As everyone knows, in the War to Resist US Aggression and Aid Korea, the Volunteer Army faced the "United Nations Army" headed by the US military and was at a serious disadvantage in terms of weapons, equipment, and logistical supplies. In the head-on confrontation between the enemy and us, even if the volunteers won the victory, they often had to pay a considerable price of casualties.
However, in the Tieyuan Blockade Battle in June 1951, there was such an incredible example of a company of volunteers fighting with the enemy for six days and six nights, not only withstood the US army's onslaughts one after another, firmly defended its own position, but also annihilated more than 800 enemy troops, setting a surprising battle loss ratio, which is quite rare in the entire military history.
What conditions or tactics did the volunteers rely on to defeat the strong enemy? This is indeed a strange example of war worthy of exploration by researchers and enthusiasts of military history.
At that time, the 8th Company of the 3rd Battalion of the 563rd Regiment of the 188th Division of the 63rd Army of the Volunteer Army was ordered to hold three highlands south of the Iron Plains, which were named by our army as 200 Highlands, 255.1 Highlands and Unnamed Highlands.
The company commander of this company, named Guo Enzhi, immediately led the whole company into the designated position braving heavy rain after receiving the task, and deployed the troops and firepower.
At dawn the next day, the famous ace unit, the US First Marine Division, pounced on The 200 Heights in a murderous rage.
When the enemy's artillery bombardment ended and the infantry launched an attack, Guo Enzhi let the second platoon fire on the front first to attract the attention of the enemy, but let the platoon take advantage of the terrain and detour back to the enemy's flank to launch a surprise attack.
This tactic of combining virtual and real and attacking on both sides really worked, and the enemy was attacked head-on and was quickly defeated. In the first contest, more than 70 US troops were killed and wounded, and the whole company became more and more confident the more it fought.
After a while, Guo Enzhi suddenly felt that something was wrong: there was no movement on the enemy's side, and the battlefield was surprisingly silent, were they playing some tricks?
He looked closely, and sure enough, he found that the enemy abandoned the 200 highlands and turned his head to the nameless highlands and quietly touched them.
Guo Enzhi immediately mobilized several light and heavy machine guns and 60 guns to block the enemy's way to the nameless highlands.
In the first round of the contest, the U.S. army did not judge the firepower of the volunteers, and unexpectedly, as soon as they approached the nameless heights, they were suddenly counterattacked by the volunteers, and their positions were suddenly chaotic, and after losing a lot of corpses on the position, they retreated again.
The soldiers were cheering, but Guo Enzhi calmly gave the order: "Immediately withdraw to the anti-gun hole, smoke the pot smoke, and rest for a while!" ”
A new soldier asked puzzledly, "Company commander, we just beat up the enemy, what are we going to do with it?" ”
"It is precisely because they have hurt the enemy that they will definitely fire and take revenge on us!" Guo Enzhi made this judgment based on his own experience.
Sure enough, as soon as the warriors withdrew their letters suspiciously, the enemy's shells slammed into them row after row. Everyone smoked cigarettes and praised happily: "The company commander is also too godly!" ”
The enemy destroyed the volunteer fortifications and sent a company of infantry to the heights.
Guo Enzhi looked at the timing and made full use of the condescending advantages to attack the enemy in three ways, and after a fierce battle, he annihilated more than 90 enemies.
The enemy was frightened and did not dare to move all afternoon, until dusk, and sent a team of people to dig fortifications at the foot of the mountain 200 meters away.
Guo Enzhi had his own countermeasures, so that the 60th Artillery Squad fired a few shells at the foot of the mountain, and then completely bombarded the enemy and ran away.
After nightfall, there was no sound under the mountain, and Guo Enzhi decided to take advantage of the enemy's fear of night combat and melee combat to teach them a harsh lesson and prevent them from resting in peace.
The three platoon leaders took the initiative to ask for help, and with a dozen or so elite soldiers to form a "night raid team", using the cover of night, they quietly touched the vicinity of the enemy's camp at the bottom of the mountain.
They quietly solved the enemy sentries, found that most of them were sleeping soundly, and immediately swept with grenades and submachine guns, and many American troops were killed in their sleep.
Before the enemy could react, the three platoon commanders, in accordance with Guo Enzhi's orders, had already led the team members to quickly withdraw from the battle, making the enemy angry and stunned.
At dawn the next day, the Americans began shelling again, but as soon as they switched to infantry mode, they did not work and were beaten back by the second platoon again.
Seeing that the strong attack was fruitless, the U.S. army came up with another trick - let an officer hold a loudspeaker, shout at the high ground in broken Chinese, and continue shelling if he said that he would not surrender until the entire mountain was flattened.
Guo Enzhi was keenly aware that this was most likely expected by the enemy, and they used artillery fire to bombard us only with the artillery hole, hoping to use a law to send people to sneak attack.
Hmm, you think you've caught our law, I'm going to give you an irregularity!
Guo Enzhi turned back to the cadres of the squad and said, "This time we will not withdraw, we are all hidden in the position, and we are waiting for the rabbit!" ”
It wasn't long before the enemy sent out a company and sneakily touched the hill.
When they rushed to less than 30 meters away from the front of the volunteer army, Guo Enzhi gave an order, and the soldiers suddenly appeared and swept down the mountain with various firearms, repelling all the enemies who were caught off guard.
In the next few days of fighting, the whole company, led by Guo Enzhi, used flexible tactics to disintegrate more than a dozen U.S. charges.
At that time, the biggest difficulty of the whole company was the lack of ammunition, but Guo Enzhi also took quite targeted measures, and after repelling the enemy every time, he sent fighters to pick up weapons and ammunition on the battlefield at the first time. In other words, they almost relied on the continuous "support" of the enemy to solve the most realistic problems of the operation.
On the night of the sixth day, according to the requirements of the previous superiors, the Eighth Company had completed the task of blocking the attack and could move to the second-line position.
At this time, when the company still had the last bit of ammunition left, Guo Enzhi still did not forget to use tactics to deal with the enemy, and he ordered everyone not to open fire again, but to push the stones on the mountain down to deal with the enemy.
The enemy saw the stones rolling down, judging that the volunteers had run out of ammunition and attacked the mountain with impunity.
When the enemy approached the position, Guo Enzhi jumped up with the soldiers and hit the last bullet and grenade in the face, so that the unsuspecting enemy was killed and injured in large numbers.
While the enemy was only concerned with fleeing for his life, Guo Enzhi led the whole company along the route planned in advance and calmly moved to the second line.
Through the statistics of our army and the comparison of the battle loss reports issued by the US army, we can see that this battle actually cost them a heavy price of more than 800 people being annihilated, and the 100 commanders and fighters of the Eighth Company, due to their tactical confrontation and making full use of the terrain advantage, only 16 brave soldiers were killed. Such a ratio of war losses was extremely rare throughout the Korean War and in the history of our army.
After the war, the leading organs of the Volunteer Army awarded this heroic company a collective special merit, and Guo Enzhi himself was awarded the special merit and the honor of "first-class hero".