Thunder Strikes Back

Chapter 141 The Snake That Broke The Backbone
At the same time, the artillery plane of the No. 221 vehicle began to slightly adjust the elevation angle. This is a necessary link in a series of complex operations of the automatic loading machine. This link will temporarily destroy the aiming, but it does not prevent the gunner from searching with the line of sight. Next target.

When Tasim finished aiming for the second time, there was a crisp sound of the breech breech locking, and the second round of armor-piercing rounds was also loaded.At this time, the enemy had not had time to find No. 221. This time, the gunner had no patience to wait for the commander's correction order, and fired the shell directly.This static versus dynamic aiming is no problem for him.The second shot hit the front of the T72's turret, obviously piercing through, because the instant air wave sent the commander and the commander's roof flying together, and the fate of the crew members inside could be imagined.

At the same time, the commander Yahini was quickly looking for the first vehicle, preparing to complete an overtaking shot. When his peripheral sight swept across, he saw that the T72 tank in the middle had started to burn. stand up.A wounded crew member was coming out of the turret. Siani had heard before that the new long-stem armor-piercing warheads were not easy to set the tank on fire unless the tank's internal protection system was not working, but it is obviously not the case now. When this kind of thing happened; when he found the first tank in the eyepiece again, the tank was turning on the spot. The leading T72 has apparently discovered No. 72, and its muzzle has been aimed at No. 221.

"Start the engine! Reverse at high speed!"

The Panzer 221 rumbled into action, then began to reverse.The sudden action destroyed the opponent's gunner's judgment on the shooting advance (the angular velocity at stop is naturally zero). The fire from the opponent's muzzle flashed in front of Yahini's eyes, but it missed.Yahini breathed a sigh of relief and had already aimed the crosshairs at the opponent, just waiting for the cannon mount to rotate into place.The high-speed rotation of the turret had some negative effects on the loading machine. The motor for the automatic shell extraction has been idling, and the shell extraction action has not been completed.After the gun rests, the shell casings from the previous round fall into the shell casing collector, and then are thrown out of the turret from the shell ejection window.During this period, the enemy's muzzle was always facing Yahini one kilometer away, and made slight adjustments. Yahini knew that the second shell after the opponent's gunner manually corrected it usually had a very high hit rate, but Now the initiative is in your own hands.

"Stop!" he yelled.

With the loud brake sound after the driver pulled the handbrake, No. 221 stopped shaking, but in the surrounding mirror, the target did not shake too much.

With a bang, the action of pushing the bullet lever was completed, and the allowable design logo in the peripheral vision mirror lit up. Yahini fired in time without waiting for a moment.A shot hits the front of the opponent's turret, coming roughly from its right-hand infrared illuminator.The enemy's ongoing S-shaped evasive and backward movements came to an abrupt end.Immediately afterwards, Yahini saw the pilot open the hatch, get out from there, and roll to the ground.Then there was the gunner, who jumped out of the top of the turret onto the sand, waited a while, and didn't see the commander, probably dead.

Within 1 minute, three damaged T3S tanks were parked crookedly on the desert.One of them was burning wildly, and the other two lay across the side of the road with their hatches wide open and lifeless. .

Sergeant Yahini didn't want to stop the attack yet. He knew that this group of enemies must be more than that. Their formation was too scattered, leaving him a good chance to attack each one.

The sergeant couldn't help but feel refreshed at the thought of the remaining Indian tanks huddled together in a dilemma to the east.In his mind, he quickly formulated a more daring plan, to continue to search eastward at a distance from the road, and wait for the opportunity to bite the invader again.

As expected by the sergeant, a tank column of the 16th Infantry Division of the Indian Army was cowering on both sides of the road to the east.

A few minutes ago, the commander of this column could not find any tanks in the first platoon on the radio.The sound of explosions coming from the front from time to time (a destroyed T72 has been exploding after burning) and the flames rising from the west hinted that the platoon had encountered an accident, which completely overwhelmed the confidence of the follow-up vehicles to continue to move forward in the dark.Since these tanks were ordered to search and advance along the road, fire reconnaissance was naturally a risk, and retreating back meant strict military laws.What's more terrible is that they cannot leave the road without authorization to start formation.Yahini, on the other hand, can move freely in the desert.

"I saw them, like a snake with a broken spine. They didn't realize we had only one tank. Slow down, keep the same direction, turret pointing at 2 o'clock," Yahini said.

Immediately the gunner saw the target indicated by the commander in the aiming sight, and in the triple search eyepiece on the right he found the first blurred T72 in the distance, which was standing there, if not for its gun The mouth is slanted out of the horizon pointing upwards, almost impossible to see.

"How far do you think?" the driver asked.

"About 2.5 kilometers. Let's measure it with a laser rangefinder."

"Wait a minute, let's detour to their side first." The commander said, Yahini heard that India has equipped some tanks with laser warning equipment, so he didn't want to measure the distance too early to avoid exposing the target, almost certain of these You won't find such a sleek device on the old T72S, but you can't go wrong with being careful.

Yahini's mental plan was to take the No. 211 tank to an inconspicuous flank north of the long snake formation under the nose of the opponent, and then secretly turned 90 degrees to align the front armor with their right armor.The driver and the gunner quickly understood the plan. Such a risky plan would undoubtedly make them all sweat, but the commander's choice may be right. The burning enemy tank after one kilometer is likely to kill the enemy tank. The enemy's attention is drawn to their 12 o'clock direction, and now is an excellent time to shift positions.

The T72S hidden behind gradually appeared in the thermal imager. Yahini found that the number of enemies was far higher than he expected. Take an average), and now he finds that there are far more than this number of tanks on the road, there are at least 3 tanks, and he can't see the ones further behind.This made him not dare to go deep rashly, so he could only revise the original plan. He secretly stopped the No. 5 at the 9 o'clock position of the first tank, then turned the car body 3 degrees, and then asked the gunner to start from the 221 o'clock position. From near to far, they shot at the enemy tanks next to the road one by one. After firing the remaining 30 rounds of armor-piercing shells, they immediately retreated to the depths of the desert.In this way, you can give full play to your front armor thickness advantage to fight against the weak flanks of enemy tanks. Of course, the first vehicle closest to No. 7 must be knocked out as soon as possible.

Tasim slowly manipulated the cannon to aim at the turret of the first tank. He pressed the laser rangefinder button to fire a laser pulse. The reading showed 1200 meters. This distance is really close enough, but the opponent is obviously still unaware of it. In the middle, because the turret of the tank is pointing straight ahead.While the gunner was aiming, Yahini turned the commander's perimeter sight and began to observe the second car. He found that the second car seemed a little special, so a new plan flashed in his mind again.

"Corporal Tahim, don't shoot yet."

"What's the matter with you? Are you still allowed to be fired?" The gunner complained, he had had enough of the car commander's endless tricks.

"Look at the top of the turret of the second car, there is an extra antenna."

"So what?" Tasim asked vigilantly. He didn't know what Yahini was thinking, but he definitely wanted to veto his aim.Sure enough, the turret rotated, and the previous aiming was destroyed by Yahini.

"Don't complain, look! It's a Commander, and there must be a company commander in it, maybe a battalion commander. We're going to make money."

"Damn, what about the order of attack?"

"You shoot at it first, make sure you kill it and leave the enemy leaderless, and I decide the second target," Yahini said.Breaking the order was bound to cause trouble for the shooter, but it was a great temptation to drive the insatiable commander to a new decision.

"Okay, just do as you say."

Tasim moved the scope helplessly, and the gun mount immediately followed the line of sight and rotated. The second car looked no different from other S-type T72s, except that there was indeed an extra whip antenna on the turret.Tahim hoped that his commander would be lucky every time. He didn't expect there to be a lieutenant colonel inside, but there should at least be a lieutenant inside, not some sergeant who likes to point fingers.The diesel engine made a monotonous noise while idling, and the gunner narrowed his eyes, and set the aiming line precisely on the target.

"Aim at the location of the No. 2 storage box. I guess the officer is right behind. Well, he must be using the radio to contact his superior."

"Okay, look at the No. 2 reserve box, what else do you want to say?"

"Wait, I have a good idea, that's right, we need to replace the armor-piercing ammunition, and I need to kill all the people in it [-]%." ​​The commander said.

"...Okay, you can say whatever you want." The gunner numbly pressed the unload button. This step can only be done semi-automatically, and it will destroy the aiming.When the gun muzzle was raised and the breech unlocking mechanism was opened, Corporal Tasim had to leave the aiming position, and went to the back cabin to take away a heavy armor-piercing shell that had faded out, and reloaded it into the vacant space of the rotary automatic bomb feeder. Then return to the original position and wait for the bomb feeder to rotate into place, and push a split-type armor-piercing bomb into the barrel.The whole process wasted about a minute and a half.

When the crosshair re-aimed at the T72K, the tank seemed to be aware of it. It suddenly shook, and a large amount of thick smoke was ejected from the exhaust pipe on one side. It seemed that it was about to take action.

"What are you waiting for? Fire!" the driver shouted.

Amidst the loud sound of gunfire, the No. 221 tank also shook, and then the automatic loader began to work hard again.The gunner was not moved by all this, he stared at the tank in the steady image sight, watching the large white smoke coming out from the joint between the turret and the ground, he knew that the blow would penetrate the tank again. up.

(End of this chapter)