Volume 3 The Third Battle Chapter 12 Ideological Work
As I expected, the old squad leader came back with the two deserters half an hour later. I couldn't help but feel relieved when I saw them coming back . I remembered that I had been frozen in the ice and snow for more than an hour because I disobeyed the orders of my superiors. If they couldn't find them this time, I didn't know what kind of punishment I would receive.
"Damn it!" Seeing the two deserters being brought back with their heads down, Hu Zi rushed up without saying a word. I turned over and stood up to stop him but was still a step too slow.
Hu Zi kicked the two deserters to the ground with two kicks, then started beating them violently with his fists, shouting, "I told you to be a deserter, I told you to be a deserter, don't be a deserter, you are just embarrassing me!"
"Tiger! Tiger!"
Everyone rushed over and worked together to pull Hu Zi away.
"Do you know why there are only so few people left in our company?" Hu Zi shouted at them, "Do you know why our company needs to recruit a hundred of you? Because our company has fought against thousands of Americans, their planes and artillery, and more than a hundred comrades are lying on the hill! They didn't even cry out in pain when they died, and no one wanted to run away, but what about you? You started running before the battle even started! You have made our heroic company lose face, are you worthy of the comrades who died in our company?"
At the end, he, a tough man, actually shed tears. The old soldiers stood there silently, not knowing what to say, while the new recruits all had guilt on their faces.
"Captain!" the two deserters said tearfully, "We don't want to be deserters. We just want to find a bowl of rice to eat!"
"Comrades new soldiers!" I sighed and said, "Some of you are farmers, some are carpenters, and some are still students, but no matter what you did before, you are all the same now, you are all soldiers!"
"Do you know what a soldier is?" I recalled every little detail of the battle and said solemnly: "A soldier doesn't sleep for days without complaining of tiredness; a soldier doesn't complain of suffering even cold; a soldier cuts off his leg with a bayonet when it is blown off; a soldier! He will charge forward even if he knows there is a dead end ahead..."
"Captain! Give us another chance!"
"Captain! We won't run away again. If we do, we'll be bastards!"
The two deserters had a look of pleading and determination that they had not seen before. Looking at the other recruits, they all clenched their fists tightly, and their entire mental outlook seemed a little different from before. I couldn't help but look at them with some surprise, and then looked at Hu Zi who was still angry. I thought to myself that I didn't expect Hu Zi's fuss to do some ideological work for the recruits. I'm afraid that such an ideological and political lesson would be much more effective than that of Instructor Zhao.
After that, the performance of the recruits improved greatly. Although the food became less and less and the training became more and more difficult, they never complained about the hardship or tiredness again, so much so that on the third night I took them to the plains to dig tunnels.
I wanted the new recruits to experience the atmosphere of a real battlefield, which would be good for them as they would soon be on the battlefield. Instructor Zhao argued with me for a while about this. His reason was that digging tunnels was related to the safety of our entire regiment. As long as there was a little noise or a soldier was undisciplined and discovered by the enemy, the combat plan of the entire regiment would be disrupted.
In the end, it was only after the new recruits signed a military order and wrote a blood oath that they finally got the consent of Instructor Zhao and his superiors.
The recruits were quite hardworking and they worked in the tunnel silently and in an orderly manner. However, a problem still occurred.
Ten tunnels were dug, because they were to accommodate more than a thousand soldiers from a regiment, and each tunnel had to accommodate more than a hundred people, so the tunnels were not too narrow. The new recruits' task was to dig tunnels and then continuously transport new soil. I arranged for one squad to dig tunnels, one squad to rest, and the other squad to transport new soil, taking turns.
It was the turn of the soldiers who were resting to dig the tunnel. Perhaps because they were full of energy after the rest, the soldiers swung their shovels with great vigor. Suddenly, with a bang, a soldier's shovel hit a stone. Then there was an explosion on the ground, and the broken soil on the top of the cave fell down.
The soldiers were stunned and everyone stopped what they were doing.
Apparently the soldier had used too much force, and the vibration from the shovel hitting the stone triggered a mine on the ground.
I cried out in my heart, "Oh no!" and ran towards the cave entrance. Before I reached the entrance, the enemy fired flares one after another, and the outside of the cave was instantly illuminated as bright as day.
It's over, I sat down on the ground. In fact, if the recruits outside the cave lay still, the enemy would find it difficult to find them under the flares. They were covered with white cloth, and even the soil transporting baskets were covered with white cloth. But the recruits had never seen such a battle. If a few of them lost their patience and ran around in fear, they would soon be discovered by the enemy.
But what surprised me was that after a long while there was no sound outside, no gunshots, no artillery fire, until the flares lost their light and the surroundings fell into darkness and silence again.
It seems that the puppet soldiers thought that some small animal had triggered a mine! But what about the new recruits? Could it be that they were frightened by the flares?
"Company Commander!" At this time Hu Zi crawled in from outside.
"What's going on?" I asked impatiently.
"It's okay!" Hu Zi smiled bitterly and shook his head, "I was really scared. I was worried that those new recruits would lose their patience and mess things up. But these new recruits are all good. None of them ran away! It's just that two of them peed in their crotches..."
With a roar, the soldiers in the tunnel all laughed when they heard this, but they did not dare to speak loudly for fear that the enemy would hear them.
"Huzi!" Instructor Zhao said, trying not to laugh, "Tell the new recruits in your platoon that they did a good job. Bring the two soldiers who peed in their crotches back to the hiding place and find them two pairs of pants to change into, otherwise they will freeze to death in this cold weather."
In the darkness , a new soldier said in a thick Sichuan accent: "You can't have babies if you're frozen!"
A burst of laughter rang out in the tunnel again.
New recruits, new recruits, I realize that they have gradually integrated into the volunteer soldiers, but it will take some time to become a soldier. They need to experience a real battlefield and fight the enemy on the battlefield. I just don’t know how many of them will be left after fighting a few battles.
