Just as the Chinese Marine Corps was intensively preparing for the landing on Luzon Island, thousands of kilometers away in Shuangchengzi, a heavy snowfall completely blended the Russian fortresses in the direction of the mountain pass into the white background, and there was no feeling in the sky.
The less warm sunshine reflected on the thick snow, and the strong reflection confused the sight even more. Although the reconnaissance plane in the sky had flown very low, it was still unable to identify the covered objects from the vast white land.
Russian army fortress.
The Shuangchengzi Fortress Group consists of hundreds of overt or covert reinforced concrete fortresses. On several peaks on both sides, there are also hidden large-caliber naval guns removed from some retired old battleships, many of which are 200 mm.
above caliber, and these naval guns were removed and reinstalled here with the turret and bottom ammunition supply system. The Russians, who clearly felt the threat from China, began to operate here in 1900, and it took a full seven years.
It took years to build this fortress, which in their view was completely impregnable. Even because airships showed their power in Europe, Nikolai equipped his blood relative + no + mistake + novel + 3w.++ uncle with a large number of
Anti-aircraft weapons.
"Order the reconnaissance aircraft to withdraw and bring bombers over. Do not bring bombs and coagulation decoys. Instead, directly replace shrine bombs and smoke bombs. The long-range cannon group is ready to fire. Use red smoke bombs according to the previously scheduled coordinates to provide target guidance for the bombers."
Duan Qirui, commander of the Third Army, said as he looked at the reconnaissance planes circling in vain in the sky.
This heavy snow has indeed caused him a lot of trouble, and with the current season, the snow will not melt within a few months, so he will have to carry out artillery bombardment without aerial reconnaissance and firing, which will
It greatly reduces the effect.
The communications soldier beside him immediately sent the order back to the rear base of Ningguta. The Thunder bombers on standby at the field airport immediately began loading and taking off. At the same time, on the heavy artillery position north of Shuangchengzi, one door after another
The 55mm field heavy cannon was also ready to fire. These heavy artillery with a range of more than 25 kilometers had already targeted the fortresses of the Shuangchengzi fortress group ten days ago with the help of reconnaissance aircraft and maps.
Of course, artillery shells of this caliber are not very lethal to those solid reinforced concrete fortresses. The two sides have had many artillery battles these days. Not only are they unable to effectively destroy the Russian fortresses, they are even vulnerable to their large-caliber artillery.
In retaliation, except for these 155 heavy artillery, it is basically difficult for other artillery to suppress the Russian heavy artillery at range. After all, a large part of their heavy artillery is also made in China.
Duan Qirui's real weapon against the Shuangchengzi Fortress is right next to him. On the concrete gun emplacement that the engineers spent more than 20 days pouring, there are ten giant 540 mm self-propelled fortresses that the soldiers call water tank cannons.
Artillery fire is on standby.
The crane on the rear of the gun used a special grapple to lift a warhead weighing more than one ton and more than two meters long from the ammunition cart modified from the chassis of the tank. It was carefully placed into the bullet chute behind the gun barrel, and then the ejector rod pushed the warhead.
It was pushed into the gun bore, put in the propellant packs installed according to different range standards, and then closed the gun gate. Then the gunner who controlled the artillery began to adjust the pitch angle, and the ten super cannons slowly raised their seemingly disproportionately short cannons.
The barrel is thick, and the muzzle is huge enough for an adult to crawl into, pointing toward the sky.
All they need to do next is wait for the order to fire.
Soon the bombers Duan Qirui needed flew over the Shuangchengzi Fortress, and then following the orders of the artillery commanders on the cannon positions, each of the 155 mm heavy bombers spewed out flames, and the shells roared across the sky.
, eye-catching red smoke exploded in the Russian fortress group nearly 20 kilometers away, and the waiting crew members on the bomber in the sky quickly determined the approximate location of the target by comparing it with the Shuangchengzi fortress plan in their hands, and then
The belly bomb bay opened, and smoke bombs and shrapnel bombs roared down at the same time.
"What are the Chinese going to do?" In a bunker in the Shuangchengzi fortress group, the fortress garrison commander Major General Koloff looked at the rising clouds of smoke outside in astonishment from the narrow observation port. The heavy snow gave him a great shock.
Help, the Chinese bombers that he was most worried about were useless because they could not distinguish the snow-covered bunkers. All he had to worry about was the Chinese heavy artillery, which greatly eased his defense pressure. But he still couldn't
He understood why the first thing that fell was not the expected 280 shell but an inexplicable smoke screen, but he soon remembered the latest information he had just obtained.
"Quick, order everyone to put on gas masks. The Chinese may be using new types of du gas." He reached out and grabbed his gas mask and shouted at the same time. After China joined the war, the French, who no longer had to keep secrets, immediately put theirs away
The news that the shalin poison came from China was not only a reminder to their allies, but also a provocation to the Germans. Of course, this was definitely meaningless. William had no right to care about this issue at this time.
However, Major General Koloff's order was issued a little late. The poisonous gas mixed with the smoke screen had already poured into the fortresses. Before putting on gas masks, there were already a large number of Russian soldiers.
He fell down convulsingly. Fortunately, the facilities were perfect and the vents were quickly closed. The soldiers put on gas masks and soon the damage caused by the poisoned gas was insignificant. Then the poisoned soldiers were carried away one by one, and then the reserve soldiers filled their vacancies.
.
Looking at the Shuangchengzi fortress group that had completely disappeared into the smoke vortex, Duan Qirui nodded with satisfaction. He had no choice but to do this. Although those water tank cannons were powerful, their range was unfortunately too short, even with the largest equipment.
The range of the artillery is only ten kilometers. This range was already very safe ten years ago. But in this era when the maximum range of army artillery is more than twenty kilometers, it is difficult to ensure safety, especially in the Shuangchengzi Fortress Group.
The four 280mm howitzers originally purchased from China were almost the same as water tank guns in terms of range and ballistic characteristics, and could easily cause damage to them, so he had to blindfold the Russians first and then beat them.
"Fire!" He turned to the commander of the heavy artillery brigade who was on standby. The latter immediately gave the order to fire to the waiting artillerymen. Then he saw the ten water tank cannons emitting flames at the same time in an instant, and then felt
The whole earth shook violently, and the explosion of propellant hit the ears of the people around him like a heavy hammer. Even the battle-hardened generals couldn't help but scream, while those huge cannonballs
It roared into the sky at a speed of more than 200 meters per second, and then hit the Russian fortress in the distance with a high trajectory and inertia like a meteor.
At this time, Major General Koloff was feeling depressed about the more than a thousand casualties caused by the shad gas. Although the casualties were not large, this situation of being at the mercy of others was very helpless.
"What's the sound?" He raised his head and looked outside blankly. The strange whistling sound coming from above his head was approaching rapidly. The staff officers around him also looked at each other, but then they felt as if the ground was being hit hard by a huge hammer.
After a while, there was a loud noise from a nearby fortress. It was not an explosion, but something like the collapse of something. Before they could react, there was a sudden explosion like the sky was falling apart, and then in just a dozen or so seconds
Within seconds, the same nine explosions sounded continuously. Although he was not hit, the approaching explosion still caused Koloff's command post to shake violently. There were even cracks in the concrete protective layer above his head. As you can imagine,
You know how terrifying this explosion is.
Koloff and his officers were dumbfounded. They didn't even understand what was exploding. Compared with the explosion of the battleship's main gun shells, it was like a child's firecracker. Except for the explosion of the ammunition depot, they really
They couldn't imagine anything that could be so powerful. Because the smoke obscured their sight, they couldn't see whether the bombs were dropped by the planes overhead. But the bombs dropped by the planes would definitely not be so accurate. The smoke also obscured the planes.
He had no line of sight, and there was more than ten centimeters of snow covering their heads. He didn't know that the water tank cannon on the opposite side was aimed at the coordinates on the map.
Although it is impossible to calibrate fire in this case, fortunately, those artillerymen have extremely accurate layout plans of the Shuangchengzi fortress group. Starting from this fortress group, this is the main reconnaissance target of the Central Intelligence Department. It would be terrible even if you think about it.
It is too easy to obtain such things in the Russian bureaucracy. The Chinese Army General Staff even has the design drawings of these fortresses, let alone the simplest layout drawings.
One of the ten giant shells in the first round of shelling hit the target, and then smashed through the reinforced concrete protection like a wooden board. Then the two hundred kilograms of antimony and antimony charges inside exploded instantly, not only destroying the
The fortress directly turned into a huge crater, and it also directly collapsed two small bunkers adjacent to it.
In fact, using 540 guns to deal with these fortresses is completely overkill. Although Alexeyev built these fortresses according to the standards of defending 305 guns, due to the layers of corruption and embezzlement of the people in charge,
Of course, including his own. In the end, these fortresses may not even be able to defend against 280 shells, and the quality of the Russian fortresses cannot be compared with Sevastopol more than thirty years later. But Yang Feng’s water tank cannon
But it is not inferior to Mustache's Karl Cannon, and is even more powerful, because it knows that there is no need to care too much about penetration. These shells contain more explosives, a full 250 kilograms of antimony, antimony and aluminum.