Chapter 434 Knowing what is known is knowing what is not knowing is not knowing
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The entire bloody fight lasted for more than two hours. The Ming army continued to use a phalanx of rifled guns and bayonets to resist the charging enemies, while using rangers to spray in the face to harvest the outflanking enemies.
As the scale of the gains became more and more exaggerated, Galdan, who clearly had an absolute advantage in military strength, finally woke up and knew that the battle could not be fought like this.
Unfortunately, it's too late.
The prolongation of the bloody battle for half a day allowed more reinforcements to arrive from the rear of the Ming army. It became even more difficult for Galdan to escape, and his retreat had been further forced and his position was tight.
At the beginning, he faced only more than 40,000 Ming Army cavalry, but now, with the addition of new troops, this number may have been 60,000 or even 80,000.
The Ming army in the Shahukou Pass also received some reinforcements during this period, and even dared to break out of the trench defense line at Shahukou after the Junggar troops were shaken, and launched a counterattack to support the friendly forces.
More importantly, when the battle reached dusk, Galdan discovered that in the direction of Ulanqab in the northeast, which he had originally looked down upon and ignored, there were actually traditional nomadic horse archers under the banners of Chahar and Horqin Mongolia.
, responded to Ming's call, came over to attack from the flanks, snatching heads and gaining military exploits.
That number is probably in the tens of thousands. After all, the Mongolian tribes in the grassland can use all their people as soldiers. After the Chahar and Horqin people surrendered to the Ming Dynasty, they had more than thirty years of peaceful farming and reproduction, and now they have pulled out 30,000 to 50,000 cavalry.
It's all normal, and it doesn't even count as an effort.
Seeing this scene, Galdan almost exploded with anger: What these people did was not rape! We are all descendants of Genghis Khan. Don't these people have a sense of honor? Are they helping the Han people to kill the Mongols?
You must know that when Galdan marched before, he had always noticed the activities of the Chahar people on the grasslands due east and northeast, but he did not take it seriously.
Because he originally came to invade the Khalkha Mongolian grassland. After he occupied the Khalkha grassland, he would naturally border the Chahar grassland further east. There were activities of the Chahar people at that time, and he only thought that they were afraid of them.
He is on guard for self-preservation.
If the Ming army had used a Han cavalry with a clear banner to leave the border in advance and make a detour, then Galdan's scouts would have been alert when they saw it and reported it immediately, and Galdan would have responded.
However, the other party's identity as a Mongolian made Galdan feel that they all had the same culture and ethnicity, but they were just coerced to retreat here and banded together to defend themselves, so he didn't take it seriously.
Who would have thought that Li Dingguo actually colluded with these Chahar and Horqin Mongolians in advance!
Using their cover status, Ti made a detour to the north behind Galdan, blocking the last direction of Galdan's escape, and completing the long-distance detour and blockade that was inconvenient for the Han army.
Obviously, Li Dingguo must have promised the other party a lot of benefits. Or at least told them that the Ming army would fight a tough battle, but once Galdan showed signs of collapse, they could follow him and fight a smooth battle.
Judging from the fact that the grassland coalition forces responded to the call of the Ming Dynasty regular army and were willing to contribute to the suzerain, Li Dingguo's promise obviously worked.
People on the grasslands, even if they don't have much military pay, are still willing to fight against the odds. This is a rare opportunity to rob livestock, property and people. As long as the Ming army can survive the initial offensive stage, who can't follow up and kill and rob people?
?
Even if thousands of tribesmen soldiers or more are killed in the bloody battle, compared to the gains and trophies gained from annihilation, that is still worth it.
The grassland people are inherently fierce and despise life. As long as they can plunder, dead people are nothing.
All these dragnets completely shattered Galdan's spine and he was unable to escape quickly.
The Ming army's spray cavalry and Chahar Horqin cavalry from all directions chased the defeated Junggar army, which had lost its unified command system and was fighting for its own life.
The battlefield, which stretches for more than a hundred miles, is constantly being drilled and cut, and small divided encirclements are being implemented everywhere.
The Dzungarian army closest to the eastern part of the battlefield was surrounded by organized forces. They either fought to the death or had to surrender in the end.
They also knew that persimmons are weak, so after being besieged, they singled out the Chahar Mongols, who were of the same race as themselves, because they felt that they were weaker and could easily break out of the siege in that direction.
As a result, the Chahar and Horqin people, who originally planned to take advantage of the situation, had to swallow the bitter fruit and consumed each other's lives in the Mongolian civil war with the Junggar tribe. In the end, each suffered more than 10,000 casualties, but the Junggar tribe still suffered.
The casualties were far worse.
The Junggar troops deployed on the east side were eventually annihilated by the entire army. Only the troops close to the center and west of the battlefield could break through.
The subsequent pursuit battle lasted for many days. Li Dingguo held hundreds of thousands of troops, but he did not use all his cards in the first decisive battle.
This shows that he has obviously thought that cavalry on the grassland come and go like the wind. It is impossible to catch the opponent's tail or completely surround and annihilate him. He will always be broken through by a large force.
Therefore, Li Dingguo's idea was to deploy troops in batches along the nine sides of the Great Wall. The troops on the eastern defense line would attack first. After defeating and annihilating the enemy as much as possible, the enemy would naturally flee westward.
The other reserves of the Ming army deployed in Jiubian, which are closer to the west side pass, can immediately leave the pass and head north to intercept after receiving urgent news of the victory of the friendly forces in the east, allowing Galdan to continue his escape route to the west.
Being skinned layer by layer.
The pursuit battle became increasingly chaotic, but the results also snowballed.
Li Dingguo led the Han cavalry and Chahar Horqin Mongolian cavalry and chased them from Killing Pass to Guihua City, where they had another large-scale field battle with the remnants of Galdan, killing tens of thousands of enemies.
Then the Ming Dynasty ambushed the reserve team in Hetao in advance, and then intercepted from Guihua City to Shenhebei at the corner of the Yellow River, where there was another bloody battle. Countless Junggar cavalry who originally wanted to march along the plains on the north bank of the Yellow River were also besieged.
Drive down the Yellow River——
The main reason is that north of the Yellow River in this area, there are the Yinshan Mountains. In order to escape quickly, Galdan did not want to go north around the Yinshan Mountains, so he chose to go south of the Yinshan Mountains and the flat and narrow valley plains on the north bank of the Yellow River. Unexpectedly, in
Here we were driven out by the Ming army again.
After finally escaping to the west entrance of this section of Yinshan Mountain, Galdan, who had been defeated in three battles, felt that it was necessary to adjust his route. He would rather go to the desert north of Yinshan Mountain. However, when he wanted to cross the mountain near Wuyuan (Baotou), he was deployed again by Li Dingguo.
The reserve team left the border and went north to attack, and suffered tens of thousands of casualties and captured battle losses.
There were four major defeats in four battles, which lasted for more than half a month, from the defeat at Shahukou to the defeat at Guihua City to the defeat at Shenhebei and finally the defeat at Wuyuan.
Li Dingguo switched to another battle and pursued for more than 600 miles. In the first battle, he killed 80,000 prisoners and wounded 80,000 soldiers at Hukou. In the second battle, he killed 37,000 soldiers in Guihua City. In the third battle, he killed 20,000 soldiers in Hebei and drove them away.
Countless people went down to the Yellow River, and in four battles and five plains they captured 40,000 more soldiers.
Galdan's more than 300,000 troops were annihilated in total up to 170,000. Even among the soldiers who fled back, there were still many lightly wounded.
If he hadn't captured some of the Khalkha traitors who had surrendered to him when he was in Khalkha Mongolia, he might not have even a hundred thousand fighting soldiers left after he returned. Now counting the temporarily captured compatriots, he could barely survive
There are about 110,000 soldiers with well-preserved combat strength, and 30,000 to 40,000 lightly wounded soldiers.
However, the combat effectiveness of the 20,000 Khalkha militiamen who have just been captured is obviously not comparable to that of the Junggar army, which has been conquering the east and west for 13 years. This is because it has been 30 years since the Khalkha people were naturalized in the Ming Dynasty.
There has been no war.
Of the more than 110,000 intact soldiers in Galdan, only the 90,000 Junggar soldiers of their own tribe are the real elite.
After returning to Luntai, Galdan was able to crazily recruit new tribesmen to join the army to make up for the shortfall. After all, he is the master who controls a population of five to six million Tatars, and all the people of the grassland nomads are soldiers. Five
The loss of 6 million Tatars and 200,000 elite soldiers is nothing.
But the quality of these Xinla Zhuangding's militiamen will definitely be much worse than the veterans he brought to conquer the Qinghai-Tibet countries in Central Asia.
…
After the Ming army won the battle of Lienjie from Shahukou to Baotou, the news quickly spread back to the Nanjing court.
The Nanjing government and the public were naturally very excited and immediately began to plan the next strategic goals.
When the news came, Emperor Zhu Ciyu was in the palace, discussing with his family about the war ahead. So as soon as he heard about it, he immediately consulted with his father and cousin to see whether the next step should be to launch a full-scale counterattack immediately, and strive to defeat the Junggar tribe in one go.
The roots are completely destroyed.
After Zhu Shuren heard this idea, he did not immediately express his stance. Zhang Huangyan, who was standing next to him, saw that he did not express his stance, so he did not express his stance yet.
Zhu Shuren suddenly turned to the three children beside him who were engrossed in eating fruits, namely twelve-year-old Zhu Hekun, ten-year-old Zhu Hetan, and nine-year-old Zhu Hezhi, and asked kindly:
"Do you think we should pursue it or not?"
Zhu Hekun was more domineering and irritable, and immediately said with high spirits: "Now our country, the Ming Dynasty, is as powerful as the Han and Tang Dynasties. In the past few years, in order to sympathize with the people, relief was the first priority, and we did not engage in war. We accumulated little by little.
The ugly people of Junggar do not know that our Ming Dynasty has given way to justice, Yelang is arrogant and brought about his own destruction. It is time for him to take advantage of the victory and pursue the victory, directly attack the Luntai, plow the court and sweep the holes. In this way, our Ming Dynasty's martial arts can completely surpass the Han and Tang Dynasties.
It’s also out of reach.”
The more Zhu Shuren listened, the more he wanted to laugh in his heart, not because of his grandson's knowledge, but because he saw a show-off child who "had just learned a lot of idioms, and when he spoke, he piled up idioms and allusions like crazy."
This feeling is just like when junior high school students write compositions. Some junior high school students who have learned a lot of idioms can't help but use all the idioms they can and show off a little more.
In order not to undermine his grandson's confidence, he did not make an evaluation immediately and turned to the other two people.
Zhu Hetan is not that showy and lacks the courage of his second brother.
, his studies are relatively average, and he has learned all the subjects taught by the bachelors.
At this moment, he didn't know whether he should hit him or not. After all, he was only ten years old, so he said: "I once heard from Bachelor Liu of the Institute of Geography that it is more than four thousand miles from Luntai to Hetao, and there are two more miles from Jiuquan to Jiayuguan.
Thousands of miles.
As long as our great army of heaven can bring a hundred thousand people to Luntai, we will certainly be able to annihilate Galdan. As for whether we can annihilate the Junggar tribe or other Western Tatar tribes, I really don’t know.
There is a hierarchy of learning and there is a specialization in skills. When it comes to offensive matters, one should listen to the judgment of Li Guogong and other generals who have fought for a long time. Whether the logistics and military supplies can run for thousands of miles should be judged by Zheng Guogong of the Ministry of War. Whether the territory can be defended/exploited for a long time after the enemy is defeated.
Regarding territory, you should ask the Ministry of Civil Affairs and the Ministry of Finance."
Zhu Hetan's words were very cautious, and in the end he didn't come to any conclusion himself. He just said that professionals should handle the matter, and he didn't know the details.
Zhu Shuren still had no comment, so he turned to Zhu Hezhi to ask, but Zhu Hezhi was more than a year younger and was only nine years old now. It was obvious that his three views had not yet been formed, and his knowledge was not as good as that of his two elder brothers. He hesitated and said something naive.
To be honest, he seemed to be trying to guess what his grandfather was thinking.
But how could Zhu Shuren fail to see a child's attempt to flatter him?
He pretended to show off his tone, sometimes hinting that he should be beaten, and sometimes hinting that he should be cautious. As expected, Zhu Hezhi was also wavering.
So Zhu Shuren finally confirmed: he just wanted to copy the correct answer to flatter him.
Of these three grandsons, one is courageous and decisive, one knows the limits of his abilities, and the other is emotionally intelligent and good at pleasing his father and ancestors. They each have their own strengths and weaknesses.
Zhu Shuren also accepted it as soon as he could. He was afraid that continuing to raise Gu would affect their brotherly relationship, so he sent his three grandsons aside. He said directly to Zhu Ciyu:
"Although what the child said is not applicable, the question he asked is still worth pondering. If Li Dingguo now organizes a new force to pursue the expedition, he can continue to defeat Galdan and expand the results. It will definitely be possible.
But around Luntai, it is worth debating whether the hometown of Junggar can be captured and defended. The local Hulu have always disobeyed the Ming Dynasty. Even when the Ming Dynasty was founded, none of the former Mongolian khanates surrendered. In this way, it is impossible to defeat a
Tribe, let all surrounding tribes return home.
Even if the surrounding tribes had just been annexed by the Junggar tribe a few years ago, the most they could do was add insult to injury and join forces with the Ming Dynasty in an attempt to restore the country when the Ming Dynasty was dealing with the Junggar tribe. But from now on, will they directly become vassals to the Ming Dynasty?"
After hearing this, Zhu Ciyu felt that his father's intention seemed to be to not fight, and he was a little unwilling to do so: "In this case, is it just a defeat without expanding the results of the battle?"
Zhu Shuren Zhizhu stroked his beard and said: "We need to expand! But for the northwest, we cannot currently aim at expanding the land. We must be mentally prepared. We are only going to weaken the effective forces of Junggar! We can even contact and encourage others.
The chiefs of various tribes were annexed by Junggar and made various promises.
In this way, once the strength of Galdan's core tribes is weakened, the conquered tribes in the surrounding areas will spontaneously prepare to take action. In this way, just like after Cao Cao's execution, Gongsun Kang was in urgent need, and Gongsun Kang joined forces with Yuan Shang and Yuan Xi. If Cao Cao
If the pressure is slowed down, Gongsun Kang and Yuan will harm each other.
After all, Luntai is thousands of miles away. Nowadays, it is impossible to count on long-term garrison and occupation. The destruction of the Junggar tribe is destined to be a protracted war. We, the Ming Dynasty, must be ready to spend ten years of national power, or even fifteen years, to Yongding the western border.
!Eradicate nomadism from the steppes of Central Asia!”
Zhu Ciyu was silent, admitting that Jiang was still too old, and that his father's knowledge was really far-sighted and incomparable to him.
He was just a little unwilling to do so: "Then in the past few years, you have been focusing on weakening, and you have not been able to get the real benefits of opening up new territories?"
Zhu Shuren said nothing, but showed an incomprehensible expression, asking them to think again.
After a few minutes, Zhu Hetan, who has relatively broad interests and also likes to study human geography, first thought of an idea and couldn't help but show off: "Father, grandfather, I have an idea, I don't know if it is right or not."
The old god Zhu Shuren was stroking his beard on the ground: "Tell me and listen."
Zhu Hetan said nervously: "Listen to what my grandfather just said, one of the important reasons why it is difficult to identify the barbarians in the Western Regions is that the Mongolian and Yuan khanates never submitted to the Ming Dynasty when the Ming Dynasty was founded.
It was only more than thirty years ago that the descendants of Huduntu Khan led the Chahar tribe to surrender, but they were only the successors of Beiyuan and could not represent the other three khanates established by Genghis Khan.
Therefore, whether we can surrender to the other side and secure the territory in a short period of time has a lot to do with whether the local people, trade, and culture are close to the Han Dynasty and the Ming Dynasty.
Nowadays, the territory of Junggar can be divided into two parts. When Mr. Liu from the Institute of Geography gave me a lesson, he once said that the northern half of the territory and the barbarians outside the Tianshan Mountains are all descendants of Tatars. And the land of Qinghai-Tibet was called Us in the BC Yuan Dynasty.
Hidden, after the foundation of our Ming Dynasty, there were many scattered people who paid homage to our Ming Dynasty.
I heard this time that when the Junggar tribe invaded the Khalkha Mongolia, some of the Khalkha tribes around the Guihua City abandoned the light and surrendered to the dark side. The reason was that the Chahar people believed in Tibetan lamas, and the Galdans could annex them.
Tibet, it can be seen that he is the spiritual leader of all Mongolians'.
In this case, can we, the Ming Dynasty, do the opposite? Focus on attacking and weakening the northern territory of Junggar and aiding its civil strife. On the southern half of its territory, namely Qinghai-Tibet, we should focus on conquering and rescuing it by force.
The local chieftains had already surrendered to the Ming Dynasty. Now that the Ming Dynasty rescues them, they may not be as resistant as those in the northwest. Once Tibet is controlled, the Ming Dynasty will be the spiritual leader of all Mongolians.
If we go to the Northern Circle and occupy it, maybe we can get twice the result with half the effort, so as to defeat the rebels?"
Zhu Shuren finally felt relieved, sighed, and educated Zhu Hekun next to him: "As a prince, it is not enough to just learn to fight bravely, but you must also learn from your third brother, geography, culture, beliefs, ethnicity, and history. These must be taken into consideration.
.”
After the education, Zhu Shucai stood up and finally concluded with his son: "The third child is right. Although it is not as thorough as I thought, the general direction is the same. Let's refine it according to this idea."
…
After Zhu Shuren expressed his position, because what he said was indeed reasonable, Zhu Ciyu would not sing the opposite.
Zhu Ciyu is now thirty-six years old. He has already reached a mature age and is no longer eager to prove that he is superior to his father. So after careful consideration, he handed it over to the Ministry of War and other yamen for calculation, and then referred to the history of the vassal country by the Ministry of War.
Cognition, overall planning,
Finally, it was decided that "with the Kunlun Mountains as the boundary, the northern half of the Junggar area should be attacked and weakened and stimulated internal self-reliance; for the area south of the Kunlun Mountains, the main purpose should be to rescue and recover, send troops to occupy, and actually reform the land and return it to the local people."
Plan to destroy the country in stages.
The territory of the Junggar tribe is still too large, and it cannot be eaten up in one bite or within a few years.
Then eat Qinghai-Tibet first, then the territories and Central Asia!