After receiving the materials delivered by Zhang Xinda, Li Yongji immediately sent them down, so that all the vehicles were filled with fuel, the guns and cannons were full of ammunition, and each of them also carried three days' worth of fast food and drink, which can be said to have done his job completely.

Seeing that the preparations were completed, Li Yongji left Bai Yunfei's first regiment, cooperated with Charles's two infantry brigades, and began to launch a tentative attack on the position of the Ohio Russian regiment.

During the entire offensive, in order to bluff, the attacking troops threw in a division of more than 6,200 men as soon as they came up, almost half of Charles's troops, because the troops that followed Li Yongji this time were only two divisions, and one division remained in Cairo City.

The whole division lined up in a wide straggler line, lined up in two neat formations, and under the accompaniment of the military band, they slowly advanced, blowing and beating, and the scene looked quite spectacular.

However, when the Federation troops in the trenches were waiting in fear to engage the opponent in a short fight, or to fire a platoon of guns, they found that the enemy on the opposite side only advanced beyond the range of their own guns, that is, suddenly stopped at a distance of 400 meters.

Then, they fired a volley of guns from 400 meters away, and then, after the artillery of the Federation Army began to roar, they were under long-range artillery fire and quietly retreated in a neat formation.

Before the Federation Army could catch its breath because of the retreat of the other side, they found that a continuous muffled sound suddenly sounded on the position of the Union Army on the opposite side.

While the recruits were still surprised, the experienced veterans soon asked them to lie down in the trenches, and told them that it was the artillery of the opposing army that had fired, and that the number of guns was definitely more than a hundred, and they were all large-caliber guns.

The Union veterans were right, it was indeed the Union artillery that fired. And the number of guns fired was indeed more than a hundred, two hundred guns to be exact.

However, the artillery fire fired was basically honest front-loading smoothbore infantry guns, and there was not a single modern artillery.

The Confederates began to stop sending infantry to attack, but only blindly bombarded the positions of the Federation Army with artillery, and at first, the Union artillery occasionally fired back, but when it was discovered, it would soon lead to retaliation from the other side, especially since this retaliation was mostly the terrible flowering explosive bombs. After inflicting heavy losses on their artillery, they never fired back, and ordered everyone to lie down in the trenches and die silently, neither firing back nor allowing the infantry to take the initiative.

In this way, the Union army no longer sent infantry to attack, but kept firing artillery from a distance, morning after afternoon, until the sun was about to set. Only then did they put an end to this seemingly eternal shelling, and began to collect their troops back to their camp, and their camp was only four kilometers from the first line of the Federal Army!

During the offensive throughout the day. The artillery attacks of the Union military have not stopped, but if you look carefully, you can find that most of the artillery fired by the Union Army is the Hua 1 modification artillery, that is, the imitation of the 117 mm caliber M1857 12-pounder front-loading smoothbore gun. That is, the so-called Napoleonic cannon, the shells are basically solid shells, and there are few flowering/exploding/exploding/bombing.

This batch of imitation Napoleonic artillery. In fact, most of them are immature products in the early stage of Zhang Xinda, that is, the batch with extra high and low machines.

Because of the workmanship and design problems, such as the addition of high and low machines, it is still not different from the real Napoleon gun, so it was later called the Hua 1 modified artillery.

This kind of artillery is not much more powerful after modification, but the cost is much more expensive than the general imitation Napoleon gun, so the later imitation Napoleon gun, that is, the export version of the Hua 1 artillery, is really an imitation Napoleon gun, that is, the M1857 12-pounder front-loading smoothbore gun, one of the total Qiē is cheap and simple, removing all the bits and pieces, including high and low machines.

At present, there are a total of 200 artillery pieces with high and low aircraft, which are basically the remaining stocks of Zhang Xinda's factory, so this time Li Yongji asked for them together, and then gave them all to Charles's two brigades.

The reason why this kind of artillery is come is because this kind of artillery is cheap, and the shells are even cheaper, they are just some solid shot put, and they are all feints anyway, so they simply use these artillery, as for why it is given to Charles's troops, it is entirely because the troops of the Dream Division have lost sight of this old goods.

Although the troops of the Dream Division do not look down on these bulky and backward things, Charles is different, his troops are only temporary troops of the Union Army, so they are poorly armed and equipped.

Most of the weapons of Charles's Sixth Army were honest front-loading smoothbore guns, as for artillery, they didn't have artillery at all in the past, and then they were equipped with eighteen guns after entering the Tennessee regiment sequence, and they were all old-fashioned front-loading smoothbore six-pounder guns.

Now that the Chinese gave them two hundred cannons at once, and said that the ammunition could be fired at will, it felt as refreshing as a poor boy becoming a millionaire overnight.

You must know that the main army of the alliance army may not be able to make up 200 guns, but now they can play 200 guns with one army, what is that arrogance?

On this point, Charles is quite satisfied, and deeply feels that following the Chinese is a lot of benefits, not only the usual food and drink treatment is much better than in the past, even the artillery can use so much, so good, if you find an opportunity to change the gun in your hand in the future, it will be better.

In short, during the whole day's feint, except for one division's infantry who pretended to advance and then quickly retreated under the bombardment of the opponent's artillery, the rest of the time was spent in the roar of their own artillery, and the artillery roar here was basically the roar of these two hundred Hua 1 modified 117 mm guns.

The two hundred guns fired almost non-stop, which gave the other side the illusion that their front of the Western Front was the main force of the Union Army, and the number was likely to be no less than one corps, and the other side was going to attack itself from the front.

Although the Allied forces stopped shelling when the sun went down and returned to the camp, the Federation troops on the opposite side did not dare to relax their vigilance at all, on the contrary, they looked at the large campfire on the opposite side, and they all expressed full worry.

"There are at least 60,000 people on the other side!" After observing the situation on the other side with a telescope, the commander of the Ohio Russian regiment, Scist. Enfield was unequivocal. "This is definitely the main force of the Union Army, maybe it's the newly expanded Tennessee Army! It seems that there is a bad battle to be fought next. ”

"The general is right." Schistost's adjutant nodded, "The opposite side should indeed be the main force of the Alliance Army, and it should be more than 60,000, I think it should be more, looking at the number of this camp, 100,000 people are possible, it is indeed a strong enemy." ”

"Hmph, even if it's 100,000 people." Skerst kept his eyes on the binoculars. continued to say indifferently, "We also have 60,000 people, and we have dug complete fortifications in advance, so many trenches, if they want to get in, they must lose half of them first!" Of course, the Southerners are heroic, but I don't think they have the courage to go on the offensive even if they lose half of them. There is nothing to say about defeat. ”

"I hope so!" Scester's adjutant nodded, "General, I'm not worried about anything else, just the Chinese." After all, during the daytime attack, it was obvious that there was a shadow of Chinese......"

"Wells!" Skerst lowered his binoculars and glanced at his lieutenant disapprovingly, "You're a little too pessimistic. What if there are Chinese? Well, let me think about it, you're trying to say. Do you want me to be careful of Chinese heavy artillery and ironclad cars? Don't worry, you see, we have a lot of trenches, and there are more wooden fences, even if they have ironclad cars, they will roll them over here! Maybe we'll be able to capture some of these ironclad cars. ”

"General......" Wells opened his mouth, but after looking at the other party's Yan Sù expression, he finally nodded, "Yes, the general is right." ”

"Well, that's good." Skester nodded, then continued to look through the binoculars, but said no more.

Obviously, Wells's concern just now, Scist is not unaware, in fact, Skerst is cautious, how can these things not be clear? It's just that now it's in a state of battle, and now it's not in private, but in the trenches, and there are so many people around to watch, if Skerst, the commander-in-chief, says that he is discouraged, then the people around him will definitely be more worried, and then there is no doubt that this worry will spread out, and then seriously affect the morale of his own army.

Therefore, even if he is equally worried about the future of war, Skerst, as a commander, must downplay it, only in this way can everyone be confident.

This is the difference between the commander and the adjutant, the adjutant can worry about all kinds of things, pour cold water on all kinds of things, but the commander can't, if the commander is sad all day long, then everyone else will be even more sad.

In fact, although Skerst ordered a large number of trench positions, due to their lack of numbers, the weapons were mainly front-loading smoothbore guns like Springfield, which were limited in power, and Yan Zòng lacked artillery, and the whole army only had seventy guns, so even if there were trench positions, once faced with the enemy's attack, it would be a fierce battle.

In the course of the previous war on the Eastern Front, although the trench proved to be a good fortification, if the other side was willing to pay a great sacrifice and attack with an iron heart, it still could not be stopped.

After all, they don't have machine guns, they don't have more and more artillery, they only rely on slow-firing front-loading smoothbore guns, and the number of people they can shoot is very limited, even if the trench can slow down the infantry attack, but once the number of people attacking is large enough, enough to exceed their own firepower density, and at the same time they are not afraid of casualties, then they still can't stop the other side.

Therefore, the function of the trench position is to delay the enemy's attack, and then in the process, use its own firepower to inflict a large number of casualties on the enemy, so that the enemy loses the courage and will to attack. However, if the opponent has more people than himself, has stronger firepower than himself, and is not afraid of such casualties at all, then it is himself who loses.

Therefore, the trench warfare of this era cannot be compared with the trench warfare of World War I and World War II, but is more of a kind of courage or psychological warfare, depending on who can not withstand this pressure of mutual consumption first, and who collapses first.

Of course, Skerst had 60,000 men and trench positions, so it would normally take at least three times as many people to break through his position.

In other words, it takes at least 180,000 people to break through his position, and although the Alliance Army on the opposite side has a lot of numbers, it will definitely not exceed 180,000, so he is still very confident that he will hold here.

It's a pity that Skerst overestimated, or miscalculated, the strength of the Union Army, in fact, not only him, but almost all the Federation Army, thought that the opposite side was the main force of the Union Army, and the strength must have exceeded 60,000.

The reason is very simple, there are so many campfires and camps opposite, you can probably count how many people on the opposite side, and these Americans would not have thought that most of the camps opposite are empty camps, and there is no one next to many campfires, which is completely a strategy used by the Chinese, which is specially used to bluff.

If the Americans have studied the Chinese art of war, they will know the term "increasing troops and reducing the number of troops", and the current tactic is a change in the tactic of increasing troops and reducing the number of troops, that is, increasing the number of empty battalions, which is also a kind of flexible application.

Not to mention, from a distance, there are so many bonfires and tents, no one will believe that most of them are empty, and during the day, the Union army has invested more than 6,000 people at once, and a full division of troops has begun to attack, which is quite grand at this time in terms of scale.

After the attack was frustrated, they decisively withdrew their troops, but they continued to fire artillery bombardment, and after fighting for such a long time, the Federation Army probably guessed how many artillery pieces the Alliance Army had, at least the number of artillery that fired was nearly two hundred.

In the infantry offensive of this era, usually the first contact, especially when the enemy situation is unknown, the two sides will not immediately engage in the main attack, and most of them will send about one-tenth of the troops to a tentative attack, or a reconnaissance attack.

Then, if more than 6,000 people attacked at a time, and then dispatched more than 200 artillery pieces to attack non-stop, then everyone would think that the coalition army on the opposite side had at least 60,000 men.

As for the fact that the first wave of the Confederate attack was a little too weak, or too careful, the Federation Army did not doubt it too much, after all, it was the first offensive, and in the daytime offensive, the Confederates clearly had more artillery and more shells.

Since they have more heavy firepower and more shells, it seems that it is not surprising that they will first use artillery fire to open the way, bombard their own positions, and consume their own living forces, while recuperating their energy and waiting for a fatal blow.

This is the case with group attacks in this era, the infantry is tentative, if they have stronger artillery, then speak with artillery first, wait for the shells to hit almost the same, and then let the infantry attack under the cover of artillery, this set of tactics has been used since the Napoleonic era, and it has basically not changed until now.

Because of this, how many artillery pieces you usually have, you can basically infer how many people you have, so after the federal army found that the coalition army on the opposite side actually had more than 200 artillery pieces, they calculated that they had at least 60,000 people according to their own speculation.

Obviously, this was a ploy of the Alliance Army and the Chinese Expeditionary Force, whether it was the initial divisional infantry attack, or the subsequent non-stop artillery bombardment, or the increase of empty camps and bonfires at night, it was a kind of bluff on their part.

All this qiē, or this painstaking bluff, was to attract the attention of the Union Army, and to convince the Union Army that his immediate enemy was the main force of the Union Army, and that the Union Army was going to attack on the Western Front with iron heart, to break through their defenses from the front.

In other words, the ultimate goal of the coalition army's actions was to cover Li Yongji's real killer force, that is, the roundabout corps composed of two motorized regiments!

Thankfully, this strategy seems to have succeeded, at least judging from the movement of the Federation Army, they did strengthen the forces of the Western Front, which added more weight to the success of Li Yongji's roundabout offensive operation. (To be continued......) R1292