Yangzhou is one of the most prosperous cities in contemporary times. The reason why it is so prosperous is inseparable from its location. With the Beijing-Hangzhou Grand Canal, Yangzhou can bring together a lot of money from all over the world.
Not to mention, the Lianghuai salt industry was quite developed during the Ming Dynasty, and Yangzhou was the distribution center of the Lianghuai salt industry. The capital gathered here alone amounted to at least tens of millions of taels of silver.
And this is just the glory of Yangzhou in business, but in terms of military, Yangzhou also plays an important strategic role. Why, it is because of the Beijing-Hangzhou Grand Canal.
Yangzhou guards the entrance of the Beijing-Hangzhou Grand Canal to and from the Yangtze River. Whoever occupies Yangzhou can guard the entrance, um, or exit of the Beijing-Hangzhou Grand Canal.
For the current war between the Tang Army and the Ming Army, Yangzhou's role is even more important. If the Tang Army wants to go north, it must pass through the Beijing-Hangzhou Grand Canal, and to pass through the Beijing-Hangzhou Grand Canal, it must capture Yangzhou.
For the Ming army, if they want to defend Jiangbei, or even Shandong and North Zhili, they must defend Yangzhou!
Because Yangzhou is so important, both the Tang and Ming armies invested heavy troops here, and they paid the highest level of attention to it.
The main force gathered by the Ming army in Yangzhou will exceed 130,000, and the total force will reach more than 150,000!
As for the Third Army prepared by the Tang Army for Yangzhou, its total strength reached 55,000. In addition to the navy's naval guns, the total number of artillery pieces weighing more than five kilograms in the Army's Third Army alone exceeded 200!
And now, after the Third Army successfully landed in Tongzhou, it will send out its main force and head towards Yangzhou!
The Third Army was coming fiercely, and the Ming army in Yangzhou City had naturally noticed it early, and began to shrink its troops and voluntarily abandoned the Ming army in Tongzhou. Although they were punished on the surface, they were given the opportunity to make meritorious deeds in the blink of an eye. To put it bluntly,
Even the adults above agreed that the defenders on the Tongzhou side should retreat on their own initiative to preserve their strength.
After that, even the main force of the defenders in Taizhou took the initiative to retreat, leaving only more than 2,000 people to put up a symbolic resistance, and then the more than 2,000 people also retreated en masse.
Facing the menacing puppet Tang rebel army, the Ming army rationally chose to shrink its troops and planned to hold on to Yangzhou City while redeploying its defense line in Gaoyou in the rear.
Facing the Ming army's approach of not resisting continuously but actively shrinking its troops and preparing to be a coward in Yangzhou, Hao Bainian was not impatient.
Hao Bainian is naturally confident. This time, he brought more than 200 artillery pieces, including three battalions of heavy howitzers. Although Yangzhou City is considered a big city, its city defense is not as good as that of Jinling City.
It's a big city, and it's not as easy to defend as Anqing.
Therefore, he continued to move forward slowly and steadily, without making any risky strategies such as dividing his troops.
On September 15, the troops of the Third Army arrived outside Yangzhou City, but Hao Bainian did not lay siege to Yangzhou, but ignored it and led his troops directly towards the Yangzhou Fort.
Yangzhou Fort is a series of forts set up by the Ming army to prevent the Tang Dynasty navy from going up the Yangjiang River and entering the middle reaches of the Yangtze River, and also to prevent the puppet Tang rebels from invading the Beijing-Hangzhou Grand Canal. There are five large and small forts.
There are many artillery pieces attached to the cannon, and a lot of troops are stationed for defense.
However, the Yangtze River defense line built by the Ming army was actually based on the Ming navy as the main force, and the forts, to be honest, were just for cooperation.
Today's artillery has a limited range, and it is almost impossible to rely solely on artillery to blockade the lower reaches of the Yangtze River, which is several kilometers wide. This situation not only occurred in the Yangzhou Fort, but also in the previous Jiangyin Fort.
The same situation exists at the Humen Fort at the Pearl River Estuary!
Today's forts are mostly used to cooperate in combat operations or to guard important ports. In the wide stretches of the river, their role is actually limited.
Their warships can't defeat your forts, why don't you know how to hide away?
Now the Yangzhou Navy of the Ming Army has been completely destroyed, and the Navy has gathered many main fleets and gradually moved up the river. This time, they are no longer worried about the risks caused by the ships being too large, and are preparing to directly use the capital ships
Enter the middle section of the Yangtze River, and then use powerful naval gunfire to cooperate with the army to destroy and capture the Yangzhou fort group.
On September 16, the Third Army successively launched offensive operations against the Yangzhou fort group along the Yangtze River. The navy also dispatched battleships to carry out shelling and cooperate with the operations. Although there were many Ming troops guarding the forts, there was the Tang Sea.
The army's opponent, the largest of which was a fort with more than thirty artillery pieces, failed to hold out for even a day before it fell.
During this period, the Ming army in Yangzhou City also tried to take the initiative to attack, but Hao Bainian quickly turned back with the main force of the Third Army and gathered the cavalry battalions of various troops. The third cavalry detachment of the cavalry took the opportunity to attack an outgoing Ming army.
The Ming army that led to leaving the city lost thousands of troops not long after leaving the city, and finally fled back to Yangzhou City in panic.
The Ming troops in the city did not dare to come out, so the Third Army calmly cleared these forts one by one.
On September 20, the Third Army announced that it had occupied the last fort of the Ming Army. It not only cleared the Yangtze River channel leading to the middle reaches of the Yangtze River, but also opened the entrance to the Beijing-Hangzhou Grand Canal.
Immediately afterwards, the Navy directly established the Beijing-Hangzhou Canal Fleet, and mobilized more than 30 small-tonnage, shallow-draft inland river gunboats from each fleet, and then went directly to the Beijing-Hangzhou Grand Canal and headed straight for Jiangdu, the capital city of Yangzhou.
!
To the navy, these river gunboats may be just auxiliary warships, the kind that don't feel bad if they sink the main ship's gunfire, but they are actually equipped with real artillery.
Take the Class B inland river gunboat with the most equipment in the Tang Dynasty as an example. Its displacement is about 80 tons to 100 tons, and it is equipped with two five-pound cannons and three three-pound shotguns.
In addition, 50-ton Class C inland river gunboats are also generally equipped with a five-pound cannon.
The firepower of more than thirty inland river gunboats is comparable to that of an artillery regiment of the Army, and will be a powerful artillery supplement for the Army.
Although these inland river gunboats don't even have official ship names, they only have simple numerical designations, such as gunboat A1, gunboat B2, and gunboat C3!
Although the army and navy had joined forces to clear out the Yangzhou forts, and the navy also dispatched the Beijing-Hangzhou Canal Fleet to support the Army's Third Army, Hao Bainian was not in a hurry to attack Jiangdu.
The Ming army in Jiangdu City is now conservatively estimated to be 100,000 people. If they launch a forceful attack without thinking, they may suffer huge casualties. The strategic initiative now lies with the Tang Army, so Hao Bainian is not in a hurry.
First, artillery positions were built, and then bombardments were carried out day and night, especially heavy howitzers, whose shells were fired at the top of Yangzhou City for free. Now the Third Army's ammunition supply is quite abundant.
After the Yangtze River channel is opened, those transport and supply ships can arrive directly outside Jiangdu City and unload ammunition on the spot!
The smooth supply of supplies was rare for the Tang Army in so many years of operations.
Of course, the Third Army fought so hard that the logistics department behind them who supported them with logistical supplies was also exhausted and almost died.
In order to supply the Third Army's terrifying ammunition consumption flow, the logistics department prepared hundreds of large and small transport ships to ply various routes.
Although most of the ammunition currently used is ammunition that was previously stored in Wusong Port and Jiangyin Port, the subsequent replenishment of ammunition needs to be transported from the distant Guangdong and Guangxi regions.
From the Pearl River waterway, to the coastal route, and then to the Yangtze River route, these ammunitions need to be transported over long distances before they can reach the hands of the Third Army.
However, although sea transportation is also quite far away, it is still much simpler than using manpower to travel over mountains and ridges for land transportation.
Therefore, although it is difficult, the logistics department can barely support the Third Army's ammunition-wasting combat method.
When the Third Army bombarded Jiangdu but delayed launching a general infantry attack, although Li Xuan in Jinling City knew Hao Bainian's strategy in advance, he was still a little impatient.
In order to pry open the turtle shell of Yangzhou, he temporarily detained the 5,000 Guards troops originally planned to strengthen the Second Army, and then sent them to Yangzhou to prepare to reinforce the Third Army.
These 5,000 Guards troops include three Guards infantry battalions, an artillery battalion, a baggage battalion and a cavalry unit. This unit is led by Guards Major General Bai Linyi, one of the three chiefs of staff of the Guards and the director of the Military Command Department.
Lead it yourself.
The command system of the Guards is different from that of the Army. There is no regiment-level establishment, only the battalion level. There are six infantry battalions, three artillery battalions, three baggage battalions, and one cavalry battalion.
In this way, there are naturally no commanders above the regiment level. The daily operations and training of the Guards are all the responsibility of the Chief of Staff and the two Deputy Chiefs of Staff of the Guards Military Command.
But theoretically speaking, these three people do not have the power to directly mobilize any Guards troops. Only after receiving temporary authorization from Li Xuan can they have the power to mobilize these Guards troops.
Major General Bai Linyi of the Imperial Guard was naturally one of them, and his identity was somewhat special. He was a member of Empress Dowager Bai's family. Although the relationship was a bit distant and he could only be regarded as a collateral descendant, his surname was still Bai anyway.
And this person's ability is pretty good. He served in the army before. Later, Li Xuan simply transferred him to the Guards. Then he worked in the Guards for many years. In addition, this person is also smart. Although he is
She is a relative of the Bai family, but she is different from Bai Yunqi who never forgets to seek welfare for the clan members and always joins forces with the Queen Mother Bai when there is no need.
Since this person joined the Guards, he has basically cut off contact with the Bai family, and directly refused Queen Mother Bai's summons.
Of course he did this on purpose to show Li Xuan!
Everyone knows what kind of force the Guards is. If you hold an important position in the Guards, if you dare to get involved with other people, even the Queen Mother, you are basically seeking death.
Bai Linyi, who was born in a maternal relationship, turned himself into a loner after joining the Guards. Except for Li Xuan, no one could hope to persuade him.
After Major General Bai Linyi arrived in Jiangdu with 5,000 Guards troops, Hao Bainian was still very happy even though he knew that the Guards came here for training and to increase their combat experience and that they were unlikely to actually go into battle and fight to the death.
In any case, these are reinforcements of 5,000 troops. With these 5,000 Guards troops, he will be able to free up the 5,000 troops of the Third Army for use on other fronts.