On the third day of June, the sun is scorching hot at noon.
In the Heshuote Camp in the Mangla Valley, Batur Hutaiji of the Junggar tribe threw off the reins and led his soldiers wearing mail and carrying muskets into the camp.
Heshuote's tribe was resting, and the people were walking barefooted and shirtless on the sand, silently and restrainedly polishing their armor blades, and scratching the arrow shafts with notched wooden arrowheads again and again.
Batur Hutaiji walked towards the dome tent in the center of the tribe. He saw a middle-aged man with a big beard and a rat tail tied to a wooden post.
The man was stripped naked, revealing scars from battles all over his body. He was tall and strong, with only a pair of shorts covering his body. His brows were furrowed and his eyes were sharp, like a beast in the desert.
Batur Hutaiji raised his head to look at the golden snow-tops of the mountains in the east, and chuckled lightly as he stood in front of the felt tent.
Heshuote's national advisor Khan walked out of the felt tent. The two Oirat leaders hugged each other enthusiastically and then separated. Batur Hutaiji said: "This is really a good place."
Mangla Valley is indeed a good place.
This place is located on the southern edge of the Mugetan Desert south of Qianhu, Guide. From the Mangla River, which originates from the snow-capped mountains in the east, all the way to the west, a silver satin-like valley breaks out in the desert until it merges into the Yellow River in the west, forming a unique
natural landscape.
The river valley is separated by continuous golden sand dunes, and lush forests grow on the south bank of the valley. The river is so low that no matter whether you stand in the woods or in the desert, you cannot see the valley hidden below.
The state minister Khan smiled and invited Taiji of Junggar to enter the tent, saying: "This was once the tent of Tuyuhun. It is indeed a good place... Why did Taiji come here?"
After entering the tent, Batur Hutaiji took off his round hat with beaded strings on it, held it in his hand for a moment, exhaled heavily through his nose, and then said solemnly: "It is indeed as you expected.
, the Marshal's Mansion has sent troops."
There was a slight change in the expression of the national preceptor Khan: "Eastern?"
As Oirat pursued Chahar to this point, Lin Dan Khan hid in the Bajiao City, and the National Advisor Khan judged that the war between the Oirat coalition forces and the Marshal's Mansion was inevitable.
Even if envoys are sent to pay tribute and marriages are reconciled, the war can only be delayed but cannot be avoided.
The Imperial Guard Khan tried to avoid war and was able to capture the vast area of Qinghai except Hehuang without any bloodshed. This was of course the best result for the Heshuo Special Department.
It’s not that the National Preceptor Khan was greedy for too much. In the process of chasing Lin Dan Khan, he almost circled the entire Qinghai. The Marshal’s Mansion showed no signs of development and utilization of the land beyond the several passes of Qinghai Lake.
This is almost no man's land.
On this basis, he can make many concessions, such as becoming the tax collector of the Marshal's Mansion in Qinghai, providing two to three thousand soldiers, such as marriage and paying tribute.
If necessary, he was even willing to call Liu Chengzong a foster father.
As long as there is the reality of an independent vassal state, it doesn't matter how you look.
Liu Chengzong is a Han, and the backbone of the Marshal's Mansion is also a Han who defected from the Ming Dynasty. Sooner or later, they will have to fight back to the Central Plains. In the consciousness of the National Preceptor Khan, Qinghai is not that important to Liu Chengzong.
However, the envoys sent failed to get a positive response from Liu Chengzong... This means that the Marshal's Office does not want to talk to him at all.
On the other hand, the Oirat coalition's military supplies were low and they could no longer support their march of five thousand miles back to the Tianshan Mountains.
But Oirat's spies couldn't enter the territory of the Marshal's Mansion.
In fact, it was the Imperial Preceptor Khan who was unlucky. Normally, it would be very easy for the Mongols to sneak into the west of Xining, but what identity could the Oirat spies pretend to be? They must not be disguised as businessmen.
Before the spies boarded the Qinghai Lake train, they were suspected of smuggling because they did not have the station documents. Later, they were found to be carrying a tapestry from the Western Regions, confirming the name of smuggling.
The Oirat spy did not dare to admit that he was a spy and admitted the crime of smuggling.
Facts prove that if you don’t understand the law, you must not break it.
In the two counties of Haixi and Haibei, there is no information to be spied on, so spies are just a matter of luck.
Usually, you spend a few months in jail. If you are lucky and there is a shortage of manpower, you may be released the next day to raise lambs and mine ore. If you do well, you will open up wasteland and divide it into a piece. The next year, you will be registered as a household registration.
Common people.
Even if you are unlucky, if you are imprisoned for three to five months, you will be fine when the war is over. In the past, Chuck Rabbit Gil's spies were like this.
The boss sweeps the grave.
Smuggling is different, it is a crime that depends on technique.
Anyone who dares to block the handsome man's way of making money will be killed on the spot if he is caught. If you have good skills, you will be able to be born into a wealthy family in the next life.
To the Marshal's Mansion, this was a trivial matter that almost no one knew about, but in the eyes of the National Advisor Khan, it was a sign that the Marshal's Mansion was preparing to send troops southward.
Instead of transporting baggage and preparing for war, who would block the customs so that not even a bird can fly in?
By a strange combination of circumstances, even though Imperial Advisor Khan's conjecture was based on the wrong source of information, he came to the correct result. One month before Liu Chengzong's expedition, he predicted that the Marshal's Army would go south to fight.
It was also based on this conjecture that even if Lin Dan Khan, who had no skills, was hiding in Bajiao City, the Imperial Guard Khan did not dare to attack the city immediately after a long pursuit of three thousand miles. Instead, he discussed with the leaders of the four divisions to suspend their troops and wait for the battle.
They dispersed their troops in the vast Heka Grassland and Huangnan Xiaohetao, focusing on the left, right, and middle. Each department was stationed in strategic locations to prevent the commander's government from going south.
In fact, at this moment, the main forces of the Chinese army assembled by both sides are only 200 miles away in a straight line, but they are separated by the Yellow River and the Mugetan Desert, so that each other does not know the enemy's location.
Liu Chengzong's dispatch of troops was expected by the National Preceptor Khan, but sending troops from the east and having the Junggar tribe first learn of the situation was unexpected by the National Preceptor Khan.
Because the defense area of the Junggar tribe is in the east, guarding the mountain road leading to Qianhu Post in Guide, it is not a good choice for sending troops. As soon as you come out of the mountain pass, there are Oirat troops in the west and east.
If we send troops from there, we will definitely seek a beating.
"They didn't rush out." Batur Huntaiji said with a relaxed expression on his face: "Thousands of households from Guide sent troops, and it seems that they also have the surname Bo'er. They were beaten for a while by the little prince under my command, and we both won.
No, we went back, but they are increasing their troops."
This chapter is not over yet, please click on the next page to continue reading!
The feudal lords of Oirat are divided into big princes and small princes. The big princes are naturally Khan and Taiji. The big princes have their own Ulus, which are fiefs or tribes.
The leaders of the fiefdom are all noble Nayan, and these Uluses are divided into small Uluses, with Zaisang as the leader, forming the tribe's management system.
"Didn't rush out?"
The national advisor Khan frowned. This did not feel like a deliberate big war, but more like a small-scale conflict caused by an accident. He murmured to himself: "I thought they would send troops from the northwest, the mountain pass guarding the salt pond.
”
After a short period of confusion, the Imperial Guard Khan came back to his senses, sat down next to the tea pot with Batur Hutaiji, poured a bowl of hot tea, pushed it over and asked: "How is their army?" p>
Battelle Hutai Ji Shaojia thought for a while and said: "There is more armor and high morale, and the infantry can fight well in formation."
"Almost everyone has a helmet, and probably everyone wears armor, but the workmanship is not good. Some of the armor can be penetrated with a heavy arrow, but the fighting is very fierce. There are several teams that fight to the death, and their traditions...
Cut off people's heads."
Upon hearing these words, Imperial Preceptor Khan felt suspicious.
There were remnants of the defeated soldiers from Chuoketu under the command of the Imperial Guard Khan. He specifically inquired about the situation in the Marshal's Mansion. As far as he knew, Liu Chengzong's army did not chop off people's heads.
It should be the Ming army who chops off people’s heads.
But this Guide Qianhu Office is indeed the Qianhu Office under the Marshal's Mansion.
In the mind of Guoshi Khan, the Marshal's Army that the Junggar tribe encountered might be a Ming Dynasty official army that surrendered to Liu Chengzong, so they had such a habit.
He asked: "Where are the firearms?"
"They have one cannon and many muskets. Some are useful and some are not. It's very complicated."
When Batur Hutaiji mentioned the word "very complicated", he couldn't help but touch his nose with his hand. He felt guilty when he said this.
It is difficult to find a more chaotic firearms unit in the world than the Junggar Musketry Team at this time.
They have a large number of homemade muskets of different specifications, a small number of purchased muskets from several countries, and a small number of seized muskets from different origins.
In the long war with the Tsarist Russian expedition, the Junggar tribe captured hundreds of muskets, and none of those muskets were the same.
Similarly, the Tatar blacksmiths recruited by Junggar could not make several identical muskets.
However, the firearms used by the returning German military households Batur encountered were far more complex than those used by Junggar, and they were very powerful and scary in melees.
There were more than a dozen musketeers holding long-handled short muskets, and they lined up at the mountain pass and fired them all at once. The Junggar infantry was about to rush up while they were changing ammunition, but they didn't expect them to take out the spearheads from their backs.
He inserted it into his musket and actually picked it up and charged.
There is a round musket with several pipes, which is rotated to hit people. When it gets close, it uses a small ax with a musket to hit people.
There are relatively normal muskets, arranged in three rows of horizontal arrays and fired in rotation; there are also strange things that look like normal muskets, but after firing, they install small iron pipes from the back and continue shooting; there are also muskets that appear to be sticks, and they are close
When you lift it up and swing it, the handle of the gun actually has a knife.
There are even people who carry cabinets and push carts onto the battlefield, and the carts release a bunch of smoking arrows; the cabinets spurt out fire from a dozen steps away, and they keep burning if they touch their bodies.
A bunch of strange-looking things really frightened the Zhungeer troops when they fought.
However, despite the scary momentum, the actual results of both sides were similar.
The returned soldiers had great advantages in small-scale melee fighting in the mountains, but when the Junggar troops retreated outside the mountains and formed a Tuocheng musket formation on the plains, they were helpless.
The range of those strange things is not very far, and their power is designed to hit people. They are not good at dealing with camels covered with animal skins and quilts. If they get close, they will be suppressed by Junggar muskets.
After several rounds of fighting, not only did they fail to achieve greater results, they also retreated hastily because the trees on the mountain road behind them were ignited by the oil tank, leaving many corpses behind.
As for Batur, he was deeply impressed by the beheading behavior of returning German soldiers, mainly because these people were too enthusiastic about beheading. No dead man could keep his own head. The tragic scene shocked many Jungar soldiers who participated in the war.
They were all frightened and had a psychological shadow.
Batur Hutaiji thought for a while, searched for opponents in his mind, and made a comment on this enemy army: "Compared with Yang Jier's tribe, they are stronger in melee fighting and weaker in field fighting."
Yang Jier is a Kazakh Khan, and the Kazakh Khanate is a good reference for Oirat, because the war between them has been going on for a hundred years.
The Kazakh Khanate is a veteran force in the Transoxiana region. It once sent 100,000 troops to occupy Akhsiyi, Andijan, Tashkent, Samarkand and other places. It had the upper hand for most of the Hundred Years' War with Oirat.
As for the sixth year of Longqing, Anda Khan's right-hand man, the Ordos tribe, was cut off by Huang Taiji's expedition to Suiye City. He was beaten to the point where the Kazakh Khan was full of teeth. Unconvinced, he chased after him and was cut off again. Huang Taiji led 700 people to fight in a battle.
The great victory of fantasy is an accident in the long history.
Upon hearing that Batur Hutaiji believed that the Marshal's army was weaker than the Kazakhs in the field, the national advisor Khan slowly nodded: "We can lure them to attack us."
After saying this, the national advisor Khan decided to summon the nobles from various tribes to the Mangla River to discuss matters.
As soon as he made this decision, he said to Batur Hutaiji: "We will go west and fight them in the Heka Grassland, but the Junggar tribe will arrive later."
Batur Hutaiji asked: "Why?"
The National Preceptor Khan raised his hand and pointed to the east: "There is a big Khan in the mountain city. He must have been unable to bear it for a long time. If the Marshal's Army goes south, he will probably come out of the city, and Taiji will need to ambush him for a while."
Huitaiji had no objection to this arrangement in his heart. It was much easier to lead an army to ambush Lin Danhan than to fight against those marshal's troops with strange-looking weapons.
However, he did not agree immediately. Instead, he asked: "Who is the man tied to the pillar outside the tent?"
"A Chahar spy, a Han from Tumochuan."
"Han? I thought he was an Oirat."
This chapter is not over yet, please click on the next page to continue reading!
When mentioning the prisoner tied outside the tent, the Imperial Guard Khan showed a complicated expression of wanting to laugh but not being able to laugh: "I also thought he was from Oirat."
The spy pretended to be so similar. He had an Oirat hairstyle, spoke a fluent Mongolian dialect, had a full set of Oirat cavalry equipment, and even the trinkets on his braid looked fake.
Even when he was discovered, it was because he was pretending to be too professional.
Among a group of Oirat soldiers who had been on an expedition for half a year, everyone had half an inch or even an inch of hair growing on their heads, and there was a man with a clean shaven head.
Among a group of Oirat soldiers who were resting in the hot summer, all shirtless and barefoot, a heavily armed and sweaty man appeared.
Among a group of Oirat men who were generally 5 feet 23 inches tall and weighed 123 pounds, a strong man appeared who was 5 feet 5 inches tall, covered in fat and muscular, and weighed at least 160 pounds.
Especially words, words are the biggest flaw.
What is Oirat?
The cost of communication among the Oirat people is very high. Mongolian language is not the only language they use. Not to mention the fact that the warriors of the four major tribes gather together now, even in a single large tribe, it is difficult for the people inside to communicate fluently.
In the Junggar tribe alone, there are Kazakh tribesmen who speak Turkic dialects, Huihui from the Western Regions who teach Mongolian guns and artillery, Western monks and soldiers who preach to everyone, and even Cossacks who were captured and surrendered.
People of all kinds have lived together for a long time, and their words have long been mixed together.
This is the darkest era in Oirat.
Due to years of war, the big nobles are still in danger, and the wealth of the small nobles is even more difficult to accumulate. People with knowledge have almost disappeared during the war.
Not to mention herdsmen, most of the princes and nobles are also illiterate.
This will not interfere with the daily life of the tribe, but the impact is particularly far-reaching. Their language will become increasingly confusing, further leading to the failure of writing.
The result of the failure of writing is that their history and epics, culture and knowledge are dying.
People often speak in Mongolian dialects interspersed with Turkic dialects. Suddenly, they borrowed two words from Hui Hui, mixed with Western terms learned from monks. During the conversation, there must be three or five words that no one can understand.
Local dialect.
What you said I guess is a normal and common way of communication.
At this juncture, an extremely tall and strong Monan dialect master suddenly appeared in a scorching hot environment, fully armed, adhering to decent appearance, and extremely tall?
This physical condition, this knowledge reserve, and this discipline are nothing like Oirat or even Chahar.
The national teacher Khan is still doubtful whether this person is Tumote or not.
But Batur Hutaiji didn't care about this person's origins, and just asked: "Is he literate?"
"He said his name was Dai Daozi, that he knew Chinese and could also write."
With a snap, Huitaiji clapped and said: "Give me this man, and I will ambush Chahar Khan."
He wants to create a new script, a script that belongs to Oirat and Junggar!