Soldiers of the company were on duty at the lookout post. Photo by Zhao Chen
On the northwestern border of the motherland, in the valley between the Alatau Mountains and the Baluk Mountains, there is a large passage from China to Central Asia, on which the Alashankou is located. The Alashankou Border Defense Company of the Xinjiang Military Region, known as the "first outpost of the wind," is stationed here.
On 8 September, this reporter and his entourage set off from Bole City to the Alashankou Border Defense Company to visit the border guards who were "dancing with the wind."
Among the rolling hills, the new barracks with blue roofs and yellow walls stand out. Both the surroundings of the barracks and the modern facilities inside the barracks are refreshing – wide and smooth asphalt roads replace potholes in the "washboard road"; The transmission "cement pile" that can resist high winds replaces the previous "black pole"; The windows in the house are bright, and the living facilities such as LCD TV, computer, and air conditioning are all available.
Yamaguchi is also a wind pass. The strong winds brought by the cold Siberian air have become the protagonists of Alashankou, with winds above magnitude 8 blowing for an average of more than 160 days a year.
The strong wind brought difficulties to the work and life of officers and soldiers: when the wind was strong, it was very difficult to go to the post, and they could only climb up with their hands and feet; On the patrol road, the flying snow and gravel were swept by the wind, and it became difficult to even breathe...
Officers and soldiers told reporters that the watchpost tower is the commanding height of the station and the place where the wind is strongest. Nowadays, in order to ensure the safety of sentries, the sentry tower has been changed from an open fence to a closed exterior wall, and a closed passage for the sentry tower has been specially designed, which greatly reduces the safety risk of officers and soldiers going up and down the sentry when the wind blows.
The strong winds brought inconvenience to the work and life of officers and men, and many officers and soldiers suffered from trachoma and rhinitis, and their eyes were red and itchy when they were sick, and they kept crying and sneezing.
Sergeant Zheng Fuqiang told reporters that the windproof sand mirrors and windproof sand neck sleeves now distributed can effectively protect them, and the drugs for symptomatic treatment are also complete, and the number of sick officers and soldiers has been greatly reduced.
"The wind is like a song, the responsibility is like a mountain", on the hillside behind the lookout post, the eight large characters made by the soldiers with stones are particularly eye-catching. On Hero Mountain next to the lookout post, a statue of Wu Guangsheng, the first head of the border station at Alashankou, stands in the wind.
In August 1962, Wu Guangsheng led 17 officers and men, armed with one map, three camels, and one marching pot, to walk for dozens of hours from Bole to Alashankou, where they began a hard life on the deserted and wind-ravaged Gobi Desert.
In 2001, the old station manager Wu Guangsheng died in his hometown in Jiangsu. Before he died, he told his family to bring his ashes back to Alashankou and scatter them on the border line where he haunted. The company commander told reporters.
"The wind is blowing, and I won't move!" Following the example of their revolutionary predecessors, officers and men have been more careless and harder, taking root in, dedicating, and meritorious border defense.
- No matter how strong the wind is, the training standard cannot be lowered at all.
"When the recruits were training, I had excellent results in the 3,000-meter run, and when I came to the company's first assessment, I happened to catch the wind, and I failed." Sergeant Cheng Liangxiong told reporters that in order to overcome the strong wind, he tied sandbags to his calves and worked hard to train his lower limb strength; Use a backpack rope to pull the squad leader to run, simulating the drag brought by the wind; Climb the top again and again to enhance endurance and explosiveness... His training performance improved by leaps and bounds, and he soon got excellent again.
"Actually, there are a lot of tricks to training in the wind. For example, when facing the wind, you must adjust your posture and point sideways, and you can't breathe heavily..." Now he has become the backbone of training, and he has a lot of experience in talking about organizing training in the wind.
During the interview, the reporter saw that the company had built an indoor training ground, and the outpost squad had also built an underground training room, and the improvement of training conditions had provided a strong guarantee for the company's military training.
- No matter how strong the wind is, the patrol cannot fall for a single step.
One winter, Sergeant Chen and five of his comrades went on foot to patrol the boundary marker, when they suddenly encountered a category 10 wind and heavy snow. The radio and Beidou handsets quickly drained their batteries due to the sudden drop in temperature.
"The wind was blowing heavily in the snow, completely obscuring the view. We can only move step by step. The cold mask was blown through by the wind and snow, and when he returned to the company, half of his face facing the wind lost consciousness. Chen Weibing said, no matter how hard and tired he was, the moment he saw the boundary marker, everyone felt that it was worth it.
Over the years, in order to complete the task of patrolling on duty, the officers and men of the company have explored a variety of wind-resistant formations.
"Patrolling in high winds, forming a formation all the way, the distance between people should be shortened from 5 meters to 1 meter, and the latter person should tightly pull the belt of the previous one; The wind blows for a long time, the first person is prone to tinnitus and dizziness, everyone should alternately stand at the front of the team, against the wind..." Saying that, the soldiers took out a backpack rope from their backpacks and showed it to reporters, which is a necessary equipment for their patrols, and when the wind is too strong, they must use backpack ropes to tie them together.
——No matter how strong the wind is, the defense of the country cannot be less than a day.
In three months, Yan Xiaofei, a first-class sergeant who has been holding Alashankou for 16 years, will retire and return home.
"He never asked for it, but recently took the initiative to ask me for 3 requests." The company commander said emotionally, "First, I will be on duty at the lookout post for another month; The second is to stand at the national gate outpost for another 1 month; The third is to work in the company for another month as usual. He said that he could not lose a day in the border of the country, and after working for the past three months, he would never have the opportunity to hear the wind whistling in the mountain pass. ”
Walking down the watchtower, a colorful map of China on the stone wall comes into view, with two sentences engraved on both sides of the map: "The motherland is in the heart" and "The hometown is in the dream."
At that moment, the reporter was in awe: generations of border people have erected immortal monuments in the wind and snow of Alashankou.
▲Published on September 22, the second page of "Jiefangjun Bao"
Author|Jiefangjun Daily reporters Fei Shiting, Qian Zongyang, Li Lei
Source丨PLA Daily, Learning Corps (ID: xuexijuntuan)
Executive Producer丨Ou Can, Hou Dawei, Editor丨Liu Jianwei, Yan Shan, Chen Li, Editors丨Li Chen, Zhou Zhou