by James Rosone
Walking out of the fortified positions, the men of Second Platoon moved to the edges of the bunkers and climbed up the grass-covered sides to gain a better view of what lay around them. As he looked back toward the runway, Price could see the burning wreck of at least one C-17. Further out, he spotted a gravy train of aircraft lining up for their approach.
“These guys must be bringing in our light armored vehicles and other heavy equipment,” Price reasoned.
Parachutes were still descending over the runway with each pass of one of the cargo planes. Swarms of soldiers on the ground were busy unwrapping a pair of JLTV vehicles, which looked to be equipped with M2 .50-caliber heavy machine guns.
“OK, enough lollygagging,” Lieutenant Martinez announced. “We need to push the perimeter out. You guys see that string of roads and cutbacks leading up that ridge? We need to secure it. Battalion wants us to set up a position on top of the crest before nightfall, so we need to hoof it if we’re going to make it up there by then.” Martinez gestured toward an incredibly tall and intimidating ridgeline, part of the Dulan Forest. Various parts of the ridge provided exceptional overwatch of the air base, which would be very helpful since it was unknown if the area was still occupied by enemy forces lying in ambush, or if it was truly empty.
The soldiers grumbled a bit but eventually threw their packs on after the short break and fanned out as they made their way into the tree line that led to the outer perimeter road. As the platoon made their way up the forested ridgeline, they heard an increase in gunfire maybe a couple of kilometers to their right. Clearly, one of the other platoons was in the thick of it. More gunfire was still sounding off in the distance to their left, where the main city was located. That beach was being hit by an Australian infantry unit, so it wasn’t Price’s concern, so long as the Aussies did their job and secured the city. The airborne had the air base and the Dulan Forest to secure. It was rough terrain and would be a challenge, but it was a challenge the sky soldiers thrived on.
******
Nanfangao Lookout
The last two weeks had been filled with terror and anxiety. The Americans had been dropping bombs all over the place, hitting God only knew what. From time to time, a bomb or missile would land near the bunker complex Sergeant Lei Wei had been calling home for the past two months. It especially irritated him when he was trying to write a letter home to his family. His unit would be ordered to man their weapons and be ready to repel a possible enemy invasion. Each time their officers told them this might be it, the time when the Americans would finally land their vaunted Marines on the beach to steal the rightful territory of Formosa from China’s bosom.
Lei felt proud of himself, and he knew his parents and elders back in the village were extremely proud of him as well. After his herculean efforts and bravery during the invasion of Formosa, he had been awarded the Order of Heroic Exemplar by the lone political officer who had survived that day of days. Once Formosa had been captured, Lei had been specially flown to Beijing, along with nearly fifty other soldiers who were being awarded the medal. They were presented their award by President Xi himself at a formal ceremony. For his part, Lei’s exploits that day were widely publicized in his home village and region as an example of what a young man, a lowly farmer, could achieve and do for his country. The Communist Party had promoted Lei from a militia member to the rank of sergeant in the 40th Motorized Infantry Brigade, which was traditionally stationed in the province he was from.
That particular brigade happened to be a jungle warfare brigade, and they had been placed in charge of a large swath of the eastern shore of Formosa. They would be the frontline force against a naval invasion. Lei felt immensely proud at being promoted into this unit, though he was not exactly thrilled with the tough odds they would be facing against any Allied force that sought to liberate Formosa.
For nearly eight months, everyone had thought the Americans would leave Formosa alone and focus their efforts elsewhere. Then rumors had spread about a massive military defeat in northern China that had cost the lives of over a hundred thousand soldiers. The more recent gossip was that the PLA forces were being defeated in the Philippines. Sergeant Lei recognized that if the Americans had recaptured the Philippines, then it was likely just a matter of time before they tried to steal Formosa.
One of the privates broke Lei out of his reflections. “Sergeant Lei,” he said, “do you think the Americans are going to invade soon?”
A few of the other soldiers perked up as they heard the question, waiting to hear what their sergeant would say. Putting his pen down, Lei looked up and saw the scared expression on the young man’s face. Lei replied, “The Americans will come. I don’t know if it will be today, tomorrow, or next month…” Just then, a series of explosions blasted in a not-too-distant area. He continued, “…but rest assured, the Americans will come, and when they do, we will throw them back into the sea from which they came.”
The soldiers in the sleeping quarters of their bunker complex nodded in agreement. Before the men could ask any more questions or ponder what he had said further, the general quarters alarm sounded, alerting them that they were to man their battle stations. Getting up from his cot, Lei cinched his boots back on, then pulled on his body armor and reached for his QBZ-95 rifle. The men quickly filed out of the sleeping quarters section of the complex and made their way to the gun positions their squad had been assigned to.
Walking through the maze of tunnels in the complex, Lei could hear and feel the bombs hitting the earthen fortifications above them and around the nearby area.
“This is a much heavier bombardment than anything we’ve seen up to this point. I wonder if this really is it,” he thought.
His squad of soldiers moved through the tunnel, past other groups of soldiers running to and from various other sections of the underground maze.
Bang! Boom!
A series of large explosions rocked the mountain their fortification had been carved into, knocking most of the men in his squad to the ground. Bits of the ceiling crumbled down, letting in some small segments of dirt. Looking ahead of them, they could see a rush of smoke billow into the tunnel from one of the gun bunker positions, which was right next to the section his squad had been assigned to defend. Several soldiers stumbled out of the bunker room. Some of them held their heads, one braced his arm, and another limped out on an injured leg. Many of the soldiers in his squad rushed toward their comrades see what had happened and to help them.
Sergeant Lei spotted one of the other sergeants he had taken a liking to and ran up to him. “What happened, Yin?” Lei asked.
His friend looked dazed at first, unsure who had asked him the question. Then he slowly recognized his friend and fellow sergeant. “I think it was an American bomb or missile. They didn’t hit us directly, but the explosion was close. Oh God, I still have wounded soldiers in there. We need to get them help,” he replied, suddenly remembering the rest of the reality around him.
Before Lei could send his own men in to help, a group of medical soldiers ran past them into the bunker room, and their captain walked up to them both. “Sergeant Lei, get your men into your bunker room and prepare to repel the Americans,” he ordered. “We’ll handle Sergeant Yin’s men.” The captain had a concerned look on his face that betrayed his true feelings. He looked scared, like the rest of them.
“Yes, Sir!” shouted Lei, who then barked orders to his squad to man their positions.
Racing into their own bunker room, he saw the three soldiers he’d left on duty, looking out the gun slits with pairs of binoculars. When the rest of the squad ran in, they turned and excitedly explained what they were seeing, pointing at dozens upon dozens of enemy warships that had not been there even a few hours ago.
Grabbing one of the binoculars, Lei saw what looked like mini-aircraft carriers, with too many small craft to count circling around them in a holding pattern. Then he spotted several destroyers and cruisers, which were using their five-inch guns to fire di
rectly on their positions. Hearing the roar of a jet engine, Lei looked up and saw an American war plane swoop in and release a pair of objects from under its wings. The payload struck the fortified positions near the Suao Lighthouse on the opposite side of the naval base and harbor. That had been one of their key strongpoints to keep the Americans from being able to capture and use the former Republic of China naval base, piers, and docking cranes.
Lei could smell the air, charged with burnt dirt, metal, cordite, and sulfur, wafting in through the gun slits. The atmosphere around them was already filled with the odor of battle and high explosives, a smell that would only grow thicker throughout the day. His nose also detected the putrid smell of burnt flesh, feces, and urine from those who had been killed and had lost the will to hold their bowels during their demise. Snapping out of the apocalyptic scene unfolding before them, Lei knew he had to get his men ready to defend their position.
“We need to get the guns ready at once!” he shouted. “Assistant gunners, make sure you have the extra barrels ready to swap out when the time comes. Also, make sure you have enough water nearby to help keep the barrels cool. They are going to heat up quickly, and we need to make sure we don’t melt them. Where’s my ammo runners?”
“Here, sergeant!” the trio shouted as they ran up to him and stood at attention, waiting for his next set of orders.
“Get the ammo cart and grab four more boxes of ammo for the Hua Qing. I want two extra boxes next to each of the guns! Understood?”
“Yes, Sir,” they replied and ran out to grab the extra ammo.
Taking a moment to survey his position, Lei felt confident about their chances. His bunker room was six meters wide and ten meters in length, with ten meters of rock between them and the next bunker room. To their front, the gun slits looked like sideways Vs, opening the aperture of the gun slit further away from the opening; this provided the gunners with as much protection as possible from the outside and gave them exceptional fields of fire and the ability to raise or lower the angle of their fire, depending on where the enemy was.
It also had a wall that divided the room in half, to help ensure that a single rocket, missile, or cannon round wouldn’t kill everyone in the bunker with one lucky hit. Inside the bunker, they had two of the coveted Hua Qing miniguns. The guns were electrically run six-barrel killing machines. Sergeant Lei had been told that they were a knockoff version of a similar gun system the Americans used. Because of the incredible rate of fire, each of these weapons had a five-hundred-pound wooden crate/ammo box sitting next to it, which were self-designed by the PLA soldiers who would be manning and using them in the bunker complexes.
Each of these boxes of ammo had fifty 100-round belts attached to them, giving the gunner 5,000 rounds before they needed to swap out ammo boxes. Outside of the bunker complex, this little idea of stringing that many belts of ammo together would never work, but for their purposes, it was brilliant. The commander of their bunker complex had considered the idea important enough to share with the rest of the island defenses, which definitely said something.
They also had two W-85 heavy machine guns, which fired 12.7×108mm rounds, similar to the American M2 .50-caliber machine gun. Between these four killing machines, Sergeant Lei was confident his twelve-man squad would be able to prevent the Americans from successfully landing at the portion of the coast they were designated to protect. He just hoped the other areas would be equally protected.
Lei’s biggest concern, since they hadn’t practiced for it in any of their training drills due to the cost of ammunition, was making sure they would be able get rid of the sheer volume of spent shell casings these four machine guns were going to create. The bunker had two slits in the floor next to the outer wall, which had been cut in the rock on each side of the bunker for this purpose. The goal of these fixed positions was to be able to fight in them for a long time. Knowing that, the engineers designed a way to get rid of the brass casings as quickly as possible, so they wouldn’t clutter the floor up and make it nearly impossible to walk. Each of the guns had a trash can next to them and a flat metal shovel. One of the ammo carriers would also man the shovel and trash can. When the cans got full or there was a lull in the shooting, they would lug the trash can to the slit in the wall and dump the spent casings down it. The casings would then land outside the bunker and gather below to be picked up at a later date, assuming, of course, that they successfully repelled the Americans.
One of the soldiers backed away from the wall and put his binoculars down. He looked nervously at Lei. “This looks like it’s it,” he said, “the big invasion you and the captain talked about. That looks like a lot of enemy soldiers.” He motioned to the small landing craft still circling around their mother ships. “Do you think we can stop all of them?” he asked.
Sergeant Lei walked up to the young private and put his hand on the man's shoulder. “We’ll stop them,” he said, trying to display as much confidence as humanly possible. “You need to stay focused on doing your part. Don’t worry about what the others are saying or doing, just concentrate on your piece of the puzzle, and we’ll get through this. Besides, you’re the lucky soldier that gets to use the minigun.” His mouth curled up in a sarcastic half smile.
Unlike a lot of the PLA sergeants, Lei felt he could accomplish more with honey than vinegar. Maybe it was his small country villager attitude, but he seldom yelled at his soldiers unless they needed it. His squad, and a lot of the other members of his company, had taken an immediate liking to him. Not only was he a hero and good luck charm, but he was also a nice guy to be around.
“They’re heading to the shore now!” shouted one of the soldiers excitedly as they watched the smaller amphibious assault vehicles and troop landing ships begin to head toward the shore. Several of the destroyers fired smoke rounds into the village and port area just in front of the shoreline in an attempt to obscure their view of the landing.
“That smoke may hinder the bunkers near the coast, but it won’t affect us,” Lei thought as a devilish smile spread across his face.
As the landing force got closer to the shoreline, a pair of fighters flew in low and fast, releasing a series of long, tumbling bombs. They hit right on top of where Lei knew a line of bunkers and trenches had been built. The bombs exploded in thunderous flames that grew in intensity and stretched across the entire trench line. Horrible walls of fire intensified as the firestorm consumed everything in its path.
“Dear God, is that what napalm looks like?” Sergeant Lei wondered. His palms were suddenly very sweaty. The Americans had begun using that horrible weapon early on in the war, especially as the fighting had intensified in the Pacific.
Ten minutes went by, and then the first American landing crafts hit the shoreline, disgorging their human cargo. Lei watched in amazement at how many American Marines charged up the shoreline and how quickly they did so.
“Should we open fire, Sergeant?” asked one of the corporals who manned one of the machine guns. So far, none of the other bunker rooms had started shooting yet, so as not to give away their positions.
Lei shook his head. “Not yet. Our orders are to wait until the third wave of Americans lands. Then we are to unleash death and destruction on them.”
The corporal nodded, though he clearly wanted to start shooting at the American invaders. It felt like forever elapsed as they watched the first wave of Americans rush forward to be met by what remained of their initial defensive line; it was fascinating and terrifying at the same time. Watching those American Marines scream and charge their positions in such a ferocious and fearless way sent shivers down Lei’s back.
“These men fight more viciously than the Taiwanese did, and they are more skilled,” Lei realized nervously. He started to wonder if it would really be possible to make it out of the bunker complex alive.
The second wave of Marines landed and joined the fray. To Lei and his comrades’ horror, they watched as the Marines quickly overpowered and overwhelmed the first
defensive line with speed and ease. Lei really earnestly began to question if they could hold this position, or if he was already surrounded by his tomb. This bunker complex they were in was manned by only 230 soldiers, and they only had five-gun bunkers. Once they were taken out or overrun, that was it for their part in the war.
Twenty minutes after that second group landed, the third wave of landing craft arrived. This wave brought with it multiple hovercraft or LCACs, which proceeded to offload dozens of eight-wheeled light armored vehicles and main battle tanks. Just as Lei was about to order his bunker to start shooting, he saw dozens of helicopters approaching the shoreline.
“Machine gunners, focus your fire on those helicopters!” he yelled. “When they come in to drop off more Marines, light ‘em up!”
One of the minigunners angled his weapon toward one of the Osprey tiltwing helicopters and let loose a string of bullets that looked more like a laser beam reaching out for the helicopter than it did machine-gun fire. In seconds, the Osprey was sliced through by hundreds of rounds, tearing it apart. The chopper blew up in spectacular fashion over the beach, crashing down onto the Marines below.
The corporal turned to fire on the next helicopter, although at this point, the cluster of helicopters took evasive maneuvers as they broke off their assault. However, Sergeant Lei’s bunker was not the only one to fire at the Ospreys—a total of three were downed before they managed to head back to the sea from which they had come. The soldiers manning the machine guns then switched to shooting at the swarm of American Marines who were moving inland.
Suddenly, the field phone attached to the wall rang. Lei grabbed the receiver, straining to hear who was on the other end and what they wanted. As he focused all of his attention, he could barely make out the voice of his captain. “I need to speak with you immediately,” Lei heard.