Liu Bei's pupils were dilated. He was thinking about Zhang Fei's words and felt that they made sense, but he always felt that something was wrong.
Does Zhang Fei really not know the importance of the lower-level people in Guizhou?
Without them, where would the taxes, soldiers, and food come from to feed these so-called warriors?
Wasn't it the case that Qin was able to unify the world and mobilized these leaders? At that time, there were many famous figures in the Six Kingdoms, but not all of them were reduced to nothing in Qin's iron-blooded army.
So Liu Bei retorted with intention, but stopped when he was about to speak, because he thought of the second meaning of Zhang Fei's words. Did Zhang Fei really not know the importance of Guizhou?
He thought about his and Zhang Fei's identities, their ranger team, and a series of people like Gongsun Zan. They all have a common identity, that is, soldiers. In this era, they soldiers do not rely on each other.
If we form a team, who else can we rely on?
Relying on those ministers who have already made a bad smell in Kyoto? It seems that no matter how much powder they apply, they still can't cover up the unique smell of their old people.
"Brother, eat it quickly. This biscuit has just come out of the pan. It won't be crispy when it's cold."
Zhang Fei's words interrupted Liu Bei's reverie. He lowered his head and looked at the golden cakes, and suddenly asked:
"Where did we get the sesame oil?"
Zhang Fei shrugged his shoulders and said:
"Before we set out, we came out of the warehouse in the east city of Xingyang. Brother Gongsun and the others were the ones who took the lead in opening the warehouse. It is said that at that time, many people ran out of Xingyang City and said that the warehouse belonged to them. Later, Brother Gongsun gave him a whip.
Crying. These people were crying and saying, "Do you know who we are? It's really a joke. We came all the way to Xingyang to help them suppress thieves. What's wrong with getting some sesame oil?"
Liu Bei frowned and interrupted Zhang Fei:
"How do you know so clearly? You also went together?"
Zhang Fei choked, and his original words became:
"Isn't this sesame oil robbed by these people? That stuff in the warehouse is not from the hands of the state."
Liu Bei said nothing and only ate the Hu cake in his hand, but it was cold and tasteless.
----------
August 28, the sixth year of Guanghe.
After the Taishan Army defeated the Kaifeng Army and captured its flag, it continued northward. Its front troops, Li Damu and Dian Wei, took the lead in arriving near Xingze.
Along the way, Taishan's army had strict discipline and blocked off all directions so as not to disturb the people. However, the Youzhou Cavalrymen who went south thought they were foreign soldiers and ran rampant. Along the way, they committed plunder and adultery, killed pigs and cattle, and demolished houses. Every time they went to a village, they
An empty township.
The two armies formed a sharp contrast. Now these contrasts will not have any impact on the upcoming Battle of Xingyang, but the people in these troubled times will eventually vote with their own feet to choose who to support.
Li Damu and Dian Wei's Second Division had previously arrived at Yanshi. There, they learned from the soldiers and horses of the right wing who stayed behind that Zhang Dan, the right captain, had led the main force to ambush in order to resist the Han army going south. But until now
No news has been sent back to the camp yet.
When Li Damu and Dian Wei heard about this situation, they guessed that something had happened to Zhang Dan's department.
They were very close to Zhang Dan. Whether they were public or private, they all needed to go to the rescue. The two discussed it, and after sending a feather letter to the main force of the Chinese army behind them, they resupplied a batch of supplies from the Yanshi camp.
Lead the army.
Li Damu and Dian Wei are both ligers and tiger-like heroes, and the two battalions under their command are the oldest battalions of the Taishan Army. They have high morale and elite armor, making them a first-class force. Therefore, Li Damu and Dian Wei do not do much to rescue.
Think about it, do it when you think about it.
With the two of them, you can go anywhere in the world.
When the two troops arrived outside Xingze, they saw the smoke curling up from the burned reeds.
Then they were surrounded by overwhelming cavalry.
Li Damu and Dian Wei have never seen such a swift and windy cavalry group. Really, they are both covered in sweat now. If they had not ordered all their troops to march in armor before joining the battlefield, then they would have to have two thousand elites.
collapsed.
Under normal circumstances, if an infantry encounters a cavalry attack on the march, it will be devastating. Because during the march, in order to reduce the load, all armor is mounted on baggage vehicles. But once it encounters a cavalry attack at this time,
When the cavalry charged, these infantrymen had neither time to put on armor nor time to form a formation, so they could only be slaughtered by the charging cavalry.
Li Dian's 2nd Battalion, with 2,000 men, was directly arranged into a large phalanx according to Cao Cao. But the phalanx was completely different from anything the Han army had ever seen.
This square formation is a new formation that Zhang Chong compiled based on his experience in the Changshe War. At that time, the Taishan Army also encountered a charge from the main force of the Han cavalry, and its victory at that time was mainly due to Zhang Chong's proper dispatching.
and Guan Yu’s personal martial prowess.
After the war, Zhang Chong saw that the main force of the Han army he would encounter in the future was either an elite cavalry corps or an elite infantry corps like the Xiliang Army, so he used Li Damu and Dian Wei as a pilot to compile this new formation. In Zhang Chong's plan
Here, this kind of thousands or even tens of thousands of people will become the main force of the joint war in the future, and their success or failure will determine the success or failure of the joint war.
In the past, the phalanx of Han soldiers had a wide front. There were both spearmen and swordsmen in the first row. But now in the new formation, the first row is composed of two narrow spear formations.
In the square formation composed of Li and Dian, the spears in the front row can no longer be called spears, but to be precise, they are foot spears, because they are a full five meters long.
Originally, the spears of the Han soldiers were generally more than three meters long. The spears of this length consolidated the advantages of flexibility and resistance to enemies. The Han soldiers had only two enemies, one was the Qiang people in the northwest, and the other was the Xianbei in the north.
The Qiang people have both infantry and cavalry, but they are mainly good at walking. The three-meter-long spears in the hands of the Han soldiers are enough to withstand the impact of the Qiang people. When facing the Xianbei cavalry, the grassland cavalry
They are all peripheral shots and cannot rush into the formation, so a three-meter-long spear is enough.
But now that the main enemy of the Taishan Army is the Han Army, the whole situation has changed. Most of the Han Army's cavalry are assault cavalry and can charge into formations, while the Han Army's main infantry is also a disciplined division and can
The master of economics who stood facing the Taishan Army.
At this time, the length of the Han army's standard spears in the hands of the Taishan Army was not enough. Because there was a need for infantry square formations and resistance to cavalry charges, Zhang Chong decided to take the lead in using rifles with a length of five meters in the Li and Dian divisions.
.In this way, the infantry fighting on the front line will have a longer space to resist the enemy, and can also hit the enemy earlier.
Moreover, this trend of lengthening lances also appeared in the Taishan Army's assault cavalry. Zhang Chong also lengthened the horses of Yan Gang's centurion, and in order to balance the lengthened lances during the charge, Zhang Chong ordered the craftsman camp to
Hooks were specially made on the armor to hang the lance so that the lance could be extended further.
In addition, the earliest military formation of the Taishan Army was organized by Army Deputy Yang Mao according to the Han method, so the front row always used a wide formation. The advantage of this is that it can defeat the enemy with a narrow front on the right side first.
However, as the Taishan Army's need for confrontation with the infantry formation deepened, Zhang Chong decided to use a narrow-wide, large-depth strip formation to fight against the Han Army's formation.
Because Zhang Chong discovered in the first-line confrontation that when elite military formations confront each other, both sides will show a very strong sense of combat and well-equipped fighting tools. Therefore, it is difficult to say whose military formation will be defeated in a short period of time. Often,
It's a stalemate on the military line.
At this time, the key to victory comes from squeezing. This squeezing comes from the pressure from the rear. It is like tug-of-war. One person pulling and two people pulling are completely different. At this time, the deeper and longer military formation has
The stronger the squeezing force, the more likely it is to overwhelm the opponent and then defeat him.
When this kind of confrontation reaches a certain level, the weapons in hand are even useless. Because everyone in the front row is a soldier, the more the spear is squeezed, the harder it is to save the thrust. There will even be crowds in the first row.
People, cheek to cheek situations.
In other words, the brutal confrontation of the infantry phalanx even became a squeeze competition to compare strength.
In addition, the first row of the new formation is all composed of pure infantry soldiers. In normal times, the Han soldiers would actually put a few particularly brave soldiers on the front line, wearing several layers of armor and wielding long halberds.
Use an ax to kill the enemy. Some elite shooters will also be on the front line, so that they can have a wide enough field of vision to accurately strike at the soldiers in the enemy's line. Even brave people like the Qiang people who are not afraid of death will even be on the first line.
Arrange light-armed daggers on the line. When waiting for the line, they crawl under the Han army's spears and stab the Han army's private parts with their daggers and meat knives. It is very vicious.
Zhang Chong has the ability to reform military formations better than any other general in this world. Ever since Zhang Chong was forced to get involved in this troubled world four years ago, he has been fighting on the front line.
The generals of the Han army focused on winning a decisive victory thousands of miles away. They decided on the plan for the battle in the big tent, and even drew formation lists for the leading generals before the battle. These people were educated and innovative, but they did not
They had fought on the front line, but they didn't know what the front line was like. Those who fought on the front line, although they felt that this was not good and that was a bit problematic, did not have enough quality to adapt the military formation. As a result, the Han army's military formation could not
Adapt to the current specific war developments.
But Zhang Chong was different. He was more educated than anyone else, and he was better at summarizing. He had been fighting on the front line for many years, so he took the lead in adapting the military formations under his command.
In fact, Zhang Chong's adaptation of his subordinates was exactly the adaptation of various factions in the Three Kingdoms period. At that time, the military fighting skills of the three kingdoms of Wei, Shu and Wu were at their peak, and they all unanimously valued the ability of the starting army to fight.
Returning here, Zhang Chong was the first to discover that in an infantry confrontation of the same level, the original fancy troops were no longer good. In the first few rows, spearmen, swordsmen, axemen, and shooters were mixed together to create a strong impact on the line.
The damage is far greater than the damage to the enemy.
Zhang Chong used his own personal experience to conclude that the most fundamental aspect of the infantry formation is the squeezing ability of the intensive infantry hand.
Of course, Zhang Chong will not arrange all the battalion heads under his command according to Li and Dian's second division. Because the wide formation and the deep formation have their own advantages. The former is good at outflanking the two wings, and the latter is good at squeezing the enemy's line. One
A good commander needs to have a lot of toolboxes in his hand, instead of only having a hammer in his hand and using it to hammer everything he sees.
It's war, it's a combination of art and science, but it's not just art or science.
And now, on the edge of Xingze, an infantry army of two thousand people hastily formed such a new formation. There are twenty people on the first side of the formation, and fifty people stand in each line. Change
In other words, the depth side is almost three times the width side. Then the other section is also arranged in the same way.
So what was placed in front of the Han Army's Youzhou Cavalry were two long military formations. The soaring steps were weird and full of intimidation. The horses under the Han Army's cavalry were covered in blood when they thought of charging at these terrible enemies from behind.
The monsters covered with giant thorns snorted and moved their front hooves in circles uneasily.
The Han knights each had their own way of comforting their comrades, and their hearts were full of uneasiness.
But little did they know that the mighty military formation of these three thousand Han cavalry at this time also made the Taishan Army in the front row anxious and frightened.
These three thousand cavalry were located in the southeast of the military formation, with the sun at their backs. They were bathed in the sunshine and exuded endless golden light.
In this glow, these three thousand cavalry were divided into three huge phalanxes of one thousand cavalry. The red general flags had the names of their respective generals written in black, and more big flags had the word "Han" written on them.
Yes, announcing their identity to the group of moth thieves opposite.
Naigong is the strongest cavalry regiment of the Han Dynasty - Youzhou Tuqi.
At this time, the sound of horns came from the Youzhou Assault Cavalry Formation, and then each of the three thousand-man cavalry regiments separated into two hundred-man cavalry groups. They were all dressed in Hu clothes and whipped hair, and they were obviously Wuhuan people.
These Wuhuan people rushed to Li and Dian's second army formation two hundred steps away and began to separate to the two wings, and then roared and fired arrows along the perimeter of the Taishan army's formation.
On the one hand, the Taishan Army on the left and right endured the rain of arrows, and on the other hand, they had to listen to the ghost screams from the Wuhuan people from time to time. At this time, the Taishan Army archers in the formation also began to fight back at the Wuhuan cavalry cruising outside, but faced with
The effect of the cavalry moving at high speed is not great.
But in fact, the Wuhuan cavalry's arrow rain was not very effective. The sergeants of Li and Dian's second division all wore four-flap helmets, which were iron helmets made of four shaped iron pieces connected with ropes. This kind of iron helmet
The iron helmet has a rim around it, which provides very good protection against arrows.
Therefore, the Wuhuan cavalry seemed to be very powerful and did little harm to the Taishan Army, which was armed to the teeth.
The commander of the cavalry army on the opposite side also obviously saw this. Then the flag on the opposite side waved, and another Han army sudden cavalry slowly marched towards the Taishan army's line.
The Taishan Army in the front row couldn't stop sweating from the palms of their hands. If these rifles didn't have grooves for gripping, I guess many of them wouldn't be able to hold them. Of course, this rifle is too heavy, which is five meters long.
The step can only be held upright at this time. Once it is put down, it can no longer be lifted.
Seeing that the Han army's sudden cavalry on the opposite side began to speed up slowly, the two high-ranking generals in the front row of the Taishan army began to give orders:
"Let it go."
Immediately, the rifleman in the front row, Ru Lin, was smashed down. Then the Taishan Army infantryman in the front row took out a layer of wood from his back, then struggled to lift the end of the rifle from the ground, and stood the wooden board upright.
As a stand for steps.
After doing this, the senior general in the front row ordered again:
"Get up."
Following this order, the riflemen in the first row were raised outward at a low angle by relying on the principle of leverage. For a moment, the giant beast of the Taishan Army opened its fangs at the Han Army cavalry.
Just when the Taishan Army in the front row was gritting its teeth and preparing to withstand the first wave of Han cavalry charges, there was a loud sound of gold on the opposite side. Then these Han cavalry who were about to charge circled around and returned to their own military formations. After that, these
The Han cavalry retreated towards Xingyang.
Li Damu and Dian Wei were still wondering about the behavior of the Han army in their respective military formations, when they saw a puff of smoke and dust rising from the southeast, and a large banner with the word "田" on it swaying towards them.