"Chapter 588: Turning Defeat into Victory"
Human beings are essentially social animals, and those individuals who are born without sociality are either inferior to others or superhuman. Pen & Fun & Pavilion www.biquge.info society actually existed before the individual. Individuals who are unable to live in society, or who do not need to participate in social life because of self-satisfaction, are either beasts or gods.
- Aristotle (one of the great philosophers, scientists, and educators in the ancient history of the world)
The Spartan hoplites were indeed one of the most powerful infantry armies in the world, with no other infantry capable of defeating the Spartan hoplites in equal numbers than the elite Germanic berserkers of the Germanic barbarians and the elite hoplites of the Roman power.
Helplessly, the ironclad cavalry is not infantry at all, but the king of cavalry; Cavalry is a class of troops whose combat effectiveness is superior to infantry, and in the era of cold weapons, it is almost impossible to rely on the same number of infantry to defeat the same number of cavalry, even if the opponent's cavalry is only the worst light cavalry in the cavalry, it is not something that infantry can easily deal with.
The hoplites of the Roman powers were indeed extraordinary, and against the average light cavalry, the Roman hoplites could remain undefeated and possibly defeat the enemy even if they were about the same number as the enemy; However, the premise is that the other side is just a general light cavalry.
If you change to the super cavalry of the cavalry such as the ironclad cavalry, even if you use twice the Roman hoplites to fight the ironclad cavalry, you will not have any chance of winning; This is like Caesar of the House of Julius when he led his army to face the Gothic cavalry of the Germanic barbarians, and the Gothic cavalry was still more than a step inferior in combat effectiveness compared to the ironclad cavalry.
Therefore, it would be too wasteful for the Spartan hoplites to use super infantry like the Spartan hoplites against super cavalry like the ironclad cavalry; However, the commander of the coalition army, as the general of the Spartan city-state, trusted the Spartan heavy infantry of his city-state the most, and the only thing he could rely on at such a critical moment was the Spartan heavy infantry.
If the disorganized barracks did not have enough time to put the soldiers off guard, the Greek coalition would soon be crushed by the hoplites of the Brutus family in the melee; The allied commander-in-chief had to let the fearless Spartan heavy infantry buy time for the assembly of heavy pikemen in the rear.
As it turned out, the decision of the commander-in-chief of the coalition forces was extremely correct; Although the Spartan heavy infantry could not resist the charge of the ironclad cavalry, they used their own flesh and blood to block the ironclad cavalry at the front of the barracks and could not advance forward.
During this time, the 10,000 elite hoplites from the Spartan city-states were quickly organized; These heavily armed pikemen slowly advanced forward in a neat formation, knocking out the ironclad cavalry who had lost their mobility out of the barracks!
Before the ironclad cavalry could retreat, the more than six thousand Greek cavalry and javelin cavalry that followed them charged; Compared to the invincible ironclad cavalry, the Greek cavalry and javelin cavalry were extremely weak and weak.
The phalanx of 10,000 Greek hoplites stopped the charge of more than 6,000 cavalry, and more importantly, the losses of the Brutus cavalry were even greater than the losses of the Greek hoplites; Unlike the ironclad cavalry, which had been forced to withdraw from the battle, these Greek cavalry and javelin cavalry were simply routed and scattered.
The failure of the ironclad cavalry's attack did not make Tiberius, who was watching the battle from behind, show a look of disappointment; After all, these ironclad cavalry had successfully defeated the opponent's most elite Spartan heavy infantry, and the 5,000 Spartan heavy infantry, the most combat-effective in the Greek coalition, paid at least 3,000 casualties under the fierce attack of the ironclad cavalry.
However, the 3,500 ironclad cavalry of the Brutus family withdrew from the battle at the cost of less than a thousand ironclad cavalry casualties, in any case, such a damage ratio was the Brutus family's advantage, and Tiberius naturally would not mind the forced retreat of the ironclad cavalry.
As for the defeated Greek cavalry and javelin cavalry, Tiberius was really disappointed; More than 6,000 cavalry were defeated by the opponent's infantry of less than 10,000 people, even if the opponent was the most suitable heavy pikemen to deal with cavalry, Tiberius could not accept such a reality, these Greek cavalry and javelin cavalry combat effectiveness is really poor!
If it weren't for the lack of cavalry strength of the Brutus, Tiberius would not have used these Greek cavalry and javelin cavalry as the main force of the Brutus cavalry legion; However, after the lessons of this battle, Tiberius had already made up his mind that he would not continue to use Greek cavalry and javelin cavalry in the future, these cavalry were simply scum on the battlefield!
The Fifth Legion led by Otis and the Sixth Legion led by Amos, whose task was to begin the attack on the Greek coalition as soon as the cavalry legion's attack was over; Even if the cavalry corps in front was defeated by the enemy, Otis and Amos still led their troops into battle after the collapse of the cavalry in front.
The hoplites of the Brutus family are the absolute main force of the army, and they are also the mainstay of the Brutus family's outward expansion; With the hoplites of these two legions in battle, the hoplites of the allied Greek army were once again pinned down.
At this time, the other hoplites and Rhodesian slingers in the Greek camp were also reorganized and joined the battle when the hoplites in front of them fought a bloody battle with the enemy hoplites; The two legions of the Brutus family had only 20,000 troops, while the Greek coalition fought with more than 40,000 men.
In order to redeem the defeat of the cavalry legion in front of Tiberius, Harold personally led the retreating ironclad cavalry to attack the hoplite pikemen of the Greek coalition army from the flank again after the two legions in front of him fell into a bitter battle!
This time, Harold's ironclad cavalry did not so simply rush into the infantry of the Greek coalition and rampage; Just after these ironclad cavalry rushed to the battlefield, tens of thousands of Greek cavalry of the Greek coalition army were overwhelmed, and Harold had to meet these cavalry first.
The strong combat effectiveness of the ironclad cavalry is indeed not boasted, and the ironclad cavalry of about 2,500 was so stubbornly withstood the attack of 10,000 Greek cavalry, and invinciblely chiseled through these 10,000 Greek cavalry; In this round of fighting, Harold's ironclad cavalry only paid the price of more than 300 killed, while the Greek cavalry of the Greek coalition lost a quarter of its cavalry.
After successfully completing this feat of gouging, Harold did not give up the attack on these Greek cavalry, but led the ironclad cavalry to turn around and start a new round of charge against the enemy ironclad cavalry again.
While the ironclad cavalry of the Brutus family was ravaging the Greek cavalry of the Greek coalition, the fifth legion of Osis and the sixth legion of Amos were slowly surrounded by the Greek coalition from three directions; The two legions of the Brutus family, apart from the retreat behind them, were surrounded by Greek coalition forces in front and on the left and right flanks, and on three sides were densely packed with Greek hoplites.
At the same time, the Rhodesian slingers of the allied Greek army were constantly throwing stones at the hoplites of the Brutus family behind the hoplites; Although the hoplites were well-armed and equipped to ensure that they would not lose a lot of money under such fire, there were always some unlucky ones who died under the slings of the opposing side, which undoubtedly lowered the morale of the other hoplites.
Judging from the current situation, the army of the Brutus family is almost a foregone conclusion; Even if Harold's ironclad cavalry could defeat the enemy's Greek cavalry with fewer victories, it would not be something that could be accomplished in a short period of time, but the battle range of the Fifth and Sixth Legions of the Brutus family was getting smaller and smaller, and they would soon be completely annihilated by the phalanx of the Greek coalition pikemen!
Tiberius saw the inferiority of the Brutus army, and understood that it was almost impossible to save himself with the strength of his own mid-lane army alone; However, he had no intention of retreating, because he believed that the left flank of Ganeus and the right flank of Nero would be able to defeat the two flanks of the Greek coalition and arrive in time for reinforcements.
War is a big gamble, compared with those gambling that wins and loses money, what is won or lost on the battlefield is the life and death of a country and a nation; For Tiberius, the Brutus family could afford to lose the war, but the Greek city-states couldn't, which is why Tiberius dared to hold on to the gamble.
If the coalition of the Greek city-states loses the war, then they lose the independence and future of the entire Greek nation; If the Brutus family loses the war, it will only be a few years to delay the war to unify the Greek peninsula again.
The situation on the battlefield was becoming more and more unfavorable to the Brutus, the battle area of the Fifth and Sixth Legions had been reduced to less than half of the original size, and Harold's ironclad cavalry was the Greek cavalry that had not yet routed the enemy; There will be an hour or two of fighting at most, and then the Brutus family's mid lane army will be completely wiped out here, because they are already surrounded on all sides!
Just when the commander of the Greek coalition encouraged his soldiers to destroy the enemy in the encirclement in one go, the banners of the Brutus family army appeared on the left and right flanks of the battlefield at the same time; Soon, a dense crowd of Brutus soldiers emerged from the left and right flanks and quickly joined the battle.
The army of the Brutus family, which was originally surrounded by the Greek coalition army, became the core army of the Brutus family to attack the Greek coalition army on both sides; However, the Greek coalition army quickly shrank its forces after being surrounded on both sides, and gave up the attack on the Brutus family, and in just ten minutes, the Brutus family was completely defeated and won! (To be continued.) )