Chapter two hundred and sixty-seven Artillery
A large group of generals in the Fengjun Army are as determined as other generals in the contemporary era. Artillery advocates believe that the more cannons, the better, but many officers will have different opinions on what cannons to equip.
Some military officers, especially the older generation of generals, think that the army should be equipped with more medium caliber field guns and mountain guns, that is, 57 mm and 75 mm guns, on the grounds that these two calibers, especially 75 mm, have met the needs of supporting infantry, and enumerate the army of all countries.
Before and after World War I, most countries’ army equipment divisions belonged to support artillery, which was almost three inches in size. Britain, France, Russia, Japan, the United States, Italy, etc. Although Germany was equipped with 15mm howitzers, it still kept a large number of 75mm field guns and mountain guns.
The history of equipment in the past decades has made many people, including Xu Bangjie, firmly support to equip the troops with more 75 mm caliber guns, and even try to restore Fengjun to the establishment of 10 guns in one battalion in the old Beiyang era
A considerable number of them support the equipment of more mortars, especially 120 mm heavy mortars. The best solution to the lack of large-caliber heavy artillery in the army is to equip a large number of large-caliber mortars.
Everyone supports the large-caliber long-range heavy artillery, but it is only a verbal expression of support, because everyone knows that these large-caliber long-range heavy artillery are expensive, and even if the army runs out of money, it will not be equipped with a few doors.
Nowadays, in Fengjun, there are more than 200 guns with 75 mm caliber and nearly 600 mortars with various calibers, but there are twelve long-range heavy guns with 100 mm cannons. It can be seen from such a low proportion that this thing is not affordable for ordinary people.
However, even though it is expensive, seeing that this heavy artillery battalion suppressed the 75 mm caliber artillery of the straight army at one fell swoop in Tangshan Battle has turned many senior generals into staunch heavy artillery supporters, and the military meeting of people like Fang Biyong directly suggested increasing the number of heavy artillery equipment.
However, the focus of today’s meeting is not to discuss whether the number of heavy artillery equipment should be increased, but mainly to summarize and compare the casualties of the enemy and the enemy after the Tangshan campaign. Then, the most important thing is that although a large number of generals still have a lot of questions about the ninth division’s breakthrough in Yinfeng.
For Zhao Dongyun, what is the most important thing for the ninth division to quickly defeat the first brigade?
So in the next two days, a large number of staff officers from the Department of War, the Department of Supervision and Training, and the Department of Strategy read the battle report of the ninth division in an attempt to find out the key point that the ninth division could win in a short time.
However, they are disappointed that there seems to be nothing unusual about a series of battles in the ninth division. Xu Bangjie’s command of officers at all levels in the ninth division is quite normal, which is not surprising for this large group of staff officers, because their large-scale investigation of the ninth division’s defeat of the enemy’s first brigade is to find out the differences and then quickly extend this different expenditure to the army
However, they didn’t find anything different!
After the heavy artillery battalion of the ninth division suppressed the first brigade to support the artillery, it was a quick attack. However, the success of the subsequent attack of the ninth division was definitely not due to the suppression of the direct artillery, because the first line of Fengjun in Huanxi Village also occupied the artillery advantage. At that time, the first Huncheng Brigade in Bao Guiqing had only a dozen mountain cannons. However, the two mortar battalions of the third division and the tenth division combined nearly 75 mm artillery and nearly 120 mm mortars and more than 60 mortars. This artillery advantage can be said to be greater than that of Yinfeng Line.
However, Huanxi Village failed to form a large-scale breakthrough like Yinfeng’s, which led to the massive collapse of the enemy?
"We believe that the breakthrough of the ninth division is not a decisive reason although there are artillery support reasons. According to our preliminary investigation results, we found that the collapse of the enemy’s first brigade first occurred in the third battalion position of the 37th regiment of the ninth division of our army.
In the battle, almost all the heavy weapons and equipment of the regiment were collected. During the battle, the first battalion of the 37th regiment temporarily retreated to rest the second battalion due to heavy casualties, and the second battalion was temporarily transferred to the third battalion by the Lei Anlin School of the 37th regiment in the later direction, so that the number of light machine guns and mortars in the battalion reached twice the quota.
In particular, although the number of light machine guns increased, it was not evenly distributed, but the first company that took the lead in attacking was supported by nine extra light machine guns. The large increase in the number of light machine guns greatly suppressed the enemy’s interception fire and broke through a certain enemy company’s position. The breakthrough of this position quickly caused a chain reaction, which led to the complete collapse of the enemy’s second defense line and the collapse of the entire Yinfeng defense line! "
Zhao Dongyun meditated after listening and then said, "Do you want to say that the victory in this battle was not due to artillery but to light machine guns?"
PricewaterhouseCoopers: "The advantage of artillery is an essential factor to win, but the light machine gun is an advantage factor to win our arms!"
The wall always puts the importance of artillery on light machine guns. You don’t need light machine guns to fight in the army, but you can’t live without artillery.
But on the other hand, when Fengjun launched an offensive war, the light machine gun played a huge role. Many wars have shown that the importance of the light machine gun is no less than that of the heavy machine gun.
The reason why the ninth division defeated the first brigade of the direct army was quite simple, that is, the front line was served by the army, or rather, the 37th regiment had a large number of technical weapons to a certain section of the front line, and then it broke through the enemy in a certain step. This seems to be a simple period, but in fact, in this kind of opportunity, it is the lifelong pursuit of every military commander to achieve absolute superiority over the enemy, and it is rare to be able to do so.
This light machine gun tactic should develop much faster than you think. Zhao Dongyun mused in his heart that the 37th regiment temporarily strengthened the regiment light machine gun to the third battalion, especially the first company of the vanguard, which had three light machine guns, plus the temporary attachment of nine light machine guns, it reached twelve, which was enough for each infantry squad to have one light machine gun. There were still three redundant ones.
The dense firepower formed by twelve light machine guns is enough to hit the opposite enemy and lift its head!
However, it was unexpected for this kind of frontline troops to temporarily raise the light machine gun. In the past two months of fighting, many frontline commanders, especially the commanders at the grass-roots company and battalion level, just like to raise the light machine gun and assign it directly to the attacking troops.
It is common for a battalion to get up from a light machine gun and give it to a company, and a company to get up from a light machine gun and give it to a platoon. However, it is the first time that this kind of thing has happened like the 37th regiment of the ninth division.
This situation is not good or bad, but it also directly proves the fact that the number of light machine guns equipped by Fengjun is seriously too small. If Fengjun troops can equip each company with nine light machine guns, then the offensive force will never be delayed as long as the former Tangshan campaign in the future.
However, according to the current high price of light machine guns, it is also impossible to equip them on a large scale. Although the price of contemporary light machine guns is cheaper than that of machine guns, it is not much cheaper. This Madsen light machine gun is a rare one, even if Fuyuan Machine Factory produces imitation Madsen light machine guns according to patents. Although the ex-factory price is cheaper, it is not much cheaper.
Now it is not the first world war, but the large-scale general equipment of light machine guns in 197. It is impossible for Fengjun to bear the fact that a warlord in the south and a division can be equipped with 20 or 30 machine guns. Now there are nearly 60 light machine guns in a division of Fengjun, which adds up to more than 210 machine guns.
Although the number of this heavy machine gun is still illegal compared with the explosive heavy machine gun equipment in various countries, the proportion of light machine gun equipment is definitely the highest. So far, all countries have equipped heavy machine guns with light machine guns on a large scale, which is only a small amount of experimental equipment. After all, for the powers, heavy machine guns have passed the test of the Japanese-Russian war, so it is necessary to vigorously develop equipment for light machine guns. This thing has not yet passed the test of large-scale war.
"As for the light machine gun, we’d better follow the original steps and fill up the existing troops with one light machine gun in each row. However, considering the urgent demand of the frontline troops for light machine guns, a small number of troops can be equipped with high light machine guns. Well, let the 12 th regiment of the third division pilot each infantry class with a light machine gun in the specific preparation and tactics. Ask the personnel of the preparation department, the war department and the supervision and training department to give me a plan in three days!"
Zhao Dongyun’s decision to assign a light machine gun to each infantry platoon last year will not be easily changed. This involves not only military and financial issues, but also a series of issues such as the tactical arrangement of troops and ammunition, not to mention the need for a large number of troops. Even if a large number of light machine guns fall from the sky, they can make the soldiers have a good hand, but the logistics system of Fengjun is also a way to meet the demand for a large number of light machine guns.
There are too many influences on the establishment and equipment changes, so it is impossible for Zhao Dongyun to make changes at any time according to his own preferences.
Chapter two hundred and sixty The downtown threat
Chapter two hundred and sixty The downtown threat
When many personnel from Zhao Dong Yunhe Command stayed in Tangshan to take care of the follow-up summary of the Tangshan campaign, the pace of a large number of troops serving the army did not stop, and all the troops almost followed the pace of direct withdrawal and gradually advanced.
With the pressure of Fengjun step by step, it has been through the fiasco of Tangshan campaign, and it is more and more difficult for the straight army to resist!