by James Rosone
He ran to the back of the bunker and grabbed the handset to the artillery. “Those rounds hit right on the money. Fire for effect, six rounds HE if you can. The PLA is starting to overrun our positions and we need that artillery,” he yelled over the concussions of gunfire and explosions going on all around him.
“Copy that, the rounds are on the way. Once these rounds are complete, we have to shift fire to the next sector. You’ll be on your own for a little while,” the voice from the artillery battalion responded.
“This is it,” Lin thought. “We won’t get another fire mission. The communist navy is going to hunt down these guns that have been punishing their troops on the beach.” His life began to flash before his eyes.
It took a little less than five minutes before the artillery barrage began to land throughout the beach, killing hundreds of PLA soldiers in the process of landing, along with those still trying to make it across the highway to the base of Hill 137.
Just as Sergeant Lin had hope that the enemy might actually be on the ropes, the bunker not more than 200 meters away from them exploded in spectacular fashion.
Lin surveyed the scene and spotted a Xian JH-7 fighter bomber flying low and fast across their bunkers and trench lines. Several oblong objects tumbled through the air towards them.
“Incoming! Everyone, drop to the ground!” Sergeant Lin yelled.
Seconds later, a thunderous explosion ripped through the air. Searing heat rushed across the hill as flames of napalm began to expand. The jellied liquid was thrown across the trench line and bunkers of Hill 137, marking everything it touched with devastation. Fortunately for Sergeant Lin and the soldiers next to him, the dangerous fuel did not fly through the gun slits of their bunker as it had one of the others. However, nearly the entire trench line had been saturated with the napalm.
Dozens of his soldiers screamed in agonizing pain as the material stuck to their clothes and burned through to their skin, then melted through their flesh to their bones, killing them in one of the most horrifying ways imaginable.
“Get back to the guns! Keep firing at the enemy. We have to keep them from overrunning our positions!” Sergeant Lin yelled, trying to get his soldiers to focus on the task at hand and not the burning carnage of their comrades. There was nothing they could do for them anyway; they needed to hold out long enough for their reinforcements to arrive and throw the invaders back into the ocean.
With several of their machine gun bunkers down and most of the soldiers in the trench line killed, the PLA ground forces were steadily advancing to the base of Hill 137 and working their way through the concertina wire Lin’s men had placed at various intervals to slow them down. Light and medium tanks were also starting to land at the beach.
The level of resistance they could provide had dwindled significantly since that fighter bomber had paid them a visit. Sergeant Lin grabbed one of the radio handsets and tried to raise their brigade headquarters. On the first couple of tries, he was unsuccessful. Once he was able to get through to someone, the colonel on the other end seemed very surprised that Hill 137 was still holding the line.
“All of the other beach strongpoints in your sector have fallen,” he explained. “What is left of the brigade is falling back to their secondary position.”
“Can you send additional reinforcements?” Lin asked. “We can continue to hold the hill if we get immediate support.”
There was a pause. The colonel was probably conferring with his counterparts on the other end. “Have what is left of your company fall back to the secondary position and rejoin the brigade. We have prepared additional fortifications, but we need all the soldiers we can get to man them.”
“Acknowledged,” Lin replied.
He set about doing his best to get word to the remaining soldiers to fall back. Once he had fired off the green flare and contacted the bunkers that were still able to answer his radio calls, he and four of the remaining soldiers in his bunker ran for their lives.
As they ran through the trench towards the back of the hill, they saw the charred bodies of their comrades, twisted, contorted, and still smoldering. The smell of burnt flesh hung in the air as the remaining survivors did their best to escape. One of the soldiers, who had been doing his best to keep up with Sergeant Lin, suddenly stopped and began to throw up from the sights and smells that were overwhelming him. After emptying the contents of his stomach, he shook off the horror and resumed running after his comrades.
When they reached the bottom of the hill, they found nearly two dozen other survivors, and collectively they moved as quickly as their feet would take them to the secondary position, roughly three kilometers away on another ridgeline. For the time being, their fight was over. They had done their duty to the best of their ability and had paid dearly for it. They had started the day with 220 soldiers. Now they were down to just twenty-eight.
Roadblocks
Taipei, Taiwan
Jinhe Sports Park
Captain Ma’s aircraft buffeted a bit as the transport craft started its final approach to the drop zone. The air force and navy had been hammering the Taiwanese air force and air defenses for the past six hours. In that short amount of time, they had already effectively destroyed the Taiwanese air force, and now they were working on taking out the island’s remaining air defenses. With heavy fighter and ground attack aircraft support, the airborne forces were being sent in to capture their objectives.
Like the other paratroopers from the PLAAF 43rd Airborne Division, anxiously waiting in the cargo hold of the aircraft, Captain Ma was both excited and terrified at the same time. The transport bounced up and down, weaving around more than he was used to. There were a few extreme evasive maneuvers as Taiwanese anti-aircraft artillery narrowly missed them; the closer they got to the capital and their primary objectives, the more danger they were in.
Their flight plan evened out, then one of the crew chiefs yelled out to everyone, “We are almost to the objective, so get ready to jump!”
The pilots had no intention of staying in the area any longer than they needed to. Ma stood up and began to shuffle towards the door lining up for the big leap.
“Remember, this is just like Mongolia and Vietnam. No big deal. Just get on the ground and take it from there,” he thought, trying to calm his nerves.
The small red light near the exit of the aircraft switched from red to green, and the jump master standing at the door yelled, “Go, go, go!”
One by one they walked through the door. Before Captain Ma knew it, he had reached the door and stepped out, just as he had done in training and his previous jumps. As planned, his rip cord caught, and in a second, his freefall ended. His main chute deployed, jerking him hard as his descent to earth slowed. Ma looked up at the transport he had just jumped out of and saw the rest of his men making their way out of the aircraft.
Nearby, another Chinese aircraft was also unloading a group of paratroopers. He watched as the men floated down through the sky. All of a sudden, the engine of that lumbering plane took a direct hit and exploded. The fire spread to the fuel bladders in the wing, and the entire right wing of the aircraft collapsed, sending the plane into a terrible tumbling circle as men continued to try and jump out.
He didn’t have time to dwell on the loss of his comrades; he was steadily floating towards the earth below. He looked down. Below his feet he identified the park that was their designated drop zone, and he guided his parachute towards it.
Despite the loss of the nearby plane, there were now thousands of parachutes in the sky, hovering towards the ground. In a way it was strangely beautiful to watch the thousands of paratroopers descending from the sky with Taipei in the background and the lights of tracer rounds reaching up from the ground like a giant laser show.
Before Ma knew it, the ground was quickly approaching, and he prepared to tuck and roll and engage any enemy soldiers he might encounter. His feet hit the ground, and he bent his knees in perfect form before he disconnected from his p
arachute. Captain Ma grabbed for his drop bag and placed his pack on his back, calling out to the soldiers nearby. Several of them came running towards him, ready for any orders he might issue.
Ma’s first step was getting his company collected and organized. They would be responsible for securing Highway 3, preventing any Taiwanese reinforcements from entering the city. Their sister company was going to secure Expressway 64 near the Jinhe Sports Park, further blocking another major road running through the city. Their goal was not to try and secure the city, just prevent enemy reinforcements from traveling freely while the ground forces arrived at the shore.
As his group of men gathered around him, Captain Ma issued his orders. “Lieutenant Zang, get your platoon moving to the tunnel entrance. Find whatever civilian vehicles you can and set up a road block. We need to make sure no enemy soldiers are able to get through.”
“Yes, Sir,” Zang replied.
Ma turned and repeated his order to the other platoon commanders, asking them set up road blocks at different sections of Highway 3. He kept one platoon in reserve with him, in case he needed them to reinforce one road block or another.
The first thirty minutes on the ground was rather chaotic. Heavy machine gun fire rattled loudly through the city. Somewhere overhead, jet aircraft screamed as they whizzed along. At unexpected intervals, explosions rang out.
Captain Ma’s soldiers did not encounter a lot of regular Taiwanese army soldiers, but they definitely met some initial resistance from the local military police units that had been deployed throughout the city. As Ma listened to the scene around him, it sounded like most of the fighting in the city was taking place where the rest of Ma’s brigade had landed.
One problem his soldiers were starting to encounter was the immense number of people trying to flee the city. While his platoons were trying to set up the roadblocks, they were also dealing with an overwhelming number of frightened civilian refugees trying desperately to flee the fighting. Ma had given explicit orders to his soldiers not to shoot at or kill any civilians unless absolutely necessary. If people were trying to flee the city, they were to let them flee.
There was actually a larger strategy at play than a display of mercy. As the refugees clogged up the major roads and paths leading to the fighting, this would prevent the Taiwanese army from being able to move their forces where they were needed. Mainland China also did not want to intentionally alienate the population. The end goal was to bring Formosa back into the fold, and they couldn’t do that if they turned the civilians there even further against them.
Just as Captain Ma thought his sector was being safely secured with little resistance, the radio crackled to life, letting him know that one of the platoons was reporting the sight of Taiwanese heavy tanks.
“Crap,” he thought. “I don’t know that we have enough antitank missiles with us if they are any larger than a platoon-sized element.”
Ma turned to his company sergeant. “Make sure our Hongjian-12s are deployed to that road block immediately,” he ordered. While they had plenty of RPG-7s with them, they only had fourteen of the HJ-12 Red Arrows, which could lock on a target before launch.
Boom! Everyone turned in the direction of the second platoon. A billowing cloud of black smoke rose into the air. Another explosion rocked the earth, and then frantic calls came in over the radio.
“We have tanks to our front. They are punching a hole through the road block!” a frantic voice cried out.
Ma turned to the platoon leader he had kept in reserve. “Get your platoon moving to reinforce them now. Report back how many tanks there are and if you guys are going to be able to hold the line. If not, I need to know ASAP, so we can fall back into the surrounding area,” he ordered.
The young lieutenant, who had just joined his unit a week ago as part of the replacements they had received, quickly responded, “Yes, Sir.” Then he rushed off to mobilize his platoon to the endangered roadblock.
When Li’s platoon got within 100 meters of the roadblock, they spotted soldiers from one of their sister platoons, who were starting to fall back. Immediately behind them was a Taiwanese M-60 Patton tank, hell-bent on killing them.
“Sergeant, get that missile set up and take out that tank!” yelled Li, loud enough to be heard over the roar of the machine guns firing all around him.
The sergeant yelled back, “Copy that, Sir!” and set to work. A couple of his soldiers had been lugging around several Red Arrow 12 “fire and forget” antitank launchers. The shoulder-fired weapons were still relatively new, but in their limited use thus far, they had proven to be extremely effective at taking out enemy tanks.
Whoosshhh… BAM! The explosion reverberated through the air as the paratroopers watched the missile leap from the launcher, traveling the short distance to the tank in less than a second. Once it was hit, the tank came to a halt. One of the hatches on the turret blew open and a small geyser of fire shot up into the sky.
Lieutenant Li stopped to look back at the soldier who had launched the missile to congratulate him on the hit, when a second tank rammed the now-burning wreck, pushing it to the side. The commander of this new tank was standing outside the turret and used his M2 .50-caliber machine gun to rake the paratroopers’ positions. The soldier who had successfully destroyed the first tank was cut down in a hail of bullets as the large caliber rounds tore his body apart.
“Someone, take that tank out!” yelled Li to any of the soldiers left who still had another missile.
There was no response. Seeing everyone ducking for cover, Lieutenant Li immediately scanned the area for options. He spotted a dead paratrooper lying on the ground next to a small delivery van that had been torn to ribbons by the tank’s heavy machine gun. Lying next to the soldier was another Red Arrow missile.
Not thinking about his own safety, Li jumped up and ran across the street to the missile launcher. He ran past several of his solders writhing on the ground, calling for help.
“If I don’t take down that tank, there is nothing I can do to help them,” Li realized.
Reaching down, Lieutenant Li grabbed the missile and pulled it back behind the van. He was startled as a tank round hit the front of a building not more than thirty meters to his left, sending debris flying in all directions.
“That was way too close,” he thought.
Li looked down at the missile launcher, toggled the safety on the missile and then raised it to his shoulder. The ground below him was starting to vibrate now as the tank continued to move closer to him. The creaking of the tanks treads and the clanking sound it made as the metal and rubber tracks hit the asphalt sent shivers down his spine.
In that moment, he knew it was now or never.
Taking a deep breath and steeling his nerves, Li jumped out from behind his covered position, aimed the missile at the tank and squeezed the trigger. In a fraction of a second, the missile leapt from the launcher and streaked across the short distance to the enemy tank that had been bearing down on them.
The missile scored a direct hit, and for a second, Li was elated at having taken the enemy tank out. Then his world went black; suddenly he didn’t feel or see anything as his lifeless body collapsed to the ground, riddled with bullets. Taiwanese soldiers who had been using the tank’s armored body as a shield had rushed forward, and Lieutenant Li was their first target.
The battle for control of this major road interchange lasted for nearly an hour, until the Taiwanese tanks pushed Captain Ma’s forces back into the city, opening the roads back up. Ma’s company retreated and took up residence in a nearby elementary school and several surrounding buildings. They moved eight different RPG teams to the roofs and windows of their shelters. If those tanks or infantry decided to try to head in their direction, they’d be in for a rude awakening. Since they were unable to hold their primary objective, they moved to their secondary mission, which was to attack as many enemy vehicles and cause as much chaos in the city as possible.
“I hope the other com
panies are having better luck in their sectors than we are,” Ma thought.
What Captain Ma did not know was that one of the Chinese battalions had been cornered shortly after landing by a much larger armored force. They had been compelled to surrender after taking heavy losses. Only two of the battalions from their mainland brigade were still actively fighting.
Out of the Darkness
Taoyuan, Taiwan
Taiwan Taoyuan International Airport
The ground surrounding Colonel Wang shook and vibrated with the force of constant explosions. He looked nervously at the walls of the bunker around him, hoping they would hold.
Two days before the invasion, the tanks in his 542nd Armored Brigade had been moved to a series of underground tunnels. They were being held in reserve for when the PLA began to land their heavy tanks at the beaches. When the air raid sirens had first blared, they had all thought this was another drill. False alarms were common on Formosa. However, as the first series of explosions rocked the earth, it was clear that the threat was very real.
The next hour brought a nearly constant barrage of explosions, some near, some far, but all violent in the destruction they caused to the villages and cities above them. While Colonel Wang was glad he and his men were underground, he felt sorry for the civilian population that was having to ride out the attack in less-fortified bunkers than his tank unit was currently surrounded by.
After being cooped up in the tunnels for nearly three hours, Colonel Wang received a radio call. “This is Iron Mountain. The communist forces have officially landed at the beaches. They are presently being engaged. Get your brigade ready to respond to your assigned targets and prepare to exit the tunnels.”
“It’s about time they get us into the fight,” Wang thought. “If the PLA is able to land a large enough land force, we won’t be able to push them back into the sea.”
