Li Xuan's subsequent strategic ideas are quite big, but with the current strength of the Tang Dynasty King Master, it is actually not easy to achieve it.
The Tang Dynasty has currently reorganized a total of six infantry divisions, and two mixed regiments, both of which are the main regular army. In addition, there are five temporary regiments. The strength of the temporary regiments is somewhat inferior, and they are all uniform.
Pure cold weapon troops.
In the current sequence of the Tang Dynasty King's Division, these temporary regiments are used to act as secondary front operations and stay behind to suppress the rear, and are not used for front-line operations.
The total number of troops that can be used for front-line operations is only six divisions and two mixed regiments. Among these troops, one division must be left in Guangxi and the direction of Yunnan. As an important defense area, the Pearl River Delta region must also keep some troops, plus Guangdong.
In other places, the huge Guangdong, excluding Hainan Island, also requires at least one division of troops for garrison.
Hainan Island also needs the Second Mixed Regiment to be garrisoned. Well, at the same time, Lianzhou Prefecture and Leizhou Prefecture are too close to Hainan Island and far away from the hinterland of Guangxi and Guangdong. In fact, they are also garrisoned by the Second Mixed Regiment. The Second Mixed Regiment is currently composed of
There is an infantry battalion and a reserve battalion.
Li Xuan planned to add another reserve battalion to the Second Mixed Regiment, increasing the strength of the Second Mixed Regiment to three battalions. These three battalions could be stationed in Lianzhou Prefecture, Leizhou Prefecture, and Qiongzhou Prefecture respectively.
The Second Fleet, which is being rebuilt in conjunction with the navy, should be able to protect the land and sea security of the Beibu Gulf region. The security of this area means that the Tang Dynasty can obtain a safe route for maritime trade with the Nanyang region.
Currently restricted by the waters of the Pearl River Estuary, especially because many islands in the Pearl River Estuary are actually controlled by the Ming Navy, Guangzhou, an important commercial port, has not been able to play its important role. Therefore, Li Xuan has already ordered
The Ministry of Commerce and the Ministry of Industry increased investment in Hepu Port in Lianzhou Prefecture, preparing this port to take on the important task of foreign trade and exchanges in the Tang Dynasty.
Through this port, the Tang Dynasty officials have organized several batches of official fleets to the Nanyang region, mainly to Malacca for trading, mainly to purchase artillery and various types of saltpeter, sulfur and other strategic materials. The output is porcelain, silk
Mainly traditional products.
Of course, in addition to official trade, part of private trade has also been transferred to Hepu Port!
Since the Beibu Gulf is so important, it is not only necessary to rebuild the Second Fleet on a large scale, but also to increase the strength of the Second Mixed Regiment. If it were not for lack of finances and shortage of firearms, Li Xuan would have planned to directly garrison an entire division in this area.
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As for the first mixed regiment, its main direction was to face Nan'ao Island. After Wang Yue led the remnants of the Ming army to retreat to Nan'ao Island, Nan'ao Island's strategic position increased rapidly. The Ming army obviously regarded Nan'ao Island as a containment and harassment.
The bridgehead of the Puppet Tang Dynasty.
It is worth noting that the old friend of the Tang Dynasty, Mr. Wang Yue, the governor of Guangdong and Guangxi, has lost his official position and resigned due to the loss of Guangdong and Guangxi. He was even brought back to the capital by the Jinyi Guards. He is probably already in prison.
If I stay here, God only knows whether I can come out alive.
However, Wang Yue lost his official position and resigned, but the defense of Nan'ao Island has not been reduced at all. Currently, the island is defended by the Nan'ao Island Commander-in-Chief, and another old friend of the Tang Dynasty, Yu Dayou, suffered a series of disastrous defeats, but because of all the
The army's combat was quite outstanding, and it was the only bright spot among the many armies in Guangdong and Guangxi. Therefore, instead of being unlucky, he was promoted. He is now the commander of the Fujian capital, with the old troops of the Guangzhou battalion and the remnants of the Guangdong and Guangxi superintendents as the core to organize new troops.
Where is the army?
This new army is very interesting, because after encountering several consecutive disastrous defeats, Yu Dayou calmed down and thought about it. This time he did not build a musket battalion, but directly established a musket army. The core of training the new army was guns. Not only did he get
With the support of Master Zhang Yue, even the training of Du Biao under Zhang Yue moved closer to Yu Dayou's Musket Army.
From Wang Yue's supervision of Guangdong and Guangxi, to Yu Dayou's Musket Army and Zhang Yue's supervision, after being severely beaten several times by the puppet Tang thieves, the Ming Dynasty also gradually began to reform the military system, and
A trend has formed in a short period of time. Many generals of the Ming army believe that swords and spears are no longer enough in these days, and that the best way to kill them is to queue up and shoot them with muskets!
Mr. Zhang Yue was recently promoted. Because of his achievements in suppressing bandits, he successfully suppressed the offensive of the puppet Tang bandit army and blocked the front line with Huguang. He also beheaded ten thousand Tang bandits, greatly boosting the prestige of the official army. These tens of thousands of heads were
Most of the levels were obtained in the previous Battle of Xingquanfu and a series of battles in northeastern Guizhou.
At that time, the Second Army of the Tang Army fought in an extremely embarrassing manner. Although the main force was still there, the garrison brigade and the local bandit camps suffered heavy losses, and the number of casualties must have been tens of thousands.
But the real thieves here, that is, how many regular troops there are in the Royal Army of the Tang Dynasty, this is a number worthy of discussion. Anyway, Zhang Yue will not tell the adults in the capital that most of the tens of thousands of heads are
They are all fake thieves.
And he also defeated the Tang Navy in the naval battle in the Qiongzhou Strait, sank hundreds of Tang Navy ships, and drowned countless Tang Navy ships!
Well, the Ming Navy in Guangdong is also under his jurisdiction!
After such a series of calculations, Zhang Yue actually fought pretty well. As for the continuous disastrous defeats in Guangdong and Guangxi, the big bosses in the capital also knew that it was not his fault. Before Zhang Yue took office, the situation in Guangdong and Guangxi was already beyond control.
After Zhang Yue took office, Wang Yue was basically directing the war in Guangdong because the distance was too far.
The big guys in the capital and Zhengde, who was lying in bed every day, also knew about this, so they did not blame Zhang Yue. However, for the loss of Guangdong and Guangxi, someone must take the responsibility. This person
who is it?
Nonsense, who else but Wang Yue? Not only Wang Yue, but also the middle and high-level officials in the Guangdong and Guangxi regions, except for a very small number of lucky people like Yu Dayou, most of them did not end well, so the Ming Dynasty treated these people
There is nothing to say. Those who deserve to be killed will be killed, those who deserve to be exiled will be exiled, and those who deserve to have their homes confiscated will be confiscated!
If you lose such a big Guangdong and Guangdong, you still want to have a good ending, don’t think too much!
Because of the success in suppressing the bandits, and because the puppet Tang troops had begun to target Jiangxi and Fujian provinces, Emperor Zhengde added four words in front of his dispatch: Governor-General of Guizhou, Guangxi, Guangdong, Fujian, Jiangxi and other provinces.
Military affairs changed from the governor of four provinces to the governor of six provinces.
At the same time, the Ming Dynasty also realized that the puppet Tang rebellion was not a small rebellion, but a life-and-death enemy that could threaten the foundation of the Ming Dynasty's rule. Now it took it very seriously. Money and food from the Jiangnan region and troops from the northern region began to be transferred to Zhang.
Yue and even the northern frontier troops mobilized part of them to go south.
Therefore, when the Tang Army and the Ming Army faced each other in the past few months and no large-scale war broke out, not only the Tang Dynasty King's Division took the opportunity to rest, replenish and reorganize, but the Ming Army also did the same.
Now the army under Zhang Yue can be said to be powerful. The armies in Huguang, Jiangxi, and Fujian are all under his jurisdiction. At the same time, the navy in Guangdong, Fujian and other places is also under his command. This navy has hundreds of ships.
There are over 10,000 soldiers, but the army is a mess, numbering at least several hundred thousand.
As for the specific number, Zhang Yue himself doesn't know a lot about it, because many of them are soldiers from local guards and recruits from local governments. There is no accurate number of these troops at all, because the people below like to exaggerate their reports.
For a thousand-household house with two to three hundred people, the local officials dared to say that there were one or two thousand people, just to defraud Zhang Yue of money, food and weapons.
If the statistics are based on paper, the number of troops under his command is at least 800,000, but whoever believes this number is stupid. Zhang Yue is not stupid, so he naturally does not believe it.
According to his own estimate, the number of troops under his command should be between 300,000 and 400,000. As for the specific number, Zhang Yue got angry: Ignorant boy, you ask me, I ask who is going!
However, even among these 300,000 to 400,000 troops, not all of them can fight. In Zhang Yue's own mind, except for the 20,000 elite supervisors under his command and the 5,000 border troops specially mobilized by the imperial court from the north,
Except for that, everything else is unreliable.
At most, Fujian's new commander Yu Dayou's 8,000 musketeers command is more reliable, but the others, that is, the ones who are responsible for the attack, cannot really be counted on them.
There is a reason why Zhang Yue attaches so much importance to the 20,000 supervisors under his command!
Among the 20,000 supervisors, except for the Beijing camp and cavalry brought from the beginning of taking office, the others were all recruited young men, which were the "recruited soldiers" in the Ming army system.
And it is also equipped with a lot of firearms. There are more than 4,000 imitation muskets of the Tang Dynasty. There are also a lot of artillery. There are a lot of old-fashioned bowl-mouth cannons, general cannons, and the newly imitated super invincible big guns.
There are also many general cannons and Franco machine guns.
If we simply compare the number of firearms, the supervisor under Zhang Yue actually has more firearms than the two infantry divisions of the King's Division of the Tang Dynasty combined.
In addition, the musket army under Yu Dayou also had more than a thousand muskets.
This is enough to prove that the Ming Dynasty has a very deep foundation. In less than a year, it has created more than 5,000 muskets from scratch, which is much more powerful than the Tang Dynasty!
The same is true for artillery. Who doesn't know how to make a cannon? It's not that difficult. There were so many craftsmen in the Ming Dynasty. Even if the production efficiency is lower, it is still possible to make a cannon according to the same pattern.
At most, the caliber is smaller, the power is smaller, and the quality is worse, but it is definitely usable.
In addition to the 20,000 supervisors and the 8,000 musketeers, the only ones Zhang Yue valued were the frontier troops!
These five thousand border troops are not equipped with any muskets or large-caliber artillery, but they have a lot of Franco machine guns, and the most important thing is that the northern border troops often confront foreigners. Since the Ming Dynasty, they have always been Ming troops.
The best among them.
But in terms of the quality of the soldiers, Zhang Yue believed that these 5,000 border troops were enough to defeat his 20,000 supervisory standard!
And these supervisors, border troops, musketeers, and hundreds of thousands of ordinary guards and young and strong soldiers in Zhang Yue's hands were the main difficulties faced by the Tang army if they wanted to go north!
Especially those 20,000 governors and 5,000 border troops. It is impossible to seize southern Huguang without annihilating them!