The eighty-year-old Li Haiyang, thin and weak, his face was dull, and when he staggered towards him, I could feel the breath of death approaching him. Sure enough, it was the last time I saw the old man. Li Haiyang, an old man who has been a farmer all his life, sat in the shade of a tree and told me about Lieutenant General Kaul of the Indian army and the Sino-Indian counterattack in 1962.
It was only then that I learned that in the 1962 war of counterattack against India, ten young people from Liangmen Village, Xuezhen, Fuping County, Shaanxi Province, also participated in the war. Among them, the elders I know well are Fan Zhongqiu, Tong Xinshun, Zhou Xuesheng, Deng Zengmin, Han Jingmin, Zhao Taiping, and Li Haiyang. Among them, Zhao Taiping is my grandfather. It never occurred to me that this group of croppers in my hometown was once a fearless warrior in the rain of bullets and bullets.
What I could not have imagined was that the opponent of these old farmers was Lieutenant General Kaul, the commander-in-chief of the Indian army' front. At 7:30 a.m. on October 20, 1962, our army could not bear it any longer and was forced to launch a full-line counterattack against the Indian army. In this counterattack operation, the 2nd Battalion of the 33rd Regiment of the 11th Division, which they were in, directly attacked Huanglong, attacked De Rangzong, entered the headquarters of the elite 4th Division of the Indian Army, and almost captured Lieutenant General Kaul, the commander-in-chief of the Indian front.
On the opposite side of this war, India sent a group of young generals to lead elite troops to fight. The representative figures of this group of young generals in the Indian army were Lieutenant General Kaul, commander-in-chief of the front line, Major General Pattania, commander of the 4th Division, and Khoshir, commander of the 62nd Brigade. Brigadier General Singh, Brigadier General Dalvi, Commander of the 7th Brigade. All of the senior generals of the Indian Army have been baptized in World War II, have had extraordinary experiences, and have made outstanding military achievements. New Delhi, however, could not have predicted that the fate of this group of young men would be rapidly reversed.
On the first day of the war, Darvi, commander of the Indian 7th Brigade, was captured.
At dawn on October 20, our border troops launched an artillery battle against the Indian troops who invaded the Kojlang area, and a counterattack on India's self-defense began. While our army was shelling the Indian positions in the front, it launched an attack on the Indian army from the left and right flanks to remove the dark bunkers painstakingly operated by the Indian army. After three hours of fierce fighting, the left and right wings of the Indian army were successfully cut off, and then a battalion was sent to carry out the tail cutting task, making the Indian 7th Brigade a turtle in an urn. A battalion of mine, which was responsible for cutting the tail, attacked the brigade headquarters of the 7th Indian Brigade.
On the first day of the war, after 12 hours of fierce fighting, our army completely annihilated the 7th Brigade of the Indian Army. Brigadier General Daver of the 7th Brigade of the Indian Army, a hero of the Indian Army in World War II, was eaten in the first battle. After the total army was defeated, Dalvi fled with his henchmen into the primeval forest. Soon after, the brigadier general was being captured by our soldiers while roasting corn on a cob in the jungle. After being captured, Darvi complained: "You are fighting irregularly! Before I could wash myself, your soldiers attacked my command post from behind. ”
A few days later, the captured General Dalvi was sent to Beijing. The defeated general lived in the mainland for more than 7 months. The next day, early summer, he was repatriated to New Delhi.
Brigade Commander Hoshir of the 62nd Indian Brigade. Singh, who changed into soldier clothes to escape, was killed by our border guards.
Among the young and strong factions of the Indian army, Hoshir. Singh's fame is great. Back in the period of World War II, Hoshir. Singh fought against the Japanese army on the battlefields of Burma and Thailand and became a national hero in India. On November 12, about 500 people from four companies of Guo Zhixian, deputy commander of the Shannan Military Subdistrict, crossed the canyon and dense forest after three days and three nights of detours, and made a surprise attack on the Indian 62nd Brigade stationed at Xishan Pass.
Guo Zhixian's 500 people appeared when Hoshir. Brigadier Singh roasted the fire at the command post. Hosier. After losing the battle, Singer resisted and led the remnants to try to open a passage to escape south. However, Guo Zhixian's troops could not easily let go, and the two sides launched a fierce white-knife battle. After a white-knife battle, the Indian 62nd Brigade was completely crushed by our army. Singer changed into the soldier's attire and fled in a hurry with several guards. Hosier. Singh attempted to flee along the path to Bhutan and back to India. As a result, the Indian general's luck was so bad that he was about to run out of the border when he was shot and killed by my border guards.
A few days later, two hygienists from the 2nd Battalion of the 32nd Regiment of the 11th Division, escorting Indian prisoners, found Hoshir. Singh's long corpse. The general died a tragic death, with three bullets in the chest. After our hygienists ripped open the soldier's clothes he was wearing, they found the rank of Indian brigadier general on his shirt. Hosier. Singh was killed, becoming the highest-ranking enemy general killed in the self-defense counterattack against India.
Major General Pattania, commander of the Indian 4th Division, hid in the primeval forest for five days and five nights after the defeat, and was eventually rescued by a helicopter sent from New Delhi.
At 00:00 on November 18, two regiments of the 11th Division of our army interspersed in a roundabout direction and launched a blockade battle against the 4th Division of the Indian Army stationed in Rangjong, Germany. Derang Dzong is a strategic location defended by the 65th Brigade of the Indian 4th Division, which is also the headquarters of the Indian 4th Division. Officers and men of the 2nd Battalion of the 33rd Regiment of our 11th Division made a surprise attack on De rangzong and annihilated the headquarters of the 4th Division of the Indian Army.
Major General Pattania, commander of the Indian 4th Division, fled into the primeval forest with several guards from the division headquarters. At night they hid in a tree cave and looked around for ways to escape after dawn. For five days and five nights, the wolf-like Major General Pattania was hungry, with a yellow face and thin muscles, and a bleak road ahead. However, he still escaped by chance. On November 28, 1962, a Reuters reporter disclosed: "Major General Pattania was safely carried by helicopter to Tispur (India) last night, and the same helicopter also transported 3 injured Indians... The general walked in the jungle of the mountains for 5 days, without food or water, and was found after the helicopter searched intensely. ”
The escape of Lieutenant General Kaul, the supreme commander of the Indian front, became a pain in the hearts of veterans. For this reason, the ten soldiers in our village have long felt very guilty, and they always can't lift their heads in front of the officers and soldiers of their friendly neighbors. Soon, they chose to retire from the army, and the failure to capture Kaul became the lifelong hidden pain of this group of croppers.
The officers and men of the 2nd Battalion of the 33rd Regiment of our 11th Division surprised Andrjeongjong, and their goal was not to annihilate the headquarters of the 4th Division of the Indian Army, but to capture Lieutenant General Kaul, the commander-in-chief of the Indian Front. Before the battle began, they received information that Lieutenant General Caul was at the headquarters of the 4th Division of Derjendzong. However, when they attacked Dergentzong, they did not find the shadow of Lieutenant General Kaul.
Years later, they learned that a few days before the start of the war, Lieutenant General Kaul had a premonition that the momentum was not right, so they used the old illness as an excuse to break away from the wrong, quietly left the Derang Dzong, and fled back to India.
Lieutenant General Caul
After the war, Lieutenant General Kaul resigned from the military.
Since then, he has been snubbed in India for a long time, no one mentions his past exploits, and many people reprimand him for being a horse ass, who became a lieutenant general commander by nepotism, and lost battles on the battlefield. After resigning, Kaul, cold and warm self-aware, fortunately, with the help of a banker friend, has since changed to finance. However, Kaul was a soldier after all, and he did not do a good job after changing careers. It was not long, so I simply resigned again. In this way, Lieutenant General Kaul completely disappeared from people's field of vision. Kaul died of illness in New Delhi in 1972, just a few days before his 60th birthday.
……
The soldiers in my hometown who attacked the Dejang Sect, and the group of croppers who retired to their hometowns, regretted that they had not been able to capture Lieutenant General Kaul, the commander-in-chief of the Indian Army's front line. In 2019, veteran Li Haiyang died of illness. Elder Li Haiyang was the last of the ten veterans in my hometown who participated in the war.
I still remember what the old man said before he died: "After the armistice at the end of November 1962, we felt that the forest of de Rang Dzong in the early winter was very warm. We took off our backpacks, took off our cotton coats and pants, and walked quietly in the big forest. There are many streams, the yaks are strong, and there are all kinds of flowers blooming on the ground... Unconsciously, it went to the twilight. I've lived so long that I've never seen such a good place! ”
The snow in the Himalayas is always white.