Late Han Zhao Tang

Chapter 323: Breaking the Formation with Divine Stratagems, Exhausting Han Sui

It was not difficult to predict that Han Sui would leave troops behind to guard the rear. It was said before that Jincheng was at least a thousand miles away from Lueyang. If Han Sui did not leave elite troops behind to guard the rear, once Zhang Yu led his cavalry to pursue, Han Sui's troops would surely be defeated. Leaving troops behind to guard the rear to resist the enemy would give the main force more time to retreat!

On the 21st, Han Sui and Song Jian led their troops to retreat northward, leaving Yan Xing and Cheng Yi to lead the troops to guard the rear. Zhang Yu sent out his troops to pursue them, leaving Guo Tu and several thousand soldiers to guard the main camp.

Qinting was more than fifty miles away from Lueyang. Zhang Yu sent out his troops to pursue at noon and arrived at Lueyang at dusk.

Now the Lueyang camp was no longer the scene where Han Sui stationed his troops, for the camp had been burned down by a great fire, and there were only broken walls and little wood left. When Zhang Yu arrived, there were still some fires burning.

Seeing this, Zhang Yu pointed his whip and said to the generals, "Han Sui burned his camp and fled because he was afraid that our army would get food. He left elite troops behind to defend the dangerous places or to set up ambushes on both sides of the road. Our strategy now is to exhaust all the ways and not give the enemy any chance to make changes."

"Who is willing to be the vanguard and chase Yan Xing?"

"The last general is willing to be a pioneer!"

Zhang Xiu rode forward, cupped his hands and said, "Xiu is from Lianglong, and is familiar with the geography. Now you can lead the cavalry to follow us!"

"it is good!"

Zhang Yu warned, "Hulukou is long and narrow, so it is not advisable to rush in and chase deep. The vanguard should follow closely behind and spur them on horseback. When the enemy is exhausted, that is the time to defeat them."

"As ordered!"

Zhang Xiu accepted the order and turned around to call on his cavalry to give chase.

After Zhang Xiu took the lead in pursuit, Zhang Yu said, "It is getting late, we should set up camp and rest. However, the enemy has fled far away from Jincheng, so we should not let them go lightly. You have gathered your strength here, and now is the time to use your strength."

"Leave 3,000 infantrymen here to transport military supplies for our army, and the rest will follow me in pursuit!"

"promise!"

In order to prevent Han Sui from escaping successfully, Zhang Yu decided to seize the time to chase him.

That night, Zhang Yu led the infantry and cavalry for 20 miles and rested with the other generals at the entrance of Hulu Valley. Zhang Xiu followed Zhang Yu's instructions and followed Yan's troops.

On the 22nd, at daybreak, Zhang Yu led 20,000 infantry and cavalry to pursue along Hulu Valley.

Hulu Valley is a river valley washed out by Changli River. Because its terrain resembles a gourd, it is named Hulu Valley.

It was late autumn, with little green and more yellow on the hills, and the river in the valley was wide and shallow. To prevent Yan Xing from setting up an ambush, Zhang Yu sent out his cavalry and ordered his infantry to ride camels and horses.

Because the infantry and cavalry were highly mobile, by the afternoon, Zhang Yu had led his troops to march seventy miles and had already approached the armies of Yan Xing and Cheng Yi.

"Bah!"

Zhang Xiu's scouts rode fast and found Zhang Yu's flag. They dismounted and bowed, saying, "Sir, Zhang Zhonglang ordered me to report that Yan Xing and Cheng Yi's troops are thirty miles ahead. They have noticed our movement and are now lining up to fight."

"How many soldiers are there in the two armies of Yan Xing and Cheng Yi? How are their elite troops?" Zhang Yu stopped his horse and asked.

"My lord, according to our investigation, the enemy army has about 10,000 soldiers. Their weapons and armor are not well-equipped, and there are many old and weak soldiers and few strong and healthy ones." Houqi reported.

Although Han Sui chose Yan Xing and Cheng Yi to lead the troops to stay behind, he hesitated when it came to guarding the rear.

During the previous attack on Qingshui City, Han Sui had lost thousands of soldiers and horses. Now, the troops are the rearguard. To put it in a nice way, they are risking their lives to delay Zhang Yu's pursuit.

Therefore, Han Sui left elite troops to guard the rear, fearing that too many casualties would affect subsequent operations. So after hesitation, he chose to use the old and weak Han and Qiang to guard the rear. On the contrary, Cheng Yi was in charge of his own army, so he could use more elite troops than Yan Xing's troops.

Zhang Liao was eager to try, and said: "Sir, we are now thirty miles away from the enemy, and the enemy is not prepared. It is better to lead the infantry and cavalry to advance quickly and charge into the battle. We will surely win a great victory. It may be difficult to break through the enemy's formation when they are prepared."

Zhang Yu pondered for a moment and said, "What Wenyuan said makes sense. If the enemy forms a battle array to resist, it will be difficult for our army to defeat them suddenly. So we can order the National Defense Army and the cavalry to follow us!"

"promise!"

The success or failure of the battle between the two armies depends on breaking the formation. Although Yan Xing and Cheng Yi have only 10,000 soldiers and horses, compared with the 20,000 infantry and cavalry under Zhang Yu, there is a huge disparity in numbers. However, if Yan Xing's troops are allowed to line up, and Zhang Yu wants to break Yan Xing, he also needs to let his troops line up.

The two armies fought for a long time, which seriously consumed the soldiers' energy. Therefore, for Zhang Yu, who was pursuing, it would be best to avoid fighting as much as possible, so that he could have more energy to pursue Han Sui. If he could not defeat Yan Xing quickly, Han Sui could sacrifice some of his lives, which would buy him and his elite troops more time to withdraw.

Soon, under the guidance of Zhang Xiu's scouts, Zhang Yu arrived with 20,000 infantry and cavalry, and joined Zhang Xiu's cavalry of more than a thousand cavalry.

However, under the command of Yan Xing, the Long army formed a five-mile wide and long formation, facing the hills and valleys in the east and the Changli River in the west. The flags were fluttering and the soldiers looked in strict order from a distance.

Zhang Yu was not afraid of danger. He rode his horse straight up the hill to look out and had a full view of the Long army's deployment.

"My lord, I have been chasing Yan Xing and Cheng Yi all the way. When they learned that our army was chasing them, they formed a battle array in Huluchuan. I led my cavalry to harass the enemy's battle array many times before, but they were all repelled by Yan Xing's troops!" Zhang Xiu said, "If my lord had arrived a moment earlier, the enemy's battle array would not have been in place yet, and I would have been able to route them with my cavalry."

"It's not too late now!"

Zhang Yu narrowed his eyes and looked at the square formation, and he already had an idea in his mind.

"Where are Bulu and Hutuli?" Zhang Yu suddenly called out in the Hu language.

"exist!"

Tuli, who was now dressed as a Han general, rode forward and respectfully waited for Zhang Yu's military orders.

"Tuli, are your horse-driving skills useful?" Zhang Yu asked.

"It works!"

Buluhutuli said: "I have a thousand cavalrymen and two thousand horses under my command, and they all obey my orders!"

"Okay!" Zhang Yu pointed with his whip at the western formation where Yan Xing was stationed, and said, "Yan Xing's troops seem to be in turmoil. You drive your troops and horses to charge the formation, cooperate with the infantry and armored soldiers, and help me break through the enemy's square formation. As for the enemy's cavalry, I will send other cavalry to fight them."

Driving horses to charge is not a joke, but one of the tactics invented in the long-term confrontation between nomadic peoples and farming peoples. For example, in the long-term border war between Ming and Mongolia, Mongolia was very good at driving horses to charge, which once became the most troublesome tactic for the Ming army.

When Qi Jiguang was stationed in Jizhen, he had two major solutions to the tactics of driving away nomadic peoples and breaking their formations. First, if the number of horses charging the formation was not particularly large, he could use spears, horses, chariots, etc. to block them accordingly; second, if the number of horses charging the formation increased, to tens of thousands of horses, he would have to dig trenches and use artillery to wash the ground.

The nomadic people's habit of driving horses to break the enemy's formation once influenced the fishing and hunting people, the Jurchens. During the Battle of Sarhu, the Tatars used the tactic of driving horses to break the enemy's formation and defeated the Ming Dynasty coalition forces in one fell swoop.

Of course, the tactic of using livestock to drive and break the formation did not only originate from nomadism, it can be seen as far back as Tian Dan’s fire bull formation.

Since Zhang Yu used the army, a large number of Hu people on the border surrendered to him, so Zhang Yu often thought about how to make up for the shortcomings and blend the different fighting styles of the Han and Hu people. The Han people are particularly good at swift and fierce hand-to-hand combat due to their organization and high armor and soldiers; the Hu people are particularly good at harassment and raiding due to their ethnic habits.

With the integration of the characteristics of using troops, Zhang Yu gradually and boldly used the nomadic people's unique way of breaking the infantry formation, that is, when necessary, using horses to charge into the formation and defeat the enemy as quickly as possible.

As he spoke, Zhang Yu looked at Buluhutuli and asked, "Can you do it?"

Buluhu Tuli watched for a moment, clasped his fists and said, "I am willing to serve my lord!"

As Zhang Yu's military order was issued, the troops under his command quickly changed. The infantry first dismounted and formed a battle array, while the cavalry gradually divided into small teams. Among them, Buluhutuli followed Zhang Yu's military order and gathered more than a thousand horses, ready to drive the horses into the battle array.

While Zhang Yu's troops were organizing their forces to break the enemy's formation, Yan Xing was organizing his troops in the formation.

Yan Xing was unhappy at the moment. He felt that he had paid so much for Han Sui, but now Han Sui asked him to lead the troops to the rear. In fact, leading the troops to the rear was not a problem. The key was that Han Sui went back on his word and first said he would give him elite soldiers, but he only gave the old and weak.

Obviously, Han Sui did not think that he had the ability to defeat Zhang Yu, so he assigned the old and weak to him to delay Zhang Yu's pursuit. In the past, when the rebels fought against the Han army, they always used the rear guard to delay the Han army's pursuit. And the Han army was unwilling to travel thousands of miles to pursue the powerful enemy even though they had killed enough prisoners.

Forget it. My family is in Jincheng now, so I can only serve Han Sui for the time being. Let him take a look at the strength of Zhang Yu's soldiers and see if they are as outstanding as the rumors say. Although we fought Zhang Yu last time, we were ambushed and defeated, so it was difficult to see the strength of Zhang Yu's soldiers in detail.

"Woo!"

Hearing the signal for an attack, Yan Xing's expression changed slightly, and he murmured, "Not long after I led the army here, Zhang Yu has already ordered his troops to attack. How fast!"

As the dust flew, hundreds of thousands of horses were seen neighing and galloping towards the Long army infantrymen. Among the horses, Bulu Hutuli waved the wooden whip in his hand, and more than ten Hu cavalrymen who were proficient in the art of driving horses made strange "wulu" sounds and drove the horses to charge the Long army square formation.

Behind the horses, there were armored cavalry, and behind the armored cavalry were armored infantry holding spears to press forward. It was obvious that they wanted to wait for the horses to charge into the battle formation, and then attack the infantry and cavalry together to defeat the Long army.

"Bah!"

Looking at the horse herd approaching without a leader, Yan Xing's expression in the formation inevitably changed. He had only heard of using cavalry to charge a square formation, but he had never heard of driving horses to charge a formation. If he let the horses charge into the formation, his troops would probably be defeated. Where did Zhang Yu learn such a method?
Under the charge of the horses, the front-line soldiers standing in front of the battle array with their spears across their shoulders were already terrified at the sight of the horses rushing in like a raging wave. Now not only the infantry in front of the battle array were terrified, but even the Qiang cavalry lined up on both wings were frightened by the mighty horses charging into the battle array. The horses' hooves were trotting on the ground, and if it weren't for the control of the Qiang cavalry, they would have retreated.

"shoot!"

The officers in the Long army shouted loudly, fearing that the horses would charge into the army.

The archers shot their arrows swiftly, and the sound of arrows breaking through the air was like a flock of bees flapping their wings and rising into the sky, shooting towards the herd of horses.

"Whizzing!"

Dense arrows fell on the horses, and many horses neighed. However, under the trend of the Hu cavalry's special horse-herding methods, and the desensitization training of the horses, the horses still did not change direction under the arrows, and rushed straight into the army.

Seeing the horse herds pressing forward, a large number of front-line infantrymen in the Long Army could not bear the pressure and fled backwards, completely ignoring the military discipline.

“No retreat!”

The officers in the battle tried to stop the deserters, but to no avail, as more and more soldiers in the front row fled. If there were chevaux de frise and trenches to stop the simultaneous charge of thousands of horses, it could still be stopped by fortifications, but now how could people dare to stop it with flesh and blood, not to mention that the soldiers under Yan Xing's command were not elite.

Yan Xing looked depressed and felt powerless. His self-confident bravery was of no use in the fight with Zhang Yu's troops, especially since Zhang Yu's troops dared to ignore the losses and let the large-scale horse charge. Now, let alone the infantry, even he would be afraid.

"Boom!"

When the infantry of the Long army changed their mind, the horses rushed into the battle formation and knocked the Long soldiers dizzy. Some horses were stabbed in the belly, which aroused their ferocity and made them charge around in the battle formation, breaking up the already shaky Long battle formation.

On the battlefield today, besides the neighing of horses, there are also the wailing of soldiers. And only after the physical resistance of the crowd did the horses stop galloping.

Following closely behind, the armored cavalry galloped forward, brandishing their swords and spears to kill the Long soldiers. The armored cavalry, which numbered several hundred, was not a large number, and their role was more to disrupt the Long formation. After the armored cavalry charged, the infantry led by Gao Shun rushed into the formation, chasing and killing the fleeing Long soldiers and defeating the Long soldiers who were still fighting.

When the infantry broke through the formation, the Qiang cavalry came into contact with the cavalry led by Zhang Liao. When they saw Yan Xing being defeated, they realized that the situation was hopeless, so they turned their horses and fled without any intention of resisting.

Under the charge of Zhang Yu's cavalry, several thousand infantry and cavalry were quickly defeated in less than two quarters of an hour. When Yan Xing's troops were defeated, Zhang Xiu was ordered to drive the defeated soldiers to attack Cheng Yi's army.

The defeated army, under the influence of Shanxi's infantry and cavalry, directly dispersed the Cheng Yi troops who were fighting with Xu Chu's infantry. A large number of armored cavalry rushed into the battle formation, directly disrupting the Cheng Yi army formation. However, the Cheng Yi soldiers and generals were brave, and they continued to fight even though their battle formation was defeated.

As the sun was setting, Zhang Yu stopped his horse on a hill, looking at the Long army that was still fighting despite being defeated, and said with a sigh: "The Long soldiers are available. After defeating Han Sui, we can select 10,000 elite soldiers as soldiers."

Although Zhang Yu had defeated the Long army twice since the expedition, he still had a good opinion of the Long soldiers. As a frontier region of China, Longyou has been in conflict for many years. The people living in Longyou are brave and can become an elite force with a little training, which is indeed a high-quality source of soldiers.

If the Long army was weak, Zhang Yu would not have chosen to confine the troops to feed themselves and defeat them by starving them of food. Instead, he would have used a combination of infantry and cavalry, combined with armored cavalry attacks, to defeat them. The two major defeats of the Long army were all due to Zhang Yu's use of tactics, which made it difficult for the Long army to exert its true combat power before defeating them.

If they meet a suitable commander, such as under Dong Zhuo, the Long army will be able to shock the world. Now that Longyou has been pacified, Zhang Yu must select at least 10,000 soldiers to build him another ace iron army for the future expedition to Hebei.

"Compared to the soldiers of Long people, You think the skill of driving horses and breaking formations can be of great use!"

Xun You said with a smile: "Yuan Shao has many soldiers and generals. Hebei is close to the border, and Jizhou is rich in strong bows and crossbows. That's why Gongsun Zan can't defeat Yuan Shao. If you can use your horse-driving skills to your advantage, Yuan Shao's army will be unable to stop you!"

Hearing this, Zhang Yu narrowed his eyes slightly. He had been looking for a tactic to break the infantry phalanx. He was simply afraid of the few elite infantrymen under Yuan Shao's command. Now that his horse-driving skills could break Yan Xing's infantry, he would surely be able to break the strong vanguard troops like Qu Yi.

"Capture and kill Han Sui first!"

(End of this chapter)