stubborn thief

Tang Tong was stunned.

He saw that Wu Dahai's cavalry was afraid in the charge, so he reluctantly shot an arrow and Zhang Yi turned back.

At that time, he was thinking about whether to send soldiers to capture the general in python-patterned armor who was leading the troops in the distance.

Then his wish came true. As soon as the general discovered Zuo Guangxian's cavalry, he led his troops to join the cavalry and rushed into his formation almost in an attempt to escape.

The whole collision process was extremely fast.

The cavalry came closer and again spread their wings and fired arrows, looking the same as last time.

But this time they came prepared, and the arrows were more powerful, denser and more accurate, shooting straight at one point in the phalanx.

While shooting down several soldiers, a team of armored soldiers dismounted, stabbed the horses' buttocks with their swords, and drove their horses to meet the flags and spears and charge into the battle formation.

The soldiers on horseback followed up and fought with the reinforcements at the opening of the army formation, gradually tearing open a gap, after which the cavalry filed into the formation.

Very ferocious.

There was no way they could not be fierce. Only half of the entire cavalry entered the formation of the Zuosi Army of the Han Army under Tang Tong. The remaining half, because of the resistance and fighting of the Zuosi soldiers, did not have time to enter the formation and was intercepted by the lancers riding past outside.

No impact.

When the Lancers got closer, they began to slow down and spread out their formation, making a gesture to intimidate the enemy cavalry.

The Blue-bordered Cavalry were indeed frightened. The cavalry that did not have time to join the battle immediately moved to the side, drew their bows and drew their arrows, shooting as they retreated.

But this was exactly the purpose of the Lancers. After driving away nearly half of them, the Mongolian cavalry behind them continued to drive them away. The Oirats cavalry turned their horses' heads and stabbed down with their spears one by one the loose cavalry outside the formation that had neither joined the formation nor fled.

It's easy to play leisurely.

Because the Mongolian lieutenant general of the mobile camp was Yunduchi.

He was the fifth son of the Khan, the national teacher of the Khoshut tribe, and the elder brother of Dorji, the general of the Yanqing tourism army.

Yun Duchi not only did not treat the Eight Banners cavalry with caution as if they were facing a powerful enemy, he did not even take them seriously. Even when he looked at the cavalry charging the battle formation during the march, his eyes were playful and mocking.

Anyone who sees the look in his eyes can read: I want to see how you die.

Because this scene seemed familiar to him.

The commanders of these armored cavalry were too stupid.

Yundu Chixin said: You are as stupid as I was back then.

Young people are like this, they have little experience.

Although the armor of the Eight Banners cavalry was not bad, Yun Duchi felt that it was still a little lacking in protection compared to the armored cavalry of the Khoshut tribe who wore chain mail over a four-mirror armor.

During the Hehuang Campaign, Yun Duchi, under the command of his father, the Imperial Preceptor Khan, drove the Chahar surrendered troops through Liu Chengzong's army, filled their trenches with the corpses of men and horses, and used the Khoshut armored cavalry in his hands to ram Liu Chengzong's artillery.

Artillery must be the weak point in military combat. This is what the national teacher Khan and Yunduchi thought at the time.

So they blindfolded their horses, overturned the carts and the battle lines, and rushed in. The artillery was approached, the advantage was on my side, and victory was at hand!
What happened later?

The fight has just begun after breaking the formation.

Instead of running away, the artillerymen drew their swords, pulled out their golden hammers, and hammered the shit out of the armored cavalry.

To bump into them is simply to be tired of living.

Yun Duchi even felt that even without support, Tang Tong's gunners could kill these cavalrymen in the battle formation.

This was the experience gained by the Khoshut cavalry when they collided with Liu Chengzong, with blood and tears.

When the quality, equipment and organizational ability of the armies are similar, nine out of ten times when cavalry clashes, they will lose.

A cavalry collision is a gamble.

As long as the infantry formation holds up, the cavalry will be doomed.

Therefore, Tang Tong in the army was not panicked at all. When he found that the Oirats cavalry came to support him, he simply ignored the half of his Han army that was destroyed by the cavalry, and instead dispatched another Han army that had not been attacked to withdraw and move forward to support the Western Barbarians.

He himself also looked towards the front intently.

A frontal infantry confrontation is the battlefield where the real winner is determined.

While Wudahai was charging the camp, the cavalry and infantry of the Second Bordered Blue Banner led by Fei Yanggu were still advancing. At this time, the distance between them had reached a hundred steps, and the front of the Bordered Blue formation had gradually widened.

Everyone in the Bordered Blue Banner also had a horse, but like the Marshal's Army, when the armies were engaged, in order to avoid disconnection between the infantry and the cavalry, the cavalry and infantry all led their horses on foot. Some teams responsible for infantry attack missions simply left their war horses in the center.

At this time, Tang Tong could already see the opposing team's formation clearly. It was also a one-two-line formation with gaps on all four sides, that is, dozens of small teams formed into three horizontal lines.

The first line has more infantry than cavalry, and their positions are 1, 3, 5, 7, and 9; the second line is mainly cavalry, and their positions are 2, 4, 6, and 8; the third line is a reserve force with mixed infantry and cavalry and war horses, and their positions are the same as the first line.

The formations of each Niulu small formation are basically similar. Most of them are one or two-character formations. Each small formation is separated by a width of one formation in front, behind, left and right. The entire large formation forms a wide and extremely large canine-tooth battle line.

This is also the idea of ​​Zhuge Liang's Eight Formations, which is about the accommodation between formations and between teams.

The advantage of such a formation is that it is easier to deploy troops and support retreat during battle.

Fei Yanggu was in the third line of the battle formation, the Bordered Blue Banner Army was in the second line, and the first line was still Hu Xibu's Mongolian Banner.

Since Nurhaci started his army to fight against the Jurchen tribes, his tactics had been like this: seize people and livestock first if possible, then throw the captured people into the front line of the battlefield to fight, attracting arrows and cannonballs, wasting gunpowder and physical strength, and wait until the enemy killed each other and the old soldiers were tired and lost their fighting spirit, then send Jianzhou to fight and defeat them in one fell swoop.

When fighting Shenyang and Liaoyang, and even in later battles, they would capture as many people as possible. The Ming Dynasty even had a term for these people, "the shaved army."

This is not specifically aimed at the Han people.

The nobles of the Later Jin Dynasty treated everyone equally, starting with the Jurchens. For attacking troops, they would use Suwan instead of Suzi if they could, and Zhechen instead of Suwan if they could. Later, when the scale became larger, they could use Haixi instead of Jianzhou, and could use barbarians instead of Haixi.

After long using the strategy of using barbarians to control barbarians adopted by Lord Li of Liaodong, Nurhaci surpassed his teacher and worked out a set of effective management methods.

This was also the reason why Huang Taiji issued a special imperial edict to rectify military discipline and require that people should not be plundered and couples should not be separated when Ajige was advancing westward via a roundabout route.

Because they had been used by the Eight Banners, Han Chinese, Mongolians, Jurchen barbarians, Korean captives, and bachelors were not easy to mess with.

Although there are some timid and cowardly people everywhere, there are more people who will do bad things.

The barbarians were okay, at most they would kill a few people guarding the prisoners on their way out; the Mongols were the best, although they also looked down on the Jurchens a bit, but the Mongolian nobles valued strength, and if they were convinced on the battlefield, they would be convinced in their hearts too, and their tribesmen did not have many problems except stealing iron pots.

The situation of Han and Korean bachelor captives is more outrageous, but in different ways.

The most outrageous thing about North Korea is the Yangban nobles. They bully the weak and fear the strong. When other men are captured and escape, they will definitely kill the Later Jin soldiers first. When the Yangban nobles want to escape, they will insult the Later Jin women first.

Nurhaci originally wanted to kill all the captured Korean soldiers in Sarhu, but was dissuaded by Daishan. As a result, some nobles from the two classes did it, and the old Khan could not bear it. Daishan persuaded him eight hundred times, and in the end only the nobles outside the city were killed, killing four or five hundred of them.

The outrageous thing about the Han captives is that they are difficult to predict. The Ming army in Liaodong came from all over the place, and even those who were looted and robbed in roundabout ways included all kinds of people.

If you treat him well, he will kill you if he rebels against you. If you treat him badly, he will also kill you if he rebels against you.

The key point is that they are not trying to escape, but to rebel. Killing their master is the lightest punishment, and they will set fires and poison people at any time. Although they often cannot achieve their goals due to limited poison and the noise caused by setting fires, it seems that as long as the number of people exchanged exceeds one, it is worth it.

On the contrary, if the couple were brought together, they could be tied up, and they could not escape as slaves, and dare to die as soldiers. At this time, the Bordered Blue Banner Army had no Han troops available, so Hu Xibu's Mongolian Banner could only charge and fight to the death.

They are dismounted cavalry, and their ability to charge into battle is much stronger than when they are on horseback.

The cavalry charging the battle formation is impressive, but in fact it is not that powerful. As long as they are not frightened, any cavalryman without armor can break into the battle formation.

Because the cavalry will cause chaos when they enter the battle line, and they will inevitably be outnumbered in some local areas...but an army without even armor can be scared away by a donkey charging at them. It is almost impossible for them not to be scared away by the sight of a cavalry charge.

The power of the infantry charge is much greater because the formation is more dense, and when the musketeers are close together, with the same number of people, the armored ones have a huge advantage over the unarmored ones.

The Corning Musketeers' protective equipment was very poor. Although they also wore cloth armor, only the helmet was normal. The cloth armor only had forty armor plates on the chest and back. Its protective ability in combat was not even as good as the two iron arm restraints on the arms.

This was not Liu Chengzong's discriminatory treatment, or the officers' embezzlement, but the firearmsmen of the Marshal's Army were basically all like this.

Even without mentioning that the Marshal's Army's firearms and ammunition were heavier, the Ming Army's three-long guns, which were the equipment of the bird-gunners during the Chongzhen period, weighed twenty kilograms just from the muskets, ammunition, and matchlocks they carried with them.

This is almost the weight of a long piece of armor made of wrought iron and steel, with cold-forged armor plates.

However, the Ming army's muskets were equipped with 300 rounds of ammunition, each weighing six cents, and 30 pre-loaded cartridges.

The Marshal's army had no ammunition for their heavy guns; instead, the gunpowder and lead ingots were placed on the carts and melted down when they were not needed.

They only had thirty pre-loaded cartridges, but even so, the ammunition was too heavy to handle. A pre-loaded one-plus-three-four-round cartridge weighed four ounces and five centimeters, which was more than eight pounds.

In fact, ever since the heavy gun was changed, the Marshal's gunners carried fewer and fewer cartridges. At the beginning, there were thirty of them. After defeating the Oirats, he took ten and put them on the car. After defeating Cao Wenzhao and Zu Kuan's gang, he took another ten and put them on the car.

Because they found that no one could make them fire ten guns in a battle.

The average army would be stunned by a single volley, and their morale would collapse after two rounds of firing, leading to their immediate defeat.

Even if the enemy was more elite, they would rush forward to fight with only three guns... Liu Chengzong's gun team was too hated on the battlefield and was almost always attacked in every battle.

At this moment, Fei Yanggu felt that the smoke from the bird guns on the opposite side was just for the atmosphere, and the ones that really fired the lead bullets like water came from the cannons hidden in a pile of firearms.

The bullets are too dense, they cannot be fired by hundreds of guns.

The Later Jin Dynasty had seen both heavy guns and raised spears. They also had them, namely the banjiu gun and the big chasing wind spear.

But both the Banjiu Gun and the Dazhuifeng Gun only fire one large bullet, which is not as big as the lead bullet fired by the opponent.

It's unacceptable to have thousands of small lead bullets sprayed at you at once.

Fei Yanggu concluded that there were at least three thousand-jin cannons in that formation.

In fact, there is none.

There were only four 200-jin small cannons, but because their barrels were short and their range for shooting scattered bullets was shorter than that of raising the guns, they were not fired and were placed in the formation.

The Blue Mongols suffered heavy casualties in the charge.

Twenty or thirty steps away, the troops of each Niulu Banner fired arrows frantically at one point in front of the main attack formation. Arrows rained down like rain and hit the chariots and long shields with a sound of breaking through the air.

Their bows and arrows were extremely accurate at this distance, not only injuring the gunners who had no time to dodge, but also suppressing more soldiers hiding behind long shields and chariots, making them dare not show their heads, in order to completely interrupt the shooting of the gunners from the reinforcement camp.

At this time, many Western Barbarian musketeers had already finished reloading their ammunition. They simply extended their muskets through the gaps in their long shields and fired at the army formation.

Although the number is small, even the three small lead bullets in the gun barrel can penetrate armor and cause serious injuries.

But in reality, all the bullets fired were fatal. They were too close, and the four lead bullets, one large and three small, had no time to spread out, and they all hit the same unlucky guy.

Moreover, although the small lead bullets could not achieve any success, the large lead bullets could penetrate the armor of the people, and even after penetrating the front row of Blue Banner Mongolian soldiers, they continued to injure the Blue Banner Army behind them.

However, no matter how much damage the muskets caused at this time, they could not stop the enemy from charging.

The Gushan Ezhen of the Eight Banners Mongols are generally Mongolians, but the Blue Bordered Mongols are not. Their Gushan Huxibs are Yehe nobles.

Hu Xibu was a tough guy and was originally a follower of Irgen Jueluo Ashan.

Before the Jin Dynasty came into being, Ashan and his family defected to Nurhaci and served under Daishan. However, Daishan did not value him, so in anger he defected to the Ming Dynasty.

As a result, as soon as they entered the border, they were hacked to pieces by the Ming border troops and ran back in fear.

Nurhaci killed his two sons and forced them to continue serving him.

Later, during the reign of Huang Taiji, when Duoduo was fourteen years old, Ajige wanted to arrange a marriage for him. He planned to let Duoduo marry the daughter of their uncle Abutai, so he sent Ashan's younger brother to act as a matchmaker.

Abutai was the chief of the Ula tribe in the Later Jin. If the marriage was successful, the power of the three brothers Ajige, Dorgon and Dodo in the Later Jin would be at its peak.

So Huang Taiji was furious and stripped Ajige of his title as the leader of the Bordered White Banner and even killed Ashan's brother directly.

Ashan was frightened and defected from the Ming Dynasty again. This time he sent two followers to contact the Ming army in advance, but these two people were killed by the Ming army again.

As his follower, Hu Xibu felt that there was no hope in defecting with Ashan, so he fled back to the Later Jin.

When he escaped back, he was demoted to a commoner and put under the command of Gushan Yibai of the Mongolian Empire at that time. Although Yibai was a member of the Zhushen clan, he had lived in the area ruled by Khorchin for generations. He did not recognize the Manchuria established by Huang Taiji, and considered himself a Mongolian. He also controlled the Mongolian flags that surrendered to the Later Jin.

He was mostly responsible for the reception and diplomatic missions of the Later Jin Dynasty to Mongolian nobles.

Therefore, Yibai was particularly protective of the Mongols. Whenever they went into battle, he would let the Jurchens under his command go first, while the Mongols would watch from behind and only go forward when the troops in front were tired.

But at that time, Lindan Khan was still alive, and it was the national policy of the Later Jin Dynasty to win over the Mongolian tribes. Ibai was too prestigious among the Mongols, and no one could do anything to him. They could only bribe the Mongols under his command.

During the Ji Si Rebellion, when Zunhua was attacked, a Mongolian soldier under Yibai's command climbed the city wall before the Eight Banners. Huang Taiji was so happy that he summoned him personally, gave him wine, and rewarded him with cattle, horses, silk and cloth. He also gave him the title of Baturu and appointed him as Niulu Zhangjing.

In that battle, Hu Xibu was the second one to climb the city wall and got a defensive position.

Later, he made successive contributions. Because of his Yehe noble family background and his meritorious service to the Mongolian banner, and because of the expansion of the Eight Banners of Mongolia, he was appointed Gushan Ezhen.

Hu Xibu has plenty of experience in fighting against firearms.

When the rain of arrows did not kill many enemy soldiers, Hu Xibu was not discouraged, but relieved.

Because the enemy was dodging the arrows.

The armored soldiers of the Ming army would not dodge the arrows, at most they would lower their heads.

Before the attack, Hu Xibu had made preparations for both situations. If these firearmsmen did not dodge the rain of arrows, he would have to plan to retreat.

On the contrary, after disrupting the enemy's firearms and getting close to them, it seemed that the battle was sure to be won, so they immediately urged each Niulu to intensify the attack.

At once, the Blue Mongols clashed in groups. The ones at the back drew their bows and shot arrows at the chariots and shields to suppress them. The armored soldiers in the front pounced on the chariots, rammed their long shields, and pushed and hooked the chariots.

The firearmsmen on the chariots and behind the shields also drew their swords and stabbed. For a while, the two sides wrestled continuously across the shields and chariots. After all, the Western Barbarians were inferior in armor and lacked courage in the fight, and their front line was soon filled with gaps.

The pressure on the reinforcement camp's front lines suddenly eased, and a large number of Blue-bordered Mongolian soldiers rushed to several gaps, trying to gradually tear them open in order to break through the formation.

Just at this moment, Niulu Zhangjing, who had first broken into the formation, looked up and found that the people behind the opposite chariot formation had been replaced.

They were fully armored infantrymen wearing long red helmets and helmets, holding flags and spears, and holding golden spears. Under the command of the military commanders, they pushed four small red cannons and formed a new battle line to launch a counterattack against them! (End of this chapter)