Chapter 840 This official is going to have dinner in Yangzhou!
The Ming Army had been fighting against the Tang Army for many years, so they were naturally very familiar with the large number of grenades equipped by the Tang Army. They even copied and equipped them themselves, but the quantity of the equipment was not large.
Because the grenades currently equipped by the Tang Army and the grenades imitated by the Ming Army are, to put it bluntly, a cannonball with a matchlock fuse. The technical difficulty is very low, and any blacksmith can produce it.
What restricted the Ming army from equipping grenades on a large scale was not technical factors, but cost issues!
Gunpowder is very expensive these days. The sulfur and saltpeter required to produce gunpowder are relatively expensive. At the same time, the processing technology is not that simple. The processing of gunpowder is relatively complicated, which always results in the price of gunpowder being relatively expensive.
.
There is no problem if it is used as propellant for guns and cannonballs. It is more expensive and you can sustain it with grit. However, if it is to be used as gunpowder for cannonballs and grenades on a large scale, then the quantity required will increase significantly.
This ultimately led to a significant increase in military spending.
The Ming army's military expenditure was so small that it did not have enough gunpowder or the large amount of gunpowder needed for guns. How could it be possible to waste a lot of gunpowder to make grenades, landmines and the like.
But the Army of the Tang Dynasty is different. Although the cost of purchasing gunpowder for the Army of the Tang Dynasty is also not cheap, it adopts large-scale imports to reduce the cost of raw materials and uses large-scale mechanical processing. As the output increases, the unit price will naturally decrease.
Come down.
What's more important is that the military expenditure of the Tang Army was much higher than that of the Ming Army, much more!
When the Ming army in Yangzhou City wanted to motivate the soldiers, but in the end they couldn't even get out one hundred thousand taels of silver, the third army outside the city fired only artillery shells worth more than one hundred thousand taels.
The military expenditure of the Tang Army was enough to support the Tang Dynasty King's Division to equip the Tang Dynasty with various firearms on a large scale and use them on a large scale!
Grenade is just one of them!
Similarly, those heavy howitzers are also big money devourers, so every howitzer is worth money, and a lot of money!
Although the Ming army was limited by military expenditure and did not have large-scale equipment of hand grenades, it still had a small number of hand grenades in an elite unit with good treatment.
Now that they are familiar with grenades, these Ming soldiers naturally know how to defend against grenades!
If there is a bunker, naturally hide in the bunker!
But when you encounter a grenade temporarily and there is no bunker to rely on, the best way is to lie down directly. Although you may still be injured, it is better than standing stupidly.
In particular, heavy infantry are usually equipped with heavy armor. If the distance is farther and the luck is better, the armor can also block the damage of shrapnel. Of course, whether it can block it depends on luck.
Of course, if you are unlucky enough and a bomb falls next to a soldier, you will most likely be doomed.
So when the commander of the Ming army saw the grenade, his first reaction was to shout for people to get down, but it was still too late!
As soon as he finished speaking, he heard a loud noise in his ears, and at the same time, someone pushed the protection behind him. Then his vision went dark, and he completely lost consciousness.
Because at this time, a howitzer exploded just two meters behind him!
The shock wave of the grenade pushed him, but it was not the shock wave that made him fall down and even lose consciousness, but the shrapnel!
Among the many shrapnel left behind after the grenade exploded, one of them happened to hit his back. The shrapnel easily tore apart his armor and penetrated into his body, thus taking away his life.
The grenades continued to explode, and after dozens of grenades exploded, most of the dozens of Ming army heavy armored infantry who originally rushed to the top of the ruins had fallen.
At the same time, on the slope outside the ruins, a major officer from the Tang Dynasty assault camp once again raised his steel knife high and shouted: "Team 1, charge forward, quickly!"
"Team 2, follow quickly!"
"The grenadier is preparing for the second round of bombing!"
"Come on!"
"Long live the Tang Dynasty!"
As the smoke from the previous round of grenade explosions was blown away by the wind, the commando battalion that had been repulsed half a minute ago once again climbed to the top of the ruins. When they climbed up with a squeak in their footsteps, they were stepping on both the enemy and ourselves.
The corpse of the soldier!
The two sides have been fighting each other in this ruins for only a few minutes, but the number of soldiers from both sides who fell in this ruins has exceeded 200, and they are still rising!
Densely packed corpses almost covered the entire top of the ruins!
And outside the ruins, on the road where the Tang Army charged, there were even more corpses and wounded lying there!
They charged directly against the Ming army's artillery, muskets, grenades, and bows and arrows!
Of course, the Ming army was even more uncomfortable, because when the soldiers of the Ming army used guns, artillery and other weapons to attack the infantry of the Tang Army charging outside the city, more than 200 artillery pieces and more than 10,000 muskets of the Tang Army were also aimed at them.
Fire at the top of the city!
A Ming Army musketeer team with hundreds of households often just finished reloading, and then when they leaned out from the battlements, they would be attacked by intensive barrages from outside the city. Can they pull the trigger alive? Can they escape alive after pulling the trigger?
Come back, it's purely a matter of character.
Under the powerful firepower of the Tang Army, the Ming troops on the city wall almost fell off the city wall like rain. They were densely packed and continuous. More Ming soldiers fell directly to the city after being killed or injured.
On the head.
Soon, the blood on the city head was flowing horizontally. If you step on it, you may even slip if you are not careful!
At this moment, although both sides are suffering huge casualties, the senior generals of both sides know that the final victory or defeat may be decided in the next few minutes, right in the gap of the ruins!
Therefore, even if the first batch of the first assault battalion to attack the city had already lost more than half of their lives in the fierce battle and had lost the ability to continue the attack, the commander of the assault force on the front line did not hesitate at all and continued to order the second assault battalion.
The assault battalion also participated in direct charge operations!
To climb up the ruins, it is only a straight line distance of more than ten meters, but here, every centimeter of progress has to be paid in blood!
And on the top of the ruins that the two sides fought over repeatedly, the corpses of soldiers from both sides were spread all over the ground!
When the battle was at its fiercest, Datang's assault battalion was once again driven down. After hundreds of new reinforcements from the Ming army stabilized the defense on the top of the ruins, Datang's army became even more ruthless and directly called
Heavy howitzers, regardless of possible accidental damage, conducted intensive shelling on this gap in the ruins.
In one salvo, more than twenty howitzers landed here, directly killing at least 200 Ming troops. The Tang army itself also suffered accidental injuries, with dozens of casualties.
Such a brutal battle even caused a Ming army troop that came for reinforcements to mutiny on the spot and run away!
Because this kind of battle has turned into a veritable meat grinder. The gap in this section is not big. Even with the partial incomplete city walls on both sides, it is only tens of meters. The troops that both sides can invest at the same time are only a few dozen meters.
Just a few hundred people.
However, the casualties of hundreds of people were naturally not taken seriously by the senior generals of both sides. The attackers in front had almost suffered casualties. The Tang Army would not hesitate to send another battalion up!
The situation is similar on the Ming Army side. Those senior generals are constantly deploying troops to plug this gap!
However, soldiers are also human beings, and they will also be afraid. If you ask them to fight in ordinary battles, then it will be fine. But if you ask them to fight in a battle where they will die in the end regardless of victory or defeat, they will also flinch.
Even mutiny.
At this time, what is tested is the determination of the generals on both sides!
What is tested is the courage of the soldiers on both sides!
It will further test the daily discipline training of both armies!
The senior generals on both sides are determined, but there is a huge gap in the courage and discipline training of the soldiers on both sides!
The Army of the Tang Dynasty that attacked the ruins consisted of assault troops and some grenadiers. The assault troops were mainly made up of soldiers and the most elite sword and shield soldiers. They never retreated in battle.
Not only did the soldiers fight like this when they served in the Tang Army, they also fought like this when they served in the Ming Army!
Among their many tactical actions, there is no option for retreat at all!
As for the grenadiers, they were the best among the best in the Army of the Tang Dynasty. Only the best soldiers in terms of quality and courage could be selected as grenadiers!
When these two are combined with each other, the combat effectiveness and resilience they unleash will definitely exceed that of the Ming army on the opposite side!
When the second assault battalion of the assault battalion and a newly reinforced grenadier team stepped on the corpses to the top of the ruins again, this time they directly brought two shotguns with them.
They came up and set up on the spot, aiming at the hundreds of Ming troops inside the ruins who were preparing to counterattack.
At the same time, the grenadiers also dropped the last batch of grenades they carried!
After thinking about the sound of the artillery and hearing the sound of the explosion, more than half of the more than 300 Ming soldiers who were preparing to counterattack were killed or injured on the spot, and the remaining ones finally couldn't bear such a cruel battle. Many people asked them on the spot.
Then they ran away, and some even started running around screaming.
"Don't stop, charge down, defeat them, disperse them!" the leader of the assault battalion major shouted, leading the troops who had finally climbed onto the ruins to continue the assault.
But he had just taken two steps with his troops when his body froze slightly, and then he fell forward involuntarily. If you look closely, you can find that a small hole has appeared in the plate armor on his chest.
Blood spread out through the small holes, and together with the blood of others, soaked the ruins.
He fell, but his troops did not stop. Hundreds of soldiers of the assault force advanced quickly, stepping on the corpses of their comrades and Ming army soldiers.
Behind them, more soldiers of the Tang Army were passing through the ruins!
It was an infantry regiment in the Fifth Infantry Division of the Tang Dynasty Army. There were heavily armored musketeers in it, as well as heavy armored spearmen who gave up their spears and directly picked up the sword.
They densely packed through the gaps in the ruins, and then quickly spread to the city walls on both sides like the back of the city wall!
At the same time, on the high ground outside the city, Hao Bainian also put down his telescope, and then said: "The artillery unit can transfer its firepower to the city walls on both sides, and then let the second mixed regiment go into battle to support the fifth infantry division!"
After saying that, Hao Bainian looked up at Yangzhou City again, and then said: "Tell Chen Keqiao that I will have dinner in Yangzhou City tonight!"