Prime Minister Bizen

The importance of the main formation on the battlefield is unquestionable. The location of the main formation flag means that the regiment commander is behind the soldiers, and the flying formation flag means that the general of the army is behind the soldiers.

Therefore, under normal circumstances, the main formation will be set up in a conspicuous place, so that the soldiers fighting in front can clearly see the location of the main formation.

Under normal circumstances, the immobile main formation also means that the development of the situation is as expected by the general, and everything is under the control of the general, which will give the subordinate generals who command the front line a more reassuring psychological hint.

Of course, this also depends on the situation. If the situation is stable, sitting firmly in the central army is the best placebo for the soldiers. If the situation on the front line collapses, the front line is still standing still and has not made any changes, which will cause the soldiers on the front line to panic. A feeling of being treated as an outcast.

This is the reason why Suga Masatoshi came to ask Hideka to change the garrison formation and get Hideya's approval after Hitachi stood guard for more than 2 hours.

Of course, when they are at a disadvantage, what soldiers want to see most is that the generals of the formation will appear beside them and fight together with them. This will greatly encourage the low morale on the front line.

In the Battle of Kawanakajima that year, when Uesugi’s army failed to break through the formation many times, it was Uesugi Kenshin who personally led the horse-riding warriors of the formation to break the formation for the whole army, and had a close contact with the tiger.

Now Tokugawa Hidetada saw that his army at the foot of the mountain was struggling to resist, and Yasumasa Sakakibara on the frontal battlefield could not provide support, so he could only send out his main formation, and he personally led it to sit on the northern battlefield of Yelichuan.

In fact, he doesn't need to fight the enemy at all, he only needs to move to Honda Kangzhong, he will give great encouragement to the frontline soldiers, and tell them that the general is behind him, and if he collapses at this moment, it will threaten the safety of the general .

Maybe ordinary recruits don't care whether you are Tokugawa or Nishikawa, but for the samurai who are subject to Tokugawa, it is tantamount to being prepared to press them forward, and then let them force these recruits to retreat.

On the side of the Xiu family, his movement of the formation was not because of the wavering of the front line, but simply because the troops in his hands were not mobilized in time, so he could not let the banners of the formation block it.

However, it is said that the two armies moved successively, which had a considerable impact on the situation.

Sakakibara Komasa saw that Tokugawa Hidetada's main line moved, so he mobilized the red reserve team to catch Hideka's opportunity.The movement of Xiujia's main formation really relieved Suga Masari, who was under a lot of pressure on the front line.

After the order was issued, the Xiu family galloped southward with their attendants and the Banners lined up behind the formation.When passing by the firearms preparation array, he ordered loudly to the firearms preparation general Hideo Yanhara, "All the artillery fires forward, don't worry about cooling down, give me all the bombs!"

Hideka asked Maeda Anhu to attack first in order to harass and delay the progress of the Chibei on the other side. He even paid the price for the team of Banners and the Chibei cavalry to charge each other.

Maeda Anhu led his men to cross the river on horseback first, and bumped into the Ukido Qi team who led the team and fought and retreated, and the red armored cavalry who came to chase them.

If the rangers were at a disadvantage in terms of numbers and equipment before and were unwilling to fight back, now with the support of Xiujia Banner cavalry team, they will never retreat.

Maeda Anhu exchanged a few words with Ukita, and asked them to lead a formation behind him, and the 400 bannermen lined up in a frontal formation to meet the enemy westward.

The changes here were naturally seen by the chasing red cavalry. The two sides reined in their horses and stood dozens of steps away from each other, but it was the Fengchun army who made the first move.

Because both the Banner Cavalry and the Jurchen Rangers are equipped with bows and arrows on their equipment, and their main tasks are to harass and chase. On the contrary, Tokugawa Chibei are all spear cavalry. The purpose of their training is to find weak points to attack Broken.

As the precious red cavalry of the Tokugawa family, his body is naturally more than usual.However, in the face of the bannermen and rangers equipped with armor-piercing arrows, dozens of people still fell to the ground after two rounds of arrow feathers.

As the general of the red cavalry, Uematsu Yoshitaka, his mission was to lead the cavalry to drive away the rangers who were harassed by archery, but he never expected that there would be a cavalry force with the same number as himself.

What made him most uncomfortable was that this armored cavalry also shot arrows at his side with a bow like a ranger, and whether the red equipment on his side was equipped with a bow depended on whether the samurai was proficient in bows and horses. counterattack.

Faced with this situation, he either rushed up and continued to disperse at the risk of falling into the enemy's formation, or turned around and returned to the main formation to wait for the ashigaru to continue to oppress.

As Kiso Yoshimasa's younger brother, he knew very well that the one in front of him had all kinds of colors, but all those riding and shooting with longbows must be the elite members of the Toyoharu family.These cavalry have been selected from the beginning of their preparations to be skilled in horse archery.

At the time of Jibei, there were no more than 800 cavalry, and it was only supplemented to 1200 cavalry before the Hojo Crusade. However, after the Kanto was transferred to the Kanto, knowledge and behavior doubled, and the Kanto warriors were as proficient in bow and horse as Jibei, but this cavalry still only retained 1800 It can be seen that the current cavalry in the banner are all elite warriors.

He is very clear about the level of the Chibei in his hand, and it is no problem to use it to fight in the field, but after all, if it is not the original Takeda Chibei, what are the chances of winning against the elite Toyoharu Banner?
But he got the order to disperse the rangers. If he just took people back like this, and the rangers turned around and harassed the team again, wouldn't the mission not be completed?
Just as he was hesitating, several people on his side fell from their horses with armor-piercing arrows, and the subordinates were already in a commotion at this moment, constantly urging him to give orders.

Uematsu Yoshitoyo gave the order to retreat after careful consideration, and asked people to retreat with the wounded. These cavalry still had to be left to Akabe Ashgaru to deal with.

But his retreat gave the Xiu family more opportunities to change.

Hideya, who rode across the Asahinagawa River with more than a thousand people, scanned the battle situation and found that the Chibei in front had retreated, while the heavy armored cavalry on the left side of the battlefield were in anxiety with the Mikawa crowd. He immediately turned to his left and right soldiers Ling said, "Go to Kawabata's parents and ask him to come out with a battalion of Gomoto Banzhong to block this opening. I will wipe out the mob on the left without retreating."

After giving the order, the Wanxiu family let the cavalry blow the conch horn to gather the cavalry. This order means that the Xiu family asked all the nearby cavalry who heard the sound of the horn to get closer to him as much as possible, including the flag of Maeda Anhu who was chasing out before. The rangers of the crowd and Ukido may even be able to come over to the Ukido Yabu who wanders on the south bank of the Inagawa.

Xiujia led the cavalry and continued to march southwest. The Conch blew all the way, and soon Maeda Yasuo, Ukidaka, Ukidatatai and others would gather around Xiujia. 2000 cavalry corps.

This figure is extremely terrifying in the Warring States Period of Japan. Every vibration of 2000 military horses trampling on the battlefield can give people a great shock.

It is impossible for such a dramatic change in the regiment to hide from Sakakibara Komasa's eyes. He even saw the Hideka horse seal and the formation flag moving in the southeast.

Without any extra thought, he asked the left and right to order, "Let Murakami Yoshikatsu rush up and block the cavalry army of the Youfu main formation. Except for the army formation that is already engaged in battle, all other army formations look southeast of my horse seal." Move to encircle the location of Youfu!"

Yes, Sakakibara Komasa also decided to put all his eggs in one basket.

Compared with taking down Xiujia himself, any openings that appear when the army alternates on the frontal battlefield are small gains. He wants to use a large number of infantry to eat up Xiujia's cavalry, capture Xiujia himself, and end this battlefield.

But will Xiujia make her wish come true?Will time let it do what it wants?

Perhaps because he saw the Hideka horse seal and formation flag moving on the east side of the battlefield, Tatsuan Togawa, the guard of Tanaka Castle who was belatedly aware of it, immediately ordered the big golden cannon and Kamui to be placed in the castle. The artillery was fired, and at the same time, the second formation of 4500 people stationed in the city was divided into two formations to attack east and northeast.

The sudden sound of cannons from behind him scared Makino Changyasu, who was in charge of staying behind, and also scared Sakakihara Yasumasa, who had just made a change.In particular, a shell hit a place less than 5 meters away from him, and directly took away several warriors who had followed him for many years, which made this experienced general feel a little dazed.

He looked blankly at Tanaka Castle behind him, and asked suspiciously, "What kind of big cylinder can shoot so far, the distance is probably 1200 steps!"

Seeing the swaying flag on the top of the city and the soldiers pouring out from the gate of Dongkai City, Yasumasa Sakakibara quickly recovered his expression. He summoned his son Tadacho Sakakihara and said, "Go to Nei Shanzheng (Nagayasu Makino) personally, and let him He must delay the surprise attack of the defenders of Tanaka Castle. Just give me another hour. No, even if it is half an hour, I, the Tokugawa clan, will win this battle!"

Sakakibara Tadacho accepted his father's order dumbly, mounted his own horse and headed west with two attendants on the left and right.

But before the others reached Makino Changkang's formation, they saw a dense army of soldiers coming from the east in the distance.If it weren't for the gentian Wuqitong pattern flag that was raised high, he might have thought it was reinforcements from Hamamatsu.

"That troop strength is probably no less than half a thousand!" Sakakibara Tadaga thought with worry in his heart.

But his father's order was still to be carried out. When he finally found Makino Changkang, he saw that his expression was more dignified than his at the moment, and he was slowly retreating eastward with the army.

As soon as the two met, Makino Changyasu turned around and asked Sakakibara Tadacho the situation in the east, "When will Shikibe break the front line? Kodaira, you should have seen that Toyoharu reinforcements are coming from the west!"

"I will report this matter to my father immediately. Father, please be sure to stick to it for an hour. Tokugawa rises and falls, and the young master's safety depends on Nei Shanzheng alone!"

Sakakibara Tadacho read out Sakakibara Yasomasa's order to Makino Nagayasu, but he was unwilling to stay in this dead place for even a minute, and did not even give Makino Nagayasu a chance to refute. Tell him all.

Hearing behind him that not only Tanaka Castle opened the city to break through the siege, but also thousands of reinforcements from Toyoharu's family, Sakakibara Komasa was very stable. His eyes were fixed on the upside-down gourd horse seal, but his mouth He couldn't stop murmuring, "A little closer, a little closer will succeed!"

However, it is said that Xiujia led 2000 cavalry to the flank of Mikawa led by Oka Minister Sheng with a time difference. After a little reorganization, the former three banner groups formed three unconnected army formations.

Xiujia led the formation of attendants 300 steps away, and on the left and right were nearly a thousand cavalry led by two adopted sons.

Hearing Xiujia's order to charge, the Banners who had already lined up and prepared to use Tian Anhu as an arrow charged towards the Sanhe crowd.

This Mikawa group is not the same as the Mikawa group that followed Tokugawa Ieyasu across Kinki and Shunen San. The quality of the soldiers is uneven, but they also lined up the spear formation defense under the scolding of the samurai.

Of course, Xiujia would not let his precious bannermen go to the spear formation for nothing, only the bannermen of the three teams stepped forward to shoot Yaprosium arrows. ~" The sound of the arrow can put a lot of pressure on the ashigaru.

Of course, the killing and killing of the bannermen's cavalry and shooting is the main thing, but what is more important is to frighten the psychological quality of Ashgaru by riding horses from different directions to the front of the formation again and again, so as to make them appear flaws in the army formation.

Sure enough, after a few rounds of frightened riding and shooting, there was commotion in the army formation on the southwest side. Ashigaru wanted to hide behind the army formation, but was caught by the samurai behind and planned to hack him to death directly in front of the formation.

It was just such a commotion that caused a breach in the gun array, and the Bangamoto battalion in charge of this raid, under the leadership of Shigemasa Yorai, decisively changed his bow and gun and came forward for a real charge.

The horses ridden by the bannermen, or the Mongolian army horses from the Jeju military horse farm, or the horses from Ezo, are all as tall as the shoulders of ordinary Japanese, and they are properly tall horses today.

These military horses galloped back and forth on the battlefield. For the Japanese visitors whose average height was less than 1.5 meters, it was as if a wall had hit them.The most important thing is that there are still spear spikes hanging on this wall!

If it was just a psychological pressure before rushing back and forth for 30 steps, this time he rushed directly in front of him, but it really scared the Sanhe people to death.

Except for the loose army array blocking the speed at the beginning, after the Banner crowd rushed into the army array, it was like a no-man's land, and the army array quickly fled like a tiger.

The escape belt on this side collapsed the army formation on the side, giving the other two banner teams a chance to continue to charge.Following Habamoto, Yuxi Duotai and Jiaqi's two teams of Rangers followed closely behind.

In this way, 2000 cavalry forced their way into the Sanhe army formation of more than 4000 people. You must know that there are still 2100 heavy armored infantry on the opposite side.

They wore heavy armor like chopping boards, and the cavalry on the Xiu family's side were like steel hammers, smashing directly on the army formation of the Sanhe people, smashing the already low-density army formation into pieces with one hammer.

The Sanhe soldiers hiding in the formation and facing the heavily armored soldiers didn't even notice the change before they were knocked to the ground by the huge monster rushing from behind, and then trampled on by the horses.

Another samurai was holding a long spear in front of him, but when he heard the commotion behind him, he turned his head and saw an armored warrior holding a long spear that would have pierced his body.

It wasn't until the gun head pierced his body that he realized that there was already a person hanging from the gun head, and he was actually the second unlucky person to be pierced.

Some of them were lost when they crossed the river in Inagawa. The Sanhe people, who had no good strategy in the face of heavy armored warriors, were completely discouraged after being charged with their backs. The soldiers and warriors scattered, but how could they run with two legs? What about four-legged ones?

I'm afraid it's impossible for rangers to charge into the battle, but the fleeing pawns are holding their sabers in their hands.

Oka Minister Mori and Sakai Shigeta wanted to restrain the soldiers before, especially Sakai Shigeta, who was in charge of blocking the cavalry.

After killing several people with his vassal warriors, he managed to gather a group of desperate soldiers. Before he could give an order, he was rushed together by Ukidoyasu's ranger and Maeda Antora's armor from two directions. .

The hundreds of people who finally gathered became the biggest target, but after being squeezed and attacked from both sides, there was never a single Tokugawa soldier who stood up on the battlefield.As for where Shigetada Sakai is, and who won the first rank, it is still a mess.

The Hide family made a time lag, and finally killed the 5000 Mikawa crowds on the south bank before Sakakibara Yasomasa brought people around, but not far away, Sakakibara Yasomasa himself led no less than 8000 people to him in a mighty way. Come.

The Xiu family, who hadn't rushed to the battle, had already discovered the situation here, and had been pinching the progress and calculating the time.

After seeing that the target of the main attack had been defeated, he immediately issued an order: "Blow the horn to gather troops, don't want heads, don't worry about those fleeing defeated soldiers, and quickly gather cavalry."

Xiujia knew that he still had a tough battle to fight next.