Chapter 189 The First Battle

On October 19, hundreds of Beiyang cavalry in dark blue military uniforms led their horses slowly on the loess official road in northern Tongzhou. They were soldiers of the Fengtian First Cavalry Association under Zhao Dongyun.

Although their military uniforms are no different from other new armies in China, the military uniforms on their arms of both officers and soldiers are temporarily sewn with a white belt. On the one hand, this white belt is to express the sorrow for Yuan Shikai's death, but it is more important to distinguish between the enemy and the enemy. .

After all, the uniforms of the domestic new army are all the same these days. Although Zhao Dongyun and others have rebelled, it is impossible to say that tens of thousands of sets of different styles of uniforms are prepared in just a few days, so the uniforms worn by the troops around Zhili are the same. In order to avoid the enemy at that time Therefore, Zhao Dongyun ordered the troops to temporarily sew a white belt on their arms.

At the same time, he has also ordered the Quartermaster's Office of the Fengtian Army Command to purchase new military uniforms. In order to distinguish the color of military uniforms from other new troops in China, this new military uniform will refer to the color of the German Army's new military uniforms. The combat uniforms will adopt 'blue gray', and the dress will also be slightly modified. The clothes continue the Beiyang tradition, continuing to use dark blue, while the trousers are changed to black, and the top hats are also changed to Western-style military hats.

Other details have also been modified, such as changing the epaulette to a simpler and more intuitive combination of stripes and five-pointed stars to represent the military rank. Generally speaking, these details are mainly designed to abandon the patterns and symbols of the 'feudal dynasty' and the dragon python. The people of the Ministry of Munitions even want to directly copy the German Army. Military uniform style.

After this change, the appearance of the Fengtian Army's new military uniform, which has not been officially promulgated, has the image of the Beiyang Army in people's impression, that is, the image of the Beiyang Army after 1912.

People's impression that the Beiyang Army is not an army that wears earthy yellow military uniforms in summer and dark blue military uniforms in winter, but an army that wears blue-gray military uniforms in winter and summer.

Of course, the new military uniform has just been determined, and it is impossible to distribute it to the troops in time. Now in order to distinguish it from other troops in China, the Fengtian Army can only use the simplest method, which is to sew a white cloth belt on the original military uniform.

Wang Duan's army is also similar, but one of them uses yellow cloth strips, while the other one uses red cloth strips, which has no big meaning inside, just for the sake of the enemy and self.

Otherwise, the big guys on the battlefield will wear the same appearance, and they will probably not be able to distinguish me from each other when fighting.

These cavalrymen in dark blue military uniforms and with white cloth on their arms were leading the horses to walk slowly. However, at this time, several horses suddenly galloped in front of them, and not long they walked to an officer with the deputy leader.

"Your Excellency, the enemy is found ahead!" The knight who arrived in a hurry said breathlessly.

Hua Yongquan, the leader of the first standard and second battalion of the First Cavalry Association of Fengtian Standing Army, immediately looked cautious: "How many enemies are there?"

The reconnaissance cavalry replied, "Located in Huangjiazhuang in front of us, we are currently marching from east to west, and there is about a battalion!"

"Have they found us now?" Hua Yongquan heard that it was a infantry battalion, and his face was more cautious. Although the cavalry battalion he led was a large cavalry battalion, more than 600 horses were almost equivalent to a cavalry regiment in the West, but if it was against an infantry battalion, it would be fine if the other party was not prepared, but if the other party was prepared, he would not be able to get it. What benefits!

The reconnaissance cavalry said, "I don't think so. We touched the edge and found them. They should not have found us yet!"

Immediately, Hua Yongquan nodded, and then made a move, and then several officers rode over. Before long, a map that was obviously temporarily drawn was displayed on a stone slab on the ground.

"The enemy is located outside Huangjiazhuang, about four kilometers away from us. There are still some ups and downs here in the middle, which is why both of us found them so late. Let's talk about it and see if we want to fight and how to fight!" Hua Yongquan did not act arbitrarily with other middle and senior officers, but summoned his officers to discuss it.

The reason why he did this is not to be modest, but that he knows himself. He was born as a bandit. In those years, he went to Zhao Dongyun with the boss Lu Shuanggun. Although he stayed in the accelerated class of the third town for half a year ago, he was not as good as those orthodox officers from the professional class. It was not a big problem for him to wave his sabres and charge. He would not blink when he took his subordinates to attack, but this If you talk about any tactics, it's really not as good as those officers from the class.

Before leaving the station, his former boss, Lv Shuanggun, who is currently under the command of the Second Cavalry Standard of the First Cavalry Association of Fengtian, warned him that this battle was no better than before. He discussed more with his professional cavalry officers when he encountered trouble. In short, he would not lose a few words with them!

Hua Yongquan opened his mouth to ask, and the following leaders and military schools also opened their own mouths. The first one was Zhou Shuren, a young officer. He said loudly, "Huangjiazhuang is flat outside, and there are bush forests in the western region as cover. I think we can make a raid!"

Hua Yongquan frowned after hearing this: "Although there are woods as a cover at this time, the terrain is not high, and it is more than 400 meters away from the passage through which the enemy passes. I'm afraid it is difficult to form a fire suppression!"

But Zhou Shuren said, "We don't have to stay in the woods, but rush directly to attack!"

Hua Yongquan frowned even more when he heard it: "You mean to fight an immediate melee?"

Hearing Zhou Shuren's suggestion to rush directly and fight with a saber, Hua Yongquan would doubt whether this boy was born in Lushi!

If it is a feasible tactic to continue to launch a charge melee with sabers before the Russo-Japanese War in previous years, then after the Russo-Japanese War, the cavalry battle has completely abandoned the immediate melee. In the Russo-Japanese War, the two sides invested tens of thousands of cavalry, but never issued After a large-scale horse melee, most of them rode horses quickly maneuver to a certain position, and then set up machine guns to play foot combat, and the immediate confrontation between the cavalry of the two sides is even less!

Even a bandit cavalry officer like Hua Yongquan knows this situation, but this Zhou Shuren, who graduated from the Japanese mainland and is also a professional horseman, will not know?

Although Hua Yongquan wanted to reject his proposal directly, he still said, "Oh, tell me the reason!"

Immediately, Zhou Shuren continued to point to the map and said, "Look, gentlemen, if we start from here and here, we can rush directly to the official road, and this section of the road is flat, and we only need to rush through within a few breaths of 400 meters.

And their battalion is relatively long and marching. It must be difficult to organize defensive firepower in a short time. Even if they have heavy machine guns, they don't have enough time to set up. In addition, there is no terrain to hide on both sides of the official road, and there is no large number of carriages to rely on in their army, so as long as we rush over and kill him unprepared, we can definitely force the enemy to cause chaos and then collapse, and then pursue and cover up, we can do great success!"

Another team officer next to

said, "What if we are exposed before the attack?" And what if they react faster than we thought?

Zhou said, "If it is the former, we can organize firepower in the woods and fight with them. If it is the latter, do you think my fifth association, the most elite in Fengtian, can change from a marching state to a defensive formation in just 15 seconds?"

The team officer said, "No!"

Then Zhou Shuren said rudely, "Do you think the sixth town trained by Wang Shizhen is more elite than the third town trained by our general?"

Although the team officer was unconvinced, he had to answer at this time: "Naturally, it is far inferior to the third town of our army!"

At this time, Zhou Shuren turned around and said to Hua Yongquan, "If you rush out directly to fight a melee, it is possible to win a big victory. If you fight an ambush hundreds of meters away, it will be a small victory at most. How to make a decision? I hope Hua Guan will think deeply!"

Hua Yongquan listened to Zhou Shuren's words and was also a little hesitant. To be honest, according to his idea, he is naturally conservative. It's enough to make an ambush. Although it's a little far away, he should be able to harvest some results, but Zhou Shuren proposed to take the initiative to go out and fight immediately. To be honest* *The force is very strong.

In addition to achieving great results, this is also related to the traditional thinking of cavalry officers. As a cavalry officer, whether he is from bandits or a professional class, most of them have a dream of rushing to the enemy with a horse's knife.

Although reason tells them that this idea is behind the times, many cavalry officers are still subconsciously influenced by this idea.

Looking at this Zhou Shuren, Hua Yongquan knew that this guy looked young, but he was definitely not a hairy young man who had just joined the army. Like most of the contemporary professional officers, he applied for Zhejiang Wubei School when he was young, then joined the Zhejiang New Army, and was later recommended to Japan. Lu Shi studied abroad and just returned to China after graduation this year. Before he had time to return to Zhejiang to serve, he was recruited by Zhao Dongyun.

And Zhao Dongyun's prestige among young people in China is still quite good, so this week's calligrapher, like several other students, refused the solicitation of the province, that is, the Zhejiang New Army, and then joined Zhao Dongyun under Fengtian, and served as a cavalry team. The team officer was awarded the rank of the military academy.