King's Landing in France

Page 133

"Then the revolution gave them high morale, and it is normal for such troops to be better at fighting than the Austrian army.

"But now we have a bunch of rabble in our hands."

An Ning: "The only way to deal with it is to build a stronghold and fight silently. The good news is that we have several rivers that can be used as defensive barriers.

"We deploy ladder defenses by the river, trade space for time, and use troops to pile up the enemies. Let the troops go now."

Berthier: "It's reasonable. But before the troops leave, we have to decide on the army commander. The selection of the army commander must be cautious. I tend to choose old officers with certain military experience. There are still a few who support the Republic. General's."

An Ning curled her lips, wondering if she would rack her brains to disarm these old soldiers after defeating the enemy?

In the old French army system, four generations of nobles must be hereditary to become senior officers.

Therefore, the generals of the old French army were basically big nobles. Now the old nobles who are beheaded like the assembly line of the Republic can't really count on their loyalty.

After a short thought, An Ning vetoed the idea: "No, it's nothing more than a low-level military officer. After all, a lieutenant colonel can make waves is limited. Those who command an army must be loyal and reliable. Choose people who are famous in society. Be the commander."

"Everything is up to you." Berthier immediately agreed respectfully, but immediately changed the topic, "But these teachers, painters and businessmen really can't be expected to have such excellent conductors. Is it... just like before In that case, you can appoint some people to be the army commander? Anyway, you can find people with no experience, so why not just..."

Berthier has always had some complaints about An Ning's promotion of various front-line personnel. At this time, he took the initiative to ask An Ning to nominate some famous celebrities to serve as army commanders.

An Ning was scratching her head and faced a difficult situation. She also had to be famous and able to convince the public, but also had military talent to be able to fight well...

Those promoted by An Ning in the past had excellent performances, so there have always been rumors in the army that "General Frost has received a divine revelation".

Such rumors have side effects. If there is a problem with the person recommended by An Ning, they will immediately suffer backlash.

After thinking about it, An Ning shook her head: "No, I don't know such a person, it's better for you and Lazar to choose someone who is famous."

Don't make me take the blame if something goes wrong.

An Ning has already got some famous generals, and he will wait for their military ranks to be raised in the next war.

At that time, it happens that these celebrities do not perform well in the war, so we can take the opportunity to replace them.

Berthier didn't know An Ning's calculations, he frowned, not hiding his worry at all: "Crazy, we actually want to use such an army that has been almost laymen from top to bottom to defeat the coalition forces of two old powers. "

An Ning patted his chief of staff on the shoulder: "Believe in the great people of the great country, we are not facing the enemy alone, the whole of France is with us."

Berthier corrected: "It is two-thirds of France, and at least one-third of the region has rebelled."

An Ning thought what was wrong with this, I have encountered much worse situations than this - in "Europa Universalis 4".

The rebels guarding the country's gates are no joke.

Sometimes when the enemy country attacks when you explode the rebels, An Ning will move your army around the enemy's land and wait for the enemy country to wipe out all the rebels on your own land before returning to fight the weakened enemy army.

Thinking of the previous experience of playing games, An Ning even smiled.

Seeing his smile, Berthier showed an expression of "the general is really unfathomable".

Just then, someone came in to report: "Urgent letter from Nice."

An Ning: "Give it to me!"

As he spoke, he came to the courier in three steps, grabbed the envelope that the courier had just pulled out, and opened it.

The letter was written by Massena. He led 3 French troops to attack on his own initiative, and defeated more than [-] Sardinian troops on the plain in front of Mondoville, and had already approached Mondoville.

An Ning was overjoyed, and while handing the letter to Berthier, he said: "We must vigorously publicize Massena's victory, and now we urgently need a good news to boost morale!

"Tell our soldiers that the army of the Republic is a new type of army, an army armed with the ideas of the Great Revolution, and it is by no means comparable to the army of these old kingdoms!"

Berthier: "It should be publicized vigorously. By the way, don't we inform Parliament?"

"The parliament has special commissioners in Italy, and they will communicate... Well, let's talk to the parliament. After all, the parliament is the highest authority in France in theory, and we are just military generals appointed by the parliament."

As soon as An Ning finished speaking, a new messenger arrived.

This time it was a messenger from the parliament: "Report, the parliament has just passed the amendment of the new military rank. In order to ensure the smooth flow of the chain of command, the ranks of army general and legion general are specially added to the original highest rank division general! "

An Ning: "What the hell, do they have to replace the original military ranks of the old kingdom? Is there any problem if the form doesn't change?"

Berthier asked the messenger: "Who proposed to consider this amendment? We just ordered the new military rank to be ignored in the conference yesterday. We will amend it today. The response is very fast."

Messenger: "It's Bishop Talleyrand."

An Ning frowned: "Talleyrand?"

Damn, this chameleon, shouldn't it treat me as a wall?

Chapter 227 Napoleon in Sedan

While An Ning was busy expanding his army and fighting wits with the parliament, Napoleon finally saw the flag of the Prussian-Austrian Allied Forces in Sedan.

"I thought they were going to drown in the mud in the early spring of France." Napoleon muttered while watching the enemy change from marching column to horizontal formation with a telescope.

France's current infrastructure is very bad-well, it has not yet entered the industrial age, and of course the infrastructure cannot be compared with that after the industrial revolution.

After all, cement had not yet been invented at this time, and asphalt was also a rare paving material that could only be used in places where asphalt was produced.

The country roads in France are still specially leveled, but they can't hold up to the spring rain.

The mud caused the Prussian-Austrian coalition forces to advance slowly after crossing the border, and now they have only touched the front of the Sedan Fortress.

Napoleon even suspected that the Prussian-Austrian Allied Forces were not motivated to fight and were deliberately grinding foreign labor.

He put down the binoculars and said to the adjutant next to him: "Quickly, get everyone ready. Today the enemy should only attack tentatively to test the strength of our defense. We hurt them, and tomorrow they will attack more concern!"

As soon as the words fell, the guns of the Prussian-Austrian Allied Forces rang.

Napoleon hurriedly raised the binoculars: "Fire from such a distance?"

As soon as the words fell, there was the sound of shells piercing through the air, and then Duang hit the slope of the fortress wall with a bang.

The outer walls of the bastion are all sloped, which has a very high defense against shells.

The cannon of Urban might have blasted the walls of Constantinople, but not the walls of the bastion.

Napoleon looked in the direction of the rising smoke: "Well, it turned out to be a 24-pound cannon. No wonder they pushed it so slowly. It turned out to be pushing this thing forward."

24-pound heavy guns are generally installed on warships, and the bottom deck of a first-class battleship will be equipped with such heavy guns.

This thing is extremely troublesome to use on land, because it is too heavy.

I don't know if it was the Prussians or the Austrians, but they pushed this kind of heavy artillery to the front line and fired at the coloring fortress.

On the sea, this kind of heavy artillery may destroy the wooden deck of the battleship, but on land, facing the thick sloping outer wall, even such a cannon is not painful.

In this era, attacking the fortress is a pure meat-cracking battle, and the defenders can kill a large number of enemies with cleverly designed fortifications.

To conquer a strong fortified fortress like Sedan, the attacker had to carry out earthworks, which would be a long process anyway.

Napoleon is now full of confidence: "Hmph, there is no need for reinforcements at all. With the strength I have now, I can stop the Prussian-Austrian coalition forces until the counterattack begins in July!"

※※※

Grand Duke Karl was observing the fortress of Sedan with a telescope, admiring while observing: "The French military engineers have done a good job, and this fortress has been repaired very well. I am afraid that the siege will be extremely long. We can only hope that hunger and disease will make the French Give in."

Carl's chief of staff said worriedly: "The nobles who fled from Paris and led us said that the French army gathered in Paris, and the delay has been long. It is estimated that we will have to face a large number of French troops.

"Although most of them probably had little training, a musket was almost as deadly in the hands of a recruit as it was in the hands of a veteran."

The accuracy of the musket is poor, and there is not much difference between veterans and recruits.Although veterans theoretically reload smoother and faster, the inherently poor rate of fire of muskets makes this advantage less important.

Carl: "No, that's not what I'm most worried about. I'm most worried about the enemy generals!"

The chief of staff asked with some disdain: "The cobbler?"

"He may come from a humble background, but he must have outstanding military talent to defeat so many veterans! And he has always been very good at commanding this kind of motley army, and he has turned the motley army into an elite army!

"If we delay in these fortresses for too long, what we face in Paris may not be a mob, but the elite trained by the generals. We will be drowned by the vast number of French troops."

The chief of staff was a little disbelieving: "It was only yesterday that there was a rebellion in western France. Marshal Alvinzi and the Duke of Brunswick both believed that the French army we faced was at most 20 people, which was evenly matched with ours. Everyone believed that This estimate overestimates the French!"

Karl didn't answer, just stared at the battlefield.

The Prussian-Austrian coalition forces that had just arrived launched a tentative attack on the fortress, and the battle infantry of the coalition forces was approaching the bastion of the fortress.

The troops at the front of the line had already entered the trench, and the French army on the fortress was constantly shooting, and the entire fortress was shrouded in smoke from the shooting.

Carl: "There will be no results, no, no. I am opposed to such a waste of troops. We should first surround the fortress, settle down, and then approach bit by bit through soil work."

Chief of Staff: "You just said that we have to act fast, otherwise we will be drowned by the French army..."

"Moving quickly is not the same as wasting troops like this!" Carl sighed.In this battle, he is not the supreme commander.

He could only watch as the coalition forces tried to attack the fortress according to the orders of the high command, because both Marshal Alvinzi and the Duke of Brunswick felt that the French might not be ready in a hurry.

How is this possible!

Archduke Karl cursed in his heart while watching the lives of the Austrians and Prussians being consumed in front of the strong fortress for no reason.

※※※

At night, Napoleon ordered to take out precious dried meat and wine to reward the soldiers who killed the enemy in large numbers today.

During the banquet, Napoleon personally came among the soldiers—he was learning from General Frost, whom he admired the most. The general liked to walk around his barracks in an approachable manner, and greeted the soldiers.

"Everyone!" Napoleon said as he stood on a carriage carrying baggage and stood on the barrels on the cart, "Today's coalition attack was easily resolved by us, and they left a large number of corpses under our city. Every day's attack will definitely suffer heavy setbacks like today! We will stay here and block them until the general's counterattack comes!"

Napoleon drank a big gulp of wine, then smashed the tin wine glass on the ground, and said loudly: "Your Excellency the General told me that there is a way to hold on firmly! After the victory in the war, he will personally welcome me!"

"Think about it, that's the French God of War, a Caesar-like figure, he personally greets us, it's exciting to think about it!

"Of course, His Excellency the General has never been stingy with material rewards. When he was in Italy, he promised the glory of conquest and the wealth of Italy like everyone else, and he did it!

"Comrades! To the general, to the Republic, to yourself! Cheers!"

Under the magic of wine, the soldiers shouted together: "For the general, for the Republic!"

At this moment, neither Napoleon nor Grand Duke Karl knew that this was just the beginning of their fateful confrontation.

Chapter 228 I am His Excellency General's most proud student

In a blink of an eye, Napoleon had been guarding Sedan for a week.

After three days of initial storming, the Prussian-Austrian Allied Forces found that the fortress was well-prepared and morale was high, and it was unlikely to rely on a rapid offensive to take it in a short period of time, so they began the siege and soil work.

This morning, as soon as Napoleon woke up, the chief of staff rushed over to report: "Acting Commander, today an Austrian officer surrendered to us because he longed for the republic!"

Napoleon was overjoyed: "What? There is such a thing? No, maybe there is a fraud. I will meet him later!"

Then Napoleon rushed to the command room of the fortress in a hurry.

Previously, in order to prevent the coalition forces from attacking at night, Napoleon slept directly in the command room, laying a bed on the floor. The offensive finally slowed down in the past two days, and Napoleon returned to his room and slept beautifully on the camp bed for a few nights.

When they arrived at the command room, the officer who surrendered was drinking coffee. Seeing Napoleon come in, he quickly stood up and said, "Your Excellency, Commander!"

Napoleon: "How do you know I'm the commander? Is my name already so resounding in the coalition forces?"

"No, it's because everyone said that the commander commanding the city wall these days is relatively short, so..."

Napoleon: "Chief of Staff, I think this person is a fake surrender!"

The chief of staff thought for a while, but didn't answer.

The Austrian said: "I am deeply influenced by the enlightenment thought, and I have read the works of Voltaire and Rousseau freely, and I once went to the New World as a volunteer to participate in the North American liberation war. The republic established by the people of the New World inspired me deeply. !"

Napoleon: "You don't have to say so much. I'll know if you really want a republic. I'll test you. What is the biggest advantage of the French Republic now?"

The Austrian thought for a while and replied: "Is it an advanced republic system? A system that conforms to the social contract theory and the theory of separation of powers..."

Napoleon: "Shit! It's the people! Everyone in the republic is equal, so everyone is a master. This is called master spirit! This is the magic weapon for our army to win!"

The Austrian looked at Napoleon suspiciously: "Whose theory is this?"

Napoleon: "The person who put forward the theory is not yet well-known in the academic world, and only those close to us know about it. But in the future, some people will write books for him, just wait and see!"

"Ah..." the Austrian seemed to understand, "It turned out to be General Frost's statement, er, I am not familiar with the general, and I don't know the general..."

Napoleon: "Huh, come, someone, arrest him and imprison him until the defense of the fortress is over."

Austrian: "I have brought the latest information!"

"Oh, really? Then tell me, how many people are besieging the fortress, and who is in command."

Because of the onslaught of the previous few days, the coalition forces failed to climb the walls of the fortress after breaking through the trenches, so the French army did not capture any prisoners at all, and there was no way to interrogate them.

The Austrians were also straightforward: "You are facing 7000 people from the Austrian Third Army and 5000 people from the Prussian Second Army. Judging from the current progress of the soil work, you will be confronted in a few days." Up to [-] coalition forces attacking in turn."

Napoleon: "And who commanded this combined force?"

The Austrians replied: "The Austrian army is led by Archduke Karl, and the Prussian army is led by General Franz. The two sides are bounded by the north-south axis of the fortress, with the Prussian army on the west and the Austrian army on the east. There is a joint in the middle. You must send When the messenger goes out of the city, he should go in the middle, and he should be able to escape in the dark."