As the most important part of the Hetao strategy, the construction of the Hetao defense line is also the focus of the Ninth Army, and even the Army.

The Hetao defense line started from Youwei County under the rule of Datong Prefecture, passed through the former site of Yulinwei in the former Ming Dynasty, the former site of Zhenyuwei, Chi'er Mountain, Yunnei, and Junzijin, and finally arrived at Dongsheng City.

The overall direction is not a straight line, although the whole is to the west, but it is first to the northwest, then slightly to the southwest, and then slightly to the northwest, the first half is generally along the Hunhe River, the middle is straight into the Yellow River, and then along the Yellow River to Dongshengcheng after arriving at the Yellow River.

Along such a line, in the past few months, the Tang Army has built fourteen cities of different sizes, the most important of which is naturally the westernmost Dongsheng City.

The second is Yulin City and Zhenyu City, two more important cities.

These three cities, basically are heavily garrisoned, Dongsheng City needless to say, the scale is relatively large, and Yulin City and Zhenyu City are also more important, although the time is limited, the scale of the rebuilt city is not large, but the garrison is a lot, basically maintain a garrison of more than 3,000 people.

These cities are located in a dangerous position, it is an important stronghold of the Hetao defense line, the Tang Army is naturally also strictly defended, if the Tatars are sure to fight down, they have fought before, but people also have self-knowledge, knowing that it is very difficult to forcibly attack such a heavily garrisoned city, so when they cut off the supply line, they often choose to those cities whose geographical location is more important, but there is no heavy guard.

Unfortunately, South Limburg belongs to such a city.

Nanlinbao is just located in the west of Yulin City, east of Zhenyu City, between the two cities, and although the terrain is not how dangerous it is, it is also specially selected for the construction of a canyon area.

As long as this place can be conquered, it is enough to cut off the connection between Yulin and Zhenyu City, and it is not important to cut off the connection between the two cities, the important thing is to completely cut off this entire supply line.

In order to cut off the supply line, it is not necessary to conquer such important cities as Yulin City and Zhenyu City, and this more than 100-kilometer-long Hetao defense line can be cut off at any point, and this defense line can be cut off at the waist.

The Tang Army was also aware of this problem, so it also opened up other supply lines, especially the most important Yellow River supply line, to supply the troops deep into the grassland.

However, the Yellow River will freeze in winter, and it is destined to not be able to rely too much on river transportation, so they plan to open up supply lines from other places, but in some places, it is difficult to carry out large-scale supply by land transportation, especially the four-wheeled carriages used on a large scale by the Tang Army, which have greater requirements for road conditions.

Therefore, the land transportation supply line with a flat road from Youwei County to Yulin City, and then to Zhenyu City and then to Dongsheng City is still an unobtainable supply line.

Otherwise, the two sides would not have been fighting back and forth over this supply line for months.

The big city can't be beaten, the Tatars choose to fight the small city, according to the reason, in the fourteen cities, except for Dongsheng City, Yulin City, Zhenyu City is a big city, the other eleven cities are similar, most of them are chosen to have a certain defensive ability to charge the building, the scale is also similar.

But South Limburg is very unlucky, every time the Tatars want to cut off the supply line on a large scale, they will fight this city, they naturally don't know, the first time to hit here, it was purely because of coincidence, as for the second time and even four times in a row to choose here, that is because of the number of attacks, very familiar with the nearby terrain, and even the internal structure and facilities of South Lincheng are quite familiar, the risk of fighting, grasping.

If it is a different place, this person is not familiar with the place, who knows if he will be ambushed by fighting.

In military operations, when the interests are similar, it is natural to give priority to grasping the big ones and the risks to be small.

As a priority target for the Tatars most of the time, the Tatars who came to attack were very attentive, and the troops that came were as few as five or six thousand, or as many as tens of thousands, and as for less than five or six thousand troops, the Tatars also knew that they could not fight, so they never sent such a small number of troops.

In the face of heavy Tatar attacks every time, it is hell that South Limburg can hold on.

This was overcome, then counterattacked, and then overcome, and counterattacked, all back and forth three times, and it was normal for such repeated battles to lead to heavy casualties on both sides.

The top is also paying more and more attention to this place, and continues to increase troops here, so far, the garrison of Nanlinbao has 1,500 people, in the fourteen cities outside the sun, it can be regarded as the city with a permanent strength second only to Dongsheng City, Yulin City, and Zhenyu City.

And they also have nine artillery pieces to help, and a lot of grenades and so on, and the defensive force is stronger than in the previous three defensive battles.

According to Pan Deyue's own estimates, with the strength of 1,500 men under his command, plus nine artillery pieces and a large number of grenades, when fighting defensively, he could resist the attack of 10,000 Tatars for at least half a decade and half a month, and he could fight better, and even be able to block the attack of 15,000 people.

Ten days and half a month have been full of friendly troops to come to the rescue!

With an army of 1,500 troops, nine artillery pieces and many grenades to help, Pan Deyue felt that he could avoid the unfortunate fate of his predecessors, but what he didn't expect was that this Tatar was really competing with Nanlimburg, and there were more troops than ever before!

Ma Dan, there are 30,000 Tatar cavalry coming this time, and they are almost 40,000 horsemen, which are so vast that they almost cut off the heavens and the earth.

This strength is more than the Tatars who came three times combined!

If this can be held, Pan Deyue feels that it must be a hell of a life!

His predecessor was unlucky enough, but he didn't expect to be even more unlucky!

At this moment, Pan Deyue regretted a little, knowing that he had postponed this position, even if he would rather not be promoted.

But his head was a little hot, as soon as he heard that he was going to be promoted to major, and he also served as the commander of a city, his real power was greater than that of those ordinary infantry battalion majors, and he had more soldiers in his hands, as for the risks involved, he had long forgotten about them.

He also didn't want to think about it, Nanlincheng garrison of 1,500, and nine artillery pieces, this kind of strength, which belongs to half of the standard reinforced battalion, can be called a regiment in some specific places, and its commander is usually a lieutenant colonel or even a colonel.

He, a newly promoted major, was able to become the commander of the 1,500-man garrison of South Limburg?

Because there was no one to compete with him......

In the army, this is loyal to the Son of Heaven and martyred for the empire, that is what should be done, but the ghost place of Nanlimburg is too evil, and it is not a particularly important place, but the Tatars choose to attack with heavy troops every time, and most of the soldiers who perform tasks here, whether they are ordinary soldiers or officers, or even the supreme commander, do not end well, and there are not even many opportunities to be injured, many of them were killed by the Tatars after the city was broken.

Therefore, many colonel-level officers who knew the inside story were reluctant to go to Nanlimburg to serve, and they would rather escort supplies in the wilderness and fight the Tatar cavalry than go to Nanlimburg to be besieged and wait for death.

But Pan Deyue, who had just gotten up from the lieutenant, didn't know, and by the time he knew, it was too late, he had already agreed, and the appointment letter was already in his hand.

At this time, even if you know the inside story of the matter, there is no way, military law is like a mountain, this has taken over as the commander of South Limburg, dare not go? Immediately court-martialed.

Because of the separation of the military and the government, the military now also deals with the matter of violating the law and discipline on its own, so a military tribunal has also been set up.

Pan Deyue naturally didn't want to go to the court-martial, so he tried his best to persuade the top to reinforce more troops, and gathered 1,500 men, as well as reinforced artillery.

But it doesn't happen!

Pan Deyue's more than 1,000 troops, facing the attack of nearly 40,000 troops under the personal command of Altan Khan, were defeated without holding on for a day!

There is no way, although there is a fortress defense, there is also artillery to help, and Pan Deyue also carefully arranged all kinds of defensive tactics, but the people Altan Khan did not play any tactics with Pan Deyue at all, with a wave of his hand, 40,000 people rode directly to the city, and then began to climb the wall to climb the city, the city wall of this earthen city is not a few meters high, people can ask people casually, and they can jump on the city wall with a jump.

What a!

More than 40,000 people rushed up like a tide, and the more than 1,000 soldiers defending the city couldn't stop it even if they had three heads and six arms!

When the city was lost, Pan Deyue wanted to emulate the commander of the second and third Nanlimburg, and committed suicide with a knife on the spot.

The two predecessors in front of them died like this!

Under the annihilation of the whole army, as the supreme commander, how can he have the face to run away and survive, even if he escapes, he will inevitably go to a military court in the end!

Reason?

All your subordinates died in battle, but one of your supreme commanders escaped and didn't shoot you, how could those soldiers who died and died in the war be convinced? How can the still alive Tang soldiers be convinced?

But he was persuaded by his subordinates!

This is not to say that Pan Deyue is afraid of death and does not dare to commit suicide, but this time they were defeated a little quickly, it is said that it is a day, but the Tatars have half a day to prepare for the siege, and the real siege time is less than half an hour.

Therefore, the defenders of the city actually did not suffer many casualties, and most of them withdrew from the city wall to the north side.

If Pan Deyue dispelled the idea of suicide, and then withdrew to the warehouse in the inner city with his subordinates, ready to defend to the death!

This was built after he took over South Limburg, using a large amount of cement, which was extremely strong, and ordinary nine-pound artillery could not collapse.

The original armory was built too close to the outside, and it was already destroyed in the war, so this armory was rebuilt to store ammunition and food, and by the way, a small well was dug, which can be regarded as the strongest fortress in South Limburg.

It's a pity that this warehouse is not large, and it was originally designed to accommodate a hundred people at most, but now the remaining more than 700 people are hiding inside, and the troops cannot be deployed.

But in this way, because the place is small, it is easier to defend, and due to the terrain restrictions, it is impossible for these Tatars to attack with too many forces, so they can only send people in from the entrance, and the entrance is small, and dozens of people at once have to block the entrance.

After the Tatars failed to attack several times, but after killing and wounding hundreds of people, they simply left a thousand people to garrison the entrance and left it alone, anyway, there was no entry or exit from the warehouse, and the remaining hundreds of people could not turn over the storm.

Today's Altan Khan, how can he consume troops in this broken warehouse

He is still waiting for the arrival of the main force of Datang!

He wants to fight to the death with the Southern Tang barbarians here!

Cheng, this huge Tumo River and Hetao are still their Tatars!

Defeat, everything is over!