On November 4th, the Beijing division near the beginning of winter was full of late autumn gloom, and the dead branches and fallen leaves and scraps of paper on the streets of the capital were scattered leisurely, and then they were trampled under the feet of the soldiers who hurried by.

The sound of rumbling artillery could be faintly heard in the overall hurried footsteps of the soldiers, and the sound of the explosion of shells fired by the Beiyang rebels outside the Beijing Division.

In the War Department, Wang Shizhen and Feng Guozhang sat opposite each other!

"Since Zhao Dongyun's third town launched an attack on my Tongzhou three days ago, the pressure on our western front is getting bigger and bigger, Brother Feng, do you see if you can transfer another battalion over, otherwise the pressure on Tongzhou is too great!" Wang Shizhen's face was gloomy, since Zhao Dongyun led the third town to Tongzhou in late October.

The combined forces of Wang Duan Zhao and the three finally launched a formal attack on the Beijing Division, and according to the previous telegram discussion of Wang Duan Zhao and the three of them, Wang Duan Zhao and the three of them were each responsible for a joint attack on the Beijing Division on a front.

Among them, the first town commanded by Wang Yingkai was responsible for breaking through from the southwest and attacking the area of Changxindian, while the fourth town commanded by Duan Qirui continued to attack north along the railway, and the main attack direction was the area of Nanyuan. As for Zhao Dongyun, because he came relatively late, and at the same time, he had a large number of cavalry in his army, so his third town was mainly responsible for attacking from Tongzhou, while the cavalry troops were roaming around the periphery, mainly to ensure the safety of the third town's own rear road, and at the same time, it also shouldered the heavy responsibility of guarding against foreign troops in the Tianjin concession area.

In the face of the attack of the allied forces of Wang Duan and Zhao, Feng Guozhang and Wang Shizhen fully learned from the experience of the Russo-Japanese War and dug trenches in an attempt to conduct a defensive operation.

However, this tactic has a greater effect on the southwest and southern fronts, but it has not had the desired effect on the Tongzhou front!

"I always thought that those small cannons were useless, but I didn't expect that these small cannons were actually used against our heavy machine guns, this Zhao Dongyun is really different from ordinary people!" Feng Guozhang also sighed, and at the same time, his heart was full of worries!

Mortar, this thing is actually no stranger in the Beiyang Army, as early as two years ago when Zhao Dongyun first started to equip this mortar in the third town, Yuan Shikai and Duan Qirui also noticed this mortar, but they found that although this mortar is light and fast enough, the firing range is too close, especially those sixty mm small guns, if you want to hit the enemy, it is estimated that you have to move to a distance of five or six hundred meters, this distance is the effective suppression range of heavy machine guns.

At the same time, the fast rate of fire also means that the ammunition consumption will be very high, which must be a guy who swallows money more than a heavy machine gun!

In addition, after the outbreak of the Russo-Japanese War in the past two years, and the fact that Zhao Dongyun's trench theory was taken seriously by the armies of various countries around the world, not only did the international attach unprecedented importance to heavy machine guns, but even the Beiyang Army also paid further attention to the tactical use of heavy machine guns. As for mortars, which have many obvious shortcomings in the eyes of many contemporary generals, the huge cost is completely disproportionate to the expected effect.

After all, not every warlord leader can make a fortune by doing business with Japan and Russia like Zhao Dongyun, and there are a large number of small coffers to purchase additional ordnance, and the annual military expenditure of other Beiyang towns is only so fixed, and there is no money to purchase heavy machine guns or other traditional artillery after purchasing mortars.

But what they don't know is that since Zhao Dongyun came up with that trench theory and brought the application tactics of heavy machine guns to this era in advance, he has been thinking about this question, that is, how to deal with trench warfare? Well, to be precise, how to deal with the trench defense system on the battlefield in the Far East.

On the battlefield in the Far East, whether it was the War of Japan, Russia and China, or the Civil War in the Beiyang, in fact, their trench system and artillery strength could not be compared with the Western Front of World War I in later generations, in other words, the artillery density on the Far Eastern battlefield was far inferior to that of the Western Front of World War I, in this case, the front will inevitably be much thinner, and heavy machine guns will become the main support point of the front.

In this way, if you want to break through the enemy's defense, then the most important thing is to end the enemy's heavy machine gun, once the enemy's heavy machine gun is eliminated, then the follow-up attack will be much easier!

In addition to the inherent long-range shelling and heavy machine gun suppression, as well as the rifleman's accurate long-range sniper machine gun shooters, the 60mm mortar shelling became a crucial part of the anti-heavy machine gun operations in the Third Town.

The 60-mm mortar is light in weight, quick in maneuvering, and of course rapid-fire is fast enough, although it is still slightly lacking in accuracy, but when fired at a distance of several hundred meters, it can effectively use rapid fire to end the enemy's unprotected machine-gun position.

In contemporary field warfare, whether it is the enemy or oneself, in fact, the heavy machine gun positions are unprotected, or there are only improvised civil fortifications. In contemporary times, except for fortresses such as Lushun, there are very few machine-gun fortresses made of cement, rock, etc.

Therefore, field anti-heavy machine gun operations with sixty-mm mortars is quite feasible.

It's just that this tactic has quite high requirements for mortar shooters, after all, to end the machine gun fire point, the shells must accurately fall into the enemy's heavy machine gun position, and the accuracy requirements are quite high.

However, the Third Town has been equipped with mortars for many years, and these mortar shooters are all veterans, as long as they are given a chance to fire, it doesn't take much, three rapid fire can take out an enemy heavy machine gun position, and no matter how bad it is, it will not force the enemy's heavy machine guns to move, thus reducing the pressure on their own infantry.

In this attack on Tongzhou, many of the infantry tactics used in the third town can be called a new type of tactic compared to several others, although on the surface everyone is digging trenches and using similar infantry tactics, but the extensive use of mortars still makes the third town's fighting style far different from other troops.

"It's not uncommon for this Zhao Dongyun to fight, we have expected this situation before, but although Tongzhou is a little nervous, it can still support it for the time being!" Feng Guozhang continued: "Now we don't have many reserves on hand, we still need to save them!" ”

Although Wang Shizhen was slightly dissatisfied when he heard this, he didn't speak, after all, he also knew that he only had two towns on his side to deal with the attack of the three towns of Wang Duan Zhao and the three people, and it was certain that there would be some difficulties, and now he hoped to use defensive tactics to cause a large number of casualties to the attacking Wang Duan and Zhao people, so as to force them to negotiate an armistice with him.

"The three of them are not all of the same heart!" Feng Guozhang continued: "It is impossible for any of them to accept too many casualties, so as long as we persist, this Wang Duan Zhao coalition army will not last long, and they will not be able to talk about it at that time!" ”

Feng Guozhang's words are still very insightful, although Wang Duan Zhao and the three of them have a military advantage, but these three people have their own small abacus, which looks like that, but in fact, everyone has not worked hard so far.

Outside Tongzhou, Zhao Dongyun stood up after listening to today's battle report and looked at the detailed map of the Beijing division on the wall, and at the same time, Chen Guangyuan on the side spoke: "Their fourth town obviously didn't contribute, and they haven't taken a Lihezhuang in three days. If they continue like this, if they take Nanyuan, they won't have to go next year! ”

Gu Lanyu, the new commander of the Sixth Association, also said: "That Wang Yingkai is not a good bird, he is grinding, if I had taken the first town to attack, I would have taken down Changxindian, why would I still be outside now!" ”

Fang Biyong, who had a plate, muttered in his heart: Everyone is half a catty, saying that others have not contributed, don't we also have no real skills, some time ago the battle also sent a total of two standards to fight in rotation, and there was not a single charge operation, if our third town showed real skills, it is estimated that Tongzhou would have been taken down long ago.

Therefore, Wang Duan and Zhao are in the army, and no one can say who is not, all of them have Xiao Jiujiu and are unwilling to contribute.

But these words must not be spoken!

Zhao Dongyun said at this time: "The other two sides naturally have the first town and the fourth town to solve, we don't have to worry about how they fight, if we are on our side, although the early fight is relatively smooth, but the effect is still not obvious!" ”

"The officers on the front line are still too conservative, we must be broad-minded, we can't always hold on to the old ways in the Franco-Prussian War, Japan and Russia have already given us new tactics, and now what we have to do is to learn a lesson and further improve the new offensive tactics! If the heavy machine guns on this front line are not playing well, then you have to let the people below learn more, how to use 60mm mortars to achieve better results, and how to use 80mm mortars to achieve the effect of mass-suppressing the enemy, all of which must be discussed and tested one by one! ”

Zhao Dongyun said after speaking: "In addition, the one hundred Madsen light machine guns we ordered in the first half of the year have also arrived, and it is time to form a light machine gun unit." ”

At this time, Fang Biyong spoke: "I have been in contact with this light machine gun before, although the firepower is a little worse, but it is better than the light weight, I think it should be able to act as an infantry accompanying firepower!" However, now the number is too small, I am afraid that it is not easy to divide, and our army has not been equipped with light machine guns before, how to use this is a problem, is it directly attached to the infantry shed as I said before, or is it stored and attached to the infantry company? ”

As he spoke, Fang Biyong looked at Zhao Dongyun again: "Commander, what do you say should be done with the establishment of this light machine gun?" ”