I

  Chapter 368 366【Riding battle】

  Shanhai Pass.

  Liu Zongmin met Li Zicheng alone, and said, "Your Majesty, beware of Ma Ke secretly informing the slaves!"

   "I know, these generals are unreliable." Li Zicheng nodded.

   Li Zicheng had two main ways of dealing with the surrendered soldiers of the Ming Dynasty due to time constraints.

  One is the officers and soldiers who surrendered along the way during Li Zicheng's march. These officers and soldiers were basically disbanded on the spot and sent back to their hometowns to work in the fields. A few young men were recruited to supplement the vacancies of the Dashun Army.

  One is the Daming Frontier Army. Because they maintain their combat effectiveness, it is temporarily inconvenient to move, so they are allowed to continue guarding the frontier. If the troops are forcibly disbanded, the frontier generals are likely to rebel, and Li Zicheng does not have so much time for conquest.

  Hong Chengchou belongs to the second type, and Ma Ke also belongs to the second type.

  Marco is already doing well. Facing the attacks of Hauge and Dorgon, he did not immediately choose to backstab Li Zicheng. He was guarding the city and watching, what if Li Zicheng could kill Huang Taiji?

   Now that Li Zicheng retreated to Shanhaiguan, Ma Ke began to make up his mind.

Li Zicheng said: "There are not many Tatar slaves in the pass. They are all partisans who took a detour to cross the Great Wall. Don't rush to break through, just destroy these partisans! At that time, relying on Shanhai Pass, if the Tatar chieftain (Huang Taiji) does not withdraw his troops, he will find an opportunity to go out of the pass and go with him." decisive battle!"

   Liu Zongbin said: "When fighting, take Ma Ke out, and our own people will guard the gate."

   "Oh, how dare you let him guard the gate?" Li Zicheng sighed.

  On this day, the follow-up troops of the Qing Dynasty came. With a full 60,000 army and a large number of grain transporters, it seems that the Tartars have already come out.

  Before dispatching troops in a hurry, Huang Taiji could only mobilize 60,000 troops, but now he gathered 60,000 troops to kill. Not only that, there were also thousands of Mongolian cavalry in the direction of Lengkou and Xifengkou, crossing the Great Wall and entering Shanhaiguan.

  However, 120,000 troops were sent back and forth, and there are still more civilians. The Liaodong people's power has been seriously overdrawn. Once the Shanhaiguan Pass cannot be defeated, the Manchu Qing regime will weaken from then on, and I am afraid that it will have to kill people to protect food to survive.

   "The Tartars have increased their troops again." Liu Zongmin said worriedly.

  Li Zicheng forced himself to be calm: "Follow him to increase troops outside the pass, and first destroy the Tartars inside the pass."

   Liu Zongmin led 10,000 troops and was responsible for defending Shanhaiguan.

  Li Zicheng took Ma Ke and personally led an army of nearly 60,000 to fight. The soldiers pointed directly at Haoge, Dorgon, Tang Tong, Bai Guangen, and Jiang Zhu in the pass.

  In "Ming History", it is said that Li Zicheng's tactics are "three walls", which is almost certainly a fabrication.

  At this moment, Li Zicheng also formed a triple formation, with infantry in the front, cavalry in the middle, and cavalry in the rear.

  Due to the continuous seizure of officers and soldiers' equipment, the elite of the Dashun Army are all wearing armor, even the infantry are wearing high-quality leather armor, and some infantry are also wearing heavy armor. There are spearmen, archers, and firecrackers, but there are not many sword and shield players, and the defensiveness of the formation is far inferior to that of the Datong Army and the Manchus.

   "Boom boom boom!"

  There was a rumble of cannons outside the pass, but it was Huang Taiji's main force, which was attacking Shanhaiguan with heavy artillery.

  Li Zicheng believed that Liu Zongmin could hold on, and ignored Huang Taiji at all, and sent his troops to kill Haoge and Dorgon in the pass.

   In order to quickly detour and attack, Hauge and Dorgon have all cavalry under their command. They let the surrendered troops lead the front, and they themselves led the cavalry around the battlefield.

  Tang Tong, Bai Guangen, Jiang Zhu and other surrendered generals were numb by Li Zicheng's army.

   On their way to Shanhaiguan, they all selected young and strong civilians to supplement their troops. Now each of them commands 5,000 troops, and there are 15,000 Han soldiers alone. All mobs!

   "Quickly withdraw to Funing!" Dorgon was shocked.

  Haug said: "Yes, retreat quickly, this battle cannot be won!"

   These two famous characters, don’t think how brave they are, they also run fast when they encounter danger.

   There were still three miles between the two sides, and Hauge and Dorgon ran away with their cavalry, leaving the 15,000 infantry of the generals on the battlefield.

   "Run!" Seeing that the situation was not good, Tang Tong immediately fled with his family cavalry.

  The rest of the surrendered generals also scrambled to flee, and there were only 15,000 Han Chinese infantry left on the battlefield.

  Most of these Han infantry were civilians along the way, and some of them served as soldiers for only a few days. They did not dare to flee back, fearing that they would be requisitioned by the Qing army again, so they knelt down and surrendered.

"Chase!"

  Li Zicheng didn't bother to pay attention to these surrendered soldiers, and ordered the infantry to be guarded and collected, and led Xiaoqi and cavalry to chase the enemy cavalry.

  Xiao cavalry are all elite cavalry, capable of charging, riding and shooting.

  The cavalry is much weaker. Although it is also armored, it is more like mounted infantry.

  And this cavalry team is very special, consisting of thousands of teenagers, they are Li Zicheng's "Child Army". He is usually responsible for detaining, interrogating and demoting officials, and is also responsible for publicizing policies everywhere, and is also the executor of the previous salary.

  When the "baby army" is mentioned, Ming officials can pee their pants in fright.

  The head coach of the Haier Army is called Zhang Nai. He stood out from the many youths by virtue of his military exploits, and now he has been adopted by Li Zicheng as his adopted son.

   "Kill the enemy, kill the enemy!"

   Zhang Nai drew his sword and shouted, thousands of teenagers shouted in unison, and even rushed in front of Li Zicheng on horseback.

  Li Zicheng said in surprise: "Blow the horn quickly, let them run slower!"

   "Woooooooh~~~~"

  The horn sounded, and Zhang Nai hurriedly slowed down his horse, waiting for Li Zicheng to catch up.

  After leaving Shanhaiguan, Hao Ge and Dorgon suddenly laughed.

  Li Zicheng was fooled.

  Manchu Qing army, strictly speaking, there is no distinction between infantry and cavalry.

   If you have to forcibly define the Manchu cavalry, then it is a very unique mountain cavalry.

  They can also ride horses to kill, shoot and other skills, but generally they don't use them for charging, and they are more good at running. March quickly in the mountainous area, go around to the predetermined combat location, you can immediately dismount and attack the city, you can also form an infantry formation to fight, and cavalry combat is also available at critical times.

   If the enemy has a large number of traditional cavalry, the Manchu and Qing cavalry will use routines.

  Using loose to outrageous formations, conduct guerrilla warfare and mobile warfare to lure traditional cavalry from the formation.

  Constant riding coverage, constant disengagement.

  They will set up an ambush during the pursuit, or gather superior forces to fight back. Use cavalry and shooting to weaken the morale of the enemy army, disrupt the formation of the enemy army, and then launch an assault from the flanks and rear wings.

  Huang Taiji was very courageous, and collected 20,000 cavalry for Hauge and Dorgon.

  Three thousand of them are guarding Liangcao and Hong Chengchou in Funing, and there are 17,000 horses left in front of them. After they lured Li Zicheng out of the formation, they suddenly dispersed into four groups, and slowed down their horses to shoot at the rear.

  Li Zicheng had tens of thousands of armored cavalry and thousands of children's cavalry under his command, and they also dispersed.

  Baby cavalry, few of them could ride and shoot, and were ordered by Li Zicheng to stay behind and charge directly at the critical moment. Li Zicheng personally led Xiaoqi, and shot at one of the enemy troops.

   At the moment when the two sides approached, hundreds of Manchu and Qing cavalry were shot by arrows, but only a dozen of them fell from their horses. The cotton armor was enough to withstand the power of bows and arrows. Moreover, the war horses of the Manchu and Qing Dynasties also wore cotton armor on key parts to strengthen their defense against bows and arrows.

   Just when Li Zicheng had the upper hand, the other three Manchu Qing cavalry suddenly rushed around the flanks, throwing arrows at the Dashun cavalry.

   For the next ten minutes or so, Li Zicheng was a little stunned because he had never encountered this style of play.

  A group of Manchu cavalrymen risked their lives to shoot at Li Zicheng against the rain of arrows, while the other three groups kept shooting arrows around the side. When Li Zi formed his troops to shoot at each other, the Manchu and Qing cavalry suddenly dispersed again, one group divided into several groups and fled.

  How far did you hit in the end?

  The two sides were divided into countless stocks, each with only a few hundred people, distributed in disorder on the battlefield, and the fighting rhythm was completely controlled by the Manchu cavalry.

   Moreover, after the Manchu and Qing cavalry interspersed back and forth, it is possible for several groups to quickly merge into one and charge with superior forces on a local battlefield.

  It sounds simple, but it is actually very difficult, which requires a very high degree of organization and training!

  Li Zicheng has a high degree of organization, but almost no training in relevant tactics, because he has never fought such a cavalry battle. Even though he had many Ming frontier troops under his command, these Ming frontier troops revolted very early and had no exposure to the Manchu and Qing cavalry tactics that had matured in the past ten years.

   After being eaten away by the enemy's two thousand cavalry, Li Zicheng awakened his fighting consciousness from the mountain of corpses and sea of ​​blood.

   "Woooooooooooo!"

  Blowing the trumpet to gather troops, the Dashun cavalry scattered all over the battlefield gathered in the direction of Li Zicheng.

  From the time of the battle to the present, Li Zicheng finally completed his assembly at the cost of almost 3,000 casualties, and rushed towards the Boyer Army regardless of everything.

  The Manchu and Qing cavalry joined forces in pursuit, nibbling the tails of the Dashun cavalry all the way.

   "Woooooooooooooooooooooooo!"

  With the sound of high-pitched horns, Zhang Nai led an army of thousands of children to kill, and charged with all his strength as fast as possible.

   This is almost a suicide charge. Although the children's army rides horses, they are still infantry in essence. Their weapons, equipment and combat skills cannot be compared with real cavalry.

   But the thousands of young men were not afraid. They held up infantry spears and charged towards the Manchu cavalry without risking their lives.

  Abandoning the equipment, relying on the speed of the horse, charging quickly, and fighting at close range, this is the best tactic to deal with the Manchu and Qing cavalry. In just over ten minutes, Li Zicheng realized it during the battle!

  The Haier Army just lacked cavalry equipment. Although the horses were relatively inferior, they ran much faster than the Manchu cavalry.

   Seeing this situation, Hauge and Dorgon hurriedly ordered to disperse, intending to repeat the same trick to eat up the cavalry team.

  Under the leadership of Zhang Nai, thousands of children in the army forgot to die. After being shot and killed hundreds of people quickly, they crashed into the scattered formations of the Manchu cavalry.

  It doesn't matter if the equipment is inferior, these teenagers are here to die, one for one, two for one, three for one, all are acceptable.

  Li Zicheng also brought Xiaoqi over to help, facing the shooting of other small groups of enemy troops, he rushed into the group of Manchu cavalry dragged out by the boy army.

  Tang Tong, Bai Guangen, Jiang Zhu and other surrendered generals were all dumbfounded at this moment.

  They fled to watch the battle from afar and witnessed the whole battle process. So far in the battle, the Dashun Xiaoqi Cavalry had suffered more than 3,000 casualties, the Dashun Boy Army had more than 1,000 casualties, and the Manchu Qing cavalry had also suffered more than 2,000 casualties.

   Moreover, Li Zicheng has found a suitable tactic.

  The intensity of the war was too high, beyond the imagination of the generals. They couldn't understand why both sides were not afraid of death.

   "Withdraw!"

  Manchu Qing cavalry who were bitten, some remained alive, and were directly abandoned by Dorgon and Hauge. They took the opportunity to distance themselves and wanted to continue playing routines.

   Li Zicheng gritted his teeth and said, "Withdraw to Shanhaiguan!"

  Although this tactic is effective, it was created by the Haier army. Although it can effectively kill the enemy, if you come a few more times, thousands of child soldiers will have to confess here, and Dashun Xiaoqi will have to pay a heavy price.

  Seeing Li Zicheng retreat, Hauge and Dorgon came back with troops.

   Li Zicheng was determined to be ruthless, and after he separated hundreds of boys into the army, the teenagers used their lives to cover Li Zicheng's retreat.

  (end of this chapter)