Warring States Survival Guide

Chapter 238 Car Fort
The outstanding performance of the Wanjin Army's engineers greatly intrigued Masakatsu Hachisuka, a man of both wisdom and courage, who carefully observed the Wanjin Army throughout the journey.

To him, the soldiers of the Wanjin Army seemed to be a head taller and a half-head taller than the servants of ordinary daimyo and noble families. Their physiques were also far superior to those of the conscripted foot soldiers. Were they all carefully selected? Or were the common people of the Chita Peninsula just naturally stronger?
He couldn't say for sure, and couldn't guess the reason, but just by looking at the average physique of the Wanjin Army, he knew that these people were not to be trifled with, and their individual combat capabilities couldn't be that bad.

This difference should not be underestimated. In ordinary combat, a little more strength is enough to win. Moreover, in a close-quarters battle on the battlefield, there is not much room for maneuver. Most of the time, the stronger one survives and the weaker one dies.

The weapons and equipment of the Wanjin Army were also excellent. They wore thick, black, moisture-proof tunics, wide-brimmed peach-shaped iron hoods, and thin iron cheek guards. Although they were not covered from head to toe like the modern-day Guzu, making everyone look like a lump of iron, all vital organs were protected. At the same time, they did not lose their flexibility and battlefield mobility.

Judging from the domaru alone, Harano was indeed a wealthy man. Equipping such a soldier with all the gear would cost at least fifty or sixty kan, not even counting uniforms, shoes, socks, leggings, rifles, cannons, water bottles, mess kits, raincoats, and the like.

If you include that, an average soldier would need at least one or two hundred kan (a unit of currency). That's about all a low-ranking samurai would have, maybe with a few more bows and arrows, armor-piercing blunt weapons, but not much more.

After observing for a while, Hachisuka Masakatsu felt that the equipment of the Wanjin army was impeccable, definitely costing a fortune, and their morale...

The morale of the Wanjin army was extremely high. They went to the battlefield without fear, and their discipline was impeccable. When they marched, they marched in neat formation. All the soldiers looked straight ahead, without whispering or looking around. The long spears they carried on their shoulders were neatly arranged, rising and falling like waves with the march. It was as if these soldiers had only one thought on their minds: to advance, advance, and advance some more. Nothing else mattered to them.

Hachisuka Masakatsu couldn't help but turn to look at his men. The ranks were uneven and the numbers were inconsistent. Even though no one was making a loud noise, many of them were talking in hushed tones, giving the impression of a flock of sheep returning home after grazing.

It's not that you don't know the value of something, it's that you have to compare it. He hadn't thought there was anything wrong with it before, but now that he looked at it again... it really was different. Even though there were many seasoned thieves among his 500-plus men, many of whom had lives on their hands and were absolutely daring to fight and kill, he still felt like he had lost.

So this is what it feels like to have a strong military?

The more Hachisuka Masakatsu looked around, the more he felt that he had wasted his life. It was like a frog in a well being suddenly lifted out of the well by a big bird and opening its eyes to see the world.

This feeling even made him somewhat disheartened, and his desire to make a name for himself faded.

If the army outside the Namikawa region is of this caliber, then he might as well stay in Hachisuka Village and do some water transport business; otherwise, coming out would just be a pointless death.

However, he quickly shook his head and temporarily dismissed the idea. At least the situation in Mino was different. The army there was not much different from his "Kawanai-shu". At most, they had more and better armor, but they were not at the point where they could not fight.

The Wanjin Army should be considered quite special.

He grew increasingly curious about the Wanjin army, and upon closer inspection, he discovered that his entourage had been replaced by a large number of arquebusiers. These arquebusiers wore simpler armor, with only breastplates remaining on their torsos, but the workmanship was equally excellent. Their marching formation was equally orderly, except that each arquebusier unit was accompanied by a large number of horses and wagons.

The horses were all good horses, mainly strong and young draft horses. Apart from differences in coat color, their teeth looked almost the same, which fit his newly established stereotype of Wanjin—everything was uniform, everyone was exactly the same, and everything seemed to have been deliberately required and trained for a long time, creating a strange feeling.

These horse-drawn vehicles were also quite special, in the form of a wagon, extremely heavy, with very thick wheels and walls, and the carriage was also equipped with a large number of iron-clad perforated baffles that could be erected.

At the same time, some of the vehicles were very long, and the contents inside were covered with tung wax tarpaulins, so you couldn't tell what they were unless you lifted them up.

As a transport vehicle, this vehicle is excessively bulky and has too many useless items. But if it's not a transport vehicle, why would Wan Jinjun carry them?

Is it for charging into battle?
Japan has been relatively isolated since ancient times, with mountains and rivers accounting for more than 80% of its land area, and plains being extremely rare and fragmented. In the history of warfare, there have been almost no scenes of chariots crisscrossing the land. Hachisuka Masakatsu examined it carefully for a long time but could not figure out what this "bent-pass chariot" was for, and could only speculate that it was a type of chariot.

Yuanye, along with Aqing and some officers, observed these "cart forts".

This is a new product, a result of the Taiwanese Navy giving back to the Taiwanese Army. Or, you could say it's a bonus earned by the Taiwanese Army for the gunners they trained during their "sales expedition."

The main form of this was pulling horses.

The Chita Peninsula does not produce horses, and Owari lacks horse farms. Horses are transported here entirely by horse traders. As a result, even animal power for production is scarce in Wanjin, making it impossible to provide horses to the Wanjin army on a large scale. This has resulted in the Wanjin army being a pure infantry force. Sometimes, even in the fields, horses have to be temporarily lent to messengers as replacements, let alone using horses specifically to pull carts.

He even once wanted Kinoshita Tokichiro to raise horses for him on the Chita Peninsula, because there was a severe shortage of horses. The Chita Peninsula was indeed not suitable for large-scale horse breeding; that was just the natural environment, and he couldn't change it. The small horse farm he had built was not producing any horses and was basically about to be declared a failure, so he switched to raising cattle.

However, this problem was resolved after the "trade expedition." The Hojo clan, being poor, was eager to trade horses from the Takeda clan for gunpowder, firearms, fabrics, and porcelain produced in Wanjin. This greatly alleviated their financial burden, and sometimes they could even make a small profit. The Satomi clan, currently locked in a battle with the Hojo clan, was not to be outdone and had even more allies than the Hojo clan. After discovering that Wanjin merchants offered relatively high prices for horses, they actively imported horses from the Tohoku and Hokuriku regions and then concentrated them in the Tokyo Bay area to sell to the Wanjin people.

Of course, warhorses are not sold very often. Apart from the batch requested by the wilderness, warhorses are generally not sold to Wanjin merchants.

The Hojo, Satomi, and even the Takeda families all kept a relatively tight grip on warhorses, a strategic resource, and their prices remained high. Rare and famous horses would fetch astronomical prices. Only draft horses, pack horses, and donkeys and mules bred along the way were of little concern to them and were willing to be sold for money to exchange for goods.

However, this was enough for Wanjin. On the production side, warhorses were just waste money, while draft horses, pack horses, mules, and rabbit horses were the ones with value.

With a source of horses secured, and given the current boom in Wanjin maritime trade, many people were transporting these hot-selling goods back home. The Wanjin market didn't hesitate and immediately mobilized Hayek's resources. The price of horses was halved again and again within a month, allowing the Wanjin army to finally make large-scale purchases at low prices. Yuanye no longer needed to secretly glance at the military expenditure list and clutch his chest, unable to breathe.

Then, after acquiring thousands of strong draft horses, and with no shortage of timber and carpenters on the Chita Peninsula, Haruno and chief engineer Okabe Ichigen worked together for a while and developed the "Cart Fortress".

The prototype comes from the Battle of Namkl in 1419 and the Battle of Sudomir in 1420. The Hussite army used the "wagon fort" tactic, first defeating the charge of more than 2,000 royalist cavalry with only 400 men, and then holding off the charge of more than 1,000 Knights Hospitaller, which shocked the world.

Of course, the victory was also largely due to the position of the position. At that time, Yanjeska used ponds, wetlands and swamps as flank protection, forcing the knights to charge head-on against the crossbow bolts. However, after carefully recalling and pondering for a while, Yuanye believed that the "wagon fortification tactic" from more than a hundred years ago should also be applicable to the Wanjin army, and it was very suitable for the Wanjin army.

As an engineering student, he always acted on his ideas. When he actually improved the "cart bunker tactic," he ended up getting himself into trouble with the Taiwanese army.

The modifications weren't extensive; the main idea was to use the modified large vehicles as cover to defend against enemy arrows and lead bullets, and to launch counterattacks with the musketeers and small cannons mounted inside the vehicles. Meanwhile, pikemen, flailers, and grenadiers were positioned in front of the vehicle formation to prevent the enemy from forcibly jumping over and breaking through. In the future, there were even plans to hide a small cavalry unit within the vehicle formation to launch a counterattack at a critical moment and crush the enemy.

Simply put, this is a tactic for defending a city on flat ground. It was a clumsy method he came up with to deal with cavalry and large groups of infantry when the primitive matchlock gun could not carry out the "line-up shooting" operation.

Matchlock guns cannot be deployed in tight battle lines. After the matchlock bullets are fired, the matchlock and sparks will fly wildly. Matchlock gunners usually carry a lot of gunpowder. If they are shoulder to shoulder, there is a considerable chance that they will set off their comrades next to them and blow them up after firing a single shot. This will cause great chaos and seriously damage morale.

Therefore, arquebuses could not completely stop the enemy from getting close. Arquebusiers still needed melee units such as pikemen and sword and shieldmen for protection. And once melee combat broke out, even if they were well-armored and well-trained, they still could not avoid casualties in the chaos.

However, Yuanye did not want too many people to die. His strict military discipline was based on high welfare and high compensation. Moreover, he only had one prefecture, and agriculture and industry accounted for the vast majority of the population. Otherwise, he would not have so much money to burn. Therefore, he was short of soldiers. So far, he could only arm less than 3,000 soldiers, which was not enough to bear too many casualties.

Therefore, he developed the "wagon fortress" and planned to play the "turtle tactic" for a period of time. If someone wanted to fight him, he would set up a wagon formation and exchange fire with the enemy to achieve a high exchange ratio, at least he would never lose. If the enemy ignored him, he didn't care. Anyway, he was based on the Chita Peninsula and was not threatened. He would slowly move in the enemy's territory, gradually eroding the enemy's foundation, or threatening the enemy's vital points, forcing the enemy to knock their heads against his "wagon fortress".

Anyway, that's what he's going to do. He's willing to lose some mobility. After all, there are no perfect tactics in this world. It's not easy to be both stable and fast. The most important thing in war is to make the most of your own advantages. There's no need to train yourself to be a hexagonal warrior!

However, the "cart fort" has only just begun to be deployed, and he is not sure whether it will be effective in Japan's mountainous terrain with many rivers. He came here to help Mikuro out, hoping to see the marching effect as well, which can be considered a low-intensity live-fire exercise.

It seems that...

He has a well-trained engineering corps, so crossing rivers is not a problem for vehicles. When operating alongside large-scale troops, its speed, damage rate, and repair speed are consistent with previous test data, indicating it is generally usable.

At least it should be fine as an infantry transport vehicle. This vehicle can also carry a lot of food, fodder and tents, which can improve the infantry battalion's self-sufficiency in the field. It can also carry small artillery for rapid movement, and it is also very good as a small artillery transport vehicle and ammunition vehicle.

However, we still need to observe further to see how well it is compatible with the military, whether a few broken vehicles would cause formation chaos, etc. The Taiwanese troops also need to get used to long-distance marches with "fortified vehicles" and dealing with emergencies such as vehicle breakdowns. Officers and non-commissioned officers also need to accumulate experience.

Haruno paid no attention to Hachisuka Masakatsu's cautious observation. He had seen too many historical figures and had already demystified them, so he was too lazy to pay attention to most of them. He spent the whole way discussing topics related to "Wheel Fortress" with his officers. However, he was afraid that this time it could only be used to see the effect of marching. He was afraid that there would be no chance to actually use it in battle.

The real test of this thing is on the Ise Peninsula.

Once the performance and operating procedures are completely resolved and the time for combat is ripe, he will lead several hundred "caravans" to the Ise Peninsula to slowly move and occupy wherever they go, eventually reaching the main territory of Teiwazu.

(End of this chapter)