I want to be emperor

Chapter 439 tit for tat
Hong Chengchou sent Zu Dashou, Wu Xiang and other Liaodong generals to attack in a detour with tens of thousands of troops.

This kind of thing can't be hidden from the Chu army!

Even though the distance between the two sides is dozens of kilometers, in fact, the total number of 10,000+ troops of the two sides is gathered here, and their respective scouts are everywhere. It may be difficult for these scouts to directly break into the enemy's main force at close range, but breaking into It is still possible to take a look at the outer areas from a distance.

What's more, tens of thousands of troops attacked, this is not a small news, just after Zu Dashou and the others attacked, the Chu army scouts lurking around Tianjin discovered something strange, and immediately sent someone to send the news back quickly while following them from a distance.

Under the gallop of the reconnaissance horse, the speed of message transmission is no less than that of the [-]-mile rush supported by the post station system. In just one day, General Li Chengtong, who was leading the army northward, obtained the information that the Ming army was attacking with a large number of troops. .

"A large number of cavalry in the enemy army?"

"Still carrying the banner of Zu Dashou?"

Li Chengtong judged it immediately based on the information from multiple sources. The Ming army must have sent a large group of cavalry to go around and attack its own supply line, and even contain or even threaten its own army from the side and rear.

At this time, General Dong Mingjie, the commander of the second army, said: "Brother Li, a large number of enemy cavalry attacked. If there is no accident, they rushed to our rear, or even Jinghai. Should we send cavalry to intercept?"

Although Dong Mingjie is also a general of the army, the leader of the first army, but his qualifications are less senior. He was promoted to a general of the army because of his military exploits after the Jiangbei Battle, while Li Chengtong was promoted to a general of the army after the Battle of Dongjin last year. , and also the first batch of generals in the Great Chu Empire.

Therefore, although both sides are generals, their qualifications are still quite different.

What's more, before the Northern Expedition, when they held a strategic meeting in Huai'an, the emperor Luo Zhixue had already appointed Li Chengtong as the North Zhili garrison commander in advance to take charge of the war in the North Zhili area, and ordered that if there was a multi-military cooperation on the front line, Next, with Li Chengtong as the main force, General Dong Mingjie, commander of the Second Army, and General Li Dongshao, commander of the First Army, as assistants.

So in this Tianjin battle, the supreme commander was Li Chengtong, so Dong Mingjie naturally needed to ask Li Chengtong for his decision.

Li Chengtong said: "The troops from the Liaodong side came out. There are tens of thousands of people. Naturally, they can't easily go around and go south. If we let them run behind us, although the inland river fleet on the navy's side is fierce. It can't stand the other party's ambush in advance or even block the canal directly. Once the canal is blocked, the logistics will be worrying!"

"Since the opponent's move is a big move, and they sent out all their Guanning iron cavalry, then we can't be too petty here, let the three cavalry brigades gather and attack, and let the tenth division cooperate with them in the battle."

"It's just right, let the tenth division try to see how effective they are in actual combat with the multi-time hollow phalanx!"

Hearing Li Chengtong talk about the hollow phalanx, Dong Mingjie said, "Hollow phalanx? But the formation that His Majesty personally proposed to resist cavalry?"

"At the end of last year, I also watched the tenth division practice the hollow phalanx in Jinling City. To be honest, I always felt that this formation was too thin."

"If you only rely on the musketeers, then these musketeers' muskets have sleeve thorns, which can barely serve as short spearmen, but after all, they are not spearmen in heavy armor. I am afraid that it will be difficult to resist the cavalry attack!"

Dong Mingjie is still a little worried about this. In his opinion, the best way to fight against the enemy's elite cavalry is to form a huge phalanx of musketeers and spearmen like the traditional infantry division.

The middle of the four sides is protected by heavy armored spearmen, and the four corners are deployed by musketeers to shoot. It has both defensive capabilities and lethality. It is difficult for ordinary cavalry, even cavalry in heavy armor, to break through this formation.

However, Li Chengtong said: "The problem should not be big. We have conducted many drills before. During the Battle of Jiangbei, an infantry battalion on the side of the Tenth Division was also attacked by enemy cavalry. Then formed three hollow phalanxes, one big, two small, and three, which blocked the enemy's cavalry attack and forced them to retreat!"

When Li Chengtong said this, he actually lacked confidence.

Although this hollow phalanx tactic was proposed and implemented by His Majesty himself, it has performed very well in many drills and even several small-scale actual combats.

But it's still hard to be completely reassured.

For example, drills are more of a simulation. You can't really let a group of cavalry directly charge towards infantry. This is not a drill, but an actual combat.

In the case of exercises, it is also difficult for infantry to feel the sense of oppression from a large number of enemy cavalry charging, and this sense of oppression is a test of the soldiers' will. It is very possible to give up holding the front line or even turn around and run.

And once a soldier escapes, a chain reaction will easily occur, eventually leading to the collapse of the entire formation, and the subsequent enemy cavalry will kill the fleeing soldiers one by one like killing pigs.

In addition to not charging directly, it is also difficult to model the situation where the enemy cavalry rushes up desperately, and then throws a large number of cavalry bows and arrows in a close range. Although the musketeers of one's own side are all wearing armor, the protection area of ​​half-body light armor is priority , the performance is also limited, and it is still incapable of facing some heavy arrows that specialize in armor-piercing.

However, Li Chengtong still sent them out.

Because Li Chengtong knew that the firepower density of the new troops like the Tenth Division was not comparable to that of the old troops like the Eighth Division.

Even under the impact of enemy cavalry, the Tenth Division, which can form a tighter formation with flintlock guns, is enough to fire more bullets.

Perhaps, when the enemy cavalry charged, they would collapse due to the heavy casualties.

Li Chengtong ordered the three cavalry brigades and the tenth division to attack together and march towards Xiwen'an.

There is the detour direction of Zu Dashou's department.

If nothing unexpected happens, the two armies will meet about [-] kilometers west of Jinghai.

And this is unlikely to be a surprise.

Under the monitoring of many scouts on both sides, the movements of the main forces of both sides are basically translucent. The Chu army knew that tens of thousands of Liaodong soldiers of the Ming army had detoured, and it didn't take long. Zu Dashou also knew that the Chu army had dispatched nearly two An army of ten thousand people came to intercept.

Yes!

The Chu army did not play any trick of equal strength with the Ming army, but dispatched three cavalry brigades and a tenth division in one go, with a total strength of nearly 2 troops.

The strength of this force has reached twice the advantage in an instant!
This made Zu Dashou on the opposite side want to vomit blood... Why, he still wants to bully people by numbers.

After complaining, Zu Dashou chose to retreat very conscientiously!

But as soon as he retreated, Hong Chengchou who was behind heard the news, and sent someone to scold him bloody.

Retreat when encountering Chu thief's interception?

Your ancestor Dashou is still fighting a fart. Since the Chu thief intercepts it, you can fucking go around for me. If you can't go around, just rush over.

No matter what method you think of, you have to go around by this official, attack their logistics line, and even attack Qing County.

Now that he was halfway on the road, he wanted to run back in despair. Would he want to sit back and watch the Chu thief make steady progress all the way north, and then talk about the city of Tianjin?

In that case, I want you Guan Ning cavalry to be useless, why not bring tens of thousands of cannon fodder to the battlefield?
Yes!

The reason why Hong Chengchou used various methods, even at the expense of forcibly ordering and oppressing Zu Dashou, they sent troops from Liaodong, and they brought at least [-] elite cavalry.

The purpose is to allow them to use the cavalry's mobility advantage to attack in a detour when the Chu thieves attack, so as to stage the Chu thieves' logistics line.

In order to reduce the pressure on the subsequent frontal battlefield.

It is best to be able to kill the Chu thief's cavalry in one fell swoop, and then grasp the maneuvering advantage of the entire battlefield. In this way, the subsequent battles will be easier to fight.

However, the first time Zu Dashou met the Chu thief, the distance was still dozens of miles away, and he wanted to run away before meeting him.

Hong Chengchou was furious about this.

In this regard, the envoy sent by Hong Chengchou brought Hong Chengchou's very rude oral message.

He said that he could find a way to go around, and he didn't want to find an opportunity to rush over directly, so he wanted to retreat!
Even if you don’t have the confidence or confidence, and you’re afraid you won’t be able to fight, you can always take a detour, and you can find an opportunity to slip through the night or other opportunities.

This place is so big, and there are dozens of miles of empty places around it... Even if you don't want to fight head-on with the Chu thief, you can still find a chance to sneak over there.

As long as it passed, as long as there was such a large army behind the Chu thieves, it would be enough to relieve the huge pressure on the frontal battlefield in Tianjin.

In short, don't expect to run away, if you continue to lead the troops to retreat, I will go crazy, and then I will have to use my head to boost the morale of the army...

Not to mention, Hong Chengchou's threat is still very effective these days, even more effective than Chongzhen's threat...

Chongzhen and those cabinet leaders did not dare to threaten Zu Dashou, because they did not have any troops directly under them, and they were not the front-line troops, and they had to worry about the influence of many overall situations, so they often followed Zu Dashou.

But Hong Chengchou was different. When he took office as governor of Jiliao, he brought tens of thousands of Qin soldiers with him, and he had dozens of long-barreled cannons under him.

Moreover, this person has led troops in Shaanxi and Jiliao for a long time, and he is very good at dealing with veterans such as generals and lieutenants. He also knows how to use money, food, armor and artillery to win people's hearts, and even use food and grass to coerce many generals under his command. .

Even the domineering Zuo Liangyu had to obediently listen to Hong Chengchou when he was in Henan.

Although Zu Dashou is usually more arrogant than Zuo Liangyu, but that was in Liaodong...

After entering the customs, Zu Dashou found that he was controlled by others everywhere!
This is especially true after the money and food brought from Liaodong were eaten up on the road.

Because from that time on, all the food and grass needed by their tens of thousands of troops was in the hands of Hong Chengchou. If Hong Chengchou provoked Hong Chengchou, he would directly cut off the food for you. Even if Zu Dashou could lead his troops to flee back to Liaodong, he would starve to death on the way back to Liaodong. .

As for rushing back all the way...

How do you think the food in Hong Chengchou's hands came from? The court didn't give Hong Chengchou any food...

Hong Chengchou sent troops early to rob all the grain in a large area of ​​Beizhili, so he didn't leave much grain for Zu Dashou.

Facing Hong Chengchou's order, Zu Dashou deeply felt the humiliation of having to bow his head under the eaves.

So while sending people to the surrounding areas to search and prepare food secretly, they turned around and headed south unwillingly.

(End of this chapter)