Chapter 145: 144, Dive Bombing And Circling Bombing, Bombing To Our Heart’s Content
According to Sun Debiao’s description, in the area 5 kilometers on the north bank of the Luan River, three barracks were lined up in sequence.
In front of the barracks, Japanese soldiers had captured many locals as laborers to build fortifications.
For nighttime bombing, they had to avoid those laborers to prevent accidental injury.
Immediately, Fang Wen sent this request via telegram.
On Stone Mountain, Sun Debiao was leaning back.
In front was camouflage cloth covering the brought equipment; from a distance, it looked just like a large stone.
He finished eating the pancake in big bites and picked up the headphones to continue listening.
Everything was now set up, just waiting for the general manager’s order.
Radio waves came through; he recalled the memorized codes and translated them.
【Select any one of the three barracks, avoid the laborers.】
【Confirm and reply, bomb tonight.】
It was about to begin.
Sun Debiao was wild with joy inside; he took out binoculars to watch.
In the distant barracks, the conscripted laborers were digging fortifications in front of the left barracks.
That meant the middle and lower ones could both be targets.
He thought, in storytelling, don’t they always say the general sits steadily in the central tent?
So select the middle one; maybe they could bomb a Japanese admiral to death.
After deciding, Sun Debiao immediately replied via radio.
Then he carefully adjusted the signal transmitter, aiming at the middle barracks.
After receiving the reply, Fang Wen immediately stood up.
He returned to the company and called names one by one.
“Manager Liu, let’s have a drink today.”
“Shao Sishen, come to my place tonight.”
“Pan Jiafeng, come over after work.”
“Uncle Fang, I’ll wait for you at home.”
“Howard, come to my house for dinner.”
These five arrived right on time at 5 p.m. quitting time and came to Fang Wen’s house.
A large table of dishes was set up in the courtyard.
Everyone smiled without speaking, silently eating and drinking.
Until nightfall.
Fang Wen checked the time: 7:10 p.m.
He stood up: “Let’s go.”
The five followed him out of the courtyard; Kuang Mingzhu watched them leave from the doorway.
The group entered the airport, boarded the f.220 airplane in the hangar, and slowly taxied onto the runway.
Zhao Shanhu turned on the runway lights and waved to signal.
The airplane accelerated, took off, and flew southwest.
Three hours later, they arrived at Xiangxi Airport; Fang Wen turned on the radio device and called.
“Taishan One arriving, requesting permission to land.”
This was a strict takeoff and landing operation requirement; even at this time, Fang Wen led by example in complying.
Ground replied: “Request received, cleared to land.”
Immediately, the airplane circled to adjust position and landed on the runway.
As soon as the airplane touched down, people at the airport began bustling about.
Huo Duanyang directed: “Be careful, don’t panic, just hand the stuff to the people on the airplane, line up and take turns.”
Under his command, porters selected from the bomb factory and Security Brigade carefully carried over magazine boards one by one, handed them to the four on the airplane, and stacked them neatly.
Fang Wen and Pan Jiafeng got off the airplane to do another task.
They hung ten 50-kilogram external aviation bombs on the bomb racks.
Although designed for the f.220’s bomb racks, these napalm bombs had great power and had to be handled carefully.
Fang Wen, Pan Jiafeng, Fang Shun, and Huo Duanyang carefully lifted the 50-kilogram bombs and hung them on the bomb rack devices.
Then carefully pushed them down to check if secure.
A total of ten, which was only one-eighth of the external payload capacity.
But this was already the limit of what the bomb factory could produce.
Even more, because these bombs were so powerful, they hadn’t undergone live testing and were being used directly in the bombing.
One hour later, all bombs were loaded.
As the person in charge of loading, Huo Duanyang reported: “100 magazine boards, totaling 3600 0.5-kilogram napalm bombs, and 10 50-kilogram external napalm bombs, all loaded.”
Fang Wen looked at the others: “Is everyone ready?”
“Ready.” The Taishan Volunteer Army members said in unison.
This was Taishan Airlines’ war; their hearts surged.
“Let’s go.”
Fang Wen boarded first, the others filed in after.
Only Huo Duanyang stayed behind; as airport person in charge, he also had to watch the bomb factory and couldn’t leave.
Right, and William, who had just taken over the Public Security Brigade, stayed with him.
Under Huo Duanyang and William’s gaze, the airplane took off and flew northeast.
It was now 11 p.m. at night.
Tonight’s weather seemed poor; the pitch-black night sky had no stars, completely unsuitable for flight.
But now Fang Wen had another, more powerful navigation method.
He entered mechanical perception state, transforming into a giant eagle of the night sky.
From the northeast, the continuous radio waves feedback was immediately received.
Though the distance was far and the signal not strong, it was continuous and indicated the direction.
Fang Wen unhesitatingly piloted the airplane that way.
Over four hours later, at 3 a.m., 100 kilometers from the target area.
“Airplane will arrive in the bombing zone in twenty minutes, everyone to stations.” Fang Wen issued the order gravely.
Pan Jiafeng immediately stood and hurried to the rear cabin.
He placed magazine boards on the slide rail cart, and with Howard and Fang Shun, half-squatted in readiness.
In the aimed direction, Fang Shouxin, Shao Sishen, and Shopkeeper Liu had already installed the first magazine board, hands on the lever.
Everyone awaited Fang Wen’s order.
At this time, Fang Wen was fully focused in mechanical perception state, determining the best bombing timing.
He was equivalent to the brain of the entire bombing action; no mistake could be made, or the bombs falling would miss by a mile.
The airplane reached 5000 meters over the barracks and began circling.
Fang Wen, in mechanical perception state fused with the airplane, calculated thereby.
5000 meters altitude, wind from northwest, wind speed 8 meters per second.
8 meters per second wind speed could sway branches on the ground and also cause bombs to deviate on landing in the air.
This was similar to the situation when bombing warships in Shanghai.
The problem was, this bombing had more bombs, which could cover failure rate with quantity.
No, Fang Wen dismissed the idea; since bombing, it had to be accurate.
If they couldn’t hit accurately from 5000 meters absolute safe altitude, then descend to 2000 meters.
Though 2000 meters would make noise alerting ground troops, the bombing was brief; the enemy probably couldn’t react.
After deciding, Fang Wen began descending altitude.
At 2800 meters, he issued the order: “Countdown from 3 seconds to start bombing.”
In the cabin, Pan Jiafeng loudly counted: “3 2”
Simultaneously, the airplane dove down.
Just as Pan Jiafeng counted to 1, they were right over the barracks.
The three bombardiers timely pulled the levers, hundreds of bombs pouring out.
In just 5 seconds, the airplane flew over the barracks, completing the first bomb drop.
6th Division Hiraga Brigade camp.
The camp was quiet at this time.
Except for patrolling sentries, hidden sentries in the dark, and set up cross defense firepower.
The commander who arranged all this was very confident; even if troops south of the Luan River came to sneak attack, he could easily arrange soldiers to respond.
But he never imagined the enemy would attack from the sky.
When the roaring sound approached from afar, accompanied by a huge black shadow passing over.
The commander jumped up, instantly realizing the severity.
“Air raid!”
“Air raid!”
He ran to the camp center without time to dress, shouting loudly.
With his shouts, camp sentries aimed searchlights at the officer.
At this moment, the officer became the most conspicuous person in the camp; his shouts let more soldiers hear.
But the next second, countless black dots fell from the sky.
These black dots hit the ground, roofs exploding instantly, countless fire points shooting out in all directions.
By ill luck, the searchlight-illuminated commander became the target attracting the most fire points.
On the distant small mountain, Sun Debiao observed with binoculars.
When the airplane passed over the camp, he saw it.
Binoculars naturally shifted down to observe movement in the camp.
A Japanese officer in underwear ran to the camp center, flailing his arms.
Then he was lit by the searchlight.
Sun Debiao made an aiming pose, making a bullet firing sound: “biu, little Japanese, you’re dead.”
The next second, he really saw that officer become a fire man, running madly in the camp.
2 minutes later, Fang Wen completed the flight turn and continued bombing.
He shouted: “Speed up the drop rate.”
According to the plan, 100 magazine boards, totaling 3600 0.5-kilogram napalm bombs, couldn’t be dropped one board per pass.
That would require 30 trips of circling repeated bombing; the effect at end would be amazing, but the airplane couldn’t withstand such intense repeated turns, ascents, dives, and ascents again.
Therefore, next they had to accelerate the bombing.
From airplane passing over the camp took 5 seconds.
In these five seconds, at least 2 magazine boards had to be dropped.
For this, everyone had specially trained.
Immediately, as the airplane dove over the camp again, the bombardiers swiftly completed the process: pull ring to drop—remove empty magazine board—install loaded magazine board—continue dropping.
Each step completed in under 2 seconds, to ensure bomb impact points covered the barracks without falling outside.
After the second round of dropping ended, everyone looked at the ground barracks through the observation window.
A fire line stretched across the middle of the barracks.
That was ignited by aerial bombs bursting into flames.
Fang Wen saw more clearly than everyone; he saw many soldiers in the barracks running out to put out the fire.
It seemed the bombing effect wasn’t sufficient yet.
At the same time, Fang Wen saw people from the barracks on both sides rushing over to help fight the fire.
He had a new idea: straight dive bombing had too small an impact area; what about circling bombing.
Circling bombing would make the impact area circle the barracks, not only expanding the area but also sustaining the bombing, seeming more suitable for the current situation.
This was a bombing method not yet seen in current air war history.
Only future high-tech bombers could achieve it.
Bombers of this era at most did dive straight bombing or precision bombing, bomb and leave.
How could they play so many tricks like Fang Wen.
After deciding, Fang Wen immediately began implementing.
He shouted loudly to the back: “I’m preparing to change bombing method, circle the barracks; when I say start dropping, keep dropping continuously until all bombs are dropped.”
The six in back were extremely surprised, then delighted; this kind of continuous dropping matched the many bombs in the airplane.
Circling to bomb once per lap wasn’t as satisfying as continuous bombing.
Everyone unhesitatingly agreed to the plan.
“Report bomb count.” Fang Wen asked.
Pan Jiafeng quickly calculated and reported: “Master, 9 magazine boards dropped, 91 left, and 10 50-kilogram aviation gasoline bombs unused.”
“Then next, everyone work hard; we’ll drop all bombs on the Japanese heads at once.”
Fang Wen’s words filled the six with vigor, awaiting the drop order.
Immediately, the airplane turned; under Fang Wen’s mechanical perception state control, the f.220 circled the barracks.
“Start dropping.” He issued the order.
Immediately, the high-altitude circling airplane continuously dropped 0.5-kilogram napalm bombs like raindrops.
One circle after another, massive napalm bombs exploded, encircling the barracks in a huge fire ring.
Until all magazine boards were expended.
Pan Jiafeng eagerly said: “Master, 10 50-kilogram aviation gasoline bombs left unused; I know you plan to drop them in the middle—can I drop one myself?”
Fang Wen nodded: “All of you come over; we’ll complete the final bombing together.”
The six bombardiers stood at the cockpit door, together reached out, and with Fang Wen pressed the external bomb drop switch.
10 50-kilogram aviation gasoline bombs fell from the sky, bursting into towering mushroom clouds, dyeing the sky red.
Facing the soaring firelight, the f.220 then returned south.
Watching the black shadow in the sky brush past the moon, Sun Debiao observing from the distant high mountain finally fully relaxed.
The mission was finally complete; he too had to leave here, transfer elsewhere, and continue guiding the bomber.
After this bombing, Sun Debiao felt immense pride in his actions.
He had personally witnessed a Japanese Army barracks destroyed, with at least 2000 Japanese soldiers inside.
After this bombing, see how the Japanese could still be arrogant.
He packed his things on his back and, under cover of night, carefully went down the mountain.
But unexpectedly, a voice came from behind.
“Immortal master, thank you for sending down heavenly punishment to avenge this old man; I kowtow to you.”
He hurriedly turned back.
Only then discovering a family still on the hilltop above him.
Wasn’t it the man he had saved, his mother, wife, and child?
Turns out this guy hadn’t died after all, making him worry for nothing.
He asked: “When did you arrive?”
“We’ve been here a while. My mother said you were performing rites against the Japanese, so we didn’t dare disturb you and watched from above. Great immortal, you’re too amazing—take me as your disciple?” the man replied.
“I’m not an immortal.” Sun Debiao wanted to explain but thought he couldn’t reveal the airplane secret.
He changed his words: “But I’m sent by the immortal; the immortal not only wants to punish these Japanese soldiers with heavenly wrath but also those elsewhere. Problem is, I’m not familiar with the area and need a guide.”
The man’s mother hurriedly pushed her son forward: “My son can do it; he runs in the mountains every day, knows the nearby roads well—let him follow you to avenge his father.”
Sun Debiao nodded in agreement; a local guide was much better than stumbling around blindly.
Immediately, he bid farewell to the man and his family and continued scouting enemy movements along the Great Wall Defense Line.
And at the same time.
The army south of the Luan River also discovered the anomaly at the Japanese barracks.
