Tibet.

Chapter 1448 Reverse Encirclement
When Yu Changyang received the news that the army of Bayegu Khan had retreated, he immediately turned around and attacked the 30,000 Shiwei troops 80 miles away.

At the second watch, Yu Changyang led 10,000 cavalrymen and approached the Shiwei army camp. When they were still ten miles away from the Shiwei army camp, the Tang army stopped advancing. If they continued forward, they would be discovered by enemy scouts.

At this time, the Tang army scouts brought a map of the Shiwei army garrison.

Yu Changyang is not a new general. He is one of the first 300 Pei family soldiers who followed Li Ye. He has followed Li Ye in battles for nearly twenty years. He is now the general-in-chief, the champion general, and the Duke of Lu. This time he is going to the expedition against Shiwei as Ma Lin's deputy general.

The reason why Yu Changyang failed to become a capable general was because of his weak cultural foundation. When he first followed Li Ye, he could only recognize a few characters.

But he had enough qualifications and merits, and was extremely loyal to Li Ye, so he was granted the title of Duke.

Yu Changyang unfolded the sketch and took a closer look. The 30,000 Shiwei troops were stationed near the river, with fences, trenches, and scouts distributed about five miles apart. However, there were not many scouts on the east side, and they were basically concentrated on the riverside. The river was fifty feet wide, the water was very deep, and the current was fast. It was impossible for the Tang army to wade across the water to attack the Shiwei army from the east.

Moreover, with a width of fifty feet, bows and arrows could not cross the river. However, the Shiwei army did not know that the Tang army also had heavy crossbows and artillery.

With the heavy weapons of the Tang army, defeating the Shiwei army was no longer a problem. The key was to annihilate the enemy and not let them escape. This was the principle of the Tang army in dealing with the Donghu people. The Tang army did not massacre women and children, but would definitely kill all the enemy troops on the battlefield.

Yu Changyang kept his troops on hold, waiting patiently for news, and at the same time sent people to build a floating bridge on the river.

At four o'clock in the morning, news from Zhang Dian finally arrived. They were forty miles north of the Shiwei army.

At the same time, Zhang Dian dispatched 10,000 troops to the east to prevent the enemy from fleeing eastward.

The Shiwei army was surrounded from the south and the north. Yu Changyang ordered General Liu Wei to lead two thousand heavy crossbowmen and twenty cannons to rush to the other side of the river.

The Tang army did not alert the scouts on the other side of the river, but instead attacked the enemy with artillery first.

Cannons had not played a big role before. One of the main reasons was that the propellant fuse and the shell fuse did not work together well. The gunners were afraid of explosion, so they left the shell fuse very long, causing the shell to be shot out with a long fuse. After the shell hit the ground, the fuse went out. The same was true when sieges were carried out. When the shell hit the city wall, the shell did enter the wall, but the fuse was broken, resulting in half of the ten shells being duds.

The Ordnance Department immediately made improvements based on the feedback. They designed a paper tube, wrapped the propellant and the shell tightly together, twisted two fuses into a fuse, and after lighting the fuse, the cannon would fire first, pushing the shell out. At this time, the fuse of the shell had already burned into the body of the shell, and the shell would explode when or before it hit the ground.

But this creates another problem, as the fire is ignited at the muzzle, causing the diameter of the projectile to be smaller than the barrel, and the edges to not fit tightly, leaking a lot of expanding gas, which results in the projectile having a short range.

Of course, this problem has always existed in ancient artillery. If the fit is too tight, the shell may get stuck in the barrel and cause it to explode.

Even now, San Ge’s cannons still explode frequently, not to mention in ancient times.

Therefore, a cannon range of seven or eight hundred steps is enough, which can replace large catapults, eliminate the difficulties of transportation, and is very convenient.

Twenty guns were placed on a small hillside, aimed at the enemy camp six hundred steps away.

Two thousand heavy crossbowmen were lying in ambush about a hundred steps away from the river, while dozens of enemy sentries were scattered along the river. They had prepared more than twenty haystacks, which they would set on fire immediately if they spotted the enemy.

The Tang army could of course kill all these sentinels, but the risk was relatively high. Once discovered, the entire plan would fail. So there was no need to alert the sentinels. They could first bombard the enemy camp with artillery, and then charge forward with the heavy crossbow army.

"emission!"

At Liu Wei's command, the soldiers lit the fuse on the muzzle at the same time. At this time, the enemy sentries on the shore also discovered the Tang army's burning torches. Something was wrong! They all lit up the haystacks.

At the same time, two thousand heavy crossbow soldiers jumped up and rushed to the shore. Almost everything happened at the same time.

The artillery exploded with a loud bang, pushing out the shells. The fuse on the shells had already burned into the shells in the air. Twenty shells fell into the camp and exploded instantly. Flames burst out and black smoke rose into the sky. Hundreds of soldiers were killed or injured.

The entire camp was alarmed. The Shiwei soldiers all stood up. Two thousand heavy crossbowmen quickly rushed to the river and shot at the camp with their crossbows. In an instant, a thousand arrows exploded in the camp, and tiny poisoned iron balls flew everywhere. Countless Shiwei soldiers were hit by the poisonous bullets.

This is why artillery fire is needed first. It is necessary to alarm the Shiwei soldiers to stand up and run, so that the arrow mines will explode and kill a large number of enemy soldiers. If the enemy soldiers are lying down, the tiny poisoned iron balls will have no effect.

At the moment the artillery exploded, eight thousand Tang cavalry also rushed towards the enemy camp five miles away.

At this time, the second and third rounds of artillery and arrow mines exploded in the enemy camp, causing the Shiwei soldiers to cry for their parents and wail everywhere. What was even more terrible was that the Shiwei army did not set up a sheep and horse camp, but tied the war horses directly next to the big tent. As a result, the violent explosions in the camp frightened the war horses. In extreme panic, the horses broke free from the reins and ran wildly in the camp, knocking down countless soldiers.

More than 10,000 war horses without cavalry rushed out of the camp and fled in all directions, causing countless Shiwei soldiers to become infantry, or two people riding one war horse to flee.

At this time, the attacks of arrows, torpedoes and artillery stopped. Eight thousand Tang cavalry rushed over and broke into the camp. The Shiwei army was defeated. In the dark night, countless Shiwei soldiers and cavalry fled north in panic. Many soldiers and horses fell down while running. They had been hit by poisoned projectiles before and were only injured, but now the poison had taken effect.

The Tang army ruthlessly killed the Shiwei soldiers. Almost all the horseless infantry were killed. More than 7,000 Shiwei cavalry fled for more than 20 miles. Tang cavalry appeared in front of them to intercept them. There was a surging river to the west. Many soldiers fled eastward again, but they were intercepted by 10,000 Tang cavalry from the east.

On one side was the turbulent and wide river, and on the other three sides were Tang cavalry. The last several thousand Shiwei cavalry were surrounded and had no way to escape. They wailed and fought desperately with the Tang army, but what greeted them was a volley of arrows fired by the Tang cavalry, mixed with countless individual arrow mines. Explosions rang out one after another, and the air was filled with smoke.

After three rounds of archery and explosions, when the smoke cleared, the battlefield became completely quiet.

But the war was not over. Yu Changyang led another 10,000 cavalrymen to turn south and attack the territory of the small Khan of the Bayegu tribe.

The Tang army sent troops to help the Great Khan Dada destroy the Small Khan Shaji. According to the agreement between the two parties, the Tang army would get half of the cattle, sheep and other property, while the other half of the cattle, sheep, property, population and land would belong to the Great Khan.

On the grassland, horns were wailing and drums were beating. Two armies of 60,000 people were fighting on the grassland. Both Bayegu tribes had invested all their forces, trying to completely defeat the other in this battle.

At this moment, a 10,000-strong Tang cavalry came charging from the east and rushed straight behind the central army where the Little Khan Shaji was. The Tang cavalry fired individual arrow mines while galloping, and explosions sounded everywhere at once. The Bayegu people had never seen such a terrible weapon, and everyone was frightened and panicked. The central army of the Little Khan was in chaos.

Seeing the explosions one after another, Shaji was so frightened that he urged his horse to flee westward. The soldiers who were fighting saw their lord fleeing and also abandoned the battle and fled. Dada shouted excitedly, "Our reinforcements have arrived, chase them down!"

Dada's army was greatly encouraged and they pursued bravely, defeating the little Khan's army.

(End of this chapter)