The first batch of soldiers was personally led by fellow villagers, because this was the first actual combat after the armed swimming training of the soldiers of the expeditionary force, and the fellow villagers were a little uneasy.

The other is that he inherited Zhang Chi's command style, believing that sometimes the commander must go to the front line in person on the battlefield, otherwise there will be some emergencies that cannot be commanded in time and it is easy to delay the fighters.

More than a dozen Higgins landing craft slowly drove into the entrance of the atoll under the sound of artillery, and the sea was even filled with the water vapor evaporated by the explosion of the shells, full of gunpowder smell, and a little salty seawater...... Turning on the lights was likely to make the Japanese soldiers aware of their presence, so the driver could only nervously follow the troop transport in front of him in the dark night, carefully driving in the dark.

Luckily, these pilots are also trained to fight at night...... They are Chinese sailors of the New Seventh Army, and the US military generally does not choose night battles, so no matter whether the navy or air force is uniformly trained in night combat, there is relatively little training. Of course, this is limited to the US military in this era, after the War to Resist US Aggression and Aid Korea, the US military fully realized the lack of its own night combat capability and worked hard to make up for this shortcoming.

In the early days of the War of Resistance Against Japan, they even trained to secretly drive a boat full of explosives at night to get close to a Japanese warship and then detonate it, so the training in night combat was stronger than that of the American army.

The pilots of the landing craft were also handpicked from Chinese sailors, and they were successful in transporting the troops into their designated positions in the lagoon through narrow atolls inlets in almost total darkness.

Asked after the war how they could do this, their answer was: "One is to listen to the sound, the sound of the motor." However, the sound of the motor is not very reliable, because it is sometimes difficult to distinguish between the rumbling cannons, and the other is the feeling of driving a boat. ”

The success of these sailors caused the townspeople to change their minds temporarily...... When he and the first wave of fighters reached the designated lagoon area, he ordered all the fighters to jump into the sea and wait, waiting for the landing craft to return and pick up the second wave of fighters before launching a joint attack on the enemy.

It should be said that this approach of the countrymen is still very risky, and the main danger is that the soldiers waiting in the sea may be discovered by the Japanese army, and then the whole plan will not only fail because of this, but also cause heavy casualties to the troops...... The fighters had no ability to fight back in the sea, so they could only let the Japanese guns open fire.

However, this adventure of the townsmen proved to be worthwhile, because the number of people in the attack was too small, only about 500 men, and the Japanese army was very well fortified on Beato Island...... The total area of Bito Island is only 1.18 square kilometers, and more than 6,000 Japanese troops have been tossing around on this island for more than a year. this

For such an island, it is difficult for a sneak attack of 500 people to play a little role, especially since the villagers also know that the Japanese Navy Special Marine Corps is stationed on Bito Island...... For this unit, the countrymen have fought with them on Kuah Island, and know that their combat effectiveness and will to fight are not comparable to the ordinary Japanese army, which is a bit like the difference between the US Marine Corps and the US 27th Division, although the combat effectiveness of the US Marine Corps at this time is not very good, but it is much better than the US Army.

Therefore, his fellow villagers did not dare to take this risk, he was afraid that after the sneak attack of 500 men, the Japanese army, who was good at night fighting, would desperately launch a counterattack against them, and the second wave would not have time to arrive or the entrance to the lagoon would be blocked by Japanese artillery, then the operation would be in vain.

So the townsmen and more than 500 soldiers floated in the sea and waited for more than 20 minutes...... This was not very difficult for the fighters, as they could float in the water with their poncho-wrapped equipment, and their main fear was that the Japanese would send a few flares into the middle of the lagoon or search for it with searchlights, but none of this happened.

In fact, these are the same countrymen who are too worried.

The reason why the Japanese did not fire flares or search with searchlights in the lagoon was not because the Japanese were not very vigilant, but because the US troops fired smoke bombs on all the islands of the atoll, especially Bito Island, where the Japanese troops were heavily stationed, and the US 2nd Marine Division also played a significant role, and they fired almost all the smoke bombs brought to the island.

This, combined with the smoke and water vapor from the shells, made the Tarawa Atoll so dense in smoke that it was difficult for the Japanese to find the soldiers of the expeditionary force suspended in the sea a kilometer away, even if they fired flares into the lagoon or searched with searchlights.

There were also some surprises, which were not caused by the Japanese, but by the shells of the US Navy...... As mentioned before, Beato Island is corally sandy, and Beato Island is only about 500 meters wide, so even if the shells fired by U.S. warships on Beato Island can accurately hit Beato Island through comparative shooting, some shells will still bounce and shoot into the sea water of the lagoon.

From time to time, several shells passed over the heads of the fighters and exploded nearby, which at one point made the fighters think that they had been discovered by the Japanese...... The soldiers could not tell whether it was an American shell or a Japanese shell, but the townsfolk were sure that they were not exposed from the fact that there were no flares in the sky, so they stabilized the soldiers and let them continue to lurk.

In fact, his fellow villagers didn't have a score in their hearts at that time, because he never understood it...... Since the Japanese did not find them, then where did these shells come from? The artillery of the Americans will not be so inaccurate, knowing that they are going to land from the lagoon, and they will hit so many shells into the lagoon?!

This riddle could not be solved even if fellow villagers asked about the U.S. Navy or Japanese prisoners of war after the war, and both sides said that the shells could not have been fired by them.

Until Nimitz expressed curiosity about the Battle of Tarawa...... He did not understand why the U.S. Navy had been bombarded by the Japanese army in Tarawa for so long and with heavy artillery and aerial bombs, and why it had been unable to destroy the fortifications built by the Japanese army in Tarawa, resulting in so many casualties among the U.S. troops.

Therefore, Nimitz specially found an island in the Pacific Ocean with a similar topography and geology as Beato Island, built fortifications in the shape of Beato Island, conducted artillery tests and observations, and finally discovered the mystery...... The shells will bounce off the island and jump to the sea on the other side to explode.

Further testing led to the realization that in order to destroy a fortification like Beato Island, it was necessary to use large-caliber artillery to use a time-delay fuse and fire at a wide angle.

(To be continued.) )