1627 Rise of the South China Sea

Chapter 730 Passive Situation

"Is Master Bart satisfied with these meals?" Although the expression on Bart's face had already explained everything, Cheng Dapeng still tested Bart's opinion in a very humble tone.

Bart wiped the oil stains from the corners of his mouth with a napkin, burped loudly, and then responded to Cheng Dapeng: "It's great! Seriously, after this meal, I really want to order the cook who is in charge of the army's logistics to be dragged away." Go out and hang yourself! In comparison, the food we ate on the battlefield these days is simply pig food!"

"Master Bart is satisfied! Since the adults like it, the villain will ask the cook to prepare an extra meal and send it here every day." Naturally, Cheng Dapeng would not miss the opportunity and immediately climbed up the pole.

"If the soldiers and civilians in the city have the awareness to become bosses, then the end of the war will come sooner." Bart sighed with emotion.

"Could it be that today's war is not going well?" Cheng Dapeng asked tentatively.

Although Batavia officials did not announce the progress of today's battle, the walls of the east, north, and west walls were filled with cannon fire from early in the morning, and the cannon fire continued for two days in the afternoon. For hours, this made the tens of thousands of residents in the city tense.Cheng Dapeng is naturally no exception, but what he wants to know is not only the progress of the battle, but also the process and means of combat between the two sides. Compared with the result, these details are more valuable to the Haihan military.

"I have to admit that these wild monkeys outside the city are really difficult!" Speaking of this topic, Bart's good mood just because of the delicious food seemed to disappear all of a sudden.

Although the fight against the Mata blue army is an absolute military secret, the delicious food sent by Cheng Dapeng just now has greatly deepened Bart's trust in him. Peng has let go of his guard and began to describe today's fighting situation to him.

Cheng Dapeng was undoubtedly very shocked by the situation described by Bart. He had carefully checked the equipment of the Dutch defenders when he visited the city wall last time, and believed that the Dutch defenders should have considerable Strong combat capability, at least above the Ming army.Coupled with the solid city defense of Batavia City, it should be reasonable to cause a lot of damage to the siege enemy at the beginning of the battle.Moreover, the artillery fire during the battle during the day was so dense that in Cheng Dapeng's imagination, hundreds of artillery pieces were fired, and at least two or three thousand enemy troops were killed by the bombardment. How could the battle situation be still at a disadvantage.

The reason for this situation is undoubtedly the main reason for the tactics adopted by the Mata blue army in this attack on Batavia.The Batavian authorities made preparations based on the fighting conditions of the two armies in previous years, but apparently underestimated the changes in the enemy's tactics.The tactics adopted by the Mata Blues on the first day of the battle left the defenders visibly at a loss.The large trebuchets that appeared on the battlefield were obviously not improvised siege equipment made by the Mata blue army after they came here, but were made early and transported by sea boats from farther places to participate in the battle.The Mata blue army did not rush to launch an offensive in the first two days after logging in, probably just assembling these huge siege machines in the camp.From this point of view, the pre-war preparations of the Mata Blues are undoubtedly more targeted, and the results achieved are also very obvious.

The Mata blue army with primitive equipment was able to take the initiative from the very beginning, which Cheng Dapeng never expected before the war.According to Cheng Dapeng's prediction, even if the Mata blue army could gain the upper hand in the battle by virtue of its strength, it would probably only be achieved after suffering heavy casualties during the siege.I never thought that on the first day of the war, the performance of the Mata Blues gave forecasters like Cheng Dapeng a heavy slap in the face.

Although the Mata blue army inevitably paid a certain price in casualties during the battle, but judging from the current casualty ratio of the troops participating in the battle, the Mata blue army really does not have a significant gap with the Dutch army.The Mata blue army may not be able to calculate the casualties of the Dutch army, but the condescending Dutch army can see it clearly. For a commander like Bart, today's battle process undoubtedly caused a certain psychological shadow on the defenders.Originally, the sharp firearms that the Dutch army was proud of combined with the solid city defenses caused extremely limited damage to the opponent. However, the horse-fighting blue army, which was regarded as island monkeys, barbarians, and heretics, used the primitive weapons in their hands to fight proudly. record.

"This... this is really..." Rao Cheng Dapeng was eloquent, but after hearing Bart's description, he was a little speechless.Whether it is comfort or encouragement at this juncture, it seems a bit wrong to stand in Cheng Dapeng's position.Fortunately, he was thinking fast, and after a short pause, he continued the conversation: "Master Bart, we have an old saying that if you keep the green hills, you don't have to worry about no firewood. After all, the city of Batavia is still with us." In your hands, no matter how powerful the Matalan people are, they can't fly in out of thin air, right? Besides, it must be difficult to manufacture such a huge trebuchet, and they may not be able to replenish the wear and tear after they are outside the city. Catapults, don’t they have to be filled with human lives!”

Bart thought to himself that he just didn't know how many trebuchets the Matalan people had prepared. If there were hundreds of them, then everyone might really have to consider surrendering in advance to save their lives.Of course, he would not tell Cheng Dapeng what was in his heart, so he nodded and said, "Boss Cheng is right, as long as I, Bart, are still around, I won't let Matalan people step into Batavia. City step!"

Cheng Dapeng bid farewell to Bart and returned to his residence, feeling happy and worried.The happy thing is that he succeeded in connecting with Bart, and he will also have an excuse to go to the city defense fortifications to inquire about the battle situation and obtain first-hand information during the battle in the future; Falling into passivity from the very beginning, it really made people worry whether the city of Batavia would be able to defend itself.

Although Cheng Dapeng has never seen the battle situation in person, judging from Bart's description, the biggest problem for the Dutch army at present is that they cannot quickly deal with the large number of catapults in the enemy's formation, and they are almost watching the opponent bit by bit. Destroy your own fortifications.How to make the Dutch army get rid of this disadvantage, Cheng Dapeng can't think of any effective way.Although he had also received basic military skills training when he was trained in the Ministry of Security, he was really a layman on how to command operations.

Cheng Dapeng thought again, if one day it is the Haihan militia that needs to face the Mata blue army on the battlefield, how should we deal with it?But as soon as this thought came to him, he laughed dumbfounded himself.The range of the Dutchman's artillery is limited, and he can't take advantage of the trebuchets of the Mata blue army. However, the artillery equipped by the Haihan militia is quite different. There is no chance of pushing the trebuchet too close.Moreover, the range of 400 meters of the trebuchet has almost reached its limit. If you want to build a trebuchet with a longer range, then its volume will have to be expanded, the transportation and deployment on the battlefield will be more inconvenient, and the time and cost required for manufacturing will be greatly As a result, its cost-effectiveness may not be comparable to that of using artillery.

Cheng Dapeng recalled that he had heard that during the Haihan militia's battle in Annan, the southern Ruan's army had used large weapons such as trebuchets on the battlefield, but their range and power were probably not as good as those of the Matalan people. The giant trebuchet prepared was blown to pieces under Haihan's artillery fire without even having a chance to play a role.

Thinking about it this way, although the Dutch have always been proud of their level of armed forces, compared with the Haihan militia, it can be said that they are superior.However, this also reflects the importance of intelligence work from the side. If the Dutch could collect the opponent's combat readiness in advance, then the current situation would not be so passive.What Cheng Dapeng did in Batavia at this time was precisely to prevent the Haihan militia from having similar embarrassments on the battlefield in the future.Thinking of this, Cheng Dapeng felt that an inexplicable force had been injected into himself, so he took up a pen and recorded Bart's description of the battle situation in detail.

The news gathered to Dacheng Rice Bank that day was not limited to Bart, and several other people who worked with Cheng Dapeng also obtained other news through other channels.

Although the Mata blue army took the north of Batavia City as the main direction of attack, they also launched offensives in the east and west directions at the same time.It is said that the battle process is similar to that in the north, but the other sources of information are hearsay, which is far less detailed than what Bart described to Cheng Dapeng.

According to the information obtained from the city's medical and medical institutions, there were a certain number of casualties and war damage on the east and west sides.In particular, the explosion outside the east city before the end of the battle in the evening was heard by almost half of Batavia City, and the casualties caused by it also overwhelmed the field medical institutions in the east city.In addition, a large number of civilians were dispatched to the east and north to leave the city. It is said that they wanted to rush to repair the fort that was damaged by the opponent's catapult during today's battle.It only takes about ten hours until dawn, and there is really nothing to look forward to how much work the peasants can complete in the dark. It can only be said that it is better than nothing.

Since the official has sealed off the battle situation, and the curfew has been enforced since it got dark, there is no negative news spreading in the city yet.On the other hand, dozens of Matalan corpses were hung on the square in the center of the city. The council and the military can only use this method to strengthen the confidence of the people in the war situation.As for the next battle strategy, Cheng Dapeng reckons that a big man like Fan Dimen may not be better than himself, and he can think of a better way to deal with the catapults of the Matalan man.

On July 7th, not long after the sky dawned, the horns of the Mata Blue Army began to echo in the wilderness outside the city.If hearing such a trumpet sound the day before would cause the defenders to fight, then after yesterday's battle, many people's first reaction to the sound of the trumpet probably turned into a headache.Because with the sound of this trumpet, perhaps a large number of stone bullets will fall from the sky next.

Sure enough, the Mata blue army still continued yesterday's combat method. Dozens of tall trebuchets were slowly pushed out of the camp and headed towards the city of Batavia.Although they are well aware of the opponent's tactics, the defenders currently have no better way to deal with it. They can only watch the opponent deploy trebuchets in a calm manner, and slowly adjust the position and launch angle.

The only thing that can make the defenders feel lucky is that the commanders can see from the binoculars that the number of stone bombs piled up next to the trebuchet is much lower than yesterday. It seems that the Mata blue army's stone throwing tactics also have the problem of ammunition supply.There are actually two quarries outside the city of Batavia, but they are far away from the port where the opponent landed, and there is probably no way to excavate enough stones to transport them to the battlefield in a short period of time.

However, this kind of luck did not last long, and soon the commander of the Dutch army saw from the binoculars that Matalan men were transporting carts of gravel and bricks to the front line in small carts.There is no doubt that the Matalan people are not stupid. After they discovered the problem, they chose the nearest solution and began to demolish the buildings outside the city.

Although the residents of Batavia mainly live in the city, there are many facilities such as plantations, ports, and trading markets outside the city, and there are also many buildings.If the Mata blue army had the patience to demolish all the masonry buildings within a radius of ten miles outside the city, then the demolished masonry would probably be enough to smash the entire city wall of Batavia to pieces.

"It's all gravel, and the trebuchet is not so accurate." The commanders could only use such helpless words to comfort the ugly-faced subordinates.

At present, the defenders have not yet obtained permission to go out to fight in the city, and there are only a few hundred cavalry in the city. The tens of thousands of horses who want to go out of the city to fight against the blue army will undoubtedly seek their own death. It will destroy all the limited mobile power on the battlefield.Therefore, after losing the best opportunity to go out of the city to fight a few days ago, Van Diemen no longer mentioned his plan to send cavalry to fight.

The accuracy of throwing gravel is indeed far less than that of a whole stone bullet, and its ability to damage the fortress wall is much worse. However, its effect like a goddess scattering flowers is to make the defenders in the fortress outside the city suffer. .The soldiers had to gather under the wall to avoid being hit by the masonry fragments falling like raindrops.Even a stone the size of an egg is powerful enough to kill people when it falls here. Even a metal helmet is very likely to have its neck broken after being hit by a stone.

"These damned cowards! They just hide away and throw stones! Could it be that these heretics are all monkeys?" Bart on the city wall saw the embarrassment of the defenders outside the city, and couldn't help yelling.

(End of this chapter)