Hell's Sharpshooter

Damn it! Chen Ge's face beneath the tactical balaclava changed abruptly, and he couldn't help but draw in a sharp breath. Klishchiivka Heights was the linchpin of Bakhmut's southwestern defenses, one of the core battlefields of the Bakhmut meat grinder. Controlling it meant strangling Bakhmut's southern supply lines and seizing the initiative in attack and defense. The Ukrainian military held it with heavy troops; not even a bird could fly over. Rock of Assault Team One, Fortress of Team Two, Ice Man of Team Three, Drill Bit of Team Four, Thunder of Demolition Team, Night Hawk of Reconnaissance Team, Quiver of Sniper Team, and Carrier Pigeon of Communications Team—these several men likewise understood the importance of Klishchiivka Heights, and knew how terrifying that place was. Trench pointed at the map and said in a deep voice: "Wagner is currently advancing from both east and south. The main attack on the southern wing is Opytne. The Ukrainian military, relying on the artillery observation advantage of Klishchiivka Heights, has effectively blocked our offensive." "The Ukrainian forces defending the southern wing are the 93rd Mechanized Brigade, the 58th Motorized Infantry Brigade, part of the 46th Air Assault Brigade, totaling about 5,000 troops. Relying on Opytne, Klishchiivka Heights, and Kujiumifuka, they form the southern wing defense system." "Klishchiivka Heights is located 8 kilometers southwest of Bakhmut. To the west of the village is Hill 215.7, elevation 237 meters, overlooking all of Bakhmut and the southern river valley." "The T0504 Highway, adjacent to the Ukrainian southern main supply line, and the Bakhmut-Horlivka Railway together form the southern wing transportation hub." "The Ukrainian military controls the heights, protects the T0504 supply line, ensures ammunition and food for tens of thousands of Bakhmut defenders, prevents our army from encircling from the southern wing, and their artillery can fire directly on Bakhmut's southern and western districts, suppressing our assault forces." "If we control these heights, we can cover the supply lines with fire and cut off Bakhmut's southern passage. The Ukrainian troops inside the city will become turtles in a jar. Deploying artillery on the heights, we can bombard Ukrainian positions across the entire city…" After Trench finished detailing the situation on Bakhmut's southern wing, Ukrainian troop deployments, and the importance of the location, he paused for a few seconds and looked up at Rock, Chen Ge, and the others. "Our mission is to infiltrate and assault, seize the core of Klishchiivka—a Khrushchyovka just 300 meters from Hill 215.7—and provide laser designation for the Aerospace Forces, destroying Ukrainian artillery positions, ammunition depots, reserve assembly points, and the water tower building on Hill 215.7, which is Ukraine's core observation post and artillery calibration point, guiding rear artillery to precisely cover our attack routes." Khrushchyovka, from Russian Хрущёв (Khrushchev) and ка, meaning small and shabby—literally translated as "Khrushchev's little broken building." After 1955, Khrushchev, to solve the postwar housing shortage, pushed through fast, cheap, standardized housing, replacing the luxurious Stalinist buildings of the Stalin era. Most were five stories. Compared to the solid, sturdy Stalinist buildings, Khrushchyovkas were flimsy—adequate for civilian use, sufficient for urban warfare, but unable to withstand 152 or 155 mm artillery strikes, let alone FPV drone top attacks. Chen Ge's eyes widened. Why did this mission feel so familiar? Storming a building, laser designation—isn't that the plot of Hell's Sharpshooter? Except the difficulty here was even more hellish than Hell's Sharpshooter—way too fucking hellish! Rock swallowed hard and asked in a hoarse voice: "Trench, is it just our Falcon Hunting Team going?" Trench nodded helplessly: "Yeah. Ratibor and the regular army both sent elite squads to try and take it, and all failed. But this time Khozyain and the commander personally planned the joint operation. Three assault detachments will secretly assemble 3,500 veterans and 7,000 K-soldiers, and the regular army will also send four battalions to coordinate in capturing Klishchiivka Heights." Khozyain, meaning master, boss, or head—Wagner's internal everyday name for Prigozhin, radio call sign Petrovich. The commander: Utkin! Rock and the others, hearing that Prigozhin and Utkin had formulated the battle plan and were assembling over 10,000 men for the encirclement, felt half their tension and anxiety instantly dissipate. Chen Ge wasn't so optimistic, because he knew just how terrible the joint operations capabilities of Wagner, the Big Goose Army, and the Aerospace Forces were. Terrible couldn't even describe it—it was just garbage! The command system was extremely fragmented, with no joint all-domain command and control system like the U.S. military. The army, air force, and Wagner each used their own radios and maps; information didn't get through. They undermined each other, fought their own battles, and trusted no one—like a T-72 with mismatched wheels, a leaking engine, and parts fighting each other. This wasn't an insult; it was a fact. But orders were orders, and they had to go even if they had to grit their teeth. Hailstone said: "Any remaining concerns? If not, we can draw up the battle plan and move out tonight!" Chen Ge and the others exchanged glances and shook their heads. Next, after detailed and rigorous discussion and research, everyone formulated a battle plan that made Chen Ge's scalp numb. Too crude, brutally simple to the extreme! Having been transmigrated for over half a year, he had seen just how crude Big Goose soldiers' tactical thinking was. For example, on the Russo-Ukrainian battlefield, the core was just three moves: artillery carpet bombardment, armored steamrolling, infantry mopping up. This wasn't fighting; it was going through the motions. Artillery bombards first; after the shelling, tanks advance. Tanks charge in, and infantry dismounts to clear the field. Sounds reasonable, right? The problem is: after the artillery bombards, are the positions even still there? After tanks charge in, are anti-tank missiles waiting? After infantry dismounts, what if Ukrainian troops come out of tunnels? The Russian army doesn't care! These tactics worked in Syria against lightly armed opposition forces and IS terrorists, but in Ukraine they ran into NATO intelligence plus Javelins and NLAWs and crashed outright. Even worse, they never learned lessons: tanks destroyed today, and tomorrow they charged down the same route again. The Ukrainian military had Russian attack routes figured out, mines laid, artillery coordinates set, waiting to reap the harvest. High-ranking officers' thinking was even more rigid to the point of outrage. Shoigu and Gerasimov were still fighting a Soviet-style war: competing in manpower, artillery, and steel torrents. They were reluctant to use precision-guided weapons; battlefield communications were down, and soldiers used walkie-talkies to shout, which Ukrainian forces intercepted every time. The most outrageous thing was the great Kyiv withdrawal in March 2022—the reason was that fuel couldn't keep up. The so-called second-largest military power in the world, the Big Goose, had logistics this rotten, truly speechless. At the grassroots level, it was just gritting teeth and bearing it. Russian soldiers weren't lacking courage; they were brave without brains. Orders came down, and even knowing the front was a minefield, they charged in. Officers didn't think about how to reduce casualties, only about how to complete the mission. Wagner's convict soldier charges were the ultimate expression of this mindset: no tactical improvement, just fill the gap with cannon fodder! Special forces tactical thinking was also crude, absurdly so. Trench and Hailstone were retired GRU officers; Rock, Fortress, and Ice Man were too; Drill Bit and Night Hawk were SSO; Thunder and Quiver came from Signal Flag. But judging from them, Russian special operations tactical thinking wasn't a precise scalpel—it was an AK with a scope: a little more accurate, a little more ruthless than ordinary infantry, but essentially still infantry thinking. Their plan had three steps: depart at midnight, sneak to the southwest side of Klishchiivka Heights, feint east to strike west, send one squad to draw fire, split the main force into two teams, and rush up to seize the building. Good grief—I just said good grief! Deep down they still believed in firepower density and assault speed. To them, special operations wasn't about fewer deaths, but about using elite forces to smash open a gap at key points. Too reckless. You dare to charge, but I don't! "Trench, I have an opinion!"