Wuchang, which was just an ordinary city a few years ago, has become very different in the past two years. You can often see many soldiers passing by on the streets, and a corner of the city is full of people all day long.
Thick smoke billows.
The Fucheng, which originally had only tens of thousands of people, is now packed with 70,000 to 80,000 people. Even the original urban area cannot accommodate people, and it has to be expanded outside the city walls.
The reason for all this is naturally that Zhang Yue regards Wuchang as his rear base camp!
He ordered Song Zhiwen to make guns and cannons here to train the new army, and Song Zhiwen recruited a large number of craftsmen from various places and began to build guns and many other ordnance day and night.
There are more than 5,000 craftsmen of various types here alone. The craftsmen and their families have caused the population here to increase significantly, and even caused a certain degree of abnormal prosperity.
In addition, in addition to the indigenous people, recruited craftsmen and their families, the city's population also has a large number of troops!
There were more than 10,000 Chinese troops under supervision, and a large number of them were withdrawn from the front line by Zhang Yue, and then sent to Wuchang to serve as guards for ordinary workers.
This brought the population of Wuchang Fucheng to 70,000 to 80,000, and a population of this size was actually not small in ancient times.
In a luxurious house in the center of Wuchang City amid the hustle and bustle, Zhang Yueduan was sitting in a side hall, reading the battle report urgently sent by the messenger!
"Everyone, let's take a look!" After a while, Zhang Yue put down the battle report, and then handed the battle report to Song Zhiwen next to him.
After Song Zhiwen read it, he passed it on to others. After a while, five or six people in the side hall had already circulated it!
"Sir, the puppet Tang rebel army is going to Yuezhou, and our army only has three thousand troops in Yuezhou. I'm afraid it will be difficult to withstand the rebel army's front, so we need to make plans in advance!"
The man continued: "Once Yuezhou is captured by the rebels, the connection between our Wuchang and Changsha will be cut off. Not only will we not be able to contact Changsha to send replenishing soldiers and military supplies, the rebels will also be more likely to directly transfer from Yuezhou."
Go south from the prefecture and cooperate with the First Army under Hao Tie to besiege Changsha and Hengyang. In this way, the land of Huguang south of the Yangtze River is in danger!"
However, Song Zhiwen spoke at this time: "But if our army rushes to reinforce Yuezhou, it is very likely to fall into Li Thief's conspiracy!"
"The leader of this second army is Li Chunjing, and Li Chunjing is very cunning in his military use. He often makes false claims and attacks in the east. Some time ago, Li Chunjing said he was coming to Wuchang, but now he is going to Yuezhou. Who knows?
Is his goal to be in Yuezhou, or is he trying to take the opportunity to intercept our reinforcements? Or is he luring my Wuchang troops to Yuezhou and then heading north to Wuchang with a false shot?"
Song Zhiwen's words immediately caused many people to frown!
Yes, this Li Chunjing is very cunning in his military use, and there is no common sense to follow. Who knows what his real purpose is!
But when everyone frowned, someone said: "No matter what Li Chunjing really wants to do, the current situation in Yuezhou cannot stop Li Chunjing's troops!"
Listening to everyone's discussion, Zhang Yue was also a little irritated. Ever since he had been supervising the army in the south, the suppression of the puppet Tang Dynasty had not gone smoothly. He had lost troops and generals and lost the city. Otherwise, there would not have been so many people in the court impeaching him.
But what can he do? He is also helpless!
The soldiers in the guard station are useless and almost always lose every battle. Often they cannot defend a city even with several times the force. The only thing Zhang Yue can rely on is the supervisors he has trained himself, but the number of supervisors is endless.
There are so many!
Although the cost of Zhang Yue's supervision is not as high as that of the Tang Dynasty Army, it is still expensive. Fortunately, although Huguang has not yet reached its peak state of development, Huguang is well-known in the world, but after nearly two hundred years of development,
, Huguang’s population and acres of land have also reached an extremely impressive state.
Only in this way can Zhang Yue be able to support his new army of governors.
But after all, the number of troops is still a little less, and there are too many places that need to be defended. Now, if Zhang Yue relies solely on supervising the standards, he is actually unable to take advantage of the strength. Only by adding various local training armies can he be able to
It has a certain advantage in terms of military strength, but this advantage is not very obvious.
The most obvious example is that in the direction of Huguang, Zhang Yue deployed a total of about 25,000 supervisors and almost 20,000 training troops. The total force was only 45,000 in full.
As for the local guardsmen and young men, who would count them in the war now?
However, as for the puppet Tang rebel army in Huguang, Hao Bainian's First Army now has the First Infantry Division, the Second Infantry Division, the Third Infantry Division and a mixed regiment under its command, with a total strength of about 40,000.
In other words, in fact, in Huguang, the strength comparison of the main forces of both sides is almost the same.
And this also caused Zhang Yue to feel even more inadequate.
But even so, the strength of the Ming army under Zhang Yue is actually much higher than before. In the past, the two to three hundred thousand local guardsmen and young men recruited temporarily were useless except to waste food. Now Zhang Yue is already
The strategy has been changed. Guard soldiers and temporary young men are basically not used in battles. Instead, they are sent to work in workshops, or simply go to farm, and some who are useful are used as ordinary civilians.
Although the number of troops is not as large as before, the combat effectiveness of Zhang Yue's army is actually better than before. Otherwise, Zhang Yue would not have the confidence to kick the guards aside!
But no matter what, lack of troops is the biggest problem facing Zhang Yue now!
Now facing the bandit army attacking Yuezhou, Zhang Yue couldn't think of where he could mobilize troops to strengthen Yuezhou's defense. If he mobilized troops from Wuchang, Wuchang's defense would also be weakened. Changsha and Hengyang had already been
He has transferred some troops. If he transfers them again now, I am afraid that Hao Bainian can directly lead the First Army to capture Changsha without Li Chunjing leading the Second Army to kill them.
Could it be that Yuezhou couldn't be saved? We could only watch helplessly as the puppet Tang rebel army captured Yuezhou?
After a long while, Song Zhiwen suddenly said: "How about dispatching the main force from Hengyang to the north to garrison Yuezhou?"
After Song Zhiwen said this, the group of people below immediately shook their heads and said: "Hengyang is an important place to prevent thieves. How can we easily mobilize troops to go north? Moreover, Hengyang is so far away from Yuezhou and we can't get there in time!"
When a group of other people objected, Zhang Yue looked at Song Zhiwen, and then saw Song Zhiwen showing a hint of a wry smile. Others may not know why Song Zhiwen said this, but as the one-handed leader of Song Zhiwen
Zhang Yue, who was reactivated and entrusted with important tasks in two years, heard the meaning behind Song Zhiwen's words.
When Song Zhiwen said this, he was not only planning to mobilize troops from Hengyang, but also preparing to completely abandon Hengyang, perhaps the entire south of Changsha!
Nowadays, Zhang Yue is in a lot of trouble. He doesn't have many troops, but there are too many places that need to be garrisoned. At this time, if he needs to avoid being defeated one by one and tired of being killed, the best way is actually to abandon some salients.
Then shrink your troops.
And today's Hengyang is such a protruding part.
If Hengyang can be abandoned voluntarily, the main force of about 30,000 people in Hengyang city can be transferred to Changsha, and correspondingly, troops can be transferred from Changsha to reinforce Yuezhou.
In this way, Changsha, Yuezhou, Wuchang and Jiujiang can be connected in a straight line to support each other and prevent the rebels from entering northern Huguang!
In fact, Song Zhiwen had mentioned this idea to him a long time ago, but Zhang Yue dared to kick aside the guard soldiers without hesitation, and he also dared to risk infamy and requisition the thieves' pay, but Zhang Yue did not dare to take the initiative
Give up Hengyang!
So Zhang Yue refused without hesitation. Unexpectedly, Song Zhiwen would bring it up in front of everyone today, but as he expected, everyone also raised objections without hesitation!
After hearing this, Song Zhiwen sighed slightly, and then said: "Since we can't mobilize troops from Hengyang and Changsha to go north to defend Yuezhou, we need to be prepared for the fall of Yuezhou. It's best to hurry up and send troops to Changsha and Hengyang."
Send a batch of ordnance and food over!"
Everyone can understand why Song Zhiwen said this, because once Yuezhou is lost, Changsha and Hengyang will basically be trapped behind enemy lines. If they don't want to take the initiative to break out, they can only defend, and what if they don't have ordnance and food and grass?
OK!
At this time, Song Zhiwen continued: "In addition, since the main force of the bandit army is advancing westward, we can also take the opportunity to recover Nanchang and even Ganzhou!"
Hearing Song Zhiwen's words, everyone suddenly realized, and someone immediately said: "Yes, they beat them, we beat ours, and they go to attack Yuezhou, then we will go directly to attack Nanchang, and after recapturing Nanchang, we will capture Ganzhou.
In this way, it will be possible to recover most of Jiangxi!"
However, Zhang Yue also had doubts about this. Nanchang is not easy to attack. If it cannot be conquered for a long time, it will be a big trouble!
But now, Zhang Yue feels that he has no good choice. It is not a matter of reinforcing Yuezhou, it is not a matter of no reinforcements, it is not a matter of attacking Nanchang, and it is not a matter of not fighting.
In the end, he asked everyone to retreat in a dull atmosphere, but in the end, he still did not make any decision. He just asked people to hurry up and send a batch of ordnance, ammunition and food to Changsha and Hengyang. At the same time, he also sent the useless guards to Changsha and Hengyang.
The soldiers dispatched ten thousand people to Yuezhou, but everyone knows whether these tens of thousands of guard soldiers are useful. This is at most a psychological comfort, but in fact it is of no use.
As for sending the main force to Yuezhou, it was put on hold!
Anyway, he still has time now. It will take time for the puppet Tang bandits to attack Yuezhou. If Zhang Yue sends reinforcements from Wuchang, he can go directly by boat and the journey is much shorter, so he still has time!
The Ming army remained as stable as Mount Tai, and Li Chunjing was unmoved. Instead, he continued to move towards Yuezhou, as if he insisted on marching into Yuezhou!