In the Campaign to Resist US Aggression and Aid Korea, although the Volunteer Army was not as good as the United League with huge industrial support in terms of firepower, it was also equipped with some artillery, such as 60 mortars.
The 27th Army of the Volunteer Army, with a total of 4 divisions, is equipped with more than 330 60 mortars. But according to post-war statistics, these more than 300 mortars fired less than 5,000 shells in normal war.
Why is that?
The 60 mortar can be said to have accompanied our army for decades. To this day, our army is still armed with 60 mortars.
But what exactly is this mortar good at**? Obviously it's just a light mortar, although it has been transformed by modern science and technology, and has improved in terms of range and power, but it's still not as good as other larger-caliber artillery, right?
For example, why was the 75 mm caliber mountain artillery forced to be eliminated by 60?
During World War II, the 75mm mountain artillery was generally organized into a battalion in the establishment system of our army and used as a suppression artillery at the corps or division level.
In 1937, under the army adjustment division system of the National Revolutionary Army, an infantry brigade had three battalions, each battalion was equipped with an artillery platoon.
In the 1942 National Revolutionary Army military establishment system, we can also see that there is a field (mountain) artillery battalion directly under the first army, with three companies under its jurisdiction, and one company is equipped with 4 guns.
However, the establishment is like this, and in practice it is very difficult to achieve in wartime.
Due to various reasons, until the victory of the Anti-Japanese War in September 1945, only 76 of the 119 armies were equipped with artillery battalions, and only 51 of the 350 divisions had artillery battalions.
After the victory of the Anti-Japanese War, the national ** received a large number of Japanese artillery, which made each division barely have a mountain artillery battalion.
After the founding of the People's Republic of China, China promulgated the "Provisional Establishment Table of the Army Units of the National Defense Forces" in 1950, which also organized the 75mm mountain artillery into a battalion (12 guns) as the suppression artillery directly under the infantry division of the People's Liberation Army.
According to this schedule, each division was equipped with 3,993 rifles, 680 short guns, 732 submachine guns, 201 light machine guns, 54 heavy machine guns, 84 60 mortars, 27 82 mortars, and 12 mountain guns.
After the outbreak of the War to Resist US Aggression and Aid Korea, with the introduction of a large number of Soviet Unions, from 1951, a group of mountain artillery battalions of PLA infantry divisions were expanded into artillery regiments.
The artillery regiment consisted of the original mountain artillery battalion and a Soviet-style 37mm anti-aircraft artillery battalion, as well as the Soviet-style 762mm field artillery battalion. Some divisions separated the anti-aircraft artillery battalions and did not include them in the divisional artillery regiments.
Some infantry divisional artillery regiments have abolished the 75th Mountain Artillery Battalion and added Soviet-style 122mm howitzer battalions, such as the infantry divisions of the 1st Army, 16th Army, and 66th Army.
In 1953 and 1954, the army establishment was revised again, and the 122mm howitzer was officially used as the divisional artillery of the PLA infantry division, and the 75 mortar was eliminated from the divisional artillery of the army infantry division.
The newly formed Army Infantry Division Artillery Regiment has a total of three artillery battalions, namely the 120mm heavy mortar battalion, the 762mm field artillery battalion, 122mm howitzer battalion.
In addition to the artillery regiment, the newly formed army infantry division also has an independent 37mm anti-aircraft gun battalion and an independent 57mm anti-tank artillery battalion.
Where is the gap between the 75mm mountain gun and the 120mm howitzer and other artillery?
This mountain cannon and 76The 2 field artillery had a considerable gap in firing range. At that time, the People's Liberation Army mainly used three 75mm mountain guns: the US M1 mountain gun with a range of 87km, the Japanese Type 94 mountain gun has a range of 83km, the Japanese Type 41 mountain gun has a range of 63km。
For comparison, the Soviet-style ZIS-3 762 field artillery range is 133km。
The 75 Mountain Gun was not without advantages, it was much lighter in comparison: all three 75 Mountain Guns weighed about 500kg, the Soviet-style ZIS-3 762 field guns have a full 1200kg.
However, this was no longer a big problem for the PLA at that time. In 1950, there was only one transport vehicle in the infantry division of the People's Liberation Army, and only one automobile company was formed at the army level.
In 1954, the PLA infantry division had 41 transport vehicles and 39 tractors in the artillery regiment alone.
On the premise that the towing capacity is greatly increased, the pursuit of a longer range artillery is acceptable, even if it is heavier.
As a result, the newly formed infantry division directly under the artillery 122 howitzers, 76 .2 field guns, 120 mortars, 37 anti-aircraft guns, 57 anti-tank guns configuration.
Air defense, anti-tank, curved fire, and large and medium-caliber suppression artillery are complete, so there is no need to keep 75 mountain guns. At this point, the 75 mountain artillery was excluded from the equipment of the artillery directly under the infantry division of the People's Liberation Army.
So, can the 75 mountain artillery continue to exist as artillery directly under the regiment? Our army has not done this, but Japan has tried.
During World War II, the Japanese Army used the Type 94 75 Mountain Gun as the artillery directly under the division or regiment, and the Type 41 75 Mountain Gun as the artillery directly under the wing, with 4 guns per wing.
But by the 50s, it was no longer necessary for our army to use 75 mountain guns. Because at that time recoilless guns had already risen, compared to which mountain artillery and infantry artillery were not very useful.
Let's take a look at the field artillery. Soviet ZIS-3 762 field artillery and its imitations domestic 54 Type 76The 2mm field artillery (cannon) was equipped in the PLA for a long time, and until the self-defense counterattack against Vietnam, it was still the divisional suppression artillery of some infantry divisions.
The imitation of the Soviet D44 85mm cannon, which was finalized and put into production in 1956 to replace the 76The Type 2 of the Type 56 field gun (field artillery) of the 85mm field gun, which until the 80s was fully converted to the 762 field artillery was replaced from the artillery directly under the division.
During the same period, the main threat to our army, the Soviet army, has been replaced with T-12 100mm anti-tank guns.
At the end of the last century, with the gradual advancement of military reform and the gradual transformation of the PLA into brigades, the medium-caliber field artillery, which had pursued larger caliber and more mobile artillery in the artillery under the corps, and had long been unable to perform its own post, finally left its post.
After talking about the 75 mountain artillery, let's take a look at the situation with the 60 mortar. Compared with medium-caliber mountain artillery, the localization of the 60 mortar was relatively late, but it developed rapidly.
*31 (1942), the 50th Arsenal of the National ** Ordnance Industry Administration produced a domestically produced Type 31 60mm mortar based on the French Bronde 60mm mortar.
From 1942 to 1945, 50 arsenals produced a total of 60mm mortars.
From 1943, the 10th Arsenal also began to produce 60mm mortars, and by 1945, a total of 2,770 were produced.
Even at the end of the Liberation War, when the people were anxious and did not know what to do, from September to December 1948, 50 Arsenal and its sub-factories still produced 2,700 60mm mortars.
Of course, our army also has a production line for the same **. During the War of Liberation, our party relied mainly on military factories in Harbin for the production of 60mm mortars.
During those three years, the Harbin military factory produced a total of 60 mortars and 2337 units. **10,000 Fans Incentive Plan
From these data, it must not be difficult to see the reason for the massive use of 60 mortars in our army: this was the most produced artillery in our country at that time, and it was also the most common and accessible infantry artillery in the country.
60 mortars were generally deployed in infantry companies as an important support firepower for infantry.
In 1945, on the establishment table of the Army's Division A, the infantry company also had six 60mm mortars in each company;
In 1946, the army division was still six 60mm mortars per company.
On the part of our party, although the demand for 60 mortars is still high, some 82 mortars have also been appropriately added. At that time, it was believed that if the company needed curved firepower, it could transfer 82 mortars from the battalion to the company, and there was no need to organize 60 mortars.
But the 82 forced had a disadvantage: it was too heavy, and with the carrying capacity of our army at that time, it was difficult to carry the infantry to carry a rapid assault. Therefore, our army is still equipped with a large number of light 60 forces.
Even now it is still equipped with many 60 mortars, at this time, of course, not because of insufficient carrying capacity, but because the position of 60 mortars is temporarily irreplaceable.
Because there is no ** that can completely replace the 60 forced to perform functions like recoilless guns replace infantry artillery mountain guns.
A ** disappears from the military, usually because either the combat environment in which it was originally applied no longer exists, or there is a ** that can completely replace its function.
Just because it has its own limitations and is suppressed under certain conditions, it will not make a ** disappear.
Having said all this, what is the function of the 60 mortar? Quite simply, the positioning of this ** is:The company-platoon inter-echelon target supports firepower and is light enough for infantry to carry.
This function is not as important at the moment, but it is still largely not negligible. Infantry still needs a long-range projectile that can be carried around**.
The 60 also has two major advantages: infantry carrying and high ballistic curvature. These two points determine its importance in the army. If there is no ** that can surpass it in these two points in a short period of time, 60 can still be used for a while.
Not only our ** team, but also the armies of other countries in the world are still using this **, because mortars have their own advantages: they can cause great damage to infantry units.
Of course, mortars may not be the strongest in this regard, at least during World War II, there were infantry guns that were also capable of killing and infantry.
However, a common advantage of mortars is that they are relatively lightweight, ballistic, easy to dig trenches, and have larger ammunition than body-barreled guns of the same caliber.
The most important point is that this thing is not necessarily accurate, but it is huge in number and very popular, second only to machine guns.
This is delegated to grassroots units**, and front-line infantry can be on call when they need mortars, and calibration is fast.
Compare the artillery before the appearance of mortars, all howitzers with a range of twenty or thirty kilometers were used, the shells had to fly for one minute, and basically all curved guns needed to be tested before they were accurately guided.
Therefore, in addition to the artillery bombardment planned before the start of the battle, the infantry at other times wanted to summon long-range artillery, and they needed to apply for ** first, and when the superior felt that it could be fired, the artillery could receive the message.
So, in the Battle of Changjin Lake, why did the 27th Army, which was equipped with 330 60 guns, only fired more than 5,000 shells?
This is really inseparable from the weather in the Changjin Lake area. It was very cold, reaching minus 40 degrees Celsius.
The fighters at that time could not necessarily guarantee even their own warmth, and the 60 mortars had numerous failures. 70% of the guns did not hit, and the gunners were often glued off a layer of skin because they had no gloves when reloading the shells.
In this case, the Volunteer Army was able to fire more than 5,000 shells, which is already admirable.