Chapter 400

If you want to talk about the incendiary bombs of the Ning Navy, you have to mention a key person, that is, Catherine. This is the difference between the East and the West in technology in the Age of Discovery.

In ancient times, unlike later generations, there was a sophisticated welding technique, but for wooden sailing ships, the Oriental adopted the mortise and tenon technique to join the planks together to form a sturdy hull. In addition, they use materials such as felt or tarpaulin for padding between the planks and on the bottom of the boat, which increases the tightness of the boat.

In ancient China, people used the technique of stitching to ensure that the boat did not leak. They use materials such as hemp rope or bamboo tendons to make perforated stitches between the hull panels to form a tight connection. In this way, not only the strength of the ship is ensured, but also the tightness of the ship is improved.

Although the effect of stitching technology is good, the problem is that the cost is relatively high, however, in the West, asphalt penetration technology is adopted, using asphalt to improve the sealing of the vessel. For example, excavations in Egypt have found that many of them have been coated with bitumen on the bottom, which is effective in preventing water leakage.

As early as the fifth year of Chongzhen, when Catherine returned to Daming from Venice for the first time, she brought four ships of asphalt as a strategic material, but it is a pity that asphalt is very useful for Daming, and most of the demand is used to make ink, Cheng Shijie found that the natural asphalt transported by Catherine is actually a mixture of asphalt and crude oil.

This let Cheng Shijie see another way, the refining technology of crude oil is complicated and complex, it is not complicated, it is not complicated, and the use of local distillation technology can separate crude oil into diesel or gasoline, after more than a year of tinkering, it has been successful.

In the process of refining crude oil, in addition to diesel and gasoline, several oils are also refined, such as lubricating oil, the bearing of the carriage and a little more smooth operation, and for example, gun oil, soldiers have to use it to wipe their guns after training every day, corrosive gun oil, can decompose the fire residue in the barrel, and wax tablets, this thing is also quite popular.

But the most popular is the transparent liquid of gasoline, this thing is half a bottle, add some sugar, egg white, sulfuric acid and other things to it, plug the bottle mouth with a cloth and light the fire, the fire burns wherever it goes, and burns all the way to the bones, no matter how you shoot it, you can't get it out of it, the more you make the fire, the more fierce it burns, that terrifying scene, even the veterans of the Ning Navy who have survived a hundred battles gasped!

Diesel fuel is not yet available on a large scale, so it can only be used to clean rust when dealing with pig iron and steel parts, but gasoline, gun oil, and lubricating oil are not difficult at all.

It's just that the capacity of the refinery of the Ning Navy is too low, and the local method of oil refining is too polluting to the environment, so Cheng Shijie put the small refinery of the Ning Navy on the island of Luzon, directly imported crude oil from the Republic of the Venetian city-state, refined it in the Luzon refinery, and finally divided it into various refined oil products and sent them to Liaodong.

This kind of gasoline napalm incendiary bomb, on the play of its true character of the king of destruction, this war, the new army of Heluo brought a total of 17,000 gasoline napalm incendiary bombs, of which more than 6,000 are rocket artillery fired incendiary bombs, more than 11,000 are throwing type, ready to give the Qing army a surprise, but has not been able to come in handy, this thing is very dangerous, a improper operation will burn themselves, Ning Navy soldiers are a little scared of it, not very active, can not try not to use.

But now it's a defensive war, and the advantages of fuel cylinders are brought into play.

The throwing gasoline napalm incendiary bombs that smashed over the head and face brought huge trouble to the Qing army, and how many people were burned to death and burned were secondary, and the most fatal thing was to see so many people and horses wailing in pain with a large fire, the whole army shuddered, and the morale was naturally greatly hit.

After all, being burned alive is not a comfortable thing, who would want to? One or two waves of attacks caused the Ning Navy to smash back with throwing gasoline napalm incendiary bombs, with many casualties and little progress, which made the Qing army a little discouraged.

Huang Taiji's face sank like water, and he constantly released the infantry cavalry in his hand and launched attacks on the Ning Navy camp again and again. Huang Taiji believes that half of the combat effectiveness of the Ning Navy is tied to the artillery, and defeating the artillery is equivalent to winning half of it, no matter what, the artillery position of the Ning Navy must be gnawed down!

After most of the day's fighting, the Ning Navy fired more than 4,000 rockets and artillery shells before and after, but the casualties caused to the Qing army were very limited, and there were only seven or eight thousand casualties, which made Zhou Ning very dissatisfied and severely reprimanded Yuan Shiliang, the artillery commander.

In fact, Cheng Shijie was not surprised, because he knew that although the power of weapons is getting bigger and bigger, the lethal effect is getting lower and lower, just like in the new round of Palestinian-Israeli conflict, more than 5,000 rockets and artillery shells of the Pakistani army were fired, causing only a few hundred casualties, and an average of 10 rockets and artillery shells may not be able to kill or injure a person.

Cheng Shijie found that the Qing army was just a small group of sporadic cavalry, if it was like a fly, it went back and forth around the defense line of the Ning Navy, probing, and once the loopholes of the Ning Navy were discovered, they would immediately swarm up.

Cheng Shijie had to sigh: "The Qing army has now become very smart, and has applied clever tactics, constantly looking for the weak position of our army's defense line, constantly launching attacks with small roads and groups, consuming our army's physical strength and ammunition, and preparing for the upcoming decisive battle, all very fine!" ”

"If they hadn't plotted to blow up our ammunition depot in Trois-Rivières, we wouldn't have been so passive!"

Zhou Ning smiled bitterly: "It's just that they definitely didn't expect that our ammunition reserves are far more than they imagined, in addition to the one hundred and twenty rounds of ammunition that each soldier carries, the baggage battalions of each regiment also have one hundred and twenty rounds in reserve, want to consume our army's ammunition?" I'd like to see if they have enough lives for us to consume!" ”

As for the physical exertion......

Zhou Ning didn't bother to comment on this question. The Ning Navy is a professional army, what they have been doing is to fight and prepare for war, and other Ming troops marching more than 50 miles a day are considered elite soldiers, however, under normal circumstances, the Ning Navy trains every day to be 10 kilometers in the morning and evening, which means that under normal training conditions every day, they have to march 40 miles in full armor.

What's more, the officers and men of the Ning Navy only need to stay in their positions and shoot and throw bombs, while the Qing army has to run around shooting arrows and charge, who consumes more physical strength? Not only strategically, but also in terms of tactical superiority, Zhou Ning really couldn't think of any reason for him to lose this battle!

Cheng Shijie looked at Zhou Ning and said, "Next, what are your plans?" ”

"The last general is ready to give them a little sweetness to taste!"

Cheng Shijie guessed that Zhou Ning was preparing to be a yin person.

Sure enough, with Zhou Ning's successive orders, the firepower density of the Ning Navy officers on the battlefield weakened significantly, and they felt that the Ning Navy's firepower was weakening.

Huang Taiji was overjoyed: "They don't have much ammunition, it's great!" ”

The soldiers of the Qing army deserved to be the kings of the era of cold weapons, although they suffered heavy casualties, they became more and more fierce, and they simply split a bloody alley in the defense line of the Ning navy, and attacked with difficulty.

Huang Taiji stared nervously at the battle on the front line, his knuckles turned white, and when he saw a large ball of fire rising from an artillery position, he cried out out in a gaffe: "It's successful!" Breakthrough! ”

Zilharang's forehead was covered with sweat, and he was so nervous that he couldn't do it, and finally breathed a sigh of relief at this time: "The price is not small, but if you can destroy the artillery of the Ning Navy, even if the price is great, it will be worth it......"

In fact, Huang Taiji didn't know that this artillery position was abandoned by Ning Haijun on his own initiative, and that violent explosion was nothing more than detonating the explosives buried on the artillery position, which was used to encourage the Qing army to continue the attack.

The Qing army continued to attack, and with each step forward, it paid heavy casualties.

Unconsciously, the battle lasted for more than two hours, the Qing army attacked and advanced, and successfully broke through the seven lines of defense of the Ning Navy, and unconsciously, the oval defense line of the Ning Navy had become a concave moon shape.

The sun began to set in the west, and the battle flags of the Qing army were shining in the sun, and the layers of corpses and pools of blood constituted a magnificent and terrifying picture.

If you look down from the sky, you will find that the offensive spirit of the Qing army is no longer there.

"Your Majesty, the soldiers are too tired, and the physical strength of the war horse is about to run out!"

Hauge, who was in charge of the front-line command, was very unhappy, and for most of the day's onslaught, he lost more than 2,000 lives just by laying yellow flags. Even now, he had to admit that no matter how fiercely they attacked, it would be difficult to gnaw at the defense line of the Ning Navy.

What made them even more unbearable was that Ning Haijun was distributing meals, and they could judge from the fragrance wafting from the Ning Haijun camp that Ning Haijun's lunch was potato stew and fragrant milk tea, in fact, these Qing soldiers didn't know that Ning Haijun's lunch was very rich, not only with out-of-season vegetables, but also with a lot of fresh fruits.

The Qing soldiers themselves were hungry, and now they smelled the enticing fragrance, so how could they stand it?

The Qing army obviously did not have such a good treatment. Although Huang Taiji raided Beijing again before setting out, trying his best to provide better supplies for his army, Beijing was a consumer-oriented city at this time, and all food and vegetables depended on the whole country.

Months of fierce fighting cut off the Grand Canal, and the Ming army captured almost all the prefectures and counties around Beijing, which meant that Beijing had no way to get supplies from the outside world, the supply of fresh vegetables, meat, and eggs was greatly reduced, and the grain trade in the market was almost completely stopped.

So now, the best thing the Qing army could eat was a bowl of rice with wheat grains covered with a thin layer of salted meat foam. Don't think about big fish and big meat, as for fresh vegetables and fruits, the vast majority of Qing soldiers said that they had never seen this thing since they entered the customs.

The war horses ate better, the auxiliary soldiers cut the fine ingredients for them early, mixed with eggs and sugar, and when they were full, they were fed a small half a catty of blood-inducing spirits, and those Liaodong war horses were very satisfied with this meal, and after eating, they shaved the ground with their hooves, urging the master to go to the battlefield, and they looked impatient.

After a full meal, the Qing army could not wait to launch an attack on the Ning Navy, and the effect of the attack was similar to that of the morning, still attacking all the way and bleeding all the way.

Until the sun was about to set, the Qing army still did not make a breakthrough visible to the naked eye.

The current Qing army is exhausted, they haven't slept all night, and they have fought hard for another day, and the people who are beaten with iron can't stand it, just when Huang Taiji is about to order the Qing army to truce and fight again.

The Ning Navy launched a rare counteroffensive, of course, the Ning Navy's counteroffensive was still as usual, with artillery and rocket artillery.

"Your Majesty, the slave is incompetent, please punish the emperor!"

Huang Taiji sighed, at this time.

"Boom, boom, boom......"

The rumbling sound of artillery shattered the silence of the battlefield, and the cannonballs roared through with a fierce wave of air, falling in the formation of the Qing army, and exploded into a dazzling fireball, which was a test firing of artillery.

Immediately after that, more three-inch guns and four-inch guns joined the ranks of the test firing, and the rocket artillery also fired one after another, firing two shells each, and blasting up rows of untidy craters at the front of the position of the Ning Navy.

As the artillery began to fire, Cheng Shijie also stood in front of the officers and men of the whole army to do the final mobilization, in fact, this does not need to be mobilized, the morale of the Ning Navy is like a rainbow, of course, Cheng Shijie will not let go of this opportunity to pretend to be forced.

"Officers and men of the Ning Navy, today is the final decisive battle between us and Jiannu, that is, the decisive victory, but also the life and death, the winner stands, and the loser lies down! Our Ninghai Navy came out of Ninghai Prefecture, Dengfu, Shandong, Denglai rebels, Japanese invaders, Mongolian Tatars, Liukou, pirate groups, and Xiyi regiments...... These powerful enemies have all fallen before us! ”

Cheng Shijie shouted: "The enemies of our Ning Navy have used their blood to show the world an iron-clad fact, any enemy who stands in front of our Ning Navy is destined to be crushed by us, Jiannu is no exception, and the Qing army is no exception!" Ben Shuai gave them the opportunity to go back to their hometown by themselves, but they refused, so we had to send them back to their hometown with guns and knives! ”

Admiral Ning let out a thunderous roar: "Send them back to their hometown!" ”

Cheng Shijie waved his hand and pointed to the Qing army's military formation, which had begun to move slowly: "Kill!! ”

"Kill !!"

The thunder that rumbled from the earth shook the clouds in the sky, and then the mountains roared and the tsunami followed, and hundreds of rocket artillery shells lined up in front of the formation rushed up diagonally with long smoke and flames, turning into fire dragons with teeth and claws to pounce on the Qing army!

At the moment when the rocket artillery shells took off, the heavy artillery of the Ning Navy and the Qing Army invariably let out a terrible roar, and the flowering bombs, incendiary bombs, and solid lead balls flew towards each other with a palpitating whistling sound.

At the end of the short trajectory was a large mass of explosive smoke and flames, the blast wave threw the shattered weapons, human bodies and armor fragments into the sky, and the shrapnel that was so hot that it almost burned flew densely in all directions, and no armor could resist the high-speed flying fragments, and the soldiers within the killing radius, whether they were white-armored soldiers or red-armored soldiers, whether they were the elite of the Jiannu Eight Banners, or the Mongolian servant army, all fell in clumps like cutting wheat.

Seeing that Ning Haijun's artillery was becoming more and more violent, without any signs of stagnation, a terrible thought rose in Huang Taiji's heart: "Hit the plan?" Could it be that the explosion at the Three Rivers ammunition depot was a hoax? ”

Huang Taiji actually thought too much, although the ammunition depot of Sanhe of the Ning Navy was blown up, but the problem was that the emaciated camel was bigger than the horse, and no matter how many shells the Ning Navy lost, it was enough to crush the cost of the Qing military system.

(End of chapter)