The Zhenjiang of Liaodong in the Ming Dynasty was not the Zhenjiang of Jiangsu in the future. It was a small military fort at the border between the Ming Dynasty and North Korea. It was not even a city and was located in a very remote wilderness. It was separated from North Korea by the Yalu River. To the north, there were mountain roads leading to Kuandian and Hetuala. To the southwest, there were roads leading to Dandong and Fuzhou.
Because of the remote mountainous terrain, there was no wide field outside the city that could accommodate a large number of troops. There were only uneven slopes, hills, and depressions. It was difficult for Zhou Qingfeng to form three infantry phalanxes in the wilderness outside the city. Facing the 10,000-strong North Korean army, there was no formation at all.
Zhou Qingfeng felt that the tactical theories he had learned in the past half a year were all wrong when he saw the other party huddled together in such a messy manner. He had spent all day thinking about formations, firepower allocation, road passage, logistics management, military geography, and so on. His brain was hurting from thinking about them. Why didn't these people care at all?
Did the enemy commander really just draw a frame with the mouse and attack at will?
Looking at the dense mass of enemies that were advancing a few hundred meters away and firing randomly from time to time, all the officers and soldiers of the Imperial Guards felt that it was absurd. Every day when the commander-in-chief trained the soldiers, he would say that they were not allowed to open fire within 50 meters. They had to have a strict formation to ensure firepower output, and they had to be determined not to run. Once there was a mistake in the formation, they would suffer huge losses or even suffer a painful defeat.
Now it seemed that they were 'flirting with the blind'. They had such a beautiful formation, but they didn't meet the corresponding opponent.
The enemy was really strong, so strong that they were not afraid of death!
The suona was giving orders, and the officer was calming the soldiers down. The two cavalry cannons on the high ground on the left flank of the Imperial Guard were ready and asking for fire. The answer was, "Don't shoot. Wait until the enemy is 200 meters away."
The cavalry platoon felt their throats go dry. The platoon leader couldn't help but open his canteen and pour water down his throat. At the same time, he poured some water on the barrel of the cavalry cannon next to him, hoping that it would cool down quickly. On the battlefield, even one second faster could give people great psychological comfort.
When the Imperial Guard formed the cavalry cannons, the commander was instilled with the idea that they were the magic weapons to defeat the enemy on the battlefield and needed to appear at the enemy's vital points. Because of this, your enemies will hate you to the bone. One had to be careful in battle. While displaying firepower, one had to pay attention to maneuverability to avoid falling into desperate straits.
To put it bluntly, troops that played with mounted cannons were all weak-skinned and hated. If they were not careful, they could easily attract the enemy's general's attack. So, for the sake of their own lives, they had to be smart. This was the first time the cavalry artillery platoon was going into battle. The entire platoon only had two small cannons with a very short range. The twenty or so men in the platoon were all on tenterhooks.
"Platoon Leader, the enemy has entered our effective range of 300 meters." The squad leader of the artillery squad gave a thumbs up and closed his eyes. He turned around and reported a number.
The military personnel of the 'Revolutionary Army' had a monocular made of crystal, and each company level cadre had one. The artillery section was special, they even had platoon commanders. This allowed them to know the situation within a few kilometers like the back of their hands. The cavalry artillery platoon leader once again looked in the direction of the Grand Marshal's main formation. He shook his head and said, "The Grand Marshal ordered us to fire within 200 meters. The order hasn't been changed, so we can't fire."
Type 1617 cavalry artillery had a pitiful caliber of 50 mm, and the projectile could be held in one hand. The design of the cavalry artillery emphasized on weight reduction, so it could be disassembled and transported during marching. During a battle, the entire artillery could be mounted on a horse and quickly retreated. There would be no time to disassemble it during a battle, so they had to fight as fast as they could. If they were any slower, they might lose their lives.
Due to excessive weight reduction, the total weight of this cannon was less than 80 kilograms. The barrel forged with wrought iron was very thin, so it didn't use too much gunpowder, resulting in an effective range of only 300 meters. However, in order to quickly fire in a short period of time, this cannon was the first firearm of the 'Revolutionary Army' to use fixed ammunition.
The cannonball, along with the medicine, was wrapped in a silk cloth and waterproof. When loading, the tarp was torn off and the cannonball was stuffed into the barrel along with the silk cloth. The silk cloth would be directly burned during the bombardment, leaving not much residue. The cannonball was wrapped in sheepskin soaked in grease and stuck in the barrel to increase the airtightness.
This kind of artillery that was still in the experimental state encountered the North Korean army for the first time in actual combat. The cavalry artillery platoon commander who commanded the two cannons took a detour and occupied a high ground in the woods outside of Zhenjiang City, overlooking the chaotic North Korean gunners. When the enemy entered within 200 meters of the firing range, an almost perfect formation appeared in front of him.
After entering the era of firearms, every commander had to pay attention to oblique fire. Their own forces must not be fired at by the enemy, but their firepower must be poured on the enemy's side as much as possible. Because in the formation, there were only a few rows of people in front of them, but there could be dozens of rows on the side.
"Request for Grand Marshal to open fire." The cavalry artillery platoon commander hurriedly shouted to the signaller holding the signal flag.
The signal flag was waved, and the message was transmitted within a range of hundreds of meters. The signaller of the cavalry artillery platoon seemed to have received a very long sentence, "Grand Marshal said that you are mobile firepower, and on the basis of conforming to the general principle, you should grasp the opportunity yourself, and there is no need to repeatedly ask for instructions. In the future, this will be recorded in the cavalry artillery unit drill manual. "
The cavalry artillery platoon commander was stunned for a second, then he shouted loudly, "Open fire!"
Boom! Boom! Two small-caliber cavalry artillery cannons roared at the same time, and the cannons quickly recoiled, sliding a few meters on the ground. The two gunners of the artillery squad hurriedly reset the cannons, and the reloader used the brush to poke the barrel a few times, then immediately stuffed a solid bullet in.
The artillery platoon commander opened the closed spring on the barrel and the lid of the gunpowder pool, then held a sharp needle in his hand and poked the ignition hole. At the same time, he poured some igniting powder on the gunpowder pool, then closed the lid. That's right, this light cannon no longer needed an ignition rod. With the help of the wreckage of the road robber, the Imperial Guard finally used flintlock ignition.
This kind of light cannon only needed ten seconds to reload, and it could fire six times in a minute. During training, the cavalry artillery unit was required to pour as many shells as possible in the shortest amount of time possible. After firing for three minutes, they would immediately turn around and escape, not giving the enemy a chance to counterattack. Zhou Qingfeng gave this tactic a name: 'Three Minutes, Real Man.'
As soon as the artillery platoon opened fire, the two cannons continuously fired. The cannons did not stop, and the sound was dense and explosive. The temporarily built artillery position was quickly shrouded in white smoke, and soon, they could not even see the target clearly, but they still fired in the general direction.
All the gunners trained hard in this' Three Minutes Rapid Firing ', which meant that they had to fire a total of 18 shells at the same time. Every gunner had to have enough explosive power to be as valiant and majestic as a real man in these three minutes.
There were twelve gunners in each squad, and they continuously reset, reloaded, and fired. Everyone was in full swing. The platoon commander who was waiting for the artillery platoon to count the number of shots and shout for them to stop. After three minutes of bravery, they immediately lifted the burning hot cannons like frightened rabbits, and quickly mounted them on the horse with the best stamina in the platoon.
The entire platoon quickly became dispirited, and they fled along the retreat route that they had prepared beforehand.
They did not even look back …
After about 15 minutes, the scout of the artillery platoon carefully poked his head out from another observation point. Across the forest, he first looked at the artillery position where he had just fought. The white smoke there had mostly dissipated, and everything was quiet. There didn't seem to be any enraged enemy generals launching violent attacks on them.
Oh no, it was very likely that the artillery platoon did not cause much damage. The enemy probably did not feel any pain at all, so they were too lazy to care about this small group of people roaming around the battlefield.
"Platoon commander, no one is chasing us." The scout could not see the battlefield from where he was, and he could only report whether they were being chased by the enemy. Since the cavalry carrying the cannons could not run fast in the wilderness, the people in the artillery platoon had been brainwashed by Zhou Qingfeng to think that they were in a dangerous situation on the battlefield.
But now …
"No one is paying attention to us?" The young platoon commander, who was on the battlefield for the first time, also felt that things were not going well. "Could it be that the smoke from the artillery was too thick, causing our subsequent shots to miss and miss?"
There were more than 20 brothers in the platoon. After the formation of the unit, they trained hard every day for three minutes. If they did not hit their target in these three minutes, they would be ashamed of the lavish meals they had and the generous pay they had received for the past six months. Not only would they be laughed at by their comrades, but they would also bring great trouble to their comrades.
Thinking that they might have affected the battle because they did not perform well, the hearts of the brothers in the artillery platoon suddenly sank. The platoon commander ignored the danger and crawled out from the forest where he was hiding and poked his head out from a bush. Behind him, the deputy platoon commander and the squad leader of the artillery platoon all followed. They popped their heads out and looked around.
"Where are they? Where are the North Korean soldiers? "
"I saw thousands of people huddled together just now. How the hell did they disappear in the blink of an eye?"
"Could it be that we really did not hit anything, and those guys took a detour to the rear of the Grand Marshal's main formation?"
The cavalry platoon commander was anxious. He simply stood up from the bush and ran out. He wanted to go back to the artillery position to see what was going on. As soon as he moved, everyone in the platoon ran out, clamoring to see what was happening on the higher ground. By the time they returned to the original artillery position, they were already panting and had their hands on their knees.
But when the cavalry platoon returned to their original position, they looked out along the range of the artillery just now. The swarm of North Korean gunners had passed in front of them, but now they had all disappeared. There were gullies left by ricocheting shells on the ground. Because a total of more than 30 shells had been fired, the ground within a distance of two to three hundred meters had been plowed by the shells.
And in these muddy gullies, there were broken corpses and miserable wails of the wounded. At first glance, the entire ground was a blood-red color. But on a closer look, a large number of broken limbs were mixed with the mud. Stomachs and intestines were everywhere. Many of the North Korean wounded had not died yet, but could only roll back and forth on the ground, crying and begging for death.
"Oh my God, how many people have died?"
"Did we do this?"
"These guys have been defeated by us, right?"
Facing the dense flank of the enemy, the cavalry artillery platoon of the Imperial Guard of the Revolutionary Army for the first time had a good start. They used their sudden firepower to bombard the enemy's detour attack, causing a lot of casualties to the thousand-man squad. They directly killed and injured nearly a hundred people.
From a tactical point of view, the cavalry artillery platoon's attack was a success.
But …
"Platoon commander, look!" A cavalry artillery soldier pointed to an open space more than a hundred meters away and shouted anxiously, "Our enemy has not been defeated. They are attacking the high ground on our flank."
You've already exceeded your reading limit for today. If you want to read more, please log in.
Login
Select text and click 'Report' to let us know about any bad translation.
