The intuition of the Ming soldiers who saw the landmines was correct, because in the next moment, these fuses continued to detonate the mines, and suddenly more than twenty huge clouds of smoke and dust suddenly rose up from the Ming army's array, and the explosions even
Louder than the sound of an artillery fire!
And the power is not comparable to that of solid ball shells or grenades.
These landmines are said to be landmines, but in fact they are iron-packed gunpowder bags with a charge of more than ten kilograms. Although limited by technology, the explosive power of gunpowder in this era cannot be compared with various explosives in later generations, but
When so much gunpowder explodes, the power is quite huge. Not only does it produce a shock wave, but when these large mines explode, they will also spray shrapnel outwards, causing even more severe damage!
A six-inch howitzer in later generations was enough to sweep across an area the size of an entire football field. The Tang Army's large mine, which was used on the battlefield for the first time, although the power of the gunpowder was relatively small, but the quality was not good enough to make up for it in quantity, so this kind of
The explosive power of oversized mines is quite large.
More than 20 large landmines exploded one after another, causing heavy casualties to the Ming army array, especially the several small Ming army phalanxes at the center of the explosion. Almost more than a hundred people in the entire phalanx were collectively wiped out, and their corpses were
No existence.
Such a violent explosion and such heavy casualties inevitably caused the Ming army's formation to shake!
Not to mention ordinary soldiers, even the senior generals of the Ming Army were at a loss for a while, because such a fighting method was beyond their knowledge.
In their view, the battle should look like this: one's own side makes an initial advance with absolute strength advantage. Although the advancement process will inevitably be bombarded by the artillery of the puppet Tang rebel army, such casualties are controllable and are also one's own.
If they can withstand it, the artillerymen with bowl-mouth cannons at the front will fire when they advance to about 100 meters. At the same time, the archers will move forward to launch missiles, killing a large number of the puppet Tang rebels with a rain of arrows.
However, the soldiers rushed forward with spears, sabers and shields in hand!
At this time, the fragile phalanx of the Pseudo-Tang rebel army will inevitably collapse. After all, they have too few troops, and although the muskets are easy to use, at a distance of only a hundred meters, if our own side rushes over at high speed, they can at most
Play two or three rounds.
When our own soldiers rush forward, they will be able to defeat the puppet Tang rebel army in one fell swoop. In this way, a great victory will be won!
However, this is obviously their wishful thinking. The Tang Army has fought against the Ming Guards soldiers many times, and they have long known the tactics of the Ming Guards. Therefore, the Datang Army also focuses on developing medium and long-range firepower and a large number of equipment.
Not to mention field artillery, they are also commonly equipped with two-pound shotguns with an effective range of 150 meters. At the same time, division-level troops are also beginning to be equipped with heavier three-pound shotguns with greater range and power.
The three-pound shotgun is not only more powerful, but its effective range can also reach two hundred meters.
If the Ming army did not have an absolute strength advantage and a huge ability to withstand casualties, it would actually be difficult to rush from 500 meters to the front of the Ming army of the Tang Dynasty in a head-on confrontation.
Because in the medium and long distance of 500 meters to 100 meters, the Ming army without powerful artillery can only be passively beaten!
And another very critical point is that at this distance, it is difficult for the Ming army to launch a charge, and their movement speed is very slow.
The soldiers of this era of the Ming Army, not to mention the Ming Army, even the Tang Army's troops had a large number of soldiers wearing heavy armor. The mobility of these soldiers and spearmen was very lacking.
It is basically impossible to charge from a distance of about 20 to 30 meters. It is best to launch the final charge from a distance of 20 to 30 meters.
This means that within a combat distance of 100 to 500 meters between the two sides, the side with the weaker artillery power will one-sidedly bear more killings, and it will be multiple rounds of continuous killings, resulting in a large number of casualties and morale.
Crash.
If the artillery power is powerful enough, the artillery bombardment alone can completely inflict casualties on the opponent's infantry phalanx during the advancement process.
For example, if an infantry unit of the Tang Dynasty Army withstood two or three solid ball artillery shells in a dense and deep formation, the casualties of the entire infantry unit would often exceed one-third.
If it is an infantry battalion, it cannot withstand multiple rounds of artillery fire!
Because excessive casualties will inevitably cause the collapse of the army!
Those who can continue to launch attacks even with more than 30% casualties in the brigade are without exception the most elite troops in this era. In the entire Datang Army, there are only a few troops from the First Infantry Division.
, or to be more precise, only the 1st Infantry Regiment can do it.
However, if the casualty rate increases to 50%, then the First Infantry Regiment will still collapse. In modern armies, there are very few troops that can continue to launch attacks with 50% casualties.
, and the only ones are elite troops famous in the history of human war, such as Napoleon's Guards.
In addition, the above ratio does not apply to armies armed with country, nation or all kinds of messy ideas, but only to armies armed with interests as the core bond.
Otherwise, you can use the old Japanese army from the Meiji Restoration to World War II, the German SS during World War II, the Soviet Army during World War II, and other armies armed with spirituality to compete with the Tang Army, which is based on interests.
Compared with the modern armies formed by the core ties, there is no comparison, because the two are not at all of the same era, or even products of the same nature.
The army of the Tang Dynasty was like this, so the Ming army on the opposite side, which was also a garrison soldier, performed even more unbearably.
After the continuous explosion of large mines, the Ming army's array was filled with dead and wounded. Even the large and dense formations had many small holes. The sudden heavy casualties directly interrupted this Ming army.
's spine.
They stopped and began to look around blankly, with panic and bewildered expressions on their faces, because most of the Ming army soldiers knew what was going on, even the generals did not know.
They don't know what happened. They don't know if they will suffer a more terrifying blow if they continue to move forward. They don't even know if they will suffer such an almost devastating blow if they stay where they are.
Ever since, after a brief pause, these Ming troops retreated as violently as the tide!
Of course, even though they were stunned by the mines, the Ming army's retreat was organized by itself, so it can't be said to have collapsed. It was just that it would completely collapse soon after running.
At this time, Gu Shizhong also seized this rare opportunity. He directly ordered the lightly-armed soldiers in the army, that is, the soldiers without armor, to advance quickly.
He didn't want to give the retreating Ming army on the opposite side any chance to regain their footing. As long as he kept up the pressure of continuous pursuit, the Ming army on the opposite side would collapse sooner or later.
Then, in the queue, numerous musketeers, bows and arrows, armorless sword and shield bearers, and spearmen began to trot forward to pursue the retreating Ming army!
At this time, Gu Shizhong sighed: "It would be great if there was a cavalry at this time. It doesn't need to be more, as long as you give me five hundred cavalry, then I will definitely be able to completely defeat the Ming army in front of me!"
Facing an enemy that has retreated and is about to collapse, if there is a cavalry group behind to cover up the enemy, the results will definitely be fruitful, and it is highly likely that the enemy will be completely defeated.
Because in this kind of frontal field battle, the large-scale casualties actually did not occur in the frontal battle between the infantry of both sides, but in the pursuit stage after one of the parties collapsed.
And there is nothing more suitable to shoulder this kind of task than the light cavalry!
It is a pity that there are not many cavalry in his temporary fourth regiment. There is only one team with more than fifty cavalry. Moreover, these cavalry are only regimental cavalry in the Datang Army sequence, not regular cavalry.
Cavalry in the camp.
In the Tang Army, there are two categories of cavalry. One is regimental reconnaissance cavalry, which is mainly assigned to each regiment-level unit. It has two main tasks. One is responsible for forward reconnaissance, and the other very important task is to serve as
Quick messenger.
The other type of cavalry is the regular cavalry in each cavalry battalion. These cavalry are usually responsible for peripheral reconnaissance and patrol tasks. On the battlefield, they are responsible for the mobile force of the troops. They go into battle at the most critical moment and attack the enemy's flanks.
, to cover up and kill the already defeated enemy troops.
Although both types of cavalry are equipped with long-barrel muskets, short-barrel muskets, sabers and other equipment, the reason why these two classifications appear is because the quality gap between the horses and cavalry on both sides is relatively large.
Generally speaking, the horses in the cavalry battalion are of the best quality and are all Mongolian horses or carefully selected southwestern horses, while the horses of the regimental reconnaissance cavalry are ordinary southwestern horses.
The same is true for the quality of the cavalry. Only the best cavalry can be selected into the cavalry battalion. The cavalry with lower quality will first serve in the reconnaissance cavalry team and will be transferred to the cavalry battalion if they perform well.
This can be regarded as an innovative model for the cultivation and training of cavalry troops by the Tang Dynasty Army. After all, the Tang Dynasty was in war, and the demand for cavalry was very large. How many cavalry were sent to the battlefield.
But if you send the novice cavalry of unqualified quality to the battlefield and let them directly engage in cruel cavalry charges, the losses will be too great, so they will be sent to the reconnaissance cavalry battalion for a period of time to train, and then they will be transferred to the cavalry battalion to serve.
.
In fact, in other words, the reconnaissance cavalry directly under each regiment is actually a cavalry training unit, which is just trained in actual combat.