Struggle in Russia

Dmitri stared at the map in a daze, and the suggestions given by Li Xiao made his mind a little confused. He has long been accustomed to the traditional step-by-step combat method. If he wants to capture Kozelets, he must concentrate his forces and rush over. As long as the artillery is powerful enough and the troops are large enough, there is no chance of failure.

It's just that this traditional combat method is obviously not suitable for the current situation. In the past, he could not take the gray animals seriously. If they died, he would just recruit them again. There were not many other gray animals in Russia.

Anyway, this was the way they used to fight the Turks in the past, which was to push hard all the way. If they couldn't push, they would negotiate a truce and then draw the territory. They would continue to push after the next gray animal grows like a leek, and then repeat the operation.

Of course, he himself did not appreciate this combat mode. He felt that it did not treat gray animals as human beings and was a waste of life.

It's just that the combat method he advocated has only become similar to that of Britain and France, where firepower is king. Equip yourself with sufficiently advanced cannons and firearms, and then destroy your opponents with fierce rain of bullets.

As for the combat mode, it is still the same, that is, it has changed from pushing with human lives to pushing with firepower.

But Li Xiao was obviously not this way. His trick of attacking in the east and in the west completely subverted Dmitri's thinking, letting him know for the first time that the war could still be fought like this!

Does this set work?

To be honest, Dmitri didn't know, but he knew that compared to his own hard push, Li Xiao's tactics might be more suitable for the current situation.

What is the current situation?

First of all, he has insufficient troops and the morale of the surrendering army is unstable, so there is no guarantee of a hard push.

And once the attack is frustrated and the surrounding rebels know that he is not that difficult to deal with, they may swarm up and besiege him.

In this way, the hard-earned start will be in vain, and Chernihiv may even lose it again.

The second is that he must help Kiev to rescue the siege. Once Kiev makes any mistakes, St. Petersburg will be very disappointed, which will affect his status in the heart of Alexander II.

However, this is not what Dmitri values ​​most. He is more worried that once the rebels take Kiev, the courage of these savage beasts will expand infinitely, and then there will be nothing they dare not do.

What's more, with the strength of the rebels, after taking Kiev, they will definitely continue to attack in all directions. How can he put out the fire with the few troops he has on hand?

To sum up, Dmitri cannot make any mistakes, and he must win Kozelets as soon as possible. It is better not to pay any price for it, which is more advantageous.

Therefore, pushing hard is definitely the stupidest and stupidest way to do it. On the contrary, if Li Xiao's trick can succeed, it is conceivable that the price to pay is very small, and the price-performance ratio is not generally high!

After pondering for a long time, Dmitri finally made up his mind to abandon his own tactics and fully adopt Li Xiao's opinions.

Li Xiao was very happy about this. Fortunately, his partner was Dmitri. If it had been an old stubborn like Menshikov or Paskovich, there would have been no use at all.

These elders never have such things as strategies and tactics in their minds. They just force themselves to take advantage of them, either to defeat their enemies or to defeat themselves.

"To achieve the goal of seizing the east and attacking the west, we must make the enemy believe that our target is Konotop, so luring the enemy is very important. It must be loud and it is best to deceive even our own people. I suggest not to lure the enemy. I will inform the husband and the friendly forces in Vorozhba of our true battle plan, and tell them that we need their cooperation in the attack on Konotop!"

Dmitri was surprised again. Is this fake act too exaggerated? Are you even lying to your own people? Is that a bit much?

Li Xiao replied: "It's not too much at all. The defenders of Glukhov and Vorozhba have long been frightened by the rebels. They are not reliable at all. If the true purpose is informed to them, they will not be able to do anything." It’s just a perfunctory thing!”

This is another difference between Li Xiao and Dmitri. He understands the psychology of these Russian bureaucrats very well. For them, one thing is worse than one thing less. If Dmitri really told them that this was just making excuses to get them to cooperate, they would probably think that it had little to do with them, and they would just pretend to be fooled and be done with it.

Only Dmitri told them that they were really going to attack Konotop, and he also asked them to cooperate fully and attack together. For them, it was no one else's business and they had to take it seriously.

What's more, if you want to deceive the enemy, you must act as realistically as possible. If even your own people think that the target of the next stage is the Konotop Natural Rebels, they will not doubt it.

Of course, another reason why he even lied to his own people is that Li Xiao felt that Glukhov and Vorozhba’s friendly forces were unreliable, so he told them the real situation. Even if they cooperated wholeheartedly, there was no guarantee that they would not leak the news. .

Their weak sense of confidentiality and even more sieve-like confidentiality measures are really worrying!

Although Dmitry felt that this was a bit excessive, he finally agreed in view of Li Xiao's strong request.

In order to make the show real, he ordered his staff to come up with a decent battle plan for attacking Konotop.

According to this plan, the five thousand garrison in the direction of Mena crossed the Desna River to the south, threatening the west side of Konotop and cutting off the connection between Konotop and Nezhin.

Glukhov's more than 10,000 defenders will gather about 5,000 troops to attack Krolevec and threaten Glukhov from the north.

In addition, among the 20,000 defenders of Vorozhba, 10,000 rebels were left to defend the direction of Sumy, and the remaining 10,000 went west to capture Buren.

Dmitry gathered 10,000 Russian troops and 20,000 surrender troops to attack Nezhin in an effort to capture this important city.

When Nezhin was recaptured, Dmitry's main force would immediately move eastward to join Mena's troops and the troops of Glukhov and Vorozhba to besiege Konotop.

When this plan was sent to Mena, Glukhov and Vorozhba, the Russian generals in these three places were not too surprised. According to the plan, this strategy was considered safe. After all, Konotop threatens Chernihiv's eastern flank. If the threat on this side can be eliminated, then the small quarter of Ukraine's northern lost land will be recovered.

Next, whether the Russian army continues to retake Sumei and Kharkov to the east, or to relieve Kiev south, it will have a solid rear, and there is no need to worry about the threat of the rebels in the rear.

In military terms, this is called a steady and steady attack. For the Ukrainian and Russian troops who have been psychologically affected by the rebels, this is more in line with their mentality. If Dmitri had asked them to march straight in to relieve Kiev from the siege, they would still be worried!

So they agreed to Dmitri's request and promised to cooperate fully...