On July 23, 1912, following the outbreak of armed and bloody clashes between China and Britain in the Sino-Burmese border area, the Southwest Autonomous Government decided to launch a self-defense counterattack against the British. Pen, fun, pavilion www. biquge。 infoOn July 24, the participating units completed all operational preparations, arrived at the assembly area, completed the formation, and began to wait for the operational order, and the Chinese border line also closed the border on the same day.

There is a well-known saying that is admired by military strategists: "Suddenness is the essence of strategy". It's hard to imagine what a battle without its "suddenness" would have been. But one thing is certain, compared with the southwest, the British army will definitely be in a hurry in this operation.

Just as July 24 passed peacefully, and everyone began to laugh at the statement submitted by Wang Chonghui, Minister of Foreign Affairs of the Southwest Autonomous Government, to Pan Lena, Consul General of the British Empire in Chengdu, on July 25, the war of self-defense against Britain officially began on the same day.

On July 25, on the border of Yunnan and Myanmar in southwestern China.

At 8 o'clock in the morning, the divisions received an urgent telegram with three red stars from the front command of Baoshan, and the front command ordered the artillery of each division to immediately enter the firing position and stand by.

Because Zhang Wenguang, commander of the Sixth Division, and Zhao Dayong, political commissar of the Sixth Division, were to sit in Tengchong and command and coordinate the entire division, the front line in the Pianma area was commanded by Li Huaiping, deputy division commander, and it was only natural that he became the supreme commander of the specific implementation of the battle plan on the front.

At the top there is an observation post, where Li Huaiping's command position is located, and there are several telephones around it, and several operational staff officers are busy doing something around. Li Huaiping is like a primary school student stepping into the examination room, dispatching his wisdom, looking forward to handing in a satisfactory answer sheet. As the intelligence officers and reconnaissance personnel of the Second Department of the General Staff Department infiltrated and passed on the news one after another, the enemy camps, warehouses, transportation hubs, and artillery positions on the front line of Burma were discovered and demarcated one by one. The topographic map of Pianma, which occupies one wall of the combat command room, has been filled with a variety of signs and symbols representing different targets, and the real outline on a sand table is clearly displayed in front of people.

The order for the shelling was delayed, which made Li Huaiping feel the dull atmosphere around him, and he was about to be overwhelmed. Distraught, he threw the paper and pen in his hand on the desk, walked out of the shelter, and breathed in fresh air. Then, lifting the telescope hanging around his neck, he picked up the branches of the tree, and looked at the gray and dense jungle of the British camp opposite, and really wanted to concentrate all the shells and smash it completely.

"Deputy division commander, when will you fight?" Ouyang Yi, the commander of the artillery regiment, also walked out of the shelter, and he was a little out of breath.

Ouyang Yi's question could only make Li Huaiping smile dryly. You know, in order to ensure the suddenness of the shelling, there is a very important issue, that is, the timing of the shelling. And this was directly in the hands of the former commander Cai Yi, and the order to open fire must be given by him personally.

At 9:30, a crisp phone rang in the shelter department, and Li Huaiping and Ouyang Yi, who were already waiting outside a little impatiently, had a touch of joy on their faces, and even Li Huaiping himself felt that he stepped forward quickly, and his hand to answer the phone trembled slightly. I only heard the chief of staff Lan Tianwei say happily on the phone: "The commander's order has been issued, and the cannon will be fired on time at 10 o'clock!" ”

"Yes!"

"Now let's start checking the watch, based on my watch, it's 9:32 in the morning."

According to the rules, the watch is based on the watch of the supreme commander, and because it is Lan Tianwei who conveys the order, Lan Tianwei's watch is the only standard time at this time. After putting down the phone in his hand, Li Huaiping was now reciting Amitabha Buddha in his heart, and immediately relayed the news to Ouyang Yi next to him. Ouyang Yi was also very excited, and finally let go of a stone in his heart.

The sky was evenly covered with thin clouds, and the sun behind the clouds shone brightly. Ten minutes before the shelling, the time had suddenly become long and quiet, and even the distant breeze could be heard through the treetops.

At 9:57, Li Huaiping ordered: "Load all cannons!" ”

At the same time, the artillery regiments and battalions of all divisions on various fronts waiting on the front line quickly removed the camouflage nets and shook their cannons within a few dozen seconds of quickly removing the camouflage nets for them. As the swarthy barrel was quietly raised, the loaders pushed the first wave of shells into the breech, closed the bolts, and the aimers began to position the muzzles according to the elements they had given in advance. The commanders gave the order: the shells are loaded!

At 10 o'clock, the moment when the minute hand and the second hand were in a straight line, Li Huaiping gave an order to the microphone. The order is just two words: "Fire!" ”

As soon as the order is issued, the protagonists who sing the leading role are naturally the artillery and the officers and soldiers of the front-line positions. As a result, the commanders of the various artillery companies who answered the phone shouted "open the artillery" one after another, and the deputy company commander's hand, which had been raised 20 minutes earlier, was suddenly released, and the hands of the platoon commanders and squad leaders on the position were also lowered together. Next to the loaded gun emplacements, the firefighters immediately pulled the rope and fired, and in an instant, the shells were fired in groups from different directions.

Clusters of white smoke and orange-red flames flashed on the artillery positions. The sound of a little late arrival, the screech of cannonballs cutting through the air, and the ground shaking beneath their feet was shaking rapidly. The soldiers jumped and jumped, shouted and screamed, and began to beat the Zhu Yuan given by their superiors.

The high explosives carried by the 155-caliber shells set off a dazzling explosion point at the moment they touched the bottom, and the shrapnel of the shells was wrapped in the surrounding mud and quickly thrown into the air, and the entire British defense line was instantly shrouded in shrednel and mud with scorching temperatures. Of course, along with them were the British soldiers who were caught off guard.

The observers at the forward observation post clearly saw in the high-powered artillery scopes that the British soldiers were rolling and crawling, running back lifelessly, and then being torn into pieces of flesh by the shells and flying into the sky. And this scene is in stark contrast to the unusual appearance of them strolling around in groups of three or five before, cool and comfortable under the trees.

At this time, the artillerymen, who were completely in the state, were getting more and more energetic. Many burly and sturdy loaders, regardless of whether they would lose their strength, threw off their arms one by one, desperately holding the cannonballs and rushing towards the gun position. In order to speed up the shooting, some soldiers did not even need to send a bullet stick, but wrapped a piece of cloth around their right hand, moistened it with water, and loaded the shell with their fists, which was blistered by the cannon chamber at a temperature of several hundred degrees Celsius, and burned off the skin. There were several gun emplacements that were fighting quickly, and the battle was not over when the shells ran out, and the anxious artillery commander jumped and sent his men to move from the neighboring gun emplacements without asking for instructions.

At the same time, about 10 minutes later, the British artillerymen who had survived the first round of shelling were finally reacting in panic at the British artillery positions behind the British lines on the Burmese side.

"Fight back, hurry up and fight back!" The British commander, who had reacted from the shelling, roared in frustration.

As a colonial army, the artillery they are equipped with is only a 75-caliber field artillery, and their artillery can not be compared with the southwest in terms of firepower and range. Not a single one of the guns of the Southwestern Army was hit, but further pointed out the position of the forward artillery observers who were observing in front of the high-powered artillery scopes.

In the sharp roar of another wave of shells, finally, the position of the British artillery was once again plowed by the large-caliber howitzers of the Southwest Army, and the remaining artillery was instantly turned into parts and blown into the sky.

The rumbling of cannons was accompanied by the blazing sun in the sky. After more than 5,000 shells were fired out by two more artillery battalions of the artillery regiment of the Sixth Division, the shelling, which lasted for 15 minutes, finally stopped. At the end of the battle, the gunners were all blackened by the smoke of the shells, except for the teeth and eye sockets, which were white, and the whole person began to become black.

The earth-shattering sound of artillery that had suddenly begun suddenly stopped abruptly. The smoke and smoke from the positions and the smoke of fire and gunpowder on the British positions on the opposite side were a spectacular scene that made the infantrymen who were waiting to attack begin to feel excitement in the scorching heat.