【403】A bitter battle is coming

On Woody Island, a small island of 4,000 inhabitants, Captain Clark formed his own "Youth Corps," a group of more than 150 children aged 14 to 18 who had received a "nationalized education" in South Korea, and who, after receiving their first salary, received the promise that they would become heroes if they succeeded, provided that such a light promise worked.

Clark selected 40 sentries from the children's regiment to patrol around the island, and who would keep an eye on these half-grown children? And the infinite energy and keen observation of these half-grown children are precisely the most suitable for sentry.

Clark divided eight men into two groups and set up two heavy machine guns to wade across the sea at low tide on the island to be on guard. The eight older kids were new to heavy machine guns, but after a little training, they were excited to learn how to pull the trigger with a crosshair. Clark hoped that if he needed to flee by boat, the two heavy machine guns would be able to hold the KPA back for a while and buy him some time.

The rest of the group members were given guns and began to follow Clark on reconnaissance missions.

Clark decided that the first step was to grab the "tongue". But the target is not to choose North Korean soldiers, but fishermen, so that it is not easy to startle the snake. After capturing three fishing boats with assault boats, Clark determined from the fishermen that there were no mines in the port of Incheon.

Combined with the huge tidal drop in the Port of Incheon and the rapid currents of the Exocet Channel, Clark had no doubt about it.

Laying out mines is a professional and dangerous job, which is basically impossible to effectively implement without professional minelayers and professionals, without detailed hydrographic drawings.

Historically, after the Chinese Volunteers entered Korea, General Peng specifically asked the Navy to send personnel to lay mines on the Qingchuan River to prevent US armed gunboats from attempting to block the rear road of our volunteers along the Qingchuan River. Later, two American gunboats were indeed blown up and sunk, and Mr. Peng expected the enemy to be ahead, which can be described as clear.

At that time, the navy sent only a few professional minelayers and a five-member officer corps who had served as the captain of a minesweeper to carry out several days of depth surveying and underwater laying on the Qingchuan River before completing the task of laying mines.

Laying mines is definitely not like sprinkling pepper for granted, throwing it in and it's over, and there is no such idle method of laying mines in reality. Moreover, the mine belongs to the kind of thing that "with the passage of time, the mines laid out before disappear quickly, and no one knows where they went...... if you want to achieve the purpose of blockade, you need to repeatedly replenish mines, and every time you replenish mines are dangerous......

Back to the point, before the scheduled date of the attack, Clark's "Youth Regiment", or Children's Regiment, finally helped him to find out the deployment of troops in the port of Incheon:

-- There were about 1,000 militiamen at the Incheon wharf, and they had set up checkpoints everywhere and blocked all roads to the interior, so it was impossible to find out the strength of the troops in the rear.

-- There are two anti-aircraft guns, seven machine guns, and three guns of 60mm or more on Wolmi Island.

-- There are 20 coastal guns in the concrete fortifications of Wolmi Island.

-- There are 25 machine guns and 5 120mm howitzers on Kowkimi Island.

-- There are about 2,000 troops on the island, and the number is unknown, and it seems that they are militia forces.

-- The Yaojima Lighthouse was not damaged, but the battery wiring was cut off.

After arresting two North Korean policemen, Clark heard that the troops in the port of Incheon were very weak.

At this time, Clark thought that the investigation was almost over, so he sent a telegram back, reporting in detail the results of his investigation. At the same time, it was agreed that on the evening of August 14, he would light the Yao Island lighthouse, which had been closed by the North Korean army.

There is no doubt that Captain Eugene Clark's reconnaissance is worthy of the Navy Cross for which he was later awarded.

While Clark's reconnaissance operation was underway, the American feint attack also began.

MacArthur ordered U.S. bombers to launch a fierce air raid on the coastal road and railroad in the Gunsan port area, which was suitable for landing. All radio broadcasts and newspapers and magazines began to carry information compiled by the US military intelligence agencies.

"Here is the latest AP newsletter, General Walker declared that the Busan defensive circle will move from defense to full-scale counteroffensive in mid-October, after being replenished by three infantry divisions......"

"This is the latest news from Kyodo News, the allied army's material stockpiling in Busan has been completed, and a full-scale counteroffensive is expected to begin on October 15......"

"The Washington Post estimates that the coalition's October counterattack will be unstoppable......"

…………

A string of news is hinting that the US military will start a full-scale counterattack from Busan in October.

The US military intelligence agencies have even released smokescreens in US newspapers, hinting at a landing at Inchon in mid-October, and judging from the current situation of the US military's heavy bombing of the mountains, it is easy to mislead the DPRK into believing that Inchon is not the landing site chosen by the US military, or that the landing window is October, not August, which is just around the corner.

Negative emotions are contagious, and a qualified general will never show his weakness in front of his subordinates. Therefore, although Kim Il Sung was very depressed in his heart, he still showed everyone his confident side at that time.

However, the battle for Masan, on the outskirts of Busan, has been going on for more than a month since the end of June.

Since the beginning of the war, the total casualties have exceeded 60,000, and compared with the more than 8,000 casualties of the US army, the ROK army's casualties of more than 40,000 are still quite high. But if you calculate carefully, the KPA casualties are mainly due to the US military, and the US army is still increasing its troops in Busan.

After the Americans quickly popularized the equipment of Super Bazooka, the KPA has lost eighty percent of its more than 200 T-34 tanks, leaving only more than fifty, completely losing the magic of the war. If we continue to spend it like this, all the people's families will be left in Busan.

Although Kim Il-sung personally came to the front line to direct the operation and boost morale, the US military's artillery coverage and aircraft targeted bombardment were stronger day by day, and every step of the people's advance was bloody. The Baeksu-dong position, which had been captured before the Battle of Masan, was lost again under the counterattack of the American army. Not only Masan, but the entire Busan encirclement has fallen into a stalemate.

As a last resort, Kim Il-sung ordered all troops to start overhauling the fortifications and prepare for a long-term confrontation in Busan.

Kim Il Sung couldn't care about the Inchon landing, so he decided to take a gamble, he felt that Incheon could be the second Busan at worst, and if he fought well, he might even wipe out the US troops at Incheon. The battle there will be handed over to Deputy Commander Cui Yongjian. Ten newly recruited militia divisions, about 110,000 men and one main division, have been deployed in Inchon to prepare for the siege of the American forces after the landing.

If it weren't for China's generous support of the second batch of 100,000 rifles and 100,000 grenades after the first batch of more than 200,000 rifles from 20 divisions, Kim Il Sung, who was already overstretched at this time, would not have been able to form a new unit.

Since the start of the war on 1 June, the KPA weapons that have participated in the war have lost an average of 10 to 20 percent per month, and the current loss of rifles alone is as high as more than 30,000. After the factories in the rear were bombed by the US military, the production capacity of gun repair and accessories was only three or four percent of what it used to be.

Kim Il-sung used to look down on the miscellaneous army and hoped to unify the equipment with a full set of Soviet weapons, but now that he is facing a large-scale increase in the US army, he is not in the mood to be reserved.

He has ordered that all the previously seized US military supplies be unsealed, and together with the American-made rifles provided by China, a large-scale militia division with all American weapons will be continuously armed, and the Soviet weapons will only be used in the main infantry divisions.

On the basis of maintaining about 110,000 troops in the 10 main infantry divisions and 100,000 in the 10 militia divisions, for a total of 210,000 troops, another 10 new militia divisions will be established. In this way, the total strength of the KPA will reach 300,000, which is already the mobilization limit of the DPRK's 8 million population, and with the weak national strength of the DPRK, it is really impossible to support more soldiers.

Because of constant attrition, the troops are increasingly short of heavy weapons. Kim Il-sung, who began to rely on hand grenades, was determined to fight a people's war with the multinational forces led by the US military with grenades and rifles......

Deputy Commander Cui Yongjian once had brilliant combat experience in the Northeast Anti-Japanese Federation, and once led the army to kill the captain of the Japanese Army Major General in the operation.

By studying the materials provided by the Chinese comrades on the Pacific War, Deputy Commander Cui understood that trying to stop the US troops by building a defensive position on the beachhead was no different from sending them to their deaths. In the face of the absolute dominance of the US military in the sea and air firepower, even if the concrete pillboxes were built on the Inchon beachhead, they could not stop the coverage of iron bombs and naval guns. What's more, where did you get these reinforced concrete for building bunkers? Even if he is given supplies, how can he repair it for a while?

There is no doubt that the only way to do this is to retreat inland, build deep positions where the US warships are out of reach, and dig countless tunnels and caves to hide troops. Just like the Japanese Kuribayashi Tadamichi did in the operational materials of the Iwo Jima Battle provided by the Chinese comrades.

However, in the Battle of Iwo Jima, the Japanese army was a lone army trapped on an island, and without the support of the navy and air force, there was no land support, and defeat was inevitable. In the past month and a half, Cui Yongjian has dug countless transportation trenches between various trenches like a mole, digging all the way from Seoul to Incheon, digging like a spider's web.

This time, even those great men who knew history far away in the north were not sure whether the US military would be able to reach Seoul quickly.

When Xiaoqiang asked Commander-in-Chief Zhu, the commander-in-chief said: "Next, it depends on how firm the intention of the US army is to take Seoul." ”

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Heartfelt thanks to HZwangj, user 05492126, Shuibutou, Star Shadow Emperor, Zizhu!

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