Chapter 419 Fierce Artillery
Duan Qirui's 4th Division and other troops are gradually resisting, but after connecting and losing many peripheral positions, they have retreated to Jinling City and built a large number of fortifications by relying on the buildings of Jinling City itself.
The Anhui army has gathered nearly 70,000 people in Jinling City and the surrounding areas one after another, more than the attacking Feng army, but it is still very difficult to resist, especially the disadvantage of artillery has made the Anhui army suffer.
Fengjun gathered more than 100 75mm barrel artillery and hundreds of mortars on the front line of Jinling. In addition, the supply of shells is relatively smooth, so this shell is free of charge. From the beginning of the battle to now, Fengjun has fired more than 100,000 shells at Jinling, on average. Each 75mm barrel gun fired more than 100 shells, while mortars, especially 80mm mortars, fired an average of more than 200 shells.
Maybe this number is not worth mentioning for the wars in World War II and modern wars with millions of shells, but you should know that this is 1908, and this is still a domestic Feng army. It is quite difficult to achieve this firepower density.
The firepower density of the Jinling Campaign can almost be compared with the Tangshan Campaign of the Zhifeng War last year. The original Tangshan Campaign can be said to represent the highest level of contemporary Chinese warlord forces. Because both sides are fighting at home, the supply is smooth, and a large number of them have been hoarded before. Ammunition, so both the direct army and the Feng army were shot out for free, and their firepower density followed the Russo-Japanese War.
After the Tangshan Campaign, even Fengjun himself did not have the ability to replicate the original fire density.
Because the Feng army has been preparing for a long time in the Jinling Campaign, it can be said that it has hoarded half a year of ammunition in advance, so that so many shells can be fired within half a month before the start of the war.
So many shells fell on the Anhui army's position, which was enough to cause great damage to the Anhui army.
When the Feng army captured the outer positions of Jinling, the strong support of the artillery played a major role in successfully conquering these peripheral positions.
To put Jin Sanpang's words: Modern war is a cannonball!
There is no doubt that the artillery occupies the absolute protagonist in the current war. Although the rest of the infantry and cavalry are, to be honest, they are only secondary forces.
Otherwise, why did Zhao Dongyun bother to expand the size of the artillery of the Feng army?
When Fengjun buys ordnance from foreign countries, especially from Germany, its main cost is to buy artillery. After the Soviet Union and Germany reached a loan agreement at the beginning of the year, part of its aftercare loans need to be used to buy ordnance from Germany according to the agreement. What is the armor purchased with this amount of money? Naturally, it is Artillery.
In February alone, the Soviet Fengjun placed an order of up to 10 million yuan of ordnance to Germany at one time, of which at least 6 million were used to buy the latest export artillery of the German Krper factory: M1905 75mm 30x diameter field gun, and some of it was used to buy M1904. There is still a small part of the 100mm cannon used to purchase the Spencer heavy machine gun. This Spencer heavy machine gun is actually an improved version of the MG01 heavy machine gun, that is, the famous MG08 heavy machine gun in history. However, when Feng Jun bought the heavy machine gun last year, the German army had not adopted this heavy machine gun on a large scale. It was not until this year that the German army began to serve the heavy machine gun and gave the German army the number of the standard weapon: MG08.
Because Fengjun purchased this machine gun, it is still called the Spencer heavy machine gun, but Fuyuan Machine Factory has purchased the patent license of the machine gun from Spencer, and Fuyuan Machinery Factory is currently improving the production line of the MG01 heavy machine gun. To enable the production of Spencer heavy machine guns, a few sample guns have been tried to be produced, and Fuchang has given this imitation heavy machine gun the name of 'Fuchang 08 heavy machine gun'.
However, whether it is purchased or produced by itself, the number of Fuzuo 08 heavy machine guns is not large for the time being. At present, the Type 01 heavy machine gun is still supported by the Fengjun sky, including the Type 01 heavy machine gun imported from Germany and produced by itself. In addition, there are a small number of French Hachikais air-cooled heavy machine guns and 38-year-style heavy machine guns imitated by Japan, which are mainly from seizure.
The previous direct army and the current Anhui army are equipped with a large number of such heavy machine guns.
In addition to the large-scale procurement of artillery from Germany, Fengjun also continued to purchase the guns produced by Fuchang. Basically, there are many 1905 75mm mountaineers and 1906 75mm field guns. Both guns are also replicas of German artillery, and the 1906 75mm field gun is a replica of the German M1905 75mm 30x field gun.
Generally speaking, Fuyuan's self-produced weapons are mainly for prevention, and only mortars and grenades are independently developed.
As for the independent research and development of body-barre artillery or rifles, Fuyuan Machine Factory does not have this ability for the time being. Not to mention independent research and development, even imitation production does not dare to change the original German design without authorization, and there are often some performance gaps between the performance of imitation cannons and those produced in Germany.
However, these performance differences are nothing compared with the price. Although there is a gap between the performance of machine guns and artillery imitated by Fuchang and the original products, the price is generally more than 30% cheaper, especially the price of ammunition, which is closer to direct imports.
For example, the most common 75mm shell is loaded with T`NT. No matter which country it is produced, the price given by major foreign banks to Fengjun is generally more than 45 yuan each.
However, the price of 75mm shells produced by Fu Factory adopted imported TN`T and then produced by itself is 35 yuan. Although this price is still high, it is still much cheaper than direct import.
If the bitter acid produced by Fuyuan Machinery Factory is used as the charge, the price of a 75mm shell is only 25 yuan.
Although there are some risks in the application of bitter acid as a shell, the huge price gap still makes Fengjun purchase and apply this shell in large quantities.
After all, although the shells that use imported TN`T as a charge are easy to use, they are too expensive. Although the shells with bitter acid as a charge are inconvenient and dangerous to use, they are cheaper.
Since the end of last year, Fengjun has widely purchased shells with bitter acid as a charge, especially on 75 mm barrel guns. As for mortar shells, in order to further maintain the low cost of artillery shells, 80 mm and 60 mm mortars continue to use black gunpowder, while 120 mm In order to gain more power, mortars use more expensive bitter acid shells.
After all, the most critical thing about the 120mm mortar is its power. Other range, mobility and accuracy are scum. If you can't even get up the power, then there is no need for this large-caliber mortar.
As for the TN`T shell, I can't afford it.
At present, only those cannons that use TN`T shells are less than 100mm cannons in the Feng army. Anyway, these cannons are not much, and they are expensive, just like a good horse to be equipped with a saddle. Since the expensive 100mm cannons have been bought, Zhao Dongyun is still willing to pay for a few shells.
The main artillery imported from Germany and produced by Fuchang constitute the main artillery group of Fengjun at present. Of course, like other weapons, there are also a large number of other types of artillery, such as captured, early purchased Japanese-made 30-year field guns, mountaineers, and even a small number of artillery from the early Hanyang soldiers. The 57mm mountain cannons produced by the factory and the 75mm field guns produced by the Jiangnan Manufacturing Bureau and the 76mm field guns of the Russians are even those old-fashioned retreat guns.
Basically, there are artillery models that China can find at present, which is the problem of quantity.
As for unifying artillery models, simplifying logistics and so on, let's wait until Zhao Dongyun unifies China and is not short of money. Now, as long as there is a usable artillery for the army.
Hundreds of artillery of various models and sources constitute the main artillery group of the Feng army at present, and these artillery gave the Feng army strong artillery support in the Jinling Campaign.
Every day, pieces of artillery landed on the opposite Anhui army position, which can cause a large number of casualties among the enemy and Ping's people. This situation is more obvious when the Anhui army retreated to Jinling City. Countless shells fell into Jinling City, causing casualties to the Anhui army. In fact, more Ping's people were killed and injured.
These days, when the Feng army fought, they did not care much about the casualties of the people. When the artillery commanders of the Feng army launched shelling, they never considered whether shells would fall into the civilians.
The ordinary people during the war are always the most miserable. The Jinling Campaign, which lasted for a long time, caused tens of thousands of casualties to the two armies of Feng and Anhui, but also caused more than 100,000 casualties to the local ordinary people.
In order to avoid the war, countless Jinling and surrounding people dragged their families away from their homes, and then went to Shanghai, Hangzhou, and even cross the north of the river and other areas. No matter where they go, their purpose is only one, that is, to leave the battlefield and go as far as they can.
These people use a very fashionable term in later generations: war refugees!
However, unlike many people who will pay attention to refugees in later generations, even Duan Qirui himself does not pay much attention to the life and death of these war refugees in his jurisdiction. Even in order to supplement the war damage of the front-line troops, Duan Qirui also sent troops and officials to recruit civilians and soldiers among the refugees.
Every day, countless middle-aged men will be forcibly recruited by the Anhui army. Some people in good physical condition are supplemented to the front line after simple training, and then act as cannon fodder soldiers. Those with poor physical conditions are regarded as civilian men to help the Anhui army transport ammunition and supplies under the threat of bullets.
This kind of thing happened not only in the Anhui army, but also in every warlord army, even in Fengjun.
However, the strong men of the Feng army generally do not directly add them to the army as cannon fodder consumption. The Feng army, which has a large number of new recruits in the rear, is actually not short of new soldiers. The strong men of the Feng army are generally incorporated into various civilian regiments and transportation regiments of the quartermaster's.
How did the hundreds of thousands of civilian husbands owned by Fengjun in the rear provinces come from? Most of them were forcibly recruited, um, and they are not paid. Sometimes even food needs to be brought by these strong men.
People in future generations may see such words: the people who ruled the Su system enthusiastically supported the front line, carried food by themselves, and the unicycles transported and replenished the bloody Feng army on the front line, which strongly supported the unified cause of the Soviet system.
But what about the actual situation? Few of these people came voluntarily to transport supplies to the Feng army.
Maybe someone said, why doesn't Fengjun hire a large number of people to transport supplies and must use forced recruitment?
Zhao Dongyun's answer to this is: No money!