Chapter 726: Approaching for reconnaissance

The two small-scale confrontations during this day and night were just appetizers before the war, but the corpses of several enemy soldiers hanging in the central square did play a certain role in soothing the mood of the people in the city. After all, this was already Paris.

For the third time in the past five years, the city of Batavia was attacked by the Malan army. Although the first two battles ended with the active withdrawal of the Malan side, no one knew that the city of Batavia

Whether it can survive the third offensive. Being able to achieve some results at the beginning of the siege can make the people in the city a little more optimistic about the future trend of the battle.

However, some well-informed people, such as people like Su Keyi and Cheng Dapeng, have learned from special channels that those who fought against the defenders were just the vanguard of the Ma-Ba Blue Army, and that the terrible ones hanging in the square were

They were not just a few randomly picked up from the piles of enemy corpses outside the city, but a total of so many people were beaten to death under the city. It would be impossible to hang up a few more to show off their prestige.

After initially testing the strength of the garrison at the top of the city, the following Matalan troops did not immediately launch an siege. Instead, they set up camp outside the city and began preparations for the siege. However, according to their past

The method is that this preparation period only lasts for two or three days, and by then it will no longer be a minor harassment.

Taking advantage of this rare period of calm, Cheng Dapeng brought his condolences to the city defense headquarters outside the North City Gate, and under the introduction of Su Keyi, he met Anthony Fan, the supreme commander of the city's defenders.

Dimen.

Due to the language barrier between the two parties and Van Diemen's busy military affairs, the two simply exchanged a few words through Su Keyi's translator. As for Cheng Dapeng's intention, Su Keyi had already told Van Diemen in advance. Due to the actions of the Su family,

Guarantee, and Cheng Dapeng himself was considered a well-known businessman in Batavia City, so Van Diemen did not doubt Cheng Dapeng's true intention of visiting the city this time, and quickly approved his visit to the city wall.

An application to provide condolences to the combat troops on the front line. Of course, for safety reasons, Su Keyi also had to go to the top of the city as an escort.

During the siege of the city during the war, it was difficult for even wealthy businessmen to organize decent comfort items, so the things Cheng Dapeng prepared were extremely simple and crude - just boxes of cash. Before giving to Van Diemen

After leaving behind a pair of heavy gold ingots, Cheng Dapeng directed his followers to carry the box containing the silver ingots all the way up the city wall.

The outline of the city wall of Batavia City, designed and built by the Dutch, is an irregular bastion structure, and the Dutch-style bastion can undoubtedly occupy a place in the history of war. During the Dutch War of Independence, it was used

Fortresses such as bastions made it difficult for the Spanish army to fight in the Netherlands. In the end, although the Spanish had the superior force, they had to withdraw from this area because they could not conquer the numerous bastions.

Most of the territory of the Netherlands is flat and lowland, with almost no danger to defend. This allowed the Dutch to gradually design more and more complex fortresses during the war. Their structure alone could add some combat effectiveness to the defenders.

The city of Batavia they built in the northwest corner of Java Island can be said to have concentrated the essence of Dutch bastion fortifications. In terms of the reliability of defense, there is basically no other city in Southeast Asia that can match it.

Of course, due to the intervention of the Haihan people in this time and space, bastions are no longer just unique fortress buildings built by European colonists. In fact, the Victory Fort in Sanya is a defensive fortress designed according to the bastion principle.

Its defensive capabilities require a guard force of less than a thousand people to resist an enemy force ten times larger than one's own, which shows the power of this kind of fortress.

In the history of world wars, bastions began to rise widely in Europe in the 16th century, and did not slowly withdraw from the battlefield until the second half of the 19th century. This is not because someone invented a more advanced fortress form than the bastion, but at this time

Explosive shells began to be widely used in wars. Traditional bastion walls could not effectively protect against the damage of this new type of artillery shells, and the defensive effect they could play was not as great as in previous centuries. However, for now, blooming

Only Haihan can fully master the black technology of artillery, but the artillery unit has not yet been officially deployed, so the bastion structure is still a very powerful defense system.

The main city wall of Batavia City is not high. Cheng Dapeng visually estimated that its height is only eight to nine meters according to the Haihan scale. Compared with Guangzhou Prefecture and Zhaoqing Prefecture, the city walls are significantly shorter, but the thickness is about the same. However,

The obvious difference from the Ming-style city wall is that there is no layer of wall bricks wrapped around the rammed earth city wall. This is because the masonry structure is easily damaged by artillery strikes, and can easily produce ricochet and increase the casualties of the defenders.

In addition, there are obvious differences in structure. The city wall here is not a straight line, but has a prismatic structure protruding outward every other section. The outside of the city is between the two prismatic structures, about 100 meters away from the city wall.

Thirty to forty meters away, a small triangular fortress was built, with one to two hundred soldiers stationed inside. Its position was also within the firepower range of the prismatic structures on both sides.

Beyond this layer of defense is the moat that connects the water veins. The Ma Da Blue Army, which had swam in the dark to sneak attack the city, was discovered by the fortress garrison outside the city. Under the firepower from outside the city,

The enemy troops who attacked at night were quickly repelled.

If Cheng Dapeng had never been to Sanya, he would probably be surprised by this weird city wall in Batavia City. However, with Fort Victory, a fortress with more mature design and construction, in front of him, Cheng Dapeng felt that the Netherlands

The city wall built by humans can only be regarded as average. After all, Victory Fort has already completed the structural reconstruction of concrete, and its strength is far from being comparable to this rammed earth wall. Of course, he did not relax because of this, and carefully looked through his eyes and

Use your hands and feet to measure the data of the city wall, and keep it in your heart silently.

Cheng Dapeng received specialized city defense reconnaissance training during his training in Sanya. Most of the content was taught by teachers from the military and the Ministry of Construction, allowing students to learn how to complete the survey of city defense fortifications in a short period of time and construct their structures.

Copy it on paper. A more advanced application is to infer the firepower points, weak points, garrison points and other key parts of the city defense through observation. Cheng Dapeng can personally go to the city wall to observe at close range, so naturally he has already

The difficulty of the reconnaissance mission has been reduced to a minimum.

However, God seemed to be particularly partial to Cheng Dapeng, and wanted to find another way to lower the difficulty. After Cheng Dapeng and Su Keyi climbed up the city wall, an officer soon came to receive them. Whether it was a coincidence or a deliberate arrangement, this name

The officer named Bart was actually related to Su Keyi, and the woman he married locally was considered a cousin to Su Keyi. Although Bart himself had a family, the marriage he married here was only considered a side wife, but this kind of relationship was not allowed.

Fake. Su Ke Yiyan briefly and comprehensively introduced the relationship between the two, and Cheng Dapeng immediately felt relieved. At least the difficulty of dealing with him has been reduced a lot.

And this Bart's attitude towards Su Keyi was obviously much warmer than that of his boss Van Diemen. After seeing the Van Diemen's warrant produced by Su Keyi, his face no longer had any rigid expression, and he smiled and used the unskilled "

He spoke in Chinese with a big tongue: "Thank you very much, Boss Cheng!"

Cheng Dapeng said a few words of humility, then asked his entourage to open the silver box and introduced to Bart: "I have no strength to tie the chicken, and I can't participate in the battle. I can only use this little thing to comfort Lord Bart's brothers. Each of them

Two taels of silver, sir, please summon the brothers to collect it!"

Bart's eyes lit up, he called the soldiers behind him and gave a few instructions, and someone immediately came to take over the silver box. Of course, Cheng Dapeng would not be ignorant and insisted on handing out the money himself, so he motioned to his subordinates to hand over the money. As for the money arriving at Bart, Bart's eyes lit up.

How much more can be leaked from the hand to the person below probably depends on his mood.

Of course, these are not the main point. Whether it is money or anything else, these are just a means used by Cheng Dapeng to deceive intelligence. This Bart happens to be one of the officers responsible for guarding the northern city wall. Of course, Cheng Dapeng hopes to get it from him.

He obtained some first-hand intelligence information from his mouth.

"I heard that the Ma Da Blue Army has fought with our defenders. Lord Bart, can you point out the place where the battle took place? I would also like to pay my respects." Cheng Dapeng asked humbly.

Bart was obviously a person with no scheming ideas. He didn't think it was inappropriate when he heard such a request. He immediately pulled the two of them to a nearby prismatic protrusion, pointed to somewhere outside the city and said: "Look, there is a place over there.

The bushes underneath were the impact points of the cannonballs.”

The first thing Cheng Dapeng paid attention to was not the battlefield outside the city, but the setting of this protrusion. This is a fort with two artillery. Judging from the caliber, it should be a 12-pounder, but the gun body is obviously larger than

Haihan's standard artillery is larger and bulkier. Although Cheng Dapeng is not a military expert, he has received relevant training and knows that this is because the Dutch's cannon casting technology and materials are not as good as Haihan's, so they can only cast the gun body.

It is thicker to ensure its sturdiness.

Cheng Dapeng looked at the location Bart pointed at, visually measured the distance, and then continued to ask: "Sir Bart, I see that place is at least a hundred feet away from the city wall. This artillery fire is so fierce that it can kill the enemy."

A hundred feet away?"

Bart couldn't understand what Cheng Dapeng was chewing in ancient Chinese, so he had to let Su Keyi translate it. After listening to it, Bart laughed and said: "Actually, this is not our maximum range. These two cannons can at least hit... well

, using your unit of measurement, it’s about 150 feet.”

Although this range is not comparable to the range of the Haihan artillery that Cheng Dapeng knows, it is already quite impressive. I just don’t know how accurate the shooting of this artillery is. If it is accurate, it will be fine, but at the maximum range, it basically relies on blindfolding.

, then it is difficult to have any actual threat.

Cheng Dapeng deliberately pretended to be an amateur and said: "With such a sharp weapon, I guess as long as there are ten or twenty gates, you can defend the city, right?"

"One or twenty?" Bart shook his head decisively: "Boss Cheng, just on the northern city wall that I am responsible for, more than fifty artillery pieces have been deployed. If the war is fierce, the number of artillery pieces on the city head may be increased.

"

Cheng Dapeng said: "The horse beat the blue army so well?"

Bart was silent for a moment this time before he responded: "Although I hate to admit it, the Horses are not weak against the Blues. They have the weapons we have. The final victory must belong to us, but this battle cannot be

It will be easy.”

Cheng Dapeng did not respond after hearing this, and looked up into the distance. Outside the faintly visible enemy camp, there were a small number of cavalry moving around. It seemed that they were also preventing the defenders from coming out of the city to harass. And among these cavalry

Under cover, nearly a thousand people were digging fortifications on the plain outside the city and carrying some war supplies. Although they didn’t know how the Matalan people would attack the city, after listening to Bart’s introduction, Cheng Da

Tomo actually feels a little uneasy about the direction of this war.

If the Haihan militia came to defend the city, could they do a better job than the Dutch? That is natural, after all, the place guarded by the militia has never been captured. So if the Haihan militia came to attack, what should

How to attack this fortified city?

Cheng Dapeng was thinking about these problems and became a little distracted without realizing it. When Su Keyi saw this, he thought he was really scared because Batavia City was in crisis, so he kindly comforted him: "Boss Cheng, you want to

You have to have confidence in the defenders. When Ma Dalan came to attack the city twice before, the situation was far more critical than it is now. At that time, the council discussed whether to surrender the city. If Lord Cohen had not opposed it,

This place has long become the territory of the Matalan Kingdom. In the past few years, Lord Cohen took advantage of the truce period to strengthen the city wall, and also transported a large number of muskets and artillery from the West to increase the defensive power. The strength is much stronger than in the previous years.

.In my opinion, the Matalan Kingdom will probably suffer a lot if it invades the country this time."

Cheng Dapeng came back to his senses and responded: "What Brother Su said is that with a general like Lord Bart leading the troops to guard the city, the city of Batavia will definitely be in danger. Although there are many enemy troops, it will not be a threat to Lord Bart."

Say, these are all real military achievements waiting to be obtained!"

After hearing Cheng Dapeng's compliment, Bart was very pleased. He patted his chest and said, "Don't worry, Batavia is not that easy to break. The Matalan people will leave their blood and lives as an offense to us."

cost!"

Bart probably felt the atmosphere of common hatred from Cheng Dapeng, and in the following time, he introduced to him the situation of the city defense area he was responsible for without any hesitation. Cheng Dapeng was so happy that he didn't need to use his brain anymore.

For the routine, it is enough to just listen to Bart's own introduction. If appropriate, he will say a few words of praise, and Bart will happily continue talking, unaware that he is leaking major military secrets to outsiders.
Chapter completed!