Next is the last part of the Yongle two-year arms technology visit, that is, the field investigation of the fortress.

This kind of thing, to be honest, as long as the firearms can keep up, it is a real artifact of abuse.

Especially in overseas colonies, if you get a fortress and a supporting artillery group, hundreds or thousands of people can hold on to the stronghold for months or even a year, calmly waiting for the support of the fleet.

However, compared with the traditional high-walled cities, the fortress tests the technical and tactical level and psychological quality of the defenders.

There are many examples of warfare in ancient and modern China and foreign countries to testify, how big is the bonus of the high city wall to the defender's psychological advantage, the city wall is enough for the defender's people, in many cases to play the same combat effectiveness as the attacking party's pawn, but if this situation is put on a relatively low fortress, untrained people watch the enemy climb up the gentle slope, I am afraid that there will soon be a situation of "two wars, almost want to go first".

But on the contrary, if the fortress is stationed in a well-trained firearms unit, with a standard configuration of guns and artillery, then the fortress is almost impossible to attack when defending against the attacker, and even the most efficient killing machine, which is why in the Age of Discovery, Western colonists can easily rely on coastal strongholds to rule a vast area, the impregnable fortress is the secret, in all the recorded historical materials, the record of the fortress being conquered, can be described as one in ten thousand.

This has to mention the gold content of Zheng Chenggong, although it is not easy to gnaw, but Zheng Chenggong faces the city of Gelansha is a standard fortress group structure, with a circumference of two hundred zhang, three zhang high, the outer city is composed of three fortresses, the inner city is composed of four fortresses, a total of eighty cannons, this Renaissance star-shaped fortress, before the Vauban siege method (parallel trench advancement, that is, the civil operation siege method) was promoted, it can only be consumed by time, reliable Half Moon Fort to cover the artillery group, Zheng Chenggong still broke through the outer city of the fortress, and threatened to blow up the inner city with gunpowder, forcing the Dutch to surrender.

Looking at the earth-and-stone fortress in front of them, the princes seemed to see a little wayway, but they didn't seem to see anything.

The fortress, also known as the "Star Castle", was invented by the Italians in the late Renaissance in Jiang Xinghuo's previous life, mainly to change the traditional square city wall into a concave polygon, and change the round city tower into a prismatic fortress, eliminating the fire dead angle of the castle, so that no matter from which place to attack the city, it will be covered by the cross fire of more than two fire points. The improved version of the fortress was made by the Dutch, during the Eighty Years War of Independence of the Dutch from Spain, after actual combat testing, the Dutch chose to reduce the height of the fortress, thicken the wall, and then build the angle between the outer wall of the fortress and the ground into an obtuse angle, so that not only to prevent artillery, but also to fight against gunpowder bombing the city.

And Jiang Xinghuo Demon changed out of the fortress, considering that there was no artillery in this era, so he did not choose to greatly reduce the height of the wall and thicken the thickness of the wall, because this kind of low and particularly thick wall is mainly used to fight against direct artillery aiming, now even if it is the Timurid Empire, there is no direct artillery, so it is appropriate to thicken it, more is to repair the outer wall with angular, uneven, so that compared with the traditional straight city wall, the shooting dead angle is almost completely eliminated, and the enemy on either side will be subjected to multiple angles. Multi-directional firepower strikes turn the fortress into a killing machine.

This kind of fortress is basically similar to the early Italian fortress in the Renaissance period, but it is better in terms of self-sufficiency, which is equivalent to an independent fortress group, with basements, warehouses, wells and other buildings, and the standard of logistics and materials is almost 1,000 people stationed under the non-ration system for half a year, or under the ration system for a year.

First build a series of them in the Hexi Corridor in Gansu, and the rest can be repaired on the northern border and overseas bases, and the effect is definitely better than the traditional square city.

Jiang Xinghuo smiled: "Let's get on the hot air balloon and take a look down first." ”

He actually hid a hand today, just to surprise these people and let them see what war in the age of firearms is.

And this hidden hand must be in mid-air to see clearly.

There were two prepared hot air balloons tied to it, and everyone divided into two groups and boarded the hot air balloons, and then the hot air balloons slowly rose to a distance of about eight or nine zhang from the ground, and at this height, the entire structure of the fortress could be easily observed.

No matter how high it is, I don't dare to go up, the rope is very safe in this position, and if it rises again, no one can say whether it can still guarantee absolute safety.

But the height can't be too low, because the shells also have ballistics, in case which gunner misses, this will be funny if the entire Ming military high-level is in a pot, although the probability of this kind of thing is one in ten thousand, but what if?

Zhu Di and others who boarded the hot air balloon, looking down from mid-air, the whole fortress was like a . Starfish.

Subsequently, the core of the fortress was quickly observed by a few people with a keen sense of military smell, the entire "edge" around the periphery of the fortress is built around the cannon, the previous turret has always been quadrangular or round, and now the turret of the fortress is prismatic, the role of this turret structure is obvious, that is, it can easily form a non-blind angle shooting on the infantry who come to attack.

"What are these canals and gentle slopes for?"

"Traps."

In Zhu Di's words, in fact, this thing is for the attacker's infantry to climb, and it belongs to what seems to be a smooth road to victory, but it is actually a trap to hell.

In the sky, it is even clearer to see that there is also a low wall in the middle of the bastion for the musketeers to shoot, and the front of the low wall is generally equipped with a concave fort, which seems to prevent the enemy from climbing quickly.

In addition, there is a small triangular fort battery under the battery, which is shorter than the main battery, which is probably designed to avoid accidental injury to friendly soldiers, and you can also see the tunnel and Z-shaped horizontal wall from the air.

"Start?"

"Let's get started."

"Let's demonstrate."

The officer on the ground straightened up and ordered his subordinates.

"Yes!"

The scarecrow infantry wearing armor was carried to the offensive position by a group of people, and it looked like there were nearly a thousand people, not to mention lining up to be shot, it was also a saturation attack.

Subsequently, the artillery on the bastion began to fire at the positions of the imaginary enemy.

"Whoosh!"

There was a sharp whistling sound, and the shells exploded, and the high-speed shells rubbed the air, forming a long white exhaust, and then landed in the target area.

"Boom! Boom Boom! ”

In an instant, the flames of the explosion and the smoke of gunpowder rose to the sky, and the attacking scarecrow suddenly turned into a cloud of debris, flying down with the dirt.

"Why do shells explode?"

Jiang Xinghuo, who was grabbing the edge of the hanging basket with Zhu Di, explained: "Blossom bomb! ”

Blossom bomb is actually a technology point without any technical content.

At first, Jiang Xinghuo thought crookedly, when he studied the paper shell fixed ammunition of the fire gun, he thought that the cannon must also make the overall copper shell shell, just like the grenade of modern artillery, and later found that his thinking had reached a dead end. Because he remembers that the flowering bullet appeared at the end of the Ming Dynasty!

What level of technology can there be at the end of the Ming Dynasty?

The scientific and technological products that can be made at the end of the Ming Dynasty will definitely be able to be made now, so it must be the wrong way of thinking.

Later, during the Chinese New Year, Jiang Xinghuo watched the children smash snowballs, and suddenly thought that in the "Pirates of the Caribbean" movie that he had watched before, it seemed that the cannonballs used by the pirates were round cannonballs like snowballs, and then a fuse was artificially lit in the middle.

Then Jiang Xinghuo suddenly realized.

There is no need to think about any high-end proximity fuze or delayed fuze, this is purely artificial, and there is no difference with the principle of delayed explosion of two kicks, which are all gunpowder, which can explode after launching, if you really have to say what is the difference between the flowering bomb and the second kicking, that is, the second kicking is a paper explosion, and the flowering bomb is an iron explosion.

So, it's really a layer of window paper

Solid shells were used before, but now you can use flowering shells, it's as simple as that.

But the emperor and the princes didn't know, everyone saw this scene, they really gasped, although they knew that the power of artillery was very strong, but they didn't expect that now artillery has developed to the point that it can destroy infantry on a large scale.

In the past, although the solid artillery shells were very powerful, the destructive effect on the infantry was not obvious, and the projectiles could only kill and injure two or three people.

Looking at the scarecrow infantry wearing armor torn apart by artillery fire, they really didn't expect that the damage that the new cannonballs combined with the fortress batteries could do was so amazing.

Then the musketeers on the low wall also fired.

When the smoke cleared, the princes who came down from the hot air balloon looked at the scarecrow infantry who had become wreckage up close, and then remembered the scene they had just seen from the air, and they all showed shocked expressions on their faces uncontrollably.

"Good! That's great! ”

Zhu Di suddenly applauded excitedly: "What a fortress, with such artillery fire, isn't it really a one-man affair and a man who can't open it?" ”

Zhu Neng couldn't help but admire: "Good guy, if this thing comes out, the field fighters may not rush down to the muzzle, but this defending the city is simply incomprehensible!" ”

"Is this the fortress of the national teacher? It's amazing. ”

The military department Shangshu Ru Yu obviously didn't understand, and after hearing their words, he couldn't help frowning and said: "The cannon is indeed sharp, and when it comes next to it, the armor will be shattered, but this fortress is just shorter and thicker and more complicated than an ordinary city, and the ministers really can't see any way." ”

Zhu Di said with a smile: "Uncle Zhongzhong, this is what you don't understand, you haven't seen the time when you attacked Texas, if there was this 'cross fire' at that time, we are afraid that we would not even have the idea of attacking the city." ”

This is called the layman to see the excitement, and the insider to see the doorway.

Although Ru Yu is an earl, although he sits in the position of the secretary of the military department, but in essence, he is still a civil servant who has never been on the battlefield, and the most terrible thing about the fortress is not the flowering projectile, even if it is a solid projectile, or there is no artillery at all, it is a firearm and a strong crossbow. The effect is the same, the key is to kill without dead ends.

It's just that the artillery equipped with flowering shells magnifies this infinitely.

Zhu Di pulled Ru Yu up the gentle slope to continue to watch carefully, and when he saw the muzzles of three black holes on the fortress pointing at him at the same time, Ru Yu was shocked.

Just now he was in the sky, his old eyes were dizzy, and he watched the ground bomb lively, and now he personally climbed along these gentle slopes and canals to the fortress, only to discover the subtlety of this firepower design.

"This is still made of rammed earth and masonry, and if reinforced concrete is used, even gunpowder will not be afraid to blow up the city."

As soon as Jiang Xinghuo's words fell, Qiu Fu asked, "Then how much does this reinforced concrete cost?" ”

"Steel bars are definitely expensive, and concrete has to be experimented to get out, but it is definitely cheaper than glutinous rice syrup and strip stones."

Hearing this, Qiu Fu was a little disappointed, obviously if the reinforced concrete structure wants to be built in a large area, it is not possible in terms of cost, but since it is cheaper than the cost of glutinous rice pulp and strip stone, it is no problem to use it in key cities or fortresses. ”

"The wall of this fortress is actually repaired according to the traditional city wall model, and it is not difficult to look at its battlements and walls, if it is made of reinforced concrete, it can be improved, or even built into an arc."

The traditional city wall is generally flat because of the masonry structure, because once it is built into an arc, the force will be very uneven, in order to offset this uneven force, the arc must be pulled gently, and increase the thickness of this building is the most obvious urn city structure, almost all urn cities, are very thick and gentle, although it is a semicircle from the inside, but from the outside, the arc is extremely insignificant.

Reinforced concrete structures can achieve much more breakthroughs in construction than masonry structures, the most typical example of which is dams, which can achieve a fairly perfect arc to counteract the high pressure caused by large amounts of water storage.

"Arc, isn't that even a ladder that can't be erected?" Xu Jingchang suddenly realized this.

"It's not that arcing."

Jiang Xinghuo smiled, since all the basic scientific research achievements of the first year of Yongle were shown to them today, the effect was also obvious, what Jiang Xinghuo said Now their first reaction is to believe.

What are the revolutionary military technologies of cotton-steel composite armor, steel cannons, paper-shell fixed-loading bombs, flowering bombs, and fortresses? It doesn't seem to be there, but when these are combined, they have quietly advanced military science and technology for two centuries, and when the Ming army has these, it is equivalent to having equipment and technology that can only be available after about 200 years of normal.

And this is the real generation difference.

Zhu Di was still interested, and led everyone to the fortress.

"When will Ryu Seung come back?" Zhu Di suddenly asked as he walked.

Zhu Neng was stunned, and immediately replied: "Almost this month, come back with Cao Guogong." ”

On the Annan side, Daming's garrison has actually been constantly withdrawing from the country, and Daming has no idea of not leaving. You can fight back at any time if you want to, it doesn't make much difference where the troops are stationed, as long as you control the contract port of Thanh Hoa Port.

The reason why the troops were stationed in Annam was really what Chen Tianping strongly requested.

Annan has just ended the war, and the north has been ceded to the Ming Dynasty, the whole country is in chaos, a large number of armored troops, swords, guns, bows and crossbows occupy the mountains as kings, bandits are rampant in various places, and it is very necessary to clean up.

In fact, if it is just a matter of public security, it is better to say that it is enough to send troops to suppress bandits, but the most serious problem is that Chen Tianping's basic plate is too unstable, and what he is doing can be said to be boiling with public resentment.

After the fall of the Hu family, these local heroes who were affected by the Hu family's new policy began to counterattack on a large scale, and they pulled each other with Chen Tianping, but Chen Tianping had nothing to do.

In the current Annan, politically, Chen Tianping has to rely on these traditional nobles and local tyrants; Economically, in addition to accepting blood transfusions by being a comprador of the Ming Dynasty, Chen Tianping had to collect taxes from the local government; Militarily, the loyalty of the army that surrendered to him was very low, and the military discipline was even more corrupt, and only the Ming army was reliable.

Therefore, the army clashed with the local heroes at two ends in three days, and the conflict of interests of different factions in the temple gave Chen Tianping a headache, what else could he do if he didn't rely on Daming?

But now the Ming Dynasty's military center of gravity is going to move north, and it is definitely impossible to help Chen Tianping fight a law and order war here every day, so the Ming army is returning to China one after another, and what can help Chen Tianping sit on the throne is to transport materials through Thanh Hoa Port, and leave a team of capable soldiers and horses, and reorganize and train Chen Tianping's own armed forces.

This matter was handed over to Zhang Fu, who had performed well in the process of conquering Annan, to deal with it, and when Li Jinglong, Liu Sheng and others returned to China, the Ming army stationed in Annan was commanded by Zhang Fu.

Thinking of Zhang Yu's status in the Yan army, although Zhang Fu is only an earl now, he will definitely be promoted to marquis in the future, and then rightfully inherit Zhang Yu's dukedom.

In fact, if Zhang Fu wanted to, he could follow Xu Jingchang's example and directly beg the emperor to let him shadow the duke, Zhu Di also had this idea before, but Zhang Fu himself refused, he wanted to get ahead with his own skills.

"When Liu Sheng comes back, let him put up the shelves of the two guards of the Shenji Battalion."

Coming to the fortress and looking at the barrel of the artillery, Qiu Fu asked a soul question.

"How is the artillery aiming?"

Jiang Xinghuo personally demonstrated it to him this time.

However, unlike the previous disdain in the military academy, this time the old general squatted down and took a serious look.

Li Jinglong, a five-star general who was far away in Annan, commented: "In the past, I scoffed at this, but now I can't wait to learn frame by frame, not because catapults can't afford to use them, but because artillery is more cost-effective." ”

Artillery firing certainly does not come from the gunner's senses.

In fact, now through the guidance of Jiang Xinghuo's artillery books, coupled with the exploration of Liu Sheng and others, the artillery of the Ming army has been given a relatively standardized operating guideline, and there are also supporting artillery aiming equipment.

"This is a cannon gauge, which is used to measure the elevation angle."

This thing is a bit like a fishing rod, you have to put the rod in the muzzle of the gun first, and then judge the elevation angle of the gun body according to the area where the hanging heavy object line coincides with the gun gauge, Jiang Xinghuo remembered that the gun seemed to be able to measure data from the rear, but he didn't figure out how to get it, so he could only use this relatively primitive measurement method for the time being.

"This is a cannon ruler to measure the filling of gunpowder bags."

The function of the gun ruler is to measure the amount of gunpowder that the gun should be filled, which is related to the caliber of the gun and the size of the projectile, the best choice must be to fill the gunpowder completely burned out, and the shell can be pushed out of the barrel, but in fact, it is generally more than less, because it will not explode immediately if it is filled more, but it is very dangerous that the shell cannot be shot if it is less. If the solid shell cannonball can't be shot, it can still be poured out, and the flowering shell won't just blow up inside?

Therefore, in order to have a specific standard, gunners will refer to this scale, that is, the gun ruler, when loading gunpowder.

But in fact, just like only novice chefs will put seasonings by restraint, veterans are "in moderation" and "a little", and they know how much they are just a little bit when they grab it, and they usually don't look at this thing.

"This is a rectangular plate, which is used to measure the length and angle of the appliance, we have always had it in Huaxia, which was mainly used for astronomical stargazing, this simplified version is used to guide artillery firing, first calculate the elevation angle, and then in the case of a certain amount of gunpowder charge and shell weight, the firing range is basically fixed, so you can achieve the effect of hitting the target more accurately by adjusting the up, down, left and right of the artillery."

"If you repair a bunch of them in the Hexi Corridor, Timur's old lame man will gnaw them one by one, and I'm afraid that his teeth will have to be shattered."

"Hahahaha!"

With Zhu Di's hearty laughter, at this moment, many people present realized what a great invention this seemingly simple, but full of science and technology sense of fortress is!

You must know that the expedition of the Timurid Empire has always been something that makes Zhu Di feel thorns in his back, even if it can't be said to be a shadow, it is uncomfortable, and Zhu Di can say this kind of thing after only witnessing it once, which is undoubtedly very confident in the defensive ability of the fortress.

"After the concrete comes out, in the Hexi Corridor in Gansu, we will repair more than ten or twenty of them!"

"Okay, but this cost" Xu Jingchang said cautiously.

A hundred can be repaired, the question is how to calculate the money?

"Take the account of the Governor's Mansion of the Five Armies."

"But the fortress must be well stocked with sufficient supplies and equipped with enough firearms, and it is necessary to plan to hold on for a long time, if there are no firearms, then the fortress will not be able to exert the maximum effect."

When designing the fortress, Jiang Xinghuo did not plan to use the fortress as the main force of the Ming Dynasty's territorial defense, because a complete fortress or fortress group, its cost is really not cheap, in addition, the fortress not only needs sophisticated firearms, but also needs to be equipped with enough elite soldiers, after all, firearms and fortresses are complementary to each other, without gunners who can skillfully operate cannons, the fortress will not be able to exert this power.

But even so, Zhu Di still plans to spend a huge amount of money to build a fortress group in the Hexi Corridor within the scope of his ability, this is not only a matter of money, but also the safety of the entire Ming Dynasty.

After all, no one knows when the war will break out, although Timur's expeditionary force needs to go a long way, but there is always an end to the road, and it is not sure when it will appear in the northwest.

Therefore, since he decided to build a group of fortresses, Zhu Di did not mean to spare money.

"All expenses are reported to the Governor's Office of the Five Armies, and the affairs of the fortress group in the Hexi Corridor must be given priority to investing manpower and material resources, and the reinforced concrete, artillery, guns, and ammunition needed will all be arranged according to the highest standards."

"One more point."

Jiang Xinghuo added: "The construction of the fortress should also be adapted to local conditions, and it cannot be rigidly copied, so there must be a process of training engineers in advance." ”

In fact, according to the different terrain requirements of each bastion, the construction specifications are also strictly limited, including the flexible combination of shooting boundaries and gable walls and half-moon walls, all of which require engineers to learn and master various technical knowledge.

All in all, if you want to build a fortress, you first need to have a top engineering team, and this team must have enough competent, good enough engineers who are proficient in mathematics, geometry and architecture, and these happen to be what the Ming Dynasty lacks now, so you can only urgently train a group of top ones first.

And now, although a brand-new fortress did not take long to appear in everyone's field of vision, this does not mean that the fortress can be built quickly, because the construction of a fortress on the edge of Nanjing and the construction of a fortress on the northwest border line are limited by transportation, raw materials and other conditions, and the speed must be different, so a large amount of advance must be reserved.

Thinking about it at worst, although the fortress was improved by Jiang Xinghuo, and it was built according to the mature fortress, it was new after all, and the new thing like the fortress, many internal structures have not been tested, and there may be moths somewhere, and once the internal structure is damaged, things will become a lot more troublesome, if it is not strong enough, it is not good, in the great northwest, it can only rely on demolishing the east wall to make up the west wall to ensure the operation, and nothing can be transported into the city when the heavy army is besieging the city.

That is to say, in the event of a war, the garrisons in these fortresses are dead soldiers, cannon fodder used to consume the Timurid Empire's troops and will to fight, and they can hardly get any support.

"But if there is a real battle, if the fortress is overcome, won't the artillery and firearms in it fall into the hands of the enemy?" Ru Yu suddenly thought of a question at this time.

Yao Guangxiao, who had not spoken, said lightly: "Even if it is for him, Timur will go to the country for thousands of miles, and he can't imitate it, even if it is really imitated in the future, if the Ming Dynasty has more advanced weapons, if you are really not at ease, you can also use copper cannons and relatively backward firearms in the fortress on the northwest border, and equip more bows and crossbows, and the effect is the same." ”

In fact, not to mention the Timurid people, even if a team of craftsmen like the Mongols came and wanted to improvise cannons in the Gobi Desert, which lacked raw materials and equipment, it would be impossible.

According to the current progress of weapon research and development of the Ming army, the next generation of flintlock pistols and large-caliber smoothbore guns are on the schedule, even if there is really something similar to the Battle of Talas that led to the leakage of technology, the Timurid Empire is really imitated, and when the Timurid Empire can be mass-produced, the new weapons on the Ming side are still generational.

"Just give it your all."

In this situation, who dares to guarantee that no war will befall in the future?

"Let's do what we just decided."

Zhu Di said: "But this matter does not need to be too hasty, first prepare the preparations, and then figure out the terrain suitable for building fortresses in Gansu, and then design the fortresses according to the actual situation." ”

"Yes." Xu Jingchang bowed down to receive the order.

(End of chapter)