Chapter 826: The Landing of Leyte Island
Translator: _Min_ Editor: Caron_
At 14:31 on July 21st, Moro 1st Armored Brigade, and the 6th Infantry Brigade entered the Surinam region. The command was ordered by the New Moon Island Command Centre and they began to embark; at 16:00, Celestial Trade’s spokesperson announced to the media that Celestial Trade would intervene in the form of mercenary warfare against Country F in the name of self-defense.
At 17:30, the landing fleet carrying two brigades set off from Surinam Port. The fleet avoided the artilleries deployed by Country F on the other side of the coast and marched towards the Region of Leyte.
While relying on the powerful computing power of quantum computers, Celestial Trade launched a full-scale cyber-attack on Country F. A large number of packets tagged with the word “Nazi” swarmed onto Country F’s government websites, replacing not only all the characters in the database but also completely paralyzing the network servers in ten minutes.The photo of President Aquino IV was replaced by Hitler, and the national flag of Country F was replaced by a swastika. Eighty percent of the websites in Country F, including the media, communications and transportation systems, had been paralyzed by the Celestial Trade Network Force, which had a major impact on the military operations of Country F and directly affected Country F’s war mobilization and support capabilities.
At 17:32, ten Aurora-20 fighters first reached the target area and encountered twenty F-22 fighters that took off in an emergency.
Because of the assistance provided by the Rothschild family included the Patriots 3 land-to-air defense system, the air battle was extremely fierce. After paying the heavy price of four Aurora-20s, the Celestial Trade Air Force downed 15 F-22 fighters in exchange and successfully captured air superiority over Leyte Island.
At 20:19, the Sea Lion Special Forces landed in the mountainous region of central Leyte and launched a night attack against the 4th Air Defense Battalion deployed there, destroying 8 Patriot 3 air-defense missiles deployed in the foothills of the mountain and killed 221 country F soldiers with the assistance of drones.
After discovering that the Sea Lions Special Forces had been airdropped, Country F urgently transferred a division from the southern defense line for support.
At 20:32, the formation of the Moro Landing Forces at Leyte Bay began to attack. Under air strikes of the Aurora-20 and suppression from electromagnetic pulse cannons of the guardian frigate, the 6th Infantry Brigade boarded landing crafts and began to attack the beach in the southern part of Tacloban.
The night sky exploded with thunderous boom, it was an Aurora-20 dropping an EMP bomb over the city of Tacloban.After a short air raid warning, the entire city was in dead silence. The city was covered by electromagnetic pulses. The sporadic lights were also wiped out and the east coast of Leyte fell into complete darkness.
Country F’s 2nd Mechanized Division, who was responsible for defending the area, immediately mobilized after receiving a naval intrusion warning. The EMP arrived, but because the communication equipment and armored units were protected against EMPs, their combat effectiveness remained.
Celestial Trade and Moro were destined to be a fierce battle.
Accompanied by the roar of motors and shouting of waves, the first wave of landing teams began to rush to the position of Country F. Country F built a concrete fortress there with anti-personnel mines and tapered concrete blocks on the beach that impeded armored forces
Although the Air Force and the Navy carried out a series of bombings in this region, it was obviously impossible for Country F’s Army to be stupid enough to put all its troops into the trenches at once. Soldiers continued to die under Aurora-20 bombs and missiles, but soldiers soon reinforced the defensive positions.
Due to the loose formation, landing attacks weren’t as easy compared to Joint Military Exercises.
But they weren’t too difficult either…
The sea was deafeningly silent. Aside from the roars of the engines, Zhang Feng couldn’t hear any other sounds.
As the 11th battalion of Celestial Marines, he and his platoon were arranged into the first wave of attack along with Moro 3rd, 4th, and 5th Battalions of the 6th Infantry Brigade.
This time, it wasn’t an exercise. He was no longer an ordinary soldier but a Seargent in war.
In the air, a blazing fire exploded, and the orange-red flare illuminated over the stronghold position of Country F.
Immediately afterward, Celestial Trade transport planes dropped a dozen coffin-like black boxes onto Country F soldiers. When these black boxes slammed into the area Country F was defending, these soldiers had no time to react before the sides of the black boxes snapped open.
Accompanied by a buzzing, hundreds of Hummingbirds were ejected from the drone hives and attacked the position held by Country F’s 2nd Mechanized Division.
“Sh*t! I can’t hit these da*n things!” The machine gunner clasped the trigger and let loose onto the drones on the beach a hundred meters away. However, no one knew if he hit anything.
Not far in the distance, the drones were moving between the first lines of defense. Like reapers with scythes, they harvested Country F soldiers hiding behind the bunker. At such a close distance, the stocks of rifles were actually more effective than bullets.
“Enemy drones landed on the beach! We can no longer hold our position!”
The soldier taking cover behind the sandbags pressed his helmet and shouted loudly into the intercom.
“What are the first-line-of-defense idiots doing? Turn on the KS-32 anti-drone system! Fast!”
“It’s already on! Damn! This stuff doesn’t work!”
“What?!”
On the distant beach, fire and light flickered.
The firepower suddenly seemed muted. The airdropped drones caught Country F soldiers by surprise. In particular, the KS-32 anti-drone system ordered by Country F’s Army had no effect against the Hummingbird drones.
The soldiers on the landing crafts had opened the safety, fastened their nylon helmet buckle, and prepared for the battle!
“50 meters! Release the drones!”
Zhang Feng shouted at the same time, suddenly knocking on his chest.
The drones popped out from the grooves in the kinetic skeletons and scattered from all sides of the landing craft.
“Jump! Prepare to fight!”
“Roger—”
A howitzer exploded about five meters in front of the landing craft and nearly overturned the boat. Already approaching the beach, the soldiers quickly untied their safety belts that had been strapped to them and flipped into the sea from the side of the landing craft. They maximized the power of the kinetic skeletons and rushed toward the beachhead.
The Moro Army had taken the lead in rushing to the beach. Without the support of the drone group, they began to fight for control of the beach against Country F’s soldiers.
It was at this time that the two frigates of Celestial Trade also began a new round of firing.
Bombs with orange trajectories created countless specks of dust toward Country F’s 2nd Mechanized Division.
When Zhang Feng and his team rushed to the beach, the battle on the beach was almost over.
After the optical illusion of the Sea Lion Special Forces taking out the Patriot 3 air-defense missiles, they succeeded in getting rid of the siege and intercepted Country F’s Mountain Division. After hijacking the vehicles, they crossed 12 kilometers and raided Country F from the rear. They called in airstrikes to destroy 12 concealed infantry vehicles and 4 M1A1 main battle tanks.
The armored units were hit hard. More than half of the soldiers were killed and wounded. Country F soldiers began to withdraw to Tacloban.
“No, don’t kill me! I surrender!”
“Ah! Mom—”
The real battlefield was far crueler than exercises. When Zhang Feng rushed into the trenches behind the beach with the team, it was already bloody and gruesome inside. Broken arms were mixed with the wreckage of drones, together with lifeless, torn bodies.
Country F’s soldiers, who had lost their morale, dropped to the ground and raised their hands to surrender. There were also tenacious people hiding among the corpses and waiting for people to come close and perform suicide with grenades.
After killing a Country F soldier who rushed at him with rifle stock, Zhang Feng appointed a person from the team to watch the prisoners then took the remaining soldiers to continue chasing the retreating enemy forces.
After they took control of the beach, the engineers dismantled the tank traps, the anti-tank mines were deployed, and Moro’s 1st Armoured Brigade began landing. The 5th Mechanized Division already boarded the transport ship and was moving toward the line of defense on Leyte Island.
At the same time, Celestial Trade Command Centre issued new combat orders.
The order was to take control of Tacloban before dawn the next day, then control the highway connecting Samar Island in the north to completely cut off the supply line of Country F’s army deployed in the northern part of Leyte Island.
