Zhang Xin and Qian Shangduan calmed down, and King Jing Zhao Tuan was about to write the letter to Hu Kai. At this time, Xu Huai took out the autographed letter from Wang Zhen to him, handed it to Lu Xiong, and said:
"Hu Shijun's place still needs Master Lu and Qian Langjun to go there in person..."
Xu Huai didn't think that when the Red Husbands were interspersed with the East Route Army, the West Route Army would take the risk of attacking Taiyuan.
Preliminary intelligence collected so far also shows that the Chihu West Route Army has built large-scale fortifications outside Taiyuan City to control the dangerous Xing Pass on the outside of Taiyuan - this means that the Chihu people can still withdraw their siege troops from the outside of Taiyuan.
The emergency southward transfer. The Chi Hu people stormed Zhengzhou a little later than expected. They were probably waiting for the siege troops to bypass the numerous passes in the southeast of the river and go south.
It is a pity that although most of the cities in the southeast of Hebei and Hebei were not lost, a small number of defenders only dared to retreat into the city. The scouts of the Red Husband were everywhere in the fields, and the intelligence spying scope of Yue Yulou was limited.
At that time, I didn't know whether Cao Shixiong's troops were still staying in Lanzhou and had not been mobilized south by the Chihu people.
When the soldiers of Tongbai Mountain retreated to Fuzhou, Yuehailou was also appointed by the Chihu people to march thousands of households, and was able to recruit surrenders between Yunshuo and form a tribe; when Xu Huai went south from Fuzhou to Bianliang, he heard that in Yingying
After the fall of Zhouzhou, the Han troops in Yingzhou who wanted to surrender to Dayue, but were rejected by Liu Shizhong and Cai Yuanyou, and were forced to do hard labor, were all absorbed by Yue Hailou.
Wen Hengyue, the general of Xinzhou and the former seventh general of the Tianxiong Army, and others also led their troops to surrender to the Chihu people.
In addition to the surrendered Dai Viet troops and horses, the remaining Khitan troops in Yunshuo and Yanji, totaling 70,000 to 80,000 troops, surrendered to the Chihu people.
With the style of the Chihu people, it is impossible to allow them to stay in Yunshuo Yanji and other places to slowly reorganize and train.
If possible, they will be directly driven to the Hehuai area to participate in the battle to make up for their lack of absolute numbers of soldiers and horses.
As for the endurance of the surrendered troops, whether their endurance is strong enough, and whether they have enough horses to improve their mobile combat capabilities, the Red Husbands are not too concerned.
The vassal army does not have enough horses. Not only will its mobile combat capabilities be seriously insufficient, but it will also be unable to provide enough mare's milk, dairy products, and minced meat crushed under the saddle to meet basic consumption. In this case, it will bypass passes and cities.
, if you cross southward wantonly, there will definitely be problems with supply.
However, the Red Husbands were always harsh in their approach to the Semu tribes' attachment of troops, eliminating the weak and retaining the strong.
If the vassal troops cannot plunder enough supplies from the battlefield, the Red Husbands will ruthlessly abandon them and let them be trampled by their opponents on the battlefield without blinking an eye - this will also help them better tame and annex the vassal forces.
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An army that lacks supplies is usually extremely unstable and can easily collapse. However, if there are strong enough means and force to suppress it, these armies that lack supplies can also go to the other extreme and attack cities and plunder territories more brutally.
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Xu Huai predicted that the Red Husbands would use their own elites to attack Zhengzhou. However, after capturing Zhengzhou, they would go north to conquer Zhiguanxing, Taihangxing, and Baixing, as well as attack the city from Zhengzhou to the west without surrendering the vassal troops.
That would be too kind.
Therefore, Xu Huai expected that whether they went to Xingyang, Yanshi, or to help defend Gong County or Hulao, they might face a long-lasting siege battle; with only 500 elites around him, even if they were to obtain the defense command of a small city
Quan, and the local soldiers and horses are fully cooperating, but there may be some shortcomings. Lu Xiong and Qian Shangduan are still needed to rush to Caizhou to pull some elite troops over.
Lu Xiong thought that he was destined to deliver the letter, so he agreed wholeheartedly, but Qian Shangduan was a little hesitant.
"Hu Shijun may not know everything about the situation, and it is difficult to explain many things clearly in the letter. I need you, sir, to go with Lu Xiong." King Jing Zhao Tuan knew what Qian Shangduan was hesitating about, but Caizhou still needed
Qian Shangduan took a trip.
As the prince, King Zhao Tuan of Jing was not qualified to give advice to the local commanders. Wang Zhen, as the prime minister and the defense envoy of the capital, could not control the towns of Caizhou. Therefore, except for Wang Zhen and King Jing
In addition to Zhao Tuan's handwritten letter, someone also needed to lobby Hu Kai.
If Hu Kai firmly disagrees, Xu Huai will lead King Jing to Gong County at this time, and he will leave as soon as possible. However, if he wants to mobilize troops from Tongbai Mountain again, he must consider whether Hu Kai will fall out with him.
Qian Shangduan was still worried, and before leaving, he told Zhang Xin:
"Zhang Xin, you must protect your Highness's safety. No matter how important everything is, it is not as important as Your Highness's safety. When I get reinforcements from Caizhou, I will rush to Gong County to meet you."
"Mr. Qian, please have some confidence in us." Xu Huai smiled, whipped the horse that Qian Shangduan sat on, and sent them on their way.
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The Chihu people took advantage of the super mobility of the cavalry to have strong control over the battlefield, but in any case, the number of the main cavalry of the Eastern Route Army was limited.
Near the battlefield that was classified as the core area by the Red Husbands, their cavalry gathered and dispersed erratically. They were very dense and mobilized frequently. The opponents were often confused and could not figure out the direction of their main attack, and became panicked and uneasy.
However, in the more peripheral areas, the Red Husbands could only send a small number of scouts to look out for large movements.
Xu Huai and the others pretended to be soldiers, which was of course flawed. They would be easily seen through the experienced Chihu cavalry. However, Xu Huai had no intention of infiltrating into the core area of the Gyeonggi battlefield, but chose the core area.
Access to the buffer zone between the outer zone and the outer zone.
The five hundred cavalrymen either gathered or dispersed, and were arranged according to the deployment characteristics of the Red Husbandry Cavalry in different areas. Two days later, they quietly escorted King Jing Zhao Tuan to Xingyang County on the west side of Zhengzhou.
Xingyang City faces the Yellow River to the north, and is dominated by plains to the east and southeast, interspersed with hills. Only the southwest has continuous peaks and ridges. However, the mountains are not dangerous, and the connection with the main mountain range of Songshan Mountain is easily cut off by the enemy.
Xingyang is too close to Zhengzhou and is a subordinate county of Xingyang. It is under the jurisdiction of Sun Huacheng, Zhengzhou's defense envoy.
In Zhengzhou, one of the four towns, the authority of the defense envoys was actually delegated. Xu Huai was worried that if they entered Xingyang, it would be difficult for them to suppress the defenders and obey their defense opinions.
The terrain occupied by Hulao Pass to the west of Xingyang is dangerous enough, but because it also belongs to the Zhengzhou Defense Envoy, Xu Huai does not advocate entering Hulao Pass.
In order to avoid attracting the attention of the captive soldiers as much as possible, Xu Huai escorted King Jing Zhao Tuan and did not go directly to the west through Hulao Pass between Songshan Mountain and the south bank of the Yellow River. Instead, he crossed the Yellow River from the northeast of Xingyang at night and jumped to the north.
In the territory of Mengzhou, we went west from the north bank of the Yellow River, bypassed Hulao Pass, then walked on the ice to the south bank, and arrived at the foot of Gong County City on the east bank of the Yiluo River mouth.
The soldiers and scouts were scattered widely, and they were active in Gong County and Yanshi territory.
In order to avoid unnecessary misunderstandings and prevent the soldiers and scouts from noticing that Jing Wang Zhao Tuan was in Gong County, Xu Huai sent Zhang Xin to escort Jing Wang Zhao Tuan into Gong County first, while they rested in the woods outside Gong County.
The estuary where the Yiluo River merges into the Yellow River has undulating low ridges and low-lying wetlands.
The Yellow River turns southward from the eastern section of Yinshan Mountain. There are mostly loess hills on both sides. A large amount of silt is washed away by rain and brought into the Yellow River. At that time, the bed of the Yellow River from Tongguan to the east had been silted up, which made the Yiluo River and other Luoyang rivers
The streams and rivers in the basin do not discharge water smoothly, and even suffer from backflow from the Yellow River from time to time.
On the one hand, this is called the Luoyang Basin between the Funiu Mountains, Song Mountains, Xiong'er Mountains, Qinling Mountains, and Mang Mountains, which has accumulated more land suitable for living and farming. On the other hand, it is also called the Yiluo River mouth and its upper reaches that are more vulnerable to floods.
Xu Huaai used an iron pole to cut through the ice and saw that there was silt water under the soil in the woods, indicating that in normal times, this is a swamp terrain, and the ice and snow have not yet melted, making it easier for people and horses to pass through.
"The defenders in Gong County are not good enough. We need to be tough when we enter the city," Wang Ju and Zhou Jing walked over from the west and said with certainty, "The weather is not as cold as it was half a month ago.
If Gongxian County could organize soldiers and civilians to cut through the ice of the Yiluo River, even if it would still freeze, it would not be possible to freeze it into thick ice for horses to pass through. But there would be no guards in Gongxian County, Hulao, or Yingshi Division.
The organization has been doing this in peace for too long!”
Xu Huai nodded and looked at the rising sun jumping over the mountain ridge to the east.
They were not familiar with the Gong County garrison at all; King Jing Zhao Tuan and the guard commander Zhang Xin only knew the mausoleum garrison envoy Qiao Jien, the mausoleum garrison commander Chen Yougui and others.
The time left for them to rectify their defenses was too limited, so they could only make preliminary judgments on the Gongxian garrison and officials through the defense deployment arrangements outside Gongxian County, and then decide their attitude after entering the city.
