Chapter 290 Encirclement and Annihilation War

The next day, Li Er and Li San went ahead and led 30,000 cavalry out of the camp. They deliberately passed by the besieged Chen Leng's troops, letting the besieged Eastern Army feel again the sensation of thousands of horses galloping past. The dust raised by the dust made the Eastern Army soldiers choke and curse continuously.

Afterwards, Li Yuanhui led 40,000 infantry and 10,000 cavalry to reorganize the encirclement of Chen Leng's troops.

The 40,000 infantry troops included the Guangwu Army, Wagang Infantry, Tianzhushan Camp, Guangling Camp, Zhonglei Camp, Hubu Camp, Zhongjun Camp and Wuwei Army.

The cavalry brought out all the light and heavy cavalry from Jianghuai, and added 2,000 people from the Liangzhou cavalry under the second brother's command, making up a total of 10,000 people.

Fifty thousand infantry and cavalry formed a three-sided encirclement of the eight thousand infantry, leaving only a gap in the northwest corner towards the Ying River, which was in line with the military strategy of surrounding three sides and leaving one.

In this kind of plain area, with absolute military suppression and the completion of semi-encirclement, Chen Leng's troops had almost no possibility of escaping the encirclement. They would either be defeated or surrender.

The only hope we can place on is quick support and rescue from friendly forces.

The sun shines brightly on the endless plain between the Ru River and the Ying River.

Chen Leng stood on a small hill in the formation, with his personal guards on both sides. From here he could get a glimpse of the battlefield situation in all directions.

At this moment, the sound of drums and horns was heard from the distant wilderness, and sharp whistles and the sound of arrows suddenly rang out. The cavalry units of the Western Army, which had been advancing slowly, began to speed up.

The cavalry began to gallop in front of the formation, and the sound of their iron hooves gathered into thunder on the field.

The Western Army's light cavalry began to circle in four directions.

If they didn't move, they would be fine. But if they moved, they would be extremely fast. Chen Leng felt that there were countless cavalrymen around him, and there were probably tens of thousands of them. Countless iron hooves stomped the ground fiercely, raising yellow-brown dust, like a chaotic cloud, and approached rapidly with the roar of horses' hooves.

If he could choose, Chen Leng would certainly prefer to fight in deep mountains, canyons, or dense forests. With the rugged terrain, even if the Western Army had twice as many troops, they would not be able to defeat him for a while.

The problem is that the situation forces us to do so. The plain ahead is endless and there is no dangerous place to defend, making it the best cavalry battlefield.

All he could do was to have his soldiers form a good battle formation, hold out to the maximum extent possible, resist the offensive of the Western Army, and buy time for the main force to arrive to support.

He understood that the current situation was dangerous, but it was also the best chance to defeat the Western Army.

As long as he can hold out here long enough and withstand the attack of the Western Army, the two generals will then send their main forces to attack the Western Army. By then, it might be possible to achieve internal and external cooperation and achieve success in the center.

But the premise of everything is to withstand the offensive of the Western Army. As a bait, he cannot be defeated too quickly, otherwise everything will be in vain.

As the drums and horns sounded, the cavalry commander Chang Yanheng mobilized the cavalry teams to run back and forth, deliberately raising a cloud of yellow dust. This was certainly not to cheer the infantry, but to cover up their own movements with smoke and dust, so that the cavalry archers could gain a visual advantage in the duel.

If the Eastern Army infantry had no means of countering, this reciprocating shooting and harassment might last for an hour, two hours or even longer.

In addition to the cavalry using bows and arrows to continuously cause casualties to the infantry, sometimes it seems that there is yellow dust all over the sky, but in fact there are only dozens or even hundreds of cavalry running, which is completely relying on the infantry's lack of vision and bluffing.

Sometimes they would suddenly form a cavalry team, approach the Eastern Army's formation to intimidate it, and change direction when they were within a few dozen steps of the formation, forcing the defenders' formation into panic so as to cooperate with the attack of other units.

As time goes by, even the most solid formation will become loose and flawed due to fatigue of the soldiers. At this time, the cavalry can attack the infantry formation with great force until the infantry formation completely collapses, forming a trend of pursuit and capture.

This was originally a tactic used by nomadic cavalry to fight against the densely-packed battle formations of the Han army.

The Han army gradually acquired large cavalry units during the wars with nomadic peoples. From the time when Emperor Xiaowu of the Western Han Dynasty began to build a strong cavalry, until the Eastern Han Dynasty and even the Cao Wei Dynasty, the cavalry combat power of the Central Plains Dynasty has always remained at a very high level, and even the tactics have been constantly updated, and there are more powerful armored cavalry. Even the fact that the Murong clan of Dayan was able to rule the Central Plains was not a victory of cavalry over infantry.

Instead, it was the Hanized Xianbei Murong who, after mastering the household registration of the people and the army organization of the Central Plains dynasty, successfully seized the strategic opportunity of the warlord separatism and peasant uprisings in the late Cao Wei period during the period of talent boom in his family.

Therefore, the Hanized Xianbei Murong was actually no different from the Central Plains Dynasty. If Murong Ying had not been so troublesome, the Great Yan would have had a national destiny of 180 years.

On the other hand, Chen Ling was a native of Guanzhong. Although the troops he led this time were all infantry, he was also proficient in riding and shooting, and had no lack of knowledge of the tactical movements of cavalry from various places.

What surprised him was that most of the surging cavalry in front of him were probably not from the north.

Could it be the Huainan cavalry under Li Yuanhui? How could a southern cavalryman use this harassment tactic so skillfully?
While Chen Leng was surprised, Li Yuanhui was also on a high slope observing the battlefield situation.

In the battle to encircle and annihilate the 8,000 Eastern Army infantrymen in front of him, Li Yuanhui gave the light cavalry to Chang Yanheng for command, and the heavy cavalry was led by his cousin Li Xuandao himself, who was always looking for opportunities for the heavy cavalry to attack and for weak points suitable for an assault.

The timing for the large group of infantry to enter the battlefield is after the heavy cavalry assault.

Therefore, there is not much he can do as the head coach at the moment, and he should not even do too much in the current situation.

Because sometimes a military order from the commander-in-chief can easily affect the judgment of the generals on the front line, thus losing the opportunity to fight.

Therefore, in such a large-scale battle involving tens of thousands of people or even hundreds of thousands of troops, the coach has to do more to stabilize the situation and make key decisions at critical moments.

Instead of giving frequent orders that confuse the officers during a stalemate on the battlefield, such as micro-manipulations like asking the catapult to move forward fifty steps, this is not what a qualified commander should do.

The army's command system is to transmit military orders through drums, trumpets, flags, and the running of messengers.

Any military order should be taken with caution, as it often concerns the lives of hundreds or thousands of people.

Li Yuanhui looked at the cavalry running on the battlefield, and then looked into the distance. His second and third brothers had already led nearly 30,000 cavalrymen towards Xiangcheng.

Li Yuanhui thought that he had mastered the art of cultivating his Qi, but at the moment he was still a little anxious, although that didn't show at all on his face.

The significance of this battle is very important. It is almost an expanded version of yesterday's battlefield situation, but the offensive and defensive momentum of both sides is different.

Yesterday, my second brother's 1,000 cavalry disrupted the encirclement of 20,000 elite Eastern Army troops, and the timing for my third brother's entire army to move forward was just right.

Chen Leng, who was surrounded by him today, was in a similar situation to his second brother yesterday.

The difference is that the second brother took the initiative to rush into the battle, and the cavalrymen under his command were the most elite and brave in the world.

Chen Leng was passive, and except for some generals and personal guards who had to ride war horses, these 8,000 people were pure infantry.

How long can a pure infantry army, without any camps to defend itself and surrounded, and with harassment and intimidation from cavalry, hold out before collapsing?

Chen Leng’s answer was half a day.

(End of this chapter)