1627 Rise of the South China Sea

Chapter 3241
The location of Shanhaiguan has been an important throat guarding the land passage between Northeast China and North China since ancient times.Since the Sui and Tang Dynasties, the Central Plains Dynasty built the Guancheng here as an important stronghold for external defense.

In the 14th year of Hongwu in the Ming Dynasty, Xu Da, the king of Zhongshan, was ordered by Zhu Yuanzhang to rebuild a larger Guancheng sixty miles east of the former Guancheng and connect it with the Great Wall, completely cutting off the distance between Yanshan and Bohai. Overland access.

Because it leans against Yanshan Mountain in the north and Bohai Sea in the south, it is named Shanhaiguan.

For more than [-] years since then, Daming has been continuously investing manpower, material and financial resources to expand the Shanhaiguan defense line.How many phases of projects have been repaired over the years, I am afraid that even the officials of the Ministry of Industry cannot tell.

But this coastal line of defense has already become an unbreakable iron gate on the northern border of Daming.Even if it is as powerful as Haihan, if it wants to attack this grand pass, it must be carefully planned and it will take several years to slowly prepare for the battle.

The group of fortresses built east of Shanhaiguan is only one part of this line of defense, but it is not yet the main body of the line of defense.

The real line of defense is the seven large and small cities connected in series by the Great Wall running north-south with the Shanhaiguan Pass City as the center.

The circumference of Shanhaiguan City is nearly ten miles, the wall is four feet six feet high, and the thickness is more than two feet.In addition to Guancheng, the Yanshan water vein was also introduced into the moat.There are city towers on the city gates, and outside the city gates there are urns with side-opening doors.

The city wall on the east side of the Guancheng is integrated with the Great Wall, and this section of the city wall is also the west city wall of Dongluo City, one of the seven pass cities on the defense line.If you look down from the air, Dongluo City looks like a huge urn city on the east side of Guancheng, and its area is almost a quarter of the size of Guancheng.

Originally, more than ten years ago, Daming planned to build another Xiluo City that was symmetrical to it, but soon after the construction started, it was stopped due to funding problems, and finally the project was abandoned.

In addition to Dongluo City, there are also Weiyuan City standing alone outside the Great Wall at the foot of Yanshan Mountain in the northeast of Guancheng, Beiyi City and South Wing City located on the north and south sides of Guancheng, and Weihai, which is crowded on the coast of the Bohai Sea. City and Ninghai City.

There are seven cities of this size on the defense line of Shanhaiguan, which is more than ten miles wide, and there is a large group of fortresses outside the pass. The strength of the defense can be imagined.Back then, it was reasonable for the Qing army not to come to gnaw on this hard bone.

As far as the level of hardware is concerned, it can be said that the strength of this line of defense is no less than that built by Haihan on the Jinzhou Isthmus to resist the Qing army going south.

On the first day of the battle, the Haihan army wiped out most of the fortresses outside the pass, but this was only the beginning of the war.The seven well-fortified cities on the defense line are the next real test.

It is impossible to attack the entire line of defense at the same time, even if all Haihan's garrison in Liaodong is pulled over, it is by no means an easy task.

With Sun Zhen's current available troops, he can only choose one or two attack points on this line of defense, and try to concentrate firepower to break through the city defense.

Faced with such a combat goal, Sun Zhen would not expect to achieve a breakthrough by relying on the infantry's attack. All his hopes were placed on the weapons covered with tarpaulins behind the camp.

It was a new type of artillery that was shipped from the south half a year ago. After receiving it, the Sixth Army Division has been conducting secret training. It has never been used in foreign wars so far.Even when they attacked those Ming army fortresses yesterday, they only used the previously equipped artillery. With this powerful new type of artillery hidden, the Ming army would be caught off guard.

It is said that these cannons were arranged to be unveiled at the National Day event held in Hangzhou. Sun Zhen felt a little regretful that the Sixth Division Lu could not take the lead in such a show.

However, judging from the progress of the current battle situation, the Sixth Army Division is still expected to become the first unit to use this artillery in actual combat. Once Shanhaiguan is conquered, this will be a glory that will be written into military history.Thinking of this, Sun Zhen was immediately full of energy.

The day's sunlight shone on the towers of Shanhaiguan, and a new day's battle kicked off.

With yesterday's devastating offensive experience, today's attack on the remaining fortress groups has made the combat process much smoother.

However, when the infantry tried to break into the last few fortresses to clean up the battlefield, the artillery deployed on the Shanhaiguan city wall took the initiative to fire, trying to stop the Haihan army's offensive from beyond its range of fire.

The several cannons that fired had obviously been calibrated before the battle, and the shells they fired landed precisely in the direction the Haihan army was attacking, and caused some casualties to the infantry.

But this is not entirely a bad thing. The Ming army exposed the firepower in advance, and Sun Zhen can use this as a basis to adjust the direction of attack.

Sun Zhen discussed the battle plan with the combat staff yesterday, and believed that attacking the most heavily fortified Shanhaiguan Pass City was not the best choice.There are Dongluo City and Weng City on the east side of Guancheng. There are several layers of fortifications inside and out. Even if new artillery is used, it may not be able to get immediate results.

Judging from the situation of firing at Guancheng at this time, the Ming army obviously deployed the most powerful artillery to the core area of ​​the defense line, biting the bullet and attacking in this direction will inevitably suffer more personnel losses.

Sun Zhen decided to adopt another offensive plan, attacking the weakly defended area south of Guancheng, between Nanyi City and the coastal cities of Weihai and Ninghai.

The two small towns of Weihai and Ninghai are arranged one after the other along the coastline, and only Weihai City can be seen from the attack direction of Haihan, while the space between Nanyi City and Weihai City is nearly two miles long. Apart from the Great Wall, there are no other fortifications, and this is almost the most obvious weak point of the entire defense line.

Of course, only the Great Wall does not mean that this area is just a wall. The city wall here is as high and thick as the Guancheng, and there is a pier for garrisoning soldiers every hundred feet, and various defensive weapons are also erected on it.

And Da Ming didn't ignore the weakness of this line of defense, on the contrary, this is actually one of the traps set by the entire line of defense.

If the enemy breaks through this section of the city defense, they will soon find that behind this seemingly weak line of defense is a narrow plain with no shelter, which is exactly sandwiched between the three cities of the southern wing, Weihai, and Ninghai.

The shells fired from these three cities can all cover the triangular area in the middle. No matter whether it is infantry or cavalry who invade this area, they will pay a considerable price.

But for Sun Zhen, this is the easiest part of the entire defense line to break through.As for how to crack the layout of the Ming army, it has to break through this line of defense first.

Sun Zhen decisively issued an order: "Let the artillerymen push out the new cannon, aim at the predetermined location, and give me a hard bombardment!"

(End of this chapter)