Nu Yalang of Tang Dynasty

The peaks and ridges are like clusters, the waves are like raging waves, and the mountains and rivers are like Tongguan Road inside and outside.

The Chang'an battlefield was in full swing, but the Tongguan battlefield was silent.

Li Siye and Guo Yao led fifty thousand partial troops, marched south from Luoshui, and ambush in the Puzhou area.

According to Guo Ziyi's prior tactical arrangements, Li Siye should send out scouts and then wait for the Yan army to come.

However, the battle in Chang'an was fierce, and the enemy could not wait for a long time in Tongguan. Li Siye was impatient and wanted to lead the army to the southeast to actively search for traces of the Yan army.

As the deputy general, Guo Yao promptly dissuaded Li Siye and said: "The reinforcements from Luoyang must pass through Tongguan. The general hastily headed south. If he scares the enemy, it may ruin the matter."

After hearing this, Li Siye thought about it and could only give up.

On the eighth day of June, the scouts finally brought good news to Li Siye.

An army of 50,000 people came from the direction of Luoyang to observe the flags and honor guards. The leader should be An Lushan's adopted son, General An Shouzhong of the State of Yan.

When Li Siye heard the news, he was overjoyed, thinking that after holding it in for so many days, he finally had a battle to fight.

Immediately, 50,000 Tang troops were heavily prepared and put into combat readiness, ready to go south at any time to ambush An Shouzhong's army.

Guo Ziyi divided 50,000 from the 200,000-strong army as a partial army. Considering the battlefield function of the ambush, he originally allocated most of the elite cavalry in the Tang army to Li Siye.

In addition, the squatting tiger cannon, which can play a huge role in field battles, was also released to the partial army.

At this point, the 50,000 elite troops led by Li Siye, after thorough discussions before the war, agreed on a three-body plan that combined infantry, cavalry, and artillery in terms of ambush tactics.

The specific steps are:

First, use the powerful impact of the ringed cavalry to attack the enemy's weak links and break up the opponent's formation. The light cavalry then uses bows and arrows, crossbows and interspersed attacks to move the scattered enemy troops in a fixed direction.

drive away.

Secondly, the heavy infantry of the Tang Army would form a formation on the enemy's retreat route to block the enemy's progress.

Then, the artillerymen holding the Crouching Tiger Cannon will line up behind the infantry and use the power of the shotgun attack to give the enemy a fatal blow to the maximum extent, causing the enemy to completely collapse.

Finally, the infantry, cavalry, and artillery will surround the enemy in a dumpling-making manner and annihilate them with all their strength.

Such a trinity of tactics was first seen in history by the Franks during the Crusades.

By the end of the 14th century and the beginning of the 15th century, Hastings' "joint tactics" and the group ambushes in the Hundred Years' War between England and France promoted this cavalry tactic of driving enemy soldiers into the artillery ballistic range.

However, in this time and space, the Tang army, which had artillery, had figured out this tactic five hundred years in advance.

Now that the tactics are finalized, the next step is the execution phase.

After learning that the Yan army was approaching, the Tang army marched south quickly, first entering Hedong County, then advancing to Shaanxi County, and finally laid an ambush in the plain east of Tongguan, waiting for An Shouzhong's arrival.

Chang'an was besieged by Guo Ziyi's 150,000 troops and was in danger. An Shouzhong got the order from the Luoyang court and asked him to rush to help as soon as possible.

Firstly, the military situation was raging, and secondly, Tongguan Road was an important route for the Yan army. Therefore, An Shouzhong relaxed his vigilance during the march. Instead of marching carefully and spreading scouts, he ordered the entire army to abandon their baggage and go into battle lightly, as soon as possible.

Rushed to Chang'an.

As a result, An Shouzhong's troops plunged into the ambush of the Northern Tang Army.

When the Yan army marched thirty miles west of Shaanxi County, An Shouzhong, who had been serving in the military for a long time, began to feel that something was wrong.

Shaanxi County is the hinterland of Gyeonggi Province. You can't see any merchants along the way, and the mountains and woods are also silent.

Just when An Shouzhong was about to order the entire army to postpone their march, a cannon shot suddenly came from the hill.

Immediately afterwards, a tsunami-like cry of killing rang out from above the head, and thousands of cavalry rushed down the hillside and quickly attacked the Yan army.

An Shouzhong's first reaction was that he had been ambushed, something bad had happened.

Immediately afterwards, he forced himself to stabilize his mind, rode his horse to the center of the army, and began to command the troops to form formations to meet the enemy.

Many of the troops under An Shouzhong were veterans of Hebei, and the entire army had participated in the Southern Tang Campaign. They were among the best among the Yan army in terms of fighting will and combat experience.

Facing the Tang Army cavalry coming like a tide, other Yan troops might have begun to flee at this time, but the soldiers under An Shouzhong not only did not flee, but began to form formations to meet the enemy, and everyone was ready to fight

preparation.

In the blink of an eye, two thousand ring cavalry and six thousand light cavalry led by Li Siye crashed into the Yan army's formation with the impact of horse power and slope.

In an instant, flesh and blood flew everywhere in the Yan army's front line, causing countless casualties.

The Yan army's marching formation at this time was a long snake formation. Facing the cavalry's triangular wedge offensive, it was originally at a disadvantage. Looking from the sky, the originally complete formation suddenly collapsed from a large area, and the Yan army's troops also collapsed from it.

The middle was broken into two parts, front and back.

An Shouzhong tried his best to send troops and generals, hoping to make up for the cutoff center formation and re-establish the connection between the front army and the rear army.

However, what made him helpless was that the general leading the Tang army's cavalry was Li Siye.

Li Siye was well-known for his bravery in the Anxi army. During his many years in the army, the cavalry under his command had never been weak no matter what number and equipment they faced.

Li Siye himself was an extraordinary warrior. With a war horse and a Mo Dao, he single-handedly charged into the rebel army. He was able to retreat unscathed after several in and out. For him, it was as ordinary as drinking water.

.

Such a murderous god, leading a group of extremely elite heavy cavalry, would be unstoppable, let alone an ambush, or even an encounter between two armies.

An Shouzhong saw with his own eyes that when Li Siye swung his Mo Dao and cut off the two Yan Army soldiers who were blocking his horse, the former understood that this battle could no longer be fought.

An Shouzhong made a prompt decision.

He directly abandoned the intercepted rear formation of the Yan army and ordered the front formation to evacuate the battlefield as soon as possible while the Tang army was strangling the rear formation.

This move resulted in the loss of nearly 20,000 of Yan's 50,000 elite troops, but it also allowed An Shouzhong to retain his main force.

The 30,000 remnant soldiers of the Yan Army got rid of the Tang Army's cavalry and fled at full speed along the official road to Tongguan. After only running for a few miles, An Shouzhong discovered in despair that in the middle of the official road leading to Tongguan, there was a Tang Army's easy to deal with.

Waiting there.

The number of people in this Tang army is almost the same as the remaining strength of the Yan army.

The Yan army was newly defeated and their morale was low. Coupled with the long journey, their physical strength was also insufficient.

However, An Shouzhong knew clearly that now was not the time to hesitate. There were nearly ten thousand Tang Army cavalry behind him and they would rush to the battlefield at any time.

If the Tang army's cavalry arrives and the Yan army still fails to break out a bloody path, then they will be attacked from both sides and will only end up defeated.

At this critical moment, An Shouzhong, a good general, not only did not panic, but led his soldiers to the front line and shouted to the soldiers of Yan Army: "Those who surrender will die, and those who flee will also die. The only way to survive today is to

It’s just a fight for your life!”

When the soldiers of Yan Army saw their commander coming to the front line, their morale was greatly boosted.

An Shouzhong ordered his soldiers to dress his horses, raised the horses, and shouted: "You all charge with a certain person. If you can defeat the enemy and win, one day you will be rewarded with national soldiers!"

The whole army, whether soldiers or auxiliary soldiers, saw the commander personally going into battle and bluntly said that he was fighting side by side with the soldiers. They all shouted loudly, saying that they would fight without giving up their lives.