readx; Chapter 385: The Battle of Yili (5)

Cao Guozhao clutched the telescope in his hand tightly, looking at the scorching battlefield in front of him, the bloodshot in his eyes and the tired look on his face indicated that he had not rested for a long time!

"Lao Cao, you haven't closed your eyes for three days and two nights, go and rest, I'll keep an eye here for a while!" Yang Junchen said beside him. Pen, fun, and www.biquge.info

Slowly shook his head, "No, I can still bear it, not to mention that the soldiers on the front line are all fighting, and they haven't slept much for more than two days! Compared to us, they have to climb the ice and lie in the snow to fight hard, even harder!"

In the past two days, the U.S. ** team in front of Yili, like crazy, has been attacking the defense line of Huo's army all the time, no matter day or night, giving full play to their superiority in strength, dividing into two groups, and constantly attacking, in two days, the six defense lines in front of Yili, now only the last two are left! This is still thanks to the sniper effect of the fortress artillery, otherwise Yili City would have fallen a long time ago!

"Old Yang, how is the situation on the front line now?" Cao Guozhao asked.

"It's not too good, the 48th and 51st divisions have already lost one-fifth of their troops, and the two servant divisions have also lost almost 15,000 men! Many hidden forts in the fifth line of defense have been blown up, and the defense power is gone, I'm afraid it won't last long!" Yang Junchen said in a heavy tone.

Hearing this, a hint of deep thought flashed on Cao Guozhao's face, and through the thick observation window, he looked at the battlefield in the distance filled with gunsmoke, gunshots, and explosions, and said in a calm tone: "Let the airship troops be dispatched to cover the retreat of the troops." Get into the last line of defense and defend!"

"Yes, division commander!" the confidential staff officer next to him turned around and ran out after recording the order.

"Lao Cao. You have also read the telegram from the theater headquarters yesterday, and if the Americans really use the ice of Lake Erie to bypass the fortress and attack our rear, it will be really bad!" Yang Junchen said.

"I know, but now that the war in Erie is raging, we don't have any extra troops to defend the rear!" Otherwise, once the railroad is cut off by the Americans, we will face a dilemma of running out of guns and ammunition!"

Because the Erie Fortress was built before it was built. decided to give up in the future, so the ammunition stored by the Huo family army here is not too much, and now in the fierce war, it could have supported a month's ammunition reserves. A quarter has already been consumed. In particular, shells of various calibers have consumed almost half! If they are not replenished in time, they will not have enough ammunition for a week at most!

"It's a pity, it would be nice if it wasn't winter!" Cao Guozhao looked at the battlefield in the distance and muttered to himself in a low voice.

Hearing his words, Yang Junchen, who was standing on the side, also nodded, since the Huo family army occupied many cities on the shore of Lake Yili. A small river fleet was formed on Lake Erie, mainly to garrison the cities of Erie, Cleveland, and Toledo. Resisting the attacks of the Americans from Lake Yili, coupled with the defense line of the two rivers of the Huo Army, from south to north, the defense line built by the Huo Army in the American Theater for two years can be described as impregnable, but in winter, the frozen Lake Erie also froze many river ports on the lakeside, so that the fleet could only be frozen in the port, and a huge loophole appeared in the north. It has also caused the current predicament of the Northern Front Corps of the Huo Family Army!

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"Commander, look at the retreat of the Chinese troops, we have taken another line of defense!"

Listening to Bullock Cena's words, looking at the Yili defenders of the Chinese People's Army who slowly retreated with the bodies of their sacrificed comrades under the cover of machine guns and bombs of more than twenty huge airships, Johnston couldn't help but breathe a sigh of relief in his heart, and a trace of joy appeared on his face.

Although the US military suffered more than 70,000 casualties in two days, it also won the five lines of defense of the Chinese, but he also understood that the next war was the real test for the US army. Because of the first five lines of defense, most of the defensive facilities are tunnels and barbed wire, and there are only a small number of bunkers in the middle as the connection points of the tunnels, which are relatively easy to overcome, but the next two lines of defense, the density of the bunker fortifications has risen sharply by several levels, especially the last line of defense, a large number of pillbox fortifications, as well as battery and machine gun positions are distributed here! But Johnston had already figured out how to deal with it.

"Are the 1st Cavalry Corps, 5th Cavalry Corps, 49th Infantry Corps, 54th Infantry Corps, 3rd and 4th Independent Cavalry Divisions ready?" asked Johnston.

"Yes, Commander! They are all ready, one man and two horses, with enough combat materials for a week, tonight they will secretly bypass the Fortress of Erie, the 1st Cavalry Corps will capture Coniot, cut off the railway, cut off the supply channels for the Chinese, and the remaining 5th Cavalry Corps, the 49th Infantry Corps and the other two infantry divisions, after attacking the flank of the Fortress of Erie, will attack the troops in front of us in front of them, and strive to take the city of Erie in the shortest possible time, break through the Chinese river defense line, and lay the foundation for the final victory of this war. ”

After listening to Bullock Cena's words, Johnston nodded, compared to the ironclad front of Fort Erie, the defense in the rear was much weaker!

"How many more heavy artillery do we have?"

"There are 96 more than 100mm caliber, and 8 more 203mm heavy howitzers!" Speaking of this, Bloxena's face couldn't help but show a color of flesh pain, the original Chinese shelling directly led to the loss of more than half of the original more than 200 heavy artillery units of the US army, and the 8 guns that were pinned on high hopes, and the Krupp 'Karl' mortar specially purchased from Germany was all lost!

"However, this morning we just received 36 152mm heavy howitzers and 12 210mm heavy howitzers from the rear, and the heavy firepower has been restored, but other small-caliber 37mm, 67mm, and 75mm caliber guns have suffered large losses, although they have also been replenished from the rear to a certain extent, but now there are less than 150 guns!" Bullock said. The Chinese's artillery is really too accurate, and the rate of fire of their small-caliber artillery far exceeds ours, which is really a bit incredible, maybe they have invented some new artillery technology!"

After hearing this, Johnston also muttered a little in his heart, as he was born in the artillery department of the West Point Military Academy, he knows the performance of the artillery of various countries best, for example, the 75mm caliber artillery, now its maximum rate of fire is only 15 rounds per minute, of course, most of the time, the troops of various countries can not reach this rate of fire, and it is already a very good result to have a rate of fire of 12 rounds per minute! However, according to his observations during this period, the rate of fire of artillery of this caliber in the Chinese troops is hardly lower than 20 rounds, and sometimes it can even reach a rate of fire of nearly 30 rounds per minute! Under this frightening rate of fire, a large number of US artillery pieces and machine guns were destroyed on their positions before they could be transferred, and the casualties among the soldiers were even heavier.

However, what makes Johnston a little fortunate in his heart is that the Chinese artillery with such a terrifying rate of fire is only 75mm caliber field guns and a small number of 105mm caliber light howitzers, if the 152mm and 203mm caliber heavy howitzers also have this rate of fire, or half the rate of fire, then the number of casualties among American soldiers will be twice as high as now! It can be said that the Chinese fortress artillery group is the biggest obstacle to the advance of the US ** team.

After looking at the time, he raised his binoculars and observed the battlefield in front of him, "Let the next group of troops go up! In addition, we must use all the light artillery in our hands, and we must not let the Chinese troops get the slightest respite! We must make them more tired and tired, and then we can have a chance to win!" After a pause, "Organize the troops for the raid, and let them pass through Lake Erie as quickly as possible in the early hours of this evening and attack the flank of Erie Fortress!"

"Yes, Commander!"

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The bright moonlight poured on the earth, and the distant Lake Erie was silvery white, reflecting the small town of Coniot in winter, like a fairy in white tulle standing on the shore of the lake, if it were not for the clear sound of gunfire in the city of Erie thirty kilometers away, then the scenery of the small town of Coniot now would be an intoxicating winter night beauty.

At this time, by the bright moonlight in the sky, you can see that there are a large number of black spots on the lake outside the small town of Coniot.

"Ding ding......!" Ding Shuangxi knocked the iron drill in his hand, a large number of ice chips, collapsing from the surface of the lake, and soon an ice pit more than 20 centimeters wide and more than 10 centimeters deep gradually took shape, wiped the sweat on his head, Ding Shuangxi carefully picked up a huge black mine next to him, gently put it into the dug ice pit, and then moved out of the lead, pulled out the insurance, and then gently covered the ice chips next to him. Finally, he took out a small red flag from his waist and carefully inserted it next to the mine!

With a gentle sigh, Ding Shuangxi wiped the sweat on his face and stood up!

"Captain, why did you say the commander asked us to bury all these mines in the ice?" asked the Navy soldier in a blue and white camouflage naval uniform standing on the side.

"I don't know, but it's definitely going to blow up the Americans!" Ding Shuangxi said with a frown. He was the captain of the 13th Inland River Fleet, which was responsible for the defense of Lake Yili and the 'Chu Jiang' gunboat, which belonged to the Huojia Army's American River Fleet.

Two days ago, they had been staying inside Erie City, preparing to defend the fortress with their army brothers. However, only one day after the start of the war, more than 1,000 naval brothers, including them, led by Li Baohua, commander of the 13th River Fleet, went to the small town of Coniot located behind the fortress, and carried out the activity of laying mines on the frozen layer of Lake Erie outside the city with mines brought from the warships.

"Okay, don't worry about it so much, tonight we must bury all the two hundred mines allocated to our boat!" Ding Shuangxi said after picking up another mine from the basket next to him.

"Yes, Captain!" (To be continued.) )