When the soul of beauty is harmoniously integrated with the appearance of beauty, people will see that this is the most perfect beauty in the world. Pen "Fun" Pavilion www.biquge.info

- Plato (one of the greatest philosophers and thinkers of Western culture)

In the face of Oscar's solemnity, the generals also restrained the smiles on their faces, and began to frown and think about the advantages of Oscar's three Hannibal armies; It is undeniable that these three points are indeed the greatest advantages of Hannibal's army, and they are also the greatest disadvantages of the Augustan army, and these three factors cannot be ignored in order to win the war.

However, not everyone thinks that these three factors are difficult to solve, and Luquis already has a draft in his heart; In the past seven days, Luquis has entrusted the specific army training to the commanders under him, and he himself has been immersed in thinking about the relevant matters of this decisive battle.

Oscar and Mary can see the three points of the gap between the two armies, Luquis can naturally see it; Since Luquis could see this, his seven days in the barracks must have been prepared accordingly.

In fact, not only Luquis would have thought about these similar questions, but Quintus would have thought about them; This world is originally a world where the ass decides the head. Luquis and Quintus, as the military generals of the Augustus family after Oscar, and the two commanders of the Augustus family's army in this decisive battle, naturally have to think about these questions.

Perhaps, in the general strategic direction, the two may not be as comprehensive as Oscar and Mary think because of objective reasons such as limited intelligence; But in terms of specific combat tactics, even if the two are not as thoughtful as Mary, they can't be too far apart, and some basic tactical ideas are still there.

Therefore, after Oscar officially raised these three differences, according to the order of speeches at the normal military meeting in the past, Luquis stood up first as always and replied to Oscar:

"My opinion, leader, is that although Hannibal's army has these three advantages, it is not unoffset; As long as we take reasonable measures, these three advantages of Hannibal's army may not be able to play a big role!

First of all, there is the numerical superiority of Hannibal's army; This advantage of Hannibal's army really doesn't mean much to us. Although Hannibal's army numbered 55,000, the Greek motley army and the Carthaginian militia alone accounted for more than 10,000; Coupled with the fifteen thousand mercenaries who fled from Betica, the actual combat effectiveness of Hannibal's army was not strong.

To put it bluntly, the real core of Hannibal's army was the 24,000 infantry he brought back from Carthage; Even among the 24,000 infantry, only 14,000 elites were able to engage in bloody battles with our army, and the remaining 10,000 newly recruited infantry were certainly well armed and equipped, but they had no combat experience, so there was no need to worry at all.

More importantly, our strategy to North Africa has achieved unprecedented success, and the confrontation between Prince Adheba, who successfully annexed the province of Numidia, and the native army of the Kingdom of Carthage has contained all the native armies of the Kingdom of Carthage; Hannibal's army would not have gotten the Carthaginian reinforcements he wanted!

In this way, our army will form an absolute superiority over Hannibal's army in terms of quality; Even if it's a quantitative disadvantage, it's enough to make up for our qualitative advantage. Therefore, in terms of the hard power of the army, we still occupy an advantageous position.

secondly, there is the problem of the war elephants of Hannibal's army; This is a problem that we cannot fundamentally solve. A powerful assault group of eighty war elephants could not be eliminated in a moment; Not all armies can have the luck of General Vermina of the Kingdom of Carthage, Hannibal is not Tuguta and Jugudah, and his army of war elephants is not so easy to destroy.

Of course, that doesn't mean we're powerless about it; My personal thought is that we can reduce the impact of Hannibal's army on our army by changing the standard battle formation of our own army. Moreover, we can also use the absolute superiority of our own army in equipment to offset our absolute disadvantage in war elephants.

Our ballista units can deliver salvo strikes at the elephants of Hannibal's army at close range; Even with the strength of war elephants, it is impossible for them to ignore the fire of ballistas within two hundred meters! As long as we can successfully use the ballista unit to wipe out most of Hannibal's eighty war elephants, then our ballista force will be considered to be at its best use.

You know, it's not a big deal that our ballistae are destroyed, and we can still produce more ballistas in the future; However, Hannibal's army of war elephants was not so easy to assemble. I believe that after the elimination of Hannibal's 80 war elephants this time, it will be impossible for the entire North African continent to have a war elephant force of this size for a long time!

Finally, there is the question of the four thousand elite shield cavalry under Hannibal; I don't think the 4,000 shield cavalry will be the key factor in determining the victory or defeat of the enemy or the enemy. After all, there is already an essential difference between the army that we participated in the decisive battle this time and the army that fought in the last decisive battle in Sicily.

In the last decisive battle, the Roman army of our seven legions combined had less than 10,000 hoplites, and they were all old-fashioned Roman legion hoplites, and their weapons and equipment were not advanced; This time it's different, just the Second Legion and the Seventh Legion, we have a full 12,000 hoplites, and they are all legion hoplites with upgraded weapons and equipment, so the strength is naturally not quite the same!

I firmly believe that there are 12,000 hoplites armed to the teeth, plus the 3,000 Guards Infantry Corps and the 3,000 hoplites who are exceptionally strong in combat; This battle formation of 15,000 hoplites can definitely suppress the role that the 4,000 shield cavalry of Hannibal's army can play to the extreme!

What's more, we also have a strong enough cavalry force this time; In addition to the 2,000 hidden ironclad cavalry, we have 5,000 javelin cavalry and 1,000 shield cavalry. Together with the cavalry brigades and heavy cavalry hundreds, which are subordinate to the three legions, we can also gather a cavalry force of about six hundred; That is, our motorized cavalry also has six thousand six hundred!

Although our cavalry is not as elite as Hannibal's cavalry, it is the most powerful cavalry force in the history of our Roman Republic; At the very least, more than ten times stronger than the poor cavalry in the last decisive battle!

Such a cavalry force could not help us to form an advantage over Hannibal's cavalry, but it was enough to limit the role of Hannibal's cavalry and help us stabilize the situation on the frontal battlefield; Once we eliminate the threat of Hannibal's war elephant forces and isolate Hannibal's cavalry from the frontal battlefield, we will truly win the battle! ”

Luquis's targeted suggestion made the generals in the military tent listen to it fascinated, and Oscar himself and Mary also smiled at each other and nodded frequently; In fact, the suggestions that Lucis came up with were the main targets that Oscar and Mary discussed. Luquis was able to come up with so much on his own, which is a testament to his own ability!

However, Luquis was not the only one who could come up with these things, Quintus also came up with them; And, in some ways, Quintus thinks more concretely. So, as soon as Luquis had finished speaking, Quintus stood up and added:

"Leader, what General Lucis said just now is basically my thoughts; However, on the basis of General Luquis, I still have some opinions of my own. I believe that in the transformation of the decisive battle formation, we should try a new battle formation that has never been used before.

My idea is that in order to deal with Hannibal's war elephants, we can change the traditional Roman formation practice a little. We could serve as the center with hoplites, with two thousand combat cavalry as the left flank, the Guards Infantry Corps as the right flank, and the mobile Numidian javelin cavalry on the outside of the right flank.

In the past, hoplites were routinely divided into three platoons; The first platoon is the daredevils who resist the onslaught of the enemy, the second platoon is the main force of the battle, and the third platoon, a little further from the first two platoons, are the reserves. Usually there is a gap between the brigades in each row, about the width of a hundred-man team, and the brigades in the rear columns are staggered against this space.

But this time we were able to align the three columns in front and back completely, and slightly widen the gap between the hundreds, so that dozens of passages were opened in the entire battle formation. Light armoured soldiers who are usually in front of the hoplites, this time we can also spread them all out in the aisle of the first row.

The purpose of this is to open the passage at any time when the war elephant is impacted, so that the war elephant can pass through it, so as to reduce the impact of the war elephant against the team. In this way, we can minimize the threat of war elephants; Once Hannibal's war elephants enter our passage, we can quickly encircle them all at all costs!

Of course, our equipment troops cannot be wasted; Therefore, I suggest that some ballistas be placed in the first row of passages, so that when Hannibal's elephant troops attack, we can quickly use them to attack their elephant troops. However, I am not in favor of the deployment of the entire ballista force in the battle formation; This is not only a waste of ballistas, but also easy to cause accidental injuries.

I felt that we could concentrate a third of our ballista in the first passage to deal with Hannibal's war elephant troops; The rest of the ballistae were used together with the catapults against Hannibal's infantry. In fact, there are very few opportunities for us to use equipment in a decisive battle; Once the two armies are officially hand-to-hand, the equipment can no longer be used, and it must be concentrated before it is more valuable. (To be continued.) )