After being besieged for more than half a month and repelling Li Zicheng's two fierce attacks, causing huge casualties. As the invading army returned to silence, Huang Degong's mentality became a little tired and anxious, and he urgently needed to stretch his muscles again.
He is a very reckless person, and being impatient is not his style.
Therefore, hearing that Shen Futai finally planned to take some proactive actions, Huang Degong immediately became excited again and quickly asked for orders: "Shen Futai, if you have a plan, please order it as soon as possible!"
Chen Shuren couldn't help but laugh: "You don't even know where I plan to fight."
Huang Degong did not hesitate: "Anyway, as long as you tell me, I will do it! I will fight wherever you ask me to!"
After getting along with each other for this period of time, his trust in Shen Shuren has subtly risen several levels.
Chen Shuren was of course very satisfied with this attitude. He knew that he had finally succeeded in conquering the other party, and he had also thoroughly understood his temperament, talents, and usage.
Huang Degong should be the most capable general under his command, and he is more brave and decisive than Liu Guoneng.
In contrast, Liu Guoneng's advantage at the military level is that he is more resolute, willing to pay the price, and more resolute in execution - to put it bluntly, Huang Degong is "Brothers, follow me", while Liu Guoneng is more inclined to "Brothers, follow me"
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Maybe it was because he was born a thief and was used to seeing life and death. The sword tip sucked blood and all the old buddies died, which made Liu Guoneng not begrudge the lives of his soldiers and subordinates. Shen Shuren gave him an order and he would do it no matter the cost.
arrive.
Huang Degong cherishes his soldiers and takes the lead. When faced with absolute adversity, he may not dare to risk the entire army.
But no matter what, these two are generals whose names are recorded in history. Especially Huang Degong, even if he was not ranked in the first echelon in the late Ming Dynasty, he was at least the top of the second echelon.
It took Shen Shuren three years to develop. Except for Zheng Chenggong, the generals he has trained are not as good as Huang and Liu in terms of pure military talent.
For example, Zuo Zixiong, who was single-handedly promoted by Shen Shuren, was originally only at the level of Qianhu. Although his personal martial arts was indeed unparalleled, not inferior to Huang Degong, and his ability to command and execute troops was not bad, his overall view and ability to stand on his own were inferior to these two.
Just a big difference.
To put it bluntly, except for Zheng Chenggong, none of the original generals under Shen Shuren had the talent to control a single province and be as stable as Mount Tai. Now Shen Shuren’s territory is only in Huguang. He can personally sit in the center and his subordinates can implement his strategic decisions.
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In the future, if his power spans several provinces, and he even has to face a struggle for power with the center of the Ming Dynasty, then there must be a few famous generals like this who are willing to serve him completely.
Just like in history, when Liu Bei entered Sichuan, Guan Yu had to be left alone to guard Jingzhou.
The southern half of the country has been destined to be divided into three major areas: Yi, Jing, and Yang due to the natural geographical environment since ancient times. In the Ming Dynasty, Lingnan and Guangxi were added to the area.
[To be honest, I have been using Yeguo Reading recently to catch up on books, change sources, and read aloud with many sounds, and it can be used on both Android and Apple.]
So Chen Shuren really wants to plan the world. Even in the southern half, he must have three governors who can be absolutely trusted and loyal to him, plus three provincial guards. Otherwise, even if he controls the emperor in the future, he will still be
The risk of Qingjun side.
It turns out that before Chen Shuren became the governor of a province, these issues were a bit too far away to consider. Even if he wanted to consider them, he didn't have the strength to do so. It was too overstepping.
But now that he has officially been the governor of Huguang for a month or two, and has begun to prepare for a broader stage, the work of discovering and recruiting these talents must be put on the agenda.
When beating Li Zicheng this time, Shen Shuren never thought of completely beating Li Zicheng from the beginning to the end, and he did not have the strength.
The key is to be able to achieve peace for several years in one battle and establish a prestige that makes Li Zicheng fear him and not dare to go south easily in the future. That is enough.
Compared with military victory, what is more important to Shen Shuren is that by defeating Li Zicheng, he completely united Liu Guoneng and Huang Degong, making them sincerely convinced and admiring him.
It would be best to make them more loyal to themselves than to Ming Dynasty.
For this purpose, no matter how slow and careful the work is, it is never too much.
…
Since he was very clear about his overall plan for fighting against Li Zicheng, Shen Shuren certainly knew what could and could not be fought in the subsequent battles, and what specific goals he should pursue.
Anything that is conducive to establishing authority, attacking people's hearts, and subsequently deterring Li Zicheng must be done decisively.
As for anything that directly causes casualties, purely reduces Li Zicheng's military strength, and causes himself to be greatly consumed, then we should do it as little as possible, and try to defeat others without fighting.
Otherwise, if Li Zicheng is really beaten to pieces, who can he expect to pester Chongzhen and kill those shameless officials in Beijing?
After having a clear action goal and program, Shen Shuren announced his plan naturally:
"The intruder is so powerful that even if he can no longer afford to fight us now, it is impossible to fight him decisively. Therefore, our goal is still to force him to temporarily give up the siege of Kaifeng before this winter and give Kaifeng a chance to breathe.
As you just said, you have found out that the Chuang army has given up and continues to attack the city, and there is still a shortage of food. We have divided our troops to get food. Although you have not found out where to go to get food, you can guess the general idea after thinking about it.
direction--
The intruders came from the west, and the west side had been devoured and wiped clean for hundreds of miles. Luoyang was even more dilapidated, and further toward Tongguan there was Sun Chuanting.
Huaiqing Mansion and Wei Hui Mansion in the north had just been massacred and plundered by Li Zicheng at the turn of summer and autumn. The population is now estimated to be very small. If they hadn't robbed Huaiqing and Wei Hui of their food, maybe
Li Zicheng could not survive this autumn and could not maintain the siege of Kaifeng.
Zuo Liangyu is in the southwest, and we are in the south and southeast. Therefore, the only direction Li Zi divided his troops to go out to get food is most likely Guide Mansion (Shangqiu) in the east. Although it was also poor, it was not systematically massacred.
However, maybe some autumn grain has been harvested.
Even if the food is not enough for the people to eat until next year, as long as most of the locals are killed and all the people's living food is taken away, it will definitely be enough to feed hundreds of thousands of troops for a while. Li Zicheng will definitely be able to do this.
In this way, we have to go out of the city to actively seek fighter opportunities. The most important direction is to divide our troops and go east, heading directly east of the intruders and to the northeast of our army. If we can attack the isolated food troops of the intruders, each of them will
If you defeat it, you can achieve considerable results.
If we don't encounter the intruders and the troops who can divide their forces for food, we can gradually attack and recover some key counties, or assist in the defense of some Henan counties along the Yingchuan and Shah Rivers that are still under the control of the government troops, and continue to fight steadily and build a camp step by step.
If the intruders come to intercept, we will copy the tried-and-tested strategy at Shangcai and fight in vain. If the intruders do not intercept us, we can approach Kaifeng along the Yingchuan River and the Shahe River..."
Shen Shuren had just finished speaking incessantly, and there was still a lot to explain, but Huang Degong felt a little uneasy after hearing this, and couldn't help but interrupt: "Sir, if we don't take Yancheng, we will divide our troops to the northeast and go around the city.
, then how to solve the problem of food supply for our troops?
Yancheng is blocked at the mouth of the Tuulu Canal that connects Ruying. Our previous grain ships came from Rushui. To bypass Yancheng, we had to unload the ships and load them in Shangcai and transport them overland to Yingchuan.
When unloading trucks and loading ships, if there is a flaw in any place, you will be seriously threatened by the intruders. You are not prepared separately..."
Chen Shuren nodded: "Of course, do you still remember? A few days ago, when the intruders had just retreated and stopped attacking the city, I asked you to send people to make trouble and ask Ma Shiying, the prefect of Fengyang, to transport food to us. Didn't you do the same?
Someone has been sent as per my request."
It has now been four or five days since Li Zicheng failed to siege the city for the second time, so this time is enough time to send people from Xinyang to Fengyang Mansion in Nanzhili next door to do some things and make a round trip. Shen Shuren was in charge of Li Zicheng
This idle move was arranged the next day after giving up the attack.
When Huang Degong heard this, he also remembered this matter. He actually already knew the results of the coordination, but he was too embarrassed to speak to Shen Shuren and didn't know how to report it.
Being mentioned voluntarily at this moment, he could only say with shame: "This is not reliable. Your Excellency, you asked the general to send someone, but you prepared the letter yourself. The wording is too blunt. Ma Shiying is totally fine."
If you speak in an official tone, the rules of officialdom do not mean that he must cooperate with you.
If you had asked me to prepare some gifts and say some kind words, the situation might have been different... General Mo has heard that you have some issues with Ruan Dacheng, Ma Shiying's best friend, but this is not unexplainable."
After hearing this, Chen Shuren smiled proudly: "I had no intention of asking Ma Shiying to raise food for us. What I wanted was his uncooperative attitude.
Fengyang is where the Central Capital is located, and the officialdom must have been infiltrated by thieves. Do you think that if the news spread that Ma Shiying and I are not dealing with each other, wouldn't Li Zicheng be more and more likely to relax his vigilance?
As for how to solve the problem of the grain road after we bypass Yancheng, of course we have to raise our own transportation capacity and use sand boats to go north from the Huaihe River from Shouxian County to Yingchuan. There is always a waterway that can lead all the way to Kaifeng.
Our Shen family is responsible for water transportation and sea transportation for the imperial court. Landlubbers like Li Zicheng have no idea about the power of our Shen family on the water.
We can even transport the grain that is consumed by millions of people every year to the surrounding areas of the capital and even to the garrison in Liaodong. It is more than enough to transport military grain to an army of 70,000 to 80,000 people. Even if it is divided into several routes and each route is left with full transportation capacity, it will be more than enough.
Before I sent out the army last month, I actually secretly discussed this matter with my father, asking him to prepare enough sailors, sailors, warships, and transport ships at any time. Because there were very few people handling it, I didn’t tell outsiders. It was very
Confidentiality.
As for the Toulu Canal that connects Ruying, the two ends are Yancheng and Chenxian respectively. Yancheng is at the intersection of Toulu Canal and Rushui, and Chen County is at the intersection of Toulu Canal and Yingchuan.
We set out from Shangcai, with Yancheng to the north and Chen County to the northeast. As long as the land route only takes a few days to carry food, and the enemy is caught off guard and captures Chen County where the enemy is sparsely stationed, we can switch the food road to Shouxian and Chen County.
In the Yingchuan River Basin, what is the use of Li Zicheng's encirclement of Yancheng?
On the other hand, Li Zicheng's garrison in Yancheng will not be able to get the grain raised from the east of the Yingchuan River Basin because we have blocked Chen County. Even if Li Zicheng has emptied Guide Mansion, he will not be able to transport it directly by water.
Once he comes to Lincheng, it will be meaningless for him to defend Lincheng. In this way, Lincheng has become a lonely fruit on a withered vine. Why bother to attack it again and wait for the fruit to mature and fall off?"
As Chen Shuren spoke, he pointed on the map. After he finished speaking, Huang Degong suddenly became enlightened.
In addition, as a digression, Huang Degong may be able to easily understand Shen Shuren's plan, but most modern people who are not familiar with history and geography may have difficulty understanding at certain points——
The modern Yingchuan River and Shahe River are both small rivers with small flows, so many people will be surprised by "How can it be possible to take a big boat from here all the way to Bianshui and approach Kaifeng?" But this problem did not exist in the Ming Dynasty.
This is because since the Southern Song Dynasty, when the Jin Kingdom in the north neglected to control the water, the Yellow River burst its banks and changed its course, taking the Huaihe River and flowing into the sea, until the historical rebellion of the Taiping Heavenly Kingdom in the Qing Dynasty (1855), the Yellow River remained the same during the Yuan and Ming dynasties.
The Huaihe River flows into the sea.
At that time, Bianshui River, Shahe River, and Yingchuan River were all one of the several rivers where the Yellow River entered the Huaihe River. The water level and flow rate were much higher than those in later generations. Large ships could easily pass through them all the way. It was difficult for only army troops to intercept these rivers.
most of the river sections.
In contrast, the lower reaches of the Yellow River that were rerouted to the north in later generations were actually several small rivers such as "Jishui" in this era. Because the reroute of the main stream of the Yellow River only allowed the water from the middle and upper reaches to go south. But the Yellow River
There is still rainfall on both sides of the downstream bank that needs to be merged. This small amount of water will still take the old path of Huangge, forming small water pipes such as Jishui.
Of course, most people in the 21st century do not know this common sense of geography, but Huang Degong was from that time, so of course he knew it well. He would not have any doubts about the road accessibility problem of the grain transportation logistics plan mentioned by Shen Shuren.
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So he said with sincere admiration: "Your Excellency has such a plan, and manages several provinces like a chess game. He is really an unparalleled talent! However, if our army wants to sneak attack Chen County, and then approach Kaifeng along the Yingchuan River and the Shahe River, the road will be smoother.
, it’s not as good as Shangcai, which is still on the edge of the Runan Mountains.
What if we advance on the plains with no danger to defend and are surrounded by the main force of intruders, seeking a decisive battle?"
Chen Shuren shook his head speechlessly: "Didn't I say, 'Fortify a stronghold and fight a stupid war'? It's not 'Fortify a strong city'. Even if there is no city, we can build a stronghold ourselves, set up chariot formations, and rely on the slow flow of the river."
and advance,
We have the advantage of the naval force. When Li Zicheng besieges us, he will not be able to cut off our food route. My food route can pass through the camp through the river, so he will have no choice but to attack by force.
You have already seen the consequences of a strong attack. When we have a broken city like Shangcai, it is easy to withstand ten times the enemy. Even if the city becomes an ordinary camp, it will be no problem to withstand five times the enemy.
Moreover, the intruders have been defeated twice in a row, and their casualties, losses, and morale decline are all serious. Discouraged soldiers cannot be used. The further they go, the less willing they will be to risk everything and pay a heavy price to try to attack by force. As long as we can support Kaifeng,
The goal has been achieved, and I can give an explanation to His Majesty."
Huang Degong gritted his teeth, and finally did not question it again this time. He still had the courage, but he only cared about his subordinates and did not want to die, so he had to ask clearly at the beginning.
And as soon as he discovered that it was feasible, he immediately became like a different person, becoming very executive and thinking only about how to achieve his goals.
Huang Degong picked up the wine bowl, drank a large bowl in one gulp, and asked decisively: "I wonder how many troops and horses your lord will leave to defend Xinyang Mansion this time, and how many troops and horses will be used to attack? I would like to be the vanguard!"
Chen Shuren smiled comfortingly: "The vanguard has surrendered its talents. Mr. Huang will follow me and lead the main force. For this battle, I will mobilize 20,000 from Shangcai's 30,000 defenders, and then from Ruyang's 30,000
Among the people, 20,000 people were also allocated,
Together with all the cavalry, new musketry units, all 300-pound light-weight Folang machines that are easy to move, and the transferred sailors, we will strive to mobilize a total of 50,000 to 60,000 mobile troops.
Let Liu Guoneng continue to lead his own troops, as well as our army's old-fashioned gunmen, all heavy artillery units that are not easy to maneuver, to withstand the defensive front on the ground in Xinyang Prefecture and hold back the enemies in Yancheng. In the past two days, you will first
Yang's troops are slowly preparing to assemble, and when the time comes, they will launch a joint attack. Three days later, they will attack Chen County and fire the first shot of our army's initiative to fight."
"General, I obey!" Huang Degong accepted the order and went to prepare for war.