When Lieutenant General Dai Yaxin ordered the artillery fire, the artillerymen at the artillery position on the hill started to move.
As the artillery officers gave orders, the artillery on the hilltop also roared.
At the same time, many Tatars eight hundred meters away also raised their heads and looked into the distance, but a Tatar artillery officer at the front showed a confused look.
These barbarians of the Southern Tang Dynasty are so strange. Although the current artillery can shoot 800 meters or even more than 1,000 meters, they are all smoothbore cannons. However, in fact, for most field smoothbore cannons used by the army, they exceed 500 meters.
At a distance of 10 meters, the hit rate will drop rapidly. At most, it can only attack the enemy's dense targets and win by sheer force by firing a large number of artillery shells.
But the Tatars are no longer novices on the battlefield. They have fought with the Tang Army for many years and know the Army of the Tang Dynasty very well.
As they advanced, they dispersed their formations and established a standard anti-shell formation.
Although it is inevitable to suffer losses from artillery fire, if you really want to talk about it, for a war, this loss is nothing at all.
Therefore, after many Tatar generals saw the barbarians of the Southern Tang Dynasty firing cannons on the opposite side, they did not show any panic at the first moment. At most, they shouted things like "hold on".
In previous battles, the hit rate of artillery fire beyond 500 meters would be very low, let alone the 800 meters in front of us.
But their thoughts changed instantly.
Because as the dispatch flew across the sky and landed on the Tatar position, the artillery shells were surprisingly accurate.
Most of the artillery shells did not fall into the open spaces between the scattered troops as expected, but instead landed densely among the crowds.
One went forward, and the Tatar cavalry artillery team was already relatively scattered. Several artillery groups were relatively scattered. According to convention, it was unlikely to suffer any big losses at this distance. At most, it was bad luck.
Only one or two shells were hit.
But what they didn't expect was that several artillery shells accurately hit these artillery groups.
And the most important thing is that there were only five artillery shells flying towards this artillery team, and four of them accurately hit the artillery team or nearby.
This directly resulted in the only six artillery groups in the artillery team suffering devastating blows before they could advance to the predetermined position.
"this……
"impossible!"
"How can this be!"
Wulihan, who was in the rear, saw this scene in front of him. He never imagined that this was just the first round of artillery bombardment by the Nantang Barbarians, and it was an ultra-long-range artillery bombardment of more than 800 meters, with such a high hit rate.
I don’t dare to say where to hit, but I definitely have a hit rate of over 80%.
Only a very few shells were empty!
How is this going?
Wulihan doesn’t know!
He used his binoculars to look at the hilltop more than a thousand meters away. The artillerymen of the Southern Tang Barbarians were already loading for the second round and preparing for the second round of bombardment.
Wulihan couldn't believe his eyes, but Lieutenant General Dai Yaxin on the opposite side didn't show much surprise when he saw the effect of the bombardment.
Before the war, he already knew the huge power of the muzzle-loading rifled gun.
The accuracy brought by rifled guns doubled the effective range of artillery strikes or even more.
At the same time, the cylindrical shells used in rifled guns can allow the shells to have more charges, and more charges mean greater explosive power.
In actual combat, a rifled cannon versus a smoothbore cannon would be almost a one-sided battle.
The range and power are not on the same level.
If rifled cannons were not so powerful, the Tang Dynasty military would not have been obsessed with rifled cannons for so many years. Both the Datang Navy and the Datang Army had been struggling with rifled cannons for many years.
It's just that they all want to get it right in one step and directly equip the breech-loading rifled cannon, so they are not too enthusiastic about the front-loading rifled cannon. That is to say, the breech-loading rifled cannon has been really difficult to get in the past two years, so they got the front-loading rifled cannon.
Just as a transition.
But starting this year, after the successful development of breech-loading rifled guns, it is foreseeable that the Tang Dynasty's navy and army will quickly enter the era of breech-loading rifled guns in a few years.
At least Lieutenant General Dai Yaxin knew that the Army had officially stopped the plan to purchase equipment for front-loading rifled guns, and was preparing for large-scale procurement of equipment for rear-loading rifled guns.
This also means that the thirty-six 100mm front-loading rifled guns in the First Cavalry Army may be the first batch, and also the last batch of Army front-loading rifled guns to appear on the battlefield.
These front-loaded rifled field guns, which have just appeared for a few years and the Army only started to equip them this year, may be short-lived.
Today's battle may be the first show of these front-loaded rifled guns, and it will also be their swan song.
But Lieutenant General Dai Yaxin had no regrets about this.
He is a general, and a senior general at that, so he naturally has a greater affinity for more advanced and powerful breech-loaded rifled guns.
In fact, this is not his idea alone. In fact, most of the army has been waiting for years to install rifled guns in the rear.
As for front-loaded rifled guns, the Army has always been unfavorable. Otherwise, the Army would not have followed up two years after the Navy equipped front-loaded rifles.
Today's front-loading rifled guns have such power, so if your troops are equipped with breech-loading rifled guns, they will not be able to beat these Tatars into slag.
When the 100mm front-loading rifled guns in the artillery regiment launched a second round of shelling, it also caused huge casualties to the Tatars.
Lieutenant General Dai Yaxin turned to Qi Lianzhong and said: "Chief of Staff, I heard that the Tianjin factory has already started trial production of the 75 howitzers?"
Major General Qi Lianzhong had already put down his telescope at this time and was no longer observing the effects of the artillery bombardment. Because the effects were so good, there was no need to look further. The artillery staff and officers of the artillery regiment were naturally responsible for subsequent bombardments.
After putting down the telescope, Major General Qi Lianzhong nodded and said: "It was reported a few days ago that the 75 Howitzer has indeed been put into trial production, and the people from the Guards have sent people there to receive preliminary training!"
Lieutenant General Dai Yaxin said: "After this battle, I will definitely write a letter in person, and these seventy-five howitzers must be obtained as soon as possible!"
Major General Qi Lianzhong said: "This rifled gun is a good thing. The front-loaded rifled gun is just like this, but the breech-loaded rifled gun is more advanced. If it can be equipped as soon as possible, it will definitely greatly enhance the firepower of our army! However, the 75 howitzer
It is prepared for the artillery regiment of the infantry division, and our cavalry may not be able to get it for a while!"
"As long as today's battle is fought well, are you afraid that you won't get it?" Lieutenant General Dai Yaxin did not think this issue was worth worrying about.
Nowadays, the empire only has large-scale wars in Central Asia. All units under the Western Expeditionary Army can be fully supplied, not only ordinary ammunition, but also new weapons.
The First Cavalry Army was the absolute main force in the Western Expedition, so it was reasonable to give priority to equipping them with various weapons.
The only worry is that these artillery were developed for the divisional artillery regiments of infantry divisions. Although mobility is also valued, it is not as highly valued as the cavalry. The weight should be heavier and the mobility may be worse.
But before the emergence of specialized breech-loading guns for cavalry, Dai Yaxin could only focus on this 75-mm howitzer.
If he doesn't choose this artillery, then he has no other choice.
Although the Army has issued multiple research and development tasks for breech-loaded artillery this year, the scientific research personnel are limited, and all the research and development tasks for so many artillery are carried out first and then later.
Naturally, the one that receives the highest priority is the 75mm howitzer, which is expected to provide battlefield fire support for infantry units such as divisions, brigades and regiments.
The caliber of the gun is 75 mm, the barrel diameter is sixteen times, and the effective range reaches three thousand meters. However, because it is made of all steel, and the gun frame, gun wheels, etc. are all made of steel, the gun's
The weight is not light.
In addition to the 75 Howitzer, there is also an Army breech-loading gun, the 75 Field Artillery, that has received much attention.
The 75th Howitzer and the 75th Field Artillery seem to be the same thing, but the difference is huge, because the former is just a howitzer with a relatively short barrel and a limited range, but the latter is expected to be used by the Army for long-distance firepower
Suppressed field artillery.
Its barrel diameter has reached twenty-six times, and its effective range has reached six thousand meters.
But for the cavalry, sixteen times the weight of the Seventy-Fifth Howitzer was too heavy, let alone twenty-six times the weight of the Seventy-Fifth Field Artillery.
As for the cavalry artillery prepared by the army for the cavalry, it is actually a 75mm gun, but the barrel is only fourteen times longer, and it is specially designed to be lightweight.
Based on the current situation, if the First Cavalry Corps wants to equip breech-loaded artillery in the next few months, the only option is actually the 75-pound howitzer.
Whether he can get it depends on Dai Yaxin's methods and the performance of the First Cavalry Army.
When Lieutenant General Dai Yaxin and Major General Qi Lianzhong turned the topic to breech-loading cannons, the battle was still going on!
After being hit precisely by thirty-six 100mm front-loading rifled guns from the artillery regiment of the First Cavalry Corps of the Tang Army and suffering heavy losses, the Tatars finally reacted.
Their accuracy was not due to luck, but because they were really accurate.
Although they don't know why yet, this does not prevent them from making a choice.
Wulihan gave an order to let the troops at the front who were unilaterally bombarded begin to retreat.
At first, they retreated a thousand meters away.
However, it was discovered that it was still under bombardment, and the place where it was bombarded was not one thousand meters away, but 1,500 meters further back.
Wulihan could no longer hold on and ordered the entire army to retreat.
Not just a tactical retreat of a few hundred meters, but a direct retreat to the starting position a few kilometers later.
What prompted Wulihan to make such a decision was that a few seconds ago, a cannonball from a Southern Tang barbarian exploded next to him.