Chapter 86: "Armed Pickup" in 1861
The deafening shouts of killing echoed across the vast grassland. Once again, the gauchos, these prairie wanderers, the cowboys of South America, rushed towards the Mapuche people, either holding spears or revolvers.
“Here they come!”
Chief Namunguza stared at the gauchos rushing towards him, his seemingly determined eyes carrying a hint of despair. He pursed his lips, and suddenly an idea popped into his mind.
Maybe I am destined to die here today!
At least I can die with honor!
As a soldier, dying on the battlefield may not be a bad outcome.
He knew very well that if he wanted these gauchos to give up, he had to inflict severe damage on them and hurt them as much as possible, and only then would they give up.
"Hus, we must tie them up, even if we all die here, we must tie them up. Only by tying them up can our wives and children have meat to eat and won't starve..."
"Chief, I know!"
Huss nodded vigorously.
"Kill all the white people!"
Chief Namunguza raised his spear with all his might, and the Mapuche riders around him shouted. Although the gauchos' revolvers were powerful, they were fearless.
Once again, they rushed forward without hesitation, gripping their spears tightly and stabbing at the white people and the gauchos in the face of bullets.
Although bullets hit their bodies, the wounded still shouted fanatically, waving their spears and stabbing the enemy with all their might. The sharp spear heads pierced the horses and even sent the gauchos on horseback flying into the air.
In the collision of blood, one person after another fell. Whether they were Gauchos or Mapuches, they were all fair in the face of death.
Chief Namunguza shouted as he stabbed a gaucho cavalryman down with his spear.
"Let them die..."
The blood mist dissipates!
The spears in the riders' hands were like sharp arrows, easily piercing the enemy's bodies. Under the impact of the war horses, the bodies were even torn in two.
The battlefield was a bloody mess, with swords flashing, people shouting, horses neighing, blood flowing like a river, and corpses everywhere.
Death is the inevitable outcome on the battlefield.
Although Matoro initially just wanted to break through the Mapuche defense line as he had done in the past, and now he was able to scatter the Mapuche people with the firepower advantage of his revolver, the Mapuche people were pestering him and all of them as if they were risking their lives.
In the fight, the firepower advantage of the revolvers was still overwhelming, and the cavalry on the battlefield continued to shoot at the Mapuche with their pistols. In order to kill as many enemies as possible, they even gave up hitting people and shot at horses instead, because horses were bigger and easier to hit.
More and more Mapuche people and horses fell under the muskets. Suddenly, the warhorse ridden by Chief Namunguza neighed and threw him to the ground.
Chief Namunguza fell to the ground and was a little dazed, but he still stood up, shook his head, and grabbed the spear.
"Well, it's all over..."
Yes, for the Mapuche who lost their horses on the battlefield, there was only one way to go: death.
A gaucho cavalryman spotted him and rode towards him.
Facing the sharp spear tip in the gaucho's hand, Chief Namunguza closed his eyes. He seemed to be feeling the gentle breeze of the Pampas. The breeze caressed his cheek and brushed his black hair. He clenched the spear in his hand, knowing that the moment of death was approaching again.
He did not feel fear at the thought of death, but his heart beat faster and his blood boiled. He opened his eyes, clenched the spear with both hands, and stared hard ahead.
At this moment, he saw the gaucho fall down, as if he had been tripped by something, and fell to the ground with his horse. Then another person fell down.
Then he heard a loud thunder!
How is this going?
The next moment, there was thunder.
The thunderous sound was the sound of hundreds of war horses trampling the ground. Four-wheeled carriages, pulled by four horses, were galloping across the Pampas.
One hundred chariots and four hundred horses would be a magnificent sight to see in action, and even a thousand cavalrymen could not produce such a magnificent display.
Juan and others who were riding on horses always had questions in their eyes as they followed this huge carriage team. They had seen carriages before, but had never seen carriages like this , let alone so many of them.
"Juan, why do you think they took a carriage? Why not horses?"
Malthus wondered.
"Perhaps, they don't have enough horses."
Juan had no idea that the carriage was Zhu Xianhai's real secret weapon .
What is the Pampas?
It is one of the most extensive grasslands in the world, and it is basically a treeless grassland. In such grasslands, in this era, both the Mapuche and the Argentines had a large number of cavalry. The former can be called a "nation on horseback", while the latter includes both gauchos and South American cowboys. In a word, they all grew up riding horses.
In contrast, Nanhua basically doesn't know how to ride a horse. How can they play cavalry like their opponents? It's just using their own weaknesses to attack the enemy's strengths. Isn't this courting death?
However, such terrain cannot do without cavalry, so after the first conflict with the Mapuche people, Zhu Xianhai has been thinking about how to restrain the cavalry.
flexibility!
This is the biggest advantage of cavalry.
The most important thing on the grassland is mobility, followed by firepower, and finally defense.
How should those who are not good at riding horses make up for their mobility?
After much thought, when Zhu Xianhai was riding in a horse-drawn carriage to the reclamation area, his eyes lit up. Compared with cavalry, the technology of driving a horse-drawn carriage is simpler, and he thought of a special horse-drawn carriage in old Soviet movies - a gun-carrying pickup truck. In fact, it is a machine gun mounted on a horse-drawn carriage, which can be called the ancestor of the "armed pickup truck". During the Soviet-Russian Civil War, the gun-carrying pickup trucks of the Red and White sides formed a battle formation to capture cities and territories on the vast East European plains, either attacking or defending, and played an extremely important role.
So Zhu Xianhai immediately designed a "standardized" gun-carrying tank.
The new "chariot" uses a lot of steel parts, and the rear half of the body is made of iron plates, which can provide a certain degree of protection for the crew. The use of leaf springs to reduce driving bumps not only improves riding comfort, but also plays a vital role in the accuracy of shooting. In addition, without springs, the violent bumps on the battlefield often cause wooden carriages to fall apart.
Although Zhu Xianhai did not have the Maxim machine gun, he had Henry rifles and Spencer rifles. He then formulated a field strategy based on the "chariot". This strategy abandoned infantry, artillery, and even cavalry. The four riflemen on the chariot, like the archers on the ancient chariot, stood on the chariot and shot. The core of this tactic was to form a battle formation with hundreds of chariots to fight against the enemy's cavalry.
Compared to cavalry shooting on galloping horses, chariots are definitely a more stable shooting platform! And on this flat prairie, there is absolutely no terrain problem using chariots.
The chariot is Zhu Xianhai’s secret weapon to roam the grassland!
The steam tank is... but it is too slow. A four-wheeled chariot is definitely not slower than cavalry!
On the grassland, it is definitely a weapon that is no less powerful than cavalry.
