Chang'an City.

The light rain was dripping and very disturbing.

In the main hall of the town guard.

Liu Chan sat on the main seat, but his face showed a little tiredness.

No way, tired.

In the past few days, Liu Chan's itinerary can be said to be directly full.

First of all, it took three days to worship the sky, and the cumbersome etiquette was more than Liu Chan's ceremony of ascending the crown prince.

After that, it was the recruitment of talents, and the examination of the martial arts hall, and even yesterday, the talents who recruited the talents, as well as the students of the martial arts hall, went to Chang'an to hunt in the outer fields to enhance their prestige and feelings.

After a set of processes, the three beauties offered by Du You have no time to love at night.

"The hussar general retreated to Yongxian, and the offensive of the Wei army in front was temporarily stopped, but the Wei general Cao Zhen led the elite cavalry, left the Wei army sequence, and came towards Guanzhong first."

"How many people are there in Cao Zhen?" Liu Chan asked slowly.

Fa Zheng stepped forward and said, "There are as many as 10,000 horsemen, all of whom are the elite of the Wei army. ”

"The lonely army is deep, the food and grass are cut off, it should be very easy to deal with, how far can it go?"

Logistics grain and grass are the lifeline of an army, and without grain and grass, no matter how elite the army is, it is useless.

People are iron, rice is steel, and if you don't eat for a day, you will be hungry and panic.

There is no food left, the army's spirit is gone, and the battle will naturally be impossible to fight.

"This cavalry army has one man and three horses, and also carries many mules, horses, and donkeys, which are responsible for loading grain and grass, and the march is like the wind, and the defenders from all over the country have tried to intercept it several times, but they have all been released from the trap ahead of schedule."

How could this 10,000-strong cavalry army be intercepted by local state and county soldiers?

moreover

Cao Zhen went all the way from Yumoose to Gukou, and not a single city was captured by him, but his food and grass supplies were still sufficient.

Either they were raiding foreign settlements for supplies, or someone in the pass was returning snakes and rats at both ends, and secretly sending money and food to Cao Zhen.

Liu Chan was not angry.

After all, it has not been a month since Guanzhong was laid, and the influence of the Han State and the tentacles of the Han State have not yet been able to spread to all parts of Guanzhong.

"If you let him go to Chongquan Lotus Spoon and join forces with Zheng Hun, I'm afraid it will be difficult to deal with."

Previously, Cao Zhen was trapped in Yu Moose, and it was difficult to develop the advantage of the cavalry.

Now in the open, the cavalry is like a slippery loach, and it is difficult to catch it.

Once it joins forces with Zheng Hun, the elite cavalry and some state and county soldiers, the combat effectiveness of the Wei army will rise by more than a few steps.

"I'm afraid of that Cao Zhen, it's not that I want to go to Zuo Fengyi!"

Liu Chan's eyes narrowed slightly, and he continued: "The grain road in the rear has been robbed repeatedly, I'm afraid it's Cao Zhen's ghost, with his 10,000 riders, I'm afraid that the grain and grass in the rear can't be transported to Chang'an. ”

Originally, when the Han army arrived in Guanzhong, there was some pressure on the supply of grain and grass, but now that the grain route has been cut off again, if Cao Zhen's more than 10,000 cavalry troops cannot be restrained, I am afraid that the pressure in the Han army will be even greater.

In addition, there was a rebellion by the Wei cavalry in the territory, and the matter of collecting grain in various parts of Guanzhong could not be carried out normally.

"Logistics is indeed a problem, the Baochuan Road has transported grain several times, all of which have been looted, and the loss of grain and grass is more than 20,000 Hu, and if it continues like this, no matter how much grain and grass there is in Chang'an City, it is not enough to consume."

There is indeed a lot of grain and grass in Chang'an City, but there are also many people who gather in Chang'an City, and the front line also needs Chang'an City to transfer grain and grass.

If this continues, I am afraid that there will be a real problem of grain and grass.

"Cao Zhen's more than 10,000 horsemen must be wiped out, otherwise, the hearts of the Guanzhong army will be turbulent, and there will be more and more people who are bewitched by him and cause trouble."

Chang'an was defeated, and all parts of Guanzhong were quite obedient, because they had already seen the general trend.

When the Han State won Chang'an, it already had an advantage, and there was a high probability that the Han State would win this war.

Whoever wins, they help whomever they are, so they obey.

But if Cao Zhen is in Guanzhong, and the Han army can't control it, what will those Guan sergeant clans, Haoqiang, and other races think?

Maybe when the time comes, they will think like this: although the Han State is to conquer Guanzhong, but it is so strong that it can't even deal with the Wei army in the territory, that is, it occupies Guanzhong, and as soon as the Wei soldiers arrive, Chang'an will change hands immediately.

The human heart is very important.

Faith is sometimes worth more than gold.

Originally, now that the war in Guanzhong was in turmoil, the dispersed Wei army was carrying many people up the mountain as bandits, if Cao Zhen was in a situation and was carrying tens of thousands of people, wouldn't it be able to affect the situation?

This is something that Liu Chan absolutely can't accept.

"The plan for today is to use the river to intercept the cavalry, build a fortress on the main road, set up antlers, and reject horses to block Cao Zhen's cavalry." Zhuge Liang came up with a more secure way.

The advantage of cavalry is its mobility.

In particular, Cao Zhen has one person and three horses, plus there are many mules, horses and livestock to resist the weight of grain and grass, and the speed is even faster.

Removing the advantage of his mobility, it will naturally be easier to deal with.

"It takes time to build a fortress, and the river is shallow, so it is impossible to completely block the cavalry."

Guanzhong is not the land of Jianghuai after all.

If it is the land of Jianghuai, the power of the cavalry will be greatly reduced.

Because the water network in the Jianghuai region is dense, the amount of water is also very large.

But in Guanzhong, except for Weishui and a few tributaries, the rest of the small rivers and streams, the amount of water can only be described as touching.

"Maybe send out the cavalry, cut off their food and grass, and force them to leave!"

Wu Yi also thought of a solution.

Those who can deal with the cavalry are, of course, the cavalry.

Moreover, Cao Zhen was fighting in enemy territory, which was already at a disadvantage.

Although there are three horses for one person, and there are a large number of mules, horses, and livestock to transport grain and grass, but your war horses run fast, do your mules and horses that transport grain and grass run faster than our Han cavalry?

"That's one way to do it."

The man shall eat, and the horse shall be supplied with rest.

If the horse does not eat feed, does not eat grain, and only feeds grass, it will take 20-30 catties of grass every day, and if the grass is found by the horse itself, it will take three or four hours to eat, and if it is collected by people, it will also take an hour to collect.

In order to cope with this situation, half of the grass and some of the grain are generally mixed when marching, and in this way, the horse must eat ten catties of grass and about four catties of beans or millet every day during the long march, which can be fed within an hour.

The endurance of horses is not as good as that of people, and if you walk with weight, you may be able to walk 100 miles a day, but you can only hold on for 1 to 2 days.

The next day it collapsed, especially for grazing horses.

Horses that eat grain are much better and can last 3 to 5 days.

Therefore, the cavalry of the Wei army marched, with most of the troops each taking care of the horses, leaving about one-tenth of the people to take care of the horses, and then driving the horses forward, and when catching up with the large army, then changing horses, and then leaving one-tenth of the people to take care of the horses, feeding the horses, drinking water, and then chasing, and the cycle forward

This saved time for feeding the horses, resting, and marching up to 50 to 100 miles a day.

It really turned into the wind.

Moreover, the horsepower is saved, and the marching distance depends entirely on the degree of food supply in the rear, and is not limited by horsepower.

If Cao really marched like this, as long as he left behind the tenth of the men, because the food supply was cut off, he had to look for grain and grass, and was forced to leave the Han army's grain and grass supply line and go to Zuo Fengyi to join Zheng Hun.

"I heard that there are many Hun cavalry in Cao Zhen's army, and the Hun cavalry does not need to leave someone to take care of the horses."

Most of the troops were to go first with one horse each, leaving about one-tenth of the men to take care of the horses and chase the large troops.

This is just the cavalry of the Han people.

That's not how the nomads north of the Yellow River play.

The Hun cavalry was each equipped with 4 horses, and when they were on a long march, the 4 horses were driven at the same time, and only one of them was ridden. When one horse under the crotch is tired, switch to the other horse next to you. The transfer did not stop, the whole army was speeding at high speed, and the riders jumped directly from one horse to the other.

So 4 horses ride alternately.

The Mongol army also used a similar method, and was able to run long distances in order to achieve the suddenness of the battle.

The horses domesticated by the nomads of Mobei are Mongolian horses, which are not tall in stature, with large heads and short legs. Neither the speed nor graceful pace of horses (Arabian horses) of the Western Regions and Central Asia; Nor is it as robust and powerful as the European Normandy horse; However, it has good endurance, is not picky eater, has strong disease resistance, and can adapt to the harsh climate environment of the grassland desert (especially the harsh winter in Mobei).

After a long journey, even the coarsest forage can be used to maintain physical strength, and even the leaves and bark of trees can be eaten.

In areas where other horses can starve to death, Mongolian horses still maintain a high fighting power.

Moreover, nomads will train horses to run at the pace of camels, that is, to step forward and backward with the same side of the feet, which is what we commonly call "Shun Turn".

It is said that horses run long distances in this way to save physical strength. It is said that Mongolian horses can gallop hundreds of kilometers every day for more than ten consecutive days, and other horse breeds cannot achieve such excellent endurance.

And the Mongolian horses are not frightened in battle, and they are outright military horses.

The nomads of Mobei do not carry baggage, and they can grab wherever they hit; Mongolian horses are hard-working and eat wherever they go. Achieved a natural cavalryman.

If there is such a group of Hun cavalry, it may not be so easy to cut off their rear route.

In fact, the most important thing is that most of the cavalry of the Han army is on the battlefield in front, and now the three thousand elite cavalry of Zhang Bao and the more than 1,000 Qiang cavalry of Ma Chao are in hand.

But the cavalry under Zhang Bao, most of the heavy cavalry, is not good at running and is good at charging into battle.

Leaving behind these heavy cavalry, there are less than 2,000 light cavalry left.

With less than 2,000 cavalry, I am afraid that there is no possibility of cutting off their rear routes.

"Maybe we can make a fuss in the grain transportation team."

Grain convoys?

Everyone was stunned.

"Your Highness still plans to transport grain?"

It has been plundered several times in succession, and the transportation of grain and grass from the Baochu Road has stopped.

The grain and grass transferred from Yizhou and Hanzhong were all piled up in Chencang.

If these Wei troops in Guanzhong are not expelled or eliminated, this grain and grass will be looted once it is transported, and the pure meat buns will beat the dogs, and they will never return.

"Naturally, however, a small number of masters transported grain, heavily armored foot soldiers guarded on one side, a large number of crossbowmen were equipped in the ranks, and antlers were built to resist horses and belts in the ranks, and two thousand cavalry troops drove away the Wei cavalry on the side."

As a traverser, Liu Chan can naturally learn from his predecessors from the five thousand years of China, oh no, for the current Liu Chan, it should be the wisdom of future generations.

In the Battle of Youzhou in August 917, nearly 100,000 iron cavalry of the Khitan army were defeated by the infantry of the former Jin Dynasty, whose number was far less than their own!

This battle can be called a model of "riding by foot" in ancient military history!

In order to prevent the Khitan cavalry from suddenly launching a fatal attack on the rescue army during the march, Li Cunxian, the commander of the rescue army, ordered the infantry to cut down trees to make horses and antlers, and then the infantry advanced with these weapons.

At dinner and night, they were asked to accumulate horses and antlers into camps (fortifications) and station, so that the rescue army marched towards Youzhou City little by little under the watchful eye of the Khitan rangers.

In the process of going to the city of Trapzhou, the rescue army encountered small groups of Khitan cavalry many times, but those Khitan cavalry of less than 1,000 people were difficult to attack when facing the rescue army with a strange formation of horses and antlers, and they would also encounter the drive of the rescue cavalry, so they could only continue to harass, but with little success.

In the end, as the rescue army got closer and closer to the city of Trapzhou, the Khitans couldn't sit still, and in order to prevent the fat in their mouths from flying away, the Khitans gathered tens of thousands of cavalry and suddenly appeared to attack the rescue army that was still on the march.

In the face of the swarming Khitan army, the rescue army did not panic, and Li Cunxun and Li Siyuan immediately ordered the soldiers to pile up the antlers and horses in their hands into a solid "antler array" to block the impact of the Khitan cavalry on the military formation.

Then he asked the soldiers to take off the bows and arrows and crossbows hanging from their waists, and constantly shoot at the Khitan cavalry archers who were shooting arrows around the camp, turning the field battle into a defensive battle!

For a time, the two sides of the battle fired thousands of arrows, and the arrows they fired covered the clouds and the sun, baptizing the position like a torrential rain, and the result was a big surprise that the Khitan army, which was dominated by horse archers, was defeated by the rescue army in the exchange of bows and crossbows.

In the end, he was rushed into battle by the former Jin army, and was directly defeated.

And this is what Liu Chan wants to learn from.

In the war between the former Jin and the Khitans, the most important thing was to let the cavalry attack, which required a bait.

The bait of the former Jin Dynasty was the rescue army to rescue Youzhou.

And Liu Chan's bait is the cart of grain and grass.

As long as these elusive Wei cavalry are attracted, there is no way to talk about the mobility of the cavalry, and the field battle will be turned into a defensive battle, and the balance of victory will be tilted to his side.

If the Wei cavalry did not dare to attack, and the grain and grass were continuously transported to Chang'an, Cao Zhen would also lose the opportunity to cut off the Han army's grain route.

For the Han Kingdom, this battle is the victory of the Han Kingdom.

And if he dared to attack the grain team, then Cao Zhen's cavalry problem would be completely solved.

"Riding on foot is probably difficult." Zhuge Liang had a worried look on his face.

In the face of tens of thousands of cavalry swaying in front of you, from time to time to harass you, the pressure of the infantry is very great, if the army is scattered, it will be taken advantage of by the cavalry, and it will directly become a rout.

Liu Chan laughed and said: "You must select elite foot soldiers, and it is worthy of martial arts!" ”

Most of the martial arts are from strong backgrounds, as the reserve of the martial arts hall, they are very well-equipped, and they have experienced countless battles and small battles, so they can do everything without panic.

Mount Tai collapsed in front without changing color.

Now we need to have an elite to destroy Cao Zhen's cavalry!

"Let's give it a try, if you can solve the Wei cavalry with this, it will naturally be the best."

The worst result is only the death of thousands of people in the grain road, which is not a major injury to the vitality of the Han army.

"Liu Feng leads the cavalry, Wang Ping leads the infantry army, set off in ten days!"

Now it's just that Guanzhong has been won, and if you want to completely digest Guanzhong, it seems that you have to toss a lot. (End of chapter)