Sword of Light: Humanoid Self-Propelled Artillery

Chapter 304 Landmines Hidden Under the Lightning
Of course, such an explosion alerted Smith, who then asked the mine-clearing team leader:
"What triggered the anti-tank mine?"

The mine-clearing team leader nodded in agreement.
"Yes, Lion Chief, a minesweeper just reported that he found an M1A1 anti-tank mine, and it suddenly exploded while he was dismantling it. Not only was the minesweeper killed, but he also injured the minesweepers around him."

However, Smith was not satisfied with this answer and immediately frowned, saying:
"Weren't the M1A1 mines supposed to be very safe? They wouldn't even detonate if soldiers danced on them. How come they detonated just from being removed? Did the reinforcements tamper with the anti-tank mines, like they did with our pineapple grenades, removing the time-delay fuse or something similar?"

The mine-clearing team leader couldn't answer Smith's question because he hadn't seen any samples, and all that remained of the original anti-tank mine site was a large pit, three meters in diameter and more than half a meter deep.

There was no way around it; you have to know that 2.7 kilograms of explosives already exceeds the explosives of a typical 76mm howitzer. For example, the explosives in Li Yunlong's 75mm Italian howitzer shells were only one kilogram.

The explosive charge of a 120mm howitzer is only three kilograms, so don't underestimate an anti-tank mine. The power of such an anti-tank mine is no less than that of a 120mm howitzer shell.

Seeing that the mine-clearing captain couldn't answer for a long time, Smith naturally understood that the captain didn't know what was going on either, so he could only say:
"In that case, tell the mine-clearing soldiers to detonate the anti-tank mines on the spot next time they encounter them, without having to dig them out. As for the craters created by the explosions, let the engineers fill them in."

That's right. In order to prevent the mine-clearing soldiers from getting injured, we had to make do with the engineers and other soldiers. There was no way around it. The crater was three meters in diameter and more than half a meter deep. Tanks could pass through it without a problem, but trucks would have a hard time getting through. If it wasn't backfilled, the trucks would get stuck.

As for the modified anti-tank mines that Smith and others discussed, that would be a misunderstanding of Wang Gensheng. Wang Gensheng did not modify any anti-tank mines. As for why the anti-tank mines would explode as soon as they were moved, it was because Wang Gensheng had placed a pineapple grenade under the anti-tank mines.

Dig a small pit inside the existing anti-tank mine pit to bury pineapple grenades.

Of course, the pineapple grenade at this time is the pineapple grenade with the time-delay fuse removed, and the safety clip of the pineapple grenade should be facing upwards. Also, a pull rope should be tied to the safety pin. Pull the pull rope after the anti-tank mine is on top of the grenade.

In this way, once the safety pin is removed, the point of force becomes the safety shrapnel, which is pressed against a five-kilogram anti-tank mine.

So it won't explode just like holding it in your hand. But as soon as someone moves the anti-tank mine, the safety shrapnel of the grenade will immediately bounce off without the suppression of the anti-tank mine. As a result, the firing pin loses its safety and strikes the primer. Because there is no time-delay fuse, the moment of impact is the moment the grenade detonates.

At this moment, the anti-tank mine above could not be taken away in an instant, so the exploding grenade would naturally detonate the nearby anti-tank mine as well.

However, the anti-tank mines were too powerful, and the mine-clearing soldier who was trying to defuse them was blown to bits.

Therefore, the people around them didn't know what had caused the originally safe anti-tank mine to become so dangerous.

This method was something Wang Gensheng had seen in a movie before he traveled through time, so he casually equipped each of the two hundred or so anti-tank mines with a self-destructing grenade.

Of course, this method isn't impossible to dismantle. You can dig a hole next to the anti-tank mine, and then insert a dagger or blade between the anti-tank mine and the grenade's safety clips. This will allow the anti-tank mine to hold down the grenade's safety clips, preventing the anti-tank mine from triggering the explosion of the grenade below.

It looks easy, but it's not easy to do in practice. After all, you can't see it, so how do you make sure that your blade is piercing between the grenade fragments and the anti-tank mine, and not between the grenade fragments and the grenade itself?
Moreover, if the blade causes grenade fragments to detach during the penetration, thus detonating the grenade and ultimately the anti-tank mine, then there would be no trace of the victim.

However, before Smith could detect the next anti-tank mine, another explosion occurred on the road, instantly knocking two mine-clearing soldiers who were side by side to the ground.

That's right, the reason for the explosion was that the mine-clearing soldiers stepped on the tripwire again. When Wang Gensheng was laying the mines, he had already considered that the US mine-clearing soldiers would go around the hillside to clear the mines. Therefore, when laying the mines, some of the tripwires were placed backward, so that even if the mine-clearing soldiers went around to the back, they would still fall into the trap.

After several mine-clearing soldiers died in succession, the remaining soldiers began to feel afraid, which led them to dawdle and work half-heartedly.

For example, after the gentleman used a mine detector to search the area, he immediately lay down and began to feel around in the snow with his hands to see if there was any tripwire.

That's right, they lay down. Even if they trigger a trap and cause a grenade to explode, it won't hurt the mine-clearing soldier.

However, this naturally greatly reduces the efficiency of mine clearance.

Smith glanced at his pocket watch; half a day had already passed.

However, the mine-clearing work had only progressed less than thirty meters.

Smith could not accept this situation. Let alone 30 meters, even 300 meters would feel slow to Smith. After all, Smith was racing against time. If the 26th Army caught up with him, everything would be over.

Therefore, the key right now is to open up this road. As for taking a detour, there is no way to do so, because this road is built halfway up the mountain, with steep slopes on both sides exceeding 45 degrees.

If you want to go up, you can't; if you want to go down, you can't.

Only two legs could allow one to walk on such a steep slope.

However, Wang Gensheng had laid tens of thousands of landmines on this road, making it extremely difficult to get through.

Smith looked at the mine-clearing soldiers who were still dawdling and couldn't help but think that it would be better if there were no anti-tank mines.

This way, you can just run them over with a tank, since ordinary grenades can't do any damage to the tank tracks anyway.

Smith felt even more remorseful after learning that the anti-tank mines deployed were from his own warehouse.

He regretted leaving the anti-tank mines in the Hagaru-ri warehouse to the Chaozhou reinforcements; he wished they had been destroyed at the time.

As he was thinking, a sudden inspiration struck Smith, and he quickly asked his advisor:

"By the way, how many anti-tank mines did we leave in the warehouse at Hagaru-ri Airport?"

(End of this chapter)