Sword of Light: Humanoid Self-Propelled Artillery

Chapter 265 The Importance of Signal Towers
Wang Gensheng immediately made a gesture, indicating to secretly approach and investigate the situation.

As the leader of the investigation team, Li Xiu quickly led her team to observe the situation.

A short while later, Li Xiu ran back with binoculars and said:

"Si Ling, we've found out that the gunfire is our friendly forces engaging in a firefight with the US forces. We only have one company on our side, and although the US forces also only have one company, their firepower is extremely fierce."

After hearing Li Xiu's report, Wang Gensheng nodded and said:
"Alright! Since the US forces on the other side only have one company's firepower, let's immediately provide support and quickly end the battle!"

In fact, the signal tower of the US military is also very important, because the transmission distance of radio is limited, especially for those portable walkie-talkies, which can only transmit for a few kilometers or a dozen kilometers.

Therefore, it is not so easy to send messages to airports hundreds of kilometers away or to aircraft carriers to call for air support or request bombing.

Those who enjoy watching American blockbusters will be familiar with this scene: when the US military is ambushed and can't win, American soldiers will grab walkie-talkies and shout into them that they need support!

A while later, a support aircraft appeared in the air. So, while we marvel at the powerful support system of the US military, we can't help but wonder if every soldier in the US military can call for air support?
Speaking of this, we have to mention the US military's air support system. As early as World War II, the US military established infantry support. At that time, you could often see a US soldier holding a very large walkie-talkie and shouting that he needed support. Soon after, artillery fire would cover the area that the soldier was shouting for.

However, due to the imperfections of this support system, incidents of shells being dropped on one's own people frequently occurred.

With the development of technology, by the time of the Gulf War, the US military had established a complete air support system. This system linked the combat personnel of the US ground forces with the US military's aircraft and support units. As a result, during the Gulf War, US frontline soldiers were able to call for air strikes and support at any time from the ground.

However, while it may seem that every soldier can call for air support at any time, this support system actually involves a very large process, and not every soldier can call for air support from the rear command at any time. Those who have watched some American war movies should be more aware of this.

The U.S. military typically distributes radios to ordinary infantry squad-level combat units. If a combat unit needs support, the squad or platoon-level combat commander must send a request for air support to the rear command, which then deploys and allocates air support and strike units to the front-line units.

However, in times of wartime emergency, air support will be very frequent, and sometimes it may not be possible to get support at all.

Therefore, from this perspective, not every soldier in the U.S. military can call for air support at any time. However, as the U.S. military reforms and simplifies its communication and command systems, reducing the time from when a ground soldier sends a support signal to when the response is received, its plan is to complete a series of strike and support missions in a short time. However, this plan still does not include individual soldier support.

Furthermore, the power of the portable radios used by individual soldiers in the US military is very limited, resulting in a very short communication range. Requests for air support are now mostly relayed, such as the squad level contacting the company headquarters, which then relays the request to the air support unit before support can arrive. As a result, air support is not very fast!

Of course, this is just a conventional method. With the development of the times, especially the advancement of wireless communication technology and the emergence of satellite phones, the method of directly contacting via satellite phone and calling for air support through satellite phone relay naturally emerged.

However, during the Sino-American War, the US military's communication methods were still similar to those during World War II: soldiers would first call their superiors via walkie-talkies, which would then be relayed by communication towers to contact aircraft carriers or airfields hundreds of kilometers away, allowing US warplanes to take off and bomb the target area. There was no other way; on the battlefield, individual soldiers couldn't carry heavy, long-wave radios with long antennas for communication.

Long-wave radio stations require very long antennas and large transmitting equipment to communicate with airports or aircraft carriers hundreds of kilometers away.

This is why the US military builds signal towers on mountains.

Because only by using a signal tower can the message be transmitted hundreds of kilometers to the US military airfield.

This is similar to how cell phones use signal towers. Although shortwave signals from walkie-talkies are very convenient to transmit, their propagation distance is limited. Therefore, signal towers are needed for relaying. Otherwise, US military airfields or command posts would not receive any messages at all.

However, this only applies to aircraft. If the US military calls for artillery support, it is quite fast and can contact artillery positions several kilometers away to carry out fire strikes without needing a signal tower for relay.

After all, artillery positions are only a few kilometers away, while airports or aircraft carriers are hundreds of kilometers away. There is no way to compare the two, which is why signal towers are needed for relaying signals.

After Wang Gensheng led the Marines to within about 300 meters, he gave the order:
"Li Xiu, you coordinate with the fire support team to mark the firing points. Duan Peng and Wei Dayong, you two will cooperate with me for the assault. We'll use the old tactics again, taking them out in one fell swoop. Oh, and considering this is American troops, have the assault team bring me anti-tank grenades!"

After saying that, Wang Gensheng put down his backpack and put on his bulletproof mask, and Duan Peng, Wei Dayong and other members of the assault team also put on their bulletproof masks and put down their backpacks.

There was no other way; this backpack was carrying a lot of food and ammunition, so it was quite heavy. Therefore, it had to be put down during the assault. If it weren't for this supply backpack, the simple bulletproof vest, helmet, and face shield wouldn't have reached a weight of 100 pounds.

However, just as Wang Gensheng was about to begin the fight, Wu Qianli said:

"Wang Siling, why don't we infiltrate the Seventh Company instead? You guys should take the radios and head to the front command post!"

Wang Gensheng waved his hand in response to Wu Qianli's kind offer:
"No need. Just watch this battle. I'll show you how our Marines fight. A company of American soldiers is nothing, it'll be over in ten minutes! Oh, and this is the order!"

As expected, this tactic worked quite well; after hearing this, Wu Qianli immediately fell silent.

It has to be said that nighttime is great. Wang Gensheng led the Marine Corps assault team and advanced to within 100 meters of the firefight, and neither side had reacted yet.

(End of this chapter)