Jingtai: Making the Ming Dynasty Great Again

"General, judging from the flags, this is Esen's main force."

Sun Tang remained silent.

He is forty-three years old this year. He has been fighting on the border for more than twenty years since he inherited his father's position as the Vice Commander of Yongqing Guard at the end of the Yongle reign.

He had seen how Mongol cavalry swept across the steppes like the wind.

I've also witnessed how they charged forward like a pack of wolves when they attacked a city.

But the sight before him still made his palms sweat slightly.

The city wall of Xizhimen was rebuilt during the Zhengtong era. It was 42 feet high and 30 feet wide, with brick on the outside and rammed earth on the inside.

There are twelve watchtowers and seven horse-faced towers on the city wall, and a three-story arrow tower is set up in the southeast corner.

Sun Tang had 8,000 government troops under his command.

The force consisted of 1,200 cavalry, 4,000 infantry, 1,800 archers, 800 musketeers, and 3,000 militiamen to assist in the defense of the city.

This force should be more than enough to guard a city gate.

The premise is that the Oirat do not concentrate all their forces here.

Now, Sun Tang sees at least 40,000 Oirat troops through his monocular telescope.

"Cheng Xin".

"Your subordinate is here."

"Do you remember the Tatar cavalry we encountered outside Kaiping Guard in the fifth year of the Xuande reign?"

Cheng Xin thought for a moment and said, "I remember, they had a similar formation back then, with a heavy central army and light flanks."

Sun Tang put down his binoculars: "That time, they had a thousand-man squad on each of their left and right flanks break away from their main force and flank them from the sides."

This time no, you see, Esen has gathered all the cavalry behind the central army.

The front line consisted entirely of infantry, pushing shield carts and siege ladders.

He's going to launch a full-scale attack!

Cheng Xin was startled upon hearing this.

Nomadic tribes often used light cavalry to harass and find gaps in their defenses when attacking cities, or they would surround the city without attacking, waiting for it to collapse on its own.

To adopt such a posture of all-out attack, either the commander has gone mad, or he has a reason to fight a quick victory.

Sun Tang knew Esen's reason.

In yesterday's battle, the Oirat lost 5,000 vanguards, and Esen's brother Bolor was also killed in action.

Esen needed a victory to boost morale, and he also needed to open a city gate.

Let the wealth and blood of this capital city wash away yesterday's shame.

"Order that all firearms and gunpowder be inspected again."

Archers were brought aboard the city walls and fired in three columns, while civilian laborers below the walls were responsible for supplying arrows.

The cavalrymen all dismounted, took their spears, and went up the city wall; there was no need for them to ride horses today.

The boiling water pot, the simmering broth, the pounding stones, and the rolling logs were all in place.

Another messenger was sent to the Ministry of War to report that a strong enemy was approaching at Xizhimen, and requested that Minister Yu immediately send reinforcements.

The atmosphere on the city wall was tense, but no one panicked.

The core of Sun Tang's troops consisted of three thousand veterans from Jizhou.

These people followed him from Xuanfu to Datong, from Dushikou to Huailai, and they saw bloodshed and defended cities.

Soon the vanguard of the Oirat army arrived two miles outside Xizhimen.

Sun Tang saw clearly that the infantrymen were wearing multicolored leather coats, some of them wearing simple leather armor, and carrying scimitars, maces, and spears.

They were not the elite troops of the Mongol homeland, but rather servants from conquered Western Region tribes.

Esen intended to use these men to deplete the defenders' arrows and firearms.

"General, shall we attack?"

"Move closer to 150 paces and have the musketeers fire first."

Sun Tang did not use the cannons; these precious ammunition were reserved for dealing with Esen's elite troops.

The Oirat vanguard infantry did not form a neat square formation, but instead scattered into hundreds of small squads.

Each team consisted of twenty or thirty people, pushing simple shield carts.

It's basically just a frame made of wooden planks with four wheels underneath.

These shield carts couldn't stop cannons, but they offered some protection against arrows.

Three hundred steps.

Two hundred steps.

One hundred and fifty steps.

"put!"

The Oirat shield wagons were hit so hard that wood chips flew everywhere, and the foot soldiers hiding behind them fell down with screams.

But many more people continue to move forward.

At 150 paces, the firearm's lethality is limited unless it hits a vital organ directly.

Sun Tang continued, "Archers!"

The 1,800 archers were divided into three groups.

The first batch consisted of archers who used powerful bows with a yield of 1.5 dan (a unit of weight), and their arrows were three-edged armor-piercing cones.

The second group consisted of crossbowmen who used their feet to push open the crossbow arms and fire heavy arrows.

The third group consisted of archers with divine arms, a powerful weapon passed down from the Song Dynasty, with a range of up to 240 paces.

The rain of arrows fell, and the effect was immediate.

The heavy arrow pierced the shield chariot, pinning the Oirat infantrymen behind it to the ground.

The armor-piercing spike can penetrate a fur coat and reach deep into the internal organs.

Chaos began to break out at the front lines of the Oirat forces; some squads stopped, while others began to run back.

But the Oirat central army sounded the bugle.

Sun Tang saw hundreds of cavalrymen rush out from the Oirat main force and killed the retreating infantrymen on the spot.

Driven by death, the Oirat infantry surged forward once more.

"Golden juice!"

Behind the city wall, the militiamen used long poles to lift the boiling cauldrons and poured the foul-smelling excrement down the wall.

The Oirat soldiers who were doused with water let out inhuman screams, and their skin blistered and ulcerated instantly.

This is one of the most brutal yet most effective methods of defending a city.

At the same time, the rolling stones and logs came crashing down.

Each stone was the size of a watermelon; if it fell from the four-zhang-high city wall, it would injure anyone who touched it, and kill them instantly.

A log as thick as a person's embrace can roll down and knock over an entire group of people.

The first wave of the Oirat attack halted fifty paces from the city wall.

The corpses piled up, and the later foot soldiers had to step over the bodies of their comrades to advance.

Sun Tang, however, did not relax at all.

He stared at the Oirat main camp, where the white yak-tail banner still stood motionless.

Esen's main cavalry force has not moved a single soldier.

Sun Tang was still speculating about Esen's plan.

Suddenly, a series of hoofbeats sounded from the north side of Xizhimen.

Approximately two thousand Oirat cavalrymen charged out from the northwest corner and headed straight for the city gate!

Cheng Xin exclaimed in alarm, "An ambush!"

Sun Tang understood instantly.

Esen used his servants and infantry to launch a frontal assault, drawing the attention and all defensive forces of the defenders.

At the same time, send an elite cavalry force to circle around to the flank and suddenly attack the city gate while the defenders are exhausted!

This cavalry force was well-equipped, with both men and horses clad in armor, clearly representing the elite of the Mongol homeland.

They didn't attack the city or set up ladders; instead, they charged straight at it.

Although the gate of Xizhimen was made of iron-clad wood and was a foot thick, it was not a city wall.

Sun Tang dared not let them near the gate: "Cannons! Turn the cannons around and bombard the cavalry!"

Most of the cannons on the city wall were facing forward, and it would take time to turn the heavy cannons around.

The Oirat cavalry had already charged within two hundred paces.

"Archers, turn north and fire!"

The arrows turned to the north, but the cavalry were too fast, and in the blink of an eye they were within a hundred paces.

Sun Tang saw the cavalryman at the forefront take something off his saddle.

"Oil! They brought oil!"

Before the words were even finished, the cavalrymen had already hurled their leather bags at the city gate.

The leather bag shattered upon impact with the iron-clad wooden door, spilling black kerosene everywhere.

Immediately afterwards, the rocket was launched.

boom!

The flames instantly engulfed the city gate.

The wooden parts began to burn, and the sheet metal turned red and deformed under the high temperature.

The soldiers behind the city gate hurriedly tried to extinguish the fire with water, but the flames from the burning oil were difficult to put out with water.

Cheng Xin's voice was filled with anxiety: "General, the city gates won't hold for much longer!"