Daming Yuanfu

Chapter 352
Gao Pragmatism's plan for the reform of the Ming Dynasty Army is "step by step" like other reform plans. The main idea is to first ensure the superiority of light weapon firepower, and then consider heavy firepower.

Of course, this idea is not a decision made by patting the head, but a target based on the problems that have arisen in the original history.

Heavy artillery such as the Hongyi cannon is indeed very powerful in this era, but in the Ming and Jin wars in history, their effect on the Ming side was actually very limited.

If the Hongyi cannon is used in field battles, it is cumbersome and inconvenient to transport, and the damage is concentrated in a small area, which cannot play a big role in the face of flexible cavalry; if it is used to defend the city, its real effect does not lie in the The efficiency of killing lies in boosting morale. If the morale of the Ming army does not collapse like it did in history, and it has already been beaten to the point where it dare not stand up, then even without this cannon, it can actually be defended.

And if Houjin adopts a long-term siege strategy, even the Hongyi cannons will be useless. Although in this case, it will actually return to the ultra-low efficiency of siege in the era of cold weapons, but as long as it can be won, it can still be proved. The Hongyi Cannon itself does not have much significance for defending the city.

In history, Zu Dashou defended Dalinghe and Jinzhou, besieged the city twice, and finally surrendered. He just gave a large number of well-made red barbarian cannons to Houjin for nothing.

There is a record of this in the history of Chinese firearms: "The Ming army of the Dashou tribe, who was besieged in the Daling River for nearly a hundred days, surrendered in October of the fourth year of Chongzhen (1631) because of the lack of food and supplies in the city. Dashou was defeated in Jinzhou. According to the report of the Ministry of War of the Ming Army on November 3500 of that year, there were [-] artillery pieces in the city, such as Hongyi Cannon, Mielu Cannon, and General Cannon, as well as various military guns, miscellaneous firearms, A large amount of gunpowder and projectiles are all owned by the Hou Jin Army."

Yes, you read that right, that is 3500 artillery pieces of various types!
Even for modern warfare, this is quite a large number. As a result, Yuan Chonghuan, Sun Chengzong and others promoted the strategy of defending isolated cities, which is the so-called stupid suicide strategy of "relying on strong cities and using cannons". The cannon clusters in the army were just given to Hou Jin for nothing!
These cannons are of little significance to the defense of the city, but once they fall into the hands of Houjin, they will become the most powerful helper in breaking through the fortified city. Daming is equivalent to spending a lot of money to manufacture and present the attack gun to Houjin. The sharpest weapon in your own city.

Well, as expected, there was Kaishen Logistics in the back and Dadu Yuan in the front.

During the Battle of Songjin during the Chongzhen period, Jinzhou was besieged. The Ming Dynasty had to let Hong Chengchou take all his belongings: an army of up to 13 went to aid Jinzhou, but was rescued by Houjin. Wan's last mobile force, the field group, was besieged in Songshan by himself.

When attacking Tashan in the final stage of the Battle of Songjin, Jierhalang, Prince Heshuo Zheng of the Qing Dynasty, and Dorobeile Doduo ordered the Qing army to set up red artillery in the west of Tashan City.On the eighth day of April, the city wall was bombarded with red cannons. The next day, the city wall was blown away by more than 20 feet, and the infantry and cavalry of the Qing army rushed in, wiping out more than 7000 Ming soldiers from the three battalions in the city.At dawn on April 21, the Qing army bombarded Xingshan City with red cannons, destroying the city wall by 25 feet, and the Ming army surrendered.

So you see, it turns out that heavy artillery is so unreliable in doing these things. The so-called cannon beats mosquitoes, that's all.

Therefore, Gao Yushi has always insisted that the weapons most needed by the Ming Dynasty and the northern cavalry were not the cumbersome and difficult-to-transport Hongyi cannons, but mines, grenades, and various types of infantry muskets with fast firing rates and large damage areas. , There are also single-stage multiple-shot rockets with great Ming characteristics and various flexible and mobile light artillery.

These firearms have always been the strengths of firearms in the Ming Dynasty, and some are even far ahead of the West in the same period.If the Ming Dynasty made full use of the power of these local firearms and continued to improve and innovate with limited financial resources, then it would be the biggest threat to Hou Jin.

Even if we don’t improve the advanced muskets that are pragmatically pursued first, just further improve the landmines, pomegranate guns (grenades), and various flame spray guns, increase the power and ease of use, equip troops on a large scale, and strengthen border defense , Strengthening the combat capabilities of individual soldiers is enough to make the post-golden cavalry unable to walk around, and it is much more practical than heavy artillery.

Mao Wenlong's ability to use landmines alone under difficult conditions and poor equipment has already caused heavy damage to Houjin and caused him to complain endlessly.If this type of weapon is fully strengthened and widely used, it is conceivable that Hou Jin will have no chance to jump.

What kind of artillery did Qi Jiguang equip the Qi's army with the most in history?The Tiger Crouching Cannon is a light artillery, not a heavy artillery like the Hongyi Cannon.

So, only the one that suits you is the best.Greedy and fierce, that is the guiding ideology of naval artillery, how can the army copy this assignment?

Speaking of this, we have to improve the second stage of pragmatic artillery development: Army heavy artillery and naval heavy artillery.

Of course, high pragmatism does not mean that such things as heavy artillery will not be developed, but should be used as the main direction of development after light artillery is sufficient to form a crushing advantage in at least the Greater East Asia (also called the Greater China sphere of influence).

And even so, the highly pragmatic heavy artillery development plan did not allocate too much to the army's heavy artillery, because there is not much demand in this area-he can't think of any fortress in the Greater China sphere of influence that is the Hongyi Cannon What can't be won, let alone the improved Hongyi Cannon of Ming Dynasty.

In his plan for heavy artillery, there are only two main accessories:
One is the naval ship-borne heavy artillery, which is the only way for the development of the navy.Especially in a few years, the Western colonists will set off an Eastern colonial frenzy. At that time, once the navies of the two sides engage in battle, not only the ships, sailors, and commanders will be compared, but also the power and effectiveness of heavy artillery. The development of the industry must keep up, and we must not lag behind, otherwise we will suffer a lot.

The second is the coastal defense fort heavy artillery, which is one of the key weapons for the development of coastal defense.Why was Lushun Naval Port hailed as a natural naval "Sacred Port" by some military fans in history?The reason is that the terrain advantage of Huowei at Lushunkou is too great. After the fortress guns are built at Huowei and Jinshan, the firepower of the fortresses on the east and west sides can completely block the entry and exit of Lushun military port. As long as the two sides of the tiger's tail are blocked, the enemy ships in the open sea can only be dumbfounded, looking at the port and sighing.

The performance of the Japanese army in history also proved this point, especially during the Russo-Japanese War. Under the premise of the Russian army's own bad luck and convulsions, the Japanese army fought for nearly a whole year around a Lushun military port where foreign aid was cut off.

And the premise of all this is the fortress artillery position.

　It's a little bit of a small situation, if today's Chapter 2 can't be posted on time, it may be made up tomorrow, or I may find time to make it up during the May Day holiday... I am busy before the holiday, sorry.

　　
　
(End of this chapter)