The bloody battle along the river continued, but there seemed to be a tacit agreement that the Japanese artillery fire would not hit the pontoon bridge.
In fact, if we cross the river here, we will save dozens of kilometers and we can reach the retreating troops and the people.
"The chief has not come back. We must be nailed here. You bring a rifle company to the front. If you don't order everyone not to retreat, otherwise military law will be imposed."
At this moment, there were bloodshot eyes in Hansen Raul's eyes, and he spoke with a fierceness. This made Cao Zijin a little surprised, because in front of Zhang Sixing, this guy, even though he was just a non-commissioned officer, was not very formal.
I didn’t expect that I could still keep my composure when I was on my own, and I murmured in my heart:
Maybe he thinks that since he is a German, nothing will happen if the Japanese catch him. With such a relaxed mentality, he can perform better than others, shouldn't he?
Originally, there were 3,000 broken troops gathered on this side of the river. Apart from the approximately 1,000 troops deployed in front, they could only fill up the highway defense line one by one.
"Let's go..."
Cao Zijin, with an M35 helmet on his head, ran back to the back of the position and called out to the infantry who had just replenished their ranks.
"Follow me and go to the front line... Remember, move forward class by class, and keep more than three meters between people..."
He took two steps, then stopped and shouted to his men,
"Put your ears up for me and lie down when you hear the artillery coming..."
Under the blockade of enemy artillery fire, it is a difficult problem to bring the troops up. Especially now that everyone is on a flat plain, there is no hiding place at all.
But the good thing is that now the soldiers have already become accustomed to passing through the artillery blockade area by "running quickly in small groups".
One class at a time, scattered on the ground of Nuo Da, especially when the Japanese are not attacking the pontoon bridge, it is not that difficult to pass.
Cao Zijin, who was running at the front with a class, thought to himself:
The Japanese didn't blow up the pontoon bridge at first, probably because they were lazy and rebuilt it. But after a day of fighting, whether or not there was a pontoon bridge was of no use to them to save time, but why didn't they blow up the bridge?
Just as he was thinking about the sound of artillery shells flying in the distance, Cao Zijin threw himself to the ground, hugging his head with his arms and covering his ears with his hands.
"boom……"
In the violent explosion, stones, water and other debris flew up and fell on Cao Zijin. Although it was painful and the helmet made a "dong-dong" sound, Cao Zijin still lay motionless.
underground.
Why don't the Japanese blow up bridges?
As soon as the explosion ended, Cao Zijin, who had already run on this road several times, ran forward, but the question was still thinking hard in his mind.
When he ran onto the pontoon bridge, he felt much more at ease. Although there were bomb craters at the two ends of the pontoon bridge, the pontoon bridge was still intact.
He turned to look at the soldiers behind him. Due to the rules of turn-based fighting, they had run along this road several times.
Although my heart was still beating fast due to fear, I knew in my heart that as long as I lay down in time while listening to the sound of the cannonballs flying by, it would be very difficult for the cannonballs to kill someone unless you were very unlucky.
New recruits are afraid of cannons, veterans are afraid of machine guns...
Cao Zijin had a clear idea in his heart, why he had to run back and forth on this line like this. Not too many, after a few trips, he would be a veteran.
But why didn't the Japanese blow up the bridge?
If the Japanese blow up the bridge, then it may be time to withdraw the entire line to this side of the river. Then the Japanese advance, and everyone will fight the Japanese on the preset main position.
Is there anything wrong with this? Of course not, at least it saves everyone from running under gunfire.
"thump"
Finally, Cao Zijin was able to throw himself down in a crater without pain in his arms or knees.
This made him admire the people in the mixed barracks at the rear. When he saw the equipment that Zhang Sixing brought from the concession, they used wooden boards and rags to make knee pads and elbow pads.
Why can Lu Feizhang and the others get new equipment? Why...
A little aggrieved, Cao Zijin lifted up his helmet, and the battlefield appeared in front of him, but it was not very bloody.
Taking out the telescope, Cao Zijin habitually lifted his helmet and observed the battlefield with the telescope.
Compared with the highway line that was often bombarded, the arc-shaped single-person pit front on the plain ahead also received a lot of shells. However, based on the analysis of the muzzle flash fired by the pistol team, there should not be many casualties.
The Japanese don't have large-caliber cannons, so there's nothing they can do about such a front. There aren't even machine guns here.
Yes, there is not even a machine gun on the single-man, single-pit battle line, but the firepower of a box gun with a gun stock in a short-range battle cannot be suppressed by the rate of fire of the 38-meter rifle.
Against semi-automatics, only machine guns and grenade launchers can suppress them.
However, sniper rifles with silencers are the nemesis of these weapons. From a distance, their firepower is weak and their accuracy is greatly reduced. When they are close, they just feed the snipers.
Especially at this time, the Japanese did not pay attention to the concept of sniper combat. It would still be several years before the Pacific War, and the tactics were all wrong.
The formation of this formation... As a military policeman trained by the Germans, Cao Zijin really didn't expect that fighting would look like this.
At the beginning of this battle, he felt that the single-person single-pit front lines might not be able to withstand the Japanese charge. Especially when Zhang Sixing gave each member of the pistol team 800 rounds of ammunition and dozens of grenades, he felt that it was not possible to fight like this.
Now look at it... Three hundred meters outside the pistol team's front line is the newly dug trench by the Japanese. The reason why it is so far away is that if it is too close, it will be within the attack range of the gasoline barrel cannon.
On the contrary, as a rifle battle line, the remains of people and weapons are scattered everywhere. Although the soldiers are also beginning to dig a single-person trench battle line at this moment, the losses are smaller than traditional trenches.
Another advantage is that when individual soldiers want to escape, they will consider running on an unobstructed plain, which is to deliver food to the Japanese with good marksmanship.
Cao Zijin didn't need to worry about digging foxholes. He lifted up his helmet and continued to observe the battlefield with a telescope, but at the same time, he still had a question in his mind:
Why didn’t the Japanese blow up the pontoon bridge? If they blew up the pontoon bridge...
In fact, he couldn't understand this matter, but Major General Sato Shozaburo of the 101st Division and 101st Brigade thought it through very clearly:
He lost more than 2,500 people from the fast column. He also lost nearly two infantry brigades on the subsequent battlefield... No matter what, he had to get something to explain to his superiors.
At the moment, he only hates one thing, and that is the people who block his troops. How come there are so many box cannons.
The attack of box artillery at close range was simply not something that the 38th Battalion could handle. It was not because the soldiers did not try their best when attacking.
In fact, quite a few of those box cannons were obtained by Zhang Sixing from the patrol police in the concession. The ones made in Qingyishui, Germany, are of much better quality than those made in China.