In Huang Qiuhuan's tent, there was an American general who was dressed quite decently, and his face was gloomy, and he had to be gloomy because he had come to surrender.

The American general is called Winfield Scott, and he is not an unknown person, but one of the most decorated generals in the United States. His exploits came from the Anglo-American War of 1812, and although the Americans fought humiliating in that war, Scott was quite brilliant.

During the war in 1812, the U.S. army was a militia-based army, with insufficient training, insufficient military discipline, insufficient weapons and ammunition, and very low military literacy, which was generally looked down upon by British officers at that time.

And on the battlefield, it was also true, the British regular army was often able to defeat the large number of American militia with fewer troops, and the loss of Washington was captured by a small number of British troops from the sea when the American army had the advantage of troops.

However, in Buffalo, Scott was on par with the powerful British army, and even slightly outperformed the British army, and his famous battle was called the Battle of Chippawa.

During the war, Winfield Scott was ordered to lead a U.S. army in Buffalo on the Niagara River. Before this unit arrived in Buffalo, it was indeed equivalent to a militia, and there were various problems, but it was indeed formed according to the regular American army, numbering more than 1,300 people, divided into four infantry regiments.

In Buffalo, Scott began a series of reforms. Based on the French Revolutionary Army's military training guidelines, he had his troops train for ten hours a day, remove inefficient officers, clean up military discipline, and improve the environmental hygiene of the barracks. This series of measures has had a significant effect on the improvement of combat effectiveness, especially the improvement of environmental hygiene, which greatly reduces the probability of soldiers suffering from diseases.

After completing the military reform, the American army fought a battle with the British army, in which Scott led 1,300 American troops and repelled the invading 1,500 British troops.

In fact, this victory was mainly caused by the British commander's carelessness, because he looked down on the American militia, and hastily let the whole army launch an attack under the condition of insufficient artillery preparation, thinking that the American army would be easily defeated as before. As a result, the American troops always maintained their formation under artillery fire, giving the arrogant British a burst of guns, so that the other side had to retreat after heavy losses.

Finally, the British commander was surprised and said, "Oh my God! They are all regular troops! ”

Since then, the United States has a regular army!

It should be said that Scott's military literacy and command ability are above the standard, but he suffered defeat.

He arrived at the west with the high hopes of the U.S. government, and he brought 30,000 of America's best-armed troops to the Chicago front, after two Chinese armies had joined Chicago from St. Paul in the north and St. Louis in the south, encircling Chicago, the most important city in the western United States.

After Scotter sent troops into Chicago, he quickly took over the siege of Chicago, and Chicago was not alone to the American forces that controlled the waterways of the Great Lakes.

After the siege was lifted, Scott found that the Chinese army was retreating in one direction and retreated together to St. Louis. At this time, he had two choices, one was to take advantage of the lack of Chinese forces in the direction of St. Paul to recover the city of St. Paul on the east bank of the Mississippi River that had been captured by China, and the other was to directly pursue the main Chinese army, annihilate them before they retreated to St. Louis, and then capture St. Louis.

At this time, the transportation in the central part of the United States was still by water, and the construction of the railroad had just begun, connecting New York Harbor and the Erie Railway in the Great Lakes region, which began construction in 1832, and was not even half completed in eight years, and not an inch of railroad tracks could be seen in the entire area west of the Alabachian Mountains.

But the terrain of the United States is indeed blessed, west of the Alabachian Mountains, is the gradually declining Alabachian Plateau, the river originates from the Alabachian Mountains, flows through the Alabachian Plateau, and finally joins the Mississippi River, so the expansion of the United States to the Midwest is downstream, just as Russia's expansion to Siberia is easier than China, as long as they cross the Alabachian Mountains, there are a lot of water canals to use, such as the Ohio River, the Tennessee River, which is thousands of kilometers away. It greatly broadened the range of movement of the Americans.

Scott was able to use the Illinois River to attack St. Louis directly, because the upper reaches of the river were directly connected to Lake Michigan, not far from Chicago, and finally joined the Mississippi River not far north of St. Louis, so as long as he followed the river, Scott could fight all the way to St. Louis.

Scott thought that the elite American army he led could defeat the complex Chinese army in a ground battle, and then take St. Louis directly to recover an important American city occupied by the Chinese, and in one fell swoop to reverse the situation of continuous defeat after the start of the war.

However, this march turned out to be a disaster, his army could not find the main force of the Chinese army, and the other side dishonorably refused to go head-to-head, not only fled along the river, but also destroyed the facilities along the road, burned the local farms, and left Scott without supplies. Originally, relying on the river, Scott's logistics could still be guaranteed, but the other side actually sent a large number of Indian cavalry to harass their rear, which annoyed Scott.

After a month of pursuing and traveling hundreds of miles, it was not surprising that Scott's scouts had reported that they had discovered that the enemy's main force was blocked in a three-forked area where two rivers converged.

They did succeed in encircling the enemy "main force", 10,000 infantry in the uniform of the regular Chinese army, and a small number of artillery.

Just as Scott was about to attack, a detachment of "Indian cavalry" began to appear in his rear, and these Indian cavalry, Scott already knew enough, they fought, they came and went like the wind, they never fell in love with war, and if they put a little pressure on them, they would retreat or flee.

With the main force of the enemy in front of him, Scott hesitated for a moment, feeling that he still couldn't give up the opportunity to encircle and annihilate the enemy's main force, so he arranged for 10,000 people to break the rear and be responsible for blocking the rescue of the "Indians", using 20,000 troops to defeat the enemy's main force head-on, and then turn around and clean up the Indians.

As more and more Indians appeared in the background, Scott realized that something was wrong, and the Indian Army had more than 20,000 men, which did not match the information he had been receiving. But he didn't care too much, he cared too much about the "main force" of the enemy army in front of him.

And he has already found out that the enemy "main forces" are trying to cross the river, and some small boats have appeared on the river. So he impatiently ordered an attack.

As soon as the attack began, it was out of control, and the 20,000 "Indians" behind them also attacked, and what is strange was that they dismounted and fought on foot, listing the infantry phalanx to advance, and the artillery cooperated. At first, Scott thought it was because of the confluence of rivers, with many low-lying areas that were inconvenient for cavalry to gallop.

But when the "Indian" engaged his rear team, Scott realized that something was wrong, because his rear team was actually repulsed by the "Indian" head-on.

When did the Indians have the ability to fight large-scale frontal combat? Scott didn't know. But he was surprised to find that the situation he faced had changed, and that he had previously used 30,000 troops to surround the "main force" of the Chinese army with the help of the triangular terrain where the rivers meet, and now they were instead surrounded in this triangle.

But Scott also had some victories, his main force had brought the enemy's "main force" close to a river bay, the enemy had abandoned all artillery and baggage, the infantry was crowded on the river beach, completely out of formation, and a few had jumped into the river, hoping to climb into the overcrowded boats.

Scott could not give up the delicious food in front of him, so he transferred 5,000 troops to reinforce the rear operations, and the main force continued to attack the Chinese "main force" on the river beach, but the rear road continued to be defeated, and he compressed the scope of activity of the Chinese "main force" on the one hand, and on the other hand, the "Indians" also compressed his range of activity, forming a situation of sandwich cakes.

Scott succeeded in capturing the river bank and capturing 6,000 future and fleeing enemy "main forces", but it was too late, he also lost his last chance to break through, his army was reduced to the triangle, and he lost 3,000 men. But Scott was still confident, he still had more than 20,000 troops, and the enemy was 20,000 at best.

Scott planned to regroup and fight another head-on battle, but the opponent still didn't give him a chance. 20,000 enemy troops dug trenches and fortified in the rear, and at the same time, these "Indians" had too many cannons, constantly bombarding Scott's troops.

By the time Scott regrouped and began to attack, the enemy's trenches and ramparts had reached a certain size, and the enemy's artillery had dealt a heavy blow to his own artillery, and a large number of artillery in the river beach wetlands had been destroyed and could not move.

Scott ordered the infantry to storm repeatedly, but they could not help the opponent's trench barriers, and the opponent resolutely refused to fight a head-on battle. In this way, Scott was put in a desperate situation.

By this time, Scott had already discovered that he seemed to have been deceived. The "Indians" who stood in his way were not Indians at all, and the Chinese "main force" he captured was the real Indians, and the cunning Chinese actually changed their clothes with the Indians. With 10,000 Indians to attract themselves in the river beach area, the main force made a detour to the rear to surround themselves!

After ten days of stalemate, Scott found that he was indeed unable to break through the opponent's trench barriers, and the supply of supplies was cut off, coupled with the continuous bombardment of the opponent's artillery, which had brought considerable losses to his side.

After confirming that he could not get reinforcements, Scott chose to surrender!

Huang Qiu also praised the general very loudly: "You are commanding a regular army!" ”

He gave Scott again the words that the British were appreciative of the American military and at the same time made the Americans proud.

But Scott was not pleased, and sneered: "You are commanding a militia!" ”