Although there are many disciples of Huangshi, only Xu Ping is the only one who can be called an outstanding person, and it is difficult to discuss the merits of the two...... Today's Chinese world, I don't know Xu Ping's sparse - "Ming Ji Character Evaluation"

Three hundred years ago......

In front of him is the Jiangpu Fortress, Zheng Chenggong stood on the bow of the ship and observed this fortress with a telescope, as if a stone sculpture did not move, he had been in this state for a long time, and he could not give the order to advance. The Commander's hesitation had clearly infected his staff, and some of them had lost their breath and were about to speak, but they were stopped by their more sophisticated colleagues before they could speak.

On the way from Changzhou Mansion to here, the Ming army naval division did not encounter too stubborn resistance, and none of the ships were seriously damaged, but Zheng Chenggong did not feel much relaxed because of this, and there were imprudent staff officers who worried that this was the cunning of the Shun army. After all, this is not a vast open sea, and if a ship is damaged and cannot move on, they will have to retreat along the way they came.

It is not wise to shoot at a gun with a ship, even on the sea. The Jiangpu fortress was the core of Nanjing's river defense, and it began to operate after Xu Ping crossed the Yangtze River a few years ago, and the entire fortress was newly built, and intelligence said that the fort replaced the masonry structure with a civil structure and poured rice soup to reinforce it, Zheng Chenggong knew that this meant that the fort would not produce a large number of flying masonry fragments when it was shelled - which could kill and injure the fort defenders in large numbers. Without this threat, the Shun defenders hiding in the fort became very safe, unless they directly hit the cannon hidden deep in the fort, it would be difficult for the Ming naval division to disable the opponent's fire point.

And directly hit the opponent's running position, this Zheng Chenggong did not report any expectations at all, the ship had to keep sailing on the river to reduce the opponent's hit rate, and even if it dropped anchor and stopped, it was still impossible for the battleship to move at all, so it was impossible to carry out a calibrated shot with sufficient accuracy.

"Let's shell it out for a while." Zheng Chenggong and his staff could not observe every hidden gun emplacement, and it is conceivable that many of them would be camouflaged false gun emplacements, and some of them would be disguised as harmless - in the face of the enemy's unchanging firepower superiority from beginning to end, the veterans of the Shun army had accumulated a lot of experience in how to survive and fight under the artillery battle.

With the transmission of the order, the Ming artillery in the front line launched a salvo at the Jiangpu fortress regardless of the firing range, and suddenly smoke and dust billowed around the Jiangfang fortress. But the position of the Shun army was still unresponsive, and the entire Jiangfang fortress seemed to be empty, and not a single cannon fired back.

"It's not good." Zheng Chenggong's worries became more and more intense, the local fort was already within the firing range of the 24-pounder guns of the Ming army's naval division, and the intelligence was conclusive that the Jiangpu fortress must have placed the enemy's painstakingly forged 66-pounder and 54-pounder cannons, which must have included the Ming fleet in the firing range. Because the Ming army had already invaded Anqing and Changzhou, and many of the Jiangfang artillery had been transferred to Yingtianfu by the Shun army during the security period, Zheng Chenggong suspected that most of them had been moved to Jiangbei - after all, Jiangbei was safer than Jiangnan, and Jiangpu Fortress was their preferred location for deployment no matter how you look at it.

Therefore, Zheng Chenggong had only one explanation, the Shun army stationed at the fort was commanded by some experienced veteran officers, who avoided exposing their gun positions and firepower too early, and waited for the Ming army to get closer and collide with their guns.

After an hour of shelling, he still didn't see any Shun artillery return fire, and Zheng Chenggong knew that although his side was fighting lively, the damage to the Shun army in the fortress was still minimal.

Since the enemy is counting on himself to hit their guns, the best countermeasure is not to collide, Zheng Chenggong has the instructions of the Northern Expeditionary Army stuffed on his chest: lead the team to quickly pass through Yingtianfu, go upstream to Jiangxi to repair the ship, and then gallop to the aid of the friendly army in Huguang.

A staff officer suggested that the marines should be allowed to land and conduct fire reconnaissance on the Jiangpu fortress, but this suggestion was rejected by Zheng Chenggong without hesitation, and the Jiangpu fortress area in front of him was at least a thousand meters away from the first gun position to the last one, and was protected by fortresses and trenches. This is not something that the marines can easily take, if they are shelled by shotguns, the Ming naval division does not dare to provide close fire support because they are afraid of the power of the river defense artillery; If you really want close fire support, it is safer to rush directly over, not to mention that this is the military stronghold of the Shun army, and I don't know if there are a large number of field troops of the Shun army in ambush nearby, just waiting for the landing team to come ashore - the armored battalion stationed in Nanjing is now under the personal command of Li Laiheng, and Zheng Chenggong knows that this group of guys who followed Xu Ping from Henan are the same as Li Dingguo: everyone is a master of disguise.

"You don't have to save ammunition, we can fill it up when we get to Jiangxi anyway." Zheng Chenggong ordered all the gunners to be on the starboard side, he estimated that the fire from Jiangbei would be much more fierce than the one from Jiangnan, and all the artillerymen should do their best to return fire, and keep firing back, even if they stir up smoke and dust, it is better than being beaten: "Go forward, don't stop shooting, God is on top!" ”

"God forbid." There were no atheists on the battlefield, officers and staff prayed, orders were given, carpenters were prepared in the cabins with timber as if they were facing a great enemy, the cables tied to the dinghy were confirmed one by one, and the sailors were on standby around them.

……

Li Laiheng, the grandson of the king of Dashun, was located in the Jiangpu fortress at the moment, and his headquarters was protected by a thick wall, and it was in vain that he had been taking precautions for several years to continue Xu Ping's river defense work and try his best to strengthen this important fortress.

Li Laiheng observed the movement on the river with great interest, the warships of the Ming army were full of sails, one after another went up the river, it seemed that the other party did not plan to put infantry landing, Li Laiheng transferred the armored battalion from Nanjing City to hide near the fortress, but today they are bound to be useless.

The first Ming warship roared and rushed to the front of the main fortress of Jiangpu Fortress, and it opened fire with all its firepower, constantly firing shells in the direction of Li Laiheng. With a sound of cannons, the two twelve-pounder guns of the Jiangpu fortress began to fire, and this exposed fire point immediately became the target of all the ships of the Ming army, and Li Laiheng saw that they were immediately surrounded by smoke and dust rising from the sky, sand and stones flew sideways, and shells rolled on the ground.

Before these two cannons were suppressed, eight more Shun artillery began to fire, followed by more Shun artillery fire, and soon the Shun artillery all fired at the Ming ship according to Li Laiheng's order, and only a few huge cannons that Li Laiheng regarded as treasures were still silent.

The Shun gunners did not shoot at the hull of the Ming battleship, but attacked the sails of the Ming ships with all their might, and the sails of the first Ming ships were torn out by the Shun guns, but they still stumbled and continued to rush forward.

"Chain-changing bullets."

A batch of elaborate anti-ship weapons were stuffed into the muzzles, and these chains flew along with other round shells towards the mast and sails of the Ming ship, and the second Ming ship was not as lucky as its companion in front of it, as if there was an invisible giant, reaching out and tearing the sail off its third mast. Then, to the cheers of Staff Officer Li Laiheng, its midmast was broken by a section, and more than half of the sail was torn off the crossbar by the chain.

"General Zheng, this is still what Ling Zun taught us." Looking at the handsome flag on the flagship of the Ming army in the distance, Li Laiheng laughed, Zheng Zhilong is equivalent to the chief instructor of the Shun army to deal with the water division, he taught the Shun army a lot of methods to deal with the water division, as well as the weaknesses of the Ming army's water division. Both Xu Ping and Li Laiheng attached great importance to Zheng Zhilong's opinions when they were deploying and setting up the river defense plan. As the ship's speed was slowed down, Li Laiheng ordered Shun's heavy river defense guns to fire at it, and the sixty-six-pounder guns were slow to load, and Li Laiheng wanted to increase their accuracy as much as possible.

As the heavy artillery opened fire, the Ming ship, which had lost most of its sail power, unloaded the dinghy it had prepared on deck, and dozens of sailors began to paddle wildly, and soon the cables were stretched straight, and the dinghys struggled to drag their mothership forward.

The heavy cannon stirred up a huge column of water on the side of the ship, and the captain knew at a glance that this was by no means the power of ordinary small cannons, and he hurriedly searched for the fire from the muzzle and the smoke and dust that was stirred up, and when the Shun army fired the second time, he found the target, and shouted at the side: "Interference shot!" ”

The herald immediately passed this order to the gun deck, and several staff officers jumped into the cabin, rushed to the gun window to indicate the target position to the gunner, and then the first heavy artillery shell of the Shun army hit the gunhole, and the ferocious shell hit the wall of the side ship, and after a slight delay, the barrier in front of him was pushed away, and the sparse and innumerable wood chips rushed into the cabin, and suddenly burst around the breach, and the sailors screamed and fell around, and their bodies were covered with wooden thorns formed by the fragments of the ship's wall.

Soon after, another shot hit, and the next hit near the waterline, and with a thud the river poured into the hull, blasting the nearby sailors on the lower deck along with their guns.

The carpenters who had been standing by on the lower deck had been up the river, and they had already pulled up the strong ropes in the bilge, and these carpenters struggled through the rushing water, and when they got close to the breach, they hooked themselves to the wall of the ship, and shoved the wood into the breach.

After a few failures, they finally succeeded in pushing a large piece of wood into the hole, and the men behind them stood up and held it up, and the river splashed their faces and did not let go, and the first one began to fix it with hammers and spikes...... When another dangerous breach appeared, the second group of carpenters hurried over, and when they arrived, the river had already passed the low breach, and the carpenter leader dived underwater to spy on it, and then surfaced to direct the whole team to plug the hole...... While the carpenters were gagged, a group of sailors formed a human chain at the staircase and scooped out the water from the bilge with buckets.

The wounded battleship continued to move forward, and gradually it began to roll over, and the lower artillery bay had to close the windows, and the upper guns turned to the water as the hull continued to tilt to the side, which made it lose its ability to defend itself and fight back. Soon the captain ordered all the windows to be closed, and all the sailors took part in scooping the water.

The captain standing on the deck felt a little lucky, if he was fighting a Spanish or Dutch battery, the other side would cause more threat and damage to the ship, and at this moment the enemy troops on the opposite side still did not seem to know how to deal with the battleship, they were still firing at the hull and did not pay attention to the attack on the superstructure.

"If at this time they attack the rudder or helmsman's position......" The captain glanced apprehensively at the back of the ship, his men were trying to keep the ship on course, although the opponent was not a European naval power, but the river was not comparable to the sea, the ship could only sail in a straight line in the middle of the river, and the threat of fire and obstacles from both sides of the river made it impossible for the ship to make efficient evasive maneuvers.

Li Laiheng had been watching intently at the onslaught of the Ming ship, its sails were twisted and twisted, but it still continued to move forward with the help of the dinghy, it was really a miracle, the ship had finally sunk to a full cabin height, the lowest gun doors were not underwater, and the bow could even be seen to be visibly pressed underwater, but it still slowly sailed past the Jiangpu fortress.

"Lucky for them." Li Laiheng said helplessly, and he turned his attention to another Ming ship that sailed into the main firepower area of the fortress: "Let's beat it." ”

In order to prevent a certain ship from suddenly getting out of control and circling in the center of the river, Zheng Chenggong had to keep a certain safe distance from each ship, and the artillery battle had lasted for an hour, and the fleet had just passed a small half, but what made him happy was that although several ships were all battered, the Shun army did not seem to know how to leave a wounded ship behind. Now that the situation was beginning to favor the Ming army, the river was already shrouded in thick gunsmoke, as if there was a thick layer of fog protecting the fleet, and the ships in front had stopped firing when they passed to avoid revealing their positions by the fire, and Zheng Chenggong's flagship was the same.

Through the choking smoke of gunpowder, Zheng Chenggong could still see the light from behind, the Shun army's shooting accuracy and threat were greatly reduced, and the biggest danger at the moment was very low visibility, although it was not as dangerous as at night, but the speed of the ship had to be further slowed down to avoid hitting the reef or his own friendly ships.

A ball of fire suddenly appeared in front, Zheng Chenggong knew that it must be the gunpowder on some unlucky ship that was blinded by the artillery fired indiscriminately by the Shun army, and suddenly all the cannon sounds turned to the periphery of the burning ship, Zheng Chenggong listened to the sound of the cannon, and secretly said "It's dangerous" in his heart, he judged that although the ship was on fire, it was about to get out of the most dangerous area.

Although they could not see the Gangpo Fortress, everyone on the flagship knew that they had reached the front of the enemy fortress, and the people on the ship held their breath and did not even dare to speak loudly, for fear that it would lead to their own targeting. However, Zheng Chenggong felt that he was still continuing to be lucky, and the Shun army obviously did not know how to identify the position by the sound of water in low visibility, and they were still blindly firing their cannons, which muffled the sound of the Ming ships in action......

Author's note: Yesterday's section seemed to have a lot of controversy, and after logging in today, I saw that there were several times more messages in the mailbox than usual, and I went around the book review area and found that the doubts of the readers who left the message were close. Just after the end of the previous chapter, the author will explain here:

The battle between the agrarian and industrial nations. In short, an industrial country is a country with a high proportion of industrial output, and an agricultural country is a country with a much lower industrial output value than agricultural output. Are industrial production capacity, population, and military strength an important factor in determining war? Yes, definitely. But are these things going to determine the outcome of a war? For example, if you have a steam engine, you will be able to extinguish it, and if you don't have a steam engine, the output of gunpowder will be several times that of your opponent, and the output of cannons and muskets will be more than ten times that of your opponent.

Is the manpower gap between Ming and Shun reached: 150 million to 200,000? Has the gap between the industrial processing capacity of Ming and Shun reached: artillery, firearms than bone arrows? Has the gap between the capacity of the marine manufacturing industry reached the point where tens of thousands of ocean-going vessels are more than canoes? There are also some other culture, science and technology, education popularization, etc., and the author will not list them one by one. Our own history tells us that countries with developed industry, commerce, and manufacturing can be conquered by primitive tribes; Even if a country's industrial and agricultural output is tens of thousands of times that of the enemy, a thousand times its population, and tens of thousands of times the size of its economy, it may continue to be defeated for decades until it is conquered - although this goes against everyone's perception that national strength determines victory or defeat, this possibility is real, it has happened, and it is happening all around us.

What stopped this from happening was Huangshi's national supervision system, but the current elite rule in Dashun has a history of thousands of years, and Huangshi's national supervision system has only been four years, which is like a little tiger that has just been born for a day and a big mouse in the prime of life. Basically, I can't move the tiger baby, and I don't think it's incredible to be bitten by a mouse in the prime of life.

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