During the Korean War, the most brilliant victory of the Volunteer Army was undoubtedly the second battle, and even the mainstream of AMERICAN historians believed that the Battle of Cheongcheon River (that is, the second battle) was the peak of China's military victory in the Korean War.
The prelude to the second campaign and the peak of victory in the Korean War was undoubtedly the Battle of the Cheongcheon River.
At the end of November 1950, the Western Front Corps of the Volunteer Army dispatched all the lines and launched a three-sided attack on the enemy, and the "United Nations Army" was shaken in its entirety and retreated south across the Qingchuan River.
In order to complete the task of pursuing and annihilating the enemy, the volunteer army decided to send a force to cross the Cheongcheon River.
The Cheongcheon River is a large river in northern Korea, and the surface of the river is very wide.
At the end of November in North Korea, it was the middle of winter, and the Cold Sea Breeze had frozen the northern part of the peninsula into a large ice lump on both sides of the Korean Peninsula, and the Cheongcheon River had begun to freeze.
On the evening of November 25, the sky was clear with snow, and the third battalion of the 359th Regiment of the 120th Division of the 40th Army of the Volunteer Army rushed down the valley, stepping on the ice stream, and rushing toward the riverbank. They were ordered to serve as the left-wing advance battalion for crossing the river, opening the way for the follow-up troops to cross the river smoothly.
The troops climbed over the cliffs in the dark night, and the white gas exhaled by the warriors formed a long white mist belt above the team, rising upwards, and then condensed into frost, hanging on the hats, backs, and mouths of the warriors, one by one, like a piece of plain yarn.
I was almost at the riverside, and I heard the fierce gunfire in front of me. The battalion commander knew that it was seven along with the enemy along the river that was continuing to fight.
The troops followed the sound of the gunfire faster, approaching the riverside, the sound of the gunfire thinned down, and the nervous nerves of the battalion commander relaxed. He judged that the Seventh Company had completed its task of destroying the enemy in Jiangbei.
The Seventh Company did clear the obstacles along the river, and the three battalions successfully arrived at the riverbank.
Under the dim moon of the artillery fire, the three battalion commanders inspected the river surface by the river.
The northwest wind on the river was whistling, and the soldiers had just sweated in the rush march, and they were immediately blown through by the biting cold wind, and they felt cold on their bodies, and some of the little warriors' lips were frozen and their teeth were clattering.
Under the cold wind, the beach tens of meters wide is covered with snow, and the river is a few meters wide and ice, but in the center of the river, it is still a torrent.
By the moonlight, you can see the white ice bank on the other side of the river and the mountains in the distance.
Behind the mountain, a series of red lights flashed unceasingly, and after the flash, the shells whizzed over the heads of the soldiers of the three battalions, and one shell after another exploded over the Qingchuan River and exploded in the distance behind the three battalions.
The battalion commander gave the order to prepare to cross the river, and the soldiers quickly and covertly moved toward the riverbank, some of which had already descended into the river.
Suddenly, several shells fell on the riverbank and on the river directly in front of it, and the dirt and ice water that were lifted fell on the volunteer soldiers. Apparently, the enemy on the other side had spotted the volunteer troops that were about to cross the river.
"Hurry up and cross the river!"
At the command of the battalion commander, the soldiers lined up and poured into the gushing ice water.
Due to the urgency of the situation and the full armament, the soldiers did not have time to take off their clothes and jumped into the ice water in cotton clothes.
The chest-deep river water soon soaked the cotton clothes, fell so hard that people could not move their legs, and ice ballast was poured into the body along the neck, but the warriors completely ignored it and swam desperately to the opposite shore.
At this time, the enemy's artillery fire became more fierce, and the shells continued to explode in the river, setting off a tall column of water.
The enemy's machine guns also screamed wildly, spewing out tongues of fire, and the bullets hit the river surface, flooding with white ripples.
Some of the warriors fell into the river and never got up again. The volunteer soldiers in the middle of the river raised their weapons and returned fire on the opposite bank, speeding up their rush to the opposite bank.
"Comrades, rushing across the river is victory!" The cadres and fighters encouraged each other and shouted.
The shells slammed down with ice cubes, and the warriors rushed straight to the opposite shore, without any hesitation.
As soon as they approached the shore, the warriors rolled towards the shore like a huge wave in the river.
The enemy formed a wall of fire on the shore, and the shells constantly exploded around the soldiers, and the bullets rained down like raindrops, and the soldiers ignored them completely.
The soldier's cotton clothes were soaked by the river, and after landing on the shore, the two trouser legs were frozen into ice barrels after a while, and it was very difficult to run.
The warriors simply squatted down, folded their trouser legs in two, and in the cold wind, half-amputated their legs, launched a charge at the enemy, like a tiger descending the mountain, towards the enemy's tanks and the light of the enemy's artillery.
Because the gun had just been soaked in the river, after the cold wind blew on the shore, it immediately froze a layer of freezing, and many guns froze, and the bolt could not be opened.
At this time, a soldier was in a hurry and shouted: "Pour urine on the gun!" ”
This trick solved the problem, and the warriors fired fiercely at the enemy, and a row of grenades was thrown at the enemy.
The enemy by the river was so frightened by this courageous action that they fled in all directions in a panic.
On the mountainside, the enemy relied on favorable terrain, and a machine gun blocked the way up the hill with heavy fire.
Two squads rushed twice, both of which were knocked down and suppressed in a small ditch on the side of the road at the foot of the mountain.
"Six-zero guns, immediately knock out this fire point!" The company commander ordered.
The artillery squad immediately set up its guns and prepared to shoot at the enemy. However, the shell box was also frozen. In his anxiety, the deputy squad leader reached out and touched a stone and smashed open the shell box.
The gunners, with experience, aimed at the enemy's machine guns in the dark, and the third shell finally destroyed this point of fire.
The infantry entered the enemy's position at the moment when the enemy's fire was muted.
The fighting by the river became more and more intense, burning everywhere, and the fires illuminated the night sky, smoke billowed in thick smoke, guns shook the valley, and shells and tracer shells cut through the night sky. The enemy was running around in the light of the fire, the vehicles were squeezed forward and backward, and they were in a mess, some cars flipped into ditches, and the enemy who was smashed was crying, and the enemy was beaten to pieces.
The volunteer sharp knife battalion broke through the Cheongcheon River in one fell swoop, which meant that the "life-saving line" of the "United Nations Army" was cut off by our army, blocking the retreat route of the US army in Xinxingdong, and making an important contribution to the great victory of the second battle.