Chapter 65: war preparation

Since the end of July, Arda has held several military exercises in a row. After all, in the upcoming war, it is no longer a third-rate pirate regiment, but an aristocratic military force in another territory, so it is necessary to adapt in advance.

In order to be able to use troops flexibly on the battlefield, under Paul's suggestion, the staff began to try to use linear tactics, specifically: each infantry battalion was lined up in a horizontal line, and each spearman company in the battalion was lined up in 6 lines deep Arranged, each company is responsible for two rows; Musketeers are deployed separately, lined up in 3 rows, and one platoon is responsible for one row. Compared with the current popular phalanx tactics, the front of Arda's army was wider and its depth became smaller. The wide front can form a semi-surrounding effect. As the number of muskets equipped increases, the effect of dealing with dense phalanx will become better and better, and it can output a large amount of firepower to the enemy in a short period of time. .

Compared with the large-scale combat groups such as the ten-thousand-man team and the thousand-man team commonly used in the world, the smaller-scale troop formations like companies and platoons can provide more opportunities for subordinate commanders to exert their subjective initiative. Of course, the prerequisite It is because there are a large number of qualified mid-level and lower-level officers in the army. Paul is sure that there is no other force in the world that attaches as much importance to the training of mid-level and lower-level officers as he does. In order to train qualified lieutenants and non-commissioned officers, he even established a special military academy. The junior officers in the army have little more in their heads than their chief soldiers.

In view of the poor hit rate of smoothbore barrels, musketeers are not allowed to fire at will before hearing the officer's order. In practice, there are generally two ways: bursts or volleys.

When shooting in bursts, three rows of soldiers fire from front to back. When one row of soldiers shoots, the other two rows of soldiers aim or load ammunition. This goes round and round to maintain continuous fire output.

When firing a volley, the soldiers in the first row kneel down and shoot, the soldiers in the second row bow down and shoot, and the soldiers in the third row stand up and shoot. In this way, all soldiers can shoot a salvo at the same time. Although this salvo cannot maintain firepower Uninterrupted, but the history of European warfare proves that a burst of heavy fire within a few minutes of approaching the enemy before launching the climax of the charge is very effective. A volley of soldiers can fully prepare for the impact of the rigorously trained spearmen. Paul read a piece of information in his previous life: Such a volley can not only inflict greater damage on the enemy, but also It can cause three times the fear and shock effect of single-row shooting to the enemy, and can greatly dampen the enemy's courage. The reason is very simple. For ordinary people, the shock and shock caused by a long-lasting thunder The frightening effect will be greater than the sum of the shocking and intimidating effects of 10 intermittent thunderclaps.

Paul thought that dealing with the improvised soldiers of the local lords, he only needed a single salvo to break them down.

Soldiers standing in the first row undoubtedly need great courage, so a reward mechanism called "Courage Allowance" was created. Soldiers standing in the first row will get three times the daily salary award. In order to fully protect the soldiers in the first row, the equipment department took great pains to purchase and build a batch of iron armor, so that these warriors can safely and boldly lead the brothers behind to rush forward.

In order to eliminate the soldiers' fear of bows and arrows, the main long-range weapon in the current era, the Equipment Department also mobilized the people to make 100 wooden bows temporarily, which were used to launch thin wooden sticks wrapped with cloth on their heads. Of course, it can't be compared with a real qualified war bow, but it is enough to simulate the effect of firing a hundred arrows. During the exercise, rows of soldiers held crude small wooden shields, stepped on drums, and moved towards the "enemy army" in neat steps. During this period, anyone who could not bear the psychological pressure and retreated or rushed forward would be severely punished.

In order to give full play to the role of artillery, the concept of "infantry-artillery coordination" was also proposed. Of course, Paul's so-called "infantry-artillery coordination" is very simple to say: after the artillery bombards the infantry, the infantry rushes after the artillery. But this is still a great test of the mobility of the artillery. In order to increase the movement speed of the artillery and support the infantry in time, each artillery group is equipped with 4 horses, two horses are used to pull the cannon, and two horses are used to pull the ammunition. In addition to practicing increasing the firing speed, they also need to practice how to quickly load and unload artillery and arrange firing positions. In addition, the infantry must be able to overcome the fear caused by the shells fired by their own artillery whistling over their heads, and the artillery must also be able to roughly grasp the relationship between the different elevation angles of the artillery and the range and even the trajectory, otherwise they will hit themselves. It's not good for people.

After several exercises, a set of fighting methods suitable for Arda's army was explored:

When the enemy takes the initiative to attack, the artillery will launch long-range fire strikes on the enemy and destroy the opponent's battle formation. During the period, the musketeers used bursts to ensure the continuity of firepower. When the enemy charged to the front, the pikemen stepped forward to fight the enemy. If the forces are evenly matched, under the protection of the spearmen, the enemy will be killed accurately at close range, and the artillery will be responsible for delaying the enemy's follow-up forces.

When Arda's army took the initiative to attack, the artillery first used long-range firepower to destroy the enemy's formation deployment, making it impossible for the enemy to gather effectively~www.readwn.com~ When the artillery fired, the musketeers were in front of the spearmen and behind the enemy. When the position moved and approached the enemy, the musketeers fired a round of volleys to kill the opponent and demoralize the enemy, and then the pikemen charged to defeat the enemy.

In the previous battles, many veterans who were not suitable to stay in the army due to injuries were reassembled. They were sent to various villages and towns to establish and guide the training of militia organizations with the assistance of the local peasant association. In Paul's plan, the militias in various places will serve as reserve forces and become an important part of Arda's military system.

The reason for strengthening the training of the militia is that in the wars between the lords of this era, there is a notorious but effective war strategy-send small groups of troops to harass and loot the opponent's towns, reduce the enemy's population and economy, and finally force the opponent to submit.

When the army strengthened its strength, Cecil, who was in charge of the intelligence system, was not idle, because people in this era had little sense of secrecy, and it was easy to figure out the dynamics of the traitors in Bairdin.

According to intelligence, Viscount Abt and the other two barons have returned to their fiefs to recruit soldiers, while Viscount Angelo continues to sit in Butuya, and he will recruit soldiers on the territory directly under the Gardner family in the name of the Lord's Mansion According to calculations, the size of the army that four people can muster is around 2,000 to 2,500.

Paul naturally dismissed those farmers who had just put down their hoes. The only thing that worried him was that there were more than 20 knights in the enemy's team. Unlike the "water-injected pork" of the Greimans, they were genuine knights , the assembly is also a large cavalry force, and the individual martial arts are very strong.

"Shouldn't it be time to practice the hollow phalanx?" Paul suddenly remembered this.