I want to be emperor

Chapter 524 Secret Mission
Brigadier General Qi Lianghou, the traditional cavalry general, was very dissatisfied with this exercise, and even complained to his colleagues about it.

But the top guards and even the top army are very satisfied.

Although the process of this exercise cannot be compared with actual combat, it still fully reflects the advantages and disadvantages of cuirassiers on the battlefield.

Especially the impact that erupted against the old traditional cavalry made them mesmerized.

As for Brigadier General Qi Lianghou's complaints, Lieutenant General Qian Tai also heard about it, but he was not angry about it, and even expressed his understanding.

Indeed, it was the referee's request to prevent the Eighth Cavalry Brigade from escaping and being forced to fight against the Fourth Cuirassier Regiment.

But this exercise was originally a combination of watching traditional cavalry play various wind formations, playing bow and arrow and riding artillery.

Instead, it depends on the ability of the cuirassiers to charge into battle.

Because when it comes to kite flying, the Chu army still has a lot of dragoons. These dragoons are better at flying kites than traditional cavalry.

The range and armor-piercing ability of muskets are not comparable to bows and arrows, not to mention that when dragoons fight, they dismount and fight directly in formation.

With the existence of line tactics, let alone cavalry and archer-based light cavalry, even heavy cavalry may not be able to rush over.

Then the cavalry cannon, although the traditional cavalry cavalry is equipped with cavalry cannon, and it performs well in actual combat, but the same, the dragoons are also good, and even the cuirassiers in the fourth cuirassier regiment, they are also They will not fight alone, but will bring a bunch of cavalry guns to the battlefield.

Therefore, if you really want to test the cavalry artillery, mobility and shooting ability, the cavalry units of the Chu army are very good at it.

Therefore, the cavalry artillery will be removed during the exercise, and the cavalry will not be dismounted to fight in formation. Instead, it will focus on the drills that rarely occur in actual combat.

The ability of the Fourth Cuirassier Regiment to charge into battle was obviously recognized by the Guards and the top army.

"Although large-scale cavalry charges are relatively rare now, the Eastern captives we are facing have a large number of Mongolian Eight Banners cavalry, and at the same time they have engulfed a large number of Mongolian tribe cavalry. The combat of these cavalry Many methods are still stuck in the era of traditional cold weapons!"

"From this, we can foresee that when they are unable to break through our interception with cavalry and shoot, and attack our rear, there is a high probability that they will struggle to launch a large-scale cavalry attack. The heavy cavalry with battlefield assault ability has important battlefield value!"

Qian Tai's position on the cuirassiers has always been very clear, that is, to have assaults on the battlefield, especially in large-scale battles, to intercept enemy cavalry and even launch counterattacks.

To put it bluntly, in Qian Tai's view, this kind of cuirassier is used for anti-cavalry warfare.

As for the enemy's infantry and the like, it is natural to have our own artillery to deal with it.

And the exercise worked out pretty well!

Lieutenant General Song Qilin, Chief of Staff of the Third Army, also agrees with Qian Tai's words: "As long as the enemy's cavalry can be kept out of our own infantry and artillery, then other wars, whether it is a siege or a frontal attack against the enemy, will not be difficult." Our infantry and artillery are invincible."

"To intercept the enemy's cavalry attack, mobility is one aspect, and impact capability is also a very important aspect!"

"The mobility of the former dragoons, the developing hussars, and the original traditional cavalry is sufficient, but the impact is still too poor."

"In the past, many of our dragoons were often invincible when they faced off against the enemy's cavalry. However, due to their lack of impact ability and mobility, they were often invincible. After the army dragoons dismounted and fought on foot, the enemy cavalry rode around directly to avoid the array of their own dragoons, and looked for other weak points to attack, which made the dragoons more passive!"

"There are also some relatively brave enemy cavalry, who often approach quietly, then start to gallop on horseback at a relatively long distance, and finally charge directly in a very small time window, which leads to our dragoons often being too late to dismount The formation of horses finally forced our dragoons to engage them on horseback, and every time our losses were not small!"

"But this cuirassier is very good. Although it is not as maneuverable as the light cavalry, its short-distance maneuverability on the battlefield is still good. Even if the enemy wants to retreat temporarily, they can take advantage of the opportunity to rush directly."

"And the impact ability is even better. The effect of this dense charge formation is too good!"

"I have also seen the intensive charge of the hussars in actual combat before. Although the formation is also tight, but because of the lack of protection and the use of the saber as the main weapon, the casualties during the charge are not small."

"And the intensive charge of the cuirassiers has a much greater impact. You can expect to see them directly tearing the enemy's cavalry formation on the battlefield, forming a spearhead, and then driving other cavalry to follow up, thereby expanding their advantage!"

Lieutenant General Song Qilin said while continuing to look at the exercise report in his hand, and finally said: "Our army should also engage in this cuirassier!"

General Zuo Yingzhe, the commander of the Third Army, said at this time: "It's not easy to do this. Everything else is easy to talk about, but this horse is not easy to solve!"

"Now we can only get some good Central Asian horses from the Yarkand Khanate in the Western Regions, only a few thousand horses per year. However, although ordinary Central Asian horses are taller than Mongolian horses, they are not enough to become important horses. The mounts of the cavalry have to be selected from the best among the best, and this year it is estimated that there will only be a few hundred horses, and it is very difficult for a fourth cuirassier regiment to maintain!"

As he said that, Zuo Yingzhe also took a look at Qian Tai, who was the guard who caught the way of importing horses from the Yarkant Khanate a long time ago, saying that the guards were the emperor's army and had a lot to do with it. Horses must be prioritized.

As a result, more than half of the thousands of horses the empire acquired from the Yarkand Khanate in the past two years were taken away by the Guards.

When most of the cavalry units of the army, even the elite fourth cavalry brigade in the northern frontier army, used Mongolian horses, the three divisions of the Guards belonged to the cavalry regiment plus a fourth breastplate Cavalry regiments, these four cavalry regiments have all used Central Asian horses.

Not only that, but even the officers' mounts and the horses used for the military orders are all Central Asian horses.

To be honest, Zuo Yingzhe has a lot of opinions on this.

However, the opponent is the guards, and the guards have a special status. They have always given priority to equipping all kinds of good things, and this horse is no exception, so there is no way.

But Zuo Yingzhe also heard that the empire is in contact with one of the four tribes of Moxi Mongolia and the Shuote tribe who have entered the snow area of ​​Qinghai recently. It is possible to obtain a certain number of excellent war horses from this channel.

The upper echelons of the empire have always been trying to win over several nomadic tribes or khanates in the northwest region.

In addition to the Yarkand Khanate and the Heshuote Tribe, the empire also actively communicated with the northern part of the western part of Monan Mongolia controlled by the Dongyao people, that is, the three Khalkha tribes of Mobei Mongolia.

Although this Mobei Mongolia has a close relationship with Dongyao, in the final analysis, the three tribes of Mobei Mongolia are not directly under the territory of Dongyao people, but only temporarily submit to them as a vassal state.

Some important ministers in the empire believed that as long as the hoe was well swung, no corner could not be dug down!
Well, this is just the first half of the sentence, and the second half: If you can't dig it down, just push it down!
For this reason, the empire has been engaging in various small actions in Mongolia and the Western Regions in the past two years, constantly poaching the corners of the captors through various methods such as threats and lures.

Not to mention, it works great!

For example, the Heshuo Te tribe, one of the four Moxi Mongolian tribes that have entered the snow area, is still the leader tribe of Moxi Mongolian in name.

In the past, like the Yarkand Khanate, they flirted with the Eastern captives. Later, seeing the rise of the Great Chu Empire, they began to contact the Great Chu Empire and the European Kingdom.

It was different when the Yarkand Khanate voluntarily defected to the Great Chu Empire because of the threat of the Zhungeer Ministry. They had been timid for a long time, and only recently contacted the empire for trade.

It is not the ordinary trade behavior of the people, but the bulk material trade that the government personally participates in and leads.

They exchanged special products such as war horses, cattle, sheep, livestock, and wool in exchange for various daily-use ironware, cloth, tea, and military cold weapons and even matchlock guns of the empire.

This kind of strategic level transaction cannot be done without the nod and promotion of the high-level leaders of both parties.

The Yarkant Khanate and the Heshuo Special Department will not talk about it, but on the side of the Great Chu Empire, it is not any enterprise that conducts bulk material transactions with the Yarkand Khanate, but the Ministry of Commerce and Trade.

For this reason, the Ministry of Commerce and Trade has also set up two trading companies, which are respectively responsible for the trade with the Yarkand Khanate and the trade affairs of the Heshuo Special Department. In the future, the Ministry of Commerce and Trade may open several more trading companies to use What about the trade affairs with the other three tribes of Moxi Mongolia and the three tribes of Mobei Mongolia.

And this kind of trade between officials not only exists in the areas that these Dongyao people cannot control, even in Monan Mongolia, which is actually controlled by the Dongyao people, there is actually a wide range of secret transactions with the Great Chu Empire. .

It’s just that they didn’t make it public, and they came here secretly. The leader of the Great Chu Empire is still the Ministry of Commerce and Trade, which is in charge of the subordinate Xuanda Trading Company. However, many personnel in this trading company are actually from the Commerce and Trade Investigation Department. ...

The Investigation Department of the Ministry of Commerce and Trade, this agency is very special, it is not only a trade agency, but also an intelligence agency.

However, the reputation of this institution within the Great Chu Empire is not obvious, far less famous than the Internal Affairs Department of the Imperial Academy and the Anti-Corruption Bureau of the Procuratorate!
Even compared to the Army's Intelligence Department, the Navy's Intelligence Department is much more low-key. After all, the intelligence agencies of the two militaries knew from the first glance that they were collecting enemy intelligence.

However, because this commercial and trade investigation department only operates in the territory of hostile forces, ordinary people and even most imperial officials have no chance to contact them at all, and they never even stop listening.

On weekdays, the Investigation Department of the Ministry of Commerce and Trade is in non-friendly areas, which were controlled by the Ming Dynasty in the past, and later in Monan Mongolia. Even in Liaodong, which is controlled by the Dongbang people, the investigation department personnel can be seen.

They secretly engaged in the smuggling of various strategic materials in enemy-occupied areas, and at the same time collected various types of intelligence.

The intelligence they collect is more on the strategic level, especially on politics and people's livelihood.

For example, find out the political orientation of the opponent's high-level, and then judge which one is to be assassinated, which one can be wooed, and which one can be supported.

It is also necessary to find out the opponent's grain output and the output of various strategic materials, and check whether there is any money in the opponent's treasury.

These information are basically public information, as long as you put your heart into it, you can collect it.

Then they will summarize and analyze the news, and finally judge the real situation and trends of non-friendly forces.

And this information will eventually be used to judge or even interfere with the opponent's strategic direction, and judge the opponent's war mobilization and maintenance capabilities.

They do this kind of thing, in fact, no one in the outside world knows, unlike the Army Military Intelligence Department, who engages the whole world, even the quasi-professionals who are far away in the west and not yet bordering on the control area of ​​​​the Great Chu Empire. Geer knows that the Great Chu Empire has a military intelligence department, which specializes in spying on various military intelligence, assassinating important generals, setting fire to looting and sabotage, and the bad ones ooze pus!
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The trade between many tribes in Monan Mongolia and the Great Chu Empire was carried out secretly under the leadership of the Commercial and Trade Investigation Department, which is not well-known in the outside world.

This kind of secret trade has also solved a lot of horse shortages for the Chu army.

This has also led to a very special situation in the Chu army now, that is, some of the newly purchased war horses were purchased from the Mongols or even the Dong captives!

This point is highly similar to the Ming army!
In the middle and late Ming Dynasty, many war horses of the Ming army were purchased directly from the Mongolian grasslands. At that time, the enemy of the Ming army was Monan Mongolia.

Later, Monan Mongolia was controlled by the Dongyao people, and this kind of war horse trade did not stop. The Dongyao people even stepped in, acting as the gold master behind the scenes, and selling war horses to the Ming army through intermediaries.

Don't think it's unbelievable that the two sides are still trading war horses when they are at war. This is the reality.

Whether it is the Ming army or the Chu army, because they lack good war horses, they all urgently need war horses on the grassland.

The Ming army thought that the horse government collapsed in the middle and late stages, and the Chu army had not had time to expand its own horse government, and they all lacked horses!

In contrast, whether it is the Mongols in the grassland or the captives, they are also in urgent need of grain, cloth, tea, and various ironware from the Central Plains.

Especially for such a thing as tea, this thing has been a strategic material for the Mongolian nomads in recent hundreds of years. On the one hand, it is used to supplement vitamins, and on the other hand, it is only a religious need for doing things.

There are pressing trade subsidies on both sides.

Under such circumstances, the Chu army has also obtained some war horses from Monan Mongolia in the past two years, and the number is still quite large.

In the five years of Chengshun, the Great Chu Empire obtained more than [-] war horses from Monan Mongolia, mainly from the Xuanda area.

Moreover, quite a few of these war horses are still dominated by the Dongyao people behind them. The Dongyao people will definitely not intervene in person, but will do it through an intermediary.

However, the quality of these war horses obtained from Monan Mongolia is not good, but they cannot meet the army's demand for heavy cavalry.

If the army wants to engage in heavy cavalry, it may have to find a way to increase the number of horses imported from the Western Regions, and this is actually a solution to the symptoms rather than the root cause.

It is better to obtain excellent horse breeds and breed excellent war horses by yourself.

This is what the Damaying army horse farm is doing now. They use the many stallions they have obtained from the Western Regions through various official or private channels, and even smuggled channels, including a large number of Arabian horses, Kazakh horses and even a group of carefully selected horses. Selected Mongolian horses, etc.

Today, a large number of excellent stallions of various types are gathered at the Damaying Military Horse Farm, and these excellent stallions will be continuously bred in the future.

On the one hand, it is to directly breed more excellent horses such as Arabian horses and Central Asian horses.

In addition, these excellent stallions are also used for crossbreeding in an attempt to breed more excellent war horses.

And all this takes time!
Therefore, the Great Chu Empire Army may not be able to handle heavy cavalry for a while, and can only continue to carry forward the way of light cavalry.

As for the war horses used in the light cavalry, part of them will be resolved internally, part of them will be resolved from the Yarkand Khanate, and part of them may also be resolved from the Heshuote Ministry in the future, and part of them will also be resolved from the smuggling transaction in Monan Mongolia.

Among them, the deformity in Monan Mongolia only relies on the smuggling and trade behavior maintained by the tacit understanding between the two parties. You can't say that people from the east are the enemy, or that the Great Chu Empire is the enemy. It is purely that both sides have their own rigid needs!

There are so many horses in the hands of the Dongyao people that they can't run out...

Not to mention the tribes of Monan Mongolia, they have no shortage of horses!
However, they are extremely short of ironware, tea, cloth and other large quantities of materials in the Central Plains.

For the Great Chu Empire, a large number of war horses were needed, as well as ordinary horses, cattle, sheep, and even wool.

The two sides naturally have a complementary trade relationship.

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The empire actively sent envoys to contact the Yarkand Khanate, the four tribes of Moxi Mongolia, and the three tribes of Mobei Mongolia. These efforts not only expanded the sources of their war horses and other livestock, wool, leather and other materials, but also expanded the dumping market for their own industrial products. , or in order to further cut off the foreign aid of the Dongbang people, and even try to pull them into the chariot against the Dongbang people.

It's just that although these foreign races also made contact with the empire, and even agreed to trade with the empire one after another, they did not easily get on the chariot of the empire.

This made many high-level officials in the empire very dissatisfied, shouting that people who are not of our race must have different hearts!
In fact, most of these Moxi Mongolia and Mobei Mongolia have a hard time.

For example, Mobei Mongolia, why do people flirt with the Dongyao people, and even surrender to the Dongyao people, because the Russians from the west have already killed them...they are almost out of breath.

At the same time, the relationship between Moxi Mongolia and them was not good, and war broke out between them.

In order to protect themselves, they adopted the strategy of long-range friendship and short-term attack, and adopted the policy of surrendering to the Dongcap people to protect themselves.

And the Heshuote Department, the nominal boss of Moxi Mongolia, is not doing well, because the Zhungeer Department, one of the Moxi Mongolia, has been very strong recently.

The Zhungeer Ministry not only defeated the Russians recently, but also forced the Russians to stop going south and turn eastward to threaten Mobei Mongolia.

At the same time, the Zhungeer tribe also actively seized the playground of Mobei Mongolia to the east, and continued to expand to the southeast, and continued to launch wars against the Yarkand Khanate entrenched in Hami and Turpan.

Because of the strength of the Zhungeer Department, the Heshuo Special Department simply gave up the traditional territory of Moxi and went directly to Tibet on a large scale.

If you can't provoke me, you can't hide!
The Heshuote troops ran to the snowy area and bullied the local chieftain, but the Yarkand Khanate in Hami Turpan could not escape, and could only resist the invasion of Zhungeer.

This is also the reason why the Yeerqiang Khanate so decisively invested in the Great Chu Empire.

It was because he was so overwhelmed by Zhungeer, and in order to protect himself, he couldn't wait to keep the thigh of the Great Chu Empire, and then obtained a large number of weapons to resist Zhungeer's invasion.

Of course, the Great Chu Empire also obtained a large number of war horses from the Yarkand Khanate, and even imported excellent war horses from Central Asia further west through the Yarkand Khanate, and passed some industrial products through the Yarkand Khanate. Sold further west.

Now the entire northwest is in chaos. The empire was able to maintain a good situation for the empire as a whole under such a complicated situation. It did not allow Moxi Mongolia and Mobei Mongolia to launch a war against the empire and maintain normal relations. It is already very good to be able to pull some of the tribes and empires of Monan Mongolia to do business secretly.

As for any more, there is basically no hope now, at least not before defeating the Dongyao people.

To those nomads, what the Dongyao people had achieved in Monan Mongolia was more threatening than the guns of the Great Chu Empire!

But even so, on the eve of a large-scale battle in Liaodong, the Great Chu Empire still sent multiple missions to the north and northwest, trying to continue to poach the corners of the captives, and try to stabilize them no matter how bad it is. , to prevent them from being used by the Eastern captivity.

In particular, Monan Mongolia is the focus area of ​​this large-scale diplomatic operation of the Great Chu Empire.

Because Monan Mongolia is also divided into many tribes, not to mention a few tribes defected to Dongyao at the beginning, they are even enemies of Dongyao, and have fought against Dongyao people for many years.

It was only when he was defeated in the end that he was forced to surrender to the Dongyao people.

Among them is Monan Mongolia, the most powerful Chahar tribe in the past.

In the past, Lin Dan Khan was ambitious and wanted to reunify Monan Mongolia with the Chahar tribe!

During the same period, the Dongbang people wooed Horqin and other tribes south of the Nenjiang River Basin and Neikalkha and other tribes north of them.

Finally, after years of war, Lin Dan Khan was defeated and forced to flee to Qinghai, where he eventually died.

As soon as Lin Dan Khan died, the rest of the Chahar tribe became even more unable to stop the attack of the Dongyao people. In the end, the Dongyao people defeated the remnants of the Chahar tribe again and captured his son Ezhe. Soon after, they captured Lin Dan Na Muzhong, one of Khan's wives, and Abu Nai, Lin Dan Khan's posthumous son.

Moreover, Huang Taiji is not jealous, so he directly married Lin Danhan's widow...

At this point, Lin Danhan's lineage was completely finished, which eventually led to the complete surrender of the Chahar tribe and its affiliated Harqin, Tumed, and Ordos tribes.

And these things have not been in the past few years!

Although forced by reality, the Chahar Tribe and many of its affiliated tribes were captive, but the old hatred could not be eliminated in just a few years.

In the past, many soldiers of the Chahar tribe who died in the war against the Eastern captives, their fathers, brothers, and nephews are all still there!
And at this time, the secret mission of the Great Chu Empire quietly arrived at the border where Tumed was!

After seeing the person, the first sentence of the envoy of the Great Chu Empire was: Do you want revenge?Do you want to be free?

(End of this chapter)