The 1st Armored Division of the Praetorian Guard is the main armored division of the 1st Army of the Ming Empire, with 340 tanks under its jurisdiction, which are basically the newly replaced main No. 2 tanks. Pen, fun, pavilion www. biquge。 infoThe new tank has thicker armor, larger gun caliber, more reliable power system and suspension, and is more than twice as effective as the old tank.

Because of the preference and care of Emperor Zhu Mu, the equipment of the 1st Armored Division of the Praetorian Guard Army was even more luxurious than that of other main armored divisions of the Ming Army, and it was preferentially equipped with the new No. 2 self-propelled gun, and the Tieniu armored car was also equipped with mechanized equipment such as motorcycles and cars, which became a model for the armored forces of the whole army.

A tank platoon of the Ming army has five tanks, one company has three platoons, and one battalion has three companies, with a total of 45 tanks, more than a dozen Tieniu armored vehicles and dozens of trucks, and has independent combat capability. These three battalions in turn formed a tank regiment, which, including the tank units directly under the regimental headquarters, numbered more than 150 tanks.

Coupled with the tanks of the 3rd Armored Infantry Regiment under its jurisdiction, an armored division of the Ming Army should be equipped with about 360 tanks. One can imagine how powerful and terrifying the combat capability of such a large armored force is, and in terms of numbers alone, it is already equal to about half of the entire armored force of Japan.

It is a pity that because the Ming Empire frequently expands its armored forces, there is no real full armored division in the entire army. The closest to the full strength is the 1st Armored Division of the Praetorian Guard, which is beloved by His Majesty the Emperor.

For the rest of the Ming army's armored forces, the number of tanks in general was suppressed between 270 and 290, and the general size was around 270. Most of the armored forces, including some of the armored divisions of the 3rd Army in Guo Xing's hands, had only about 260 tanks.

What is even worse is not only that the number of tanks is smaller, but the quality of equipment is also difficult to guarantee -- some units are a mixture of Tank No. 1 and Tank No. 2, and even worse, Tank No. 1 and Improved No. 1 are mixed. The smallest armored division had only 17 tanks and was not at all capable of real combat capability.

These armored divisions, which only have a few dozen tanks, or a hundred and ten tanks, are actually trainers, at best they are a shelf, and no one will be stupid enough to really take them into the battlefield as troops. However, at least in terms of statistics within the military department, they are armored division numbers.

Because of the existence of these armored divisions, the number of armored divisions of the Ming Empire once reached an astonishing 40, and if all these armored divisions were full, then the number of tanks owned by the Ming Empire would reach a terrifying number: fifteen thousand.

You know, to maintain the scale of 15,000 tanks in the front-line armored forces, it is necessary for the factory to maintain the production of at least 30,000 tanks, and to ensure that the supply of spare parts and other equipment is maintained at a fairly large scale. This is not a question of producing more than 10,000 tanks equipped with troops, but of increasing production exponentially as the equipment of the troops increases.

For example, in World War II, Germany produced more than 8,000 tanks in 43 years, but in July 43, the total number of tanks on the Eastern Front was still hovering around 3,000, and there was no large-scale increase. From this huge quantitative comparison, it is not difficult to see how difficult it is to maintain a total number of tens of thousands of tanks on the front line.

Another very concrete example makes it more obvious how much of the consumption of tank armored vehicles in combat and use. Take the Soviet Union, another tank power in World War II, for example, which produced a total of 120,000 tanks in the war, and the total number of Soviet front-line tanks at the time of Germany's defeat was only about 10,000.

These figures may not be very accurate and may vary widely, but they also reflect the enormous consumption of weapons and equipment between production and use. The gears are to be worn out, the engines are to be scrapped, and the more advanced the weapon, the greater and more complex the logistical support pressure.

It's still the same old saying: the paradigm shift of war only transfers the pressure of firepower delivery from the front-line troops to the process of logistics supply and production, and the seemingly strengthened strike capability is nothing more than tying together the costs of production capacity, transportation capacity, scientific research, etc., and smashing them at the enemy.

At present, the 1st Armored Division of the Praetorian Guard, which has attacked the outskirts of Guicheng on the Korean Peninsula, is equipped with more than 300 No. 2 tanks, which is already a very large armored force. And the armored battalion in Fan Ming's hand had already used his equipment advantage at this moment to cut into a defensive line on the outer flank of the Japanese Turtle City.

Regardless of how the Japanese army, which was only armed with light weapons, struggled, the thick-skinned No. 2 tank was not affected in the slightest. After only 20 minutes of fighting, the Ming army almost killed more than 200 Japanese troops and routed two squadrons of Japanese infantry nearby.

The hastily dug trenches did not cause any trouble to Fan Ming's tank at all, and the machine guns hit the tank's armor and tracks, leaving no trace other than sparks. However, because the tanks of the Ming army were equipped with course machine guns in front, they could fire at the Japanese troops in front of them more flexibly, and there was almost no difference between fighting and slaughtering.

The Japanese troops in Turtle Castle counterattacked one after another, hoping to recapture the defensive positions on the outskirts of the town, but sacrificed a large number of reserves. In fact, the commander of the 5th Division, Shigeru Nakamura, is now thinking more about how to get out after holding on, rather than fighting to the end in Kamejo.

Therefore, the Japanese army watched a large number of Korean defense troops charge outward, trying to sacrifice these cannon fodder to buy enough time for themselves. On the other hand, the 5th Division is also concentrating on horses, carriages, automobiles and other means of transportation, trying to get out as soon as possible with these equipment after completing the defensive mission.

According to Nakamura's thinking, the main force of his 5th Division did not have to run fast - as long as it ran faster than the remaining Japanese city defense army and the Korean defense army, the Ming army was blocked by prisoners and cannon fodder, and it was unlikely that they would catch up with him and continue the pursuit.

His calculations were very shrewd, and he expected that the Ming army would covet the prisoners and stragglers along the way, delaying the time of the main force of the suicide 5th Division. According to common sense, it is actually easy to understand his thoughts, after all, it is much safer and simpler to catch the prisoners who have been messed up than to hunt down the 5th Division, which is still combat-effective.

Thinking of this, Shigeru Nakamura wasn't even worried about his situation, after all, the Ming army chased and killed him like this for a morning, and he also rested and rested. (To be continued.) )