathered by the military court and the supervision team shouted in despair. They abandoned everything and ran away, thinking that they had escaped from hell.

He foamed at the mouth and ran as if his lungs were about to burst.

Eight kilometers later, the nightmarish scene was still following me - the rising black clouds seemed to be announcing: This is still the bridgehead of Mengpo Bridge, why are you running?

"Brothers, run, run!"

The thin human wall began to waver, and the elite guards fired shots into the air, but they could not suppress the fleeing soldiers who were fighting for their lives! A group of brave fleeing soldiers fought for their lives, rushed past the soldiers from the Political Training Department who intended to drive them back, and fled in despair with their backs to the border area.

The officer from the Political Training Department chopped down with one hand, and the surrounding soldiers immediately leveled their submachine guns towards the sky and were about to open fire on the crowd.

But then, the whistling sound came again, this time, it brought dense, inescapable death from the sky, plowing a cloud of fire and black across the loess land. Soon, the 25-pound shells began to fall, mixed with the muffled sound of 10-inch pursuit guns. It was the field regiment's reinforcements, they had arrived on the scene.

In Longshou Village, the firepower once again treated all life equally. Anyone who didn't lie down firmly enough, lay down too firmly, or simply had bad luck would die. A minute and a half later, the artillery fire subsided, and a steady stream of Eighth Route Army troops began to emerge from the hilltop, charging the battered and defenseless Nationalist troops below.

"Lay down your weapons!" "Surrender your weapons and you will not be killed!" "Chinese people do not fight Chinese people!"

With the iconic charge, the Eighth Route Army swept down from the loess plateau like a dark green tide. The remaining Nationalist soldiers looked at each other, tacitly dropped their guns, and raised their hands. Yes, if it weren't for those troublesome officers, who would want to fight a civil war?

Since then, the two Nationalist Army divisions on the Xiyan Highway, with a total of more than 17,000 people, were all turned into dust or captured in less than 18 hours after the exchange of fire.

Chapter 277: Encirclement and Suppression Farce (1) Capturing the Bandit Leader Alive

"Brothers, let's mount our horses and charge the Communists! You must hold your ground!"

"Great! The brothers of the Ma Clan Army are so loyal! Brothers! The soldiers of Temporary Second Cavalry will buy us time. Everyone, hurry up and dig trenches and prepare for defense. The Communist army is about to charge!" Ten minutes later, Zhou Kaixun, commander of the 3rd Reserve Division of the 16th Army, which served as the reserve force of the National Army on the Xiyan Highway, heard even more shocking news.

"Master! Master! The second rider has escaped!"

"Bullshit! Aren't they going to charge the Communist army's formation?"

"Commander! They did charge, but they were charging our rear guard! Temporary Second Rider broke up our rear guard and made them run away!" "Damn it! Ma Zixiang, fuck your grandma!"

Although some unexpected events prevented Marshal Xu from completely annihilating the Nationalist army on the battlefield as planned, nearly resulting in a crushing defeat, the officers and soldiers under him were fortunate to have demonstrated strong initiative and promptly executed a far-reaching battlefield maneuver, encircling two Nationalist divisions. After annihilating most of them, they quickly changed direction and rushed along the other leg of the inverted Y-shaped route around Yangzhuanghe Village to cooperate with a main force regiment deployed there to encircle the last of the Nationalist reserve.

Unfortunately, the Ma family's Second Temporary Cavalry was resolute, turning and fleeing, even launching a fierce cavalry charge against their own Third Reserve Division along the way. After sacrificing their own infantry, these four-legged cavalrymen rode away without a glance back, escaping the Guanzhong Plains, leaving our army unable to pursue them. The Eighth Route Army could only curse and apprehend the chaotic Third Reserve Division before pursuing them southward.

The night before the Nationalist troops on the Xiyan Highway were being roasted in a fierce fire, the Nationalist troops in Longdong were being slowly cooked by the Eighth Route Army.

There were three Nationalist divisions on this front: the 78th Division of the First Army, the 53rd Division of the 90th Army, and the 1st Reserve Division of the 16th Army. Mr. Hu Qinzhai had ordered them to first seize Qingyang and Heshui, gateways to the Eighth Route Army's border region, and then coordinate with the main attack force along the Xiyan Highway to launch a joint attack, encircling Fuxian County, and then reunite and attack northward.

Compared with the Xiyan Highway where troops were replaced at the last minute, the Kuomintang's actions were actually faster on the Longdong Highway. The attack route here was shorter, so the three divisions moved more leisurely and their formations were tighter. Before the familiar "long snake formation", the Kuomintang's military deployment patterns could be roughly divided into two types: "painting a pie in the sky" and "sheep shitting".

The so-called "drawing a big pie" means that the troops do not make the front, middle and back echelons, but gather a unit into a big pie shape, filling the entire battlefield under their jurisdiction, and

The pancake will stretch and flatten, rolling forward; and the sheep shit

This is the mode of the National Army when it is on the defensive. The entire organization is broken up into groups in the villages and towns in the garrison area and they stay in place to defend.

After all, the national army probably couldn't camp outside the village.

But that didn't matter. Li Zhiwu, the commander of the 78th Division, quite complacently ordered his troops to be on guard and to find a nearby village to camp. They had made good progress over the past few days, successively breaking through several villages "heavily defended" by the Eighth Route Army and seizing countless supplies, such as straw sandals, leggings, octagonal hats and other clothing, as well as some "rubber stamps," "cowhide briefcases, and confidential documents"—all indicating that the Red Bandit Command urged them to hold out. As long as they held out for another ten days, the main force, which had been pulled back, would arrive and provide support.

Haha, in a dozen days, we might be smoking cigarettes on Pagoda Hill!

The vanguard of the 78th Division found two villages, one called "Chicheng" and the other "Huaxichi," located on either side of a dirt road, just two miles apart. This provided perfect positioning for monitoring the highway. Furthermore, they were very close to their targets, Qingyang and Heshui. The troops could use these two villages as launching points for their siege, preparing to capture both towns.

Li Zhiwu himself did not stay in the village. He stayed in a land temple a few miles behind the village. There were only a few families living on this small flat land called the temple front. He occupied this house without even a door and had his signalman set up an antenna to send electricity to Haojing:

"Reporting to the Suppression Headquarters, our troops are making good progress. Although we encountered the Red Bandits' intertwined fortifications of steel and concrete, our warriors bravely charged forward, broke through the Red Bandits' fortifications, and wiped out an entire Red Bandit regiment. The Red Bandits fled northward at night.

...We also seized a Suzhou-made crystal gold pen with Zhu characters printed on it, which we suspect belongs to the bandit leader Zhu Jiande. Although Zhu Jiande is a bandit leader, he also served in the Second War Zone. "I'm reporting: If our army captures Zhu, what should be done with him?" After sending the telegram, Li Zhiwu ordered his orderly to boil water for his feet, then sat in the command room awaiting a call from Gaojing.

The radio tubes were buzzing, two soldiers were cranking the generator next door, and outside the door, an orderly was chopping wood with an axe, making a crackling sound. Li Zhiwu was examining the captured "crystal gold pen". It was a pen of an unknown brand, completely transparent, made of a material he didn't know. At a glance, he could see the pen's golden tip and capillary tube.

There is a line of small red characters engraved on the pen - "Serve the People".

There was also a label with the word "Zhu" on it with rubber glue, probably because it was written on some document to prevent it from being lost.

But for a skilled first-term Whampoa cadet, Li Zhiwu knew this pen belonged to bandit leader Zhu Jiande. With great interest, he found some ink and wrote some hard-tip calligraphy on paper. It felt quite good, as smooth as scooping rice noodles in a bowl with chopsticks. It was comparable to an American gold pen, though the writing was a bit too fine. He guessed it was for an accountant.

He toyed with the pen for a moment longer, then pocketed it, waiting for a response from the communications office. Almost an hour later, the signalman finally put on his headphones and began listening to the message. The beeping sound lasted nearly half an hour, and another twenty minutes before he finally finished translating the message, transcribing it onto a piece of paper and handing it to him.

"Sir, a telegram from the president."

“The president’s?”

Li Zhiwu was a little surprised. His request was sent to the War Zone Command in Gaojing. Commander Hu should have replied to him. Why did the president reply?

He picked up the message suspiciously. It was indeed Chiang Kai-shek's order... "Brother, you have tracked down Bandit Zhu. We must pursue him relentlessly. If we cannot capture him alive, we must kill him in battle. We must also prevent the Red Bandits from collecting the bodies and confirm their death... However, the Red Bandits are cunning and cannot be judged by conventional means. This time, Bandit Zhu has come personally, and we must fight to the death."

Teacher Li seemed to see the principal patting his shoulder affectionately, and he gave a sincere instruction:

"Are the advancing units providing alternating cover? Are the garrison troops digging trenches and building bunkers? Are the units setting up security arrangements for their nighttime camps? Shaanxi-Gansu-Ningxia is the last lair of the Red Bandits. They've been operating there for a long time, as they're good at fighting. If you encounter fortified positions, you should use machine guns to provide cover on both sides, suppressing them with vertical fire, and then advance your artillery to the front and destroy them with direct fire. This is a Japanese tactic, and our troops have been trapped by it many times. I believe it will be effective..."

oh....

A classic move by the principal. Teacher Li Wen smiled to himself as he prepared to call Chiang Kai-shek back. It was already late, so he asked his secretary to draft a message for him. The gist of it was that the principal was wise and the students must follow his instructions—as for the actual implementation, he could play around with it later.

Anyway, I have the advantage now! When we attack Qingyang, maybe we can really let those Soviet artillery pieces move forward and fire some flat shots. After all, those artillerymen are basically weak without their Soviet instructors and can't shoot far. Pushing them to the front line might help them shoot more accurately.

None of the Russians came this time. When they heard that they were going to attack their red-headed allies, they all went on strike - humph, they are all red-headed, just the same kind of people.

The secretary quickly brought Li Zhiwu the drafted message. Li Zhiwu glanced over it, found no problem, and handed it to the signalman for broadcast. The buzzing of the radio and the hum of the generator could be heard again. Almost two hours had passed since the message was received.

Hmm? No, Li Zhiwu suddenly remembered something. He looked down at his leather boots, which were still on his feet. He hadn't taken them off yet. Where was the orderly? Did it take so long to boil water?

There were sudden, intense noises, like crackling and clacking, outside the doorless house, mixed with explosions. The originally quiet night suddenly became noisy and boiling.

What?

"Commander, Commander! The Communists are coming, and their firepower is fierce! We brothers can't hold on any longer!"

The guard captain with curly hair and a dirty face ran over. Before he could finish his words, he turned around and tried to fire to the side. But then, a series of continuous fire knocked him down. With a few thuds, the captain who had just been shouting turned into a blood gourd.

Oh no! Li Zhiwu rushed over to the table, trying to grab his belt and pull out his pistol. But in the blink of an eye, two smoking paper tubes were thrown into the door and window of this residential building.

"Grass...…"

Two loud bangs erupted, and Li Zhiwu's world spun. Before he lost his balance and fell to the ground with a thud, all he could see was a solid, bright light.

Chapter 278: Encirclement and Suppression Farce (⑵) Electronic Reconnaissance Intervention

The explosion of the flash bomb was just a small episode in this interspersed battle.

Just imagine, the two regiments of the Nationalist Army were squatting in the village in front, and a division headquarters was squatting in the land temple in the back, with a wide passage in the middle.

It may be just a harmless joint, but for the eight

Lu said, what is this?

It's a wide four-lane highway.

The frontline regimental headquarters immediately reported the situation and launched the attack originally scheduled for the next morning ahead of schedule. A battalion of the Eighth Route Army crossed the dirt road between the two regiments and rushed directly towards the headquarters of the 78th Division of the First Army. After ensuring that the entire battalion had completely surrounded the division headquarters, they swiftly launched the attack under the cover of night.

However, some people may ask why they were able to accurately capture Li Zhiwu's headquarters?

The answer is naturally mixed in among this group of Eighth Route Army, a group of "glasses" who are dressed in the same clothes, but with the words "Electric Detective" on their chests - technical personnel from the Radio School

Scouts and instructors formed an electronic reconnaissance brigade and experimentally

An old technology is being used in a new way: radio direction finding (ranging).

After all, in the night in eastern Gansu, a radio station that continuously transmits radio waves for more than half an hour at a fixed frequency band is like setting off fireworks in the middle of the night in their eyes. It is so conspicuous that it would even fail to pass the final exam. As long as the antennas are set up on two hills at a certain distance from each other, and the Doppler method is used for direction finding, combined with the known distance between the hills, a direction finding accuracy of about 1 can be used to locate a transmitting source within 15 kilometers with an error of 260 meters, or a transmitting source within 50 kilometers with an error of 870 meters.

After all, when the trio of Li, Tu and Zeng set questions, they always used a digital radio station that could send messages explosively and perform frequency hopping and FM tuning.

The guard company responsible for protecting the division headquarters was quickly wiped out by an Eighth Route Army battalion. Although they fought relatively tenaciously, they were unable to play a decisive role against the assault battalion, which was equipped with enhanced automatic firepower. A platoon of electronic reconnaissance soldiers stormed the Earth God Temple in Miaoqian Village. After throwing two paper-tube flash grenades containing ammonium nitrate and magnesium-aluminum powder into the house, they tied the hands of several officers inside and dragged them out.

Then they began to attack the two regiments in the north.

When the Nationalist troops in Chicheng and Huaxichi Village heard the gunshots behind them, they immediately panicked. Shouldn't they be attacking the Eighth Route Army? Why did the gunshots come from behind?

The group in Chicheng Village is more loyal.

They had to fight back across these several kilometers to rescue the division headquarters which seemed to be under attack. The regiment in Huaxichi Village was more cautious. Perhaps considering that the National Army had no experience in marching and fighting at night, they immediately started the infantry to occupy the houses in the village and prepared to hold on until dawn.

Then the attacking regiment was hit back by a barrage of mortars and had to retreat to protect itself; the defending regiment seemed to be attacked from all sides, with shouts of killing everywhere, and dared not make any rash moves. Now, the two regiments of the 78th Division, which were close at hand, could only watch the short gunshots from the division headquarters turn into a firefight with explosions, and then quickly return to silence.

Now, both regiments realized that they and the division had suffered from the Eighth Route Army.