Chapter 276 Fa Yuan (3) is not controlled remotely
A 600,000-strong army was difficult to centrally command in ancient wars. Even if it was forcibly centralized, it would only lead to frequent catastrophic situations such as command failures. Moreover, from the perspective of material supplies,
In other words, if supplies for a 600,000-strong army were piled up in the same place, it would be a disaster within a disaster.
However, even if Gao Pragmatic divided the 600,000 troops into four groups, the group he was on was still strong. Even after dividing 50,000 troops to cover the flanks, it would not be a joke for 150,000 troops to garrison Daning. This would be detrimental to reconstruction.
However, it has been quite a test for Daning City in a few years.
There were already some troops stationed in Daning city, but Gao Pragmatic brought only about 130,000 troops. From Xifengkou to Daning, this route was traveled by Cao Yun once in the autumn and winter last year. This time Gao Pragmatic led the troops.
He was also accompanied by Cao Yu. Of course, the banner of "Qi, Commander of the Imperial Guard" was still flying high among the Chinese army.
Daning City has been making preparations to garrison an army since last year. The city's grain stores are very abundant. Even if there is no additional import later, the grain stores alone are enough to feed an army of 200,000 for two years. In addition, there are also stores of grain.
Some cured meat, dried fish, air-dried meat, etc. can be said to be not afraid to stick to it.
Twenty years of long-term accumulation and several years of dedicated hoarding gave Gao Pragmatic the confidence to dare to mobilize 600,000 troops at a time to fight a huge decisive battle. To a large extent, the military nature of this battle is far less than that of a political oath.
Important, because the preparations for a war are so complete, the equipment is superior, and the strength of the troops is so disparity that it is almost ten times that there is basically no possibility of losing in the decisive battle. The only thing to consider is "what kind of victory is needed"
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As Qi Jiguang said before, the best way to fight nomads is to use an excellent tactical deception combined with a surprise attack to complete Huo Qubing's style or Li Jing's style of plowing holes and sweeping holes, and try to win the battle in one go.
However, for a sworn war to "resuscitate the Ming Dynasty", Gao Pragmatic needed this victory to have more political significance, so that he would continue to strengthen his persuasion to the emperor, making him believe that only a large army to encircle and suppress the Ming Dynasty could fully demonstrate the majesty of the Ming Dynasty.
This obviously brings serious troubles to military command. After all, in the entire history of mankind, there are no examples of direct command of hundreds of thousands or millions of people on a single battlefield. Because the army cannot be deployed at all, and the consumption of military rations is also a problem, so there is no such thing.
It is possible to break away from the supply line and bring five to six hundred thousand or millions of people to fight in one place.
Even at the pinnacle of human large-scale combat, when millions of troops fought on the Soviet-German battlefield during World War II, it was fought on an extremely wide front and was composed of multiple battles and could not be regarded as a single battlefield.
The Second World War was a war that took place when mechanized large-scale production reached a relatively high level, which was absolutely impossible in an agricultural society. The manpower input for the entire war reached hundreds of thousands or millions of people, and there were still some, but there were only a few pure combatants.
Millions of people have never had it. Even a war involving hundreds of thousands of people would require the efforts of the whole country in the late feudal society. Even in an agricultural society like the Ming Dynasty under a unified and centralized power, its mobilization capacity was limited.
In fact, ancient warfare was not as complicated as imagined, because communication methods were very limited. In addition to shouting, looking, and even relying on feet to accurately convey messages.
Therefore, generally speaking, the number of hundreds of thousands of people who can be commanded in a regional battle is very, very high. In terms of ancient productivity and transportation capacity, there is no way to effectively control the army in a region with more than 200,000. What's more, What's more, the increase in frontline commanders equals disunity of opinions and adds a lot of unnecessary surprises. Therefore, sometimes the number of people is a source of confusion.
It is precisely for this reason that when a large-scale war broke out in the Ming Dynasty, the emperor gave the commander Shang Fangjian to ensure that the entire army could unify its thinking and avoid command disorder.
In a battle, the number of people that can be packed in one place is limited, and it cannot be reduced or increased due to national strength and general leadership. Most wars in the cold weapon era were unit movements with thousands of people as one unit. If there are more than 10,000 people, it will be an entire army. If it is more than 100,000, it will definitely reach the battle level.
In a regional battle, a commander commands tens of thousands of people, who are then divided into several detachments of thousands or more than 10,000 people. Each detachment is commanded by the commander's direct lineage. In local battles, a few thousand people is the limit. More people means a bigger battlefield.
For example, a 50,000-man army is divided into eight 5,000-man teams, each of which is responsible to the supreme commander in turn. The commander of the regional campaign allocates these 5,000-man teams according to his understanding of the terrain, and then his own troops and horses Sit in a position where you can support key points in various locations at any time.
At this time, there may be a large number of roads and the strategic task is to defend rather than attack, so it is likely that all eight 5,000-man troops will go out to defend vertically to avoid the enemy's roundabout outflanking; it is also possible that the terrain is narrow and the troops cannot be deployed, and one channel can only A team of 5,000 people or two can be placed, and the rest must be separated by a certain distance to allow for buffer space.
Since it is basically impossible to convey orders in a timely and accurate manner after the war begins, most of the time, the orders are predicted in advance. The commander will explain his understanding of the battle situation and strategic needs to the direct generals, and it is obviously impossible for the commander to All terrains are inspected personally, so the battlefield ahead depends on the execution ability of frontline generals.
For example, the expected situation on the Eastern Front is to defend, while the Western Front is to attack. The commander's initial order is as follows, and provides minimum standards for reducing losses and for retreating or stopping the attack if the battle is unfavorable. Then the frontline generals will not be stupid. not to fight to the death, but to execute the commander's strategic needs.
At this time, the main test is the local commander's control over the front line. Unless there are special circumstances or accidents, in most cases the messenger will not be of much use, because it is indeed difficult to transmit orders in real time. Assuming it is necessary In the case of an offensive or defensive situation, a briefing will be made before the battle begins, and the so-called command system will basically not be used to dispatch troops after the battle begins.
This chapter is not over yet, please click on the next page to continue reading! Of course, it is okay to let the reserve team provide tactical support, but if the commander observes or cannot judge the situation on the front line, he still has to rely on the frontline troops to seek rescue through messengers. , in this way, the delay of the order will often lead to respective changes in the front line.
This is the overall picture of a local regional battle, which is gathered from a large number of frontline battlefields, and the entire war is an overall picture composed of a large number of regional battles. Usually one of them will be the main force, but it will not be too densely gathered in
Commanders of multiple battlefields in a region are responsible to the highest military leader.
The general logic and model are similar to the command system of regional commanders and frontline generals. That is, before the war begins, military leaders brief the commanders sent out and explain their strategic thinking and needs. Of course, there are also
Some are those who have never fought before but were suddenly involved because they were attacked. In this case, you can only rely on the judgment of the frontline generals, either to fight to the death and wait for reinforcements, or to meet in a narrow road and the brave will win and repel the enemy or even win a complete victory.
, otherwise we can only retreat after defeat.
Assuming a battle, there may be three local battlefields in three directions that make up the entire battle. There is no way to quickly support or connect each other, and each area deploys more than 50,000 or even 100,000 troops. Then before the war begins, the top leader of the army usually
You can only inform the local commander of the military strategic needs you want, and then leave everything to the general to take charge and implement them.
To put it simply, most of the time, they rely on improvisation. Military leaders who really have decision-making power have no skills at all, and their command is very limited. Local commanders and frontline generals can only rely on the general strategic deployment of previous military leaders, and
Use the actual situation on the front line to make decisions based on your experience.
If the results on the front lines are generally good for the war, then the war has a greater chance of winning. To put it bluntly, it's that simple.
Assume that the two sides' forces are deployed against each other. If one of the local battles fails, it means that the other side has more forces that can be deployed to attack, similar to playing Gwent [Note: Did I expose something?].
There are also many examples of people who hope to concentrate their military superiority and achieve the goal of using more troops to defeat fewer enemies. Taizu of the Red Dynasty is the best at this. However, this is easier said than done. In the history of human wars for thousands of years, there are still many examples of people who clearly use more troops to defeat fewer enemies.
Less likely to end up being counterattacked.
Why can we lose even if we fight with more and less? There are actually many reasons, but many of them are because the battlefield cannot accommodate so many people. No matter how many people there are on one side, there is only so much that can surround and contact the enemy on the battlefield.
Land and roads are very effective in their ability to withstand the number of people. For example, a narrow terrain can pass two thousand people at a time. Even if you have a hundred thousand troops, there is nothing you can do. This is the root cause of the importance of important places such as Tongguan and Shanhaiguan.
This kind of situation also depends on morale. Once the morale of the front line collapses and the elite troops in front are defeated by the enemy's elite counterattack, the morale of the crooked melons and split dates behind is very low, and the possibility of collapse at the first touch is very high, triggering a chain effect like Fei
There is no difference in the water war. It is not uncommon in history for the military power to appear to be at its peak, but the main force to collapse in an instant and even the regime to fall.
Including the Spring and Autumn and Warring States periods when mobilization capabilities were strongest, the military system reached a very high level in responding to war needs, but the nature of war has not changed.
In addition to the mutual level being basically equal and the equal consumption of frontline military conditions, there is also a method of looking for opportunities to attack. Before the enemy's defense and strategy have been launched, they will bypass the military key points and attack the enemy. Bai Qi attacked the Wei State
This is a good example. In this case, we don't pay too much attention to the command system, but only rely on the commander's ability and the quality of the army to quickly achieve the war goal.
At the same time, this also reflects a problem, that is, the mobilization of the army requires mobilization. If the troops are not mobilized in time, they are likely to be raided by information gaps and time differences. In the early days, the integration of soldiers and farmers, and later on in the recruitment and military household systems, all
This is to facilitate the rapid mobilization of large amounts of manpower.
Most feudal dynasties had their own military structure. Taking the Southern and Northern Dynasties as an example, there were central troops such as government soldiers. If there was external defense or war, they would start to mobilize peasants from the hinterland who had similar military backgrounds to farm during peacetime and wartime.
When fighting a war, an army can be gathered quickly.
In fact, in most cases, wars involving hundreds of thousands of people are mostly made up of tens of thousands or more than 10,000 pure combatants, distributed in large numbers in various regions of the entire country. Generally, they will not occur until the decisive battle in the later stages.
Hundreds of thousands of units were concentrated in strategic locations, and the main forces of both sides sought a breakthrough point to decide the outcome.
All in all, the current situation of Gao Wuzhi is that he is named as the supreme military leader of Meng Yuan Jinglue, but the actual army he commands is only the 150,000 people in Daning City. It is difficult to control the 50,000 people not far from the flank in real time, let alone
The Ming and Mongolian Allied Forces on the western front, the Xuanfu Taiyuan Allied Army and the Liaodong Army on the eastern front.
Different from those "combat conjectures" widely reported in the capital's newspapers, Gao Pragmatic's tasks for the other three army generals are more flexible, and there are no simple "task regulations". The generals have a very high degree of autonomy.
The commander of the Ming-Mongolian coalition forces composed of Datong, Tumote, and Ordos was a direct descendant of the highly pragmatic and hard-core generals. Datong's commander-in-chief, Ma Gui, received the order to "go north to Outer Khalkha and fight in advance."
This is really simple and broad, and it doesn't even look like a combat mission at all, because this order doesn't even have a mission goal. Where to fight, how to fight, and what kind of fight is not explained in the order, it's all up to Ma Gui's own judgment.
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As for the Xuanfu and Taiyuan coalition forces, the main general is still from the Ma family, and is Ma Chengen, the chief soldier of the Xuanfu. At that time, Ma Gui, Ma Chengen's uncle and nephew, one was the chief soldier of Datong and the other was the chief soldier of Xuanfu.
It also caused discussion. Many people believed that the two towns of Xuanda and Dazhou had 250,000 troops, and it would be very dangerous to hand them all over to the Ma family.
However, Gao Pragmatic suppressed these noises. On the one hand, he expressed his belief in the Ma family's loyalty, and on the other hand, he also cleared up the doubts of the emperor and some colleagues: Xuanda has many generals, and many of them have much deeper foundations than the Ma family, so the actual situation of the Ma family
It does not have the prestige of "one call and a hundred responses".
In addition, although the "Ma Family General" is now famous, the "Ma Family Army" has been "divided" by many children in the family. As a result, their family's direct lineage in Xuanda Second Town is relatively limited, with a total of only a little over 30,000.
If we really want to talk about threats, they are not even as good as Li Rusong from Liaodong.
Li Rusong has 40,000 cavalry in his own family, and there are a long list of generals who are subordinate to the Li family army, and each of them has a large number of servants. This is evident from the fact that Li Rusong sent 60,000 troops this time, 50,000 of which are servants.
The level of elites can be seen. The Ma family general and his family don't know if they can gather 50,000 people, and they are scattered all over the place. Therefore, if the Li family is not a threat, the Ma family is naturally not a threat.
The order Ma Chengen accepted was also very general: "After leading the troops to ensure the safety of Tumut, they can march eastward to find the enemy." There was also no clear combat goal, and he did not even explain what the criteria for "ensuring the safety of Tumut" were. It was all up to Ma Chengen.
Well, judge for yourself.
Both uncles and nephews of Erma "judge themselves", but what about the Liaodong side? The commander of the Liaodong side is of course Li Rusong, the commander-in-chief of Liaodong, and the orders he received were more interesting than those of Erma. Gao pragmatically wrote him a letter, saying
: "Li's family has been in Liaodong for a long time, and has fought dozens of battles with Chahar, and his achievements have been repeated. In this battle, the battle in Liaodong will be prioritized, and the advance and retreat will be made at the discretion of the brother. It is pragmatic and will not be controlled remotely."
Li Rusong was originally worried that he might be greatly suppressed in this battle - after all, the governor of Liaodong was from the pragmatic school, and the deputy commander-in-chief was also from the pragmatic school. It would be difficult for him and the commander-in-chief to be caught in the middle. Unexpectedly, Gao Pragmatic was a great leader.
Such was the attitude that he actually handed over full power to him. At that time, Li Rusong was silent for a long time after reading the letter, and let out a long sigh.
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