Sword of Light: Humanoid Self-Propelled Artillery

Chapter 299 Laying Mines
After thinking it over, Wang Gensheng decided to lay landmines one kilometer away from the Shuimen Bridge.

Of course, this was not to be buried now, but at night; if it were buried now, it would definitely be discovered by the guards at the Water Gate Bridge.

As for seizing or destroying the Watergate Bridge, that's not something we should do right now.

After all, compared to laying mines, blowing up the Watergate Bridge is not so important. For example, if Wang Gensheng could lay a minefield two or three kilometers long, he could definitely block Smith's Marines 1st Lion and even the 10th Corps in front of the Watergate Bridge.

After all, compared to other weapons, landmines are definitely the most powerful weapons in terms of hindering marches, preventing enemy retreats, or blocking routes.

It is important to know that in the history of world warfare, there has always been a small number of weapons that have been born to be "darlings of the battlefield," and landmines are one such weapon.

As early as the 12th century, the Southern Song army used landmines, which is the earliest recorded use of landmines. By the early Ming Dynasty, the Ming army began using landmines equipped with mechanical detonation devices. Landmines of this period were the rudiments of traditional landmines.

Landmines originated in Korea. However, it was the people of the United States who standardized landmines and brought them to the battlefield in a completely new form.

During the Battle of Yorktown in 1862, Gabriel Raines was inspired by simple explosive traps and developed tripwire and pressure mines.

If an enemy touches the hair-thin tripwire or steps on the soil covering the fuse, the landmine will immediately explode. Danger is all around, yet no one knows where it is. Landmines cause massive casualties and instill panic in the enemy.

In this way, Gabriel Reins' side successfully repelled an enemy force several times their size. Tripwire and pressure-activated mines thus became the main blueprints for mine design in various countries.

During World War I, landmine technology developed rapidly. The British army at Messina Ridge manufactured the largest landmine in human history, with a total explosive charge exceeding four hundred tons.

During World War II, landmines, already showing promise, entered a "golden age" of development. Due to their low manufacturing cost and low technological barriers, anti-personnel landmines were widely used. The S-type anti-personnel landmine developed by Germany began to transition from underground to surface detonation, and was known as the "Bouncing Betty." As the name suggests, when triggered, it bounces into the air and explodes about 1 meter above the ground, scattering shrapnel in all directions, multiplying its lethality.

Meanwhile, landmines proved highly effective on the battlefield of the War of Resistance against Japan in Huaguo. Despite the scarcity of supplies, the soldiers and civilians used stones and pottery jars to make "land mines," inventing various methods of burying and using them, effectively curbing the arrogance of the Japanese army.

During this period, anti-tank mines developed rapidly. Statistics show that over 300 million anti-tank mines were laid worldwide during World War II. The US military calculated that every 10,000 anti-tank mines laid had the potential to destroy 4,200 tanks.

The cost of 10,000 anti-tank mines is only equivalent to 4
The price is over four hundred Milan anti-tank missiles. However, four hundred anti-tank missiles simply cannot destroy four thousand two hundred tanks. Therefore, using anti-tank mines is clearly more economical.

The earliest anti-tank mines were primarily used to attack tank tracks. When pressed, the mine would detonate, severing the tank tracks. While these mines could slow a tank's movement, they couldn't fundamentally damage it. To achieve better destructive effects, targeting the relatively weak bottom armor of tanks, a full-width anti-tank mine was developed in the late 1960s, capable of both detonating the tracks and breaching the tank's hull. This type of mine used a composite fuse technology combining electromagnetic, acoustic, vibration, and infrared sensors. As long as a tank passed within a certain width, it would detonate and destroy the tank regardless of whether it ran over the mine. With technological advancements, landmines have become increasingly intelligent. Informationized minefields composed of intelligent landmines possess communication and networking technologies, tracking and positioning capabilities, and even automatic homing and friend-or-foe identification functions. They are not only the nemesis of the "king of land warfare" (tanks) but also the bane of "airborne tanks" (helicopters). The US AHM anti-helicopter mine can defend an airspace with a radius of 400 meters and an altitude of up to 200 meters. It is certain that landmines will play an increasingly important role on future battlefields.

Of course, Wang Gensheng doesn't have the kind of landmines that can blow up helicopters in the sky, nor does he have intelligent landmines.

What you find here are just ordinary, high-yield M1A1 anti-tank mines, which are anti-tank mines that the United States used during World War II.

It weighs only 5.3 kilograms and has a charge of only 2.7 kilograms. This amount of explosive is certainly not enough to blow up a tank weighing 40 or 50 tons.

However, this was specifically designed to destroy tank tracks.

Wang Gensheng brought more than two hundred of these anti-tank mines this time. Of course, it wasn't that Wang Gensheng didn't bring more, but that the US military only had that many anti-tank mines left in their warehouses.

Therefore, Wang Gensheng naturally understood that relying solely on such a small number of anti-tank mines was simply not enough to intercept Smith's convoy. After all, it would be quite easy to detect two hundred mines. So, Wang Gensheng had to mix other mines with the anti-tank mines to make it difficult for the US military to clear the anti-tank mines so easily.

However, there weren't many landmines in the warehouse at Hagaru-ri Airport, which left Wang Gensheng quite helpless. Fortunately, although there weren't many landmines, Wang Gensheng still managed to get a large number of hand grenades.

This time, Wang Gensheng brought nearly 20,000 US MK2 pineapple grenades. That's right, Wang Gensheng planned to use these pineapple grenades to make a large number of landmines.

Of course, grenades like those made by Mi Guo cannot be made into pressure-activated landmines; they can only be made into tripwire mines.

After all, unlike the Japanese melon grenade which requires striking the firing pin to ignite the primer and thus detonate the TNT inside, the American pineapple grenade has the firing pin spring installed inside the grenade. This way, simply releasing the spring plate allows the primer firing pin to strike the primer under the pressure of the spring, thereby detonating the pineapple grenade.

Therefore, the pineapple grenade is much easier to throw than the melon grenade. The pineapple grenade only requires pulling out the safety pin and throwing it. When it leaves your hand, the spring clip will pop out and strike the primer, thus detonating after burning for four or five seconds under the time-delay fuse.

For this reason, the pineapple grenade had to be made as a tripwire grenade instead of a pressure-activated grenade. After straightening the end of the safety pin, a rope was tied to the safety ring.

In this way, if someone gets close to the rope or trips over it, the nearby pineapple mines will explode five seconds later because the safety pin is pulled.

(End of this chapter)