Thunder Strikes Back

Chapter 557
He Fan reversed the car, waiting for the loader to load an anti-infantry ammunition, so that it could be sent into the enemy's fortress; an order from his superior asking him to retreat sounded in the earphones, the order was unequivocal and demanded immediate execution.

Obviously, the superiors have decided to form a new defense line east of Leh instead of occupying Leh immediately; Leh, as the last stronghold east of Kargil, is actually the northern military region of India, the end of the entire combat readiness road system, if lost, It is very likely to stimulate Meneam to recklessly shrink the entire defense line and give up this protrusion, which is quite unfavorable for the next step of annihilating the enemy.At this moment, we must give the enemy a little confidence, and perhaps allow them to continue to support.

He Fan ordered the rest of the troops to retreat, and after leaving the 1st company and commanding the platoon, his tank remained at the end of the platoon. His style of commanding a battalion was actually the same as when he commanded a company.

The tank group retreated in an orderly manner, and only the No. 04 tank remained in place, burning.He Fan has seen tanks being hit countless times, and he knows that it is impossible for the insiders to survive if they are burned like this.

With a bang, the shell was pushed into the barrel.He Fan surpassed the gunner and aimed himself. He hoped that the shells would hit the lower edge of the enemy's firing holes as much as possible, so that they could explode at a more internal position and cause greater damage.He pressed the button and watched as the shell hit its target and the bunker erupted in flames from the inside out.

"Son of a bitch, let you know how powerful it is!"

In this attack, he lost 4 chariots, and the other 3 were just faulty, and the personnel were saved, and the No. 04 in front of him was completely damaged, and it was the old car set he brought back from Assam, which really made him Some distressed.

He immediately marked the location of the enemy who had sneaked up just now, hoping that his superiors could immediately launch a strike to completely destroy the gun, lest it find a chance to move. These heavy guns often have a tracked chassis and have a certain degree of maneuverability.

In fact, the second grenade he fired exploded inside the half-sealed fortress, killing a large number of enemy artillery personnel.At that time, the gunners of this 180mm cannon were in a state of excitement. The Indian soldiers were united and wanted to finish loading immediately and kill another tank, but they forgot that the loading speed of the tank was far faster than them. After only leaving a hole in the ceiling of the fort, the Indian soldiers in the fort thought it was time to counterattack again, and they all ran to the shooting holes to observe. As a result, the grenades of the Chinese tanks arrived first.The artillery shell caused serious damage in the almost confined space, and the strength of a platoon was reimbursed immediately, and the gun was also damaged to a considerable extent.

He Fan organized the tank battalion to retreat slowly, but the Indian troops who reacted behind did not seize the opportunity to fight back.There was no large-scale fire cover for the retreat this time, but the large-caliber grenades continued to hit, curbing the enemy's desire to rush to the ground and continue to resist.

It was within ten hours when He Fan's troops drove straight in.China's ground troops also quickly broke through the long line of defense from Pangong Lake to Shyok River.He Fan's sneak crossing raid opened a breach and caused the enemy engineers to leave the pontoon bridge and escape. This allowed the Chinese army to directly take over several pontoon bridges on the Shyok River. One of the large pontoon bridges can be passed by trucks. .This greatly accelerated the advancing speed of the Chinese army. Within a few hours, a large number of troops and heavy equipment had crossed the river, cutting off the retreat of a large number of slower-moving enemies.

Before the heavy snow fell, the Chinese army had already occupied a depth of 1 to 2 kilometers west of the Shyok River. The enemy in this area gave up several important commanding heights when the rear road was about to be copied.Most of these commanding heights that are easily abandoned by the enemy have built simple roads and helicopter landing platforms that can pass vehicles.This allowed the Chinese army to drive the off-road vehicle-mounted 82mm mortars used on the front line directly to the top.The Mi-26 helicopter, on the other hand, decomposes the large-caliber light howitzer and then forms an artillery position in the valley at a lower altitude. These new 155mm 39-caliber howitzers on the battlefield use a large number of titanium alloy parts, with a total weight of less than 3.5mm. Tons can be directly transported by helicopter in the plains, and can be deployed in a relatively safe and disassembled way in areas with higher altitudes, and the speed is not slow. Skilled artillery can assemble the components and complete launch preparations in a short period of time.The newly deployed rapid-fire mortars can already fire at the fleeing Indian troops in the surrounding valleys, while the light howitzers can hit the area west of Leh, enough to suppress the enemy's 122mm howitzers.

Of course, these tactical-level firepower is far inferior to the previous campaign-level firepower attack, but relying on its high rate of fire, it was also very impressive for a while, and the overwhelming Indian troops dared not probe.The retreat of He Fan's troops was extremely smooth.They will retreat a certain distance according to the principle, and wait for the helicopter to resupply in the designated area.At this moment, a large number of Indian troops are racing against time, hoping to retreat to Leh smoothly before the cold night falls.After the Chinese artillery occupied the high ground, it posed a great threat to their escape.

Within a few hours, the field hospital in Leh was filled with all kinds of wounded who came back from the front-line vehicles. Among them, the most severe frostbite patients urgently needed to be sent to the large hospital behind by helicopter.According to the latest report obtained by Pasade, there are as many as 500 people with frostbite injuries, twice as many as those with firearm injuries, and hundreds of people with self-harm injuries. It seems that the main reason for the collapse of the frontline troops is psychological and extreme cold weather. , not the enemy's weapon.

Meneam's plan to use the depth of the mountains to retreat step by step and actively resist, did not receive the expected results under the double blow of Chinese tanks suddenly crossing the river and the extreme cold weather.Although his front-line troops were supported by military police and containment teams, they were still unable to quickly reorganize from the chaos of retreat and rejoin the battle. The speed at which they abandoned their positions was definitely no better than any Indian troops in the Assam campaign. .

With most of the communications lost, Admiral Pasade sat in Leh, patiently waiting for the end of the enemy's assault.In the end, the enemy was unable to break through the position and retreated. He realized that the main target of the enemy's attack should be in Leh. This is different from the strategy in 1962, but the intention of plotting the Kashmir region should be the same.Of course, after the Chinese army demonstrated its firepower, the continuous assault capability shown by the Chinese army did not appear to be very strong.He calculated on the map the approximate itinerary of the tank troops after they broke through the Shyok River. It does have a speed advantage that ordinary mountain troops do not have, but the pace of action of the infantry is much slower. In the end, the tanks hit the front of the bunker group, and their offensive This is obviously because the enemy ignored the will of the Leh troops to resist and thought they could capture the fortress on the move.

He thought that if Meneam's defense plan was improved, it should be more effective. After all, the enemy's tank force was limited, and India's mountain tank force would soon take shape.

The admiral knew that it was not worth much to stay here anymore. The enemy still needed time to breathe and stockpile for the next attack, so he had to rush back immediately to study a new plan.So, he rushed to the airport with Chief of Staff Anuroni.

After landing, the admiral and the Polaris helicopter pilot agreed on a retreat time, which is a strategy to prevent the enemy from intercepting the message.

After arriving at the airport, I saw that there were still many bandages on the side of the runway. Soldiers on crutches were waiting there in the heavy snow, and some of the more seriously injured were lying on stretchers shivering, although some people were on the side of the runway. Many gasoline barrels were lit, but the warmth they could provide was still limited.

Finally, a Chinook helicopter with a red cross on it barely landed in the heavy snow, and the gendarmes fired shots into the sky to stop the crowd from rushing forward.The medical soldiers had to decide the order of evacuation according to the degree of injury, but some seriously injured lying on stretchers were found to have frozen to death when they were lifted.The long queue is slowly moving forward, but the number of people the helicopter can accommodate is limited. In such a high-altitude area, the carrying capacity of the helicopter will inevitably be greatly reduced. It is impossible to accommodate too many people, and most people will still be helpless. Waiting for a glimmer of life in the heavy snow.

Pasade shook his head, wrapped his clothes tightly and ran towards the end of the runway. The Polaris appeared on time at the position where it landed in the morning.He and the chief of staff quickly boarded the plane and flew southwest.

The artillery shells of the Chinese army are still falling sporadically. Judging from the sound of explosions, they seem to have smuggled some new gadgets up again.But the shelling was not close to the airport and the field hospital, which showed that the enemy would not injure the sick. Of course, having said that, on the other hand, it also showed that they were watching here at all times.

Lieutenant General Meneyam boarded the plane with excitement at the Safdjong Airport in New Delhi. He will fly directly from New Delhi to Jammu instead of Srinagar. As a compromise, his command cannot retreat to further areas. However, Jammu is far away from the war zone and is not as easy to be attacked by the enemy air force as Srinagar.

For him, the high-level meeting in New Delhi was a major victory.After all, Singer is not a fool. He gave most of the good equipment to the northern military region, including various artillery and urgently needed tank units. According to his configuration plan, the units composed of these new weapons will be assigned to the rear The area is waiting for the enemy to launch an offensive from Fortress or from Aksai Chin along the layers of mountains, and he will slowly organize the defense line, waiting for the enemy's attack to lose stamina under the dense defense.

On the plane, he learned that the enemy's sudden attack and the forward troops of the 8th Mountain Division were defeated; the enemy launched an offensive while he was away, which was completely expected, and it was nothing to him to lose some places .According to the information gathered so far, the enemy crossed the Shyok River impatiently without waiting for the river to freeze. It seems that they deliberately wanted to demonstrate the power of the mountain tank troops.

This tank unit even hit the vicinity of Leh, but was repelled by the waiting troops.In any case, the new front appears to be holding firm.It can be seen that the enemy's attack ability in such an extremely cold climate is limited. Even though they can always conjure up some new weapons from nowhere like a magic trick, they still cannot take down the city in one fell swoop after all. The whole situation is still evolving according to their own script middle.

The last report was sent by the Chief of General Staff, Pasade himself, to the Ministry of Defense for forwarding to the Chancellery, with a copy to the Northern Command.

In the report, Pasad spoke highly of Leh's defense system and command system. Of course, it is not surprising that this set of reinforced concrete things was created by himself. The general raised some opinions on Meneam's deployment , but generally speaking, they are appreciative and think that its idea of ​​using space to consume the enemy's offensive momentum is correct.On the judgment of the direction of the enemy's upcoming attack, Pasad did not make a clear statement, but he agreed to continue to increase troops to the north, and in the direction of Pakistan, he suggested adding a part of the surveillance force, thinking that the army would be directly under the 50th Airborne Brigade and the 81st The strategic transport aircraft squadron (equipped with C17) is stationed in Amritsar and is ready to support operations in the Punjab region at any time.It seems that Pasad's idea is to stand at the height of the chief of staff and take the overall situation into consideration. He did not randomly fabricate an enemy that might launch an attack from Punjab and directly hit New Delhi in order to compete for equipment like Spanga did. , a completely counterintuitive reason.

"If the Indian Army is full of sensible people like Admiral Pasad, how can it be today?"

Meneam thought to himself. "It would be even better if I got the 50th Airborne Brigade too."

Inside Husab's underground headquarters.Lin Huaisheng and Major General Zhou Yaohua are making final revisions to the offensive plan.The final strength of this offensive will be 15, and the number of tanks will reach 1500. However, most of the troops belong to Pakistan, and a large part of them have not fought any victories since the start of the war. .Even the more elite Pakistani 1st and 6th Armored Divisions have problems such as too many recruits, too much equipment, low morale, and difficulties in providing support.

However, this battle plan, as early as the beginning of its formulation, allowed certain variables. Even if the Punjab's surprise soldiers did not fight well, they could still play a diversionary role. Then the troops from Aksai Chin would turn from diversion to the main attack , the goal is the same as New Delhi, but the difficulty will be much greater.Of course, no matter how you fight, it is more meaningful than the plan formulated by the Pakistani side, which is completely based on the enemy's scenario, to recapture Fort Fort.Meneam deployed a large number of troops near the Fort, just waiting for the Pakistani army to throw themselves into the net, so that he could organize a second counterattack.But now, his troops will not be effective for a long time after the start of the campaign.

The spearhead of the attack was carried out by the Chinese Armored Brigade commanded by Wang Zhenbei, which was only slightly smaller than the Armored Division.As a flanking force, Pakistan's 1st Armored Division is on its right flank, while the 6th Armored Division is on its left flank. The terrain here is relatively flat and open, which is indeed more conducive to the attack of tank troops than the mountains of Aksai Chin.

"The enemy retreated very deeply, and there was only one regiment left in Gujarand. The situation was better than expected. It is indeed a good opportunity," Zhou Yaohua said while lying on the map and shaking his head, "It's a pity that the morale of the Pakistani army is not good. They are still thinking about how to retreat, not how to win the battle."

"Have you ever heard a saying that a group of sheep led by a lion can eat a group of wolves." Lin Huaisheng said with his hands behind his back, looking confident.

"Well, that's what I said." Zhou Yaohua nodded in agreement, although there seemed to be something wrong with what Lin Huaisheng said, but that's what war is really about.

"There is also Yahini's army, which can be used in any critical location and plays a very critical role. They have been stationed here before, and they know the local terrain better than Wang Zhenbei."

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(End of this chapter)