In fact, from an essential point of view, the formation of the vassal divisions of military generals such as Gao Jie and Zuo Liangyu did not make any contribution to the recovery of "lost territory" for the Ming Dynasty, but made personal contributions to Zhu Yousong in terms of "strategy and establishment". Just Hongguang In other words, they also needed to rely on their military strength to overwhelm the Jiangnan gentry; these military generals also relied on their merits, and the emperor was established by our generation. From then on, they were arrogant and domineering, blindly gathering in the southern Zhili Jiangbei area to compete for "good land" to enrich themselves, and then Taking the imperial court hostage.
Therefore, such an army would find it even more difficult to defend the Southern Ming Dynasty, not to mention the Northern Expedition to regain lost territory.
Hongguang, the Southern Ming Dynasty, was supported and controlled by military generals. The emperor and civil servants could never control military generals. Military generals did not receive rewards or punishments based on whether they contributed to the country, but relied on blackmailing the court to gain promotions. Once the situation was unfavorable, they would defect. Face each other and protect your own wealth.
All in all, at the beginning of the founding of the Southern Ming Dynasty, the foundation was not laid well. As a key figure, Shi Kefa did not make a decisive decision to welcome Zhu Yousong, the blessed king, and used imperial power to stabilize the overall situation and clean up the remaining territories. This was a major mistake; Zhu Yousong was in danger of not becoming the emperor. , hurriedly sent people to summon the generals to support him, and gave him the title of "Deciding the Strategy". From then on, the military generals became dictatorial, and the country was no longer a country.
There are many conflicts among the warlords. They are brave in private fights but timid in public wars. Civil servants may rely on a certain warlord as a backer, or they may be helpless. , the country is in ruins.
In addition, the internal fighting among civil servants also intensified.
In the late Ming Dynasty, party struggle had become the "main theme" of the government. It ran through the political life of the entire court after Wanli and continued into the Southern Ming Dynasty. During the seventeen years of Chongzhen's reign, party struggle was basically limited to officials and gentry in the government and in opposition; After the establishment of the Hongguang Dynasty, warlord forces intervened, and civil servants in the DPRK often relied on military officers as their backers, making party struggle more complicated and acute. In a certain sense, it can be said that party struggle was an important reason for the demise of the Ming Dynasty.
Since the establishment of the Hongguang Dynasty, there have been disputes between Lifu and Lilu. In essence, it was a battle between different interest groups for the monopoly of the new regime.
After Hongguang came to the throne, the country was actually in a state of fragmentation. The Daping, Dashun, and even Zhang Xianzhong's Daxi regimes all faced the problem of acquiring talents for their own use, and the Hongguang regime was no exception.
Shi Kefa was relatively sober when it came to wooing talents. When he drafted the edict to supervise the country, the original draft used the word "waste ministers", which included the following words: "Except for enfeoffing borders (referring to the loss of territory under his jurisdiction during his term of office), counter-cases, plans, and illicit crimes are not allowed to be used." "" In one sentence, he thought that "the state's affairs were extremely corrupt, and the recruitment of talents should be broad. We cannot stick to the past practices" and deleted this sentence. However, when it was officially released a day or two later, even Shi Kefa didn't know What's going on? It's still being sent out as originally intended.
You must know that there are only a handful of experienced officials in the country now, so at this time, we should follow the "meritocracy" formulated by Cao Cao during the Three Kingdoms period to win over talents, and the minor problems of those talents should be put aside for the time being. aside.
However, Nan Ming's approach immediately shut out these flawed but capable officials and pushed them to the side of the hostile forces.
However, a group of officials concentrated near Nanjing, a gathering place of Jiangsu and Zhejiang people (most of them are Donglin - Fushe people) have a wishful thinking: on the one hand, taking advantage of the fall of the northern capital, the courtiers, except for a very few "dead gangsters", will almost They all surrendered to the Dashun and Daping regimes and became "thieves and pseudo-officials"; on the other hand, they used the old rules such as not allowing the use of "counter-cases" as an excuse to prevent another group of opposition officials and gentry from entering the officialdom, so that they could control everything from the central government to the government. All the essentials of the place pave the way.
Due to historical reasons, these Donglin-Fushe officials were worried that King Zhu Yousong's accession to the throne might overturn the rebellion and make them lose political power. However, Zhu Yousong had to rely on the support of military generals to ascend the throne, thus forming a situation where military generals were granted the title of meritless one. The situation of domineering and arrogant people. The military generals' control of government affairs caused a major setback in the Donglin-Fu Socialist Party's attempt to monopolize government affairs. This was originally a bitter fruit they had planted themselves.
However, Dong Lin, the backbone of Fushe, who has always claimed to be a clean stream, has never been willing to admit that he is selfish. Instead, he concentrated his firepower on Ruan Dacheng and others who later resurrected. It seems that everything is wrong because these people messed up the government, overturned the counter-case, and were honest men. They left hand in hand and entered the court. Of course, people like Ruan Dacheng were in the same league as Donglin Fushe officials in terms of party struggle. It was just a matter of comparison to see who was worse.
In fact, when Hongguang was first established, most of the ministers were gentlemen in the eyes of Donglin-Fushe people. But this situation did not last long. Jiang Yueguang, Gao Hongtu, Zhang Shenyan, Liu Zongzhou and others were squeezed out of the court one after another. But this situation It was not the result of people like Ruan Dacheng overturning the case, it was entirely the result of officials fighting each other for power and gain.
Of course, there is another reason: those ministers who returned home from official positions did not expect that the Daping Army would quickly move south. They thought they could live the life of squires in their hometowns or places of residence (such as Zhang Shenyan) in a graceful manner, and wait for the situation in the court to change. To make a comeback, leave a back-up to retreat in order to advance. However, these ministers once again miscalculated.
As a result, in the court, the conflicts among the ministers intensified, and they engaged in protracted verbal battles every day. Instead, they ignored the national affairs. Some knowledgeable people also felt that the national crisis was imminent and they should give up their sectarian opinions. However, such useful suggestions were immediately drowned in The memorials of mutual criticism were in vain. As a result, the Hongguang court has been living quietly in the intrigues of ministers and warlords, appearing in the internal strife, lingering in the internal strife, and it is not known whether it will fall apart in the internal strife.
Therefore, after Wu Shigong read these "Intelligence Summary", he was determined in his heart, and the small court of Nanming in the south was no longer afraid.
Although the current military strength of Nanming is still very "strong", Zuo Liangyu has nearly 200,000 soldiers and horses; Huang Degong has 35,000 men; Gao Jie has 30,000 troops, but he has nearly 9,000 mules and horses; Liu Liangzuo has 23,000 men There are more than a thousand troops and some local troops from the south.
However, the hundreds of thousands of troops and local armed forces deployed by the Daping Army in the south were enough to resist their attack. Besides, the current strategic focus of the Daping Dynasty was not on the Hongguang Dynasty of the Southern Ming Dynasty, but on the side of the Qing army in the north.
After arriving at the capital at that time, the Runing Army also organized pursuit troops to catch up with the Qing troops leaving the customs. Because there were not many cavalry and they were busy stabilizing the situation near the capital, the Runing Army did not catch up with the Qing troops leaving the customs in the end. With a large team of troops, only more than 10,000 Han people were rescued.
