Hulao Pass is located on the west bank of Sishui River, and Gongxian County is located on the east of Yiluo River. The area between the two cities is bordered by the Yellow River to the north and Mount Songshan to the south, with crisscrossing mountains and rivers. Compared to the vicinity of Hulao Pass, the west bank of Sishui River is crisscrossed and rugged.
There was a little room for the cavalry to maneuver.
This area extends about thirty-five or six miles from east to west and about fifteen or six miles from south to south. It extends from the northern slope of Songshan Mountain, with low ridges and crisscrossing ravines, all the way to the south bank of the Yellow River.
The Yellow River carries the sediment from Shanxi and Shaanxi and flows down, and the river bed rises year by year. This also makes the gully between Songshan Mountain and the Yellow River a lot of siltation, otherwise the terrain will be potholed and rugged.
The flattest area in this area is the mouth of the Yiluo River in the north of Zhu County.
This place is where Songshan Mountain and Mangshan Mountain meet. It was originally a wide gorge. The Yiluo River and the Yellow River converged at this time. Thousands of years of sediment deposition formed a plain that is about 112 miles from east to west and about 45 miles from south to south.
terrain.
This is also the main battlefield where the Red Husbands sniped at the Western reinforcements advancing eastwards.
Although the Western Army under Cai Ting's leadership, including the Western Army generals promoted by Cai Ting, has various shortcomings, Cai Ting has been able to sit firmly in the Western Army for so many years. This is also true of the Western Army under his leadership and the party members in recent years.
He did not lose in the battle, and even made small gains from time to time.
Zheng Huaizhong was appointed as Qinfeng Road's strategic and pacification envoy. His starting point was lower than that of Liu Shidao and Liu Shizhong brothers. He was a veteran of the Western Army who rose from the grassroots level to become a veteran of the Western Army.
The Western Army was weak in cavalry and relied mainly on infantry. It had been fighting against the Dangxiang people who were good at cavalry for many years, and had accumulated rich experience. These experiences can be summed up in four words from a strategic and tactical perspective, which is "shallow attack and advance towards the fort".
This was also the core tactic used by Wang Zhen and Lu Xiong to teach people in Huaiyuan to resist the bandits during the Tongbai Mountain Bandit Rebellion.
From a strategic point of view, the shallow attack and advance are to avoid battles and decisive battles with superior enemy forces, to avoid lightly entering the enemy's hinterland for interspersed operations, to build more fortifications on the border areas, and to defend the border areas. In terms of tactics, it is more about moving step by step and fighting steadily.
Many camps were built in front of the enemy, approaching step by step, or car formations were used to restrict the enemy's movement.
As the main general of the Western Army, Zheng Huaizhong, this set of combat thinking can be said to be deeply rooted in his bones.
He led his troops and horses as the vanguard of the Xianjun Army, and also carried a large number of side-vans and light tanks. It is no wonder that he delayed crossing the Yiluo River until mid-February. After entering Gongxian, he continued to march outside the city.
Set up camp; tentative attacks often involve more than a thousand troops and chariots approaching the enemy camp step by step.
Even if the captive soldiers deployed elite troops near the camp, they could not easily break through the tightly defended Western infantry formations.
With such a prudent general and such strategic thinking used to defend the border, there may not be any big mistakes, but at this moment, it is inappropriate.
At this time in previous years, the grain from the Jianghuai, Zhejiang, and Jinghu prefectures and counties should have been loaded on ships, waiting for the Bianshui River connecting the Hehuai River and the Caishui to dissolve the ice, and then be shipped to the capital on a large scale; as for Cai, Xu,
Grain, firewood, and meat from the Hehuai prefectures and counties in Chen, Song, and other counties were transported to Bianliang continuously for many years.
It has been more than a month since the red cavalry and the auxiliary troops surrendered, with tens of thousands of people, crossing into the Hehuai River.
Not only did the red cavalry gallop across the Hehuai River without any rivals, they also drove countless refugees from the Hehuai area into Bianliang City, where 13.4 million soldiers and civilians were originally seeking refuge.
No matter how abundant the grain reserves are in Bianliang, food will inevitably begin to be scarce and the grain roads will be exhausted. However, every time it is delayed for one day, Bianliang will be more short of grain. If it is delayed for another month, even if Bianliang does not
If it is lost, countless people will starve to death in the city.
What's more, in the coming time, the Red Husband Cavalry will continue to plunder and massacre the villages in the prefectures and counties between the Hehuai River and Huaihe River, turning the most prosperous and prosperous place in Dai Viet into a purgatory and Shura field in order to shake the imperial court.
The foundation of rule.
The commander of the Chihu East Route Army did not order the west wing troops to retreat to Hulao Pass. Instead, they extended to the north of Gong County and drove tens of thousands of prisoners to urgently build layers of fortifications. In addition to Hulao Pass, which was extremely weak, it was not conducive to cavalry.
In coordinating operations, one might think of using the inherent combat thinking of the Western Army generals to advance step by step to delay the Western Army's eastward advance as much as possible.
After thinking through all the advantages and disadvantages of this, Xu Huai increasingly concluded that this strategy should be offered by Yue Hailou and other surrendered generals of the Western Army.
The Chihu people's first southern invasion did not expect to severely damage the main force of the Western Army. Instead, they disintegrated Dai Viet's military potential from a strategic level and shook the foundation of Dai Viet's rule, setting the stage for the subsequent second and third southern invasions to completely destroy Dai Viet.
Lay a solid foundation.
When there are abundant rains in summer and autumn, the Yellow River, Yiluo River, Mang Mountain, Song Mountain, and Wangwu Mountain on the north bank of the river surge, and the rivers meet, and the river mouths are often flooded.
Although it is still the beginning of the year and the water is dry, the weather has warmed up, the ice and snow have melted, and it is muddy when people and horses trample on them. The muddy terrain has restrictions on horses and infantry, but war horses have long hooves and strong feet, so they are less restricted.
It is much more difficult for infantry to trample on muddy ground.
This made Zheng Huaizhong advance his operations in Gong County more cautiously and slowly. He conducted tentative attacks for several days in a row, and did not even break through the first layer of simple fortresses built by the surrender troops in the north of Gong County.
The hour has passed, but the forest with sparse branches and leaves is filled with mist.
Xu Huai stood on the stone hill, holding the saber at his waist. Even though his vision was obscured by fog, he couldn't help but look to the northwest.
The world was quiet. Two days ago, Zheng Huaizhong had already sent troops to enter the northern battlefield of Gong County. However, today it was obviously delayed due to heavy fog. Don't expect Zheng Huaizhong to launch a fierce attack on the simple camp of the soldiers day and night.
.
"Zheng Huaizhong hasn't sent out troops to attack the enemy camp yet?" Deng Gui came from behind and looked to the west anxiously. He couldn't hear any movement and asked Xu Huai uncertainly.
"These grandsons of the Western Army will either be so powerful that they will bury Xuanwu and the tens of thousands of elites in Yunshuo in vain, or they will be as stable as old dogs - the Japanese next door, I don't have a whip to whip these old dogs!
"Xu Huai spat.
Although he had known Xu Huai's identity as a yaksha fox for a long time, Deng Gui was still used to hearing Xu Huai's dirty words, and was really not used to Xu Huai's serious appearance in front of King Jing Zhao Tuan.
Deng Gui grinned and asked: "Zheng Huaizhong didn't take action, what should we do, withdraw?"
"We came here at night and left traces along the way. We also pulled out several hidden sentries on the other side. We are leaving now. Seeing that the hidden sentries have not returned, Cao Shili sent people to look for them. If they see the traces, they will definitely be alert..." Xu Huai shook his head.
, said.
In marching and fighting, observation of signs and traces is a basic skill - more than a thousand of them took the mountain trail to sneak here, leaving so many traces along the way that it is impossible to erase them. However, when the soldiers noticed that there were so many soldiers and horses sneaking here, they went down
It is impossible to sneak here quietly again once.
To put it bluntly, it was the Chihu people and Cao Shili who thought that if they retreated to the south of Gong County with King Jing, they would rest on the spot and completely hand over the battlefield to the Western reinforcements. They did not guard against them, so they gave them this opportunity.
That’s all.
If you don't use the opportunity, you will miss it.
"Cao Shi Levi led his elite troops westward to join the battle. The enemy camp in Qingquangou has seven or eight thousand troops. Our manpower is not enough!" Deng Gui said with a frown.
On the west flank, although the Red Husbands invested a larger amount of cavalry, they mainly drove the surrender troops to resist the eastward advance of the Western reinforcements.
At present, Xiao Qian, the Khitan general who surrendered to Xijing, is leading Datong and Tibetan soldiers. They have set up camp in the north of Gong County to fight against the Western army's vanguard. However, the combat effectiveness of Datong and Tibetan soldiers is average. Cao Shili will lead a group of horse infantry to rush to the north of Gong County every day.
Protect the flanks.
They sneaked to the south side of Qingquan Valley last night, hoping to take advantage of Cao's division to lead the elite troops out of the camp, and they would catch the remaining garrison troops by surprise.
The topography of Qingquan Valley is that the terrain on both sides is uplifted, and a long ditch extends into the northern slope of Songshan Mountain; especially the closer to Songshan Mountain, the steeper the ridges on both sides become.
When they launch an attack on the camp, they are not afraid of the enemy cavalry crossing from the flanks to cut off their retreat. They can retreat calmly when reinforcements come from both flanks.
However, despite all their calculations, they never expected that there would be heavy fog in the early morning, nor did they expect that Zheng Huaizhong would make a truce in the foggy weather, so they did not transfer Cao Shili and his elite guards away.
The fog is not particularly thick now, and the scenery dozens of steps away can barely be seen clearly. If they really get close to the Qingquangou company camp, it will be difficult to launch a surprise attack. The result will be a forceful attack.
However, if we really want to attack the enemy camp in Qingquangou by force, will they be able to put a hole in their teeth with just a thousand or so troops behind them?
"Why should I catch Cao Shili, this rabbit, and spank him so hard? Because this grandson is just a weakling now!"
Xu Huai rubbed his hands and said,
"Cao Shili attacked Gong County by force and lost many troops. Nearly 2,000 of his troops were killed in the battle, and even more were injured and disabled. His morale was so bad that he was frightened. The Qingquangou company camp seemed to have 7,800 troops stationed, but after careful calculation,
, the number of those who were not damaged at all was probably a little over 2,000. In addition, there were about 2,500 or 600 injured and injured, and there were 3,000 surrendered prisoners transferred to him from other places by the Red Husbands who saw that he was somewhat hardworking. Cao Shili
It has only been three or four days since we took over these manpower, how can we possibly use them smoothly?"
"General Wang Ju, envoy Guo, what do you say, to fight or not to fight?" Deng Gui looked at Wang Ju and Guo Junpan and asked.
"Shou Gong County is training troops for the Ling Shou Army, but we haven't even had a tough fight!" Wang Ju said while rubbing his hands.
Wang Ju is the real martial arts fanatic. In his early years, because he was a general and made many military exploits on the battlefield, he was appointed as the commander of the Jingzhou Xiang Army. However, he usually did not take care of things, so he was imprisoned and framed by Liu Shidao.
, I was not alert at first.
Forced to hide his presence these years, he had to be cautious in order to protect his family, but he was still a restless middle-aged man at heart.
"Then let's catch this rabbit Cao Shili and give it a try!" Deng Gui said...
