The frequent mobilization of the army and the high-speed maneuvering of soldiers and horses were just horizontal strokes of paper and pen on the staff map of the Joint Military Academy, but on the legs of the soldiers, it was days and nights of sleepless hard work.
Regarding Li Laiheng's eagerness to mobilize troops, the whole army, especially the grassroots soldiers, could not help but complain.
Most people would not be able to express their dissatisfaction in front of His Majesty the King of Jin, but generals like Hao Yaoqi, Zhang Piliu, and Li Shiwei, who were direct descendants of Chu Chuangyuan, could express their dissatisfaction directly.
Like Li Shiwei, he was responsible for supervising the heavy artillery unit. Although the artillery unit remained in the rear, part of the artillery unit and the cavalry equipped with spring wheel pistols and flintlock muskets also had to follow the Yulin Army in a violent forced march.
The high-intensity maneuvers and too frequent transfers made Li Shiwei complain a lot. He said bluntly: "General Staff Gu only knows how to draw horizontal lines on the map, but the soldiers only have two legs and cannot fly."
Hao Yaoqi didn't take it seriously. If it were Hao Yaoqi, the reckless man who kept making small mistakes instead of making big mistakes, he would have made a few complaints.
However, after so many years of war, Hao Yaoqi's bravery and strength will only appear on the battlefield, but will no longer appear in the headquarters.
When Hao Yaoqi was in the headquarters, when he was accompanying the King of Jin, he had become a dignified and generous general.
"Dorgon wanted to rip out the tiger's heart and pull out its teeth. This courage and heroism must be admired by me." Hao Yaoqi said, "But in terms of his powerful ability to capture fighter planes, his decisive battle determination and encirclement
The battlefield control of fortification and multi-channel resistance, and the precise calculation before the battle to annihilate the enemy, the difference between his wise chief and our Highness, the King of Jin, is incalculable."
Li Laiheng burst out laughing when he heard this: "Waving the flag is too much, and I won't be happy if you flatter me like this."
Gu Junen and Guo Junzhen looked at each other and curled their lips, knowing the easy-to-catch smile on Li Laiheng's lips.
However, both Gu Junen and Guo Junzhen have to admit that with the development of the Battle of Xuzhou, Dorgon is slowly falling into the encirclement network of Li Laiheng's annihilation campaign.
Although the Shun Army's maneuvers led to the exhaustion of the soldiers, the art of war also said that "good display will lead to unsteady momentum." The Shun Army can only mobilize and confuse the enemy through its own active mobilization. In terms of creating fighter opportunities, "display"
"It is an inevitable step to create fighter opportunities."
More specifically, it is by relying on constant maneuvering and mobilization that a powerful situation can be formed on the battlefield in which more troops attack fewer troops.
For war, no matter whether the strategy is more against fewer or less against many, it is necessary to create an advantageous situation of "more against fewer" locally, and this is especially necessary for annihilation wars.
Although there is always a saying that Xuzhou is "easy to attack but difficult to defend", specifically, the geographical conditions of Xuzhou City are not bad.
Microscopically speaking, the city of Xuzhou is located in a small basin, a natural land for city building. This kind of terrain is unique in the Central Plains. Taking into account the historical silt pad of the Yellow River, the ground of Xuzhou City in the late Ming Dynasty was lower than that of later generations.
More than ten meters high, the hills around the city are steeper than later ones. The entire city is located on the river bank among the peaks. The situation is very dangerous, far from being comparable to the more flat terrain in later generations, and the defense is very convenient.
The defenders of the city could rely on the supplies from the Biansi River to hold on for a long time. Due to the limitations of the mountains and rivers, it was difficult for large corps to assemble outside the city and pose a threat to the city.
Looking at the entire north, especially in areas with unstable water systems such as the Yellow River, Huaihe River, and Hainan River, most ancient cities have moved across their sites due to human and natural factors - changes in river courses, wars, and politics.
Chang'an, Luoyang, Kaifeng, Beijing, Anyang, Taiyuan... all are like this. However, Xuzhou never moved. It was built with yellow mud layer after layer, and there was a city under the city, with a total of ten floors from the Western Zhou Dynasty to the Ming Dynasty.
The topography of the small basin is a very important factor.
There are two rivers, Bianshui River and Sishui River, outside the city of Xuzhou. They meet and flow south. Historically, even though these two rivers have been invaded by the Yellow River for a long time, due to the restrictions of the mountains around Xuzhou, their river courses have always been very stable. The Bianshui River comes from the west, and the Sishui River flows from the west.
Coming from the north, they meet at the northeast corner of Xuzhou City and flow south.
These two rivers are both moats and waterways of overall significance, making Xuzhou easier to defend and harder to attack, and increasing Xuzhou's shipping value.
During the Yuan and Ming dynasties, the canal that passed through Xuzhou was through the Bianshui and Sishui rivers. Briefly speaking, along the Sishui you can go north to Qilu, and after the Yuan Dynasty you can go directly to the Youyan capital; along the Bianshui you can go south to Huaiyang, Wuyue, and westward.
Bianluo Guanshan, during the Southern and Northern Dynasties, there were many major battles surrounding Xuzhou, and its strategic importance is evident.
If we compare the number of military attacks that Xuzhou City withstood in ancient times with the number of times that Xuzhou City was conquered, the theory that it is easy to attack but difficult to defend is unreliable.
During the Ming Dynasty, someone specifically mentioned "Six Proposals on the Unsuitable to Move to Xucheng". At that time, Xuzhou had just been flooded by the Yellow River, and the officials and the people were raising funds to move the city. However, someone came up with this memorial to stop the move. The memorial proposed to use river defense and canal transportation.
The necessity of maintaining the original site of Xuzhou City is discussed in several aspects such as warehouses, war defense, people's livelihood, zoning, and costs, which can be called a perfect summary of the situation in Xuzhou City.
Among them, in terms of military geography, this memorial mentioned:
Xucheng is blocked by mountains on three sides and faces the river on one side. It leads to Pisu in the south, Yanji in the north, and Biansi in the west. It can spread thousands of miles to protect the dangerous strategic points of the Yangtze and Huaihe Rivers. Jinling relies on Xu as the throat of the north and south. And the Yellow River flows from the west to the east.
, the Zhahe River flows from north to south, all converging on the northeast of Xucheng. The city blocks the river, and the river blocks the city. It is actually an important town. For example, in recent years, the Lotus Demon (Xu Hongru, a bandit of the White Lotus Sect) launched an attack and attacked Haoyue.
It was not possible to cross, so Henan and the north of the Yangtze River were saved from disaster. The town of Tuangdao was moved far away, and the remaining breeders were lurking, but there was no disaster to limit it, and there were no local officials and governors to lead the residents to defend it, in case the treacherous people took advantage of the weakness of the old city.
And by occupying it, there is a risk of losing its creation by taking advantage of the invaders' caves.
More than half of the North China Plain is between the Yellow River and the Yangtze River, separated by the Huaihe River.
The Yellow River and the Huaihe River have been connected by many natural waterways since ancient times. Together with artificial canals, they have become the most extensive transportation network in the past.
Although there is no natural waterway connection between the Huaihe River and the Yangtze River, they have been connected with the help of generations of artificial canal projects. This makes the Yellow River, Huaihe River, and Yangtze River together form a close strategic area. The connection between the Yellow River and the Huaihe River
, in a long period of time, it will be far closer and more important than the connection between the Huaihe River and the Yangtze River.
Xuzhou is both a hub for land post roads and a hub for water transportation. It connects the Yellow River and Huaihe River, is bounded by the sea to the east, and the Central Plains to the west. Whoever controls Xuzhou controls this strategic transportation network. It goes north to the Yellow River, south to the Huaihe River, and out to the west.
The hub of the Central Plains.
After the Yuan and Ming Dynasties, Xuzhou became the most important node on the Grand Canal, even more important than Yangzhou on the Yangtze River. Dorgon took Xuzhou, and Li Laiheng raised his troops to Xuzhou for a great battle. The strategic intentions of both sides were completely consistent.
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Just like two comets colliding, the two elite and powerful corps were in a strategic offensive position and launched proactive offensives against each other.
This great confrontation between the north and the south, in which strategic offensives countered strategic offensives, can only be compared in history to the decisive battle between Emperor Wen of the Song Dynasty and Emperor Taiwu of the Northern Wei Dynasty during the Yuan-Jia Northern Expedition.
With the abundance in sight, Li Laiheng finally corrected his mentality. He held the half-broken arrow tightly in the palm of his hand, dismounted from his horse and looked in the direction of the deer, and said slowly:
"Taizu's spirit of martial arts in heaven protected the Dashun army's military fortunes. Taking advantage of this opportunity to break the bamboo, he wiped out Hu Chen and cleared the sea. A hundred years later, I will make the Dashun emperor prosperous for generations to come."