After completing the reform of the official system, Li Xuan was not in a hurry to immediately promote the next step of military reform, but continued to focus on his Guards.
Why?
Because in order to carry out military reform, especially things like organization and tactics, there must be a charter, and these things are not something that Li Xuan can come up with by just thinking about it. Even if he can come up with it, Li Xuan does not dare to mess with it.
come.
Organization and tactics are related to the life and death of the Tang Dynasty, and even more related to whether Li Xuan can survive. This cannot be careless at all.
Therefore, Li Xuan decided to use the Guards as a pilot first and work out the basic organization first.
"Your Majesty, there were fifty-two people in our Guards before, divided into six squads, with each team ranging from five to ten people. Now, in accordance with your Majesty's imperial decree, we have recruited thirty more people." Wang Danxu stood in front of Li Xuan,
He respectfully reported on the situation of the Guards.
Li Xuandao: "Well, that's right. Since the number of people is enough, let's start the next step of organization and training as soon as possible!"
Wang Danxu said: "I obey the order!"
After saying that, Wang Danxu raised his head and looked at Li Xuan, and then said: "Your Majesty, our army is short of muskets. Isn't it too much to train more than 20 people now?"
Li Xuan shook his head and said: "There are only more than twenty people, not many!"
"But this musket is slow to load and can't shoot accurately. It's better to replace all the muskets with bows and arrows..." Wang Danxu wanted to continue, but Li Xuan waved his hand to stop him from continuing.
Li Xuan didn't understand tactics, but Wang Danxu in front of him didn't understand even more. So Li Xuan would rather believe in the tactics he saw in movies and TV shows in his previous life than believe in this bodyguard general who was born as a bandit leader.
The organization he created for the Guards is somewhat similar to a modern army, but not like it.
According to his idea, he was planning to use spearmen and musketeers as the main force to engage in multiple deep line tactics, with spearmen in the middle and musketeers on both wings. The ratio of the two should be one to one.
The spearmen were divided into teams of thirty men, a total of six teams, in the center. There were ninety musketeers on the two wings, also divided into six teams.
But it is a pity that there are not so many muskets in Huangzhu Mountain, and it is impossible to achieve the proportion that Li Xuan imagined, so he can only lower the requirements and use as many muskets as there are.
According to his estimates, in two months, the Guards should be equipped with about twenty matchlock guns. Although it is still not enough, it can barely cooperate with the spearmen in combat.
At the same time, due to the small number of Guards, it was impossible for him to play a five- or six-column deep line tactic, and he could only reluctantly play a three-column line tactic.
To this end, he planned to divide the Guards into three parts, one part was musketeers, one part was spearmen, and the other part was sword and shield soldiers, and adopted line tactics.
Among them, the main force is the spearmen. There are three teams in total, each team has fourteen people. When fighting, they line up in the middle and form three rows in front and back.
There are four teams of musketeers, each team has seven people. When fighting, they are assigned to the two wings of the spearmen, in two columns, front and rear.
Finally, there are the sword and shield soldiers, each team has fourteen people, a total of two teams, attached to the rear of the musketeers, used to protect the flanks of the line, but more importantly, they are used to chase and kill the enemy when they are broken up.
Kill the enemy troops and expand the results!
Each of the above teams includes a captain and a deputy.
According to Li Xuan's own idea, when the Guards fought, they strictly followed line tactics. When engaging with the enemy, if the enemy was advancing slowly, they would use matchlock guns to fire in multiple rows. But if the enemy was
For a high-speed charge, you don't fire at a distance of 50 to 100 meters, but wait for the enemy to come within 50 meters or even 20 meters before launching a volley of fire. In other words, only fire one shot!
The reason why when the enemy charges, they do not use round fire but volley fire. This is because Li Xuan feels that the Guards' musketeers are only so small. If there are multiple rows of round fire, each shot will only be sporadic.
A few gunshots might as well be a big one at the last minute.
Launching a volley at the last moment can not only cause heavy damage to the enemy, but also effectively dampen the enemy's courage and effectively reduce the pressure on the spearmen when they launch an attack!
After the musketeers fired a volley, the spearmen began to attack in a dense formation. The musketeers inserted bayonets modified with spearheads into their muskets and followed the spearmen to charge. The sword and shield soldiers followed to protect the musketeers.
At the same time, kill scattered enemy troops.
Equipping muskets with bayonets was something that Li Xuan had decided long ago, and since the technically difficult sleeve-type bayonet was not considered, if only a plug-in bayonet was used, the technical difficulty could be basically ignored. In fact, the muskets equipped with bayonets
Soldiers can be used as spear soldiers.
But the problem is that the output of muskets in Huangzhushan is now too low. As a last resort, Li Xuan can only continue to mix musketeers and spearmen.
The formation and tactics of the Guards were the result of Li Xuan's hard thinking for several months. During this process, he thought through almost all the war movies, TV dramas, novels, etc. that he had seen in his mind before he came up with it.
Such a paradoxical thing.
However, the organization is there and the tactics are there, but Li Xuan doesn't know whether it will work or not, so he can only leave it to fate.
After struggling with the Guards for three full days, Li Xuancai put the reorganization of several other standing armies on the schedule!
At the court meeting, after the ministers had finished dealing with the trivial matters, Bai Yunqi, the confidant of Empress Dowager Bai and the commander of the rear army, was the first to speak: "I have something to report!"
After the word "quasi", Bai Yunqi began to talk broadly: "I have been organizing and training a standing army in the Tang Dynasty for several months. There are left and right armies in front and behind. There are five armies in Zhenxi. However, each army has its own organization and different tactics.
As for the improper cooperation between the various armies.
In the event of a major war, if the various armies do not coordinate properly, it may delay the opportunity to fight or lead to the complete defeat of the entire army. In order to maintain the invincibility of our Imperial Division of the Tang Dynasty, our army should unify its military system!"
There is no need to doubt or guess that Bai Yunqi, an illiterate, could say such an illiterate thing incorrectly. Anyone with a discerning eye would know right away that someone had taught him to say this, and no one except Li Xuan had taught him to say this.
There is no one else.
Li Xuan said at this time: "What do you all think of what General Bai said?"
At this time, Fang Dongquan and Huang Xueren did not speak immediately, but were deep in thought. However, Qian Mengjiu, a civil servant who had accompanied the army in many battles, spoke immediately:
"I think what General Bai said is very true. In the previous battles of our army, we all suffered from poor command and poor coordination. Fortunately, our soldiers were brave and achieved great victories several times. However, the Ming army will soon be very powerful.
Maybe if we enter the mountains again, if our army is unable to move forward, we may not be able to cope with the Ming army by then!"
Liu Bago also spoke: "I don't know much about military matters, but a strong army in the world must be one with strict military discipline and uniformity!"
Wang Wenhua immediately picked up the conversation and said: "Although our Tang Dynasty has such eternal sage kings as your majesty and your great blessings, we will definitely be able to win every battle. However, if the soldiers use their lives and have smooth command, they can turn a small victory into a big victory, and a big victory into a complete victory."
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Among the three mainstays of the Tang Dynasty, the only scholar and civil servant Qingyi agreed with the unification of the military system, which was within Li Xuan's expectation.
After all, for Liu Bagou and the others, the stronger the Tang army, the better, so that it can fight against the Ming army. As for the impact of the reform of the military system on the existing generals, they don't care.
Li Xuan had already expected that Liu Bagou and the others would agree. The question now is, will Fang Dongquan and the others agree?...