As the battle of Sredensk came to an end, the Russian army, having suffered heavy losses, had to retreat back to the Nebuchu fortress again.

At the same time, the victorious Emperor of China [***] also returned triumphantly and returned to his original defensive position.

Feng Guozhang, the commander of the 1st Theater of Operations, saw the great power of sniper tactics, so he seconded the 8th Mountain Combat Battalion Wildcat Commando from the Royal Praetorian Guard Hunter Special Forces, and cooperated with the 5th Mountain Combat Battalion Snow Wolf Commando to continue to wait for opportunities around the Nebuchu Fortress to eliminate the Russian army's living forces and hit the morale of the Russian army.

While the snipers were attacking the Russian army's living forces, the Snow Wolf Commandos and the Wildcat Commandos attacked the Siberian Railway supplying the Nebuchu Fortress from the direction of Sleger, planting high explosives on the railway, using remote control devices to detonate explosives, blowing up the Russian train that was passing, and then killing the Russian train guards, plundering or destroying the military supplies on the train.

The losses caused by this move to the Russian army far exceeded the losses caused by the sniping on the periphery of the commando, and the Russian army also had hundreds of thousands of garrisons in the fortress of Nebuchu, and the daily consumption of materials was huge. The Nebuchu fortress was a military fortress without any economic support, and it relied entirely on supplies from Europe.

After the attack of the Chinese Emperor on the Trans-Siberian Railway, the commander of the Nebuchu Fortress, Paulnev, had to send convoys along the way to protect the main railway line and send railway sappers to repair the destroyed railway.

Obviously, this is what the snipers of the Chinese Empire were hoping for, and they were in the nearby woods and snow, waiting to kill the Russian road guards and railway soldiers one by one.

In this way, the losses of the Russian army are getting bigger and bigger, and Paul Nev is so angry that he scolds the Chinese emperor [***] shamelessly all day long, and he will not dare to fight with the Russian army in such a disgraceful way, he is not a hero.

Zhang Zuolin was born in a small town called Baishan at the foot of Changbai Mountain, and joined the Chinese Emperor [***] team when the Sino-Russian War broke out in November 1901. He began his career as a sniper in the "Winter War" between the Chinese Empire and the Tsarist Russian Empire.

In the harsh environment of minus 30-50 degrees Celsius, he wore an all-white camouflage uniform, and sniped Russian soldiers and officers with his teammates. In the early days of the Battle of Sredensk, a total of 105 Russian personnel were confirmed to have been killed by him, and unofficial statistics point out that his results were 182, second only to the personal record of Shen Haifeng, the leader of the Snow Wolf Commando. As a new recruit, Zhang Zuolin was promoted from a second class soldier to a second lieutenant within a month, and his rank was promoted by five ranks, breaking the record for the promotion of the Chinese Emperor's [***] side.

Zhang Zuolin's excellent shooting ability is due to the experience he gained from hunting in the mountains with his maternal grandfather since he was a child. He was often kept by his grandfather near the burrows of wild wolves, leopards, and bears, sometimes lying on his stomach for days until he had killed the beasts with his earthen gun.

Under this training situation, Zhang Zuolin became a well-known hunter, and because of this, he was recruited as a special soldier by the Snow Wolf Commando less than three days after joining the army, specializing in long-range sniper missions.

After the professional sniper training of the special forces, Zhang Zuolin's personal combat effectiveness skyrocketed, and he soon made a name for himself in the Snow Wolf Commando, and grew at an astonishing rate every day.

Some people say that he will soon be able to surpass their captain Shen Haifeng, and it is true.

In the 237 Heights Guard, in addition to killing and wounding more than 200 enemies with sniper rifles, he also killed more than 300 Russian soldiers with submachine guns, so his number of kills increased to 715. At this time, Shen Haifeng, the captain of the Snow Wolf Commando, focused more on organizing and commanding the entire Snow Wolf Commando, so the number of kills was not as many as Zhang Zuolin.

During the period from the end of March to the middle of April of the second year of Guanghua, the Chinese Imperial Snow Wolf Commandos and Wildcat Commandos were a nightmare for the Russian army, with skis on their feet and snow-white trench coats, but they could come and go silently when the snow blocked all roads. And the Russian soldiers struggling in the snow and mud became live targets for the snipers of the Chinese Empire.

The three or five sniper squads of the Chinese Empire could often wipe out all the Russian convoys marching in small columns without any casualties themselves. The most terrifying situation appeared at night when the camping in the wilderness, when the Russian army was warming up around the bonfire, and was targeted and shot one by one by the Chinese Emperor [***] snipers hiding in the dark. And the Russian soldiers who were cold and starving watched their comrades fall one by one and were indifferent, because they were desperate for living until dawn.

"Company commander! Platoon leader! Help me! ”

On the ambush field, Zhang Zuolin and his squad fired more than a dozen shots, killing more than a dozen Russian soldiers each, but only three Russian soldiers were left behind, and their thighs were hit, causing them to collapse in the snow and unable to move.

Zhang Zuolin and his sniper team did not choose to kill the three Russian soldiers, but used the wails of the three to stimulate the other Russian troops who were hiding in the trenches and did not dare to come out.

This is a tactic, although it is a little cruel, but every time I think of how the Russian soldiers bullied the Chinese people back then, Zhang Zuolin and other snipers of the special combat team hate it.

A heart-rending scream finally made a Russian soldier unable to hold back, as soon as he showed his head, his head was shattered by bullets, and his brain burst out, leaving only half of his head.

The sound of gunfire then reached the ears of other Russian officers and soldiers.

The Russian officers and soldiers in the trenches were so panicked that they hid below and did not dare to show their heads at all. The only campfires were quickly extinguished, leaving them unobservable by snipers.

The wailing outside the trench was still shouting, and the company commander finally couldn't help it.

"Come over here, let's take advantage of the darkness to come and save people."

A Russian platoon commander with five or six bold Russian soldiers quietly climbed out of the trench and crawled towards the location of the wounded soldiers.

Here, Zhang Zuolin was observing the situation in the scope, because the Russian army had extinguished the torches, the light was insufficient, and the vision in the sniper scope was close to the starlight and snow reflection, but it was not very clear.

Sensing that the Russian army was coming to the rescue, Zhang Zuolin immediately whistled and gave the order to fire flares and the whole team to fire freely.

The team member next to him understood, and immediately took out his illuminated pistol and fired a shot into the sky above the enemy's position.

Bang!

The flares were fired, and the positions of the Russian troops in front were suddenly illuminated. The figures of five or six Russian soldiers who were crawling over were suddenly exposed.

Syllable! Syllable! Syllable!

After a single gunshot, the five or six Russian soldiers were immediately shot dead by the snipers.

The Russian troops in the trenches were in an uproar again, and immediately retracted their heads again.

Throughout the night, 35 people were killed in the 193 positions of the Russian army, including two second lieutenant officers and a number of non-commissioned officers. And such a situation as the 193 position was found in dozens of positions on the periphery of the entire Nebuchu fortress. On average, every position was attacked by snipers from the Chinese Empire every night, and the number of casualties was more than five or six hundred every day.

The Russian army is in fear both day and night, and the morale of the Russian army has suffered a serious blow.

In this one-sided sniper war, nearly 1,000 snipers of the Snow Wolf Commando and Wildcat Commando of the Chinese Empire achieved very outstanding results. After the end of winter, in the period before Russia officially launched its spring counteroffensive, more than 20,000 Russian troops died at the guns of snipers of the Chinese Empire, and more than 900 officers were killed, with the highest rank of major general.

Hitting every shot is the realm that snipers are pursuing. According to the post-war statistics of the Winter Offensive of the General Staff of the Chinese Empire, it took an average of 1,000 rounds of ammunition to kill every Russian soldier. However, a sniper can kill a Russian soldier with an average of 1.3 rounds.

What a disparity in numbers.

The General Staff saw the huge war potential of snipers, so Wang Shizhen deliberately went to the emperor Wang Chenhao to grind hard bubbles, and finally Wang Chenhao allowed the sniper section tactics of the Janissary Hunter Special Forces to be shared in the training subjects of the combat units of the major military regions, and each unit began to set up sniper units after the war. Basically, each company is assigned a sniper to assist in completing tactical missions.

In the winter offensive launched by the Chinese Empire, the most powerful sniper of the Chinese Empire was Zhang Zuolin. Zhang Zuolin is the holder of the Chinese Empire and the world's highest hunt record of 1,056. He was a professional hunter and was very familiar with the geography of the mountains and forests, wearing a white camouflage suit as white as snow, and sledding freely in the wilderness where the roads were covered by heavy snow. He used a sniper rifle of the first year of the Chinese Empire, which could snipe important commanders of the Russian army from a distance of 800 meters, causing great fear among the Russian soldiers, calling him the "White Grim Reaper".

Because of the terrifying combat effectiveness of the Chinese Imperial Snow Wolf Commando, more than 100 snipers who killed more than 100 enemies emerged in the whole team, and since then they have been known as the Reaper Force in the armies of various countries around the world. Then the Wildcat Commando, due to the short time, the number of kills was not as good as the Snow Wolf Commando, but it was also brilliant, and was awarded the title of "Black Hellcat" after the war.

The Chinese Empire's winter offensive, the victory in the Battle of Sredensk, and the great success of sniper tactics once again brought shame to the Russian Empire, for which the Tsarist Russian High Command gave the commander of the Nebuchu Fortress, General Paul Nev, a severe punishment, and urged him to launch a decent offensive to save the reputation of the Russian army.

Paulnev was very sad, his elite Ninth Army was cut off by Bildorf, and the Eighteenth and Twenty-second Armies were buried with him, which had greatly weakened the defenses of the Nebuchu Fortress. What's more, Paulnev has no illusions about this war, he knows very well the combat effectiveness and equipment level of the Chinese Emperor [***], especially under the influence of the theory of winning with army equipment, the Russian army is too far behind the Chinese Emperor [***], and Paulnev is in line with the main policy of holding the Nebuchu Fortress, not seeking merit but seeking no fault.

In this case, Paulnev did not take any retaliatory measures, but continued to increase the defense capacity of the Nebuchu fortress.

Because Paulnev knew that the airships of the Imperial Chinese Air Force had great destructive power and a huge threat from the air, he converted a large number of heavy machine guns and rapid-fire guns below 37 mm into anti-aircraft firepower, and deployed a large number of them in the Nebuchu fortress to guard against the attack of the Chinese Imperial airships.

In the whole of March, due to bad weather conditions, the first theater of the Chinese empire only dispatched six batches of airships to bomb the fortress of Nebuchu, and in the sixth batch, two airships were shot down by the Russian army, so Feng Guozhang, commander of the first theater, immediately canceled the follow-up air raid plan.

In the previous Far Eastern campaign, the Russian army suffered heavy losses in Vladivostok, Boli and other places, for which the Russian high command stepped up the task of producing airships.

By the end of March, Russia had a fleet of airships, a total of 55 airships, which were assigned to the Far Eastern Air Force and were transferred to the Nebuchu fortress on a priority basis.

The Russians' airships did not adopt the airship technology of the Chinese Empire, but after Russia turned to Germany for help, they obtained the German Zeppelin hard airship technology and began large-scale production. In fact, Russia does not have the ability to produce airships on a large scale, and these airships are basically assembled parts produced by German arsenals working overtime, and secretly smuggled to Russia through private companies.

After receiving these airships, the Russian army was very excited, immediately trained a group of workers, and then drove the airships to the Far Eastern Nebuchu fortress.

The intelligence department of the Chinese Empire, which learned of the movements of the Russian army, immediately reported the situation to the General Staff and the Ministry of National Defense, and the General Staff did not feel worried when it learned that a large number of Russian airships had reinforced the fortress of Nebuchu. In fact, this is one of the plans of the Chinese Emperor Wang Chenhao to deliberately mislead other countries to vigorously develop airships.

The General Staff immediately instructed all the officers and men of the First Theater of Operations, informing them that the General Staff had drawn up a response plan so that they would not have to be afraid.

In order to put this in place, the General Staff instructed Feng Guozhang, commander of the First Theater of Operations, to build a flat airstrip with a length of 120 meters and a width of 30 meters near and behind the front line. Wang Shizhen, minister of national defense, personally inspected the training of the Eighth Air Force Group and the production of new aircraft at the Nanyuan Air Base.

In March 1900, the Chinese Empire had built an air base in the Nanyuan Military Region, and once the aircraft designed by the Beiyang Science and Technology Flying Laboratory passed the audit, they would be industrially produced at the Nanyuan Aircraft Factory.

In December 1900, the Beiyang Science and Technology Flying Laboratory successfully developed the Adel 00 aircraft. The aircraft is still a single-propeller biplane, slightly enlarged from the previous Type 98K in order to gain more lift. With a length of 5.86 meters and a height of 2.42 meters, the aircraft has a large wingspan of 9.22 meters. The empty weight of the aircraft reached 182 kg, the maximum weight was 342 kg. It adopts the latest BT10 four-cylinder gasoline engine developed by Beiyang Science and Technology Engine Laboratory, with a power of 30 horsepower. The take-off speed is 10.2 knots, the climb speed is 20 knots, the cruising speed is 35 knots, the maximum speed is 55 knots, the maximum ceiling is 1200 meters, the range is 100 km, and the range of hanging auxiliary fuel tanks can reach 140 km.

The Adel-00 includes several versions, and since the Beiyang Weapons has improved the firing coordinator, the Browning designed the Browning M99 air-cooled heavy machine gun specifically for airborne weapons, still using 7.92mm general-purpose rifle cartridges. Due to the moderate weight of the M99 heavy machine gun, this allowed the weapon to be mounted on the aircraft.

Thus, the first version of the Adel 00 aircraft was a fighter model with the suffix A1. The training aircraft is a two-seater, Adel-00A2. Changing the fixed wheels to the pontoon type is the Adel 00A3.

The Type 00 underwent two years of rigorous testing and became the first practical model aircraft to be used for reconnaissance, training and combat purposes. For the first time, Air Force officials became interested in airplanes and overtook airships.

For this reason, Air Force Minister Xue Pinggui applied to the General Staff Headquarters for funds to form the Air Force Aircraft Brigade, which is the Eighth Air Force Group. The General Staff approved Xue Pinggui's request and allocated funds for the production of thirty-six Type 00 aircraft for the Eighth Flying Group. Twenty-four of them were reconnaissance aircraft (eighteen of them were land reconnaissance aircraft, and the other six were water reconnaissance aircraft), another six were fighters, and six were trainers.

The General Staff's concept of air combat is still very weak, and it can be said that there are almost none. The production of six fighters was approved only to cater to the strategic policy of the Emperor Wang Chenhao on a surprise strike at the Russian airship forces. If Wang Chenhao had not said it in advance, it is estimated that the General Staff would not have produced and developed fighters, and they would only focus on the aerial reconnaissance capabilities of the aircraft.

Wang Chenhao did not interfere in the decision of the General Staff, and he did not suggest mass production of fighter jets, because if European and American countries were allowed to discover the use of fighter jets and their actual combat effects in advance, it would be unfavorable to the future national strategy of the Chinese Empire. The production of six fighters was enough to wipe out the Russian airship forces.

However, to Wang Chenhao's displeasure, the Air Force wanted to name the Adel 00 aircraft as the Imperial Chinese Air Force Zero Aircraft. In this regard, Wang Chenhao said that he did not like the name Zero aircraft, so the General Staff had to postpone it for one year and change it to the first year of the Guanghua aircraft of the Chinese Empire. Wang Chenhao felt that something was missing, so he waved a big pen and gave the name of the Guanghua first year aircraft Sparrowhawk, codenamed J1 (J1).

As a result, the fighter model was changed to the J-1A model, and the trainer aircraft was the J-1B type. The J-1C is the army aviation version of the reconnaissance aircraft model, and the Jian-1D model is the naval aviation version of the reconnaissance aircraft model.

With the passing of winter in the northern hemisphere, after entering the second half of April, the plateau areas of Siberia and Outer Mongolia gradually warmed up, and the Russian army accumulated countless grievances throughout the winter.

On April 28, fifty-five Zeppelins arrived at the Nebuchu fortress, and General Paulnev was overjoyed and began to actively plan a major counteroffensive.

In his opinion, with these airships, the number is more than five times that of the Chinese Emperor [***], which is enough to raze the positions and cities controlled by the Chinese Emperor [***] to the ground, and he seems to have seen the scene of the Chinese Emperor [***] being blown to pieces and lying on the ground begging for mercy.

At the same time, the airfield of the Mohe airship base in the first theater of the Chinese Emperor [***] was also set up, and the Eighth Flying Group of the Chinese Imperial Air Force secretly entered the base on the night of the 29th.

(To be continued)