The movie "Chosin Lake", which was released on National Day this year based on the real campaign to resist US aggression and aid Korea, exploded, triggering patriotic enthusiasm among the whole people during this special National Day holiday, and the Battle of Chosin Lake was indeed a crucial battle in the Campaign to Resist US Aggression and Aid Korea, and the Chinese Volunteer Army also sounded the clarion call for counterattack from the Battle of Chosin Lake.
In addition to the Battle of Chosin Lake, there were many arduous and even tragic battles to resist the United States and aid Korea, which may not be as big as the Battle of Chosin Lake, but they are also very famous. The Battle of Shangganling is one of the more famous battles in the Campaign to Resist US Aggression and Aid Korea, and the Battle of Shangganling is not very prominent in the Battle to Resist US Aggression and Aid Korea in comparison with the scale and number of enemies annihilated, but the Battle of Shangganling was the most arduous and tragic battle fought by our army after entering the Korean battlefield.
In the Battle of Shangganling, the volunteer soldiers not only had to fight against the well-equipped American troops, but also had to fight in a difficult environment, and the volunteer soldiers in the tunnels had no water to drink and no food to eat, and in the case of a serious shortage of materials, they were stunned to block countless attacks of the American army.
In the face of an incomparably difficult combat environment such as that of soldiers on the front line, the logistics units in the rear defense also tried to cross the heavy and difficult times and withstand the guns and bullets of many enemy blockade lines, risking their lives to send supplies to the soldiers in Shangganling, and the whole army of the volunteer army did everything in its power to ensure the material supplies in Shangganling. The entire second division of the Volunteer Army poured out all the logistical supplies to support the Shangganling tactics, and this was the key to our victory in this campaign.
In October 1950, the Chinese volunteer army crossed the Yalu River with great vigor and vigor and launched a fierce battle with the United States-dominated European and American coalition forces in Korea, and the Campaign to Resist US Aggression and Aid Korea was officially launched, starting from Chosin Lake Chinese The People's Volunteer Army blew a clarion call for counteroffensive, and drove the invincible US coalition army south of the 38th Parallel, during which it experienced five fierce battles.
The Battle of Chosin Lake was the most important battle in the second campaign, and it was also the most representative battle, which Chinese the first time that the People's Volunteer Army annihilated the us coalition army, and this battle also played the style of the Chinese People's Volunteer Army.
After the end of the five major battles, the United Nations army suffered heavy casualties and the US army suffered a huge blow, they finally recognized the facts, coupled with the high enthusiasm for anti-war at home and abroad at that time, and the National Strategic Deployment of the United States at that time, which was mainly in Europe, they realized that they were deeply involved in the Korean War, which was extremely unfavorable to them, so the US military began to change its strategic initiative and proposed peace talks at the negotiating table.
Although we have gradually adapted to the way Chinese of fighting with the US army and have weapons and equipment provided by the Soviet Union in our hands, the Chinese and Dprk coalition forces are still at a disadvantage in terms of equipment, and the sacrifices of the five major battles are also very tragic, and the volunteers need a certain amount of time to replenish their combat effectiveness.
At the same time, after a period of fighting, the DPRK army also understood that with our current equipment, it is very difficult to annihilate the enemy's superior corps on a large scale in a short period of time. Therefore, China and the United States temporarily stopped large-scale fighting and prepared to compete at the negotiating table.
But the situation in the Korean battlefield at that time was far from clear, and it was undoubtedly very difficult to get the arrogant Americans to admit their defeat, so the multinational coalition army held peace talks with the volunteers at the negotiating table, while mobilizing weapons and troops from the country, and strived to defeat the volunteers on the battlefield and win the initiative in the negotiations.
Thus began a very dramatic scene on the battlefield of the War to Resist US Aggression and Aid Korea, in which the representatives of China and the United States negotiated at the negotiating table while privately fighting but never stopped, although there was no large-scale campaign, but there were no small-scale raids. After each battle, the volunteers will use their victories to fight for more voice at the negotiating table, and the Battle of Shangganling was born in this context.
Before the Battle of Shangganling, China and the U.S. army reached an impasse over the release of prisoners, and the Chinese people supported lonely and immediately decided to launch an autumn tactical counterattack operation, and the Chinese and North Korean troops began to carry out campaign-scale operations on various positions on the 38th Line on September 18, 1952, and achieved very good results. The offensive was initiated by Van Vleet, commander of the united nations ground forces in South Korea, who kept an eye on the engagement between the UNITED Forces and the Volunteers on the 38th Line.
After summarizing the tactical strategy of replacing defense with a small offensive, VanVleet quickly approved his battle plan to his superiors, and the multinational coalition army at that time was already frustrated in the counterattack operation of the volunteer army, and a large number of weapons and equipment mobilized by the multinational coalition were in place, and it was imminent to carry out a counterattack. VanVleet then led the U.S. Ninth Army on a vigorous offensive against Kinhua, which the U.S. military called Operation Showdown.
At that time, vanVleet was arrogant and believed that the multinational coalition at this time had accumulated enough strength to grasp the absolute initiative in the subsequent counterattack, and even after the multinational coalition opened all the military forces today, it was about to end the war, and VanVleet thought that they would be able to achieve a huge victory in this counterattack and thus end this protracted negotiation.
The most important battlefield of the US showdown operation is the Jinhua Battlefield, and there is a highland north of Jinhua City, where the highland is the only way for the US army to attack Jinhua City, and it can launch a large-scale siege war, and retreat can occupy the high ground to give the volunteer army a head-on attack, this highland is called Sniper Ridge by the US army, the volunteer army calls it 537.7 highland, of course, it has another very loud name Shangganling.
At that time, Shangganling was under the control of the volunteer army, and VanVleet understood the importance of this high ground, so he proposed to drive the volunteer army away from Sniper Ridge within five days, and the association would launch a large-scale offensive on Jinhua City.
It has to be said that according to the general battle VanVleet's estimate is very reasonable, after all, in the previous campaign, although the US army was fiercely resisted by the North Korean army, but in the end the US army still won the victory with their equipment advantage, five days to take the Sniper Ridge or VanVleet is more conservative, in the existing equipment situation VanVleet believes that the US offensive is far smoother than he expected.
It is true that in the Battle of Shangganling at that time, there was a huge gap between the military strength of the enemy and us, and it was mentioned in the campaign report of Van Vleet that the US military used 16 artillery battalions with a total of 280 long-range artillery, more than 200 fighters and countless sorties of bombers, and since the beginning of the campaign, the US military has been bombing on the Shangganling positions.
Indeed, after the Battle of Shangganling began, the US army began to bombard Shangganling indiscriminately, and the US army tilted hundreds of thousands of shells on the Shangganling position in one day. This is not counting the U.S. bombers taking off and dropping bombs back and forth, the first day was covered by artillery fire for the whole day, according to the veterans who participated in the war at that time, the hills of Shangganling were flattened by three meters.
This is definitely not a little exaggerated in it, according to incomplete statistics at that time the U.S. army fired more than 4200 tons of shells in the Battle of Shangganling, placed in the city can also be a flat city, Van Vliet abacus jingle, but do not know that all this is in the calculation of the volunteer army.
The volunteer army knew from the beginning of the garrison in Shangganling that this must be the main point of the US army's attack, so at the beginning of the garrison, it was better to dig the tunnels, calling them tunnels rather than caves, and the volunteers excavated more than 30 meters from the top of the Shangganling Mountains, and each tunnel had a soil thickness of more than 30 meters, so even if the mountain was flattened by 3 meters, the damage to the volunteers was very little.
Volunteer veterans said that the BOMBING of the US army in addition to feeling the shock, the other has no impact at all, such tunnels are still affected by the anti-Japanese period of tunnel warfare, speaking of playing tunnel warfare our Eighth Route Army is the ancestor of the old ancestors, in the tunnel left a vent, toilet and weapons reserve room and the like are readily available, there is no need to risk being bombed to go outside.
Therefore, when the US bombing stopped launching the attack, it was found that countless volunteer soldiers appeared out of thin air on the top of the hill, and they were very heavy casualties with high and low, and the US troops suffered heavy casualties in the first few days of the battle, and the shell losses were also very severe, but the attack on Ganling did not make any progress, and it was obvious that VanVleet's plan to end the offensive in five days failed. Speaking of this, many small partners may question, if the bombing of the US troops in the Shangganling Campaign did not take advantage, then why is it said that Shangganling was arduous and tragic?
In the previous article, we introduced to you that Shangganling is a position in the forefront of the soldiers, he is located here alone, so logistics and supplies are very difficult, after the start of the Battle of Shangganling, the ATTACK of the US army is very fierce, and the guns and ammunition stored in Shangganling are very wide, and the logistics supply is particularly important at this time. At that time, the army stationed in Shangganling was from 5 regiments of the 15th Army and 4 regiments of the 12th Army attacking 9 infantry regiments, and qin Jiwei, the commander of the 15th Army, realized the importance of logistical supplies from the moment the battle began.
On the first day of the campaign, Qin Jiwei, commander of the 15th Army, ordered the Logistics Department to pay close attention to transporting materials and ammunition for Shangganling, and the Logistics Headquarters of the Volunteer Army also coordinated with the second division, adding the strength of 2 supply stations and 2 corps hospitals to the original logistics supply, and went all out to do a good job in logistics support for Shangganling. After the end of the Shangganling Campaign, Commander Qin Jiwei once lamented that what we wanted, the superiors would give us whatever, and the logistics supply in place was the basis for victory in the Shangganling Campaign.
After the battle began for a period of time, the logistics support of Shangganling was very in place, and the volunteer soldiers were also full of combat effectiveness, but after the repeated unsuccessful attacks of the US army on the Battle of Shangganling, the strategic focus was shifted to cutting off the logistics supply of the volunteer army, which was also the biggest weakness of the tunnel warfare, although the defense was impregnable, but once the opponent blocked the opening of the cave and cut off the supply, the volunteers in the tunnel became rootless duckweed, and in the absence of ammunition supply, the volunteer army had the heart to fight and could not kill the enemy. What's more, in the case of lack of water and food, there is no need for the US army to attack but only a tight seal, and after a period of time, the volunteer army will lose its combat effectiveness due to hunger and thirst.
In this way, in the Battle of Shangganling, a blockade and anti-blockade campaign was launched, and after the strategic change, the enemy's aircraft artillery no longer stood on the Ganling position, but bombarded the supply line of 4 kilometers after the day and night bombing lineup, because Shangganling is a highland, and transportation can only rely on the soldiers of the Logistics Department to resist, and the transportation itself is very physically demanding, and now it has to face intensive bombing, but also to cross the heavy blockade line of the US military organization, so every transportation is a life of nine deaths.
Moreover, the volunteer army on the Shangganling front was still in combat, and the ammunition consumption was very serious, and often the consumption of a soldier needed to use two people or two people to transport to ensure it, which made the logistics more difficult. When the Battle of Shangganling was in the middle and late stages, in the face of the logistics supply delivery task with high casualties, Commander Qin Jiwei even formulated such a standard, whoever could transport a basket of apples would be awarded the second class merit. Don't think this is very strange, at that time in the Shangganling position was seriously lacking in food and water, apples can not only replenish the nutrition of the soldiers, but also bring water is the most scarce material on the front line.
And this lifeline of transportation is full of dangers, often a large number of people go up or down, and everyone is wounded, so it is really not an exaggeration to give a second-class merit to such a life-saving act, but even such a second-class merit is rarely completed, and most of the volunteer soldiers who transport supplies have left their lives on that lifeline.
Countless movies and stories have told the hardships of the Battle of Shangganling, there is no water and no food in the tunnel, the volunteer soldiers have cracked their lips and a squad of soldiers are divided into a small glass of water, etc. These deeds still appear today in the stories that are praised by everyone, imagine how difficult it was for the volunteer soldiers in the tunnels.
But in such a difficult environment, none of us, the respectable volunteer soldiers, complained, nor did anyone compete for supplies, they helped each other in the tunnels and gave in to each other, although many of them died of hunger and dehydration, but in the end they held their positions.
Moreover, under such a harsh environment, the Shangganling Campaign also produced countless combat heroes like Huang Jiguang and Sun Zhanyuan, and the facts can prove that the Chinese volunteer army cannot fight, and the Chinese people cannot be defeated.
It has been 71 years since the War to Resist US Aggression and Aid Korea this year, but the spirit brought to us by the heroes of those ancestors is still singing, and it is precisely because of the sacrifice of these great people that we have a happy life today, just like the widely discussed line in the movie "Chosin Lake", the volunteer army fights for the next generation not to fight, and the sacrifice of the volunteer army is for our better life.