"Mow the grass and set it on fire!" I ordered.

"Set fire?" Everyone couldn't help but be stunned when they heard this order.

If you want to cut the grass, everyone understands that the grass will burn near us, and cutting out a vacant lot can keep our place from being affected, but this is setting fire......

In fact, what the warriors didn't know was that the biggest danger of a fire attack like this was not the fire or its temperature, and it was very simple to keep the fire and the surrounding temperature from affecting themselves, that is, to open up an open space around it, after all, there were some thatchs around, and it didn't burn for a long time.

The greater danger is the air...... A large amount of thatch burns quickly in a short period of time, burning the air near our location, and even some of the air is mixed with carbon dioxide and ash, which can suffocate people to death.

There is only one way to solve this problem, and that is to quickly carve out a larger space, and the only way to do this is to fight fire with fire.

"Yes!" Seeing that the soldiers were still stunned, I explained in a hurry: "First cut the grass to create a large open space, and then take the initiative to set fire to it!" ”

"Hmm!" Scar quickly understood what I meant, and immediately ordered, "What are you doing in a daze?" Hurry up! ”

"Yes!" The warriors immediately set to work, though some of them did not understand the reason for this.

The soldiers move quickly, one because there are many of us, and the other because the soldiers all worked as farmers before they became soldiers...... To be exact, it should be before the war, because when I was a soldier, I also carried a hoe more than a gun. So this is to do his old job. With a military spurt as a sickle, a large open space was created with a few "clicks". The cut hay is moved to the periphery of the clearing.

"Set fire!" Seeing that it was almost over, I gave the order.

The soldiers from several directions lit matches at the same time, but the thatch was wet on the outside and dry on the inside because of the rain during this time, and the matches were not lit for a while.

Seeing this, I followed up with another order: "Use incendiary bombs!" ”

"Yes!" The fighters came to their senses after a moment's pause, took a few mortar shells, opened the safety and knocked them on the ground, and then threw them in all directions around them.

Of course, only the direction of the reconnaissance company was not ...... We'll have to consider bringing the reconnaissance company with us!

Just listen to a few "booms", and the effect of incendiary bombs is really not covered. This explosion ignited several fires in the surrounding area, and the thatch immediately crackled and burned, and the air was filled with suffocating smoke...... But I know that these smoke journeys are much better than waiting here.

"Battalion commander!" At this time, Chen Qiaoqiao asked, "What about the reconnaissance company?" ”

After observing the surrounding fires and seeing that the fire had already burned a space that could almost accommodate more than 100 soldiers of the reconnaissance company, I nodded and said, "Bring them over immediately, fast!" ”

"Yes!" Chen Qiaoqiao answered, turned around and left.

"What are you doing in a daze?" I shouted to the soldiers around me: "Let's go and get the comrades of the reconnaissance company!" ”

"Yes!" At this time, the soldiers realized that the order I had just given was not just to Chen Qiaoqiao.

Except for a platoon of soldiers who stayed behind to take care of the supplies, the rest of the soldiers, including me, followed Chen Qiaoqiao all the way in light clothes...... Everyone knows that time is of the essence at this time, and we have opened up enough space to survive in the midst of urgency, but this does not mean that the reconnaissance company has also opened up such a space. Even if they had thought of it, they would not be able to do it quickly after being hungry for a few days. What's more, at this time, the fire may burn off the connection between them at any time.

Then my worst fears finally happened......

Before we could rush to the position of the reconnaissance company, the Yue devils seemed to have discovered the movement of our part...... The movement of our toss is really not small, and the troops of nearly a company are running in the direction of the reconnaissance company without concealing their madness, and the movement of the thatch in the firelight is enough to attract the attention of the Yue devils, so a few incendiary bombs hit it immediately.

Coincidentally, at this time, a strong wind of magnitude 6 or 7 blew again, and the fire spread rapidly with the help of the wind, and the fires in other positions also spread rapidly, and in an instant, the combat zone of several tens of square kilometers became a sea of fire, and the fire detonated the mines preset by the Vietnamese army, and only the explosion made a "boom" everywhere, and even we were surrounded by a sea of fire.

"Battalion commander! What to do? Scar yelled at me.

"What else can I do?" I shouted, "All of them, rush in and get people out!" ”

"Yes!" The warriors responded in unison, and then rushed into the fire without hesitation.

There was a burst of heat and moxibustion pain, and occasionally I could smell some burnt stench, and I could even feel my hair bent in pain because of the unbearable moxibustion burning, but I didn't have the time to pay attention to it so much, I only knew that I was running all the way forward in the sea of fire, and I only thought that I hoped that the soldiers of the reconnaissance company would also take some emergency measures, otherwise even if we arrived now, we would not be able to save a few people.

However, the soldiers of the reconnaissance company are not so stupid, not to mention that there is Chen Yiyi there.

As I expected, I ran forward for a while and felt empty...... An open field appeared in front of me, and after a few moments of getting used to the light, I saw a few unadult-looking warriors looking at me weakly.

I rolled on the ground a few times to extinguish the fire on my body, and then asked, "Is it a comrade from the reconnaissance company?" I'm Yang Xuefeng! ”

"Battalion Commander Yang!"

"It's really Camp Commander Yang!"

……

That's when I realized that I might have been blackened by the fire, and no one would recognize me.

"Yang Xuefeng!" At this time, I saw a woman running on the other side, I recognized her as a woman from her voice, Ji'er guessed that she was Chen Yiyi, otherwise I wouldn't have recognized her at all, because she was much thinner than before, and it could be described as skinny.

I greeted her and grabbed her, who was almost unsteady, sighed and said, "There's no hurry, I'll talk about it later." ”

"Comrades!" I shouted to the soldiers: "There is still the ability to move, the wounded and sick are left to us, move quickly!" ”

As soon as he bent over, he put Chen Yiyi on his back and rushed towards the fire...... Fortunately, Chen Yiyi is relatively light now, otherwise I really can't do this, the reason is very simple, running in the fire on the one hand is burned and roasted, on the other hand, it is extremely hypoxic, at this time I am thinking, if we hadn't trained in the oxygen-deficient environment of the plateau, I am afraid that I don't know how many people will fall into this fire.

It is precisely because of this that the speed of rescue is slower, I can still stand the lighter Chen Yiyi, and the other fighters are more than 100 pounds of soldiers if they carry them, and both of them have equipment on them, so they have to carry one or two people in rotation to carry one person in turn.

And the one hundred and eighty fighters of the reconnaissance company...... Even if we weren't injured, we were hungry and out of strength, and it was difficult to rush through the fire alone without help, which forced us to go back and forth several times.

In this battle against the fire, the fighters were very brave, both from the reconnaissance company and the special agent company.

Needless to say, the soldiers of the special agent company, a soldier named Zhang Xinqiang rushed into the fire five times and snatched out five soldiers, and when he came out with a soldier on his back for the sixth time, he couldn't stand it anymore and fell, but even at this time, he still threw himself on the soldiers of the reconnaissance company...... Zhang Xinqiang died in the end, but the warriors he protected with his body survived.

Yang Xianping, the leader of the third squad, rushed into the sea of fire ten times to rescue ten soldiers, and never came out after the last rush into the sea of fire, and we didn't even find his body.

Xu Qing, the deputy squad leader, was injured in his footsteps when he parachuted, but he still resolutely devoted himself to this rescue operation, and after rushing into the fire three times to rescue two soldiers, he finally collapsed in the fire.

As for the reconnaissance company, some of the soldiers were arranged in the cave before they had time to withdraw, and because of the large number of people in the cave, the company commander stood at the entrance of the cave and used his body to block the fire, and was seriously injured and fainted at the entrance of the cave.

Of course, this was all discovered when the number of people was counted afterwards, and at this time, we only knew that we broke into the fire again and again and carried people out again and again.

Fortunately, our emergency measures were appropriate and the rescue was timely, and in the end, only 20 comrades from the reconnaissance company were killed, including 12 in the special agent company and 8 in the reconnaissance company.

Such casualties are quite small compared to the 300-odd people in the entire team, after all, we are in the middle of the fire.

But the battle doesn't end there, on the contrary, it has just begun.

"Hurry up and recuperate!" I looked at the soldiers who were gobbling up water and eating dry food, and ordered: "Do your best to recover your body and break through in ten minutes!" ”

"Yes!" The warriors answered.

The reason why I was in such a hurry to break through and didn't even have time to rest for the fighters of the reconnaissance company was because I knew it well...... The thatch in this open field has been burned to the ground, and as soon as the sky is bright, our team will be as obvious in the eyes of the Yue devil as lice on the bald head.

That is, we will only be able to succeed if we break through before dawn.

**********

I would like to pay tribute to the 8th Company of the 184th Regiment (then the 2nd Company of the 10th Reconnaissance Brigade), which was surrounded by a fire ignited by incendiary bombs of the Vietnamese Army when the company was carrying out a prisoner attack on the 1828 Heights. In this battle, five cadres and 15 soldiers of the whole company died heroically, and among these 20 martyrs, 11 were posthumously recorded as first-class meritorious service after the war, and the remaining nine were posthumously recorded as second-class meritorious service. (To be continued......)