A man in his fifties, dressed in camouflage, with several bloodstains on his body, his face grimy and restless, he stood before the crowd, impatiently demanding an artillery observer, speaking as fast as a machine gun.
An artillery observer is essentially an artillery scout, or artillery forward observation post, it doesn’t matter what you call it, it all ans the sa thing,
If the artillery commander is the brain of the artillery, then the artillery observer is the eyes of the artillery.
For those advanced artillery systems, mainly those with C4I systems, the artillery relies on just pressing a button with a finger; calculations for trajectory and damage assessnt are handled by computers. But for artillery without computers, or before the computer era, everything had to be done manually, using human brains.
Undoubtedly, a set of advanced artillery systems is extrely expensive. For countries like Russia and Ukraine, it’s best to stick with cheap artillery, especially for the militias in Ukraine; don’t even think about replacing human brains with computers.
So, without observers, artillery can’t aim accurately.
Precisely because artillery observers or artillery scouts hold such importance, if you can’t take out the enemy’s artillery, you must eliminate the enemy’s artillery observers. Thus, in battles where artillery is widely used, artillery observers are priority targets for elimination.
The characteristics of artillery observers demand they be positioned forward, as close to the enemy as possible, being able to observe enemy movents constantly, and wherever fire support is needed, they can quickly direct shells accurately to the right place. This makes their situation very dangerous, with a very high mortality rate.
Gao Yang now understood that the reinforcent’s artillery observers were all dead. No wonder the artillery fire was accurate initially but now no longer, because with the artillery observers gone, the artillery, located ten kiloters away, could only shoot at fixed coordinates, unaware of the front line developnts or changes in enemy positions. Accuracy was out of the question.
While coming to this realization, Gao Yang’s gaze naturally fell upon Rebrov.
For an old-fashioned artillery unit, the role of the artillery observer is crucial, and the artillery observer is a technical troop, despite doing the work of scouts. Infantry scouts cannot replace artillery observers. Now, Gao Yang only had Rebrov as a valuable asset.
After a glance at Rebrov, Gao Yang didn’t hesitate much, imdiately turned around and shouted at the man: "I am the commander here, I have an artillery observer."
"Only one?"
The man imdiately stepped forward and shouted at Gao Yang: "Our artillery is deployed approximately nine kiloters from here, having suffered an enemy airstrike, but the damage is not severe, retaining most of our combat strength. Now we just lack an artillery observer, so many guns with only one person is still too few."
Gao Yang quickly grabbed the walkie-talkie and shouted: "This is the headquarters, if any team has an artillery observer, report back imdiately, repeating, if any team has an artillery observer, report back imdiately, if not, then quickly find one, once found, report back imdiately, over!"
Though the artillery belonged to reinforcents, it was firing at a common enemy, saving our own lives; who would hide an artillery observer at this ti?
After issuing orders on the walkie-talkie, Gao Yang imdiately shouted at the man: "I was just about to find you, tell , how many guns do you have? Where are they deployed?"
The man stepped forward, pointed at the map on the table, hesitated for a mont, then shouted: "You’re using this map? We have four 2S3 152mm self-propelled howitzers, one 2S1 122mm self-propelled howitzer, its walking gear broken, can’t move but can fire, six 122mm D30 towed artillery, and four BM21 rocket launchers with 40 tubes, but the rockets are depleted and not yet delivered."
Gao Yang was both surprised and delighted and shouted: "So many artillery pieces, excellent, I’ll try my best to find observers for you, moreover, I want to get in touch with your commander, how can I contact him."
"Our commander? That’s , whatever you need to discuss with is fine, little brother, the artillery observer must be found urgently, otherwise our artillery will be rendered useless, detrintal to the situation."
Gao Yang nodded and shouted: "Understood, now please tell your next move, can your infantry enter the city? We are severely undermanned."
"No way, infantry can’t enter. Our infantry is scarce, extrely scarce, only less than two hundred, the rest are artillery. If you pull away the infantry, artillery loses protection, unless the enemy is repelled or the frontline changes, otherwise we can’t enter the city, artillery range already defines our activity scope."
Gao Yang pondered what to do next, but then noticed Glolov intensely staring at the reinforcent leader, while the reinforcent leader, pausing the conversation with Gao Yang, shouted: "Any water to drink? My throat’s on fire."
When the reinforcent leader asked for water, he also noticed Glolov standing beside him and, stunned, started staring at Glolov with a face full of confusion, sizing up Glolov.
When their eyes t, Glolov seed to confirm the leader’s identity, delightfully pointed at the reinforcent leader and shouted: "Chekriayev! It’s you, Lucky Iva, hahaha, it’s !"
Chekriayev clapped his hands and shouted: "Yuri! You are Yuri!"
Glolov exclaid excitedly: "I just thought it looked like you, the voice too, but it’s been so long I didn’t dare recognize you, also, you were a helicopter pilot, how did you end up here."
Chekriayev said sentintally: "I didn’t notice you initially, but recognized you right away, you haven’t changed much."
The two hugged each other excitedly, patting each other, then separated and hooked each other’s arms. Chekriayev said excitedly: "How did you end up here too, such a coincidence, so great! Haha, is Motolov here, since you’re here, is he?"
Glolov said excitedly: "No, Motolov’s in smuggling now, haven’t t in years but still keep in touch. How did you end up here, retired?"
"Retired long ago! Not only , my son ca too, don’t know if you rember, I ntioned him, my eldest son Rasolov, he’s commanding the artillery, when he told he decided to co to Ukraine, I chose to co along imdiately, haha!"
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