ancient greece mediterranean ruler

Chapter 1304 Persian Strategy ([-])
"Enough time?" Orontas also said coldly: "I don't think so! The news that came before was not that the Dionians sent part of their troops to the west to capture Issus and Castabruum. Waiting for the city, the road from Silesia to Syria was opened. Farabazus was just harassing and did not dare to block the Greek coalition forces directly. As long as the Greek coalition forces passed through the Tauchis Mountains, they could reach Syria smoothly all the way and join Dio. If the Nian army joins forces, it will undoubtedly greatly increase the enemy’s strength!”

Having said this, Orontas turned around, bowed respectfully to the King of Persia, and then said solemnly: "Your Majesty, the Greek soldiers have very strong melee combat abilities, and this time the Dionians will also invade the Greek city-states." The most powerful armies of Sparta, Athens and Thebes gathered together. Although according to the battle report of Pharnabazus, it was the rebellion of the Greek mercenaries that led to the failure of the entire battle, but it may also be that Sparta The Greek army led by soldiers from Athens, Athens, and Thebes first defeated the left wing guarded by our army, which led to a sudden change in the entire battle situation. Therefore, we must defeat the Dionian army in Syria as soon as possible before the Greek coalition forces arrive. , can we secure the final victory in this war!"

At that time, Orontas was ordered to intercept the Greek expeditionary force, but suffered a disastrous defeat. The terrifying impact of the Spartan warriors left a deep impression on him, so this man who had been the governor of America for decades and was like an emperor Ordinary big shots were able to temporarily put aside the arrogance of the Persian nobles and issue a warning.

His words immediately made Artaxerxes' complexion ugly, because he also had the same memory: in the battle with Cyrus the Younger, he witnessed with his own eyes tens of thousands of Greek heavy infantry fighting His left wing was routed, and he was almost driven into despair.

For several other generals present, it was obvious that the Greek army was able to defeat Darius and King Xerxes twice, and maintained an advantage of more wins than losses in the battles with the Persian army in the following decades. They are more worthy of their attention than the Dionysian army, which has not achieved a brilliant victory against the Persian army so far (in the Battle of Cyprus, the Persian fleet suffered a disastrous defeat, which did not shock the Persian nobles, because naval warfare was not what the Persians were good at, and the entire There were almost no Persians participating in the Persian fleet. As for the battle in western Asia Minor, Artaxerxes did not announce the true situation, so Pharnabazos's battle report led them to make a wrong judgment. The Persian army's The defeat came mainly from the betrayal of Greek mercenaries).

Seeing that everyone in the room was focusing on him, Trebasus felt nervous. He knew very well: at the beginning of today's meeting, Mardonius, Harpurgus, and Orontas He successively questioned the tactics adopted by the previous Persian army, which was actually expressing dissatisfaction with him.

The conflict between Trebasus and these top Persian nobles has a long history, and the root cause comes from jealousy.The King of Persia regarded Trebassus as his confidant and obeyed his advice. This was obviously unmatched by several important ministers of the kingdom who were far away from the royal court. Of course, this also involved the contradiction between the old Persian nobles and the emerging nobles.Since the rendezvous of the armies, they have expressed dissatisfaction with Trebasus many times, but with the protection of the King of Persia, the matter was finally settled, but today their joint attack made Trebasus from Artaxerxes Si felt a little bad in the eyes looking at him: this king who was mediocre in military performance wavered about whether to continue to implement the strategy he proposed!

Fortunately, he was prepared in advance and calmly took out something from his arms and said softly: "This is the most capable man sent by Lord Marktonos. After many investigations and a lot of time, I specially made a copy of the carefully drawn map of the Dionia army camp for you to take a look at."

As he spoke, he unfolded the white cloth in his hand and placed it on the open space in the center.

Marktonos, who was originally watching from the sidelines, walked over first, looked down at the cloth placed on the ground, and then said: "This is indeed the map of the Dionia camp drawn by my men."

Mardonius, Orontas, and Harpurgus walked over slowly and looked at it casually, but soon their faces showed surprise, and they bent down to take a closer look.

Seeing this, Artaxerxes asked the eunuch to bring a table and place the map on it.

While the three of them were looking at the map attentively, Trebassus said in a deep voice: "Five years ago, the Dionian army invaded Greece. The Greek city-states united and formed an army of nearly 5 people. Originally, There was a chance to repel the Dionian army, but the Dionians built a complex defensive camp to lure the Greek army to attack. The number of Greek soldiers was two or three times that of the Dionian soldiers in the defensive camp, but The siege lasted for more than two months, but they did not achieve much. Instead, the Dionysians took advantage of the Greeks' long-term fruitless attack and empty rear defense to send troops to land in Thessaly. In the end, Greece fell to the Dionysians. Ya, alas..."

This sigh seemed to twist Artaxerxes' heart, making him lean back in his chair: If it weren't for the rebellion of the Asia Minor people, Persia would have been recaptured by him long ago. Even with the nearby support of Asia Minor, Greece would not Surrender so quickly! …

"This time the Dionian army wants to repeat its old tricks again. You see - its camp relies on mountains on both sides, and there is a bay at the rear. We can only attack from the front, and the width of this front is narrow and obviously not It will help us take advantage of having more troops."

Trebasus gestured on the map and said seriously: "Look again - the camp they built actually has two layers of wooden walls. The wooden fence in the front is very low, only about one meter, and the wooden fence in the back is The wall is 4 meters high, and the two walls are 30 meters apart. There is a trench in the middle. Although our spies cannot detect the depth of the trench, based on the defensive operations of the Dionysian army in the Peloponnese, it It is difficult to cross easily. It will be more difficult for our soldiers to reach the wooden wall at the back and it will take a lot of time. And you see - there are dense towers on the wooden wall at the back, and the Dionians will inevitably A large number of archers will be deployed on it to launch fierce long-range attacks on our attacking troops.

In addition, Lord Halpurgus's men also mentioned a piece of information that requires our attention.During this period, the Dionian army sent a large number of soldiers to set up traps in front of the camp without stopping... Based on what we have learned, we can know that the Dionian camp is very well-defended, and our army is just If you want to attack the real wooden wall of the camp, you may pay a lot of casualties. Let alone a long siege, it only takes one or two failed attacks, and those affiliated troops may lose their fighting spirit. Once Dionysus regains his strength, If the demi-humans launch a full-scale counterattack, our army's situation will be very dangerous! "

The three great Persian nobles have been commanding troops for a long time, and they are all proficient in military affairs. Compared with this map, it is natural to understand that Trebasus' words are not alarmist. , thinking hard, hoping to find a solution to the problem.

After a brief silence, Orontas asked unwillingly: "Are we going to stay here all the time, doing nothing, just watching the Dionian army and the Greek coalition join forces?!"

Trebasus was waiting for the other party to ask this question, and he replied calmly: "The Dionian army invaded our country aggressively, and successively captured Canaan, Feiji, and Syria. Originally, we thought they would continue to attack The east invaded Mesopotamia, so the king personally led the army to Taposakus, but the Dionians cunningly stopped advancing and wanted to consume us through defense while waiting for the rendezvous of the Greek coalition forces. , of course we can’t let the Dionians get what they want, so we must force them to leave the camp and take the initiative to attack us, so that the entire war situation will be more beneficial to us.”

Halpurgus sneered: "Since the Dionysian army can suddenly switch from a smooth offensive situation to a defensive situation, it can be seen that their king is more cautious and wants him to abandon the camp he has built and lead a force far larger than ours." With a small army, he takes the initiative to attack us. Unless he is a fool, this is simply impossible!"

Trebasus replied confidently: "I have learned about King Dionia in detail. This is a very confident and bold Greek. He has led troops smaller than the enemy many times and took the initiative to attack, and he has won This is one of the reasons why Dionia has expanded rapidly in just a few decades and has become our opponent. It can be seen that he is not someone who dares not take the initiative to attack because of the small number of troops. On the contrary, he loves The risk is only because the king led his army to arrive in time and the difference in strength between the two sides was too great. He temporarily took a defensive position to wait for reinforcements. But as long as we pay some price, I believe he will have to give up his defense and actively seek a decisive battle with us! "

"What price to pay?!" Artaxerxes asked eagerly.

Trebassus looked at the Persian king with an extremely serious expression and said in a deep voice: "Your Majesty, the reason why Pharnabazus was able to hold back the Greek coalition forces was mainly because he burned and evacuated the villages and towns on the path of the Greek coalition forces' advance. , making it impossible for the Greek coalition forces to collect any food and supplies, making their transportation and supplies difficult. Now we can also adopt similar tactics to evacuate all the people in the area near Taposacus, burning the villages and the supplies that cannot be taken away, Let there be a white space between Taposakus and Syria—"

(End of this chapter)