Wild North America 1846

The attacking Tang Empire army launched a fierce artillery bombardment that lasted for 30 minutes, pouring more than 20,000 artillery shells on the Dutch defenders' front line positions, which was simply inhumane.

Due to insufficient range, the Dutch artillery positions only launched sporadic counterattacks. The Dutch soldiers on the front line suffered heavy injuries from artillery fire, with casualties reaching three to four thousand people.

If it weren't for the guns of the white supervising team on the second line, which were pressed against their backs, these indigenous servant soldiers on the first line would have collapsed long ago.

Many of these indigenous servants participated in the encirclement and suppression of the Asian resistance forces. They have varying amounts of combat experience, and many of them are veterans.

Even so, no one has ever experienced overwhelming artillery bombardment. It is simply the end of the world. The enemy has been bombed and suffered heavy casualties without even touching a hair.

Needless to say, it is already on the verge of collapse and will collapse if there is any disturbance.

See this scene

After sizing up the situation, General Michels had no choice but to grit his teeth and add more than 2,700 men from two infantry regiments to the first-line parapet position during the pause in artillery fire in an attempt to stabilize the third-line defense situation.

Although the first line of parapet positions has been completely destroyed by enemy artillery fire, and most of the barbed wire fences and parapet civil fences have been blown to pieces, it still has certain defensive capabilities.

After the reinforcements are sent in, they can basically stabilize the floating morale of the army.

who knows

Fifteen minutes later, when the attacking Datang Empire army formation was about to move, it was urgently stopped, and the artillery position roared again.

This move was so unexpected that General Michels almost spit out a mouthful of blood.

If you don't play like this, it would be too bullying.

The expected full-scale attack by the Tang Empire's infantry did not arrive, and the heart-wrenching artillery bombardment began again. The miserable frontline Dutch soldiers could only suffer in despair.

Groups of exploding flames, mixed with dust and broken limbs, flew into the sky, making the cruelty of war extremely real.

As expected, an accident happened...

The indigenous officers and soldiers who were still clinging to the front-line defensive positions were bombarded by artillery fire and ran backwards without their armor and armor. They could no longer endure this cruel place of death and collapsed instantly.

Now these indigenous officers and soldiers have only one thought in their minds: to escape from this terrible hell.

The dark soldiers in front emerged from behind the earthen parapets, shell pits and nooks and crannies where they were hiding, and ran backwards. The flight quickly became unstoppable.

Exploding artillery shells continued to fall like raindrops. Every time there was a violent explosion, the splashing shrapnel roared and swept across, instantly clearing away the people within a radius of seven to eight meters around the explosion point.

A sudden large-scale rout occurred, causing the casualties of the Dutch soldiers to increase sharply.

"Damn..." General Michels clenched his fist and punched the wall hard. He could endure the loss of the indigenous servant army, but he could not endure such stupidity and defeat.

It can be seen with the naked eye that on the battlefield ahead, the Dutch officers and soldiers who were originally fleeing in dense numbers were reduced to splotches and sparse under the cover of dense artillery fire.

How much more effective is the artillery coverage than hiding in the position?

"Aim and shoot"

"Pah, pah, pah... pah, pah, pah..."

The white soldiers from the Dutch army's second-line positions also performed the mission of supervising the battle team on the battlefield.

Under the officer's order, they all raised the black muzzles of their guns and pulled the triggers without hesitation.

In the era of line infantry who lined up to be shot, military law was extremely strict. Retreating without an order was a fatal crime, no matter how many people were involved.

If you just run away if you can't defeat them, then the second and third line defensive positions will be like paper, which can be broken by the enemy with just a poke.

You can only move forward, not backward.

It is okay to die on the defensive front, but it is never allowed to flee. This has stepped on the bottom line of the military.

Therefore, European armies generally set up battle supervision teams, and the same is true for the Royal Dutch Army. When the fleeing soldiers approached the 150-meter red line of the second-line position, they did not hesitate to enforce battlefield discipline.

Having just escaped from the death zone covered by artillery fire, the native officers and soldiers looked at the Dutch soldiers raising the black muzzles of their guns, their extremely frightened expressions adding deep despair...

Dense volleys of gunshots rang out one after another, and the hot projectiles knocked the Dutch soldiers who were retreating in embarrassment away. Dazzling blood spurted out, and they fell weakly in front of the second-line position. The nearest one was only seventy or eighty meters away.

.

The enemy's artillery fire from the rear and the intensive volleys of gun fire from the Dutch army supervisory team in the front caused the fleeing native soldiers to be attacked from two sides and knocked to the ground like cutting leeks.

This seemingly cruel battlefield discipline ensures the tenacious fighting style of the European army. It has become the golden rule of the army since the 17th century and has been clearly reflected in all major wars.

The European army powers Germany, France, and Russia are the countries that enforce battlefield discipline the most resolutely, and they are also the countries with the strongest armies.

The second round of shelling lasted for about 12 minutes and then came to an abrupt end.

The strong smell of blood spread from the battlefield. Between the first and second lines of the Dutch army, there were densely packed corpses everywhere. The fields were dyed red with blood. The scene was extremely miserable.

After dawn, the main army of the Tang Empire that had gathered were still arrayed 3.5 kilometers away, and the Dutch army's position on this side was already covered with desolation, dead and wounded.

Needless to say, the first parapet defense line was completely destroyed by enemy artillery fire, and all the officers and soldiers were killed or injured.

The Dutch army filled in nearly 13,000 people. Under the enemy's two rounds of artillery fire and the intensive volley fire of the Dutch army, nearly 10,000 people were killed and injured. It can be said to have suffered a devastating blow.

The remaining clever people were either still hiding behind the parapet defense line, hiding in the pile of dead bodies, or fleeing to the edge of the flank, unable to be taken care of for a while.

The three-line defensive position deployed by General Michelche was bombarded by the Tang Empire's superior artillery fire, and now only two defensive lines remained.

At this moment

The loud bugle sounded, and the Tang Empire army began to press forward...

the strange thing is

After the official attack was launched, the originally neatly arranged queue became loose. Some of the advancing soldiers fell behind and some stood out during the attack. From a distance, it was no longer a clear horizontal "one" queue.

As the soldiers' attack formation advanced, the distance between them also widened, forming countless loose triangular formations. This was the latest skirmish line attack tactic of the Tang Empire.

This skirmish line attack tactic allows soldiers to be farther apart from each other when encountering enemy artillery fire, without having to maintain a strict formation.

There is no doubt that this new tactic is more flexible.

The artillery regiments of the Tang Empire, led by mules and horses, quickly moved their artillery positions forward, and the enemy's and our artillery quickly entered the range of each other.

General Michels, the commander-in-chief of the Dutch army, held up his binoculars with a livid face. He did not order the artillery positions to fire hastily, but patiently waited for the enemy artillery positions to be positioned.

The Dutch army is generally equipped with front-loading steel hoop guns, with various caliber Napoleonic field guns of 6 pounds, 9 pounds, 12 pounds and 18 pounds.

This is a relatively advanced artillery that was popular in the 1870s and 1880s. It was derived from the early bronze Napoleon artillery, and the two are in the same vein.

The technical method of steel pipes and steel hoops is used to reduce weight and can withstand higher chamber pressures. It has been widely equipped in the British Royal Navy.

The famous Armstrong artillery equipped by the British Royal Navy is a very representative manufacturer of muzzle-loading guns in the world. The steel hoop gun developed in the late 1960s inevitably influenced European countries such as the Netherlands, Belgium, and Denmark.

The famous Colt artillery of the Tang Empire represents another major school of world army equipment, namely the breech-loading school, which uses wedge or screw breechblocks and is a representative of advanced artillery in the world today.

General Michels was patiently waiting for the artillery regiments of the Tang Empire to be in place. With the level of artillery currently equipped by the Dutch army, the accuracy of shelling fixed targets was an entire order of magnitude higher than that of shelling moving targets.

The Dutch army did not have so many artillery shells to waste, so they had to use them sparingly.

on the battlefield

An all-out attack on the advancing Tang Empire army started from a place 3.5 kilometers away from the Dutch defenders' first line parapet position, and slowly approached at a normal pace.

ten minutes later

When the attacking soldiers entered the optimal artillery strike range of 2.5 kilometers, a total of more than 220 artillery pieces from 6 artillery positions of the Dutch army opened fire one after another to attack the attacking Royal Guards officers and soldiers of the Tang Empire.

For a time, dense artillery shells fell, causing varying degrees of damage to the attacking officers and soldiers.

As a result, the attacking skirmish line became more loose, and the Imperial soldiers bravely advanced under fire.

at the same time

The field artillery of the Tang Dynasty Expeditionary Corps, which arrived at the new artillery positions one after another, quickly set up artillery and fired back, focusing on the Dutch artillery with more violent and hot artillery fire.

The two sides launched a fierce artillery battle. Amidst the rumbling sound of artillery, one Dutch artillery position was covered by fierce artillery fire. The powerful air wave generated by the explosion swept across, killing and injuring a large number of officers and soldiers at the Dutch artillery position.

In a head-on artillery duel, the attacking Royal Guards of the Tang Empire's nine artillery regiments, with a total of more than 320 artillery pieces, had an overwhelming advantage. Soon the Dutch artillery positions were in flames, and they were retreating steadily.

As time went by, the intensity of the Dutch army's artillery fire quickly declined, and it was obvious that it suffered a big loss.

Comparing the artillery of the Tang and Dutch armies, the artillery of the Tang Empire reached the advanced level of the 1890s and represents the highest level of advanced artillery equipment in the world today.

In particular, it is equipped with a full breech-loading artillery system. The shells are loaded with advanced double-base gunpowder produced by Colt Chemical Company. It is a new high-tech gunpowder developed by adding 60% nitroglycerine and 40% low-nitrogen nitrocellulose.

Explosive gunpowder is extremely lethal.

The Royal Netherlands Army Artillery was at the level of the 1870s. The artillery shells were filled with early picric acid explosives, which were much less powerful and less reliable.

Many artillery shells hit the battlefield hard without exploding, which frightened the Imperial officers and soldiers who narrowly escaped with their lives into a cold sweat.

A rough calculation showed that about 1/3 of the Dutch artillery shells did not explode.

This is because the ammunition in the Dutch army's inventory has been stored in tropical warehouses for more than 10 years. Due to the extremely hygroscopic nature of picric acid, low explosive energy, and poor physical stability, many of the stored ammunition has expired.

Even if it is shot out through a cannonball, it will just explode like a stuffy fart when it lands on the battlefield, but it will not have much lethality.

It was completely unlike the extremely lethal artillery shells of the Tang Empire. After falling, they exploded violently, blowing up a large area, followed by a large mushroom cloud of fire and dust.

After more than 10 minutes of artillery exchanges, the six artillery positions of the Dutch army misfired one after another. Most of them were bombed into a mess. Most of the 220 artillery pieces were destroyed, and only less than 70 pieces were still firing tenaciously.

This is the Dutch army's artillery positions No. 2 and No. 5 located in the dense forest. Since it is difficult to observe the specific positions, the artillery troops of the Tang Empire can only separate two artillery regiments to carry out probabilistic coverage and suppression with artillery fire.

The remaining seven artillery regiments turned their muzzles and began to bombard the second line of parapet defense positions again, firmly taking control of the war in their hands.

The attacking skirmish line of the advancing Tang Empire army had already approached within a range of 1.5 kilometers from 2.5 kilometers in these ten minutes.

The imperial soldiers with their sharp spears thrust forward were like a wave, and the artillery fire could not stop their advance, which put great pressure on the Dutch soldiers.

at this time

A loud charge horn sounded on one side of the battlefield, and soon a large amount of smoke and dust filled the air. A large number of armored chariots appeared from the flank 4.5 kilometers away from the battlefield, heading towards the Japanese position at high speed.

in the wilderness

These armored chariots, which came over at high speed, were a stab in the waist of the faltering Dutch army, which greatly damaged the morale of the Dutch army.

Moreover, these armored chariots were very fast. In just five or six minutes, they had already shortened the distance between the two by half. They might have hit the second-line parapet position earlier than the infantry. This caused great panic among the Dutch soldiers.

Under the dual effects of artillery fire coverage and armor impact, many Dutch soldiers were so frightened that they turned around and fled. This may quickly form a herd effect and trigger another major rout.

under crisis

General Michels had to send out the only cavalry regiment in his hands to meet the attack. This cavalry regiment, with a total of about 1,100 people, was the only cavalry force of the Dutch army.

In order to stabilize the defense line, I had to take it out.

I saw a Dutch cavalry force coming out from behind the three-line defensive position. The cavalry regiment quickly changed its formation while galloping, spread out from both wings like the wings of a wild goose, and charged towards the armored chariot convoy at high speed.

The appearance of such a cavalry regiment on the battlefield greatly boosted the morale of the Dutch officers and soldiers and stabilized the precarious defense line.

in cheers

The Dutch cavalry who intercepted the armored convoy once again mobilized their horses to race at high speed and launched a charge against the armored convoy. The cavalrymen drew their shining sabers and waved them above their heads. Their momentum was not inferior to that of their opponents.

Thousands of horse hooves trampled on the ground, like rolling thunder passing over the field. The charging cavalry moved forward inexorably, their eyes full of desire for victory and honor.

Cavalry, charge!