George Bush’S Great America [EN]: Chapter 336

George W. Bush’s Great America – Episode 335

< Episode 335 >

“Are, are these crazy bastards launching a surprise attack in this downpour?”

“Enemy! Enemy!”

Surprise attacks in the rain were common throughout history, but this downpour was on another level. Landslides occasionally occurred below the mountain, and the terrain was changing in real-time. The rainfall was recording 95mm per hour.

The frequent landslides were due to the constant rain and the fact that the few trees that had been there were burned away, leaving nothing to hold the soil. Moreover, despite being in a relatively open area, the heavy rain made it difficult to see even 100 meters ahead with the naked eye.

So, the tents were useless. The tents themselves were fine against heavy rain unless it was hail, but the 20cm drainage ditches had long since stopped working.

Keeping the troops in the tents was based on the judgment that no one in their right mind would start a fight in this insane weather, not to screw over the dispatched soldiers who were already tired.

As a reconnaissance unit, they couldn’t retreat just because of some rain, so they reluctantly accepted the higher-ups’ decision to endure. And even if they were attacked, they expected a firepower battle by the enemy’s artillery, not a surprise infantry assault.

They wondered if some lost rebels were causing trouble, but that didn’t seem to be the case. The enemy wasn’t fully identified, but they kept emerging from below the base.

Even though the reconnaissance team members were surprised, they weren’t flustered. Because they were carefully selected and had experienced many such attacks, they immediately put on their helmets and grabbed their guns from the tents. However, despite being used to surprise attacks, they were demoralized because this was their first operation in such insane heavy rain.

“Shit, these commie bastards! Can’t a guy get a little rest!”

“Damn, now we won’t even have tents. Did they plan this?”

Strictly speaking, the rebels should have been distinguished from the communists, but the soldiers didn’t differentiate and called them all ‘Chinks’ or ‘Commies.’ Normally, they would have been advised against it, but since it was wartime, the higher-ups’ advice was ignored, and no one on the ground enforced it. No one wanted to get shot for telling them to watch their mouths.

The officers, except for the platoon leaders, went into the command post for a countermeasure meeting. Originally, they should have left the command post immediately because it was the easiest target for artillery fire and a dilapidated building that would collapse with a few shells, but fortunately, there was no shelling yet, and the noisy 999k radio only reported a surprise attack by enemy infantry.

“Where the hell are they coming from?”

“There was a gentle path on the right side of the base, and it seems they are coming up that way.”

Actually, they were planning to go down that road when the rain stopped. What’s easy for us is also easy for the enemy. But they couldn’t be sure if they really came up that way. That’s because the terrain had changed a lot due to landslides.

So, in reality, they didn’t know which way they came up.

“What’s the scale?”

“I don’t know. We’re engaging cautiously. But if this continues, we’ll run out of ammunition. In this weather, we can’t move vehicles or even airdrop supplies. Even if it were clear, as you know, we don’t have complete air superiority here.”

The rain was getting heavier as time went on.

“How the hell did they know about this place and launch a surprise attack?”

That was the problem. If they knew and sent them on purpose, this wouldn’t be the end. The judgment that there would be no fire support from the enemy was because they couldn’t figure out the coordinates due to the weather, but just because fire support is impossible doesn’t mean a human wave attack is impossible.

However, the human wave attacks they had seen so far were not subtle. They had suffered too much to ignore the fact that only a small number of troops were sent because it was just a reconnaissance battalion.

“I don’t know. Could it just be a coincidence? Or was it for reconnaissance?”

“Maybe the rear guard can’t come up?”

That was somewhat correct.

If the purpose was reconnaissance, it wouldn’t make sense to mount such a large-scale offensive. In fact, they had telegraphed a request for reinforcements to the main force, but they only received orders to hold out, not to retreat. They only said they would send reinforcements.

“It’ll take at least two days for reinforcements to arrive in this weather. Even if the rain stops, all the roads will be ruined, and if we keep this up, we’ll all die in the meantime. What did the commie bastards say?”

“They say they’ll advance from the bottom of the mountain range.”

“Damn it. The commies’ army is better than our army. At least we’re alive.”

“This is their land, after all. In reality, it seems they’re not so much reinforcements as they are trying to exploit the gap in our defenses.”

While they were talking, an explosion was heard. It was too loud to be a grenade, too small to be a shell fired from a field gun or howitzer, and too few to be a bombing.

“Mortar? Is that the sound of a mortar right now?”

Normally, they would have been more curious as to why the mortar hadn’t gone off yet. That’s right. Normally, the sound of mortars or field guns should have been heard before the sound of gunfire.

The reasons why it wasn’t were, first, this insane weather, and second, the ground was so weak that landslides were happening as often as meals just from the heavy rain.

In this situation, pounding the enemy lines with bombs would only mean killing all the allied infantry advancing from below.

If they could accurately hit all the mortar shells in the enemy’s lines without missing a single one, it wouldn’t matter, but in this weather, that was impossible. Hitting the enemy’s lines was not impossible, but hitting all of them was impossible itself.

And that’s what actually happened.

“Are they idiots?”

As a result of constantly pounding with mortar shells and grenades, the landslides that would have occurred naturally anyway happened earlier and on a larger scale, and the rebels who were coming up were swept away by the fury of the earth dragon sleeping in the mountains. Even if they avoided the earth and sand, the result was the same. Commanders who would launch an offensive in a situation where most of the troops were destroyed could only be seen in World War I.

With that, the unexpected offensive was over.

“Hey! Company Commander Im! Report the damage!”

“We’re assessing it. According to the information we have so far, the 2nd Platoon Leader of the 2nd Company and all of his squad members were killed during the engagement.”

“Damn it. Were they camped on the far left? It looks like they died coming out.”

“We don’t know the exact engagement situation yet.”

In any case, as the soldiers screamed, holes were actually made in the tents during the engagement, and by the time this short surprise attack was over, the casualties were countable, but the tents were all torn to shreds, which was an unfortunate event.

“Shouldn’t we retreat? We’re all going to die from hypothermia or infectious diseases.”

The supply officer of the headquarters company looked at the battalion commander with a bewildered expression.

“Well, um… First, cram them into the intact tents as much as possible. And there’s that 24-man tent that we didn’t use because we had this building. Try to do something with that. We can’t go back like this.”

“This building. Can we keep using this base? Artillery fire might come soon, so we can’t just stay still.”

“We’ve tried to radio about 50 times, and we’re lucky if we get an answer once. Do you think they’ve properly figured out the coordinates?”

“…We can figure them out.”

No matter how many times they telegraphed the situation to the division, the answer was always the same.

“Damn it. The higher-ups are just telling us to go deeper. I’m going crazy.”

“We need to interrogate the prisoners to find out. We have no answer if we continue like this.”

Of course, a large number of prisoners were secured. The Chinese language was already noisy, but with so many mouths, it felt like their ears were going to be torn apart.

They couldn’t gag each of them, so the soldiers controlling the prisoners pointed their bayonets and fired into the air, responding with the few Chinese words they knew, “?嘴 [Shut up].”

“What the hell are those Chinks saying?”

The reconnaissance battalion was a carefully selected force among the dispatched troops. The only problem was that most of the carefully selected troops were originally from the reconnaissance battalion, but in any case, they had to include a soldier who could speak Chinese to send on the dispatch, so as a result, there was always one in the platoon, so they could clearly understand what the prisoners were saying.

“Oh, I understand. They say we’re all dead because more are coming from behind? Well, there’s some abusive language too.”

“You son of a bitch.”

A soldier who hadn’t calmed down from the battle kicked the prisoner in the stomach, and the prisoner groaned and sat down. The other prisoners who saw this tried to rush at him, but the prisoners bound by ropes were helpless.

“Hey, hey! Don’t hit them. You’ll go to jail. This kind of thing won’t end with 15 days. It’s prison, prison.”

“No, who’s watching this right now? And who’s going to report it? Oh, that’s ridiculous. It’s not like I killed him. Why would I go to prison for this?”

“I don’t know, shit. They catch you like ghosts. It’s directly related to the officers’ promotions, so they even make up beatings. You have to be quiet.”

“Damn it. I thought it was wrong when they talked about war crimes in textbooks, but I think I know why they happen. War is just fucked up. The dying comrades are just friends. Friends. That friend died. But I can’t even get revenge, so I can’t stay sane.”

“Oh, you volunteered, so why are you talking so much?”

“Damn it. Who knew I would die and kill in this crazy environment? There’s nowhere to relieve stress. What am I supposed to do? When I eat this cold and hard special ration, I can’t tell if we’re third-world mercenaries or officially dispatched. That special ration that I only ate the sausage from and threw away after starving for half a day during training. Back then, I hated seeing the combat rations that the other units were eating. Now it’s even more fucked up.”

As if he had been waiting for it, he poured out his complaints like a waterfall, half of which were curses. The block-shaped compressed flour and grain flour tasted like chalk mixed with concrete, and the chocolate bar tasted like rubber mixed with honey. The dried filefish smelled disgusting, but it was still dried filefish, so it had a chewy taste, and Spam or sausage were the only things that his mouth accepted, but other than that, it was not something a person could eat. The latter three were not one composition but were divided into separate types 1-3.

“Hey, sing a military song or something.”

“This shit. The Crusade of Justice is bullshit. I didn’t like that fucking military song since I was a recruit.”

While he was complaining, the 2nd Platoon Leader of the 1st Company, who was in charge of the prisoners, frowned and got up from his seat.