I want to be emperor

Chapter 449 Battle of the Cavalry

The first wave of the Ming army came first, a total of more than 1000 cavalry!
They carried the heavy shelling of the Chu army and walked forward more than 500 meters at a brisk pace, and then launched a charge more than 300 meters away.

Then...they ran headlong into the hollow phalanx of the Chu army's infantry.

Strictly speaking, they did not take the initiative to attack the hollow infantry phalanx of the Chu army. Even if this hollow phalanx looks very thin, any rational cavalry general would not let his own cavalry take the initiative to attack the waiting enemy army Infantry array.

The attack direction of the Ming army cavalry is actually the gap between these phalanxes.

There is a distance of about 130 meters between each infantry phalanx of the Chu army. At the same time, the sharp corners of each phalanx face the side where the cavalry is attacking. This arrangement is actually to make the distance between the two phalanxes The infantry's firepower forms a cross, and at the same time, it can avoid mutual injury.

Probably something like this: ('-' stands for the space bar, please ignore)
□——Cavalry——
□
-
□

The cavalry of the Ming army wanted to rush through these gaps, shoot arrows directly on the horses, and prepare to rush over and continue the assault, and then attack the artillery positions behind the first division of the Chu army and the flanks of the eighth division.

Then turn the whole battle situation around!

As long as the artillery positions of the Chu army and the flanks of the Eighth Division are attacked by cavalry, even if the Chu army does not collapse, it will be severely injured, and then stop the storming of the East Fort.

This is the core mission of these Ming army cavalry.

However, what they didn't expect was that when they rushed up, they were attacked by crossfire from many hollow phalanxes of the Chu army, causing heavy casualties.

What's more, they didn't expect that the Chu army's hollow phalanx was not limited to the front ones, but there were several more in the rear, so that after they rushed through the hollow phalanx of the first batch of Chu troops, they immediately encountered the second batch. The third batch...

And these Ming army cavalry were constantly forced to turn, not only suffered continuous killing, but also the galloping speed of the horses also decreased rapidly, and finally fell silently among the many hollow phalanxes of the Chu army.

Ever since, the high-ranking generals of both sides saw this scene: The cavalry of the Ming army seemed to be running up to die in a foolish way!

To help it look like a suicide charge!
When the remaining part of the cavalry in the first wave of cavalry finally bypassed the infantry phalanx of the Chu army and rushed out from both sides smoothly.

This wave of cavalry has more than 400 cavalry...

You know, there were more than 500 Ming army cavalry before the attack!

Two or three hundred were killed or injured on the charge, and seven or eight hundred were killed or injured by crossfire in the hollow phalanx.

It is no exaggeration to say that the casualties were heavy!

And the most important thing is that when the remaining 400 cavalry rushed out, they immediately encountered the cavalry unit of the Chu army who had been belatedly arriving.

Lieutenant General Zhu Xingfa received the order to attack. Because of the urgency of the battle, he couldn't even wait for the other two cavalry brigades and other cavalry regiments.

However, in order to maintain the physical fitness of the horses and also to maintain the formation, he could not directly lead the cavalry all the way. Instead, he took the cavalry at a fast pace and led the cavalry across hundreds of meters, and finally arrived at the battlefield.

And now even though he has arrived at the battlefield, he is only 400 meters away from the enemy cavalry, but he still did not let the cavalry charge up directly, but continued to walk at a brisk pace until he was more than 200 meters away from the Ming army participating in the cavalry , and then ordered to launch a charge.

The charge of the cavalry does not mean charging at full speed from the beginning. The cavalry of the Chu army divided the pace of the charge into four stages: slow step, fast step, running, and attacking step.

The simple explanation is that a slow walk is a normal walk with only one hoof off the ground; a quick walk has two hooves off the ground at the same time; a run means that all four hooves are off the ground instantly;

The armored cavalry in the Chu army often only walked briskly when they reached 500 meters, ran when they reached 200 meters, and sprinted at full speed when they reached about 60 meters.

And this is a training requirement. In actual combat, if the opponent's artillery fire is weaker, the running distance can be shortened. In short, it is to maintain the formation as much as possible and shorten the time for the final attack.

Of course, this team is limited to the situation of charging in formation. If it is scattered riding and shooting or other combat methods, then it is another matter.

But in the Chu army, unless it was a small-scale battle between sporadic scouts and cavalry, cavalry operations were all in formations, and scattered formations were rare.

On the one hand, the overall quality of the cavalry of the Chu army is not good, and the combat effectiveness of classical cavalry is not good, at least they cannot compete with the elite cavalry of the Ming army.

Therefore, in order to offset the relatively poor combat effectiveness of individual cavalry, the Chu army is more inclined to fight in formations, and has higher and higher requirements for the formation density of cavalry.

The improvement of the formation is obvious, and the improvement of combat effectiveness is obvious. Although the cavalry of the Chu Army often cannot compete with the elite cavalry of the Ming Army on the opposite side, even if they fall into a disadvantage, they can still fight against the elite cavalry of the Ming Army. six open.

Sometimes tactics are used properly, and a big victory can be won.

After all, whether cavalry combat or infantry combat, formation is very important.

Once the cavalry is allowed to charge and fight freely regardless of the formation, then a very interesting military law will appear, that is, the [-]th law.

What does it mean?That is, only about 20.00% of the soldiers dare to fight and rush, and the rest are basically shouting 666. In the downwind situation, they will fight a few times, and in the headwind situation, they will run every minute.
Most people are afraid of death, survival is a human instinct, it is difficult to violate.

In order to reverse this, the cavalry of the Chu army tended to form a tighter formation, and sacrificed the charge speed of the cavalry for this purpose, requiring the cavalry to maintain a relatively slow speed most of the time when charging, and only in the last tens of meters. At that time, the restriction was released, and a full-speed assault charge was ordered.

All of this was fully reflected in today's cavalry battle!
When Zhu Xingfa led the cavalry in the last 200 meters, he ordered the first cavalry brigade to run, and when he was only 70 meters away from the Ming cavalry, he ordered to charge at full speed!
Ever since, the high-speed cavalry from both sides collided instantly!
The result was no surprise!

The first cavalry brigade had more than 400 cavalry, and only more than [-] Ming army cavalry were left in the attack.

Moreover, these Ming army cavalry had just escaped from the hollow phalanx, and they were all panicked, and more importantly, they completely lost their formation. The more than 400 cavalry were all crowded together in a mess.

Rao, the Ming army cavalry general on the opposite side wanted to launch a counterattack and ordered a hedging, but they had no formation and lost their command system, so their counterattack was neither fish nor fowl.

A few dozens of people rushed out immediately, while the rest of more than a hundred people hesitated for a while, but also followed, but there were still more than 200 cavalry, but they were dawdling, and many people even went around directly Tried to back off.

It is impossible for such remnants of the Ming army's cavalry to stop the violent charge of the Chu army's first cavalry brigade.

In just a few minutes, this Ming army cavalry with [-] remaining cavalry has completely become history!
Dozens of cavalrymen of the Ming army who rushed to the forefront were immediately crushed by the cavalry of the Chu army. Some of the more than 100 cavalry behind them turned and continued to charge forward, but in the end they were all crushed by the first cavalry brigade. Completely crushed.

It was the more than 200 cavalrymen of the Ming army who were lagging behind at the beginning, because they turned to flee and escaped early!
It's just that they didn't last too long, because when most of them fled in a hurry, they couldn't tell the direction clearly, and ran towards the phalanx of the Second Infantry Regiment of the First Division of the Chu Army...

As soon as they saw the infantry phalanx of the Chu army in front, how dare these remaining Ming army cavalry rush up, and they walked around in circles, seeing the Chu army cavalry encircle them again...

One of the guerrillas they led gritted their teeth and directly ordered to surrender...

If they don't surrender, they are really going to die, and none of them will be left.

The first wave of cavalry of the Ming army, a total of [-] cavalry, was bombarded by the Chu army, intercepted by the infantry, intercepted by the cavalry, and finally the entire army was wiped out!
After dying, only a few dozen scattered cavalry ran out.

This scene stunned the senior generals of both sides, and even frightened the second wave of cavalry of the Ming army to death...

The cavalry of the Ming army attacked in three waves. After the first batch of cavalry, there was a second batch of cavalry of about [-] cavalry.

According to the plan, they would join the battle about a few minutes behind the first cavalry.

Well, when the first wave of cavalry of the Ming army entered the hollow phalanx, the second batch of cavalry had actually entered the range of the artillery of the Chu army, that is, within 800 meters.

When the remnants of the first batch of Ming army cavalry were hit head-on by the Chu army cavalry, these Ming army cavalry had already launched a charge.

But...their charge was only at the beginning, and then the Ming cavalry general on the opposite side led his cavalry, and made a strategic turn 200 meters away from the front of the Chu army...

After the first batch of cavalry went up, the entire army was wiped out. If they followed up, the consequences would not be so good.

The second batch of Ming army cavalry turned and retreated directly, not to mention the third batch of cavalry, none of them appeared within the firing range of the Chu army's artillery, and they are still behind the short hillside 800 meters away.

Seeing the retreat of Ming cavalry on the opposite side, Zhu Xingfa gave a cold snort, and then led the first cavalry brigade to catch up.

At the same time, he ordered the second cavalry brigade and two divisional cavalry regiments to keep up.

It's just that this pursuit battle between the cavalry is impossible to have any results in a short time. The cavalry of the Ming army were frightened, and they didn't dare to turn back to fight with the cavalry of the Chu army. Running towards the rear...

Running and running, they have already run out of the battlefield!
When the cavalry of both sides were chasing and fleeing outside the battlefield, the Eighth Division of the Chu Army continued to launch a strong attack on the East Fort. The Corps went up to provide infantry fire support to the Eighth Division.

Hong Chengchou's tactical concept of using cavalry to attack, severely injuring the Chu army's flanks, restraining the Eighth Division's strong attack, and even turning the battle situation was a complete failure.

So, at around four o'clock in the afternoon that day, the commando of the Eighth Division of the Chu Army finally broke through the last line of defense of the East Fort of the Ming Army, and successfully planted the red-bottomed black dragon flag of the Chu Army on this crucial fort fortress. !

Hong Chengchou's painstaking efforts, the Tianjin defense line, which was placed high hopes by the Ming court's monarchs and ministers, has entered the countdown to its complete destruction!
(End of this chapter)