This is a position with very complete defense facilities and a very strong position. In the eyes of the new supreme commander of the theater, General Alges, he has seen many such defensive positions. In the five years of the war in the eastern region, the Principality of Rimodra In the brutal offensive and defensive battles, many of the enemy's defensive positions were worse than this, but they still caused heavy casualties to the Guards Corps.
"Such a position, defended by a battalion, is enough to resist a regiment of attackers. How many people are you planning to send to attack this drill, and how many casualties are expected to be incurred?" General Alges commented expertly. , turned around and asked General Bolognik and General Sevicit who were accompanying him.
Early this morning, General Alges took a large number of entourage, accompanied by General Bolonik, to General Servicit's Pandan 2nd Division for an inspection, and asked General Servicit to command the troops to conduct on-site offensive and defensive drills. , to evaluate the offensive combat effectiveness of the Panshi Second Division. He personally took people to the defensive position to inspect it to prevent any oversights.
Many soldiers were holding scarecrows and placing them in the trenches and beside the earthen ramparts. At the same time, eight wooden artillery models were set up on the position. A battalion has thousands of soldiers. Of course, there will not be a thousand scarecrows placed on the position. Instead, one scarecrow will be used to replace a team of twelve people. In this way, only a hundred scarecrows need to be placed on the defensive position.
"I am going to attack with a large group," General Servicit replied.
General Alges nodded: "Very good. You are more prudent in doing things and adopt very orthodox tactics. This is an advantage. First, use a large group of troops to launch a probing attack, which is enough to test out most of the enemy's firepower on the defensive position. Deployment location, then the second attack can avoid the artillery projection area on the defensive position, reduce casualties of soldiers, find the weak points of the enemy's position and concentrate on launching an assault. It is indeed possible to break through the enemy's defense with minimal casualties. defensive position"
General Sevicit looked at General Bolognik next to General Alges, as if he wanted to refute something. General Bolognik shook his head slightly. General Sevicit took a deep breath and nodded to General Alges: "General, I will go to take command first. Please watch our offensive drill here and evaluate our attack after the war." The soldiers conduct guidance and evaluation. By the way, General, when will we launch the attack?"
"In fact, the best time to launch an attack is at night, because the attacker can use the cover of night to get closer to the defensive position more easily, and the attention of the defender's sentry will be greatly shortened by the lighting of the bonfire in front of the position. Sometimes there is a collision On a windy night, the flicker of firelight can even distract sentries and guards, making it more suitable for attackers to launch a surprise attack."
General Alges described it very professionally: "However, since General Sevicit is going to send out a large group to launch a tentative attack first, then night is not a good time, and it is impossible to clearly record the firepower points on the defensive positions. We will attack on Set the time around two o'clock in the afternoon during the day. You can use a probing attack and two feints to delay the time until the evening, then you can launch a real and decisive surprise attack."
General Sevicit turned around and left, but General Bolonik just received the report from his adjutant and left General Alges's side. So several school-level officers from the Guards Division who came with General Alges gathered around the general. A lieutenant colonel officer smiled and said: "General, the division commander of the Second Rock Division seems to be interested in Your comments are a bit unconvincing and disapproving”
Another colonel officer of the Guards Division shook his head and said: "After all, they are defensive second-line troops and do not understand the difficulties of positional attack on the battlefield. I doubt that they will conduct offensive drills in their daily training. This positional offensive battle It is likely to turn into a farce. Maybe they think that they only need to launch a charge to successfully rush to the defensive position, and then they will successfully capture the defensive position."
General Alges did not stop his officers from taunting him. After a while, he said: "Okay, shut up and watch the drill carefully. Even if you want to accuse others, you have to find solid evidence, not just empty words." You talk nonsense."
A lieutenant colonel from the Second Panshi Division ran over, stood at attention and saluted in front of General Alges, and loudly reported: "General, following your instructions, the Second Panshi Division is scheduled to launch an attack on the enemy's defensive positions at two o'clock in the afternoon. Attack, there are still two minutes left before the attack time. My subordinate is Lieutenant Colonel Bombeck, in charge of the staff office of the division headquarters. Please allow me to explain to you this positional attack drill."
General Arges laughed and waved his hand: "No need to explain. We can clearly see such a small offensive drill here, so there is no need to explain anything."
"Yes." Since General Alges said there was no need to explain, the lieutenant colonel named Bombeck was also very straightforward. He saluted again and retreated.
It is now about ten o'clock in the morning, but the assumed attack time is two o'clock in the afternoon. Of course, it is impossible for everyone to really wait until two o'clock. Soon a sharp copper whistle was heard, which meant that the attack had begun.
Soldiers from the 2nd Pandan Division appeared in groups of two in front of the crowd watching the offensive drill, but they were too far apart. Many officers of the Guards Corps have begun to shake their heads. With such a distance, even if the defenders let you rush to the position, you will still be outnumbered because you have no cooperating companions. This is simply giving the enemy a life. ah. The second-line troops are indeed the second-line troops, and their combat coordination is really poor
There were only about a hundred of these soldiers, divided into about fifty groups, two people in tandem. Their running posture is very strange, bending down, lowering their bodies, and sprinting forward sideways. Immediately, an officer saw it and took a breath: "Hey, there is something special about running like this. It's a zigzag shape. It's difficult to aim. It's impossible to hit with artillery like this unless it's covered by simultaneous fire. But that can only deal with two enemies." , no one would use such a method"
However, these soldiers lay down on the ground when they were 150 meters away from the defensive position and began to crawl forward. When they were about 100 meters away, they took out a small shovel from behind and dug a hole in the ground, burying their entire bodies in the hole. Here, this made the officers of the Guards Corps watching the offensive drill confused: "What do they want to do?"
Soon the officers of the Guards knew what they were doing. These soldiers dug the hole very quickly, and it only took the two of them a few minutes to complete the hole. In addition to a small half of the hole that was still being dug, the soldiers who had already dug the hole poked their muskets out of the hole, aimed at the scarecrows and wooden targets on the defensive position, and started shooting.
From the monocular telescope, you can clearly see the swing range of the scarecrows and wooden targets placed on the defensive position and the bullet marks left behind when they were hit by the guns. The officers of the Guards suddenly realized that these soldiers were sharpshooters. They dug holes to set up shooting positions to suppress the defenders on the defensive positions.
I have never seen such a style of play, sending so many sharpshooters in the first wave of attacks. In the offensive mode of the Guards Corps, ordinary soldiers basically charge to cover the sharpshooters approaching the enemy's defensive position, looking for a good hiding position before shooting to suppress the enemy on the defensive position. These sharpshooters are scattered among various squads or squadrons. No one has ever thought of gathering the sharpshooters for use
"So that's it. These hundreds of sharpshooters have basically suppressed the defenders on the defensive position. Any defender who wants to fire back will need to risk his life." An officer of the Guards Corps sighed. , this sharpshooter tactic takes advantage of the excellent performance of the Obas III standard matchlock gun equipped by the king's team. To put it bluntly, it uses an effective range of 100 meters of precise aiming and shooting to bully the enemy.
There was another sharp copper whistle. This time there were fewer soldiers attacking, only about sixty, again in groups of two. The sharp-eyed officers of the Guards Division noticed that the soldier running behind seemed to be carrying a strange iron frame on his back.
This second group of more than 30 soldiers who launched the attack were just like the first group of soldiers. They crawled on the ground about 150 meters away from the defensive position, twisting and moving forward like earthworms. It's just that they continued to move forward when they climbed past the hole dug by the sharpshooter a hundred meters away. They didn't stop until they were sixty or seventy meters away from the position. They also took out their small shovels and dug holes on the ground desperately, digging out the holes. The soil was piled up in front to cover the two of them
"What are they doing?" The officers of the Guards Corps were all confused. Are the people in the Second Panshi Division addicted to digging holes? Or are they planning to dig holes at a distance of thirty or forty meters all the way to the defensive position? No one can figure out what role digging such a big hole at such a small distance can play in the attack.
"If I were the commander of the defenders, I would prepare the soldiers in the frontline trenches for hand-to-hand combat and hide in the trenches without showing their heads. I would order the artillery to retreat twenty or thirty meters, lengthen the depth of the defensive position, and make the enemy hundreds of The precise aiming shots of sharpshooters meters away were ineffective, and then the artillery was aimed at the holes in front of these positions and fired in a roll-call manner," said an officer of the Guards Division, stroking the beard on his chin.
Another guard officer shook his head: "It's useless. Didn't you see that the soldiers who dug the pits piled the excavated soil in front to prevent guns and artillery? Besides, artillery is not a musket. It can be aimed and fired accurately, like this I think you only have to fire ten artillery fires to hit a hole that is a little big. However, the attackers dug thirty-five big holes in front of the position. It’s strange how long you have to hit them. Why are they still digging? ”
In the monocular telescopes of the guards officers who were watching this offensive drill, they could see that dirt was still being blown out of a large pit only sixty or seventy meters away from the position. The pit was big enough for three or four people to hide. What is the purpose of these soldiers digging such a big hole?
The third sharp copper whistle sounded. There were even fewer soldiers attacking this time, only thirty or forty. These soldiers did not carry muskets, but carried a bulging satchel on each side. Just like the soldiers in the previous two attacks, they crawled on the ground when they were 150 meters away from the defensive position, and quickly moved towards the one in front who was still there. Climb into the big hole dug in the earth.
After the soldier carrying the satchel entered the pit, the soldier carrying the strange iron frame set up the iron frame in the pit. Then the soldier carrying the satchel took a black object from the bag and placed it on the iron frame. superior. The other soldier stopped digging a hole and picked up his musket to shoot at the defensive position.
When the fourth sharp whistle sounded, a black object was thrown high into the more than thirty large pits in front of the defensive position and thrown towards the defensive position. And an explosion occurred soon after landing. Fire, dust, fragments of the scarecrow and fragments of the wooden target were thrown high on the defensive position and fell again
All the officers of the Guards Division, including General Alges, were dumbfounded as they watched the explosions on the defensive positions cascade together.
The fifth sharp copper whistle sounded, and the same group of more than forty soldiers, one carrying an iron frame and the other carrying two large satchels, ran directly to the front line. They did not even crawl on the ground, but were like a gust of wind. He ran to a distance of fifty meters from the defensive position, then squatted down and took down the iron frame and immediately set it up. The soldier next to him also took out black throwing objects from his backpack and placed them on the iron frame
When these twenty groups of soldiers began to throw the explosive object into the depth of the defensive position, the three people who threw it in the big pit also stood up and rushed forward. They were twenty meters closer to the defensive position and started another attack. Start erecting the iron frame and throw the explosive object into the depth of the defensive position again
The defensive position is over, and no defender can continue to hold on in such a violent explosion. General Alges and the officers of the Guards Division around him feel extremely complicated at this moment. It turns out that General Servicit The brigade mentioned means that this small number of men and horses is enough to launch an attack, rather than using the men and horses of this brigade to launch a tentative attack as General Alges thought.
The face was a little painful from being beaten, but General Alges and the officers of the Guards Division no longer had any need to worry about their own face. There was no need to watch this offensive battle drill any longer. Under the leadership of General Algers, they walked straight to the exercise venue.
"You guys, come here!" General Alges yelled at two bomb crew members who were throwing bombs, waving them to come in front of him.
"What kind of weapon is this?" General Alges asked, pointing to the strange iron frame.
The two soldiers who were shouted at by them looked at the iron frame and said: "This is a throwing device, used to throw grenades."
"Grenade?" A guard officer took off the soldier's satchel, which contained a grenade: "Is this it?"
Under the guidance of two soldiers, a group of guards officers tried the power of this grenade on the spot.
"The maximum throwing distance is seventy or eighty meters. No wonder those soldiers had to move forward thirty meters beyond the sharpshooters before starting to dig a hole. They had already entered the area covered by artillery shells and within the range of the enemy's precise aiming and shooting. We had to dig a big hole to hide ourselves, and at the same time, we could allow the subsequent ammunition-carrying personnel to come up." General Alges and the guards officers finally understood the purpose of these soldiers digging such a big hole.
"The built-in match rope was ignited for five or six seconds before exploding. The explosion covered a range of five to six meters. There were cracks carved on the surface of the projectile. During the explosion, shell fragments were used to injure people!" Another Guards officer quickly figured it out! The explosive power of the projectile.
He hesitated and said: "Actually, I have seen this grenade before. During the five-year war in the Eastern Region, when attacking the Principality of Rimodra, the rear equipment department once transported a batch of round grenades similar to grenade to the front line. It is about twice the size of this grenade, very heavy, and has a match rope inserted on it. Before throwing, you need to light the match rope on it, instead of just pulling the fuse like this grenade."
"I have seen the one you mentioned." A guard officer next to him continued: "That thing is incomparable to this grenade. It is big and heavy and requires a special trebuchet to throw it. Although it can be thrown from a distance of two Three hundred meters, but as soon as the trebuchet was pulled to the front line, it became the target of the enemy's artillery, and was quickly destroyed by the enemy. As a result, not a single hurled bomb was thrown, but instead injured many soldiers pushing the cart. All the troops have abandoned it. There is no throwing device like this that is small, convenient and practical, and can be run by just one person."
At this time, General Severit and General Bolognik came over: "General, what are you doing?"
General Alges laughed loudly: "There is no need to continue this offensive drill. I never thought you had such powerful offensive weapons. With this kind of grenade in hand, I believe that no enemy can rely on defensive positions." Can withstand our attack. By the way, General Severit, I want to ask, where did this kind of grenade come from?"
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