Song Dynasty Cannon Fodder Counterattack Record

Chapter 229 Showdown ([-])

It is unrealistic to continue to move when the Liao people plan to attack with all their strength.Dong Renzhang galloped to report again: "The Liao people seem to be going to attack aggressively. Guo Deployment, please patrol the border and shrink the formation, so as not to let the Liao people have an opportunity."

Li Buqi looked at the approaching Liao infantry formation and nodded in agreement. He ordered the Zhenwu army convoy to surround the rear and two wings of the infantry formation that had already launched the Pingrong formation, and even unloaded the horses pulling the carts. Gathered together, the vans directly meet end to end, enclosing both infantry and cavalry like a battalion fence.

Since the Liao people are going to attack aggressively, let's use bows and crossbows to deal with it. The cavalry of the Song Army is too precious, especially the police cavalry, which are of great use and must not be thrown away casually.

After the troops were shrunk, the Song army formed a compact rectangular formation. Li Buqi handed over the command of the rear car formation to Gao Zunyu. In fact, he handed it over to Yang Shiqing, and there was no need to stay behind to command. Come to the position of the Chinese army to make peace with Guo Kui.Seeing Li Buqi, Guo Kui said: "Walk the border, victory or defeat depends on one stroke."

Li Buqi is confident: "Our vehicles are equipped with more than 60 arrows and a large number of other combat equipment. As long as we don't mess around, I'd like to see how much blood the Liao people are going to bleed."

Guo Kui glanced at the back and said worriedly, "The Liao infantry is coming up. This is a bit troublesome."

Although the cavalry has strong maneuverability and rapid assault, its offensive ability is not as good as that of the infantry.And in fact, although this battlefield has left the forts set up every ten miles by the Song army, it is still not suitable for large-scale cavalry attacks.

Thanks to Dasong's operation in Hebei for many years, although Dasong's timber gap is huge, Hebei is full of forests.Although the Song army can only form a rectangular formation due to the restrictions of the forest, the right wing has a long section to be covered by the forest, and the path that the Liao people can attack is greatly restricted.Moreover, after Guo Kui and the generals repelled the cavalry attacks of the Liao army one after another, the fear of the cavalry has been eliminated a lot.It's just that the number of his own side is small, so Guo Kui is more worried about being entangled by the Liao infantry and breaking up the formation.

Li Buqi smiled and said: "Guo Deployment just needs to be at ease. Those vans are just as effective against infantry. Guo Deployment just needs to take care of the left, right and front, and leave the rest to the Zhenwu Army."

Seeing that Li Buqi spoke with confidence, Guo Kui felt relieved a lot.Just as he was talking, there was already a sound of clappers behind him, and he began to shoot arrows.

After the infantry formation of the Liao people entered a distance of about 250 meters, first the ballista on the van started to fire javelins, and soon the light trebuchets also started to fire.

Because the remaining snow on the ground can act as a buffer, the mud ball thrown from a long distance cannot be broken when it falls on the ground, so the killing effect is limited.Therefore, facing the Liao infantry, the trebuchet fired oil tanks and fireballs this time.

These fireballs are made of a mud ball or stone ball thickly wrapped with straw, wheat straw and sackcloth. When in use, the ball is dipped in kerosene, placed in the iron spoon of the trebuchet and fired.These fireballs are full of kerosene, and anyone who touches them will ignite an inextinguishable flame.What's even better is that these fireballs are soft on the outside, and can bounce and roll on the snow, causing more damage, and at worst can disrupt the enemy's formation.And even if the lighted thin-walled kerosene tank hits the snow, it will splash the burning kerosene everywhere, which will put even more pressure on the enemy's heart.

After the Liao people entered a distance of 100 meters, the steel crossbows on the van and the Zhenwu Army began to fire, and pieces of crossbow arrows covered the Liao people's army formation.The triangular armor-piercing arrows and streamlined and smooth arrow body made the crossbow arrows more penetrating, and even the shields held by the soldiers in the front row of the Liao army were penetrated.Every time the rain of arrows fell, some people howled and rolled on the ground, and their shields were even more powerless against the small javelins fired by the ballista. Many people's shields and their bodies were split by the javelins.However, under the threat of the officer's gleaming sword, the Liao people still screamed and ran towards the van lying in front of them regardless of the casualties.

When some people finally rushed under the van with the crossbow arrows and javelins, they encountered the same problem as the cavalry, but they couldn't do anything.The car boards cannot be knocked or chopped, at best, the wheels can only be smashed.But the wheels are also covered with iron, so it is not easy to smash them.Drag the vehicles, these vehicles are locked together, and when people kill you with arrows and javelins, wouldn't you be stupid to smash their wheels!
Some Liao people tried to get under the car and fight the Song army.But as soon as they got through the car, before they could stand up, many spears and axes struck, and they were killed under the car when they could not dodge.

According to Xia Xingmei's deployment, as soon as the infantry rushed to the chariot formation, the Liao cavalry moved into action.A group of cavalry braved crossbow arrows and ran to the front of the chariot formation. Seeing that the infantry was helpless against the chariot formation, they thought it was the infantry who had run so far and had no strength, so they threw out iron hooks to hook the van, and then rode their horses and ran away. , trying to tow the car away.The problem is that there are interlocking parts on the front and back of the partial van. Now all the cars are locked together and cannot be dragged at all. The riders on the horse are shot to death one by one on the horse.

When the Liao people attacked the rear of the Song army, the other three directions also launched at the same time.

Compared with the previous attacks, the Liao people's attack this time seems to have no hesitation.Amidst the rumbling drums and the whining horns, the cavalry of the brigade swarmed out from the forest passage in three directions.Unlike the previous few times when light cavalry were the main force, this time the attack was directed at elite cavalry who were wearing iron armor and even their horses were covered with leather armor.The cavalry at the most forward position each led two or three horses in leather armor and connected together with ropes. When they rushed into the bow and crossbow range of the Song army, they stabbed the buttocks of these horses with knives and let the horses go straight to the Song army. While he was hiding behind these horses, he continued to charge while shooting arrows.

This kind of cavalry attack has always been the nightmare of the Song army, so the training of the Song army in Hebei is mainly aimed at the shock tactics of the Liao cavalry.Under the shouts of the officers, the spearmen in the front row of the Song Army squatted on the ground, inserted the tail of the four or five-meter-long spear into the snow and stomped it firmly with their feet, letting the bow and arrow fall from the sky and hit them their armor.When a person fell, the people behind immediately made up for it. Five rows of shining spears were always kept at a height of more than one meter and pointed in the direction of the Liao soldiers and horses.

Behind the pikemen are short soldiers squatting on the ground. They hold big knives, heavy axes and bones and are always ready to deal with the enemy troops rushing into the formation, while the archers walk among them, ready to shoot and break through the crossbows at any time. Liao people.

The impact of the galloping horse in front, even if the spearman could stab the Liao people's horse, would be smashed to pieces by the huge momentum.But the pikeman's slight resistance will stop the momentum of the cavalry's impact. At this time, the short soldiers will rush up to fight with each other, cut up the rider, cut down the horse's leg, and protect the archer.If they can't completely stop the Liao people, they will lose.Because there are crossbowmen behind them, the crossbowmen of the Song Dynasty basically did not practice hand-to-hand combat skills.

Behind the axemen, the crossbowmen fired their crossbows methodically.A row of soldiers fired and retreated to the rear to reload their arrows, and another row of soldiers immediately took their place and continued to shoot.Although each crossbowman's face was terribly pale, they still walked forward and backward in a neat step as usual in training, aiming and firing crossbow arrows, because they knew that they were the main force to deal with the Liao army's cavalry.This is not only because the number of crossbowmen in the Song army accounted for about [-]% of the soldiers, but also because everyone knows that infantry can only block the impact of large-scale cavalry with hard crossbows.

This is the standard defensive tactic of the Song army.Li Buqi couldn't help but nodded as he watched the orderly operations of all the commanders.It seems that the Hebei Song Army has not degenerated to the level of Song Huizong in this era. As long as it is led by a capable general, it can still fight.In this way, he has the confidence to kill Xixia first.

Guo Kui was also watching the battlefield carefully, because Li Buqi added some changes to Song's standard tactics.

Because Li Buqi emphasized the role of Wangshan, the combat crossbowmen were divided into two arrays.The crossbowmen in the front basically shoot directly, while the crossbowmen in the rear array use the god-arm bows with a longer range to shoot according to a fixed scale, so that the crossbow arrows they throw will form a curtain of arrows in front of the forest passage, making the Liao people Before rushing into the front row crossbowman's direct aiming range, he suffered a wave of killing.

In theory, as long as there are enough crossbowmen, the Song army can cover the entire attack route of the Liao people under the rain of arrows.This partially solved the problem that the width of the array limited the number of crossbowmen who could shoot each time, and increased the density of crossbow arrows, which really turned the people shot by the Liao people on their backs.Especially those Liao cavalry who rushed out from the woods and attempted to attack in a lateral detour suffered more injuries because they were exposed to the crossbow for a longer time.

Of course, with so many Liao soldiers and horses, there will always be those who rush through the rain of arrows to stop them.The archers desperately shot arrows at the Liao cavalry and horses rushing forward, but a section of the spearman's human wall was still knocked out, and the short soldiers were driven forward by the capital, using all kinds of heavy weapons. The horses that rushed over the human wall blocked the cavalry behind them.The newly recruited spearman held his spear and pressed over, pushing the Liao people out again.

In various areas without the protection of the van, the Liao people saw through the array of the Song army's spears, but the Song army gritted their teeth and pushed them back again and again.For a while, dangers arose everywhere.

(End of this chapter)