Bao Xinyi's eyes widened and he didn't say a word. He had been like this for half an hour, and Xiao Weiran couldn't help but be a little worried about whether the platoon commander's eyes would hurt.

"Bao Pai, Bao Pai?" He boldly pushed the other party, watching the other party slowly turn his head, and his figure was reflected in his eyes: "Too strong, too strong." ”

"Platoon commander, it's been so long since the artillery was fired, why haven't you come to your senses?"

"You know!" Bao Xinyi woke up from a dream and suddenly regained his former vigor. He pushed Xiao Weiran away, stood up from the ammunition box he was sitting on, and moved his body with his hands on his waist. "Damn, what else do you want us infantry to do when this cannon bull is like this? Isn't the crowd also a bombardment? ”

The surrounding soldiers burst into laughter, and one of them quipped, "It's not God forbid, it's my Da Song who has howitzers, and it's Jiannu who was blown to pieces." ”

Bao Xinyi stared at the bull's eye, snorted and didn't speak. Several sappers came and hugged a wooden box: "Comrade infantry, do me a favor, stuff the explosives in the boxes into the holes you dug out, two in each hole, expose the conduit above the explosives, and bury the other parts." ”

Xiao Weiran got up and took the box, opened it and saw that it contained about a hundred red tubes the thickness of a thumb. He picked one up, weighed it in his hand, and asked, "This thing won't explode, will it?" ”

"Not really, yellow explosives require a special detonator to detonate." The sapper also picked one up and pointed to the tube above the explosive to Xiao Weiran, "There is no detonator, and it won't explode if you throw it into the fire." When you've planted the explosives, we'll install the detonators. ”

Even as the infantry began to stuff explosives into the holes they had dug, the positions of the heavy artillery battalions were still firing with fire. The current gunners have been replaced by soldiers of the regimental field artillery battalion, and comrades from the heavy artillery battalion are on the side to provide guidance. Liu Chaoen and I stood by and watched for a long time, and we probably figured out the steps of reloading.

After each shot, the gunner in the rear used the lower trolley to reset it to its original firing position. The gunner then turns the bolt to remove the chamber pressure caused by the firing and disembowel. Probably due to the design of the artillery, at this time there is often a situation where the tail bolt is blocked and cannot be twisted due to excessive pressure, and at this time it is necessary to use a hammer to hit the tail bolt. The next step is to grasp the iron ring handles on both sides of the bolt and lift the bolt out and place it on the flat plate. After that, there is the traditional cleaning of the breech, the difference is that the 75 Miss is a breech gun, which can clean out the gunpowder residue at the muzzle and tail of the gun at the same time.

After this is done, the gunner uses the ejector lever to push the shell, the plugging device and the charge into the chamber from the hole in the tail bolt. When the fire door is attached to the vertical bolt, the gunner inserts the bolt back into the barrel and rotates the tail bolt to lock the barrel, and after the tail bolt rotates, it will hold the vertical bolt tightly to complete the lock.

I roughly estimated the time it took for the artillery crew to complete this series of work, and it took an average of seven to eight minutes to prepare for a single shot. The Patrol Battalion Commander told me that they could compress the preparation time to three minutes in the case of rapid fire. However, this would drastically reduce the service life of the gun and increase the risk of blowing up the chamber, which they generally did not use.

"Fire!" The gunner roared, and the gunner lit the fire door through the small opening between the handles on both sides of the bolt, and the flame began from the ignition port and followed the L-shaped passage to the gun chamber. The cannon made a loud noise, and violently retreated under the gushing white smoke, and was immediately blocked by the hoe inserted into the earth, and was pushed back into place by the gunners. The cannonball streaked across the sky in a visible trajectory and landed lightly on the walls of the western part of the new gold—it weighed about nine pounds, and I could even see the wind in mid-air blowing it a little to the side—and exploding a cloud of sparks.

The 75-mm cannon was not very effective in siege warfare, and the battalion commander Zhou believed that it was probably necessary to have howitzers of more than 105 mm caliber to effectively destroy the old city walls. However, it is obvious that no matter how small the artillery is, as long as it hits a large enough number, it can tear down the city wall little by little. Now that the shelling has been going on for half an hour, the heavy artillery battalion, a total of 4 companies, with 20 75 misses, has now hit 80 shells on the wall west of Xinjin. In the telescope, the old straight wall of Xinjin has been blown down by more than 30 meters, and the most difficult wall in the siege is no threat in the face of howitzers.

While the firepower was preparing to enter the final stage, I seized the time to inspect the 1st and 2nd DPRK regiments, which were being mobilized. These two regiments were Korean vassal troops recruited from Jeolla Province and left provinces, and officers at the platoon level and above were directly served by our military personnel (Note 1).

The political commissar of the 1st North Korean Regiment held an iron horn and stood on a makeshift mound of earth and shouted. In the Korean vassal army of more than 5,000 people, the company instructor was responsible for relaying the shouting, conveying Lu Daoping's strange Korean accent to the vassal army under his hands: "I repeat, everyone came here from North Korea to join my vassal army of the Great Song Dynasty, and everyone has already obtained twenty acres of land in the Americas!" Participate in this battle and reward each person with another ten acres! In addition, kill the Yu Ding and the armor people of Jiannu and the Mongols, and reward ten acres for one head! Kill Baijia, and a head will be rewarded with thirty acres! Niu Lu is true, a head reward of fifty acres! Jiala Ezhen and Jiannu nobles, one head will be rewarded with one hundred acres! If the level is higher, there will be additional rewards! If you die or die in battle, your reward will be doubled and given to your wives and children! ”

"And you remember it for me! Catch the above Tartars alive and the rewards will be doubled! Rescue a Han man and reward 50 acres directly! If it is found that he deliberately killed the Han people, he will be deprived of all his rewards and deported back to North Korea! ”

"Didn't you hear clearly!"

"Hooray! Banzai! ”

More than 5,000 North Koreans raised their hands and let out an earth-shattering cry. Under the temptation of the land, these poor and landless peasants burst out with amazing enthusiasm, and everyone's eyes shone with a terrifying light.

By this time, the heavy artillery battalion had begun to extend its firing, bringing the warmth of the flames to the defenders in the city. The officers of the Song Dynasty began to organize the Korean vassal army to advance, and these Koreans, who had been trained for three months to six months, marched in silence, their faces full of fortitude and a vague fear of death. However, they had no choice, either they fought desperately and tried to survive and become landlords in the Americas, or they were driven back to their hometown in North Korea and continued to live half-dead on their one-third of an acre of land.

After all, it is not easy to live in this era. The Wehrmacht was unwilling to fight such brutal battles as street battles and city defense battles. In this kind of battle, the combat effectiveness brought about by the advanced equipment and long-term training of the Wehrmacht will be offset to the greatest extent by the complex environment, and the battle will become a simple calculation problem. Field warfare is where the capabilities of our national defense forces can be brought into play.

The Koreans came on a convoy back to Sejungjima, which brought back three battalions of marines on their way to Sejungjima, leaving only the first battalion where Bao Xinyi was located, just in case of emergency. The Korean vassal army was accompanied by a photographer, Mr. Lu Daopei, who had only come to the Chinese Governorate from Australia at the beginning of the year.

This time, as a special correspondent of the "Taiwan Daily", he came to the front line to report on the guillotine operation. When they first met, Lu Daopei wore a light-colored short-sleeved shirt with a pale yellow vest, a straw hat, and a huge wooden box, which was his camera.

Lu Daopei watched our shelling and mobilization very quietly, and only after the North Koreans began to march did he come up and greet me.

"Hello." I stretched out my hand to shake his hand and pointed to Xinjindao, "Let's talk as we go, the artillery on the wall of Jiannu has been knocked out, it's okay to get closer." ”

Lu Daopei said with a smile: "Commander Li is not afraid, I have nothing to worry about." With that, he handed the camera to the assistant, took out his notebook and pen and followed me to Xinjin.

On the way, he seized the time to interview me about some military matters. After I had finished answering in detail, he closed the notebook and put it in his satchel and asked me tentatively: "Comrade Lieutenant Colonel, when the new gold is restored, can you take me into the city for a visit?" ”

"Hmm... It's totally possible, it's just that the city is a mess, and you may feel unwell when you see it. I explained.

"It's okay, it's okay, I've received relevant psychological training." He said with some excitement. Well, I wish he can really withstand the tragic scene of street fighting.

After receiving my promise, Lu Daopei said with some interest: "Maybe you would like to take a group photo with your subordinates at the city wall?" This is the first time that the new howitzer has been put into real combat, and I have heard that it was your invention of yellow explosives that gave birth to such a great god of war, so you must be very interested. ”

I laughed a few times and said, "Of course, it's a great honor, and I'm going to trouble you to help take pictures then." ”

He said a little slyly, "If you were to take a picture, how would you compose it?" ”

I thought about it for a moment and replied, "I'll take a picture of a few kids playing football on an empty playground." ”

"Uh... The name of the photo I wanted to take was "On the New Golden City of the Wehrmacht". He was a little surprised and said, "Your composition doesn't look like a fight, where is this playground?" ”

"The playground is in Lushun, and there is a football field in the military camp there."

"What about the kids?"

"Those children are military dependents. When there are no soldiers training on the playground, the children can come and play football and run. ”

"That's... And what about our valiant Wehrmacht? ”

I finally couldn't help but laugh: "Our Wehrmacht is on the new golden city!" ”

Fang Hai, who was walking behind, didn't pay attention to our conversation. He looked ahead with some confusion, his chief and the photographer from Australia laughed and bent over, and the photographer even laughed a little suffocated...