The news coming from Jianzhou was still a bit shocking. More than 200,000 Korean wrappers were actually slaughtered and made into dried meat.
Recent trade shows that the salt imported to Jianzhou through the Horqin Department has tripled.
The number of old, weak, sick and disabled people who starved to death in Jianzhou must have exceeded 100,000. Adding in the more than 200,000 Korean soldiers who were massacred, the population was reduced by at least 300,000 to 400,000.
Instead, they increased their demand for salt, which was undoubtedly used to cure bacon.
In fact, compared to the direct damage caused by war, famine and plague in this era had a greater impact on the population.
Of course, the biggest factor restricting population is food production.
Theoretically, as much food as there is can feed as many people.
The population of China has been unable to exceed 100 million, also because of restrictions on food production.
This is why Chinese civilization has always emphasized agriculture and suppressed commerce.
Food is the most important thing for the people. For any dynasty, there are many reasons for its collapse.
But the lack of food for the people was an important reason why they rose up to overthrow the original dynasty.
During this food crisis in Liaodong, Li Xianzhong undoubtedly made a lot of money.
He only sold 100,000 shi sweet potatoes to Jianzhou and earned 500,000 taels of silver.
Most of the silver that Nurhachi worked so hard to squeeze from North Korea went into the bank of Pinglubao.
Fan Wencheng said: "It's a pity. They now have a lot of dried meat. It is estimated that they will not be short of food in a few months."
Li Xianzhong smiled and said: "It doesn't matter, won't the money they keep in Hetuala have to go to Pinglubao's bank sooner or later?"
"By the way, how much money and food do we have now?"
Fan Wencheng said with a smile: "Currently, we have 1.5 million taels of treasury silver. However, the recent expenditure on food has been a bit high. Now we only have 700,000 dan of corn and rice left. There are still a lot of sweet potatoes left, with 1 million taels left."
Li Xianzhong said: "Sweet potatoes have a short storage time and are not as good as corn or rice. Just leave some rations and seeds. Try to sell or eat them first."
"Sweet potatoes are no longer a secret now. It is estimated that many places in Liaodong will plant sweet potatoes next year. The yield of this stuff is huge, but it will not be valuable next year."
Fan Wencheng sighed and said: "The weather is really abnormal. There is a severe drought this year. If Pinglubao hadn't prepared a large number of water reservoirs in advance, the yield of even the relatively drought-tolerant sweet potatoes would have been greatly reduced."
The growth cycle of sweet potatoes is about 100 days, which is much faster than that of grains.
In the farms of the Intelligence Department in Fujian, they can mature three times a year.
The highest yield per mu is 15 shi, and the average yield is basically 10-12 shi.
However, the yield per mu in Liaodong is only 7-10 shi, and this is assuming there is no shortage of water.
In some places with severe drought, the yield per mu is less than 2 shi.
Where there is no irrigation at all, sweet potatoes cannot grow.
However, the advantage of sweet potatoes is that the fragmented land in the mountains can also be well utilized.
At present, the land around Pinglu Fort has been developed.
Therefore, Li Xianzhong built a new Mielubao in the Fushun area to reclaim the surrounding wasteland. Currently, 100,000 acres of wasteland have been developed near Mielubao.
The money in the hands of the people in Liaodong was limited, and many people could not afford even a sweet potato worth 5 taels of silver per stone.
So Li Xianzhong directly exchanged large quantities of sweet potatoes and corn for fertile land near Shenyang and Liaoyang, the core of Liaodong.
Normally, 8-10 taels of fertile land per acre per year can now be exchanged for 1 kilo of corn or 45 kilo of sweet potato per acre.
After all, there is no harvest in the fields these days, and you have to starve to death guarding the land.
Liaodong is not as good as Jiangnan. The land here is not so tight, and the price is naturally much cheaper. People can still develop wasteland near Jianzhou after selling their land.
If it doesn't work, you can still work as a tenant for Li Xianzhong.
Li Xianzhong also looked down upon ordinary fields. After all, there was a large amount of unclaimed wasteland in the Fushun area under his jurisdiction that needed to be reclaimed.
He would definitely not trade precious grain for ordinary fields.
Therefore, they only used grain to replace the more fertile farmland in Shenyang and Liaoyang.
Approximately 400,000 acres were acquired.
The reduced corn in Pinglubao was mainly used to replace land.
These lands have now become the farm of Ningyuan Bo Li Xianzhong, and the people who lost their land have become his tenants.
In addition, due to Daishan's violent expropriation in North Korea, a large number of Korean people fled from Ping'an Road and Hamgyong Road.
There was not enough food in North Korea, and people were starving to death. Kong Youde selected 20,000 able-bodied people from these hungry people and sent them to Mielu Fort in Fushun as free labor.
At present, the total number of North Korean free workers in Liaodong has exceeded 60,000, and heavy labor such as mining, farming and even blacksmithing have been contracted by them.
The liberated labor force in Pinglu Fort is naturally trained into a reserve force, ready to be expanded into a regular army at any time.
At present, the reserve force in Pinglu Fort has reached tens of thousands, and can make up for the battle losses of each battalion at any time.
If we weren't worried about the current weather in Xiaoglacier, we might not be able to grow so much food in Liaodong.
Li Xianzhong really wanted to accept hundreds of thousands of North Korean workers at once and develop all the wasteland in Liaodong.
It's a pity that I only remember the severe drought in Liaodong this year, and I really can't remember what disasters there will be later.
Anyway, starting from the 48th year of Wanli, the climate of Xiaoglacier became more and more abnormal.
The risk for him to acquire so much land is still very high. If there is an extreme weather event, all his land will be harvested.
It will not be easy to support so many people by then.
Currently, seven bushels of corn or two stones of sweet potatoes are enough to feed a laborer for a month.
But food is still a serious problem.
Due to severe drought in many places this year, food prices in Daming have generally risen, and rice in the Jiangnan region has also risen to 8 coins per stone.
In the capital, the price rose to one tael of silver and one stone.
The reason why grain prices in Liaodong have risen to such a high level is partly because of the severe drought; in addition, Li Xianzhong practiced the "open-China method" and used all the grain shipped by merchants in exchange for trade qualifications.
He restricted the amount of grain that merchants could sell in Liaodong, otherwise he would have carefully planned such a situation, and as a result, all the money would be made by those profiteers. How could anything be so cheap in the world?
Li Xianzhong said to Fan Wencheng: "The granary must continue to be expanded, and the sweet potatoes can be stored in the cellar. It is better to save food than to save silver. Now 1.5 million taels of silver is enough. All the silver earned every month will be exchanged for food in Jiangnan. Food prices in Jiangnan are high. Just go to the Huguang area further away to purchase.”
Fan Wencheng said: "Uncle Ning Yuan, don't worry. Our copperware workshop has already built a batch of copper utensils for the Jiangnan market. With the help of the Intelligence Department, we have also accepted orders for Buddhist statues from Jiangnan temples. The money earned will be directly exchanged for Food is shipped back.”
Li Xianzhong is very satisfied with this. This is the way a profiteer should think.
Now Daishan has brought all the men and horses of the two red flags to North Korea, making King Li Zhu of North Korea feel restless.
For the first time, they even proposed to increase the number of "Ming troops stationed in North Korea". Considering that there are currently only 3,000 soldiers in the Army Division among the 5,000 Ming troops in North Korea, it is indeed too few.
So Li Xianzhong decided to dispatch 3,000 people from the reserve forces in Pinglubao to North Korea.
In this way, while guarding the Yellow Sea Road, he can still have a certain amount of mobile troops, so that he can respond in time if something changes in North Korea.
Wang Huazhen, the governor of Liaodong, has been very busy recently.
There were hungry people everywhere in Liaodong. While appeasing the people, he also had to prepare to attack Kuandian and open up a second battlefield against Jianzhou, which really made him somewhat powerless.
To be honest, this dear friend has good medical skills and mediocre government affairs abilities. He has been a Beijing official all year round, but he still lacks the ability to control the local area.
After arriving in Liaodong, he repeatedly encountered obstacles and felt that Liao people were unavailable, so he began to promote officials who were not from Liaodong.
As a result, officials from Liaodong complained about him.
Within three days, officials from Liaodong wrote to impeach him, the governor of Liaodong, for his misdeeds, which made the people of Liaodong boil with resentment!
Ma Yun, the mine supervisor in Liaodong, even said in front of His Majesty that Wang Huazhen was domineering. He actually blocked the copper ship in Liaodong without authorization to deliberately create difficulties, and was suspected of soliciting bribes.
The Chief of Ceremonies also took advantage of this incident to put pressure on the cabinet and demanded that Wang Huazhen be punished, which made the chief minister of the cabinet Ye Xianggao very embarrassed.
Because there are currently seven people in the cabinet, three from the Donglin Party, one each from the Chu Party and one from the Zhejiang Party. Although the remaining He Zongyan and Zhu Guozuo agree with the Donglin Party's political policy, they are not Donglin Party members after all.
The two of them still hesitated about Ye Xianggao's proposal to hold a Beijing inspection in advance.
It may not be a good thing if all the people in the court are Donglin Party members.
Ye Xianggao was still doing ideological work between the two of them, but something like Wang Huazhen happened.
The newly appointed governor of Liaodong was filled with public dissatisfaction and took the opportunity to demand bribes, which made the two of them have some opinions about the Donglin Party members.
In order to divert the cabinet's attention from Wang Huazhen, Ye Xianggao had to ask Wang Huazhen to send troops as soon as possible.
As soon as the Kuandian war begins, everyone will be attracted to the war, and at least for the time being, the cabinet will have no time to discuss Wang Huazhen's handling.
With the great success of conquering and establishing a state, naturally no one cared about the original criticism.
Therefore, the cabinet still attached great importance to Wang Huazhen's attack. Ye Xianggao ordered Xiong Tingbi's Ministry of War to re-formulate the strategy for attacking Jianzhou.
Although Xiong Tingbi was very clear about the purpose of the first assistant Ye Xianggao, after all, Jianzhou was a serious concern of the Ming Dynasty, so in the end he still focused on the overall situation in this matter, and all the elite troops deployed to Liaodong were elite troops.
A total of 10,000 border troops were mobilized from the four towns of Datong, Xuanfu, Jizhou, and Taiyuan to rush to Liaodong.
Originally, Li Xianzhong also arranged for veteran Liu Wei to lead his troops out of Crow Falcon Pass as a feint to attract the attention of the Tatars.
Therefore, 10,000 mobile troops stationed near Crow Falcon Pass can leave the pass to fight at any time.
Most of these troops are veterans who followed Liu Wei in the southwest and are quite capable.
Then Wang Huazhen, as the governor of Liaodong, transferred 10,000 horses from Guangning, Yizhou, Ningyuan, Shanhaiguan and other places in western Liaoning.
Now, 30,000 Ming troops have gathered near Crow Falcon Pass on Qinghe Road, and all of them are elites from the Nine Sides.
Among them, Liu Wei, the commander-in-chief of Liaoyang, Liu Qu, the commander-in-chief of Guangning, Luo Yiguan, the deputy general, and Zhu Wanliang, the commander-in-chief of Hupiyi, were all outstanding generals of the time.
It can be said that the troops are strong and the horses are strong!
However, Ye Xianggao knew that it was Wang Huazhen's first time to lead an army in battle, and he might not be able to control these arrogant and powerful generals. At the same time, he was worried that Yan Mingtai and Li Xianzhong were causing trouble behind his back.
In order to avoid repeating the mistakes of Yuan Yingtai, Xiong Tingbi was asked to go to Liaodong in person as Minister of War to rearrange the strategy of this conquest.
After all, Li Xianzhong, the deputy economic envoy of Liaodong, could command Wang Huazhen militarily. In order to avoid this embarrassment, the expedition to Jianzhou was divided into two routes: north and south.
First, the Northern Route Army, led by Ning Yuanbo Li Xianzhong, had 20,000 elite troops from Kaiyuan Third Route and thousands of Imperial Army troops and continued to attack Jianzhou's heavily defended Maldun Village from the front.
Even if it is difficult to capture for a while, we must continue to attack to ensure that the main force of Jianlu is contained.
Then, Wang Huazhen, the governor of Liaodong, sent troops from Crow Falcon Pass and detoured to Kuandian Liubao, seizing this place to completely cut off the Jianlu's connection with North Korea.
After that, the South Route Army went north to attack Hetuala together with the North Route Army, completely annihilating Jian and solving this serious problem!
After Xiong Tingbi announced the new strategy for entering the army, Li Sanshun, Zhao Lejiao, Mao Wenlong and other Kaiyuan generals were all very angry!
This plan seems to be a north-south pincer attack, but in fact it is a frontal feint attack and a detour from the side.
The North Route Army is responsible for containing the enemy's main force from the front, and then the South Route Army is responsible for sneak attacks from behind to pick peaches.
The current situation in Liaodong is all due to the continuous attacks by Ning Yuanbo and Kaiyuan soldiers to weaken the Tatars. Now it seems that the Tatars are about to die.
The imperial court sent Wang Huazhen to grab the credit. This is really unfair!
Xiong Tingbi also saw the dissatisfaction of the Kaiyuan generals, so he said, "What does Uncle Ning Yuan think of this strategy of entering the army?"
Li Xianzhong said: "Such a north-south attack will definitely destroy Jianzhou and completely pacify Liaodong. In the end, the general will definitely attack Malquanzhai with all his strength and contain the main force of Jianlu."
Wang Huazhen even smiled and said: "Maldun Village is less than 30 miles away from Hetuala, and Kuandian is a hundred miles away. It seems that the success of conquering Hetuala was none other than Ning Yuanbo."
His expression of being a villain was really annoying, but Li Xianzhong still replied politely: "The Tatars have deployed heavy troops in Mardun Village. Our army has been fighting hard for more than two months and has not yet made a breakthrough."
"This time we need the help of Governor Lao!"
It was obvious that the South Route Army was here to pick peaches this time, and the generals on the South Route were also gearing up to prepare for success.
Seeing that everyone's morale was high, Xiong Tingbi ended the military meeting with satisfaction.
Afterwards, Yan Mingtai acted as a host and invited Xiong Tingbi and Li Xianzhong to get together.
After all, the three of them had worked together in Liaodong, so it was a rare opportunity to get together.
Xiong Tingbi punished himself with a glass of wine and said: "This dispatch of troops was not my intention. Uncle Ning Yuan was wronged. Xiong punished himself with a glass of wine!"
Li Xianzhong finished the glass of wine and said, "This is Ye Shoufu's secretive move. Why should Xiong Benbing blame himself? This makes it seem like we are at odds with each other!"
Xiong Tingbi said: "For more than a year, Ning Yuanbo has single-handedly forced Jianlu to this point. Xiong admires him!"
However, Li Xianzhong said to the two of them: "If it weren't for Xiong Benbing to be in charge of the Ministry of War and Brother Yan to help him when he was the governor of Liaodong, it would be difficult for Xianzhong alone to achieve such an achievement. I give you a toast!"
All three of them drank the wine in their glasses.
Then he sighed again and said: "Originally, Jianzhou has run out of food and started fighting among itself. We only need to wait a few more months and it will be easy to capture Hetuala by then!"
"I'm afraid sending troops at this time will increase the variables again!"
Xiong Tingbi said: "Uncle Ning Yuan has no confidence in the Southern Route Army?"
Li Xianzhong said: "The Southern Route Army is also a nine-sided elite, and there is no problem with their combat capability. I'm afraid that Wang Huazhen, in order to seize the first victory in conquering Jianzhou, will rush in with light troops, and end up playing the trick of Jianlu!"
Xiong Tingbi said: "Now there are less than 40,000 captives around Hetuala, and Ning Yuanbo has to contain at least tens of thousands of the enemy's main force in Mardun Village. The South Route Army will not suffer in terms of strength, and will never suffer the same fate as He Shixian. ’s mistakes.”
Li Xianzhong saw that Xiong Tingbi thought the same way, so he simply didn't say more, otherwise they would have thought that they were jealous of Wang Huazhen for taking credit.
However, several people expressed concern about the Donglin Party's aggressiveness in the court.
Finally, Li Xianzhong suggested: "If we are really forced by the Donglin Party, we might as well consider using the power of the Director of Ceremonies. Judging from the current situation, there are still many differences in the political opinions of the Director of Ceremonies and the Donglin Party, and they can be contained. Donglin Party!”
Xiong Tingbi really looked down on Wei Zhongxian, who was illiterate, so he still refused.
But this is normal. In the eyes of civil servants, Wei Zhongxian is just a rogue who rose to power by flattering others. Who would have thought that he would become the "Nine Thousand Year Old" who would dominate the government in the future?
Of course, the most dangerous among the three of them is Li Xianzhong. Xiong Tingbi will lose his official position at most, and Li Xianzhong may lose his life!
Xiong Tingbi took advantage of the wine and said: "As the saying goes, 'One emperor, one minister', I think it may not be a bad thing for Wang Huazhen to take credit this time."
"Although Uncle Ning Yuan is young, he can't show his sharpness too much. If he can retreat bravely, he will not lose his title, glory and wealth."
Li Xianzhong knew that Xiong Tingbi was kindly reminding him not to overwhelm his master with his great achievements, lest he be killed!
Yan Mingtai knew very well that after the things he and Li Xian did in Liaodong, if they lost power, the Donglin Party would probably not stop there.
Therefore, they have no way out for a long time and have no choice but to fight to the end with the Donglin Party.
So he said: "It's rare for us to get together once. Let's not talk about these unpleasant topics. We won't come home until we get drunk tonight!"
It was still extremely cold in Liaodong in November, and gusts of north wind blew through, making the soldiers patrolling the walls of Maldun Walled City shivering with cold.
On the distant horizon, a mass of black people suddenly appeared. They were like a group of foraging ants, vast and full of intimidation and oppression.
The soldier rubbed his eyes. He was afraid that he had made a mistake.
But as the distance got closer, what he could see became clearer and clearer. The spears and armor in the hands of these cavalrymen kept flashing with this cold light!
It is the Liaodong cavalry of the Ming army.
So the soldiers shouted in horror: "The Ming army is coming to attack the city!"
Following a deep horn sound, Gushan'e Zhendudu with white flags soon led thousands of people with white flags to the top of the city!
In the past two months, the Ming army had fired a few cannons for no reason, which meant that the Imperial Association Army had feigned attacks several times in the beginning. This sudden attack on the city really shocked him.
Du Du, who was still a little sleepy, soon woke up completely.
The cavalry and infantry of the Ming army were lined up neatly under the city, numbering tens of thousands.
Behind them were artillery pieces of the Ming army. It looked like there were dozens of them.
But before he could take a closer look, the Ming army's artillery roared!
Shells swept towards the city like a strong wind, and with a huge explosion, the city instantly became a mess.
Bricks and stones flew away, dust flew up, and the city towers were crumbling in the shock wave of the explosion. Many soldiers were even shaken directly to the bottom of the city by the huge air waves generated by the shells.
Since the Ming army's artillery used solid bullets before, Du Du was not prepared.
In just one round of shelling, Xiangbaiqi lost more than two hundred people.
Taking advantage of the chaos among the prisoners on the city, the Ming army's gunmen had already arrived a hundred steps away from the city.
"Bang, bang, bang"
With a burst of white smoke, the Ming army's Lumi guns also began to continuously harvest targets on the city.
Du Du shouted: "Hurry up and ask for help from Hetuala, the main force of the Ming army is attacking the city!"
Almost at the same time, the Ming army on the southern front also moved out of Crow Falcon Pass.
However, because the road in front of Crow Falcon Pass was extremely narrow, the Ming army could not move at all, so the marching speed was very slow.
The forward troops have walked several miles, and the rear troops have not yet reached Crow Falcon Pass.
This made Wang Huazhen, who was eager to make meritorious deeds, very anxious.
He pointed to the mountain road to the north and asked, "Where does this road lead?"
The military sentry said: "This road is called 'Crow Crow Road'. Ten miles away is Wuji Pass, which is twenty miles away from Hetuala."
Wang Huazhen said in surprise: "It's only thirty miles away from Hetuala?"
The sentry said: "The straight-line distance is indeed only thirty miles, but there is Wuji Pass blocking it, so it is difficult for us to threaten Hetuala directly from here!
"It would be safer to recover the Sixth Fort of Kuandian first according to the original plan, and then go north to Hetuala."
Wang Huazhen thought about it and decided to take a detour to Kuandianbao and then to Hetuala, which would cause a delay of more than 100 miles on the way.
Why don't you divide your troops at Wuji Pass? If you win Wuji Pass, wouldn't you be able to directly attack Hetuala?
When Liu Wei heard that Wang Huazhen was planning to split his troops at Wuji Pass, he quickly stepped forward to stop him and said, "Let me inform the governor, Wuji Pass is narrow and difficult to conquer. It's better not to waste time by dividing your troops."
Wang Huazhen said: "Isn't that right? I have read the previous battle reports. A few months ago, Uncle Ning Yuan led his army to kill Hetuala from Wuji Pass. Last year, He Shixian also captured Wuji Pass?"
"And this Wuji Pass has been demolished several times, and it must not be much stronger. Now that the road is narrow, I will send thousands of troops to attack Wuji Pass, and it will not delay us from taking Kuandian Fort."
Seeing that Wang Huazhen could not be persuaded, Liu Wei first led a main force of 10,000 to attack Kuandian.
Wang Huazhen sent Guangning deputy general Luo Yiguan to lead 3,000 troops to seize the pass.
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(End of chapter)
