50s: Starting with a storage ring

Chapter 384 Basket Boat

Is the war really going to be easier?
In Sun Zhiwei's view, winning is definitely not a problem; the key is how much loss there will be.

We haven't fought a war for decades, so you could say that even the most elite troops in the country today are basically new recruits.

Without bloodshed and without battle achievements, results obtained solely through training are meaningless.

Moreover, this is jungle warfare. The last time our country's troops had jungle warfare experience was during the suppression of bandits in Southwest China in the 50s.

More than 20 years have passed, and most of those experienced veterans have retired. The few experienced officers can only give theoretical advice to the new recruits.

Now is the time to test the results of the training.

The situation is different in Annam. They had just finished fighting against M a few years ago and had been fighting against neighboring Khmer in recent years. Compared to us, they are more familiar with the jungle.

However, these things are useless to talk about; you only learn from your mistakes after suffering losses. I just hope the losses aren't too great.

After receiving a reply from China, Sun Zhiwei decided to return to the north.

There are too many unexpected events in frontal combat, and he alone cannot change the outcome of a battle involving hundreds of thousands of troops across hundreds of kilometers of front.

He felt that continuing to do what he did best—providing intelligence support to the country—would be more meaningful for the battle.

At 10 a.m., Sun Zhiwei returned to the small airport in the suburbs of Saigon and boarded another Il-14 to head to Thang Long Province.

Five more hours passed, and at 3 p.m., the small plane carrying Sun Zhiwei landed at XA City Airport in southern Thang Long Province.

As soon as he got off the plane, he noticed something was wrong. There were many more soldiers around the airport, and they were conducting unusually strict security checks on everyone entering the airport.

Chaos reigned at the airport entrance checkpoint, and he could hear angry shouts and insults from afar.

Many of the people who come to board the plane are powerful and influential people in the area, so they don't allow the soldiers to conduct strict checks.

Taking advantage of their positions, they often carry contraband or participate in the smuggling of high-end luxury goods.

This inspection exposed their deception, so it's perfectly normal for them to angrily berate these new soldiers.

But Sun Zhiwei could see the tense atmosphere in this change.

It seems that the aftershocks of the explosion at Tianpai Airport two days ago have already spread to the surrounding suburban counties.

This makes it unlikely that he will be able to drive himself to Thang Long Phu.

There must be many checkpoints along the way, and the documents he has are all fake. If he encounters someone who really knows what they're doing, he'll be exposed in no time.

Fortunately, there was no inspection at the airport. After leaving the airport, he immediately hailed a taxi back to the city of XA.

On the way, he began to carefully recall the nearby map he had memorized. XA City was located in the south of Thang Long Province, about 50 kilometers away.

Both cities are located on the Red River, connected by an inland waterway with many fishing boats coming and going. This was his opportunity.

The taxi took him to the vicinity of the Honghe Passenger Terminal. After getting out of the car, he observed the area outside the terminal for a while. He then discovered that the passenger flight checks here were also very strict.

This is a problem. It's daytime now, and the river is full of fishermen, so it's not a good time to dive.

If he dared to dive onto the boat during the day, he would be discovered and reported by the fishermen in no time.

But when he turned his gaze to the fishermen's dock not far away, he found that there wasn't a single soldier there. He discovered a blind spot in the inspection: the 'basket boats' drifting freely on the river.

The 'basket boat' is a type of small fishing boat unique to Annam. It is round in shape, made entirely of bamboo, and has no bow or stern.

It is a type of small fishing boat that has been passed down since the Ming Dynasty.

In the past, in order to avoid the heavy taxes levied on fishermen during the Nguyen Dynasty, local fishermen built these small boats without bows or sterns to fish.

Because the 'basket boat' was not a normal fishing boat and did not meet any of the tax standards at the time, it avoided many exorbitant taxes and levies.

From then on, the 'basket boat' became very popular among fishermen and has been passed down to this day.

Now, Sun Zhiwei saw that there were at least a hundred basket boats sailing freely on the river, and no soldiers were checking them.

Most of the fishermen who drive the 'basket boats' are dressed in tattered clothes, have rough skin, and dark complexions, making them easy to distinguish from the passengers.

Having made up his mind, Sun Zhiwei immediately walked into the nearby woods and quickly disappeared from sight.

Once he was out of everyone's sight, he began to run wildly along the Red River through the dense forest, and soon discovered several small docks for 'basket boats'.

Calling it a dock is an exaggeration; it's actually just a bunch of bamboo and wood pieces pieced together, a strange mix floating on the Red River. Only small boats like 'basket boats' can dock there.

Many 'basket boats' live near these makeshift docks.

He spotted one of the many 'basket boats' from afar, and then, when no one was looking, he put it into his spatial storage.

Then, they collected several clean, old clothes that were drying on three different basket boats, and also took a spare fishing net from a wealthy fisherman's wooden house.

Having obtained these disguise props, Sun Zhiwei quietly retreated into the depths of the forest and began to quickly apply makeup to himself.

He covered his entire body with brown paint, and then used whatever was available, grabbing some soil from the ground, mixing it with the paint, and carefully applying it to his hands, feet, face, neck, and other exposed skin.

She even deliberately dug some black mud into her fingernails, and painted a layer of light yellow paint on her teeth.

Finally, he splashed some muddy water on the clean clothes he had just received, then put them on.

Once his feet touched the muddy ground, he put his straw hat on his head. And there it was—a perfectly sculpted 'basket boat' fisherman.

After getting his disguise sorted, he slung the fishing net over his shoulder and ran upstream from the woods.

Once he was far enough away from the 'basket boat' dock and could no longer see anyone else, he placed the 'basket boat' he had just received into the water and sat on it himself.

After boarding the 'basket boat', he began to imitate the fishermen's movements, slowly paddling the boat. The 'basket boat' under him gradually became as responsive as his own arm, obediently sailing upstream.

Half an hour later, the 'basket boat' passed by the passenger terminal, and the soldiers on the shore and on the water indeed ignored it and let it sail north.

For an ordinary fisherman, it would be considered fast if he could paddle two or three kilometers in an hour in this round boat.

But Sun Zhiwei's arm strength is beyond that of ordinary people. As his rowing skills gradually improved, the speed of the 'basket boat' under him also increased.

When a ship comes into view, he slows down; once no other ships are nearby, he speeds up immediately.

The distance by water from XA City to Thang Long Province is only 50 kilometers. He set off from Xing An at 3:30 pm and was already close to Thang Long Province by 6:30 pm.

(End of this chapter)