As Chen Xin had predicted, when the army marched into Spain, it suddenly became violent, and it seemed to be completely different from the previous intelligence. The Catholic coalition in Spain, which was resisting near the northern mountains alone, had a strength of about 70,000 or 80,000 troops, and the level of equipment and training was significantly higher than that of previous coalition forces.

It is clear that, because of the New World and the sea power of the West, the resistance in Spain in the last year or two has become fundamentally different from what it used to be. Under these circumstances, Zhou Dayong also quickly changed his mind, and temporarily decided to attack the main force in the direction of the Apennine Peninsula to leave only part of the troops for defense, and the main force was quickly transferred to the west, and at least the main force of about 200,000 people or the firepower carried by it had the possibility of completely destroying the enemy army.

The Iberian Peninsula, which had been a hard bone in the original expedition, once again broke out fierce offensive and defensive battles. In the face of an opponent with excellent vehicle shields and even armor protection, the effectiveness of the invincible heavy guns in previous battles seems to be greatly reduced, and only the direct fire or bombardment carried out by the gunners at close range, regardless of casualties, shows some combat effect. The biggest difference between the defenders and other Catholic coalition armies is that there is no shortage of firearms, even in terms of gunpowder.

In this case, most of the offensive operations can only be selected during the day. Relying on the guidance brought by the advantages of hot air balloon reconnaissance, the artillery was guided to concentrate firepower to carry out concentrated attacks, and finally thwarted several attempts of the enemy to blast and counterattack. However, it is clear that in the face of Spain's mountain defense in the north, it seems difficult to break the stalemate in the short term, even with a certain superiority in numbers.

It was not until the reinforcements of the 80,000 main forces from the direction of the Apennine Peninsula came that the situation finally improved. At the very least, while completely suppressing the resistance of the defenders, at least it was possible to launch a blasting assault under the cover of heavy artillery fire on the key defensive line.

After consuming at least one-third of the ammunition carried by the 200,000 army, the Spaniards' defense line in the north was finally breached, and in order to eliminate the 30,000 strong enemies in the defense, Chen Xinzhou's Dayong Division, which had superior troops, also paid the price of 30,000 or 40,000 casualties, plus the wounded also needed to be guarded by a certain number of troops, and the remaining mobile troops also dropped to as many as 150,000.

However, by this time in the war, the balance between the two sides on the Iberian Peninsula had at least been effectively broken, and the remnants of the resistance force had gradually become clear, probably about 60,000 or 70,000 Spaniards with decent equipment and training, including the remaining forces. At this moment, Chen Xin couldn't help but feel a trace of fear. If the remnants of the Iberian Peninsula had intervened in the decisive battle of Europe a few months ago, it is clear that the situation and form of the war on the continent would not have been the same as it is now. However, this does not raise a trace of doubt in the mind: if the enemy has the conditions to do this, why did he not do it? Was it just because of the contradiction between the French and the Spaniards before the Great Army's westward conquest? The answer is clearly no.

In order to avoid long nights and dreams, Chen Xin and Zhou Dayong both decided that the battle against the remaining enemy troops could not be delayed excessively, and a decisive victory must be achieved in a short period of time. For this reason, the army did not hesitate to take a certain risk to carry out a division of troops to attract the main force of the enemy to come to the decisive battle. The Spaniards who stayed behind saw the fighters, and concentrated the main force of tens of thousands of men to launch a fierce counterattack in an area not too far from Madrid, although the ambushed team in the division suffered heavy losses, but more than half of the more than 20,000 troops also escaped by taking advantage of the cavalry advantage that they did not have before.

At the cost of losses of more than 10,000 people, the location of the main force of the remnants of the enemy was finally determined, and the army of more than 100,000 soon pursued the remnants of the enemy who had exposed their positions all the way and compressed the enemy army near a port not far from the sea. Of course, because of the decisive action of the troops, the remnants of the retreating enemy did not completely escape into the coastal ports.

It's just that at this time, Zhou Dayong, who has experienced a lot of things in the western expedition, always feels a little strange: "It seems that the enemy intends to establish a peripheral position that has been prepared for a long time near the port?" Otherwise, even if our army gets along with each other in a different position, it is impossible to build such a strong fortification system that can cooperate with the car shield in such a short period of time? ”

"How far is this from the sea?" Chen Xin suddenly asked at this time.

"It's about a dozen miles away," Zhou Dayong obviously realized something at this time. If a projectile attack with a maximum elevation angle is carried out with a decent heavy artillery, it is possible to threaten a target at a distance of more than ten miles or so, and even more than necessary to overdraw the life of the body tube. Of course, to launch a projectile at such a distance, even if the artillery officers of the main force of the volunteer troops launched a fierce fire at a distance that had already been marked, the efficiency would be greatly reduced. At that distance, many heavy shotguns will not be large at all because of the air resistance, and only some solid shells can be threatened, and they cannot be solid shells with too small shells and too light gun weight. This means that a gun crew that fires all the one or two hundred shells it carries will be able to kill an opponent of its own strength at best, and probably less...

However, at this time, Zhou Dayong remembered some things about the confrontation in the Pas-de-Calais back then. If the main force of the Western Fleet is attacking with hundreds or even larger ships, then it will be completely different from the law of land warfare, and thousands of guns in four rows at a distance of more than ten miles can fire hundreds of thousands of rounds even if they fire mainly solid shells, and if they are not careful, they will suffer heavy losses under the cooperation of the enemy's naval guns and the land army.

For this reason, in the construction of fortifications on the south side, Zhou Dayong ordered his troops to dig more deep cliff holes, at least not less than a distance of about one person, and the attack on the besieged enemy was obviously not a particularly urgent matter.

In this way, with sufficient manpower, the fortification system in the south of the remnant enemy has begun to take shape in just about a day and night. At this time, the remnants of the enemy in the Iberian Peninsula seemed to sense something and began to approach a full force breakout. However, if the ratio of forces between the two sides is about two or three to one, such a breakthrough may still bring some threats, and with a main force of 150,000 and no shortage of horses, it is always possible to gather enough troops to completely block the breakthrough of the remnant enemy after judging the direction of the breakthrough of the remnant enemy.

After several such battles, it seems that because of the heavy casualties, the remaining enemies began to become honest.

(End of chapter)