Chapter 504: Strangulation Battle

Before going to the battlefield, the generals had all kinds of strategies and plans, and those who had received the education of traditional military generals naturally read military books and war strategies, and those generals who were homeless people fought life and death again and again.

But in every battle, there are too many uncertain things happening, and it is these uncertainties that lead to the direction of the battle.

The generals and generals of Shun Junquan already know how to take advantage of these uncertainties on the battlefield, and let this uncertainty also become a factor that increases their chances of victory.

The generals of the Ming army, except for a very small number of talents and the generals' personal guards, the rest of the army, itself is synonymous with this uncertainty, since the remnants of the three major expeditions and the gradual withering of the Liaozhen general Li generals, many times the Ming army is a joke on the battlefield.

The army of 10,000 people and tens of thousands of people, as soon as they go on the battlefield, except for the main general's own team, which can be controlled by his own soldiers, the rest are all lively, when they win, they still have some help, and when they lose, they will even endanger themselves and kill each other.

However, Shandong has never encountered such a thing, long-term and continuous training, strict and clear drills, efficient and responsible transmission of battlefield orders, on the battlefield, so that every regiment, every team, and everyone has become a tightly controllable part, forming a terrible war machine.

Originally, the Shun army was also relatively controllable, after all, the tens of thousands of foot soldiers on this battlefield were the most elite veterans of the Shun army, but the sea of steel and fire completely knocked out all controllable factors.

The ground shook and the mountains shook, and no one could survive the metal storm of death, and almost 600 shells bombarded the formation of the Shun army, and this shelling caused about 7,000 casualties.

If a qualified artillery officer sees such a result, he will probably beat his chest, because this shelling can cause better damage and more effective strikes.

But in fact, the effect of this shelling was not only to kill, this shelling did something more important, this kind of firepower coverage at the peak of the era, completely destroyed the self-confidence of the Shun soldiers, their discipline, and destroyed the most important things on the battlefield, morale and courage.

The orders of the commander of the Shun army will indeed be carried out by his subordinates, but in this state, it can only be said that the orders coincide with what his subordinates want to do.

The extreme depression and fear after the shelling need to be vented by running and fighting, and it is much better to rush forward and fight to the death with the enemy than to die in a storm of metal and fire in despair.

After rushing out, the generals at all levels below were already unable to contain the soldiers, and the brigade commanders and sentinels all found that the soldiers below were rushing forward frantically, and they were already a little uncontrollable.

The archers and bird gunners were indeed pushed to the front, but they rushed like this, and they couldn't even aim or prepare, and the first row of the Jiaozhou camp firecrackers on the opposite side was already half-kneeling.

The Jiaozhou battalion firecracker array in front of it is layered on top of each other, almost completely covering the front of the charge, and there is also a gap between the firecrackers and the firecrackers, after all, the firecrackers are hung with reserve fire ropes and ammunition bags, which are too close to each other, and they are easy to be splashed by sparks, so it is dangerous.

Through the array of firecrackers, you can see the spear army formation that is still advancing behind, and the firecrackers seem to be sparsely planted in front of them.

The stake seems to be easy to cross, but it is a wall of death......

In the earth-shattering shelling, every soldier in the Jiaozhou battalion was no less shocked than the Shun soldiers on the opposite side, but in the same way, after the shelling, the shock turned into incomparable confidence.

The palms of each soldier were dry, and some of them still had buzzing ears, but the movements were very standard, meticulous and unusual.

For the soldiers of Shun who rushed to the front, ready to shoot arrows or fire bird guns, they understood the meaning of the fire gun array on the opposite side better than those companions behind them.

Shandong's firecrackers hit far and powerful, these rumors they know, there are many people who have experienced in large and small battles, but at this moment they have no choice but to shoot the bow and arrow in their hands and the bird gun.

The charge of the Shun army is like a great tide, and these soldiers armed with bows and arrows and bird guns are the head of the tide, and they cannot turn around, they cannot turn back, they can only move forward in the direction of this great tide.

If their movements change slightly, they may be trampled to death by the people behind them, but in running, the bow and arrow are not accurate, and they can't even shoot far, because the action of opening the bow cannot be completed, not to mention the thin-barreled weapon of the bird's gun.

The soldiers of the Jiaozhou battalion, who set up firearms there and prepared to shoot, were not affected in any way, and were still preparing to shoot and fire......

You can take a few steps forward, get closer, and play a second round, maybe you can get a kill, as the archers and bird soldiers of the Shun army thought.

But further forward, it is within the range of the Jiaozhou battalion's firearms, and the officers who are the commanders of firearms have some specialties, and they are naturally proficient in firearms operation and training, and at the same time, they must also have some talent for visual distance.

In the battle, it is unrealistic to expect to have professional craftsmen like Li Meng's side to calculate, especially relying on the estimation and calculation of the firearms commander.

This is also a skill that practice makes perfect, and if you practice more, you can judge that it is almost the same, and you can see the soldiers of the Shun army running into the firing range.

No one was waiting to get close to the fight, and the order was directly given, and on the right side of each platoon of the musketeers of each regiment there was an officer who raised his saber, waved it fiercely, and gave a loud order in his mouth:

"Fire !!"

The firing orders of each regiment were not issued at the same time, and the firecrackers on the battlefield were fired one after another, and after the first platoon fired, they were still running forward, desperately trying to stabilize the balance of their bodies and shoot the arrows and firecrackers of the Shun army who threw themselves directly forward, and some of them were only injured by the firecrackers on the opposite side.

After all, the musketeers in the first platoon of Shandong soldiers and horses were crouching, and the bullet line of the heavy smoothbore guns was parabolic downward, although the muzzle of the guns was deliberately raised.

But after falling to the ground, even kneeling on the ground, he can no longer stand up, and will soon be pushed to the ground by his comrades behind him, and then trampled on and never able to get up.

First row, second row, third row...... The second firing was as dense as a salvo, and after the salvo was completed, from the beginning of the shooting, the musketeers did not rotate in formation, reloaded ammunition and fired, but simply fired the muskets as quickly as possible.

With such intensive shooting, even if the momentum of the Shun army was fierce, the several rows of people who charged in front were all empty, and the nerves in the back row were finally chilled by the wind and rain, and their steps slowed down.

This kind of shooting with good effect did not last, it was just such a round, and after the shooting, the Shandong firecrackers who had already received the order ran backwards with firecrackers, looking as if they had broken up.

Of course, the formation of the firecrackers was still very intact, and it was not scattered, running towards the back along the gap in the spear phalanx.

Looking at the distance between the two sides, they can still catch up, and they can take advantage of this sudden retreat to win on the battlefield, and the offensive of the Shun army is blazing again.

When the firecrackers fired, the spear phalanx behind them was always moving, and when they turned around and withdrew after the fire, the spear phalanx also came up.

"Stop!!"

Seeing the frenzy of the Shun army getting closer and closer on the opposite side, the regimental garrison of each infantry regiment gave orders in a loud voice, the drums beat three times, the horn sounded twice to stop vomiting, and the infantry regiments all stopped.

This sudden stop made the Shun soldiers on the opposite side very unaccustomed, because each of them was thinking about when both sides were moving forward and when they could collide with each other.

But the other party suddenly stopped, will there be any problem, many of the Shun soldiers who ran in the front also subconsciously slowed down, but the companions who ran behind them did not have time to stop, and there was a commotion and chaos in the formation.

"Raise the flat spear and step forward!!"

The generals on the side of the infantry array gave another loud order, and the soldiers all raised their spears to their shoulders, reversed their wrists, and leaned forward with their bows, moving forward in small steps.

The soldiers in the back row stretched their spears out of the gaps, layer upon layer, and the entire infantry phalanx moved forward like a steel hedgehog.

Although the soldiers of the Shun army are running at high speed, it does not mean that they will actively collide with these cold and shining spears, although many people are thinking of using shields as a shield, using this speed to collide, mess up the opponent's formation, and then take advantage of the situation to cover and kill.

But the formation of Shandong's soldiers and horses is such a posture, if they collide, there will be no other end except to be stabbed into a sieve.

In such a situation, you can only slow down, wait for the opportunity to enter through the gap in the opponent's formation, and as long as you hit an opening, you can take advantage of the situation to break in.

The people in front wanted to stop, but the people behind were pushing, and the front of the Shun army was already chaotic, but the spear phalanx of the Jiaozhou battalion on the opposite side was still rubbing forward step by step.

Holding a flat spear high, the tip of the spear is diagonally downward, and the parts of the enemy that the tip of the spear is aimed at are the heart and throat, which are the vital points of the upper body.

Attacking these two places does not require too much stabbing, as long as the piercing is fatal, if someone wants to get under the raised spear, they will be dealt with by the second and third rows of spears.

Although the Shun soldiers pushed and crowded, they still had to collide with each other sooner or later, and the chaotic formation led to the unit distance, and the number of people in many places was not the largest number, and in this face-to-face battle, the number of people on the unit distance was the key to determining the outcome of the victory.

The Jiaozhou battalion's spear phalanx, which was tightly lined up, ensured that the maximum number of spears was always maintained at each distance, and it was not uncommon for a Shun sergeant to face more than two spears.

In this case, no matter how this Shun soldier fights, whether he holds a long weapon or a short weapon in his hand, what he can do is very simple, either retreat or die.

The people behind kept shouting and shouting and rushed forward, and the Shun army was already crowded in the rear, and the people were crowded on the flat ground, and no one could see what was happening in front of them.

As soon as the crowd became dense, everyone was worried about whether there would be artillery bombardment on their heads, and everyone heard the sound of killing in front of them, and they all wanted to go to the front to fight.

But when it was crowded to the front, it was nothing more than being stabbed to death by being stabbed to death in the state of the spear telescoping of the Jiaozhou battalion soldiers, and fortunately a few people who broke in were assassinated by the spears in the back row.

The infantry phalanx of the Jiaozhou battalion marched forward step by step, looking as if it was rubbing, and the amplitude was not large, but in this way, it ensured the stability of the formation in the fierce battle, so that the soldiers would not scatter with each other and could rely on each other.

Although the soldiers of the Shun army were running in great strides and looking at the fierce momentum, they actually did not cooperate, although they were a large army of black pressure, but when they really fought, it seemed that they were facing the entire queue of the other party alone.

The sounds of fighting and screams were intertwined, and the spear phalanx of the Jiaozhou battalion continued to move forward, and a large number of corpses fell in front of their array.

If this kind of battle continues, there will be no suspense, watching the foot soldiers phalanx of the Jiaozhou battalion push forward step by step.

When the infantry of the Shun army first rushed out, the momentum was extremely fierce and seemed unstoppable, but when they rushed to the Jiaozhou battalion infantry array on the opposite side, they were still blocked, and they were beaten back little by little.

"Lao Tzu's artillery is firing, you fight again, rush to fire, if you hurt Lao Tzu's brothers, I will not be finished with you!"

In front of Shuai Qi, eight hundred musketeers were behind ten three-pounder guns, and Guo Liang, the commander of the artillery team, had a very loud voice, and even Li Meng, who was on the horse, could hear it clearly.

The battlefield is so big, the foot soldiers are strangled there, Li Meng's Shuai Qi headquarters is naturally empty, and Li Zicheng, who is in a slightly higher place, will naturally not let go of this opportunity.

Thousands of the horse teams that had been sorted out with great difficulty broke away from the array and rushed towards Li Meng's side, looking at the enemy chieftain's side, it was too big, where the handsome flag was, there was still a distance from the few queues behind him, a little disjointed, if he could take advantage of the situation, he rushed over.

Naturally, the cavalry of this assault Shun army did not expect to be able to kill the opponent's commander, but with their thousands of horses, the soldiers and horses where the opponent's commander flag was located would definitely not be able to resist it.

If you can't beat it, you must retreat for the safety of the coach, and take advantage of the opponent's coach team's retreat to cover up, firstly, it can cause chaos to the opponent, and secondly, it can reduce the pressure on the frontal foot soldiers.

Li Zicheng, who had already withdrawn to the horse team, also saw that the foot soldiers who rushed to the front were completely because of the breath accumulated in advance.

Because of the pressure of the shelling, they have to fight desperately, if they can use this courage to move forward, regardless of life and death, it would be good, but now they are blocked by the foot soldiers of the Jiaozhou battalion, and after the momentum is consumed, the other party will push back.

The battle on the battlefield is not just a front-to-face battle, since the space on the left flank is opened, it can be made here.

For example, the horse team, which was originally intended to be used at a critical moment, divided a team to attack the opponent's unprepared Shuai Qi formation, and took this opportunity to see if the whole situation could be revitalized.

Under the banner, there are also 2,000 personal soldiers around, there is an artillery position on the right, and a cavalry of several thousand people runs out from the opposite side, and this movement can be seen clearly.

After the eight infantry regiments on this side advanced, Huang Ping, the commander of the pro-soldiers, was worried, and the soldiers and horses of the Shuai Banner Headquarters were hanging alone outside the big array, which was really unsafe, and when he saw the thousands of cavalry rushing down from the mountain, his face immediately changed, and he hurriedly persuaded Li Meng and said:

"Dashuai, the thieves are on top of this piece, and they want to use cavalry to raid, Dashuai has a golden body, and the defense here is thin, let's go back to the rear army formation safely."

"Ben Shuai didn't come here to see, what are thousands of cavalry afraid of, this Li Chuang is already behind this era, Huang Ping, do you know that there is such a sentence? If you fall behind, you will be beaten! ”

Li Meng said it very easily, but Huang Ping was ignorant and worried, he was indeed unheard of if he was beaten if he fell behind, I really don't know why the big man suddenly mentioned it, Li Meng really didn't take it seriously, and said with a smile:

"Order Guo Liang to block the cavalry with artillery, Huang Ping, and transfer the troops to come forward to assist."

The commander had already decided, no matter how worried Huang Ping was, he would implement it, but Guo Liang of the artillery team didn't care, and directly placed the fifteen three-pounder guns in front of the handsome banner, and the eight hundred personal soldiers all dismounted, holding fire guns and posing in a firing queue, behind the artillery array.

When the cavalry rushed down, they saw that the other party quickly transferred the artillery that was still on the other side to the face, although the cavalry of the Shun army saw the speed of the artillery formation of the Jiaozhou battalion, but also felt that this artillery was a bulky thing, and it would not rotate if it stayed somewhere.

However, Shandong's artillery put the gun carriage directly on the horse, and quickly moved to the front, and the action was extremely rapid and effective, some people were cleaning the gun chamber, and some people were unloading the gun carriage there, and there was absolutely no action of dragging mud and water.

At a distance of less than five hundred paces, it would not take much time for the cavalry to rush over, but in such a short period of time, the Jiaozhou battalion had already completed the deployment of artillery.

The mighty general of the Shun army who led these thousands of cavalry only felt that his scalp was numb, and before leaving, King Chuang had a warning, and it was best if he could cause chaos to the other party, and he would not be punished if he could not cause a turnaround.

But so many cavalry rushed down, there was no reason to go back like this, and even if a dozen cannons were fired once, it was just dozens of cavalrymen who died, and there were not many troops around the big leader of the thieves, and there was no sign of the infantry brigade behind being transferred.

The closer the distance, the more chance the mighty general of the Shun army who led the team felt that the chance, and the mighty general began to shake his arms when the brigade was still going down.

The thousands of horses of the Shun army began to disperse gradually, and these thousands of horses rushed violently, raising smoke and dust in the sky, which seemed to be no less powerful than the infantry fighting over there.

But the artillery of the Jiaozhou battalion can not only move quickly, but also easy to adjust the direction in the spot, the thousands of cavalry on the battlefield, no matter how to bypass, have to pass through the semi-circle range centered on the artillery array, the artillery is operated by the army, the artillery must be fixed on an earthen platform, but also fixed with wooden pegs on both sides, the artillery can not change the design direction.

Shandong is very easy, those cavalry deliberately go farther, but Shandong's artillery is very simple to deal with, four artillerymen two on each side, put the thick wooden bar in their hands into an iron ring at the end of the gun mount, and at the same time exert force, lift the tail end, and land on the iron wheels of only two gun carriages.

Under such circumstances, it was very easy to turn the direction, and although the artillery bombardment was buzzing in their ears and in the smoke of gunpowder, they were able to hit with high spirits.

Now the cavalry is rushing, except for the artillery placed in front of the handsome banner, the rest of the artillery is also pushing forward, ready to start fighting.

"The muzzle of the cannon is lowered, the propellant is halved for me, whoever wants a cannonball to hit our own people, I will peel his skin!"

Guo Liang, the commander of the artillery team, stared nervously at the movement of the cavalry of the Shun army, and was also calculating the intersection of the lines in his heart, seeing the movement of the other party, he pulled his throat to restrain his subordinates there, and the route taken by the cavalry of the Shun army was also calculated, which was to make the artillery of the Jiaozhou battalion scruple and fear of accidental injury, so as to rush to the front.

Seeing that the artillery was adjusting its direction, the cavalry of the Shun army, although frightened, still controlled the horses with trembling and continued to move forward.

If the cannon is fired, it will inevitably give a lot of damage, but this battlefield is compressed very narrow at the beginning, if you fire at the cavalry diagonally, it is likely to affect the foot soldiers on this side, Guo Liang's eyes have been moving with the movements of the enemy cavalry, and in the end he did not give the order to open the cannon.

"Lao Gao, your cannon waited for the firing range, lowered the muzzle of the cannon and started firing, only one shell!!"

No matter how it is calculated, there are only a few cannons in the front suitable place for firing artillery, Guo Liang also has to think about being cautious first, but the cavalry of the Shun army has gradually accelerated because they have not been hindered and shelled, and they have also discovered the hesitation of the artillery of the Jiaozhou battalion, and the certainty of harassing and advancing is even greater.

"The first row of the artillery array is replaced with shotguns, Lao Gao, you don't have to move there!!"

Guo Liang ordered again, the 800 personal soldiers in front of Shuai Qi had already loaded the fire guns with ammunition, and the rest of the cavalry also began to prepare to attack the enemy under the dispatch of Huang Ping, but the commander Li Meng watched the battle advancing step by step over there, ignoring the enemy cavalry in front of him.

In front of the firecracker array, the fifteen guns don't have to think about what angle they are, because they are facing the direction of the enemy formation!!

Getting closer and closer, Guo Liang roared violently:

"Lao Gao, fight!!"

After shouting, the cannon that had been prepared for a long time had already been ignited and fired, and the cannonballs flew out, and there were two unlucky ones in the cavalry team at once, the horse's legs were broken, and the people were directly lifted off their mounts, for the cavalry team of thousands of people, the damage of this cannon was equal to nothing.

But this cannon was a signal, and the fifteen guns before the firecrackers were fired together.

Volleys, shotguns, within range......