However, after 1973, the Vietnamese authorities, out of hegemonic ambitions, not only invaded many Chinese islands, but also gathered heavy troops in the border areas to provoke conflicts.
Therefore, the Chinese Central Military Commission immediately decided to start a counterattack operation, which ended the entire battle in a very short time, and gave the Vietnamese aggressors a severe lesson and punishment, and in such a just war, the heroic Chinese soldiers also suffered certain sacrifices, among which the situation of the 121st Division was more serious.
A contest of soldiers
In the summer of 1978, something incomprehensible happened to the Vietnamese authorities: they listed China as "the most immediate and dangerous enemy" at a conference, and many of the participants clamored for defeating China.
At the beginning of the following year, Vietnam stepped up combat preparations along the entire Sino-Vietnamese border, and continued to carry out war provocations against Chinese border guards and civilians.
At that time, China was brewing a great policy of reform and opening up, and in consideration of the long-standing friendship between China and Vietnam, it had always adopted an attitude of restraint and forbearance, hoping to bring the situation back to the negotiating table.
Unexpectedly, the Vietnamese side did not listen to persuasion at all, but regarded China's restraint as weakness, and the war mood intensified.
From February 8 to February 12, Vietnam's military operations became more frequent, and they invaded Guangxi and Yunnan more than 30 times in five consecutive days, and even aimed artillery at a moving train.
At this point, there was no need for negotiations, and the Central Military Commission immediately ordered the border troops in Yunnan and Guangxi to carry out counterattack operations on a limited scale.
Therefore, the fighting was carried out from Pingxiang, Longzhou, Jingxi in Guangxi, Hekou and Jinping in Yunnan.
Under continuous coordinated operations, our army successively laid down more than 20 Vietnamese towns and strategic points in Lang Son and Roc Binh, thus opening the door to Vietnam's strategic depth, and in addition, our army also destroyed and uprooted most of the military installations along the Sino-Vietnamese border.
For the purpose of "education", from March 5 to 16 of that year, the Chinese border guards received orders to begin withdrawing their troops back into China.
In such a high-speed war, the Chinese troops actually still suffered a certain number of casualties, which was inseparable from the situation in Vietnam at that time.
At that time, Vietnam could already be described as a "war machine".
Since the beginning of the War of Resistance Against Japanese Aggression, Vietnam has been engaged in armed struggle, and after World War II, they have fought against France and the United States, and their soldiers have accumulated decades of combat experience.
Moreover, the Vietnamese authorities are very good at waging a national war, even women and children can take up arms and go to the battlefield, and some Vietnamese soldiers disguise themselves as civilians to launch surprise attacks, and for a while, the PLA gradually stopped approaching Vietnamese civilians.
The Vietnamese also seized the opportunity of the Chinese soldiers not to shoot at women and children, and conducted combat training for many women, girls and children, which caused many Chinese soldiers to suffer in this regard, and the self-defense that the Vietnamese originally used to resist aggression has now become a means of aggression.
The 121st Division of the 41st Army on the Eastern Front was originally responsible for interspersed operations, but they also suffered heavy casualties.
The vegetation in Vietnam is very lush, and in the past, the US military used all the means of spraying and bombing, and still had no way to deal with the soldiers lurking in the mountains and forests of Vietnam, and the 121st Division was responsible for interspersing at that time, and it also had to face a lot of unknowns.
The 363rd Regiment, which was responsible for taking the lead, went deep alone, and in order to reach the predetermined place quickly, they did not carry much water and dry food.
Their original plan was to settle the battle within three days, but the plan always failed to catch up with the changes, and due to the terrain, the battle situation, and other reasons, the distance of 80 or 90 kilometers took the troops of the 121st Division nearly 60 hours.
That is, the fighters have not yet started the war, and the supplies they carry with them are not very sufficient.
Vietnam is also very good at ambush warfare, which has also caused the Chinese army to suffer.
On February 21, the 361st Regiment of the 121st Division had just arrived in Na Lu Village, when it suddenly encountered the cold guns of the Vietnamese, and the political commissar and chief of staff quickly ordered to cross the river to fight, and found a high ground to rest.
On the other side, the regiment commander was attacked near Dongti Village in the process of directing the troops to evacuate, and in the case of passive return fire, the regiment commander and the guards in charge of covering both died.
The situation in other regiments was not very rosy, and after five days of continuous high-intensity fighting, more than 400 wounded were already in a situation of lack of medical care, and the rainforest environment increased the threat, with serious illnesses and casualties dying every day.
In desperation, the superiors could only arrange for the soldiers to find food and drinking water on the spot.
Just like the scene in "Garland on the Mountain", the soldiers searched everywhere and found that the Vietnamese villages had generally adopted a policy of "blockade", and even if the battlefield had been won, the gates of the villages were locked, and the villagers had long since disappeared, leaving nothing behind.
A senior commander and fighter chose to kill his horse and cook it to feed the wounded.
The dilemma is much more than that
Before the troops set out on the expedition, there were many migrant workers at the border who took the initiative to help the troops transport grain, grass and ammunition.
The logistics echelon of the 121st Division has a team of more than 1,000 people, but I didn't expect them to become the target of the Vietnamese army's surveillance.
During the mighty march of the large army, because they did not know the terrain and took a wrong road, they were quickly discovered by the Vietnamese troops who came to carry out the sneak attack mission, and this time they also caused great losses, and several cadres, including the main person in charge of logistics, were sacrificed.
There have been about four similar food deliveries, but all four of them were ambushed by cunning Vietnamese soldiers.
In a fierce battle, the commander and company commander of one battalion were wounded in the battle, and the other company commander was furious when he saw this, and he rushed into the Vietnamese trench with a submachine gun in his hand, killing three Vietnamese soldiers in a row, showing amazing courage.
This charge ignited everyone's fighting spirit, and the rest of the soldiers immediately followed the pace of the company commander and sprinted forward, showing the spirit of the Chinese soldiers.
The 361st Regiment was also attacked as it penetrated in the direction of An Le as the Vietnamese army blocked the road with heavy fire, machine guns and mortars, and the soldiers had to take shelter for the time being.
At night, the cadres were also unable to quickly command the troops due to geographical factors, and the soldiers of the whole regiment could only rescue themselves, but the situation of separating the shells from the mortars and the separation of the machine gunners and the secondary shooters would still appear, which also made the troops enter a relatively passive situation.
Some soldiers are still on the battlefield for the first time, and they have no experience, so they are a little at a loss, and at critical times, they still have to have experienced and reliable cadres to coordinate.
At that time, the battalion commander Chen Qinting took the initiative to take on the heavy responsibility of assembling and commanding in order to protect some new soldiers scattered in the jungle, but unfortunately he fell to the ground because of the exposure of the target, and before he died, he also handed over the gun in his hand to the soldiers around him, saying: "Run into the mountains as much as possible, don't go to the valley, the target in the valley is too big." ”
His 3rd battalion sacrificed more than 90 people, while some of the rest returned safely despite difficulties and dangers, and some returned to their brother units.
Although the 3rd Battalion suffered heavy losses in this operation, they also suffered heavy losses to the Vietnamese army, and the story of "Seven Warriors of Megatron Canyon", which caused a sensation in the country, was to describe the 3rd Battalion, these soldiers fought their way out of the encirclement and played a national prestige in a completely passive situation.
On 24 February, the situation of the 121st Division became even more severe, with many troops running out of food for more than six days, and drinking water for thousands of people becoming a problem.
Fortunately, they still waited for the good news: Wu Zhong led the 41st Army and the 42nd Army to attack Gaoping, and the city of Gaoping had been abandoned by the Vietnamese army.
Therefore, the people of the 121st Division hurriedly found an opening and ran to Gaoping, where they personally explained the situation to Deputy Commander Wu Zhong, hoping to help solve the problem of ammunition, grain and grass supply and the transfer of the wounded and sick.
Wu Zhong immediately nodded and ordered the deputy commander to give the 125th Division's supplies and ammunition support to the 121st Division, and also asked the 38th Brigade Field Hospital to send trucks to bring all the wounded and sick back to China for treatment.
With the help of brother units, the head of the 121st Division breathed a sigh of relief.
What was even more exciting was that the logistics department of the 41st Army was dispatched, and they brought a large number of compressed biscuits and meat, vegetables, cigarettes and canned food, and the 121st Division, which had gone through a whole week of ordeal, was back on track.
In the follow-up operations, all the officers and men of the 121st Division became more and more courageous, and they wanted to recover the past losses, and the follow-up results were also exciting: they annihilated nearly 3,000 enemies, achieved a great counterattack, and continued to write glory.
And in the general direction, the PLA was overwhelmed, and soon silenced Vietnam.
Some of the minor mistakes that occurred in the course of the war were also summed up by the troops, and later the troops also strengthened the ability of various units to obtain information in different battlefield environments, and continued to give play to the fine tradition of "using the old to lead the new."
In the subsequent battle of the two mountains, the troops still continued their style.
Until 1987, the mainland's border troops repelled dozens of attacks and harassments of various scales and won a complete victory in the self-defense counterattack against Vietnam.
It is precisely because of these heroes that the mainland has been able to smoothly embark on the road of reform and opening up and has made brilliant achievements.
On the other hand, this unjust war waged by the Vietnamese authorities has caused huge losses to the military and civilians in their country, making it difficult to recover to pre-war levels, and affecting the lives and livelihoods of hundreds of thousands of people.
This became a turning point in Vietnam's history, which had a profound impact on their politics, economy, military, social and cultural aspects, and since then, Vietnam has rarely made such a noise.
Resources
- The years of beacon fire in southern Xinjiang are thick - memoirs of the Sino-Vietnamese self-defense counterattack Sun Rengui Light weapons
- Self-defense counterattack against Vietnam: Both sides "celebrated" the Spring Festival with artillery CCTV