The Beiyang Maritime Trade Alliance's plan for Luzon is not worth mentioning in Liu Xin's opinion. After all, she listened to Gao Pangshi carefully explain the current situation in Europe. Although Philip II "the world is not enough for me," Spain's opponents are really
There are too many, and the power that Luzon can use is too limited.
According to Liu Xin's idea, if we only talk about taking Luzon, either one of Jinghua's North and South Ocean Fleets can handle it alone. This does not even require high pragmatism to deploy additional army troops. The Marine Corps attached to the Two Oceans Fleet itself is enough -
-The Beiyang Fleet itself has 3,000 marines attached to it, and the Nanyang Fleet, because it was previously responsible for the development of Taiwan, is equipped with more than 8,000 marines.
The Spanish Army of this era was still well-known in Europe, and Gao Pragmatic had reminded her many times. However, as Gao Pragmatic's "confidential secretary", Liu Xin was especially a general-type confidential secretary who could command operations.
After rigorous analysis, we still insist that the actual combat effectiveness of the Spanish Army will not exceed the current average level of the various garrison forces in Beijing.
Tactically speaking, the Spanish Grand Square is a mixed battle column composed of spearmen, halberdiers, matchlocks and sword and shield soldiers. In terms of guiding ideology, it is actually very similar to the Qi Army's Yuanyang Formation. However,
In Liu Xin's opinion, the flexibility of the Spanish Grand Square Formation is far from enough, especially in terms of changes in form, which is far inferior to the Mandarin Duck Formation.
Why? Because the Yuanyang Formation is actually composed of the small Yuanyang Formation into the middle formation and the large formation. In a more pragmatic way, its basic formation is squad tactics, that is, the Little Yuanyang Formation.
What about the Spanish Grand Square? It is actually an infantry regiment tactic. From its inception to standardization, it finally formed three standard columns, composed of more than 3,000 people. It eliminated swords, shields and halberdiers, leaving only spearmen.
With musketeers.
The Spanish phalanx is essentially all-round defensive, and it is more troublesome for opponents to defeat it. However, the problem is that it is too bulky, and its dense formation also makes movement inconvenient, and the line of fire of the musketeers is too narrow. Although the method of arranging muskets in the four corners has been strengthened,
It has all-round combat capabilities, but it can easily cause a waste of firepower.
Through Gao's pragmatic introduction, Liu Xin learned that the first tactic in European military history to overwhelm the Spanish phalanx was the improved phalanx of Morris, the ruler of the Netherlands, also known as the Morris phalanx.
In order to enhance the mobility and firepower of the phalanx, Morris reduced the depth of the Spanish phalanx. There were still pikemen in the middle, but he placed the matchlock troops on the wings of the pikemen, reducing the depth of the musketeers but increasing the horizontal width, extending the
The fire line strengthens the firepower; the musketeers are separated and can advance to the front of the spearmen according to the situation. After the hand-to-hand combat begins, they retreat to the wings to have greater mobility.
However, the ratio of pikemen to musketeers in the Morris Square is still about 1:1, and a large number of pikemen are still retained. This is different from the firearms that Gao Jinggong continued to promote in the various garrison forces in Beijing.
In terms of tactical thinking, the tactics currently promoted by various garrison forces in Beijing are more like the main ideas of another military revolution in Europe after Morris's Square, that is, the linear tactics of King Gustavus II of Sweden.
Gustav the Great (he was the only Swedish king who was posthumously named "The Great", Swedish: den Store) was a loyal student of Morris's military writings. Coupled with his early war experience, he felt that Morris was
The array also needs improvement.
The phalanx reformed by Gustav was a variant of Morris's phalanx, which further emphasized mobility and firepower. The Swedish army during the Thirty Years' War instead used new matchlock guns that reduced weight and reduced caliber to allow them to reload at a similar speed.
Compared with the old Mushkot heavy matchlock gun, it is faster and the firepower density is enhanced.
Coupled with Gustav's extensive use of lightweight field cannons (that is, light artillery units similar to Frederick the Great's "Flying Horse Artillery") to support the infantry, the long-range shooting firepower was enough to severely damage those in the Holy Roman Empire before the hand-to-hand combat began.
A rabble that wants to make progress.
Therefore, he boldly further reduced the number of musketeers. The ratio of musketeers to musketeers in such a phalanx on the battlefield was generally greater than 3:2. The reason why he did not further increase the number of musketeers was that his main opponents Tilly and Wallenstein
There are too many canned heavy cavalry under the command of such an imperial hero, and long gunners are still indispensable to restrain the heavy cavalry.
The tactics that Gao Pragmatic is currently promoting in Jinghua are roughly the tactics of Gustavus II. However, because Jinghua introduced rifle bayonets earlier, the firepower density of the garrison system is higher and it is more effective against pikemen.
The degree of dependence is even lower, so each garrison has even basically completed the "full firearmsization".
Of course, there is another key reason here, and that is that the opponents are different. All the garrison armies are deployed in southern Xinjiang, and currently there is almost no opponent in southern Xinjiang that has a large number of heavy cavalry.
Even if you follow the most exaggerated approach, it doesn't matter if you treat the Mughal Empire as an enemy, because the rulers of the Mughal Empire are descendants of the Mongols. They are better at light cavalry, but they are also not good at heavy cavalry.
.
This means that the garrison forces in Beijing hardly need to consider the threat of heavy cavalry (it is difficult for muskets to break armor of heavy cavalry at this time, and they need to shoot at close range, but close range means they will be attacked by heavy cavalry, and the outcome is unpredictable)
, just need to increase the firepower density without thinking, and at most consider mobility.
The emergence of any tactic must be linked to the performance of the weapons at that time. The reason why Jinghua can continue to increase its firepower density regardless of the pikemen is that Gao Pragmatic attaches great importance to firearms, which has made Jinghua's musketry level far higher than that of the same period in history. Although
He could neither produce a breech-loading gun nor smokeless gunpowder, but it was not difficult to surpass the current era.
Thinking of firearms, Liu Xin suddenly thought of a rumor from the Battle of Lang Son a few years ago. Chao Gao asked pragmatically: "There was one thing that Huang Dutong was very curious about during the Battle of Lang Son. I forgot to ask her before.
, I forgot to ask you, but now that I think about fighting the siege of Manila, I suddenly remember..."
This chapter is not over yet, please click on the next page to continue reading! Gao Pragmatic rolled his eyes and asked: "You mean she used my 'divine letter' to invite Taishang Laojun's 'Nine Nether Thunder' to explode
What about the Lang Son City Wall?" [Note: See Chapter 141 of the Guangxi Volume of this book: Fierce Battle at Lang Son]
Liu Xin chuckled, glanced at Gao Mo, and still asked: "Tell me, what was used to blow it up?"
In fact, Gao Mo knew about this, and of course Gao Pragmatic didn't mind. He smiled lightly and said, "Nitroglycerine."
"Oh..." Liu Xin suddenly realized: "I told you why it was so mysterious, and I haven't seen you use it again since."
Gao pragmatic shook his head and said: "That thing is indeed too dangerous. I was very nervous when transporting it. After using it that time, I almost stopped all production and only asked them to research passivation."
For Jinghua at that time, the difficulty with nitroglycerine was the glycerin itself, because the manufacturing method was actually simpler: half a part of glycerin was dropped into a mixture of one part nitric acid and two parts concentrated sulfuric acid. As mentioned before, in ancient China
There are indigenous manufacturing technologies for nitric acid and sulfuric acid.
Gao pragmatic made secret arrangements at the time, and it took a long time to get a small amount of glycerin. Then he found that it was difficult to use because it was too sensitive. It would explode if not careful, and it was extremely powerful. Therefore, in the Battle of Lang Son
Afterwards, he ordered a temporary halt to militarized experiments and instead asked the gunpowder factory to conduct passivation experiments.
In fact, Gao Pragmatic knew the raw materials required for the passivation of nitroglycerin, because he knew that Nobel's Dana dynamite (yellow dynamite) was obtained by using diatomaceous earth to absorb nitroglycerin - in fact, Nobel was the first to use yellow dynamite before
We also first developed the "warm method" to passivate nitroglycerin, but unfortunately Gao Pragmatic only knew the name and did not know the specific operation at all.
However, knowing the words "diatomaceous earth absorption" is not enough. Gao Pragmatic has no idea where to dig diatomite, nor how to operate the so-called "absorption" after digging.
After explaining the situation at this time, Liu Xin quickly solved one of his problems: "Diatomaceous earth, there are a lot of these in China. But I estimate that with the current technical level, only two can be used.
Place: One is in the northeast of Liaodong, and the other is in Yunnan. Although there are others in Zhejiang, Shandong, and Sichuan, there are too many impurities. I guess you won’t be able to use them even if you dig them out.”
"Is there a specific location?" Gao pragmatically asked.
Liu Xin said: "I don't remember it too specifically, but the place in Liaodong is in... well, now it's the Changbai Mountains, and the place in Yunnan is quite coincidental, it's in Tengchong."
Gao Pragmatic was stunned: "Liaodong's is in the Changbai Mountains? You mean it's in the hands of the Jurchens?"
"Yes, where else is there in the Changbai Mountains? The place I'm talking about is basically near the border with North Korea."
Gao pragmatic shook his head and said: "This is a bit difficult to handle, at least for the time being. Tengchong is no problem, but it's a bit far... You also know that the waterway in Yunnan is not convenient, and the land transportation is all carried by horse-drawn people."
"I think the main problem with transportation is not the high cost, but the slow speed. But it's actually nothing, because your nitroglycerin... With all due respect, with the current technical level, mass production is probably not very reliable.
So the dosage of diatomaceous earth is destined not to be very large.”
Liu Xin paused, then continued: "As for the use of diatomaceous earth, I don't know, but I have seen diatomaceous earth before, and the thing itself looks a bit like gunpowder. I mean, it is in powder form.
, so I guess..."
"Infiltration?" Gao Qingshi asked immediately: "Infiltrate directly with nitroglycerin, and then the diatomaceous earth will become the same thing as gunpowder. Is this what you mean?"
"That's what I mean, but I want to emphasize that I'm just guessing and I don't understand this." Liu Xin replied immediately.
Gao Pragmatic nodded, frowned and said: "We still have to do the diatomaceous earth thing. I think it is necessary to do experiments after we get it. But what you said makes sense. Glycerin is not easy to handle.
, to be honest, the appearance of the first batch of glycerol came from an accident.”
"Accident?" Liu Xin was a little surprised: "Didn't you do it on purpose?"
"No, I was focused on making TNT, but unfortunately I didn't succeed." Gao Pragmatic waved his hand: "The glycerin was accidentally made by the soap factory. I used to ask them to keep records of newly discovered things and report them.
, so after a while I saw the report and remembered that the thing might be glycerin, so I instructed them to make a little, very small amount of nitroglycerin to try."
"So it was successful?" Liu Xin smiled and said, "Then you are really lucky."
"I said they would test a little bit, but they injured seven people, and one of them was blinded in one eye." Gao pragmatic sighed: "At that time, I felt that this thing was too dangerous, and it was best not to use it if possible, so I had to forgive me.
Used it once in the Battle of the Mountain."
"It can be seen from this..." Liu Xin blinked: "At that time, you looked at Huang Dutong in a different light."
Gao Pragmatic paused for a moment after hearing the words, and coughed lightly: "Let's get down to business."
"Okay, let's get down to business." Liu Xin rolled her eyes at him and said lazily: "Even without nitroglycerin, Manila City's bastion system cannot be said to be impregnable. I can provide you with two methods here, one is quick and the other is
slow."
Gao pragmatically said: "Slow one, are you telling me to surround Manila until they cannibalize them, then open the city and surrender?"
"What, isn't this a good idea?" Liu Xin spread her hands: "I know this news cannot be hidden. Whether it is the Spanish or the Portuguese, there will definitely be ships heading to Manila, and you can't take all these ships.
Send it into the sea, after all, there is still business to be done, right?
But this has no conflict with the siege. They found out when they found out, and it doesn't matter if they send the news back to Spain. Anyway, as you said, Philip II is in ruins. There is no way he will send the Invincible Fleet to Nanyang to fight with you.
.Besides, didn’t you say that this Armada expedition will fail? Then there is no need to worry.”
This chapter is not finished yet, please click on the next page to continue reading the exciting content! Gao pragmatically said: "In addition to tactical mistakes, the Armada was also greatly affected by bad weather. I don't know if the butterfly effect will affect this.
A little. But even if the Armada fails...well, to be honest, Philip II can build another Armada in two years."
This shipbuilding ability really made Liu Xin stunned for a moment, but she still said it didn't matter: "It doesn't matter even if it's two years. The Spanish can't delay it in Manila for two years. Besides, even if the Armada is rebuilt, the first thing that comes to mind is to go to the British."
He would never come to Nanyang for revenge, unless Philip II was really crazy."
Of course, Philip II was not crazy, he was just religious fanaticism. The main reason why this guy insisted on attacking England, apart from Queen Elizabeth issuing privateering warrants and mobilizing British pirates to rob Spanish treasure ships, the most important reason was that
Against the Anglican Church - he wanted to restore the glory of the Catholic Church in England.
[Note: In fact, he still had some legal principles when it came to attacking England. The last Queen of England, Mary I, was the first wife of Philip II. At that time, Philip II’s title included King of England (co-ruling). But because
Mary I had no issue, and theoretically, after the death of Mary I, his co-ruling power was also lost. However, Philip II was more aggressive and claimed the throne of England when he invaded England.]
Having said that, Gao Pragmatic still did not want the battle to drag on for so long. He shook his head and said: "I dragged the nobles to fight in Manila. The purpose was not to compete with Spain for colonies, but to divert the attention of the nobles. But
This requires Luzon to restore its original functions as soon as possible and create benefits. So, you might as well talk about another way."
Liu Xin smiled and said: "This will require my expertise..."
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