As the saying goes, a wise man must make a mistake after thinking a lot. Only now did Claude finally understand the true meaning of this saying in his previous life. Comparing the grenade equipped in the war zone with the grenade equipped in the Kingdom of Hicks, Claude found that he was over the top and blindly pursued lightness and maneuverability. As a result, the throwing distance of the grenade equipped in the war zone was only that of Hicks. Half of the iron pumpkins equipped by the Si Kingdom were suppressed by the iron pumpkins of the Hicks Kingdom.
Perhaps the Hicks Kingdom's use of the cumbersome trebuchet-style throwers and iron pumpkin throwers with three times the weight really caused a lot of trouble for the transportation and attack of the troops. At the same time, it is easy for members of the grenade-throwing team to become the most conspicuous targets on the battlefield, suffering targeted killings from the enemy, causing heavy casualties.
However, the throwing distance of 130 to 40 meters and the greater explosive power make up for the above shortcomings. After all, the mission of a soldier is to destroy the enemy, not to save his own life on the battlefield. Especially for those hard-hearted commanders, the lives of soldiers are just consumables on the battlefield. It is nothing more than whether their injuries make the enemy pay a greater price.
Claude is guilty of being soft-hearted. Fortunately, his soft-heartedness is directed at his soldiers, not his enemies. The grenade equipped in the war zone is the kind originally invented by Claude, and the throwing distance is only about seventy meters. Although this kind of grenade and thrower has great concealment, maneuverability, and convenient operation for soldiers when attacking, when defending, the above advantages are all overshadowed by the shortcoming of short throwing distance.
You must know that when defending, soldiers stay in the defensive position and do not need to be mobile or flexible. Long throwing distance is the biggest requirement. The best weapon to deal with grenades is also the grenade. This has been proven in actual combat drills organized in the theater in the past. The defender's grenade can suppress the attacker's grenade attack and cause great damage to it.
But Claude's stubbornness caused the division of the Rock Army to suffer unnecessary losses. Back then, my sister Anna and Mrs. Sonia had tried to make a trebuchet-style thrower, and successfully threw the grenade to 200 Many meters away. However, Claude disliked the fact that most of the operators of this type of thrower were vulnerable to enemy defensive artillery attacks during the attack, causing too many casualties, and refused to allow the troops to equip the thrower.
So when General Beach Green said that these captured Hicks Kingdom trebuchet-style throwers had become defensive weapons on the battlefield, Claude realized how big a mistake he had made. He can completely build two different throwers, one for offense and one for defense, so that the Hicks thrower and Iron Pumpkin will not have such a great suppression advantage on the defensive front.
Claude has always wanted to use a grenade or a mortar instead of a grenade. You must know that he invented the grenade as a grenade before. As a result, since there was no way to safely produce nitroglycerin on a large scale to make safe explosives, the only option was to fill it with black powder. And because the explosion was not powerful enough, the amount of black powder was increased, making the grenade bulky and unable to be thrown far. In the end, there was no other way. Made a thrower that can be thrown seventy meters away
This was also the reason why Claude didn't value the grenade and easily sold its production license to the military industry representatives of the old noble families from the Kingdom. Unexpectedly, the emergence of this grenade led to various countries in the Falea continent to vigorously imitate it. The Kingdom of Hicks used the trebuchet-style grenade that Claude disliked, causing great damage to the defensive front.
The throwing distance of the grenades equipped in the theater is only half that, making it impossible to counterattack and suppress them. As for the grenades and mortars that Claude had great hopes for, they have been unable to be successfully trial-produced due to technical reasons. Perhaps the grenades currently equipped in the war zone have become the ones with the shortest throwing distance and the lightest explosive power among all the grenades imitated by all countries in the Farea continent.
Fortunately, General Beachlin did not really blame Claude for this. No general can completely predict the changes that will occur to the enemy in the future. Claude was the happiest thing to bring over the local garrison stationed at Monkenard Castle. They were originally his old subordinates. They were all veterans of the late military service of the Rock Legion, and they easily integrated into his command. , which stabilized the defensive front in the entire eastern mountainous area and increased the certainty of holding the second defensive front.
And Claude brought the 131st Thunder Battalion and the 1303rd Thunder Regiment equipped with new rifles, so General Beach Kerin eagerly proposed a plan to counterattack the first defensive line, hoping to recapture what had been lost to the enemy. This defensive front inside. However, after careful consideration, Claude rejected General Beachkerin's counterattack plan, and even asked General Beachkerin to continue to organize the young Nikancha people to build several more deep defensive fronts.
Claude's reason is simple. Just like fishing, the fish rushes to pull up as soon as it bites the hook, which often causes the fish to escape from the hook. At this time, you must be patient and let the fish swallow deeper, so that you can really catch the fish. And the current first line of defense is the bait that the big fish of the three standing legions of the Hicks has just swallowed. An immediate counterattack to regain the position is likely to alert their cunning commander-in-chief, who may be able to detach. go.
Therefore, General Buchiklin commanded his troops to stick to the defensive line, and after causing heavy casualties to the enemy, he had to plan to abandon this defensive line to lure the enemy deeper. This is the reason why Claude asked General Buechlin to continue to build a few more defensive lines in depth, so that the enemy would not give up hope when they were exhausted, always thinking that they would succeed if they worked harder, but they did not know that they were taking one step at a time. step by step into the trap.
Claude was already preparing to lead his troops to attack, just as planned before the war, inserting a diagonal line into the enemy's rear and disrupting the enemy's logistics transportation channels. If possible, he could surround the Hicks veterans of these three standing legions in these mountains, and let them become prisoners again after running out of ammunition and food, so that they can use their talents for the construction of public facilities in the war zone. and hot
Although he persuaded General Beachlin to follow his plan, it was only when Claude led the 131st Battalion of Thunder deep behind enemy lines that he discovered that the big fish of the Hicks was not so easy to take the bait. When the war zone was planning this strategic plan, it was prepared to eat a standing army of the enemy, but now Claude discovered that this strategic plan seemed to be impossible to implement. For no other reason than you arranged a banquet, and three people came. table of guests
In the forward mountainous areas of the northern coastal mountainous area, more than a dozen Nikancha battalions deployed by General Bichiklin still existed. Because of the lessons learned from the bombing and defeat of the Nikancha battalions in the defensive positions in the eastern frontier mountainous area, the Rock Army sent a squadron of legionnaires to these Nikancha battalions. Their main purpose was to train the Nikancha people. How to counter-throw a grenade.
Claude detoured from the frontier area of the northern mountainous area back to the eastern mountainous area. The officers in charge of the Nikancha battalions stationed there reported that the Hicks did not launch a feint attack in the northern coastal mountainous area, but some time ago There are many more Hicks reconnaissance teams. The main task of these Nikancha battalions stationed in the forward mountainous areas is to deal with the Hicks reconnaissance teams. Both sides have suffered certain casualties.
After entering the eastern frontier mountainous area, Claude discovered that the place was densely covered with overt and covert sentinels of the Hicks, and small teams of Hicks sentries were stationed in many high mountain areas. If the 131st Battalion of Thunder had not undergone certain special training, had strong combat effectiveness, and was equipped with new rifles, Claude would have been helpless against these small groups of Hicks infiltration troops.
Claude also ordered the 131st Battalion of Thunder to spread out and clean up the small reconnaissance team of the Hicks and the warning posts stationed on the mountain in this mountainous area. Since you can't sneak behind enemy lines without being noticed by the enemy, you might as well start a fight with great fanfare, making the enemy frightened and uneasy as to how many troops are coming to your side. Only by inflicting pain and fear on the enemy will the enemy automatically shrink its troops and give up a large area of mountainous space for the enemy to move around.
Obviously, the Hicks also noticed that an enemy force had penetrated behind them. This was an inevitable choice in a territorial war zone. In this way, the five standing legions of the Hicks were cut off from their logistical supply channels by the Ranger Regiment, and all the military supplies and grain reserves stored in Wickham Castle were burned. This ultimately led to the near-starvation and cold situation. Three hundred thousand officers and soldiers laid down their weapons, entered the prisoner camps, and began their life of hard labor.
It seems that the Directly Administered Territory War Zone has repeated its old tricks again. The Hicks people have been prepared for it. They estimated that the Directly Administered Territory War Zone should only send one or two battalions of troops to sneak into the eastern frontier mountainous area, so they sent two regiments of troops. Suppress these troublemakers. However, what they did not expect was the powerful combat effectiveness of the Thunder 131st Battalion after it was equipped with new rifles. The two regiments were defeated without even seeing the enemy, and less than one tenth of them survived.
Claude commanded the 131st Battalion of Thunder to launch a night attack and an ambush respectively against the two enemies who entered the mountains to clear out the enemy. This is the specialty of the Thunder Legion. Needless to say, night raids. Throwing bombs that do not require match ignition were thrown into the enemy's camp like raindrops, while the new rifles that fired continuously were like the autumn wind sweeping away fallen leaves. Anyone who lit the match was ready. Enemy soldiers who fight back will become the most obvious targets in the dark and will be shot quickly.
Originally, the enemies of this regiment wanted to wait for the support of the friendly forces from the rear by relying on the camp. However, under the thunderous blow, they could not hold on. The most painful thing was that it was difficult for them to find where the enemy was because they could not see the kind of enemy. The bright light emitted by the ignition of a match rope like a spark is the basis for anti-night attack warfare, so they cannot fight back.
The Hicks veterans of this regiment only heard the sound of gunfire and the explosion of grenades. The comrades around them were knocked down one by one. They only resisted for an hour and a half before completely collapsing. Only less than one battalion of Hicks veterans escaped from the hellish camp and escaped into the dark night and mountains. It was not until daybreak that they waited for reinforcements to arrive.
During the night attack, the officers and men of the 131st Battalion of Thunder suffered only minor casualties of less than a hundred people. The main reason for these casualties was the result of veterans Hicks firing guns everywhere and firing canisters from the light field artillery carried by the battalion. A blind cat will always encounter a dead mouse. Although the gunners and crew members of the artillery were shot and killed immediately, there were also a few unlucky Thunder Legion soldiers who were affected because they were too close to the enemy camp. itself
After defeating the Hicks camp, Claude had no intention of letting the soldiers of the 131st Battalion of Thunder enter the camp to search for loot and treat the enemy's wounded. Instead, he led the 131st Battalion of Thunder to rush there without stopping. The back road of this camp once again set up an ambush on the mountainside of a valley. It wasn't until all the soldiers had built their wartime bunkers and removed all traces of exposure that Claude ordered everyone to rest.
The vanguard of the main Hicks field regiment, which finally arrived at dawn, encountered the defeated troops escaping from the camp. From the frightened deserters, they learned that the friendly regiment had been attacked at night in the camp. After the news of the collapse, the commander of the pioneer battalion became timid and did not dare to move forward. If a main field regiment was defeated in the camp and only a few people escaped, then his battalion would rush over to deliver food.
After waiting for more than two hours, we finally arrived at the regiment headquarters. When he told the news about the deserters, the regiment commander yelled at the commander of the vanguard battalion and called him King Hicks. Quite simply, since the enemy used a night attack, it showed that his actual military strength was not much stronger than that of the main field regiment that was attacked by the night, so he used such a despicable tactic as a night attack. If, as those deserters said, there are at least two or three regiments or even one division, then we can completely attack by force.
It was obvious that the main field group was careless and did not take much precautions at night, so the weak enemy took advantage of it. If the vanguard battalion gets the news and rushes to the rescue immediately, they may be able to catch the tail of the enemies who attack at night. According to general rules, after winning a battle like this, the commander-in-chief of the army will let his soldiers search for loot on the battlefield and on the dead bodies of the enemy. The vanguard battalion rushed over at that time, and might even deal a fatal blow to these enemies who had relaxed their vigilance.
The regimental commander, who became increasingly angry as he spoke, dismissed the timid battalion commander from his post on the spot, and then ordered the entire regiment's officers and soldiers to speed up and rush to the camp where the friendly troops were stationed under the night attack. The regimental leader judged that after such a long time, the enemy who attacked at night should have packed up the battlefield and left the camp. Therefore, it would be safe for them to rush all the way, and it also reflected his eagerness to rescue the friendly forces. No matter how he was evaluated after the war, at least his performance was impeccable.
So the main field group of the Hicks also dived into the ambush circle set by Claude, and the tragedy happened like this. When he was first ambushed, the leader of Hicks's main field regiment wanted to fight to the death, because he found that the enemy's ambush circle was a hundred meters away, and ordered his troops to launch a counterattack on the spot. But then the regiment leader was shot like a concentrated fire, with several bullet holes appearing on his body.
Under the continuous suppression of the new rifles, all the Hicks veterans felt the intensive gunshots from all directions. Just by listening to the gunshots, they knew that the enemy's strength was not weaker than theirs. Even if they want to fight back, there is nothing they can do. Brave veterans will attract the enemy's bullets whether they are loading bullets or preparing to aim. If they straighten up a little, they will occupy an honorable death quota.
The gunfire seemed endless, as the ambushed Hicks veterans grew larger and larger in force to ambush the enemy. They felt that it was impossible for the enemy to fire so many gunshots with just one regiment, because it took time to charge and load the matchlock gun once, but at this time, the enemy's gunshots were still so dense.
The experienced Hicks veterans lying on the ground, behind the rocks, and under the corpses could only silently endure the enemy's gunfire. They believed that the enemy's gunfire would always stop.
In fact, this is indeed the case. In the eyes of the officers and soldiers of the Thunder 131st Battalion, almost every one of them has emptied six or seven five-round magazines, and the entire regiment of 1,300 people has fired nearly four rounds. Thousands of bullets were fired, and on the battlefield, more than 5,000 Hicks veterans from a regiment fell to the ground. Not a single living Hicks man could still stand or sit there.
The gunfire finally stopped. The officers and soldiers of the 131st Battalion of Thunder realized that there was no target to shoot at, and it was impossible for them to continue shooting at the corpses on the ground. Cheers began to sound. However, Claude ordered the soldiers to continue to be alert, and at the same time asked the grenade team to come forward and bombard three rounds with grenades, instead of ordering the soldiers to go directly to clean up the battlefield.
Claude's caution allowed the officers and soldiers of the Thunder 131st Battalion to avoid unnecessary damage. When the grenades exploded on the battlefield, the officers and soldiers of the Thunder 131st Battalion were surprised to find countless Hicks corpses in the pile. The Taoist figure jumped up, and these Hicks veterans braved the bullets fired by the officers and soldiers of the Thunder 131st Battalion who reacted immediately, and fled back like a gust of wind. Nearly a thousand people ignored the casualties, and in the end there were still two or three Hundreds of people luckily escaped from the encirclement
Claude was also helpless. The performance of the new rifles on the battlefield was dominant, but the officers and soldiers of the Thunder 131st Battalion, which had the most live ammunition training, still wasted too many bullets. Just like the two or three hundred Hicks veterans who finally escaped from the ambush encirclement, if they hadn't been short of troops, they would have been able to surround them and fight a perfect battle of annihilation.
Seeing the battlefield littered with casualties and blood, Claude finally gave the order, "Go clean the battlefield."