Reborn as King of South America

Chapter 456: Villarrica

"Major Barrows doesn't seem to be qualified to be a battalion commander at all!"

"Yes, the general should promote a dedicated and brave officer to the position of commander of the Sixth Battalion."

A group of soldiers enjoyed making fun of Major Barrows' scandal. Amidst the laughter, the happy and relaxed atmosphere was destroyed by a piece of bad news.

"The general has issued an order that the 4th Regiment, 6th Regiment, Artillery Regiment, and Cavalry Company must launch a full-scale attack on the Villarrica position before 8 o'clock this evening! Our company is also in the offensive sequence. "

"What? Didn't the general just order us to rest on the spot? Why did you suddenly change the order?"

"It was an order given directly to the general by General Rodriguez, and the general dared not disobey General Rodriguez's order!"

"What terrible news!"

A group of soldiers who had just been chatting leisurely, all looked changed drastically when they heard the order to attack. Many of them cursed in different accents, venting their pre-war tension and fear by swearing loudly.

At 7:45 in the evening, the Brazilian troops that received the attack order, urged by the middle-level officers, reluctantly left the camp and headed towards the Villarrica position.

There was a constant noise of people neighing and horses neighing. When the Brazilian army arrived within the attack range of the Villarrica forward position, they were greeted by a rain of rifle bullets and artillery shells.

"Oh no! The battalion commander was hit!"

A Brazilian soldier shouted loudly, and then the other soldiers saw an officer standing at the back of the attacking line, who was unfortunately hit directly by a shell.

"It's over. The battalion commander must be dead."

"Yes, if he was hit directly by a shell, he would definitely not survive."

Seeing the battalion commander being killed by a shell, several soldiers hiding behind the bushes were both afraid and relieved.

"Assholes! Keep attacking! Bancroft, Grete, and Barsalom, you three, rush out first! Notify us after you find a hidden attack position!"

The battalion commander was killed in the battle, and another senior captain quickly took over the command of his unit, and then gave orders to several soldiers who were hesitating!

"Asshole! Why us again? Why don't you hand over the mission to someone else? Are you just going to be the acting battalion commander?"

"And you called us bastards! You are so brave, why don't you just charge forward yourself!
What does this mean! You bastard! What qualifications do you have to be the captain? "

Bancroft and the other two cursed under their breath while obediently following the orders of the acting battalion commander and crawling forward cautiously.

"Grit, Barsalom, look, there is a blind spot for the enemy to shoot at right in front of us. There is a big tree there. It will be safer for us to hide under the tree!"

Bancroft crouched down and whispered.

"But the acting battalion commander's order was to approach the enemy's front line. The location of the tree was nearly 70 meters away from our attack route. Although we were safe under the tree, it was against the acting battalion commander's order."

"His orders are for us to die! If you want to lie in the churchyard, just obey the orders of that bastard!"

"No, I don't want to die! We haven't taken out the bronze artifacts hidden in Mauricio City yet! It's not worth dying now!"

"Yes, we can't die in vain! To hell with that bastard's order! The most important thing is to save our lives, and consider other things after this battle is over!"

Several soldiers discussed in low voices and quickly reached a consensus on avoiding the dangers of the battlefield. Then, under the cover of night, the three of them slowly moved away from the central firefighting area of ​​the battlefield and turned towards the big tree on the other side of the battlefield.

Bullets and artillery shells were constantly flying back and forth on the battlefield. The sounds of violent artillery explosions could be heard in the surrounding areas, near or far. The bright light produced by the explosions divided the battle area into a slaughterhouse where night and day were intertwined.

The life of a single soldier was obviously fragile and insignificant in the entire battlefield. Row after row of Brazilian soldiers, threatened by the guns of the military police, nervously rushed to the front line, and then fell down row after row under the fierce fire.

The battle lasted until 8:46 in the evening. The bodies of Brazilian soldiers were piled up layer upon layer within the front attack range of Villarrica's positions. In just over half an hour, the Brazilian army suffered more than 500 casualties in the continuous offensive.

They had no scruples when plundering ordinary Paraguayan civilians, and when Lieutenant General Rodriguez's attack order was issued again, Major General Getulio had to mobilize all the main forces of the 9th Division and launch a huge offensive operation for the sake of his political future.

The battle was intense. With the advantage of manpower, the Brazilian army was still forcing the attack on the Mbokayadi position after suffering more than 500 casualties. However, in the frontline combat area, after experiencing the powerful lethality of the new rifles and heavy machine guns of the Han country, the ordinary Brazilian soldiers lost the courage to continue the attack. Some Brazilian soldiers were frightened by the tragic deaths of their own soldiers and were unwilling to take another step forward no matter how the military police and the supervision team threatened them.

The Fourth Battalion advances! Advance! Forward—advance—"

A Brazilian mid-level officer raised his pistol and issued several orders in succession, but there was no movement from the soldiers behind him. All the soldiers were hesitating, and no one was willing to engage in a futile attack and lose his life in vain.

The atmosphere on the battlefield froze instantly! Seeing that all the soldiers did not obey his orders, the Brazilian officer yelled: "What are you doing, you bastards? Didn't you hear my order? Why don't you charge forward!" "The enemy's heavy machine gun firepower is too fierce. Without artillery suppression, we can't charge forward at all!"

"Excuses! They are all cowardly excuses. The medical soldiers of the Third Battalion of the Fourth Regiment dared to pick up their guns and attack! The medical soldiers are not afraid! What are you afraid of?"

"The 3rd Battalion of the 4th Regiment has artillery support, but we don't."

A soldier muttered quietly.

"That's enough! You cowards! Stop making excuses for your cowardice! Attack immediately!"

The Brazilian officer became furious and shouted threats.

"Sir, there's a sneak attack!"

In the dim firelight, several blurry figures suddenly appeared in the sight of the Brazilian soldiers.

"Enemy attack, take cover!"

Hearing the reminder from his soldiers, the officer who was just full of anger seemed to have changed into a different person in an instant, and he resolutely got down on all fours and lay on the ground.

"It's Lieutenant Orge of the Sixth Regiment."

As the distance shortened, a soldier spoke up.

"Where is your commander?"

"I'm here!" The Brazilian officer quickly stood up from the ground with an embarrassed expression on his face.

"General Getulio has ordered the 4th Battalion to return to the camp for two hours to rest. Major Engert's troops will take over your offensive mission."

"Okay, after Major Engert's troops arrive, I will lead them back to the camp for rest."…………

"According to the battle situation at the frontline, the Brazilian army focused its main attack on the town of Mbokayadi. It is roughly estimated that the enemy has deployed about 7000 troops in the direction of Mbokayadi."

At Villarrica Station, Zhang Wenlian, the commander of the 2000st Regiment of the st Mixed Brigade, stood in the temporary command post and said, "Our army has nearly troops defending the Mbocayadi direction. In terms of the strength of the frontal defense positions, the Brazilian army has an absolute advantage in terms of numbers."

"The Brazilian army probably ignored the direction of Teviquari and focused only on the frontal positions."

Zhou Liying, commander of the 75mm artillery battalion, pondered: "If this is possible, then it would be meaningless to split the advance troops into two groups and deploy the th Battalion, the Engineer Battalion and other troops in the direction of Twiquari."

"Based on the strength of the Brazilian army's attack, it is speculated that the commander of the Brazilian army on the other side must have been under pressure from the higher-level command organization, so he hastily assembled his main forces and launched a large-scale attack at night."

"The Brazilians are racing against time with us. They want to use their superiority in numbers to regain control of the Villarrica station from us."

Li Jitai, commander of the brigade's reconnaissance battalion, agreed: "The Brazilian army has an absolute force advantage over our army in the Mbokadia direction. If we defend the Mbokadia position with our current strength, although there is a high probability that we can repel the enemy's offensive, we may also suffer more than 500 casualties.

Therefore, I think that with the idle troops in the direction of Teviquari, it is better to withdraw some troops to support the direction of Mbokayadi, and then cooperate with the relatively abundant troops, use the cover of night to launch a counterattack against the enemy attacking in front, disrupt the offensive deployment of the Brazilian army, and buy as much time as possible for the arrival of subsequent reinforcements. "

"The total number of Brazilian vanguard attacking forces is about 7000. Currently, there are about 3 enemy troops within the frontline of our army. Based on the marching speed of the Brazilian army, if they move to the direction of Teviquari and attack Villarrica from the flank, it will take about three hours. Three hours is enough for the Brazilian army to complete the military change of changing the main attack direction. However, within the three-hour time frame, it is difficult for our army to accurately grasp the change in the Brazilian army's attack direction."

Zhang Wenlian still insisted on his own opinion and said: "Our army's goal is to ensure the safety of Villarrica Station. The troops in the direction of Teviquari cannot be easily mobilized. However, pure passive defense is not in line with our army's combat policy.

According to the suggestions made by Captain Zhou and Captain Li, we should use the cover of night to take advantage of the interval when the Brazilian army stopped attacking. On the one hand, we should send troops to launch a counterattack against the enemy at the front line to disrupt the enemy's combat plan. On the other hand, we should send several elite assault teams to break into the enemy's defense line and investigate the specific location of the Brazilian army's artillery to create favorable conditions for our artillery cluster to destroy the enemy's artillery. "

Zhang Wenlian's counterattack plan combined the suggestions put forward by several major commanders. Although the overall strategy was conservative, the specific tactical counterattacks still had the offensiveness commonly found in the Han army.

The counterattack plan formulated according to the changes in the battlefield situation was unanimously approved by several key officers. Three hours later, at 11:600 pm, after a round of artillery attack, about soldiers poured out from several frontline positions in the direction of the Mbokayadi frontline, heading directly for the Brazilian army on the other side of the front line.

The raging artillery fire and machine gun fire, coupled with the firepower advantage of the new rifles, caused the Brazilian soldiers, who were already in a state of high tension, to collapse and flee quickly out of fear after suffering a sudden attack, even though they had an absolute advantage in terms of manpower.

The counterattack turned into a battle of defeat. More than 600 soldiers took advantage of the night to chase and fight more than 7000 Brazilian soldiers. It was not until : midnight that the counterattack force's offensive momentum declined and it took the initiative to break away from contact with the Brazilian army. Only then did the Brazilian army barely stabilize its position.

At 7:10 the next morning, the Brazilian army had just breathed a sigh of relief after the shock of the previous night, but was immediately hit by the precise attack of the Han artillery cluster. The shelling lasted for about twenty-one minutes. After twenty-one minutes, most of the twenty-four medium-sized artillery pieces of the entire artillery regiment of the Brazilian army under the command of Getulio were destroyed, and only seven artillery pieces were left without being hit by the artillery fire.

The artillery regiment, which was the supporting firepower unit, suffered a heavy blow, and the 9th Brazilian Division lost its firepower to contain the artillery attacks of the Han defenders. Therefore, between 16 a.m. and 8 p.m. on September 2, the four attacks launched by the Brazilian army failed due to the powerful attacks of the Han defenders. …………

(End of this chapter)