Chapter 125 Les Miserables

On the Vladimir-Vorensk and Kovelisk fronts, the defensive area of the First Army of the East Asian Expeditionary Force began to prepare for the attack from late October 1916. According to common sense, winter is not the time for the Russian battlefield to attack. After all, the cold in Russia has always been an attacker. The natural enemy, the knee-deep snow, and the cold of winter are by no means what the human body and will can resist.

But even so, at the request of the Russian military headquarters, the expeditionary force agreed to the "winter surprise attack" proposed by the Russian side. After all, there has never been a winter offensive battle on the eastern front from beginning to end. When winter comes, the two sides will coincidentally choose the "no truce" and confront on the front for several months, waiting. Next spring.

However, for the Russian Command, they may care about their own casualties, but they will never consider the casualties of the East Asian Expeditionary Force. In order to use "one victory to boost the morale of Russian fans", they still decided to launch a one with the First, Second and Third Armies of the East Asian Expeditionary Force as the main force. The unexpected surprise.

After careful selection, the Russian base camp selected a place not far from Svenyuha village as the base to launch the attack, where the terrain is convenient for the offensive. As usual, before the attack began, the shelling began.

On January 24, 1917, after three months of preparation, nearly 10,000 cannons and mortars of various calibers were placed in the designated area. Subsequently, more than two million rounds of various shells and mortar shells were shelled one after another for ten days, turning over the vast area of the two trenches dug by the Germans. For the Eastern Front, this is the previous and future shelling. In fact, in preparation for the firepower of this attack, a train full of ammunition on the Siberian Railway and the Central Asian Railway drove from China to Russia, and Britain and France also provided loans of more than 1.5 billion rubles for this unprecedented attack.

On the day of the attack, at the beginning of the fierce bombardment, almost at the first time of unprecedented shelling, the German army took the initiative to give up the first trench, leaving only some surveillance posts. On the third day of the battle, they gave up the second trench and retreated to the third trench.

At the end of the shelling on the tenth day, nearly 100,000 infantry units of the First Army of the Expeditionary Army began to attack, using the French wave attack tactics widely used in Yeast. With the support of various caliber mortars, 16 waves rushed out of the front trenches of the expeditionary force.

For a moment, the endless tea-green crowd rushed like the Qiantang River tide and expanded towards the German position. The tide surged in front of the crooked barbed wire, fiercely hitting everything in front of them. But from the German army, behind the charred trees, from the dark castle and the fortress, followed by rapid and dense bullets and shells. For a while, everything in the world seemed to be shrouded in bullet rain, and the red and green tracks dragged out by the light and ballistics tore through the lead-gray sky in winter.

Occasionally, it was also mixed with the volley of individual artillery units. In this volley, the earth-shaking roar rolled up again, ringing several kilometers away. When the shells fell like raindrops on the wave, the German carefully constructed cross-type machine gun fire point began to shoot crazily.

On the frozen soil, which is nearly two kilometers in diameter and has been bombed by cannonballs, black smoke columns of whirlwind-like shells explode frequently. The burning coal generated by the explosion burned the earth and even melted the frozen snow, while the wave of attack did not stop, with a bayonet. The "Oriental Dwarf" howled and charged forward... The black fireworks of the shell explosion were destroying the earth more and more, leaving a large black mark in the snow. In the explosion, the grenade shrapnel made a harsh roar, like a downpour, flying at the speed of sound between the attacker's limbs, close to The machine gun fire on the ground fired more ruthlessly and crazily.

Blood!

In the seemingly irresistible offensive wave, the blood fog kept waving, and in the howling sound, the splashing blood fog suspended in the air, forming an extremely strange scene in the green wave and black flames... In the wave, a red blood fog rolled forward and churned... De The army's resistance did not show any panic. Everything was like their plan. Machine guns and shells stopped the attackers from approaching the barbed wire. At this time, only the last three of the sixteen seemingly unstoppable waves rolled to the barbed wire, rolling to the front of the barbed wire mesh that was blown up in pieces, crooked to the east and west, and the columns were scorched. It was like a huge wave hitting the embankment. It was smashed and turned into streams and bursts of rain. Come... At noon on this day, more than 60,000 people died tragically on the cold frozen soil not far from the village of Svinja, which was even more tragic than the Battle of the Somme.

But after only two hours, the attack began again.

"Crazy Oriental Devil!"

On the Eastern Front, the East Asian Expeditionary Force has long received such a title. No one will doubt their madness. At 4:00 p.m., on the forward position obtained by the barbed wire of the First Army with a loss of 60,000 people, the 6th Division of the Second Army and nearly 50,000 troops of the 105th Division attacked.

The Sixth Division inserted the first trench from the gap on the left, and on its right wing, the two wings of the 116th Division also attacked. Compared with the previous fierce attack, this attack was very flexible. The offensive tactics were like the rounded attack that the Japanese army was best at. In the 105th Division, it was positive. While launching the attack, the 6th Division and the 1st 15th Division launched an attack on the German defense line from the flank.

In the Japanese-Russian War, the Japanese army relied on this German tactic to defeat the Russian [***] team again and again, and tasted the fruits of victory again and again, but the detour tactic was the capital of Germany to start a family. In front of the German army, the Japanese army's repeated tactics encountered a nail, but even so, They still stubbornly chose the tactics they were most familiar with.

Compared with the failures of the past, under the tenacious attack of the FIRST 16th Division, the new force that had just been transferred from the Mongolian training camp to Russia, they succeeded and occupied the first line of defense that was abandoned by the German army, which seemed to be the most exciting news at the beginning of the New Year in 1917.

Before the change of defense, the 316th Wing was stationed in the town of Sokali, not far from Rudka-Melinskoye Manor, by the Stourhod River. After a journey, the wing dispersed into the abandoned earthen house in the woods the next morning and learned the French-style attack method for four days. Instead of the brigade as a unit, it attacked in half a squadron. The engineers learned the method of cutting the barbed wire at the fastest speed and re-practiced the technique of throwing grenades. . After that, the team moved forward again. For three days, I was in the woods, in the open space between the forests, along the ice and snowy road rutted by gun wheels.

In winter, the mist in Russia was driven by the wind, wiping the pine shoots and floating through the forest, just like an eagle finding a dead beast on the ground. There was light snow in the sky. These soldiers in winter clothes walked numbly like frozen walking corpses, compared with those newcomers. For the 316th Wing, which has been fighting in Russia for a year, especially for the long-and-death veterans in the wing, they clearly know what will happen next.

Walk for a few more days, rest for a few more days, and then prepare to march on the road of death.

How many people will live?

No one cares about death. For the expeditionary force, death seems to be with shadows. For many veterans, they have long mastered some skills to survive on the battlefield. Even the recruits, after coming to the front line with the belief of "doing loyalty to the empire", they only need one battle, and the whole person will be clear. Wake up.

The current "imperial army" has long lost the martial arts of the past. In fact, for these soldiers, nothing is more important than living. They have seen too many deaths. They also know that as an expeditionary force, the meaning of their existence is just "doing what the Russians are never willing to do", or More directly, they are just cannon fodder!

"It's time to be cannon fodder again!"

Sato Shinichi muttered in his heart that the soldiers in the sixth phase of his village were all included in the squadron. The second team is full of people from the same village: Morimoto's two brothers - Morimoto Jiro and Morimoto Saburo, the carpenter's son Tengda Katsu, Asako's face Aqing Yuri, the village head's son Katsuya, etc. Many of them grew up behind Sato's buttocks, but when they saw these fellow villagers, Sato Shinichi of the fourth conscripts But he didn't feel anything to be happy about. He had seen too many deaths. At the beginning, all the people who were recruited with him died on the battlefield.

"Death for the benefit of capitalists!"

Muttering the articles in the underground newspaper in his heart, there is an inexplicable sadness in Zuo Teng Xinyi's heart. Those dignitaries and capitalists, in order to please the Chinese and Westerners, let the Russians squander their lives here. What does this war have to do with the Japanese?

"If I go back to Japan, I will definitely kill the Prime Minister!"

Thinking of what Oda had said in the past that was blown up by a shell and didn't even leave a piece of bone, Sato's heart was full of approval, but he was looking forward to the revolution in his heart.

"No more fighting for the war of imperialism!"

As for the failure of the national political axe, in Sato's view, the national political axe has long been reduced to the lackey of the Chinese people. Maybe if it fails, it will usher in a "new book".

In the early morning of February 3, Shinichi Sato's team drove into the village of Little Polek. At this time, the first brigade of the th and 18th joint team is leaving from there. The soldiers ran out of those crooked houses and lined up in the street. A dark-faced young second lieutenant walked around the front row. He took it out of the military bag, peeled the chocolate candy, and pegged back and forth in the queue. The military coat, which was dragged to the ground and full of dry mud on his big skirt, swung on his body.

Soldiers with live ammunition walked on the left side of the street. The carpenter's son, Teng Tiansheng, walked in the rightmost row of the second row. He looked carefully at his feet to avoid slipping to the ground. Suddenly, someone called him in the distance, and he turned his head and glanced along the ranks not far away.

"Tengtian! Teng Tiansheng..."

A short soldier walked out of the line and ran towards him like a duck. As he ran, he threw the rifle behind his back, but the belt slipped down, and the butt of the gun touched the kettle. The rifle with a bayonet was even half a head higher than him.

"Don't recognize me? Did I forget me?

The short soldier who ran over had a messy beard on his face. After a careful look for a while, Teng Tiansheng easily recognized him as Yoshino, his middle school classmate.

"Where did you come from! Yoshino, I didn't expect to meet my classmates here? ......"

"Isn't it... coming as a soldier?"

"Which team are you in?"

"In the 138th Wing, I really imagined... I didn't expect to meet you."

Tengtian Katsu held Yoshino's dirty little hand tightly, and his whole body suddenly laughed excitedly, and Yoshino also laughed.

"We're going to attack... Look..."

"We also drive there."

"Hey, Teng Tian, don't you know that I met Watanabe before?"

"Ah! Do you mean Watanabe who plays the blue ball?

"That's right, it's him. What a pity!"

"What's going on?"

"This man... is a great man... but his head is a little too high, so when there was a battle last year, he probed his head in the trench and was hit in the head by a bullet!"

As a veteran, Yoshino seems to have taken a low view of death.

"Ah!"

Tengtian was stunned.

"And the one who went with us to listen to the teacher's corner, Yoshimura!"

"I remember him! ...Didn't you hear from him? I heard that he came earlier than us..."

"He is in Siberia..."

Yoshino sighed.

"Or it has arrived in China."

"What's wrong?"

Teng Tiansheng asked again. Obviously, he couldn't figure out what happened here.

"He became a deserter, either to a place in Siberia or to China, and then from there to Nanyang, where the rubber park is said to need a lot of workers. Maybe he is dead now.

Giri walked silently for a while, suddenly looked back at the place where the troops were queuing, and suddenly looked at Teng Tiansheng.

" Take care! My friend!"

He pulled out his hand from Teng Tiansheng's palm and said goodbye.

"Probably, we will never see each other again. Remember, when charging, if there is a crater, hide in when the officer is not paying attention, and don't come out..."

After saying that, Yoshino turned around and left. After he left, Teng Tiansheng rushed out of the team and shouted tremblingly:

"Hey, Yoshino! You were not like this in the past... Remember? You said you were going to the Yasukuni Shrine..."

The shout behind him made Yoshino twist the face that could no longer see a trace of young man's vitality. He looked at his classmates and shouted.

"Yes, the past! In the past, I wanted to do my best for the emperor, but now I let them ruin it! ... Sooner or later, I have to say that I am dead... Remember, you must be alive..."

Then he shouted a few other words, but because his team had gone far away, Teng Tiansheng didn't hear it clearly.

"Ah, isn't this Yoshino? I remember he went to your house in the past!"

Sheng also came from behind and asked Teng Tian Sheng.

"That guy is no longer the Yoshino I knew in the past!"

His lips shivered angrily, and Teng Tiansheng stroked the rifle strap on his shoulder and replied in a muffled voice. He never thought that what was wrong with these people, even... He looked ahead and looked at Sato, the eldest brother he used to respect very much. He also told everyone that no matter what, he had to live. As for the attack, even if he died, the attack was endless, and why did he help those lackeys? Fight the war.

What's wrong with them?

As soon as the troops left the village, they kept encountering wounded soldiers along the way. At first, it was one by one, and then it was in groups of three or five, and then walked forward - it was dense, a group of the same. Several large board cars full of seriously injured numbers swayed slowly. The old horse pulling the cart is terribly thin. The thin back was frayed by the whip, revealing a bone stained with a little fur. The horse dragged the four-wheeled car with great effort, gasping, bowed down, and his sweaty head almost wiped the ground. Sometimes, a horse stops, weakly agitating the deep and thin ribs, drooping its head that looks huge due to its thinness. The beating of the whip forced it to leave the same place, so it shook to this side first, then to the other side, leaving the same place and moving forward. The wounded soldiers grabbed the wooden poles on three sides of the carriage and followed the car.

"Which unit are you from?"

The squadron leader picked a kind-looking person and asked.

"The Sixth Division of the Second Army."

"Did you get hurt today?"

The soldier turned his head and did not answer. All these wounded soldiers looked exactly the same. There was no trace of anger, just like a corpse that would fall at any time. They seemed to have no soul. Looking at them, many soldiers who were new to the battlefield felt the breath of the battlefield for the first time, which was the breath of death.

The troops left the avenue and walked towards the woods about half a kilometer away. These soldiers followed with heavy steps. In the lead-colored sky in the distance, there was a German balloon tied to the ground, like a motionless gray-yellow spot.

"Look, there's something strange hanging there!"

"A big hanging of a Lu Guoren."

"Damn it, it's scouting the army's activities there."

"Do you think it's just fun to hang it so high?"

"Oh, how tall!"

"Do you still need to say that? I'm afraid the shell won't hit either."

"Well, if the Chinese plane comes here, it will definitely kill those balloons..."

Finally, before dusk, they entered the front of the positions captured by tens of thousands of lives of the 6th Division and the 618th Division, but they did not enter the trench, but curled up under a pine tree, and the piercing cold wind poured straight into their necks, making the soldiers keep fighting cold.

No fire! And here, if the fire is fired, it may attract German shells.

"Ah..."

Suddenly, there was a scream. The scream was a frightened and palpitating scream. The frightened people looked at the scream. Next, almost everyone squeezed there, and everyone was stunned by the scene in front of them.

In a small forest open space, the soldiers saw a pile of dead bodies with no end in sight. They lay there side by side, shoulder to shoulder, with different postures. Most of them were just broken arms and limbs, and in some places, the limbs of the corpses were piled up, several meters high. There was an infantryman carrying a gun, with a gas mask on his belt, walking back and forth.

The body is surrounded by footprints and wheels in the snow. On the ground, the flowing blood is mixed with ice and snow to form red ice and snow. The body, a pile of broken arms and limbs, and red ice and snow are constantly hitting every heart.

At this time, the soldiers standing there took off their military caps and walked to the dead body. Finally, their curiosity defeated the trembling and horror in their hearts and carefully looked at the appearance of the dead. Almost all the bodies could no longer distinguish the appearance. Some soldiers even wanted to count the number of corpses, but they found that it was futile to sit like this, because his bodies may have been placed, but the fragments of the limbs were stacked together.

Maybe there are thousands of corpses, maybe tens of thousands. Looking at the pile of corpses that can't be seen at a glance, everyone has such an idea in their hearts. Finally, a military sergeant looked at the body and suddenly sat down listlessly. The two broad eyebrows on the military sergeant's face were melancholy locked.

"If I continue to fight like this, sooner or later, I will definitely be beaten!"

The complaint of the military Cao was exchanged for a silent silence, but the atmosphere in these pine forests changed and became extremely oppressive. Suddenly, an officer ran over. Seeing this scene, he immediately shouted for the soldiers who dared to watch to leave. When he left, almost everyone was thinking about the same question. Question, maybe tomorrow, they will also become one of the corpses, maybe that's a good ending.

It was getting dark, and the superiors just agreed to them to enter the trenches. There is only one person in the trench, full of ice slag, and the ice slag is even red, including some broken limbs, and the air is full of a strong smell of blood. After entering the trench, these soldiers, who were about to be frozen, crouched up their coats, squatted in the trenches to smoke, and said something that no one was interested in. For many of them, the strong smell of blood and the chilling scene in the previous pine forest had affected everyone's mood.

"Remember! You must live..."

Once again, he remembered Yoshino's cry when he left. Teng Tiansheng seemed to understand something. He looked around, and everyone's expressions seemed to have changed. They were silent there, thinking...

(to be continued)