18th century total war

Chapter 256 Napoleon's Promotion

"Oh my God!"

Ali Kaya's legs went limp, and he lay down behind the parapet, drawing a cross in front of his chest with one hand, forgetting the sudden surge of heat in his abdomen...

It wasn't until a smell that made Ali Kaya ashamed came into his nasal cavity, that he suddenly woke up and was so scared that he peed his pants!
Arikaya's first reaction was not to stand up and fight back, but to look around to see who was looking at her. Then Arikaya saw the foreigner who had been bullied before, staring with disdain. Looking at his wet crotch...

"Damn country bumpkin, if you look again, believe it or not, I will pluck out your eyeballs!"

Ali Kaya glared at the other party viciously and shouted, and then a gust of hot blood sprayed on his side face. Ali Kaya was shocked and looked to the side. He had a good relationship with him before, and he was also from Turin. A blood hole was shot out in the neck, and he was lying on the ground, covering the blood-spraying neck with his hands, twitching from time to time...

After just a few seconds, the Turin fellow stopped twitching...

With a bang, Arikaya swallowed a mouthful of saliva. He was just a recruit. Where had he seen such a scene?

However, when Ali Kaya felt ashamed, the same group of hillbilly recruits who joined the army with him still looked at him with contempt.

Obviously the other party is the same as him, so he dare not stand up and fight back!

However, now Arikaya has no time to talk to that country bumpkin. He kept looking around, as if trying to find excuses for his cowardice that he didn't dare to fight back.

Arikaya finally breathed a sigh of relief when he saw his immediate superior, the company captain, also lying behind the parapet without showing his head.

Fortunately, my parents are so cowardly, so my behavior is correct!
Arikaya is not an exception in the army of the Kingdom of Sardinia. As more and more unlucky ones were killed by the guard infantry in cross-fire, fewer and fewer Sardinian soldiers were willing to show their heads until they were finally killed by the guards. The infantry completely suppressed the attack with fire.

Without the infantry shooting, the solid bullets fired from the artillery positions in the distance of the Kingdom of Sardinia alone did not cause many casualties to the Guards infantry.

The trenches were deeper and the chest defense line with more obstacles was just cleared by the infantry guards little by little. The deep trenches could not be filled in a short time, so they were put on rows of ladders.

At this moment, after their own side had finished suppressing their firepower, the guard infantry followed up with a mortar and bombarded behind the chest barrier.

Holding his musket in his arms, Ali Kaya looked at the friendly troops who had assembled behind and were about to shoot at the French army who crossed the chest barrier. The formation was scattered by the bombs, and the fear in his heart was quickly magnified.

He no longer clung to the parapet, but began to move bit by bit towards a safer position.

The smoke and dust produced by the explosion of the flower bomb provided a good cover for deserters like Ali Kaya, but it is a pity that Ali Kaya did not escape the eyes of the hillbilly private who was bullied by him.

The rural people of the Kingdom of Sardinia, whom Alikaya called a country bumpkin, had hatred in their eyes. Seeing that the other party was trying to escape from the defense zone with the help of the explosive smoke generated by the flowering bomb, he slowly raised his musket and pointed it at Alikaya's gun. back.

There was a bang.

The sound of explosions and volleys of gunshots covered up the sound of this revenge bullet very well. Ali Kaya only felt a heavy blow coming from behind him. The pain let Ali Kaya know that he was shot!

Blood began to flow from Ali Kaya's mouth, and he turned his head back unwillingly.

When he saw that the chest line did not cross into the French army, his eyes couldn't help but become confused.

The enemy hasn't come in yet, how could he be shot?

You must know that the chest line of defense is built on a sloping land, and they are in a condescending situation facing the French army, and the French army is attacking with their backs!

Without turning over the chest line of defense, the French army could not hit them defenders at all.

But soon, Ali Kaya saw those familiar eyes. The rural man whom he ridiculed as a country bumpkin was grinning happily at him.

"Damn...dead... country bumpkin..."

Ali Kaya spat out a mouthful of blood again, his head limply on the ground, his strength was draining rapidly, and his heart was full of resentment.

When Ali Kaya died, a guard infantry jumped down from the chest base where Ali Kaya had squatted before. The hillbilly private soldier who had just shot Ali Kaya immediately dropped his weapon and knelt on the ground with his hands raised high. Shouting surrender in a language the French army could not understand.

The Guards infantryman did not pay attention to the surrendering country bumpkin soldiers, but pointed his gun at other enemies who were still resisting.

One after another, the Guards infantry jumped into the breastwork defense line, prompting more and more Sardinian soldiers and even officers to raise their hands and surrender.

However, the army resistance of the Kingdom of Sardinia did not end. Complete battalion-level phalanxes stepped forward from behind, aiming at the infantry guards who were occupying the chest defense line.

The guard infantry fell down immediately, and the next moment, the surviving guard infantry rushed up, picked up the ignited grenade and threw it at the dense platoon of the Sardinian army.

Boom, boom, boom!

The smoke and dust from the grenade explosion immediately obscured the battlefield again. After throwing the grenades, the Guards infantry skillfully picked up the flintlock guns with bayonets and rushed into the air wave of the explosion. Soon, the smoke and dust could be heard one after another. scream.

One after another, the infantrymen jumped into the chest line of defense, and the left and right were full of soldiers and officers of the Kingdom of Sardinia who raised their hands and surrendered, but no one responded.

The infantry guards just collected their weapons, and had no time to gather and guard them.

However, these surrendered officers and soldiers of the Kingdom of Sardinia actively gathered together to get out of the way of the Guards infantry attack.

With the attack of the infantry, the first chest defense line was declared to be lost. A hundred meters behind this chest defense line, the second chest defense line was built on the slope, and it was constantly shooting shells and bullets, killing people. Attacking infantry guards.

The layers of chest defenses are the confidence of the Army of the Kingdom of Sardinia.

It's just that the guards infantry didn't know how to be afraid at all. Except for the guards infantry who had exhausted their physical strength and did not continue to attack, all the guards infantry were charging forward. No formation was needed, just a fierce charge!

If you encounter a complete queue of enemy troops, throw a grenade and rush in.

In Karl's eyes, the army of the Kingdom of Sardinia had poor combat courage and was not qualified to use dense bayonet arrays to resist the infantry guards.

If Karl encountered the Austrian regular army, he would never let the Guards infantry rush forward and fight desperately.

The battle did not go beyond Karl's judgment. The combat effectiveness of the Army of the Kingdom of Sardinia was really unsatisfactory. Marshal Paulio's conjecture that the officers and soldiers of the Kingdom of Sardinia should have the belief to protect their country was too idealistic.

Under the successive defeats, even the reserve forces of the Kingdom of Sardinia began to surrender and flee in organized form!

The army of tens of thousands of Sardinia Kingdoms was defeated across the board in just one day, leaving a large gap in the middle, and the hundreds of miles of defense line carefully arranged by the Austria-Sardinia-Italian Confederations collapsed.

With the main position in the middle gone, the French army can circle around the anti-French alliance positions on both sides, so there is no need to defend other areas of the hundreds of miles of defense line...

When the news that tens of thousands of the main force of the Kingdom of Sardinia's army had been defeated was sent back to the coalition command headquarters, both Marshal Borliu and other Austrian generals were shocked.

They never expected that the army of the Kingdom of Sardinia would be so vulnerable!
Later, after learning that only one division of the French army was responsible for the main attack, which was an army of [-] people, the Austrian generals even scolded the incompetence of the Sardinian Kingdom.

This battle is protecting the territory of the Kingdom of Sardinia, they are so cowardly fighting!

However, no matter how much you complain, the result is already doomed. In order to prevent the Kingdom of Sardinia from falling to France because of this defeat, Austrian Marshal Paul directly led the main force of the Austrian army into the capital of Turin, claiming to help the people of Sardinia defend the capital of the Kingdom of Sardinia .

After the Austrian army entered Turin, they immediately forced the Sardinian royal family to sign a mobilization order, open all the arsenals in Turin, and select qualified young men from villages and towns in and around the city for armed and basic training.

And the Allied Forces of the Italian Confederacy also lost the trust of the Austrian generals. After all, the Kingdom of Sardinia is a country with strong combat effectiveness in Italy. mercenary?

Don't be kidding, the Austrian generals have been taught a lesson by the army of the Kingdom of Sardinia, and they will never continue to believe in the fighting power of the Italians!
As a result, the Italian Confederate Army was deployed by Marshal Pauliu to the east of the Kingdom of Sardinia near the Milan area. Marshal Pauliu was not worried that the French army would bypass Turin to attack the Milan area. Doing so would only make the French army The back road was exposed under the nose of the main force of Austria.

The Austrian army is not a waste snack like the army of the Kingdom of Sardinia.

In the [-]st Army of the French Defense Forces, Karl quickly received the results and losses of this battle.

As always, systematically brainwashed armies do not have the species of seriously wounded, and lightly wounded do not affect combat capability at all.

Therefore, only the infantry guards who died were recorded.

Although sharpshooters also participated in the battle, they were very few in number, and they were always responsible for shooting cover, so there was no loss.

The Guards lost about a thousand and one hundred men in this battle.

For a battle with a combined scale of 10,000+ people on both sides, this loss is really not much.

No matter how weak the army of the Sardinian Kingdom is, they can rely on their defensive advantages to use guns to cause heavy casualties to the guard infantry in the upward attack.

There are only ten thousand infantrymen in battle, but they need to continuously break through the multi-layered defense line of tens of thousands of people, and the average loss of one line of defense is only a few hundred people.

Officers who had meritorious service in the battle were promoted, and the supplementary troops behind them were added to the units that suffered serious battle losses. These supplementary troops were brainwashed and trained by the French revolutionaries who had been arrested.

As a matter of course, these revolutionaries are not qualified to form an independent army, and they all follow the large army as supplementary soldiers. If there are losses in the front, they will be filled in as recruits.

If you want to be promoted to an officer, you have to fight your life on the battlefield.

A total of more than 6000 Sardinian prisoners were captured in this battle. Due to the large number of prisoners, Karl had to stay for a few more days to transfer all the prisoners to the rear guard and then send them back to France.

These captives from the Kingdom of Sardinia will enter Paris, and after screening, young and strong ones will be selected for brainwashing training to form a new foreign legion.

When Karl was browsing the battle report, he quickly found one of the bright officers.

Of all the battalion-level units responsible for the offensive, only this unit suffered the least battle losses. Only one person was killed, and there were almost zero battle losses. However, this battalion completed their combat mission very well.

Karl's gaze immediately turned to the name of the commander of the most outstanding unit——Napoleon Bonaparte.

Karl called his adjutant and asked: "Did the commander of the first regiment of the first division lose half of his body to a shell because he led the charge in this battle?"

The adjutant flipped through the small notebook in his hand, nodded and said, "Yes."

"As the head of the regiment, but still taking the lead in the charge, the officers in the First Army have such a bad morale that they don't care about their own lives at all!

This kid named Napoleon performed well, and he was promoted to the head of the first regiment, and all his troops were filled into the first regiment of the first division. "

"Yes, General."

The adjutant responded expressionlessly and made a note in a small notebook.

This little Napoleonic officer who had been forgotten by Livy was discovered by Karl in the first battle of this expedition to Italy.

This is not preferential treatment by Karl. Karl has a habit. After each battle, he will select the most outstanding officers among them for leapfrog promotion.

Of course, other officers will also receive normal promotions based on military merit, but they are far inferior to No. 1 here!
For this reason, Karl even started browsing from the performance of officers at the company captain level.

It's just that the officers promoted by the systemic brainwashing soldiers all have the same performance, and generally have the habit of taking the lead in the charge. Even if some of them perform well, they often die on the battlefield...

Only the division-level senior officers who had left the frontline battlefield could eliminate the problem of taking the lead in the charge, because the Li Wei government had strictly ordered that the guards of the senior officers must prevent the senior commanders from going to the front line in person before the troops were wiped out.

This was a decree issued after Gascoll's death.

Karl, who was influenced by Li Wei, also began to change his mind, thinking that middle and senior officers should not take the risk of going to the front line in person. Their death is a huge loss to the French Defense Forces!

Under the scouts of the guard cavalry, Karl quickly learned that the main force of Austria had retreated to the Turin area, and also figured out that only the Italian Confederate Army with a very low combat assessment was blocking the periphery of the Milan area!

(End of this chapter)