From to 1935 2020

After the Red Army occupied Yuzhong, it was less than [-] kilometers away from Lanzhou.

At this time, the three horses in the northwest seemed to have been stabbed in the waist. Whether it was the Ningma in the northeast or the Qingma in the southwest, they all sent motorized cavalry units to support Lanzhou at this time.

Before the fall of Yuzhong, Sanma's troops wanted to defend several strategic points, but the Red Army used cannons to easily blast through the city's defenses. After annihilating the main defenders, they realized that they could not fight the Red Army directly. The traditional nomad-style raiding and harassment operations have been restored.

Avoiding the main force, the cavalry maneuvered in a wide range to attack the Red Army's logistical supplies.This is how they exhausted Sun Dianying in history, and this time Sanma also wants to repeat the previous experience.

Since mid-November, the cavalry of the Northwest Sanma has been swimming and fighting around Yuzhong, trying to force the Red Army to retreat by cutting off the Red Army's logistical supplies.

In the face of the Majia cavalry's surprise attack, they had already been mentally prepared. The grain guards on the cart jumped out of the cart, took out weapons from the cloth-covered cart, and set up guns under the cover of grain.Surprisingly, in this team of 150 pack carts, there were fifteen light machine guns on the pack carts alone.In addition, as the two corners of the isolated defensive position, there are more than six soldiers gathered beside the two carts. When they uncovered the white cloth on the carts, two water-cooled Mark cores appeared impressively. machine gun.

The driver of the mule-drawn carriage got out of the carriage at this time, unhooked the mule and horse and took it aside, and blocked the ears of the mule and horse with the prepared plugs to prevent them from being startled by the gunfire.

Hundreds of meters away, a large number of horse cavalrymen wearing cashmere hats rushed towards the convoy, blowing whistles and riding billowing yellow smoke.

There were about 400 Majiajun cavalry rushing forward. When they rushed about 500 meters away from the front of the position, the riflemen in the convoy began to aim and shoot.When advancing to 300 meters, the light and heavy machine guns mounted on the grain and grass began to show off.

It rained bullets.

For a moment, flesh and blood flew in front of the grain transportation convoy, and a large number of horses and their riders fell to the ground amidst screams.In history, the cavalry of the Majia Army was a nightmare for the West Route Army, but the premise was that the Red Army at that time had insufficient ammunition, poor equipment, and exhausted soldiers from long-term battles.

But now, with hundreds of cavalry charging, what they are facing is not a simple food transport team, but a "cavalry trap" with a firepower density reaching the battalion level.

This grain convoy, which seems to have only two companies of guards, has been a "lure and kill" trap carefully prepared by the Red Army for the Majia cavalry from the very beginning. Comes with a pistol for melee self-defense.

In the past few months after taking Gannan, the Red Army of the two places has done a lot of work against the Ma Jiajun.The first is intelligence work.A large number of veterans who participated in the war with the Majia army in southern Gansu and northern Shaanxi were recruited into the army. In addition to collecting intelligence, they also worked hard to attract the combat experience they imparted.The second is to recruit some "Guanzhong swordsmen" to join the Red Army, and the third is to borrow some veterans of the Northwest Army into the Red Army for military teaching when communicating with Yang Hucheng's Northwest Army.

There was no suspense in the whole battle, and some were just pure one-sided massacres.

After industrialization, the nomads all over the world began to "be good at singing and dancing" overnight.

There is no sea of ​​people after Maxim, and there are also no cavalry after Maxim!

The Battle of the Somme was not only a massacre of infantry, but also a cavalry cemetery that buried Britain and France. After that, Western countries knew that it was suicide to attack the machine gun position with cavalry.

This time is no exception.

In just one minute, more than 1 cavalry fell in front of the food transport team. The following cavalry reined in their horses in panic and wanted to retreat, but no matter how fast the troops turned around, they could not travel faster than the speed of the bullets.

The cavalry of the Ma family army who raided the "grain transport team" of the Red Army but fell into the trap of machine guns were wiped out within a few minutes, and only a dozen or so cavalry who were lagging behind barely escaped.

After the battle, the guards of the grain transportation team cleaned the battlefield, collected the opponent's weapon bullets, cut some horse meat and loaded it on the cart, and then moved on.

As for the horse corpses all over the ground, send out a telegram, and follow-up troops will come to deal with them.It is now mid-November, and the average temperature in the surrounding areas of Lanzhou has been below zero for a long time. These horse carcasses will not rot if left in the wild for a few days.

On the grain transportation road between Anxi and Yuzhong, there were three similar battles between the assault cavalry and the grain transportation team in November, and then the transportation line basically quieted down.

After losing more than 1000 cavalry, the famous "West Horse" cavalry shrank back. In the following days, he became a sneak attacking infantry on horseback. Then turn around and run.Although disgusting, it can no longer affect the overall situation.

Throughout November, the Red Army's strategic goal on the western front was quite clear: to wipe out all the three horse forces in Ningxia and Gansu to the east of the Yellow River.

This strategic goal was nearly completed in December, and the entire river east has theoretically become a racecourse for the Red Army—the reason why it is called a theory is because according to the standards of the Red Army, it must establish a solid Grassroots organization is the real occupation.

From north to south, the three horse powers ruled Yinchuan in Ningxia, Lanzhou in Gansu, and Xining in Qinghai, all west of the Yellow River.The result of the one-month battle can be regarded as returning all the results of the expansion of the Sanma forces to the Hedong area in the past 20 years.

The whole battle process went smoothly, but what is dissatisfying is that there are not many effective forces of the three horses that were really wiped out.Four regiments, one cavalry brigade, and a bunch of improvised local militias were wiped out one after the other.

As the Red Army ended the Battle of Yulin, a large number of the main force of the Red Army was transferred from Yulin to the west. Facing the more than 9 Red Army, they did not talk about flirtatiousness, and uprightly pushed the front line. withdraw.

By the beginning of December, the entire east of the river, except for Lanzhou and the Yongjing area where a large number of Muslims lived, was almost completely lost.As for the Yongjing area, after receiving Huang Ke's information from later generations and listening to the opinions of the Han people in Gannan area, the Red Army did not enter this area for the time being.

In the process, Xima Sanma also made a strategic mistake: in the battle in November, the Red Army captured Yuzhong early and assumed that it would attack Lanzhou at any time.Whether it was Sanma in the Northwest or Chang Kaishen in Nanjing, they all believed that the focus of the Red Army's attack was Lanzhou, the center of gravity in the northwest, and the starting point of the Hexi Corridor.

Among the three horses who depended on each other, Ningma Ma Hongbin also sent his cavalry brigade south to support Ganma.

However, in fact, the center of gravity of the Red Army's attack was not the direction of Lanzhou, which was the closest to the base area, but Yinchuan, Ningxia, which was the farthest.

When the main force of the five regiments of the Red Army on the northern front pressed Yinchuan, Ma Hongbin, who was awake from a dream, hastily withdrew the cavalry brigade sent to Lanzhou.

From Lanzhou to Yinchuan, the overland distance of the expressway in the 21st century is 430 kilometers. If it is placed on the "natural road" of the Republic of China, it will be even farther.

It is now the cold winter of December, and it is even more catastrophic to let the war horses run back and forth for nearly a thousand kilometers in this season.The Ningma cavalry, who made a wrong strategic judgment, reluctantly withdrew to Yinchuan, their horses either lost weight crazily, or died of a large number of illnesses, completely losing their mobility on the battlefield.

Although the Red Army marched farther from Guyuan and Yulin to Yinchuan, the Ningma cavalry at this time had completely lost their ability to make strategic roundabout raids.The harsh field environment in winter itself is a nightmare for cavalry long-distance raid operations.

Without much effort, the Red Army of the five armies easily seized all the land east of the river north of Yuzhong City, and soon began the battle of crossing the river.

December is the dry season of the Yellow River. When the water is the shallowest, you can easily cross the river in some river sections with your trousers up.In December 1935, there happened to be a large number of such crossings on the section of the Yellow River from Lanzhou to Yinchuan.

Huang Ke reminded that it took the Red Army three full months to complete all kinds of intelligence preparations, and with the help of a large number of "Guanzhong swordsmen" captured in the Battle of Yulin, the Red Army marched west easily. Find a place suitable for crossing the river.

The battle of crossing the river began on December [-]. When Ning Ma Hongbin realized that the real main attack direction of the Red Army was Yinchuan, he hurriedly withdrew the reinforcements sent from Lanzhou, but it was too late.

The fierce battle began from the point where the Red Army crossed the river.However, during the dry season of the Yellow River, Ningma, who was short of troops and ammunition, could not resist the prepared Red Army's crossing operation.

After paying thousands of casualties, relying on the natural danger of the Yellow River, the battle plan of Bandu Shizhi went bankrupt on the same day. The first batch of thousands of Red Army troops crossed the Yellow River and established a solid beachhead. Expand the scope of the ferry control area.By December 6rd, all the main force of the Red Army, more than [-], had set foot on the land on the west bank of the Yellow River.On the [-]th, the Red Army captured all the outer positions of Yinchuan and began to attack the main city of Yinchuan.

At the head of Yinchuan City, Ma Hongbin looked at the continuous traffic trench outside the city through the lookout, feeling like Jing Yuexiu with a terrible headache.

Northwest is a place where Gu is raised. Years of vicious internal fighting have caused all parties involved in the war to develop the habit of building their own walls high and thick, densely covered with fortresses.As the core nest of Ningma, Yinchuan's city defense fortress is as strong as Yulin's.The history of the Yinchuan City Wall can even be traced back to the Qianlong era—that is, the period of Princess Xiangxiang.

Looking down from the city wall, you can see a large number of corpses that were too late to clean up, lying in disorder on the position in front of the traffic trench.Unlike Jing Yuexiu, who had lost his ambition and was waiting to die, Ma Hongbin knew what they wanted to do after seeing the Red Army using the traffic trench rise tactics on a large scale to approach the city wall.

From the first day, he organized death squads to go out to steal the camp, hoping to attack at night to prevent the Red Army from digging tunnels, but in front of the opponents who were prepared, he left a large number of corpses in vain every time.After realizing that this kind of attack on the camp was just a waste of death, Ma Hongbin could only be like Jing Yuexiu, watching helplessly as the opponent dug the traffic trench to his city wall bit by bit.

Compared to Jing Yuexiu, he even knew that there must be several hidden tunnels digging towards the Yinchuan City Wall.When it arrives, the Red Army must have planted a large amount of explosives, and then blow up the city wall.

"Times have changed!"

Ma Hongbin sighed in his heart.

Same as Jing Yuexiu, every time he peeped out, he would shrink his head immediately after only a few glances, because there were a large number of accurate shooters hidden in the mounds and traffic trenches outside the city wall, who would shoot at them from time to time. Shots were fired on the city wall.

In addition to cold guns, when the opponent dug the traffic trench to 100 meters away from the city wall two days ago, the defenders in Yinchuan had a new service compared to Yulin.

"Thump! Thump! Thump!"

"Thump! Thump! Thump!"

"Bombardment!"

There were several low-pitched gunshots from outside the city wall. To be precise, within three seconds, dozens of artillery pieces fired at the city head at the same time.

Ma Hongbin, who was on the top of the wall, saw that in the opposite traffic trench, thick black smoke caused by the shelling was continuously rising from several places. At the same time, multiple black spots visible to the naked eye jumped out of the black smoke, flying out in parabolas. , hitting the city wall at a not too fast speed.

The sharp alarm whistle sounded, and there was a great chaos on or near the city wall. Even Ma Hongbin hurriedly found a cover to hide.

"Boom boom boom..."

After more than a dozen explosions in a row, everything quieted down.

Then, the air was filled with the stench of dried manure mixed with gunpowder smoke.

"It's the golden dung cannon again, it's really wicked and bubbling!"

Smelling the lingering stench, Ma Hongbin cursed bitterly in his heart.

"Golden Dung Cannon" was the nickname given to it by the defenders after the first encounter with this artillery made by Huang Ke.

The prototype of this gun brought by Huang Ke is the 2.5-inch anti-tank gun that was widely equipped by the British in World War II.It looks like an astronomical telescope on a tripod.The artillery body is a seamless steel pipe, with a simple barrel at the rear, without the locking mechanism of traditional artillery, but similar to the sealing cover structure of the popcorn machine that is very common in the market, a flip-type breech block, this is the barrel up.

Note the "well" font size and click in to see the relevant information of the historical prototype

The firing structure of the artillery is also very strange. After opening the barrel, the shell is loaded first. The shell adopts a split structure, which can be used to launch hollow-charge ammunition for anti-tank, or a grenade with the insurance removed (but be careful to plug it into the barrel), and then stuff a cylindrical propellant with a metal shell (with black powder inside) into the barrel. Before closing the barrel, a cap needs to be placed in the center of the breech block.

It was invented by police officer Robert Harry Northover in the United States, and it weighs about 25 kilograms (including the bracket). This is a weapon similar to that made of tap water pipes.It has a tripod or tetrapod composed of hollow tubes, on which the artillery mount can be adjusted in a 360° circle, and a large pitch adjustment, and the operation is similar to a heavy machine gun with a tripod.This weapon is simple and easy to produce, and at least 1943 have been produced by the time production ceased in 10000, which is an extremely impressive number.

But in the British army, this gun almost never saw battle.In addition to the impressive accuracy, the maximum range is only 150 meters, and the power is not enough.

As a senior technician, Huang Ke, who came to Shanghai for the first time, just glanced at the photos of this weapon on the Internet, and then easily imitated it.Then the processing of spare parts is given to the students of Jiaotong University as "homework", and he is only responsible for trimming and processing the most difficult parts.

In the eyes of the British, this cannon actually received rave reviews, and it was said that it could only "fool the volunteers of the National Guard". It was originally a product of the panic in the British mainland after the French Battle. As a "psychological comfort" weapon.

However, many military fans in Huang Ke and later generations think that this weapon is very suitable for China.

It must be very difficult to use for tanks and precise attacks.But when he regards it as a large grenadier and fires explosive shells, it is a "very good" "good gun" that "does not pick shells".

Huang Ke thought it was reasonable, and based on a few photos as a reference, he designed it himself, and rebuilt the cannon using 75mm seamless steel pipes that could be bought in the concession as materials.

In order to reduce the difficulty of production, the 360-degree rotation function of the ring is cancelled, and it can only be shot from the pitch - because the former is unnecessary.The way to adjust and fix the pitch angle is simply to loosen and tighten the handle.

According to Huang Ke's own evaluation - the American design is already crude enough, but his improved design is even simpler than the American's, which is a shame for a "national technician".

It is also very simple to fire, aiming at the target with the simple ruler above the barrel.A section of the grip structure extending backwards under the barrel has an extremely simple trigger on it. The shooter can pull the trigger after aiming at the target. The hammer hits the cap and ignites the propellant through the ignition hole, and then the sub-package Type of warhead hit out.

When Huang Ke first built the cannon manually, he cleverly made an improvement: the flip-type breech block was replaced with a screw-type breech block. This improvement made the breech block more compact and safer, and even reduced the A couple of "extra" snap parts.

Then after finishing, he realized that this improvement is extremely stupid: the reason is that whether it is adding threads to the barrel or making corresponding threads on the breech block, there must be corresponding equipment, or an extremely handy machine like him Artisan technology. ——It was a very successful improvement, but the disadvantage was that it was a waste of time, and then he honestly changed back to the original clamshell design, only strengthening the buckle to prevent it from being knocked off when shooting.

Another simplification of the design made by Huang Kezuo was to cancel the launch trigger.The firing cap was replaced by a slender soil detonator fuze, which was inserted through a small hole drilled from the position of the gun barrel near the breech breech, lit with fire, or pulled on the fuse, and it could be fired.This improvement saves the trigger parts and reduces the manufacturing time. When the gun is fired, the gunner does not need to face the breech block that may be knocked off, but it is very safe. This is Huang Ke's most proud improvement.

After the artillery samples are produced, corresponding shells are needed.When he was in Shanghai, Huang Ke tried several kinds: from the wine bottle to the bamboo tube, he chose the bamboo tube at first. He found a bamboo with a diameter of less than 75 mm, cut a section, punched a hole, stuffed it with explosives and added a fuze.Tried firing and it was very successful, but the shells flew randomly, and it all depends on character.Then I thought of another thing: There seems to be no bamboo forest here in northern Shaanxi...

In the end, after Xiao Huangke resumed contact with Da Huangke, Da Huangke shared the situation on the Internet.The keyboard inventors from three mountains and five mountains immediately came up with ideas, and in the end, a wicked and bubbling guy's proposal was unanimously applauded by everyone.

That is to use cement as the material, straw rope and bamboo tendons as the bone, cast the shell of the shell, insert an explosive core inside, and fill a large amount of iron sand soaked in feces and dry between the explosive core and the cement shell.Thus, a conscienceless "smelliest weapon" was born.

After the Red Army completed the Long March, they managed to get some cement from Xi'an and Baoji in September, and then, according to Huang Ke's vision, began to cast this kind of "iron sand feces stink bomb"-the reason why they did not manufacture traditional grenades was mainly because Conditions are temporarily not allowed.

After the shells were produced, the effect was very satisfactory after multiple test shots.

The shell of the projectile made of cement did not have a lot of fragmented shrapnel after the explosion, but the feces soaked in iron sand filled in a large amount inside was extremely vicious.During the test, the flying iron sand punched countless small holes in the sheepskin of the wooden man prepared in advance-it couldn't penetrate the sheepskin, but it could tear the human skin.

Those iron sands usually cannot kill people directly, but Huang Ke knows that the bacteria contained in it, as long as they scratch the skin, can easily cause various infections, even tetanus, which is extremely deadly for this era .

As more cement was sent to the Red Army base area through various channels, a large number of this extremely simple "stinkiest shell" was also produced, and it began to be used on a large scale when attacking Yinchuan City, and quickly won the victory. The "notoriety" of "golden dung cannon".

In the past two days, as the traffic trench approached to a hundred meters below the city of Yinchuan, whether it was day or night, every once in a while, the Red Army outside the city set up all twelve "golden dung cannons" in their hands and fired a salvo. two rounds of shells

The British's prototype cannon had a maximum range of 150 meters, and Huang Ke's knockoff was similar.In testing and actual combat, the Red Army also found some shortcomings: that is, the gun cannot be fired continuously, because the barrel will overheat soon, and it is easy to detonate the sensitive black powder launch package in advance.It is safest to only fire two or three shells at a time........ It is impossible to fire a large number of shells in a short time to suppress the opponent, but it is a very useful weapon for guerrilla warfare.

Then the situation became like this: In the past two days, after firing a round of shells, the Red Army outside is usually not in a hurry to fight the second round. They only wait for the barrel to cool down, when they are happy to fight the second round and then the second round. two rounds.Of course, occasionally there will be two consecutive shots or something.In the past two days, the defenders of the Yinchuan city wall were harassed by the extremely wicked artillery, and they were permeated in the foul-smelling air for a long time, almost going crazy.

During the two-day siege, the Red Army outside the city fired hundreds of these "stinkiest shells" into the city of Yinchuan, directly killing the defenders.

More than 20 people were injured, but hundreds were injured (most of them were minor wounds with scratches on the skin).Due to the lag in the onset of bacterial infection, the consequences of being blasted will not be revealed until some time later.

Even so, the entire city wall of Yinchuan city was stinky because of the flying of dry dung powder.Not only did it make the defenders extremely uncomfortable, but even the Red Army surrounded outside the city felt sick when they smelled the stench that occasionally wafted along the wind.

The enemy's front commander who attacked Yinchuan City was Dong Zhentang.

"The tunnel is about to be dug under the city wall?"

The comrades of the engineering company replied:

"The six tunnels can be dug under the city wall in one day at most."

In the command center, Dong Zhentang looked at the majestic figure of Yinchuan City not far away through the binoculars, with mixed feelings in his heart.