Volume 2 The Second Battle Chapter 30: Battle of Hill 299 (Part 4)
"How...how did the fight turn out like this?" I couldn't help but ask in a low voice after the company commander left.
The old squad leader replied with a droopy face: "This is our first time fighting the Americans. How could we have expected that the Americans would have such strong firepower and move so quickly..."
"Then the Americans used flamethrowers!" Hu Zi curled his lips. Only then did I realize that his eyebrows were singed. He said unconvincedly, "We let them sneak up without paying attention. The flamethrowers sprayed fire at our positions. We couldn't even raise our heads. So we could only retreat again and again!"
"Oh, a flamethrower." I understood what I heard.
The U.S. military equipped and used flamethrowers in large quantities during World War II, the Korean War, and the subsequent Vietnam War. A company was equipped with as many as three. Although this thing is extremely dangerous to use, it is very effective in storming positions, bunkers, tanks, caves, etc.
The Volunteer Army had encountered this kind of weapon before when dealing with the Kuomintang, but the Kuomintang did not use it properly and failed to make full use of its effectiveness. Most of the time they hid in bunkers and used jets to deal with the People's Liberation Army attacking them, using this offensive weapon as a defensive weapon.
Secondly, and more importantly, this time the Volunteer Army’s position was too close to the highway, which gave the American jet fighters an opportunity to take advantage.
There are two disadvantages of flamethrowers. First, they are explosive. No matter what bullet or shrapnel hits them, they will immediately turn into a ball of fire. Second, they have a short range. The range of the M2 flamethrower equipped by the Americans is only about 30 meters.
These two shortcomings are fatal to flamethrowers, because they have to run more than thirty meters away to open fire, and if just one bullet hits the two large cans on their backs, they will be burned to death.
But this time, it was a perfect opportunity for those flamethrowers to come into play.
The volunteer soldiers' positions were only about sixty meters away from the highway, and their tanks were on the highway. Although we were in a dominant position, the enemy could suppress us with their powerful firepower so that we could not raise our heads. Then the flamethrowers hid behind the tanks, and under the cover of the American infantry firepower, they only needed to run a few dozen steps to reach the effective range.
Once this thing opens fire, no one can stand their ground.
Thinking of this, I couldn't help but feel scared. If the flamethrower had fired at the air-raid shelter where I was hiding, I would have been roasted in my sleep.
There were several strange cries of "Woo..." and the US military started bombarding again.
They didn't give us any chance to breathe. Maybe because more American troops had withdrawn, they had more artillery pieces. This time they had much more artillery shells than last time.
Suddenly, it was as if a tornado had blown up the battlefield, the ground was shaking, and the flying rocks, dirt, and snow were so dense that they blocked out the sunlight.
The soldiers all hid in the air-raid shelters, but this time I did not go in. Instead, I grabbed my rifle, crouched down, and ran back along the communication trench under the artillery fire.
The sound of bombs continued to be heard beside me, and the rocks and soil lifted up by the bombs scattered onto my back in pieces. It was really painful when I was hit by some of the bigger ones, but I didn't care about so much. I just made up my mind and ran towards the last trench.
Although it was only about 40 meters, I suffered a lot along the way. I was knocked down by the blast of bombs twice, tripped by a rock once, and fell down five times out of fear... I dare not tell others this number.
After going through untold hardships, he finally reached the last trench and found an air-raid shelter to hide in.
I cursed in my heart what a damn battle. With such a huge disparity in weapons and equipment, we shouldn't have had a head-on confrontation with the US military in the daytime, not to mention that we were the less numerous side.
However, it seems that there is only one way to block the retreat of these Americans. Dispersing the volunteers on the hills, like nails nailed on both sides of the road, makes it impossible for the US troops to advance. If the US troops want to escape from the road, they must pull out these nails one by one.
However, doing so would come at a great cost to the volunteers who were blocking the U.S. troops. The volunteers could only stay in their own fortifications on the hilltops and could not reinforce each other. Because once the volunteers walked out of the fortifications, there would be nothing that could resist the U.S. aircraft, artillery and tanks...
There is a saying that those who come here use space to buy time. But now we are using our lives to buy space, and at the same time we are also buying time, buying time for the American soldiers in front of us to pull out the nails one by one, so that the large force of the Volunteer Army can complete the compression and encirclement of the American troops.
And our company...is honored to be the first nail to be pulled out by the US military.
I hadn't sat down in the air-raid shelter for long when I felt dizzy from exhaustion. I shook my head vigorously to get rid of the sleepiness. This was not the time for me to fall asleep. While the enemy was bombing, I fired two blank shots outside the air-raid shelter and then replaced a new magazine for it.
After thinking for a while, he grabbed a few handfuls of snow from outside the air-raid shelter and held them tightly with both hands. At the same time, he kept breathing on them, trying to melt them with the heat from his body, but this damn cold weather...
After a long time, not a drop of water came out. Instead, my hands turned red from the cold. I had no choice but to stuff the snow mixed with mud into my mouth. Hoho… My tongue was so cold that I lost all feeling. What was even more uncomfortable was that the coldness was like a needle drilling deep into the roots of my teeth…
But I could only bear it. After a long time, I felt some water. I spit it on the cotton hat and mixed it with the dust on it. I quickly spread it evenly, and then applied some on my face and gun in the same way.
At first glance, the hat really looks like a clod of earth, and the gun looks like a branch covered in mud. I couldn't help but admire my masterpiece excitedly, looking at the gun and the hat. I didn't expect that I could make camouflage using local materials. This shows that I still have potential!
But I haven't brushed my teeth for a few days, and this smell is a bit...
