The Song Dynasty's Western Expedition was very fast, and in just one month it seized a large area of ​​land in Xixia. The three important prefectures south of Xixia, Xiazhou, Longzhou and Yinzhou were all occupied by the Song Dynasty.

These three prefectures are simply gateways to the south for Xixia. Not to mention the situation of supporting each other, the number of foreign tribes here alone has nearly 100,000. However, it is obvious that the Dangxiang people miscalculated. These more than 100,000 foreign tribes have been bribed by various means by the Song Dynasty, or moved to the heartland of the Song Dynasty, or become the army of the Song Dynasty.

The change of ownership of the three states allowed the Xixia gate to open, and also pushed the border of the Song Dynasty forward for more than a hundred miles. After receiving the order, the border guards of the Song Dynasty began to advance. The Dingbian Army, Suide Army and the Security Army on Yongxing Army Road took over the defense of these prefectures and cities and occupied geographical advantages to build city defense. The three states were supporting each other. In addition, Hongzhou and Yanzhou, which had been operated for many years in the Song Dynasty, these five states were as solid as a soup.

It is completely different from the East and West Armed armies. The Southern Army adopts the idea of ​​steady combat, which is also the most suitable combat method for the Song Dynasty. The Southern Army represents the characteristics of the Song Dynasty army, mostly mainly infantry, supplemented by powerful siege equipment and formations, and siege cities and villages are naturally no problem.

The artillery of the Firearms Battalion is their mountain-piercing axe. Any strong city wall is broken like dust in front of them. Coupled with the army of infantry, it is difficult for the Xixia city to last for how long in front of the Southern Army.

The emergence of artillery is something that breaks the balance of the battlefield. Relatively, there are advantages and disadvantages. The artillery is heavy and extremely inconvenient to move. Artillery weighing hundreds or thousands of kilograms cannot adapt to the speed of the cavalry at all. It can only be most effective in infantry.

This big guy with a black hole seems amazing, but if he is used to deal with the cavalry units of the Xixia people, it is simply a desperate situation. Facing the aim of mobile targets is a big problem, let alone factors such as loading time. If it is to fight against large-scale infantry, it will have a relatively large effect.

The only firearms brought by the Firearm Battalion this time were artillery and gunpowder bullets. Even if Zhao Zhen insisted, Di Qing denied the function of the musket. In his eyes, the musket's armor-piercing ability was still good, but relatively speaking, its cost was too high. Although the range was as high as 600 steps, twice that of the ratchet crossbow, the speed of this musket was too slow...

This answer made Zhao Zhen speechless. Yes, the speed of the musket was a little slower, but now the muskets of the Song Dynasty have used the Minie warhead, and even straight rifles have appeared in the barrel. Zhao Zhen tried the accuracy of this thing and can maintain a considerable accuracy within 300 meters. Such accuracy cannot be achieved even if it is a ratchet crossbow, right?

But Di Qing still stubbornly rejected and gave a reasonable answer. When the two armies were fighting, the role of long-range forces was to fire long crossbow arrows to the enemy in the shortest time, because there was no need for accuracy at all...

Zhao Zhen was instantly cried by his "little cleverness". Di Qing was right, in the Song Dynasty... no, in the entire history of China! All large-scale wars were 100,000, hundreds of thousands, or even millions. With such a huge scale, even if the accuracy of the crossbow arrow was not good, it would hit people with a huge base.

A military weapon with strong lethality and high accuracy is not suitable for the needs of the Chinese War. This is something that Zhao Zhen would never have thought of. From the beginning, his thinking was wrong and he was influenced by later generations...

The Minie rifle, which I think is quite good, went in the wrong direction in the initial assumptions and premises. In this way, the Minie rifle can only be eliminated from the battlefield, not because it is bad, but because it is too good...

This made Zhao Zhen feel better. The main forces of the Firearms Battalion in the Song Dynasty would be invested in the development of artillery. Although the musket was hidden, Zhao Zhen did not intend to let go completely because he had seen the horror of this thing, as long as he could increase his speed...

Zhao Zhen believes that through the accumulation of the times and the continuous improvement of technology, when the post-mounted muskets are released, they will inevitably become alternative crossbow arrows. Of course, muskets, which break the balance of war, will definitely become the target of imitation between countries.

But Zhao Zhen would never refuse to do it just because he was afraid of being imitated. Even if he didn't do it himself, it would sooner or later with the development of history. Could it be that if the Song Dynasty did not do other countries, there would be no muskets? This is obviously impossible.

What the Song Dynasty had to do was to always maintain leading technology and maintain strong national strength. As long as it stood at the forefront of the world, it would leave those imitating international love far behind.

The powerful power of artillery has already made the Liao people covetous and constantly sent secret spies to spy on it. Fortunately, the firearm battalion is an independent military system and directly under the jurisdiction of Zhao Zhen, and is only responsible to Zhao Zhen. Therefore, it is difficult to steal information about artillery from the Song Dynasty than climbing to the sky.

The huge power and destructive power of artillery were truly reflected on the battlefield of Xixia. The artillery power of the Great Song Firearms Battalion is enough to destroy the city walls of any country in the world. Not to mention the Western Xia, even the solid city of the Liao Dynasty is not an opponent of the Great Song Artillery.

The black holes emitted bursts of blue smoke. This was the most advanced bronze cannon in the Song Dynasty. The bronze cannon is much better than the cast iron, and it is at least not easy to explode. The cast iron technology of this era did not meet the needs of artillery. Brass is too expensive, and only bronze is the most suitable.

Even so, the cost of casting bronze cannons is so expensive, and the technical difficulty is quite high. Even if it is made with the national strength of the Song Dynasty, it is already quite rare to build more than 100 cannons.

For the Liao people, artillery was not necessary at all, because they mainly used cavalry operations in wars, and maneuvering was the force they valued the most. If expensive artillery was deployed in the army, some of the cavalry in the Liao Dynasty would have to be changed into infantry, which is what the Liao people most reluctant to see.

After the artillery that was being supervised by the Liao Dynasty successively exploded, the Empress Dowager Liao decisively gave up this unrealistic thing, which was at least unrealistic to the Liao Dynasty...

Today, the Western Xia has been forced to a point where there is nowhere to retreat. The elite cavalry of the Song Dynasty is not inferior to the Iron Harrier, and the damage to the city by artillery is far more terrifying than that of the cavalry. In order to speed up the advancement, the Song Dynasty's army constantly attacked the cities of the Xixia people with artillery. No city wall can withstand the bombardment of more than a hundred artillery pieces.
Chapter completed!