Prince Rui's silver bullet offensive was too harsh, especially when Prince Rui officially established it.
That means we don’t do one-time deals, but long-term cooperation.
Since ancient times, civil servants have been the most sought-after jobs in the world. To ordinary people, being able to earn royal rations is like smoke from their ancestral graves. It can even be said to be a huge leap in class.
The so-called learning of civil and military skills was sold to the emperor's family.
Those who cannot afford the royal food are incompetent.
Besides, isn't the best outcome for a rebellion to be to recruit peace?
The reason why "Water Margin" is good is because of its capitulationism.
Only a fool would stick his head in his belt and rebel against the Qing Dynasty and restore the Ming Dynasty with a job that earns him royal food and a stable salary.
What's more, Prince Rui also pardoned all previous sins. Even if he had killed important officials of the Qing Dynasty before, the Manchukuo people would not pursue him. This led to a large number of speculative and wavering elements in the Han Dynasty army to come to surrender.
In that scene, the gongs and drums were noisy, friends were summoned, and the red flag was waved.
After the "Information to the Military Officers and Soldiers of the Provoking Han Dynasty" was released, the entire Hubei region set off a climax of returning to the Qing Dynasty. Those who had surrendered wrote letters to their relatives and friends in the Prosperous Han Army according to Prince Rui's request. The relatives and friends then asked their relatives and friends to surrender and follow Rui.
Prince Confusion seems to have developed into a human-to-human transmission phenomenon.
The Xinghan Army cannot respond effectively in the short term, and this phenomenon will soon spread to Hunan and Jiangxi.
What will be shaken then is not the ruling foundation of the Xinghan Army, but their lives.
By the fifteenth day of the twelfth lunar month, the number of counties in Hubei that had completely changed their banner and returned to the Qing Dynasty had increased to 29, involving Anlu Prefecture, Yunyang Prefecture, Yichang Prefecture, Shinan Prefecture, Jingzhou Prefecture, De'an Prefecture and other areas.
The situation is not a small good, but a truly great one.
In other words, Jia Liu's small advertisement dismantled the local construction of the Xinghan Army for more than a year, destroyed their ruling foundation, and reduced the area of Hubei they controlled from the original 90% to the current level.
Less than forty percent of.
In Hubei alone, the number of people who can effectively provide money and food for the Han Dynasty army has dropped sharply to less than three million, mainly concentrated around Wuchang.
It can be said that the results of the previous Wuchang Great Victory Formation that killed General Dingxi Fengsheng were completely wiped out in the face of the silver bullet offensive.
Jia Liu didn't like to be high-profile. He repeatedly emphasized to the reporting team of Daqing Daily not to highlight his personality too much. It would be enough to publish a report on him every week, a special issue every half month, and a special issue every month.
But in the face of actual achievements and achievements, he still felt a little proud.
And I think it can be properly publicized.
First, to dispel the world’s doubts about him;
secondly, to strengthen the determination of the government and the public to quell chaos;
As a result, not only did "Da Qing Daily" publish numerous articles and explosive reports on the great achievements of General Wang on the Huguang front line, but also various shorthand books about General Wang's conquests were also worked overtime to print.
The coupons for money and food that had been sent to the capital before were all turned into documents reporting victory.
Even if he recaptures a small town, Jia Liu will solemnly go to Beijing to report his victory.
He personally does not feel that this is to ask for credit from the court, or to put money on his face, but to stabilize the people of the court.
Essentially, it is for the good of the Qing Dynasty.
As a result, documents reporting victory were flying all over the sky like snowflakes, so much so that Kuini, the Minister of Etiquette who was an intern at the Military Aircraft Department, lamented to His Royal Highness the Crown Prince in the room: "If the Qing Dynasty had used Prince Rui earlier, why would it have suffered repeated defeats?
Losing divisions and losing territory will weaken the military power and weaken the country’s power.”
The prefects appointed by the Xinghan Army in Anlu and Yunyang led the soldiers and civilians in the city anyway, which made the atmosphere rise again.
The Xinghan Army stationed in Yuan'an and Dangyang counties in Jingmen Prefecture was another division-level force with 10% of its troops surrendering to the Qing army after Zhong Xiang's Third Army.
According to preliminary statistics from the Hubei Governor's Office, the total number of rebel troops who surrendered from various places was about 30,000 to 40,000. Except for the Third Army that surrendered by Yu Zhongxiang, the rest of the troops were mostly second-line troops of the Xinghan regime.
This was originally a good thing, indicating that Prince Rui's strategy of focusing on the heart was successful. Both the local rule of the Xinghan Army and the number of their troops were greatly weakened.
Some optimistic officials even believed that within three months at most, General Wang could completely pacify Huguang and take the bandit leader to Lingchi, Beijing.
However, the more Xinghan troops surrendered, the more problems appeared.
The United Front Office of General Wang Xingyuan was mainly responsible for recruitment. The head of this office was Ji Yun, the Minister of War.
The results are remarkable, no one denies this.
The problem is that Director Ji is in charge of the beginning but not the end, that is, he only spends money to recruit people and then leaves all subsequent arrangements to the Hubei Governor's Yamen.
As a result, Hubei Governor Zheng Dajin, who was demoted five levels and remained in office, almost fainted from the anger of the demoted soldiers.
It was just an individual phenomenon at the beginning, but as things progressed, the individual phenomenon has evolved into a common phenomenon, and may even occur repeatedly.
For this reason, Zheng Dajin had to make a statement to the general Wang personally.
According to him, the quality of the rebel soldiers who surrendered was extremely low. They were either local warriors, government soldiers, Taoist armed forces, or even bandits and robbers.
For example, the Xinghan army that surrendered to the Qing Dynasty in Yunyangfang County was an army organized by the local strongman Song Xing who coerced the people. Song Xing used to make a living by gambling and opening kilns. Suddenly, in troubled times, he took a group of thugs around him and captured the county government office. , he planted a flag at the city gate and turned into a rebel army. Later, he was recruited by the Xinghan Army and appointed as a brigade commander, and he still controlled Fang County.
This Song Xing is also weird. After becoming a bandit army, although he preyed on the common people, he had a certain temperament and did not dare to go too far.
After accepting the Qing army's recruitment and becoming the garrison of Daqingfang County, Song Xing intensified his torture of the people. He either asked the people to pay this tax or that money. If they didn't comply, he would have his soldiers tie people to the county government and torture them wantonly. For this reason As many as seven or eight lives were wasted.
In addition to tormenting the people, Song Xing even ignored the various demands of the "working group" sent by the Hubei governor's office. He only asked the "working group" for salary, food, and ordnance, and lied about the quota of his department, even though he only had 1,200 people reported 3,000 people, hoping to get some free money from them.
The members of the "working group" were all capable personnel sent by the governor's yamen. They were not fools and refused to agree to Song Xing's request. They were only willing to pay the actual salary for their soldiers.
Song Xing quits his job and always takes advantage of Prince Rui's preferential treatment. If you, the Governor of Hubei Province, don't meet my request, you are going against Prince Rui!
He is the culprit who destroyed Prince Rui’s united front!
This makes the "working group" very passive and fully meets Song Xing's requirements. The province cannot come up with the money, and it will also feed Song Xing's appetite.
If Song Xing's request is not met, the problem will become serious if people make trouble for Prince Rui and even threaten to cut off his pigtails in the worst case.
If Song Xing is really forced to rebel, Prince Rui still doesn’t want the heads of his working group!
There was no other way, so the "working group" had no choice but to borrow money and grain to support Song Xing's ministry. As a result, the recovery of Fang County not only failed to lighten the people's burden, but made their sufferings worse.
Those victims who were tortured by Song Xing had nowhere to complain.
These are still secondary, after all, the land was nominally recovered.
In many places, they just started fighting, surrendered and then rebelled.
The reason for the fight was that the regular Qing army looked down upon these traitors who came to surrender.
For example, Wang Deyong, the admiral of Shaanxi Province, looked down upon the surrendered Xinghan army. Although Wang Deyong focused on the overall situation and tried his best to properly arrange the surrendered generals and troops, the people below could not stand it.
Help surrender the troops.
The two sides were at odds with each other, broke out in riots, and even went to war. Wang De's troops were not only unable to effectively threaten Jingzhou, but were overwhelmed by the tens of thousands of surrendered troops, and had to deploy heavy troops to defend Jingzhou.
It felt like there was a thorn stuck in the throat.
In addition to conflicts with regular Qing troops, the surrendered troops also had conflicts with local landlord armed forces.
There were more than a thousand local warriors recruited by Dong, a squire in Suizhou, to resist the Xinghan army. They persisted in the struggle for almost a year. During this period, they provided great help to the Qing army who came to quell the rebellion. They also fought several battles with the Xinghan army stationed in Suizhou.
, the casualties on both sides were considerable.
As a result, the Xinghan Army in Suizhou City suddenly changed its banner and surrendered to the Qing Dynasty. Not only did they receive a regular army organization given by Prince Rui, but the thieves' leaders also transformed into Dusi, garrison, and Qianzong, becoming the "officials" who weighed on Dong.
After gaining official status, the surrendered troops in Suizhou City became very arrogant, showing off their power, and robbing homes and homes was commonplace.
Many surrendered generals believe that they were restrained by Wuchang when they were rebels in the past, and now they have to be restrained after becoming officers and soldiers, so they might as well be improper officers and soldiers.
"There are no officers and soldiers in the world who don't rob. If we don't kill good people and take credit, we will be worthy of the Qing Dynasty and Prince Rui!"
Good guy, in the eyes of these surrendered troops, the officers and soldiers of the Qing Dynasty naturally possess the legality and justice of robbery.
Due to past hatred, Suizhou's surrender troops raided Dong's Xiangyong troops. Dong himself and dozens of his nephews were killed by them, and hundreds of Xiangyong were trapped and killed by the surrender troops.
When this incident came out, the gentry in Suizhou were indignant and went to Xiangyang, where the governor's office was temporarily stationed, to complain, saying that the governor did not make decisions for the people of Suizhou, so the people of Suizhou had to organize themselves and no longer be the people of the Qing Dynasty. This caused a headache to the governor of Hubei, Zheng Dajin.
.
Send troops to suppress it. Those surrendering troops were recruited by Prince Rui with preferential treatment. If Prince Rui doesn't send troops, how can he send troops?
Don't send troops to suppress it. The surrendered troops are dressed in the clothes of officers and soldiers, but they are doing the things of the traitor army. What they are doing is damaging to the roots of the Qing Dynasty.
During this period, two serious crimes occurred.
One was Ma Guoquan, commander of the Xinghan Army, who shot Song Jingya, the magistrate sent by the Hubei Governor's Yamen;
The reason was that Ma Guoquan's men were all strong soldiers. Due to time constraints after the surrender, the Hubei governor's office did not send people to take over the resettlement immediately. Ma Guoquan actually wanted to make the last fortune, so he forced local wealthy businessmen to pledge donations.
If it doesn't work, he will be killed.
He extorted nearly 200,000 taels of silver and killed more than ten people.
When Song Jingya was ordered to go to the Ministry of Ma Guoquan to carry out resettlement work, he learned of what Ma Guoquan had done and exposed the matter out of righteous indignation.
Before the Hubei governor's office could respond to the incident, Magistrate Song was shot dead by Ma Guoquan, who reported that he had slipped and drowned.
Second, the surrendered general Qin openly beat local officials, extorted money, and even sent his troops to the countryside to extort money in the name of a clean official army. This aroused public resentment and the people were unwilling to suffer and revolted one after another.
"Does Your Majesty know what the people are saying? They say the officers and soldiers are as fierce as tigers!"
Zheng Dajin was really angry. He didn't object to Prince Rui recruiting the bandit army, but he couldn't recruit everyone in such a swarm.
At least screen them out, and even if you don't kill people with bad nature, you can't give them official duties.
As a result, mud and sand fell, not only making the Qing army passive, but also the people suffered.
"Is there such a thing?"
Jia Liu was also confused. If what Zheng Dajin said was true, he was not recruiting peace, but harboring filth and evil, destroying the people's last illusions about the Qing Dynasty, and indirectly helping the Han Dynasty Army to clean up its ranks.
More importantly, if these unbearable surrender troops cause trouble, his silver bullet offensive will turn into a joke.
"Recently, it has been found that many returning soldiers sneak back to their homes at night, resulting in a decrease in combatants, making it impossible to verify."
"There are also many soldiers and sergeants who were paid for repatriation, wearing our Qing military uniforms and staying around everywhere. Most of these people are idlers, addicted to prostitution and gambling, taking advantage of the situation to show off, and commit crimes."
"There are ordinary stragglers who do not return to the ranks, collude with ruffians outside, and run rampant in evil and deceit. They often go in and out of teahouses and wine shops in groups, squandering money or falsely accusing good people, extorting money, or staying with prostitutes for gambling, and all kinds of evil
The traces are too numerous to enumerate.”
Zheng Dajin became more and more excited as he talked.
"The prince treated these surrendered soldiers favorably, but these surrendered soldiers did not understand the prince's intentions. After surrendering, they broke into private houses and robbed people, disrupted military discipline, ruined the reputation of our Qing Dynasty, and also ruined the reputation of the prince!"
After listening to what Zheng Dajin said, Jia Liu touched his forehead and said to himself: "Do you think these people think I am stupid for having too much money?"
"."
No one, including Zheng Dajin, dared to say anything, but it was generally very close to the truth.
"Let's have a meeting."
Whenever there is a major event, Jia Liu will hold a meeting.
What was held this time was not a joint meeting of the military and government of the Qing Dynasty, nor a special meeting of the Gongjinhui, but a meeting convening the surrendered generals who had surrendered one after another.
For this reason, Ji Yun was asked to send a notice to the surrendered generals to arrive at Zhongxiang within five days.
"Those who are willing to come to the meeting, I can give them a chance. Those who are unwilling to come to the meeting,"
Jia Liu didn't say it, but he really hadn't killed someone for a long time.
Wuchang City, Yellow Crane Tower.
This building was rebuilt no less than ten times in history, but was either destroyed by war or lightning strikes. The current building was rebuilt by Shi Yizhi, the governor of Huguang in the first year of Qianlong's reign.
Today, a governor of Huguang also came to the Yellow Crane Tower, but it was Chen Huizu.
Wang Wenyuan, the prefect of Wuchang, accompanied Chen Huizu to the building.
Both of them were officials of the Qing Dynasty more than a year ago. This Wang Wenyuan was an official promoted by Lao Chen and he personally wrote a letter to persuade him to surrender.
When they reached the top of the building, the two of them looked into the distance, both looking heavy.
Just because the current situation is obviously unfavorable to the Xinghan Army.
After a while, Old Chen took out a letter from his sleeve and gave it to Wang Wenyuan.
Wang Wenyuan took it in confusion and was stunned after reading it: "What kind of faucet stick?"
"It probably means the big seal of the mutual aid association."
Lao Chen is not sure whether the dragon-headed stick mentioned by Prince Rui refers to the big seal in the meeting, but he feels it should be.
"Mutual aid club?"
Wang Wenyuan was not high enough in the past, so he had never heard of the Mutual Aid Association, a secret society voluntarily organized by the Qing governors.
Lao Chen hesitated for a moment and briefly explained the mutual aid association's program and motivation for its establishment.
Wang Wenyuan hesitated after hearing this: "Is the Taiwanese master also a mutual aid member?"
"It used to be."
Lao Chen looked a little lonely. He was one of the first members of the mutual aid association, but he didn't expect to be expelled from the association today.
After hearing this, Wang Wenyuan thought of the one hundred thousand taels mentioned in the letter, and couldn't help but "thumped" and whispered: "Does Taitai intend to return to the Qing Dynasty?"
"It's not about returning to the Qing Dynasty, it's about returning to the society."
After experiencing a battle between heaven and man in his heart, Lao Chen told Wang Wenyuan: "Put 300,000 taels of silver in the treasury and secretly send it to Prince Yu Rui. Remember, this matter must not be known to a third person."
"this"
Wang Wenyuan was startled for a moment and said with some confusion: "Sir, didn't Prince Rui give you one hundred thousand taels?"
Old Chen shook his head slightly: "The gift from the prince is the gift from the prince, and the gift from me is the gift from me. This is a return gift, so you can't be confused."