Even though Bago City was not transformed into a real bastion-style city in just one month, the newly built large sharp corners still played the role of a bastion.
Different from the early obtuse-angle bastions in Europe, the newly renovated Bago City was changed from the original Chinese-style four-corner building to an octagonal building, and the angles formed by these are the best fire coverage and shooting areas.
The Burmese army only dispatched 3,000 men. Of course, it was unable to carry out siege-style operations. It could only attack two of the eight angles. This formed two parts, and both parts would be attacked by the left and right sides at the same time. shooting in a direction.
One of the characteristics of the Wanli Type 1 musket is that it has rifling in the barrel. Although the rifling is shallow and straight, and completely incomparable with the spiral rifling of later generations, for now, it still has a shooting accuracy that far exceeds that of contemporary muskets. Coupled with Gao's pragmatic knowledge of the optimal ratio of black powder and the principle of "granular gunpowder", the gun's range can almost reach the best state under current technical conditions.
Gao Silian, as a colonial envoy who opened up the Huaying area with very few troops, was actually very familiar with the Wanli-style tactics of using the bastion to defend the city.
Just like the "Waishan Fortress" that Huang Zhiting visited during the military parade in Jingang, Gao Silian built at least seven or eight large bastions as fortresses in the process of expanding to Huaying. He had no idea how to defend the bastions when defending the city. His firepower is brought to the extreme and he is very experienced.
It stands to reason that shooting can be carried out before the enemy enters the angle. That area is called the "first shooting area" by Gao Jiajun. However, the effect of shooting at this time is usually not very good, and it is easy to scare away the enemy. Therefore, when it is necessary to kill the enemy in a demonstration style, Gao Silian will not choose this tactic of firing immediately.
The second shooting area is the area after the enemy enters the angle. Generally speaking, this area can form a crossfire, but the specifics depend on the size of the city or the large bastion itself. If the city is too large, this second shooting area may not be able to fully cover the fire. , because the range of the gun is still not enough.
As for the third shooting area, it is the tip of the angle. This is the area completely covered by crossfire, which can cause the most powerful attack. If the enemy arrives here and then launches it, the enemy will not only be attacked by a sudden The powerful firepower stunned and even defeated them, and after they collapsed, they also faced a desperate return - they had to be beaten all the way back.
The Burmese army's three thousand test troops lived up to expectations and were stunned. Within the crossfire coverage of the third shooting area, they were hit head-on by the Bago garrison.
The junior officers from the Jinggang Garrison to the Bago Garrison personally led the shooting, and loudly reminded the recruits of the shooting steps, when to charge, when to reload, and when to shoot. When should the gun barrel be cleaned, when should the gun be recharged...etc., these experienced officers shouted loudly to prevent the Mon soldiers who were new to firearms from messing around.
Although Gao Silian, who was watching the battle from behind a bunker in a corner of the tower, was a little disappointed with the shooting speed of these new subordinates and was also dissatisfied with their shooting accuracy, the success of the tactics itself was unquestionable. The Burmese army who rushed up to try to set up ladders did not After a few rounds of random shooting, they all fell into collapse.
In fact, the casualties of the Burmese army at this time were not large. From the angle that Gao Silian could see, the losses of the Burmese army would not exceed 200 people. Assuming that the results were similar at the other angle, after these rounds of shooting The Burmese army's losses were only about 400 people.
According to the point of view that Gao Pragmatic repeatedly emphasized to them, the tactic of "queuing up to kill" is often compared with discipline, that is, who can withstand the first wave of damage from the shooting without collapsing, so the first in the battle line It is common for the second row to be fully lit sometimes.
Gao Silian understands this tactic, but the Burmese army on the opposite side obviously does not understand it. Not only does it not understand, but the situation they face is also different from the battle line shooting - the shooting is always face-to-face. If you have a chance, you can kill me with one shot. , I also have a chance to kill you with one shot. Whether you live or die depends on luck and shooting speed.
The key problem why the Burmese army began to collapse after losing only this few people was that they were unable to fight back against the enemies in the bastion. With only waist knives, they were not even equipped with bows and arrows. Apart from raising the simple wooden shields in their hands in vain, they had no choice at all.
In addition, the progress of erecting ladders has also gone to zero, because although the bastion was completed, Gao Silian did not give up the traditional tactics. There were still soldiers on the city wall responsible for throwing rolling stones and wood down, pouring "golden juice" on the head. ". Moreover, the shooting port in the corner wall can also shoot at the opposite wall to attack the Burmese soldiers attacking the city.
All in all, a three-dimensional attack has been formed in this area. The Burmese army is almost in a state of being trapped in a urn, unable to advance or retreat if it wants to.
In the end, these unlucky ones could only brave the crazy firepower of the fire network and retreat. When the lucky ones among them finally escaped and ascended to heaven, they found that there were only a few comrades around them.
King Mangyingli, the Golden Tower White Elephant King of Myanmar's Taungoo Dynasty, looked at the soldiers who were fleeing back in twos and threes with a livid face. His angry words "cut them all" stuck in his throat for a long time, and finally swallowed it back.
After all, he had seen the situation just now. If these soldiers continued to stay in the corner of the city wall, there would be no other meaning than waiting for death. Moreover, his strength was damaged now, and he only had these 70,000 people at hand. He would not be able to kill any more of them. It's a loss of one's own strength.
Captain Reddy came over, his face was not very good-looking, and his words were even more ugly: "Your Majesty, it seems that we are facing a very big trouble, and the situation has exceeded the pre-estimated situation."
Mang Yingli gritted his teeth, but kept a straight face and said nothing - I'm not blind, do you need to say this nonsense?
Fortunately, Captain Reddy didn't just come to mock his employer, he came with a solution to the problem.
"Your Majesty, I think at this moment, if you don't want to pay a huge price far beyond imagination to capture this city, then we should consider spending money to solve the problem."
Mang Yingli was stunned for a moment, turned to Captain Reddy, frowned and asked: "Solve it with money? Do you mean to bribe the opponent's guard? But we don't even know who the opponent's guard is... maybe it's Alabang. ? Humph, this traitor, I wish I could cut him to pieces, and if you want me to spend money to buy him off, that’s just a dream!”
"No, no, no, Your Majesty, when I say spending money, I don't mean buying off the garrison generals - although this can also be an option." Reddy shrugged and said, "I mean spending money to buy some Artillery to attack this city. Your Majesty, you know that we in Portugal have advanced artillery. If we can purchase two hundred or at least one hundred artillery pieces, it will be a huge help in capturing this city.
And I, Simon Reddy, know the Governor of Malacca and even the Governor of Goa. Through my connections, I can buy these artillery pieces as soon as possible so that His Majesty can regain this city of great political and economic significance as soon as possible. I hope you will consider this suggestion carefully. "
When Mang Yingli heard this, he sneered and said, "The artillery you sell is too expensive. Even the emperor of the Ming Dynasty could not afford a few cannons for one thousand taels of silver each."
"Your Majesty has misunderstood. One thousand taels are ship-borne long heavy guns, and that was the quotation made to Ming Dynasty officials in the early years... Of course, if Your Majesty needs it, these long heavy guns can indeed be moved to the shore for use. Through me Because of the relationship, the price can also be greatly reduced, such as 800 taels per door, what do you think?"
Mang Yingli still sneered: "But as far as I know, the cost of such a long and heavy cannon is no more than three hundred taels of silver at most."
"Oh... I admit that what you said is true, but you have to consider another point. It costs a lot to transport these long and heavy artillery from Europe to Myanmar. What's more, we will also give away four basic shells, so eight hundred Two silvers per door is definitely a friendly price."
If Gao Pragmatic were here, he would probably laugh out loud, because after a series of transformations and technological improvements in standardized production, the price of similar artillery manufactured by Jinghua is far lower than the cost mentioned in Mang Yingli: Mang Ying It says "no more than three hundred taels", but in fact the cost of Jinghua's similar artillery is only one hundred and sixty taels.
By the way, the cost of artillery of the same level in the Kingdom of England at this time was about just over two hundred taels per gun. The reason why Jinghua was able to make it cheaper was that, apart from the iron-moulded cannon, which was an artifact that was worn out during the time travel, the most critical issue was that Kaiping Industrial Zone could provide high-quality and low-priced metals.
Different from the bronze cannons used by the fleet, the artillery used by the Army Division from the No. 1 gun to the No. 4 gun are made of iron, because there is no need to worry about the high humidity and high salt environment at sea causing the artillery to rust, and Jinghua’s iron and steelmaking production capacity is huge, which means that You won't fall into a cost trap.
Even Gao Wuzhi now has some doubts about whether he can consider using iron cannons directly for the fleet, because the Ming Dynasty is really short of copper, and the cost of this bronze cannon is enough for several iron cannons. It's just that the barrels of bronze cannons are easy to recycle and recast after their service life expires, while recycling and recasting iron cannons is a bit more troublesome.
The two groups of people at the Craftsman School have been quarreling for a while, and neither side can convince the other. The half-hearted Gao Pragmatic does not dare to come up with blind ideas, so he has to put the matter on hold for the time being - after all, Britain in the original history There were still a large number of naval bronze cannons during the Yiwu period.
As for the iron-moulded cannon, when Gao Pragmatic first proposed this idea, he really thought it was a "major innovation." Who knew that the masters would understand it as soon as he mentioned it.
Later, Gao Pragmatic realized that some of the exaggeration was too much. In fact, this thing is not particularly novel in theory. For example, in the Han Dynasty, Jin Dynasty and Song Dynasty, there were iron molds unearthed for casting farm tools, but Gong Zhenlin only used them to cast cannons.
So why hasn’t anyone done this before? Actually it was because of technical difficulties.
The hardware itself of the iron mold technology is not difficult to produce. It can be made of cast iron or steel. It is nothing more than a carrying container. In addition to fixing the gun mold, it also has a better heat dissipation effect.
The advantage of the iron mold is that it is easy to integrate. Unlike the clay mold casting cannon, which has to wait for time to dry in the sun. After a cannon is cast, you have to wait several months. The iron mold cast gun can be used directly after being left alone for a while. These hardware are fully achievable at the level of the Ming Dynasty.
However, the iron mold also has shortcomings. From the perspective of metal casting and metallography, the heat dissipation of the iron mold is too fast, which causes the problem of large supercooling of the molten pig iron when it is cooled, and the cementite in the molten iron is too late. The graphite has already solidified after precipitation (graphitization has no time to proceed), so the cementite in iron mainly exists in the form of iron carbide, which is the so-called white iron.
Of course, because the molten iron is supercooled during the solidification process, the metal crystal particles on the surface are relatively dense, the body tube is smooth, and the airtightness is much better than that of the clay mold.
The real advantage of the iron mold is that it speeds up production, without having to wait for several months like clay mold cannon casting. This is particularly prominent in Gong Zhenlin's iron molds. However, the iron mold cast cannon products are very white. Due to the rapid cooling rate, although they are relatively smooth, almost all of the produced iron is white, resulting in increased brittleness. The performance of the gun is reduced.
So the result of this is that in order to increase the tensile strength, it can only be solved by stacking mass with quantity, that is, increasing wall thickness.
How does Gao Pragmatic solve this problem? Oh, in fact, it cannot be regarded as a pragmatic solution. In fact, it was later developed by Jinghua Steel itself - the key lies in the blowing equipment that Zhu Zaiyu created under Gao Pragmatic's prompting.
This thing is a bit troublesome to explain in detail. To put it simply, it is similar to the hot blast technology during the American Civil War. The temperature in the blast furnace is high enough, so that the silicon content in the molten iron is high, and graphitization becomes more prominent during cooling.
However, this only solves the problem of white iron. It has roughly evolved to the level of gray iron. However, the problem of too fast cooling of iron mold casting cannons has not been completely solved. It can only be said to be barely usable, and the casting speed has been greatly improved. , I just thought it was acceptable after a pragmatic and comprehensive consideration.
As for the problem of iron mold cooling speed, Gao Pragmatic knows the principle of solving it, which is the so-called internal mold water cooling, but this thing seems to be quite difficult. It has been several years since Jinghua Steel got his tips, but basically there is nothing progress. Being a pragmatic person, I only know a few superficial theories, and my practical ability is completely zero, so I can only continue to wait.
The issue of purchasing artillery reached a deadlock. Mang Yingli couldn't afford such a large amount of money to buy the Portuguese's expensive artillery. Captain Reddy left with great regret, and before leaving, he said something very hard to Mang Yingli. He said: "It is very difficult to capture a large bastion even in Europe. Apart from smashing it with a large number of artillery, the only way is to besiege it for a long time. Your Majesty, please consider it carefully."
Mang Yingli didn't know if his words were threatening, but the dilemma before him was obvious. Continuing to attack by force was definitely not the way to go at the moment, so he had no choice but to order a suspension of the attack and start deploying the siege.
Gao Silian's strategic goal of preventing the opponent from attacking by force was achieved.
In fact, he was a little scared, not because of anything else, but because he had never commanded tens of thousands of people before. The largest command force was only three or four thousand people, and the bastion he guarded was not like Bago City. A super large "bastion", so he has always been worried about whether his side can command it if the other party launches a general attack.
After all, the establishment of the Bago Garrison was an accident, which resulted in the fact that apart from himself, there were only a few low-level officers who were from the Gao family's servants, and the middle and high-level command system was basically empty. If we were to face a full-scale war, who knows if problems would arise everywhere.
As a result, a situation was formed inside and outside Bago City where the two sides were afraid of the wolf.
Gao Silian looked through the binoculars at the Burmese army who had begun to set up camp. He breathed a sigh of relief, then cast his gaze to the east and thought to himself: I don’t know when Dutong will choose to launch a counterattack. It is taking advantage of Mang Yingli’s unstable foothold. Should we fight back directly, or wait for a while until the Burmese army completely relaxes before fighting?
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