Chapter 1825 Enemies meet on a narrow road
When Azig was based in Jinzhou, he had suffered a lot in front of the defense lines built by the Haihan Army. He knew how much murderous potential these seemingly inconspicuous fortifications contained, and now he saw this in North Korea. The familiar scene made the memories that had begun to become blurry in Azig's heart suddenly become clear again.
Azig, who is now thirty-two years old, is not a timid person. He has made many military exploits in foreign wars in the post-Jin Dynasty. After the Jin army attacked North Korea in 1627, Azig led his troops to conquer five cities. In the same year, he defeated the infantry formation commanded by Man Gui, the commander-in-chief of the Ming army, in Jinzhou. In 1629, Azige followed Huang Taiji to conquer the Ming Dynasty and led troops to win battles in Jinzhou, Ningyuan, Zunhua, Tongzhou, Jizhou and other places. In the following years, Azige also won more battles against the Ming Dynasty and became one of Huang Taiji's most trusted generals.
If it hadn't been for a big setback in Jinzhou, Azig should have become the main force of the Qing army in attacking the Ming Dynasty. Precisely because of the impact of a series of defeats in Jinzhou, Huang Taiji's trust in him was weakened, and the direction of the Ming Dynasty was changed. The war was handed over to Abate, Dorgon and others, and Azig could only prove his strength through his performance on the Korean battlefield.
Azig held his breath and led his troops to North Korea, hoping that the achievements here would reshape his image. It is not difficult to militarily suppress the North Korean army, which has limited strength, but he really did not expect that after going in a big circle, he would run into the Haihan army in North Korea. Moreover, looking at the large amount of defense works on the periphery of this base, which far exceeds the original temporary stronghold on the Yalu River, it is obvious that Haihan has invested a lot of manpower, material and financial resources here, and this stronghold should be more than just a show.
If the defenders in this stronghold were really Haihan people, Azig felt that this place would be a nightmare for the Qing army, but he did not dare to express his feelings. This would definitely have a great impact on the morale of his subordinates. negative impact. Azig was hesitant at that moment, whether he should respect Huang Taiji's order and send troops to attack this stronghold.
But without a fight, Azig would definitely not be able to deal with the enemy, so at that moment he could only ask: "Everyone, the time has come for meritorious service. Who wants to lead the troops to take the lead?"
One of his subordinates, Jia La E Zhen Ce named Uleg Shan, immediately stepped forward and responded: "I am willing to lead the troops to break the formation!"
This Wulegeshan was an officer transferred from Shenyang. He had no experience of direct combat with the Haihan Army before, so he still wanted to take the lead. Azig did not reveal the dangers of this place, but only warned him that if it was difficult to break through the enemy's defense line, there was no need to fight to the death and he could decide whether to advance or retreat based on the direction of the battle.
Azig's instructions were undoubtedly very "kind", but Ulegshan slightly misunderstood his superior's meaning, thinking that he said this deliberately to urge him to fight with all his strength, even though he said that he would do his best and win. Break through this line of defense in one fell swoop.
There were five Niulu under Uleg Shan's command, with a total of 1,670 men and horses, of which about half were cavalry. Although he boldly accepted this task, he was not reckless. Instead of rushing in all his troops, he first sent two hundred cavalry to rush towards the line of defense in an attempt to test the defenders. Defense strength. Then he ordered another two hundred cavalry to keep distance from the first batch of cavalry, and followed behind to prepare for the second wave of charge.
Tactics like this were common in the battles between the Qing army and the Ming army. The Qing army would first use the mobility advantage of the cavalry to launch a feint charge to test the firepower points and key defense areas on the Ming army's defense line, and then launch targeted attacks. Throw your forces in a direction where your opponent's defenses are weaker.
But this trick is not so easy to use against the Haihan Army. Independent regiments equipped with new rifles can evenly deploy infantry to the entire defense line and still maintain strong firepower output without having to send troops to a certain level in order to increase firepower. The preparation is centralized.
These Qing cavalry have experience fighting against the Ming army. According to past practice, they usually charge to the edge of the Ming army's firing range. Once the Ming army can't help but fire, they will immediately adjust their direction and leave the battlefield from the left and right to minimize the risk. casualties to attract firepower, and then the next wave of charging cavalry directly charged into the formation. Since the Ming army was almost entirely equipped with matchlock guns that were extremely slow to load ammunition, they would not be able to output firepower again for a long period of time after firing. In terms of the firing frequency in a short period of time, it was even far inferior to that of a trained gun. Archer.
This weakness also caused the Ming army equipped with muskets to have insufficient firepower output when fighting the Qing army in the wild. They often could not hold on after one or two waves of charges. Once the infantry was broken through the defense line by cavalry, the muskets in their hands were basically useless. It's no different than burning a fire stick. The experienced Qing cavalry only needed one charge to cause the Ming army to fire out of control and then quickly break the formation.
However, these cavalrymen who had never fought against the Haihan Army did not know the tactics that the enemies they faced would adopt for cavalry charges. If they had known something about it, they might not have rushed towards the enemy's defense line so blankly.
When the cavalry were still about a hundred meters away from the defense line, they were surprised to find gunshots ringing out from the opposite position. Although several cavalrymen fell down immediately in the charging cavalry ranks, the cavalrymen did not panic. They immediately adjusted their direction according to their usual practice and tried to escape from the battlefield. At the same time, they used this to attract more firepower to the second batch of charging companions behind them. .
This group of Qing troops attracted the firepower as they wished. In fact, they had already entered the firing range of the Shanghai-Han troops on the defense line. However, the commander kept them close to about 100 meters before ordering fire to ensure the hit rate and killing effect. Even though the Qing cavalry adjusted their direction in time, they still could not get out of the Haihan Army's firing range quickly, and they suddenly discovered that the gunfire did not stop there, and their companions kept being shot and killed around them. Before they could figure out what was going on, they had already been shot.
The cavalry who followed in the second wave of charges rushed forward after hearing the gunfire from the opposite position, because as long as they could seize the gap where the enemy was loading ammunition, they could break through the opponent's defense line. But this was just a good wish. When they rushed closer, they found in despair that not only was there a not too wide ditch in front of them that needed to be crossed, but there was also a gap between the tall horses on the other side of the ditch. It was densely covered with barbed wire, and there seemed to be many large and small horse traps in between. Although the trenches where the enemy infantry are located are already visible, it is not easy for them to break through these obstacles.
When the charging cavalry began to slow down and tried to find a gap to bypass the obstacle, untimely gunfire rang out again from the opposite position. The cavalry didn't quite understand why the enemy on the opposite side could shoot again so quickly. Many people fell into the hail of bullets in a daze. However, when they tried to leave the battlefield, they discovered that behind them was a desperate situation. The gunshots continued to ring out endlessly. Ulegshan looked livid as he watched the four hundred cavalry he sent out lose most of them with almost no achievements. He didn't even quite understand what happened in this battle. The cavalry he sent out successfully triggered the Haihan Army's musket fire, but this shooting was not a wave like the Ming Army's, but ate up two groups of his own men almost without interruption. Even some cavalrymen were still hit and fell from their horses even when they were hundreds of feet away from the opponent's position. Such range and accuracy far exceeded his understanding of musket tactics.
And these charging light cavalry didn't even have time to launch a round of bows and arrows at the enemy position before falling off their horses or changing direction. Of course, even if they did this, it probably wouldn't have much effect, because a wooden roof was built above the infantry trenches in the Haihan position, which was obviously used to defend against arrows and falling rocks.
The two waves of cavalry charges before and after, not to mention facing the enemy, even failed to rush through the Haogou on the outermost edge of the position, and they had already suffered heavy losses, so they had to choose to retreat actively. At this time, Ulegshan finally seemed to understand why Azig had specially told him those few words after accepting the order just now. It's a pity that he realized it too late and lost an entire army of soldiers and horses in vain.
Ulegshan is not a fool. Since this test has shown that the enemy has already prepared for the battle, if he continues to send cavalry forward to charge into the battle, the result will not be much better, and he will give the opponent more heads in vain. That’s all. At the moment, he could only bite the bullet and return to Azig, hoping that his superiors would not be furious because of the poor performance of his subordinates.
In fact, Azig had expected this battle situation, and the frequency of musket fire on the enemy's position just confirmed his guess - the enemy troops building and stationing this line of defense were indeed Haihan people.
The loss of two to three hundred cavalry was not a big problem in Azig's view, and this was not a battle situation that Ulegshan could change with more than a thousand troops and horses, so after hearing the battle report, Azig was emotionally Still remaining relatively calm, he asked Ulegshan to find a few lucky people who had rushed to the vicinity and successfully retreated, and asked them carefully about the status of the enemy's positions they had seen.
In fact, whether it was Haogou, Juma, barbed wire or other fortifications, the Qing army had no shortage of means to deal with them. However, if they had to withstand the gunfire of the Haihan army when trying to pass and dismantle these fortifications, that would be another problem. It's the same thing. Similar offensive and defensive operations were attempted many times by the Qing army when they fought against Haihan in Jinzhou. They also had such a situation when they fought in Jiuliancheng on the banks of the Yalu River earlier, but they almost never broke through the Haihan defense line. Achievements.
Haihan's ability to control position defense battles is far better than that of the Ming army. Azig is very sure of this. However, as for how to crack Haihan's defense mode, the Qing army has so far not found an effective method. tactics. Even with the extreme approach of using human lives to fight hard, the Qing army has already tried it, but the effect is still not ideal. Moreover, the position in front of them is obviously not a temporary defense line like Jiulian City. It is only needed for the peripheral defenses of this position. In terms of construction time, Azig believed that it would take at least thousands of people to work for more than two months to complete it. The difficulty of breaking through this line of defense must be far greater than that of the battle in Jiulian City.
Azig's judgment on the construction period was quite accurate. He believed that the Haihan Army had been preparing for war here for a long time. At least when the news came out that Haihan had withdrawn from the Korean battlefield, this armed stronghold should have been disposed of. It's in a state of construction. In other words, the Haihan people withdrew their fleet from the Yalu River and then launched a series of plundering operations on the Liaodong coast, which made the Qing army think that the focus of their activities had shifted to Liaodong. However, they secretly crossed over to Chencang and built such a military base in North Korea that was easy to defend and difficult to attack. stronghold.
Since the Haihan people spent a lot of time building such a large project near the coast of North Korea, it is obvious that the early rumors are not true. Azige could vaguely feel that this was a big conspiracy formulated by Haihan. If he was not careful, this place might become another battlefield where the Qing army suffered heavy casualties.
Azig did not let Ulegshan continue to lead his troops to attack. Instead, he sent a number of reconnaissance cavalry to spread out along the perimeter of the position to confirm how large the control range of the Haihan Army was and whether any of his own forces could Take advantage of weak areas. At the same time, a messenger was sent back to Pyongyang to report the findings here to Huang Taiji.
"The Qing army just tried this and it's all over?" Seeing the Qing army withdrawing three miles away in one breath, Takahashi Nan couldn't help but be a little disappointed with the enemy's cautious performance. In his opinion, the exploratory attack launched by the Qing army just now could not threaten his own positions, so he ordered the corresponding positions to fire at the right time. Unexpectedly, this seemed to make the enemy vigilant. I wish I could continue my offensive.
Haihan spent two months building a defense line here, and Takahashi Minami also had the rare opportunity of personally serving as a supervisor on the construction site for a long time. Naturally, he hoped that the enemy's offensive would be more intense before he could be worthy of building this. The manpower, material and financial resources spent on this position. But if the enemy retreats at the first touch, the intensity of such a battle is far from what he expected before the war.
Haihan's strategy at this stage is to stay in this position and wait for the Qing army to attack. Even if Gao Qiaonan has a strong desire to fight, he cannot command his troops to take the initiative and can only hope that the Qing army can muster up the strength. Courage goes on the offensive. If we fall into a long-term confrontation situation like that of the Jinzhou Isthmus, it will be really annoying.
Qian Tiandun was very optimistic about this. If the Qing army wanted to break through the Datong River defense line, it would either have to defeat the huge coalition fleet on the river, or it would have to severely damage the Haihan Army that stayed on the Datong River to force Haihan to retreat on his own. , and comparing the two goals, it seems that the latter is still possible to achieve, so sooner or later, troops will have to be sent to attack this position.
(End of chapter)