Chapter seven hundred and forty seventh Huaibei no fish
The Qilin Hall was very quiet. Five or six important ministers were silent. The atmosphere seemed a bit depressing. The news came so suddenly that no one was mentally prepared.
Zhu Si paced back and forth in the hall with his hands behind his hands, his brows furrowed, and he breathed heavily unknowingly. This was a sign of his nervousness, and sometimes even he himself was not aware of it.
"Yuan Xiangguo, tell me what you think!"
Zhu Si was a little dissatisfied with the silence of the crowd, and he first began to question Prime Minister Guoyuan Xiu.
Yuan Xiu's eyelids twitched, he coughed twice, and bowed: "Your Majesty, what happened in Chengdu is really sudden and surprising, but if you think about it carefully, it should be reasonable and not surprising.
.”
"How do you say this? What do you mean it's not surprising?"
"Your Majesty, everyone in the Southern Tang Dynasty knows that the eunuchs have exclusive power, but this kind of exclusive power cannot exceed the imperial power. Once they exceed the imperial power, their death will come."
"But it wasn't them who died, it was that damn Li Shi who controlled the imperial power!" Zhu Si was filled with anger. He was eager to know the answer, but Yuan Xiu gave him an ambiguous answer.
"Here's the problem. The eunuchs have taken over the military power and the emperor wants to kill them. If they don't want to die, the only way is to kill the emperor and establish a new king."
"Yuan Xiangguo, everyone knows this answer, there is no need to repeat it!" Left Prime Minister Yao Lingyan couldn't help but sarcastically said in a low voice.
In the past two years, the feud between Yuan Xiu and Yao Lingyan has been an open secret of the imperial court. The two maintained restraint in front of Zhu Si. In addition, the two fought openly and secretly without stopping. The court officials took sides and gradually divided into two factions.
Yuan Faction and Yao Faction, if the bane of Southern Tang Dynasty was eunuch dictatorship, then the instability of Great Qin Dynasty was due to factionalism.
In front of Zhu Si today, Yao Lingyan did not dare to go too far, but he still took the opportunity to ridicule Yuan Xiu. The intelligence made it very clear that it was the eunuchs who launched the palace coup, but Yuan Xiu was still here pretending to be profound in his analysis, and he didn't make it clear.
Use nonsense.
Yuan Xiu immediately glared at Yao Lingyan and said, "I would like to hear what Prime Minister Yao Zuo has to say?"
"I'm not as arrogant as Yuan Xiangguo, and I can't say that I have high opinions, but I think this may be an opportunity for us to attack Jianghuai."
Zhu Si perked up. This was what he wanted to hear. He quickly said: "Yao Aiqing, keep talking!"
"Your Majesty, when the new king of Chengdu succeeds to the throne, various governors will definitely visit him. We estimate that Guo Song will not go, but Chen Shaoyou from Huainan, Liu Qia from Jiangnan East Road, and Ma Sui from Jiangnan West Road will definitely go to Chengdu.
The meeting, the coach is not here, isn’t this our opportunity?”
"That makes sense!"
Zhu Si was greatly impressed, and he asked Liu Sigu, who had been silent and thoughtful, "What do the military advisors think?"
Liu Sigu said after a while: "I think the timing of the death of the Emperor of the Southern Tang Dynasty is a bit strange."
"Why do you say that?"
"This is obvious. Li Shi was eager to return to Chang'an and even traded Yangzhou for Guanzhong, but Guo Song occupied Guanzhong. I am still thinking about how Guo Song should respond to Li Shi's request. After all, he publicly admitted that he
He was a minister of the Southern Tang Dynasty. I didn’t expect that Li Shi would die at this critical moment, which relieved Guo Song’s trouble. What a coincidence!”
"You mean, Li Shi's death is related to Guo Song?" Zhu Si asked.
"The humble position is just a suspicion, but there is no evidence, but I am sure that there must be many secrets hidden in it that we don't know. In fact, we don't need to care about these. Just as Yao Xiangguo suggested, now is a good time to seize Jianghuai, Wei Chen
I also hope that Your Majesty can seize this opportunity."
"General, what do you think?" Zhu Si's eyes turned to Zhang Guangsheng again.
Zhang Guangsheng bowed and said: "It is the right time for Your Majesty to take Yangzhou!"
Zhu Si laughed and said, "Okay! With your good words, I will send troops as soon as possible!"
.........
Zhu Si's army had been preparing for the whole winter and transported a large amount of food to Fuli County in Xuzhou. The 60,000-strong army was also distributed in Bozhou, Xuzhou and Sizhou. Together with the original 20,000 garrison, the southeastern army reached 80,000.
However, Zhu Si's deployment took several months to gradually complete, and the time span was relatively large. Neither Li Na, Wu Shaocheng, nor Chen Shaoyou were aware of Zhu Si's strategic intentions.
That afternoon, several fishing boats sailed out of Surabaya and entered the Huaihe River. Although winter was not over yet and the rivers in the north were still frozen, the Huaihe River was not frozen. Fishing boats could still be seen from time to time. A county town could be vaguely seen on the other side.
It is Huaiyin County in Chuzhou.
At present, Chuzhou is the territory of the Southern Tang Dynasty and is affiliated to the Huainan Jiedu Prefecture. The Huainan Jiedu Prefecture has a total of 20,000 troops and governs Yangzhou and Chuzhou. The Jiedu Envoy is Chen Shaoyou, who is also the governor of Yangzhou.
Huainan Jiedufu is currently facing enemies on both sides. It not only has to guard against Zhu Si in the north, but also Wu Shaocheng in the west. In particular, Wu Shaocheng has always been ambitious for Yangzhou. He sent troops to sneak attacks several times, but was defeated by the Huainan army.
Because of this, Chen Shaoyou was very wary of the Huaixi Army. He deployed 10,000 troops on the western front for defense, led by his confidant General Wang Shao. He also deployed 5,000 troops on the north, mainly distributed in Huaiyin County and Shanyang County.
, among which Chuzhou Prefecture has 3,000 soldiers in Shanyang County, while Huaiyin County has a slightly weaker force, about 2,000 people, but these 2,000 people are naval troops who usually patrol the Huaihe River.
Several fishing boats continued to cast nets on the Huaihe River to catch fish, and then gradually approached the south bank. There was a water village on the south bank, surrounded by a thick fence. Normally, you could not see many boats inside, but hundreds of large tents were set up on the bank of the water village.
, two thousand troops were stationed here.
In winter, the navy generally does not patrol the Huaihe River. The north is covered with ice and snow, and the river is frozen. It is impossible for warships to go south. However, warships will only start patrolling after the ice and snow in the north thaw. This is mid-January, a distance of
It has been less than a month since the northern rivers thawed.
Several fishing boats passed by the gate of the water village one after another. Normally, they would have been warned by the patrol boat, but now the gate of the water village was closed tightly and there were no boats outside at all.
Two black-clothed water ghosts silently launched from the fishing boat and dived into the water village. Several fishing boats quickly left. About half an hour later, another fishing boat passed by the water village, and the two water ghosts were picked up.
The boat and several fishing boats then sailed north.
Suyu County in Sizhou is a small county with a population of only 2,000 households. The perimeter of the county is only ten miles. You can walk from the south city to the north city by lighting a stick of incense. However, it is the closest county in Sizhou to the Huaihe River. Si River is from the county seat.
After passing by, although Suyu County is north of the Huaihe River, its rivers are not frozen.
In the afternoon, several fishing boats returned to the county dock, and several strong men hurriedly walked into the county.
Liu Sigu had arrived here a few days ago, along with Zhu Si's vanguard general Qiu Jingzhong. He commanded 20,000 troops stationed in various parts of Sizhou, but his Chinese army's main tent was also in Suyu County.
In the military office, Liu Sigu was repeatedly deliberating his plan. There were three key points in his plan. One was to cross the Huaihe River, and the other was to cut off the connection between Wang Shao's army and Yangzhou so that Wang Shao's 10,000 troops could not return to Yangzhou for rescue.
, and the third is to attack Yangzhou secretly. He has already sent a thousand soldiers to sneak into Yangzhou one after another.
At this time, a soldier reported at the door, "Alert military advisor, the spies are back!"
"Let them in!"
After a moment, three sergeants quickly walked into the lobby, knelt down together and saluted, and reported to the commander of the first brigade: "For the information of the military advisor, two of my subordinates' water ghosts sneaked into the water stronghold and saw clearly the enemy's situation."
Liu Sigu looked at the two soldiers behind him and asked, "How is the situation?"
"The gate of the enemy's water village is closed. There are more than 200 ships parked in the village, basically small and medium-sized ships of 300 stone and 500 stone. There is only one thousand-stone warship. The camp on the shore is also very quiet. No military training is seen.
signs.”
"Have you seen the soldiers?" Liu Sigu asked again.
"I saw it. There were quite a lot of people walking around on the shore."
Liu Sigu asked them in detail some other details, then rewarded them with thirty taels of silver and ordered them to retreat.
"Military advisor, it's still freezing in the north. Isn't it too early to start a war?" Qiu Jingzong asked hesitantly.
Liu Sigu smiled slightly and said: "You think so, and the enemy thinks so too, so the enemy's water village gate is closed, and even the previous patrols are gone. Isn't this our opportunity?"
"We only have ten fishing boats in hand now, so we can't transport troops. Even if we have the chance, we may not be able to seize it!"
"I specially arranged the ten fishing boats to paralyze the enemy. In fact, according to the enemy's intelligence records, there should be no fishing boats in Huaibei."
The fact that there are no fishing boats in Huaibei is attributed to Li Xilie. Within a few years, he destroyed all the fishing boats on the north bank of the Huaihe River. Since then, no one in Huaibei has dared to build fishing boats. "No fish in Huaibei" has gradually become a local phenomenon in recent years.
A common saying.
Liu Sigu pointed to the water stronghold on the map and said: "The key to the army crossing the Huaihe River is this water stronghold. If we capture this water stronghold, our ferry problem will be solved. General Qiu, take action in two days. Don't hesitate anymore."