50s: Starting with a storage ring

Chapter 696 Steel Wall
Upon hearing Sun Zhiwei's question, an older soldier walked out of the stilt house.

Like the other soldiers, his face and neck were tanned dark, and their lips were chapped and peeling, probably due to dehydration.

He smiled and saluted Sun Zhiwei, saying, "Comrade, I am the squad leader, my surname is Jiang. Thank you for the supplies. May I ask what you need me for?"

"Hello, Squad Leader Jiang, seeing your simple stilt house, I just thought of a good way to help you. I wonder if you would be willing to accept it."

"What method are you referring to?" Squad Leader Jiang asked, somewhat puzzled.

They had considered ways to reinforce the outposts, but many of these methods required a large number of personnel and supplies, which they couldn't gather in time, so they had to make do with what they had for now.

"It's difficult to transport supplies here, and it's also difficult to build structures on the reefs. It took us a lot of effort to build this little house."

"Squad Leader Jiang, here's the thing, we came here on a cargo ship, and there were a lot of empty containers on it."

“I’ve looked at this reef, and it’s relatively flat. If we bring over those empty shipping containers, we can build a metal platform on this reef.”

"Although they are not permanent reinforced concrete buildings, shipping containers are all metal, which is much sturdier than your current wooden stilt houses."

Upon hearing this, Squad Leader Jiang was unsure whether to accept or refuse, as their company commander had never instructed them on how to handle such a situation.

Seeing the conflicted look on Squad Leader Jiang's face, Sun Zhiwei knew what was going on.

He really wanted it, but it hadn't been approved by his superiors, and he didn't know if it would violate any rules, which was why he was conflicted.

"You should know that your stilt houses can't withstand big storms."

"If a larger storm occurs, not only will the safety of the soldiers be jeopardized, but your outpost will also be easily destroyed. How will the mission be completed then?"

Sun Zhiwei gave him a reason he couldn't refuse, and at the same time, he simply didn't let him make a choice, deciding for him directly:
"Whether you need it or not, all those empty boxes on our ship are useless anyway."

"I'll have the cargo ship sail to the vicinity in a bit, drop the containers off, and then you can handle it yourselves."

After saying that, he jumped back into the water and swam back to the speedboat.

Soon, Sun Zhiwei turned the speedboat around, waved to the soldiers on the reef, and sped away from Nanxun Reef.

He quickly returned to the Hai Sha ship, directed the cargo ship to weigh anchor, and then headed towards Nanxun Reef.

Standing on the tall bridge of a cargo ship, the field of vision is much farther than that on a speedboat. The ship is also equipped with navigation radar, which can detect targets tens or even hundreds of kilometers away.

Sun Zhiwei discovered many things on the way that he hadn't seen while riding the speedboat. It turns out there are many islands and reefs around Nanxun Reef.

Those islands and reefs were significantly larger than Nanxun Reef, but he did not recall that our border troops were stationed on these better-equipped islands and reefs.

This is clearly unreasonable. It's impossible for the navy to leave large islands and reefs unoccupied and instead choose a small island like Nanxun Reef to be stationed there.

The exact reason was still unclear, but he had a guess; the monkeys' territory not far to the west was still quite rampant at this time.

An hour later, the cargo ship arrived near Nanxun Reef.

Because the cargo ship had a deep draft, they didn't dare get too close and could only anchor at the edge of the reef. The two speedboats first emptied the debris from the ship to ensure they had full power, and then prepared the cables and waited on the sea.

The cranes on the Hai Sha ship began lifting empty containers from the ship and placing them on the sea.

Although these containers are not completely waterproof, they have some waterproofing measures on their doors, so they will not sink quickly after being submerged in water. They are currently floating on the sea.

Taking advantage of the opportunity, the veterans on the speedboat quickly approached, used ropes to tug the floating container, and pulled it toward the shallow waters of the reef.

One, two, three—dozens of containers of various colors were quickly unloaded from the Hai Sha ship and towed by speedboats to the shallow waters of Nanxun Reef.

Then, a group of veterans disembarked from the Hai Sha ship, swam to the shallow waters of the reef, and arranged the containers towed by the speedboat in their proper positions, gradually forming a square formation around the stilt houses on Nanxun Reef.

The veterans who came down from the ship to help were all wearing old military uniforms. The soldiers on the island saw this and finally understood what Sun Zhiwei meant when he came over: "We are all veterans."

Squad Leader Jiang could no longer sit still. He left two soldiers on the rocks to keep watch, while the rest of them jumped into the water and helped the veterans build a container wall.

The containers that were unloaded from the Haisha ship this time were all standard general cargo containers, measuring 9 meters long, 2.4 meters wide, and 2.9 meters high.

They all have three doors, one on the 2.4-meter-wide side and two on both sides, each 9 meters wide.

Once all the containers on the first floor were in place, they opened the doors of the containers around the perimeter of containers a crack.

Seawater immediately rushed into the empty container, which began to sink rapidly after being flooded and soon settled on the rocks.

With simple repositioning, the first ring of containers was completely placed. Even after sinking to the bottom, more than 1 meter of these containers remained above the sea surface.

一共12个集装箱围成了一圈，每条边分别是4、2、4、2个集装箱，它们形成了一个长36米，宽22.8米的长方形围墙。

Following this fence, soon another batch of containers were placed around them, forming a fence nearly 5 meters wide around the tops of the containers that were exposed above the sea.

This height is not enough; with high tide or waves, they will soon be submerged again.

Using the cables of the Haisha ship, the soldiers pulled more containers to the top of the first level, building a second layer of the steel wall.

That means they had more than 200 strong men; otherwise, it would have been really difficult to move a container weighing three or four tons like that.

A few hours later, thanks to the strength of many people, a three-story-high and three-story-thick steel wall was built.

But that wasn't the end of it. The wall was finished, but it made it inconvenient for the soldiers to get in and out. So, they had to add railings, stairs, and other facilities to the steel wall.

This is not difficult; you just need the right tools.

They quickly transported a diesel generator, several large barrels of diesel fuel, and a set of electric cutting tools and welding equipment from the Haisha ship.

These are all maintenance equipment from the Hai Sha ship, which can be used for repairs.

Sun Zhiwei plans to donate all of these devices to the soldiers on the islands and reefs after he finishes using them. This way, they can make further improvements as needed.

(End of this chapter)