In order to reduce the pressure on the Fourth Army, Li Xuan has been increasing troops in the northwest, but the increase is not the main force, but the reserve division!
In this area, the Tang Army has currently deployed ten reserve divisions, accounting for more than half of all reserve divisions north of the Yangtze River. Li Xuan's considerations will increase the number of reserve divisions in this area in the near future.
Only in this way can we completely free up the main field force of the Fourth Army for mobile combat!
What is worth noting is that quite a few of these reserve divisions were directly adapted from the original Ming Army frontier armies!
There are many reasons for this. On the one hand, although these Ming armies that have been stationed in the north and northwest for a long time are all old armies, their overall quality is pretty good. On the other hand, when the Fourth Army marched into the northwest, in order to avoid
A large number of control areas were seized by foreign enemies. Therefore, the Ming border troops who were stationed in border towns and still resisting other places adopted a preferential policy of reorganizing and garrisoning on the spot.
In an emergency, many Ming troops in border towns simply changed their names and became the Tang Dynasty King Division. However, this kind of reorganization was limited to reserve divisions.
As a result, the reserve divisions in the northwest region are relatively complicated. Some are transferred from the Central Plains, some are recruited and formed locally, and some are reorganized by the Ming army's border troops.
This also leads to complex ingredients and weak combat effectiveness!
But there is nothing we can do about it. Why is the Tang Army currently lacking in troops?
The Fourth Army only has a total of more than 30,000 people. They are so exhausted that they control such a large area!
Although the reserve division's combat effectiveness is not very good, it is still good at suppressing local areas and suppressing civil strife. It is not bad at defending the city in a border town.
After all, those foreign enemies could not break through the border towns garrisoned by the Ming army before, and it is unlikely to break through them now. Those foreign enemies are not as equipped with guns and artillery as the Tang army!
To put it simply, the current Fourth Army and reserve divisions in the northwest region can protect themselves, but they are insufficient to attack!
The Fourth Army is under great pressure. Naturally, don't expect them to send too many troops to fight south. It is already very good to send an infantry regiment to each of the three passes of Xiangyang and Yiyang. More combat tasks are actually coordinated.
Two prep divisions did it.
On the northern front, there is basically no need to expect them to capture De'an Prefecture or Xiangyang Prefecture, and there is actually no need for the Fourth Army to go south to break the situation. Now, the main force of the Tang Dynasty King's Division has gathered in Hanyang, and they can just fight a decisive battle directly. There is no need to go all the way.
The adventure mobilized the strength of the Fourth Army.
After observing the defense on the other side of the Yangtze River at the riverside, Li Xuan took his officials back. Little did he know that when he led a large group of military and political officials to inspect the other side of the Yangtze River, the other side of the Yangtze River,
Zhang Yue also used binoculars to look at Li Xuan and his party!
Although the distance was very far, even with the monocular telescope produced by the Puppet Tang Thief Army, Zhang Yue could only see a large group of blurry figures. But looking at this posture, it was not difficult for Zhang Yue to judge that he had grown up in the past few years.
The opponent, the pseudo-Tang Emperor Li Xuan, was among them.
Just now, he even had the urge to directly use the only two nine-pound artillery to carry out bombardment. If he was lucky, he might be able to kill Li Xuan directly. Even if he could not kill Li Xuan,
But it would also be good to kill several other important officials of the puppet Tang Dynasty.
But that's what he thought. Reason told him that at such a long distance, even a nine-pound cannon couldn't hit it, let alone hit it accurately.
Dubiao's Jiujin artillery is actually a copy of the Tang Dynasty Army's Jiujin artillery. Its effective range is only more than 500 meters. Even if the hit accuracy is not considered, the maximum range is only more than 3,600 meters.
And now Li Xuan is at least five thousand meters away from their artillery position, and the range of the artillery is not that far at all!
Even if it is within the maximum range of the nine-pound artillery, for example, three thousand meters, you basically can't expect to hit it.
A shelling at this distance is basically just a sound, and the hit rate will be so bad that it will make you doubt your life!
After all, Li Xuan is not stupid. Since he dared to go to the river to inspect the situation on the other side of the Yangtze River, he naturally considered his own safety. If there was not enough distance, how could he go to inspect.
Even if he wanted to come, a group of important ministers would cry and shout to stop him!
Li Xuan arrived in Jiangxia, and the command structure of the Privy Council could direct the battle nearby. However, for Li Xuan himself, life did not change much.
The Tang Dynasty has developed to the extent it is today. He does not need to do many things personally. Even this kind of decisive battle is presided over by a lot of generals and officers. Although Li Xuan is unwilling to admit it, now that he has come to the front line, the biggest
Its only function is to boost morale.
After waiting for three days in Jiangxia, the main force of the Fifth Army finally arrived in Hanyang!
After the Fifth Army arrived in Hanyang, it stationed troops on the north side of Hanyang!
In this way, the Tang Army actually formed a comprehensive siege of Hanyang!
On the west side is the main force of the First Army, and on the north side is the main force of the Fifth Army. On the east side, it is empty now, but the Second Army is coming and is expected to arrive within five days.
As for the south, that is the Yangtze River, and on the river are hundreds of warships of the Yangtze River Fleet!
Now the 30,000 supervisory troops in Hanyang City are already unable to fly!
Zhang Yue didn't want to run before, but now, he can't even run away!
On the 20th day of the first lunar month of the seventh year of Xuanping, the Second Army successfully arrived at the east side of Hanyang, thus completely surrounding the Dubiao Chinese Army!
After the Second Army arrived, the Tang Army did not launch a general offensive immediately, but waited for three days!
These three days are for the Second Army to rest and replenish supplies!
But three days later, more than 600 artillery pieces in the Tang Dynasty's royal division began a large-scale bombardment!
This scale of artillery attack has never been seen since the Tang Dynasty Army was formed. It is even larger than the naval guns used in previous naval decisive battles!
In this shelling, the army artillery units participating in the shelling included five field artillery regiments, four independent field artillery battalions, and seven heavy short-barreled howitzer battalions.
As for the navy, based on past combat management, it issued more than a hundred artillery pieces from river warships and established two naval artillery regiments.
Among the many artillery pieces participating in the bombardment, there were more than 150 nine-pound artillery, one hundred 24-pound howitzers, fifty 48-pound howitzers, and six fourteen-pound heavy guns.
When so many artillery pieces were fired, the scene was earth-shattering!
Almost every moment, artillery shells fell in the defense fortifications of the Chinese Army in Dubiao, and the city defense artillery positions of the Chinese Army in Dubiao were the key targets.
More than half of the howitzers were fired at the artillery positions of the Chinese Army in Dubiao!
The huge numerical gap in the artillery between the two sides meant that the Chinese Army was at an absolute disadvantage in the early artillery battle!
When the artillery battle lasted for two days, the entire Hanyang City was devastated. The gate tower on the city wall was almost completely destroyed, and many sections of the city wall were destroyed!
At this time, the Tang Army had not even completed its preparations. They had not even dug the tunnels for blasting the city wall, nor had they dug the communication trenches used by the assault troops to charge.
However, Hanyang Fucheng opposite was completely unrecognizable. Even under the fierce bombardment, it was difficult for the officers who used binoculars to observe the effects of the bombardment to find the supervisor.
The entire city seemed to have turned into a dead city!
Seeing this scene, Li Xuan couldn't help but nodded, and then said to a group of courtiers: "It seems that the 50,000 rounds of artillery shells fired in the past two days were not in vain!"
"Call to the artillery units. I am very satisfied with their work. I hope they will continue to work hard to complete the artillery preparations before the general attack to the greatest extent and blast a channel for the assault troops!"
Li Xuan personally issued an order saying that he was very satisfied with the artillery unit. Although it was just a simple sentence, it was quite a morale booster.
Because this allowed the hard work of the artillerymen who worked hard to transport and load the artillery shells to be recognized, and it was also recognized by the Holy Emperor!
In the next few days, the Tang Dynasty King's Division did not care that the artillery counterattacks of the Chinese army in the city became weaker and weaker. In the end, they simply stopped counterattacking, not to mention that several sections of the city wall had been blown down. They were still stubborn. We are bombarding according to the established battle plan!
After attacking the Chinese army's artillery position, attack the city head, and then launch an artillery bombardment deep behind the city wall!
The logistics force has prepared more than 80,000 artillery shells for this decisive battle, and more artillery shells are being continuously transported here along the Yangtze River waterway.
The people in the Logistics Department were rarely generous. They told the generals in the field troops, "Let's go and fight. This time, there will be enough artillery shells!"
It’s actually true!
The Logistics Department has prepared so many artillery shells. If they were to fire them all, quite a few artillery pieces in the field troops would be destroyed!
Especially the artillery in the Second Army and the Fifth Army. They have experienced many battles before. The life of many artillery barrels is running out. Once again, high-intensity large-scale shelling will be carried out until they are scrapped. I am very sure of that.
This situation makes those artillery generals happy and miserable!
In most cases in the past, when fighting, we had to count artillery shells. In this battle, each artillery can only fire ten or twenty rounds of artillery shells. The extra number is thirty or fifty rounds, but it is rarely used with Now that the cannonball tube is enough, you can use your hands to shoot.
There are so many artillery shells that they start to worry that the barrel life of the artillery is insufficient!
Then he started complaining about the poor barrel life of the cast-iron artillery!
The general offensive in the Battle of Hanyang Fucheng has not yet begun, but several big bosses of the army have discussed together many times whether it is time to replace the five-pound iron artillery, preferably with bronze ones.
The barrel life of this five-pound iron cannon is really poor!
During this war, the military's logistics troops not only have to carry artillery shells, but also often need to carry spare artillery. It is embarrassing to mention this.
But they don’t want to think about it, they were the ones who replaced the bronze cannons with cast-iron cannons back then!
Not for anything else, just because the cast-iron artillery is cheap!
But now, they are beginning to miss the good performance of bronze artillery, especially the barrel life!
However, unlike the Army, which wants to replace its cast-iron artillery pieces with bronze ones, the Navy is trying hard to replace all its large-caliber artillery pieces with cast-iron ones.