Daming Yuanfu

Chapter 1354 Nancha Disturbance ([-]) Lineup
The pontoon bridge on the Yehe River was built quite smoothly. Although the engineers of the Liaodong Army were far less professional than the Imperial Guards with independent engineers, but because of the existence of Tingzhou in the river at this time, Tingzhou could be used as an intermediate fulcrum. The pontoon bridge The difficulty of construction is greatly reduced.Even if there was an additional ice-cutting process, it only took more than an hour to be basically ready.

Cao Yan counted the time and calculated, and under the condition of a little bit of horsepower, Ma Chengxun should be about to return to the East City at this time, but he did not send a messenger, which means that he has no battle situation to report—— In other words, it may be that they did not catch up or did not meet the Mongols.

If he didn't catch up, Ma Chengxun would definitely choose to continue chasing him, there's nothing to say; but if he didn't catch up, Cao Yan would have to be a little worried.He frowned, momentarily hesitating whether to send troops across the river.

Going with him again was Gao Yimin.And judging from his expression, Gao Yimin seemed to be more suspicious, and said in a deep voice: "Zong Rong, the situation seems to be somewhat different from what we expected before."

"What doubts do you have?" Cao Yan asked him, while looking towards the forest not far from the front of the Qi Jin army formation on the east side, as if he wanted to find something in it.

"I suspect..." Gao Yimin also looked towards the forest, and said slowly, "Burihatu transferred the tiger away from the mountain, and the main force of the Tartars is still in the forest."

Cao Yu's eyes were fixed, but to his surprise, he showed no fear, and just said calmly: "This commander entered the barracks at the age of 13. He has fought in 64 battles so far, won 31 battles with major victories, [-] battles with minor victories, and [-] undefeated battles." , a small loss of nine battles, a big defeat of one battle."

He took a deep breath and continued: "However, there has never been a battle of using steps to control cavalry. I have to try it now. What a pity in this life." Suddenly he waved his hand and sent an order: "Order the two generals Qi Jin and Zhang Wanbang to strengthen Be alert and prepare to meet the enemy." Then he said to Gao Yimin: "Ma Chengxun's troops have left, and the northern line is empty, and it is inconvenient for the commander to sit in the middle of the army. Brother Gao, please lead my commander's family Ding Yiqian, and my younger brother's family Ding Wu 3000, [-] guards, a total of [-] people, guarding the northern line for the commander, I wonder if Brother Gao will agree?"

Gao Yimin originally wanted to say that it would be fine to let Cao Jian go, but then he thought that Cao Yan might have other intentions in not letting his younger brother go to battle. Although he didn't know why, he had to think about it.So he said: "Mr. Zongrong trusts, Yimin will not disgrace his life."

Cao Yu gave a big praise, ordered to send manpower to him and notify Cao Jian.Gao Yimin originally lived there as an aide, and had never put on armor, so he immediately changed into his military uniform, put on the "cold iron armor", and led his people to set up the battle formation on the northern front.

Unlike Cao Yu, Gao Yimin has a much deeper understanding of "controlling riding with steps". Although he has a serious face, he does not look like Cao Yu, who saw this war as if he had narrowly escaped death, and even said "what regrets in this life" Come on like this.

The reason why the ancient cavalry was powerful was that it was equipped with fast galloping horses. Compared with the slow-moving infantry, it had an absolute advantage in tactical time and space.

The advantage of cavalry is obvious, but the Taizu of the Red Dynasty said well, "Weapons are an important factor in war, but not the decisive factor. The decisive factor is people, not things." Even the Song Dynasty, which was long considered to be poor in combat effectiveness, There are also some generals who have given full play to their subjective initiative in actual warfare and created some tactics of "controlling cavalry with steps".

For example, in the early Southern Song Dynasty, Wu Jie commanded the battle of Monk Yuan and Xianrenguan, the battle of Shunchang commanded by Liu Kai, and the battle of Yancheng commanded by Yue Fei. An example of winning a battle with "step control riding".

At that time, the Song Army adopted the following three main methods: one was to "shorten the danger and use the strange", taking advantage of the terrain to limit the maneuvering advantage of the enemy cavalry.

This method mainly relies on the natural geographical barriers at the junction of the Song and Jin Dynasties and the dangerous terrain in the Southern Song Dynasty to restrict the cavalry of the Jin people.In the "controlling cavalry with steps" tactic, in order to achieve the goal of controlling cavalry, the focus is on "controlling danger", that is, launching operations on the basis of defense.

In the third year of Jianyan, Lu Yihao, who was then Minister of the Ministry of Officials, thought: "Plains and Asakusa can be used to advance or retreat, and it is a place for riding. One of the cavalry can resist ten of the infantry; the mountains, forests, rivers, and rivers are difficult to enter and exit. It is a place for walking." Land, one of the infantry, can be the tenth of the imperial cavalry. Since the Jin people lived in the south, the soldiers of the Central Plains and the Jin people have been at each other. If there is no confrontation, those who run away, because of the plains and wilderness, there are many cavalry and the Chinese cavalry is few." It is advocated to rely on the geographical situation of the water town in the south of the Yangtze River to resist the attack of the Jinren cavalry.

The second is to use the bow and crossbow projectile "non-contact" long-range strike to control the enemy.If the infantry directly contacted the Jin and Mongolian cavalry in field battles, the cavalry would undoubtedly have a condescending advantage. Only by striking before contacting the cavalry could they have a chance of winning.

Compared with the Northern Song Dynasty, there have been some new developments in the manufacturing technology and functions of bows and crossbows in the Southern Song Dynasty. The most commonly used ones are the Divine Arm Bow inherited from the Northern Song Dynasty and the newly-made Enemy Bow and Divine Strength Bow. I will not repeat them here.

The third is to rely on infantry formations to control the enemy.Due to the lack of cavalry strength, the Song army tried to rely on setting up large infantry formations to defend against foreign cavalry.However, this method of warfare limits the impact of the opponent's cavalry, but at the same time sacrifices the mobility of the main army. From the perspective of actual combat effects, it is not a good strategy.

For example, in the battle before the "Chanyuan Alliance", the "Pingrong Wanquan Formation" assembled 11 elite soldiers of the Song Army. Under the Dingzhou subordinates, they set up a defensive position like waiting for a rabbit. Unexpectedly, they were bypassed by the Liao army and easily attacked Damingfu and other cities in the rear.

All in all, the advantage of the cavalry is that they always have the upper hand, they can fight when they want, and they can leave if they don't want to.If the infantry wants to find out their own advantages, they must first choose the right place, and secondly choose the right weapons.

Today's battle has undergone many changes, and the current situation is that the Ming army is fighting to the death—but there is a pontoon bridge that has been built behind it.The number of the Ming army is probably slightly lower than that of the Mongolian army due to being "diverted from the mountain" by Buri Hatu, but the disadvantage is limited.

As for weapons and equipment, Gao Yimin believes that his side is clearly superior.

The most pressure may be Qi Jinsuo's troops who are facing the enemy head-on.Qi Jinben took more than [-] Qi family troops to Shenyang to take office. To be precise, [-] people, which is the standard number of people in a battalion of Qi Jiguang's car battalion.

Under this configuration, the car battalion of Qi Jinsuo has 256 Jinghua No. 512 artillery pieces, 8 Wanli Type 1080 artillery pieces, and 1080 Jinghua No. [-] artillery pieces.Later, due to the further improvement of the firearms of the Ming army, the equipment of the car camp also increased to [-] Wanli Type II muskets, and there were [-] firearmsmen, accounting for nearly half of the combatants (some were dedicated to logistics).

Qi Jiguang prepared the standard tactics for the chariot battalion. When the Mongolian cavalry was charging towards the Ming army, the chariot battalion quickly formed a square formation, and the infantry and cavalry were placed in the middle of the square formation.

When the Mongolian cavalry entered the range of the firearms, all the firearms fired in salvo, knocking down a group of Mongolian forward troops; but the Mongols would continue to charge up. At this time, the infantry placed horse-repelling devices in front of the chariot formation.The horse repelling device is something similar to barbed wire. When the horse rushes up, it will either be stung and startled, or it will stop, or even directly hit it to death.In any case, it will cause chaos in the enemy's attack.

Taking advantage of this chaotic moment, the Ming army's spearmen and wolf gunners in the chariot lined up with thousands of guns, and another group of enemy troops were knocked down.By this time, the Mongolian cavalry was in a chaotic formation. Those in front were about to retreat, but the rear couldn't stop their carts and continued to charge forward. The team was in chaos and lost all spirit.

At this time, after fully consuming the enemy troops through the first two links, Qi Jiguang's cavalry troops will suddenly break out and deal the final fatal blow to the Mongolian cavalry.

But this tactic has changed now. After the rise of the bayonet formation, musketeers also had the ability to fight in close combat, so the number of pikemen and wolves was greatly reduced, and the configuration of musketeers was increased to the 1080 men just mentioned.

This also caused a change in tactics, that is, the original "thousand guns stabbing together" became the "ten thousand guns shooting together" under the highly pragmatic "hollow phalanx" tactic, and hand-to-hand combat became shooting.

The reform measures of the Ming army in recent years are very large, and the organization and tactics are constantly changing.Earlier, Qi Jiguang was in Jizhen Town, and he wrote down the firearm configuration (not counting cold weapons) and the number of each vehicle battalion, horse battalion, and infantry battalion in "Records of Troop Training". At that time, there were 8517 people in a complete cart battalion. , at least 3 chariot and cavalry battalions, plus the supply battalion, the number of nearly 3 people.

The main firearms configuration of this nearly 384 vehicles, infantry, and cavalry joint combat units is as follows: (excluding the firearms configuration and number of personnel in the baggage battalion) there are 768 vehicles in total, 12 No. 24 guns, 180 rocket vehicles, and 8232 No. 1296 guns. 76800 No. 720 guns, 1497600 musketeers (Wanli Type 388800), 104280 fast gunners (Wanli Type 162000), equipped with 25551 No. [-] shells, [-] No. [-] shells, [-] musket bullets, [-] fast gun bullets, and [-] rockets , [-] No. [-] shells, and a total of [-] people.

If the supply battalion is included, the number of all kinds of equipment will be increased, and the total force will reach 30531.

With the victory of Gao Pragmatic, some changes were made to the establishment of the car battalion to adapt to the tactical changes, but in any case, according to Qi Jiguang's thinking, only these 3 people can form a "complete establishment".

It's a pity that although the theory is good, it is very difficult to do it under the military system of Ming Dynasty.The reason has been mentioned before that the military power of the general army has been suppressed, and the Ming army did not have a regular establishment of up to 3 people-this establishment was put in the red and blue civil war in later generations, which was equivalent to a reorganization division of the blue army.

Therefore, when Qi Jiguang himself was in Jizhen, he could train and "organize" in this way, but after he left, this organization actually ceased to exist.The only good news is that after he became the Imperial Guard, he discussed this establishment with Gao Yushi, and came up with a Beiyang Army establishment that was very close to Yuan Shikai's "Xiaozhan New Army".

Although Qi Jin brought a complete car camp to Shenyang, but this time he left another 1000 people to look after the house in Shenyang, and only brought two-thirds of the manpower.Theoretically speaking, Qi Jin now only has a castrated version of the car battalion in his hands, and his combat effectiveness must be affected.

Zhang Wanbang's department defending the southern front is simpler than Qi Jin's department in terms of organization. He has 500 servants and 1000 guards.Among them, the servants are all mounted infantry, and they have already dismounted and set up formation.

Because Zhang Wanbang's department is a typical "highly pragmatic organization", the ratio of firearms is higher, but there is no side car, and it all relies on bayonet formation.The characteristic is that it looks weaker than Qi Jin's subordinates. As for fighting... anyway, no one dares to doubt that he can't handle it.

In contrast, the 3000 people led by Gao Yimin are quite "primitive".One is that their firearms are not enough. The servants are fully equipped with Wanli type I muskets and "cold iron armor", but the guards are not. The Longqing type II is not equipped-of course, the production of the Longqing type II has been discontinued. They will not match again, they have old products in their hands.

These guard soldiers brought by Cao Jian came from Jinzhou in southern Liaoning. There was almost no war in Jinzhou, and the priority of changing clothes was not enough. The [-] guard soldiers only had [-] Longqing Type [-] muskets. His musket is not a three-eyed blunderbuss, but a bird blunderbuss that Jizhen eliminated in the early years.

The shooting range of the bird gun is actually not bad, mainly because the accuracy and killing distance are not as good as the Longqing II, and the reloading is much slower. As for the comparison with the Wanli I and Wanli II... don't compare it, it sounds sad.

Since the Longqing II style and the bird gun cannot be equipped with bayonets, in fact, there are only 500 people on Gao Yimin's side who can form bayonet formations, and Gao Yimin doubts that their bayonet formation training is seriously insufficient.

Bayonet formation must be trained. One of the biggest characteristics of this "modern tactic" is that it treats people as machines. You only need to compare similar ideas with "queuing up to shoot": you don't need to have thoughts, you don't need to You have your own mind, you just need to obey orders!

The gist of training this kind of army has been summed up by someone in history. The general idea is to make soldiers "fear officers more than bullets."Gao Yimin is well aware of this, and the Cao brothers entered the ranks of "high-line generals" not long ago, and most of the servants under his command are still the same as before: fighting bravely, with outstanding personal force, but hard to say about discipline.

Therefore, the current defense form of the Ming army in the north, east, and south is that the north has the largest number of people but the combat system is slightly outdated; the east has the most complicated tactical system but the most elite training; the south has fewer people but excellent tactical systems. By the way, this army The morale is extremely high, and they have no fear of the Mongols (Zhang Wanbang's troops defeated the Mongolian cavalry head-on twice with inferior forces).

Cao Yu himself sits in the central army, and there are only 8000 to [-] people left, and most of them are just infantry in the guard.The task of these people is naturally to support whichever side is urgent, but to put it this way, the east and south lines are actually not suitable for support, because the tactics of these two sides are self-contained, and it may not be effective to support the guards in the past. Cooperate.

Relatively speaking, only when there is a problem on the northern line, his support here will be more useful.

Gao Yimin obviously also understands the current situation. He has the largest number of people here, but his actual combat effectiveness may be the lowest.He rushed to the front of the formation, and while directing the arrangement, he felt a little nervous: If I were Brihatu, I'm afraid I would have to choose to break through from the north.

(End of this chapter)