Dominate the Country

Tobolsk, Chuchenhan, Nizhny Tagil, Kamensk, Yekaterinburg, Chelyabinsk...

This is a key development area of ​​Russia with a high density of cities and population. After Rumyantsev and his party crossed the Ob River and entered the west bank of the Tobol River, a tributary of the Irtysh River, such a blessed land appeared in front of the people who had been fleeing for a month.

Rumyantsev was really capable. He led thousands of civilians and less than 2,000 troops, and in about a month, he successfully "transferred" a small area of ​​3,000 miles through the waterway - the Ob River. Although the number of people when they arrived in Tobolsk was compared with the total number of Russians who fled from Tomsk with Rumyantsev, the size of this team is now only half of the original size, and a large number of people died, fell behind, and left the team on the way to escape.

But no matter what, this is a big miracle. When this team arrived in Tobolsk with great difficulty, it was considered home.

After a long boat ride, the elderly Rumyantsev's legs and feet were out of control when he got to land. But looking at the thousands of Russians he had pulled out from the east bank of the Ob River, Rumyantsev felt that all the hard work was worth it.

Winter has come, and the wind and snow have come. In the days to come, even if the Chinese have cleared the east bank of the Ob River, they will not be able to launch an attack on the west bank immediately. That's not only because they still have Omsk in their rear that has not been taken, which will make the water transportation of the Irtysh River unsmooth, seriously affecting the transportation of Chinese military supplies; but also because there are still many Russians escaping in the vast land on the east bank of the Ob River. Without completely wiping out the rear, how could Chen Han cross a distance of two or three thousand miles at all costs and launch a large-scale attack on the west bank of the Ob River in the season of wind and snow?

Therefore, Rumyantsev still has time to regroup here and wait for the reinforcements and military supplies sent by St. Petersburg.

When the war starts again next year, he will build a series of fortress cities such as Tobolsk, Tyumen, Nizhny Tagil, Kamensk, Yekaterinburg, and Chelyabinsk into a real iron wall in the western part of Western Siberia. The only pity is that these fortress cities were built a long time ago, and the target of the fortresses at the beginning was the Tatar natives who originally lived here. These people were barbaric and ignorant, and they didn't even have the most primitive muskets. They were not the Chinese with powerful weapons and military power.

Except for the three fortresses of Tobolsk, Yekaterinburg and Chelyabinsk, which are made of stone, the other fortresses are made of wood.

Under rockets, they will become vulnerable.

So this place can be defended, but not to death.

Rumyantsev is only wasting China's time here. He wants to buy time for the Ural Mountains to transform the defense line-the Ural River is not needed. With Orenburg and Guryev Fortress in hand, even if the Chinese can cross the Ural River and enter the west bank area, it will be difficult for them to gain a foothold.

All Rumyantsev has to face is Western Siberia, and he does not need to pay extra attention to the Kazakh steppe. When things reach a critical moment, he will continue to retreat westward, withdrawing his troops to Orenburg while withdrawing to the Ural Mountains, stretching the Chinese logistics supply line, and then he will make a request to St. Petersburg to continue to send large-scale Cossack cavalry to the eastern front to disrupt the enemy's logistics supply and cut off their transportation lines, and finally achieve the effect of stabilizing the front line.

And later, although Rumyantsev is an excellent commander, he can no longer predict the next step.

That can only depend on how Potemkin and Suvorov fight on the Ottoman battlefield. Perhaps, Russia still needs to involve Denmark in the war to deal with Sweden, Russia's enemy on the western front.

But in any case, Rumyantsev's "strategy" has been finalized early. That is to fight and retreat at the same time, lengthen the offensive line and supply line of the Chinese offensive forces, make them fight less and less, and finally form a stalemate.

If all his calculations were shown to Chen Ming at this moment, Chen Ming would definitely give him a very nice name - space for time. Just like the eight-year anti-Japanese war in the original time and space, or in terms of the history of the old Russians themselves, the 1812 Patriotic War more than 20 years later. Isn't that the most typical space for time?

Kutuzov did it perfectly in history. He withdrew all the Russians and burned everything that could be used by Napoleon. Fortifying the walls and clearing the fields has always been a good strategy when the enemy is strong and we are weak.

Going back two thousand years, these four words have appeared in the history of the East and the West.

...

The Kazakh steppe in October has been covered with a thick layer of snow.

This year's cold winter seems to have come a little early. The Ural River froze in late September. In early October, the 200,000 Torghut women, children, the elderly and the weak who were stranded on the west bank of the river drove their sheep and cattle and horses across the Ural River smoothly.

However, the east bank of the Ural River is not a peaceful place either. It is not far from Orenburg. If it were not for the outbreak of the Russo-Turkish War and the Sino-Russian War, which caused the main force of Orenburg to be withdrawn, the Russian army sent there might have slaughtered the Torghut tribe.

Twenty thousand Torghut cavalrymen fought in Western Siberia, and the tribe could only gather about 10,000 warriors, both old and young. The hair and beards of the old ones were all gray, and the young ones were not much taller than the horse's back.

These 10,000 Torghut cavalrymen with varying combat effectiveness escorted the tribe through the most difficult period. Then Chen Han's cavalrymen and the 1,000 Torghut cavalrymen who "died" in Irkutsk that year, plus the subsequent arrival of the Small Juz cavalry, not only pinned down the Orenburg and Guryev Fortresses, but also wantonly destroyed the Cossack villages and Russian farms in the Ural River Basin, drove away refugees, and plundered livestock, cattle and sheep property. The bigger task was to escort the women, children, the elderly and all the cattle and sheep property of the Torghut tribe back east and out of the war zone after the winter and the freezing of the Ural River.

Before the war began, Chen Ming had asked the Ottomans to do their best to stop the Russian Cossack cavalry on the Caucasus battlefield in the first year of the war, because they were afraid that the Russians would learn of the "betrayal" of the Torghut tribe and St. Petersburg would immediately dispatch Cossacks to kill and retaliate.

You know, the Caucasus War is not far from the shores of the Caspian Sea.

Chen Ming was still feeling a little worried, so he asked the cavalry and Xiao Yuz to do their best. The Torghuts helped a lot in this war, and we can't let their wives and children who stayed in their hometown be slaughtered, right?

But the facts proved that the Ottomans' request to China was still perfectly implemented. Although this has a lot to do with the fact that the Russian Cossack military armed group has not yet developed to its peak in history. At its peak, the Cossacks had as many as eleven branch groups, controlling 57.8 million hectares of land, millions of Cossack soldiers, and a total population of more than 10 million. Today, the total population of the Cossacks is at most one-tenth of the later population. When the Russians finally drew out enough Cossack cavalry from the main battlefield of the Caucasus and other places, the Torghuts had already crossed the Ural River in the wind and snow.

The weather on the Kazakh steppe is a bit like that of Western Siberia, because it is an endless grassland, and it is surprisingly cold in the morning and evening. The Torghuts and the Xiaoyuzi were all wearing thick fur coats, while the Chen Han soldiers, who were relatively weak in cold resistance, were all wearing thick cotton coats under their military coats with woolen outer layer and sheepskin inner layer. Everyone was like a fat bear. But only in this way could they withstand the bitter cold current here.

The migration speed of the entire Torghut tribe was very slow. Even though everyone knew that this was not a safe area yet, it was completely different from the mood of the Torghut tribe when they returned east in the original time and space.

Achuwak Khan of the Xiaoyuzi personally came out to command the tens of thousands of Kazakh cavalrymen he led [including a small number of Zhongyuzi people], divided into three teams in the front, middle and back, to guard the entire migration team. It can be said that he did his best.

There are only 8,000 Torghut cavalrymen left out of the tens of thousands of gathered. When the large force of the Torghut tribe joined forces with the team led by Achuwak Khan, the team of 8,000 people became only 3,000, and the rest all went back to their homes.

They didn't know when the threat behind them would arrive, nor did they know how many of those hateful and terrible Cossacks would come, so the 5,000 people who returned from the Torghut tribe were also ready to return to fight again.

There was no way. The Kazakhs and Torghuts had been glorious, and they had tasted the power of the Cossacks. Even Wabashi would not say that the combat effectiveness of the Torghut cavalry would definitely be comparable to that of the Cossacks.

Both sides had fought with real swords and guns. Compared with the Cossack cavalry who had been in war since birth, these traditional nomadic cavalry were far behind in organization and discipline, and the final result was naturally a far cry from combat effectiveness. Don't look at the Russian Cossacks, who were often killed when fighting with modern cavalry or elite arms such as the Polish Winged Hussars.

The one who commanded the Cossack cavalry to rush towards the Ural River was Lieutenant General Nikolai Kulakov, who was also the Adaman of the Ural Cossacks, which means the leader.

The Ural Cossacks had a formation of fifty centuries, but they were all standing field armies, and there were also internal guards that were not recorded. The previous war had drained them all.

The Cossack century was a company, and there were battalions and regiments above them, but there were no higher ones. It was not yet 1800 in the Gregorian calendar, not 1. Kulakov's rank of lieutenant general was because he had fought in the Fifth Russo-Turkish War, the Seven Years' War, and the earlier War of the Austrian Succession, and had outstanding military exploits, so he was promoted by the Tsar.

He led the entire Ural Cossack Corps, not just a Cossack regiment.

Standing next to him was Platonovich, one of the military leaders of the Astrakhan Cossacks, with a rank of major general. The Cossack cavalry led by the two and a small number of Tatar cavalry included, numbered enough to be 10,000.

Such a force should not be a match for the Torghut guard force. Although the latter's combat effectiveness was a little worse, the total number of troops was as many as 20,000. But when the Cossacks' military strength was mobilized to this point, Kulakov and Platonovich felt that the troops were sufficient. St. Petersburg did not need to withdraw Don Cossacks from the tense main battlefield.

Now Platonovich commanded the vanguard, about 2,000 Cossacks, who were divided into three groups, responsible for the task of guarding and searching for the traces of the Torghuts. This was not an easy task. Platonovich's troops needed to control a battle line of 200 to 300 miles, and he could not split the army too much, lest it be eaten by the large number of Kazakhs.

There are only six or seven hundred Cossacks in each of the three routes, which is the strength of a Cossack regiment. The Kazakhs have more than ten thousand people. Even if there is a gap in combat effectiveness, such a large advantage in strength is enough. Platonovich acted cautiously and asked the three teams to focus on tracking the trail. There was no harassment in their mission. Although this was hard for the scout cavalry, it also ensured their safety.

Neither Kulakov nor Platonovich thought they would not be able to catch up with the target. The latter is the migration of the entire tribe. What a big goal it is, and how slow the speed should be.

Not only the population, but also cattle and sheep. Are the Torghuts in the tribal migration situation still armed? If it weren't for the Kazakhs protecting them, Platonovich would have dared to pounce on them with only two thousand people and bite off a piece of meat.

The Cossack cavalry and the nomadic peoples fought for their confidence, that is, the Chinese cavalry could make them lose when they were well prepared. If they were not well prepared, or when they encountered each other directly, it was still uncertain who would win and who would lose.

In terms of riding and swordplay, the Chinese Han cavalry is definitely not a match for the Cossacks. But they have good coordination and better equipment. So the Cossacks are generally at a disadvantage when competing with China's regular cavalry.

Of course, the "value ratio" of Chinese cavalry is much inferior to that of the Cossacks. Although a large number of Han cavalry is imperative, the few fist troops in the cavalry are filled with many ethnic minorities. The Mongolians, Tibetans, Kazakhs and other ethnic groups on horseback recruited by the military have very strong combat effectiveness after rigorous training. At the same time, these people are becoming more and more like Kazakhs.

The number of traditional Western modern cavalry in China's starting team is getting smaller and smaller.

A large group of Cossacks crossed the Ural River, followed the footsteps of the Torghut people, and continued to move eastward.

The cold wind blew, mixed with icy snowflakes that kept hitting people's faces. The whole field seemed to have become a big cold storage, and the noses and cheeks exposed outside were all frozen stiff. The cold air frequently poured into the black coats, even though they had wrapped the coats tightly around them.

Platonovich looked at the traces left on the snowfield in the distance, and the heavy snow did not completely cover the traces - a wide trace on the snowfield, and the thickness of the snow was obviously lower than the snow on both sides. He ordered people to dig up the snow layer in the thinner snow area, and they could clearly find traces of the burning campfire.

The Cossacks all laughed happily. They knew that their mission was completed and they had found the Torghut people.

At this moment, the Torghut tribe and the joint cavalry guards around them did not know that a hungry wolf had appeared behind them. The army and the more than 200,000 women, children, and the elderly of the entire tribe were marching silently in the wind and snow. The heavy snow that had just stopped a few days ago fell again yesterday.

Although many people knew that it was good to have heavy snow at this time to cover up the traces they left behind, the snow and wind also caused a lot of trouble for their actions, and the weather became even colder. Cattle and sheep died from time to time, and many horses also died.

The good thing is that everyone has enough meat to eat.

It is also much more convenient for livestock and people to use water. Clean snow is at hand, so they don’t need to run to the rivers and lakes that have frozen into large ice blocks to break ice and get water.

This is the winter in Kazakhstan, a world of ice and snow.