The ninth and forty-first chapters are crushed by firepower advantage
The Battle of Susong was very important to the Tang Army, and equally important to the Ming Army Supervisor!
Because this place is the bridgehead for the Ming Army's governor to fight against the Second Army's entry into the hinterland of Hubei!
Once this place falls, the Tang Army will be able to pass through this place continuously and then enter the hinterland of Hubei. At that time, the governor of Hubei will be passive. Therefore, the Ming army's governor also spent a lot of effort to defend this place.
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This also led to the Tang Army investing heavily in conquering this place, and the entire Second Army was sent up!
On the first day of the general offensive, the Third Infantry Division, the absolute main force of the Second Army, launched two division-wide charges. Under the cover of numerous artillery, it began to storm Susong!
In this battle, the artillery of the Tang Army, especially the numerous howitzers, once again played an important role. In this kind of offensive battle, nothing can kill a large number of enemy troops and shake the morale of the enemy more than the powerful howitzers.
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These heavy howitzers also gave the 7th Infantry Regiment of the 3rd Infantry Division the most powerful support when the 7th Infantry Regiment of the 3rd Infantry Division was in the most danger!
In the first general attack of the day, after the 7th Infantry Regiment initially opened a gap in the 3rd Assault Battalion, the commander of the 7th Infantry Regiment, Colonel Qi Shoulin, decisively led the entire regiment to launch a fierce attack.
In just half an hour, they occupied a hundred meters of the city wall in front of them, but then the Ming army organized a large number of troops to counterattack, and regardless of the life and death of the Ming army supervisor Biao who was still fighting the 7th Infantry Regiment, they directly
A large number of shotguns were used to cover this gap.
The offensive momentum of the 7th Infantry Regiment was suppressed abruptly!
At this time, Qi Shoulin directly requested support from the howitzer battalion troops in the rear and sent back clear bombardment parameters. Then the howitzer troops used large-angle direct fire to cover multiple shotgun positions ambushed by the Ming army in the city.
Shelling!
Although the hit rate of this covering artillery bombardment was not high, the huge explosion still prevented the enemy from continuing to intercept the artillery bombardment, and then the 7th Infantry Regiment launched another fierce attack!
A large number of flintlock musketeers wearing breastplates and helmets no longer insisted on using line formations like fighting in the field. Instead, they launched attacks at the team level and boldly used bayonet charges and other methods to successfully eliminate the enemy.
The surrounding Ming army even launched a counterattack, destroying many Ming army shotgun positions.
Thanks to the brave fighting of the 7th Infantry Regiment and the 3rd Assault Battalion, the Second Army finally succeeded in opening a large gap, and then other units of the 3rd Infantry Division quickly followed up and continued to advance!
By the afternoon, the three main infantry regiments of the 3rd Infantry Division had all successfully entered the city and began to assist other units of the Second Army to enter the city.
However, the Ming army in the city was not completely defeated without losing a section of the city wall. At this time, they fully showed the Second Army what it means to fight against a trapped beast.
After the first city wall fell, they pushed into the city, where there was the inner wall they had built in the past year, which was the second city wall, and between the first city wall and the second city wall, there were many
Strong fortresses, these fortresses often have a shotgun as fire support, and a number of musketeers to form a defensive point.
This battle mode was not a street battle, but a pure fortress attack, which caused a lot of trouble to the Second Army.
But it only caused some trouble. When tens of thousands of the main troops of the Second Army entered the first city wall and continued to attack the second city wall, they continued to exert their firepower advantage.
They even pulled field artillery directly into the city from outside the city. When they found a Ming army fortress or defensive position, they immediately launched a bombardment!
Although the five-pound field guns equipped in large quantities by the Second Army have little lethality against city walls several meters thick, they can shoot one at a time against such a small fortress.
The fire support points of these small fortresses of the Ming Army are just ordinary masonry structures. They cannot be as thick as the city walls. So these small fortresses support each other, but when the Second Army directly pulls out the artillery,
When conducting precise artillery fire directly from a distance of one or two hundred meters, it is often possible to shoot one at a time.
And conquering these small fortresses is just a microcosm of the Second Army's use of firepower advantage!
In this offensive operation, the role of various artillery, grenades, and even flintlock guns of the Second Army was fully demonstrated!
If the tactical role of the flintlock gun is only ordinary in this kind of critical battle, then the role of hand grenades and grenades, two explosive weapons, is irreplaceable.
Today's grenades are no longer standard equipment for grenadiers. The Tang Army will use grenades on a large scale in a few important battles or during defensive operations. Especially during defensive operations, the requirements are not high.
Just light it on fire and throw it out. You don't have to be as demanding as the grenadier.
In the battle of Susong, the 7th Infantry Regiment alone used more than 5,000 grenades. For this reason, in each infantry platoon, two strong musketeers were specially selected to be responsible for dropping bombs.
And also conducted relevant training before the war.
The entire Second Army consumed more than 30,000 grenades in this battle, almost all the grenades carried with the army!
As for grenades, there are currently two types: twenty-four kilograms and forty-eight kilograms, of which twenty-four kilograms are the main type. From the artillery preparation before the general attack to the completion of the siege, a total of more than 3,800 howitzer rounds were consumed.
As for the solid shells of five kilograms, nine kilograms, and fourteen kilograms, there are even more. The total number exceeds 20,000 rounds. Although most of them are solid shells of five kilograms of field artillery, and only about three of the nine kilograms of shells.
One, the one weighing 14 pounds only has a few hundred rounds.
However, a large number of solid artillery shells still played an irreplaceable and important role in the battle of Susong!
By the time the Second Army completely captured the inner city of Susong, completely defeated the defenders in the city, and when the more than 3,000 remaining Dubiao soldiers in the city had no choice but to surrender, the Second Army had actually almost exhausted all the ammunition they carried with them.
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But after the Second Army consumed so much ammunition, Li Xuan in the rear was not unhappy at all, but felt extremely happy!
Because he saw a very key word in it, that is, 'firepower superiority'. The Tang Army has been playing with guns and cannons for so many years. Although they have always said that guns and cannons are sharp, the Ming army said that the reason why the Tang Army is so
It's awesome purely because of its sharp guns.
But within the Army of the Tang Dynasty, Li Xuan himself never saw it that way. It is correct that guns and cannons are sharp, but it is nonsense to say that the Tang Dynasty relied on guns and cannons to win wars!!
Are there few guns in the Ming army?
Especially Zhang Yue's supervisor, he has a lot of guns and artillery. The equipment level of Zhang Yue's supervisor is no less than that of the early Tang Dynasty Army, and even better than that of the Tang Army in the Guizhou era and Guizhou Guangdong and Three Provinces era.
It's stronger. The Tang Dynasty Army didn't even have enough matchlocks back then.
However, had such a supervisor ever won a battle against the Tang Dynasty Army?
No!
They have never won such a large-scale battle!
Why?
Because when both sides were equipped with numerous guns and artillery, the Tang Army's more than 200,000 troops needed to spend more than 20 million taels of military expenses a year. The governor now has hundreds of thousands of people, but the annual cost is only 50,000 taels.
Just six million taels of silver!
Why is there such a big gap here?
Because there is a huge gap between the two sides in equipment costs, training costs, food costs, salary costs, etc.
In terms of food and salary, as a soldier in the Tang Dynasty Army, not only can you have enough to eat every day, but you can also support your family. But like in Supervisor? Even if the soldiers in the main force want to have enough to eat every day, that is
It's impossible, let alone hope to support your family with money.
In terms of equipment and training, the Tang Army will basically issue the necessary equipment to all soldiers in need, such as plate armor. Even musketeers can now be equipped with a breastplate.
And now the standard waist knives in the military are almost all steel knives.
Live ammunition training is conducted every three days. Whether it is a musketeer or a gunner, their loading and shooting proficiency is fed by ammunition, especially the gunners of each artillery. When they are not given live ammunition training,
Just relying on simulation training to be able to play with accuracy would be damning.
Whether artillery these days can fire accurately depends heavily on the gunner's experience and intuition.
It’s not about talent or anything like that, it’s just experience and intuition.
Although gunners have some theories about what targets they want to hit, to put it bluntly, the theories these days are relatively nonsense. The theory is correct, but in most practical situations, the artillery does not follow your theory at all.
Shooting, in theory, it is possible to hit the enemy, but it just misses.
There is no way, the accuracy of artillery these days is so bad, no matter how advanced the theory is, it will still be blinded by the current artillery.
So we can only rely on the personal experience and intuition of the gunners.
This is why in the Army of the Tang Dynasty, artillery commanders are rarely transferred. The artillery commanded by a gunner will basically not change. If he is responsible for this artillery at the beginning, then he will be responsible for this artillery in the future, unless it is
The artillery is scrapped, otherwise it would not be easily changed.
Because the same gunner, the same five-pound field gun, the gunner is used to operating the five-pound field gun, and he can fire with perfect accuracy, but if he is given another five-pound field gun, he will be blinded.
He can hit rough targets.
But if you want to accurately hit a small target at a distance of three to four hundred meters, you basically can't expect it.
It takes a period of familiarity to find the state!