The news that the Mongols inquired about was correct. The Emperor Guo Ning of the Great Zhou Dynasty was indeed mobilizing troops in Yehuling.
A large number of people have gathered from Yehuling to Xuandezhou and Jinshan, and there are also mountains of combat materials transferred from Juyongguan. Deep in the grassland, in the direction of Wusha Castle, there were also Han slave slaves, which caused several famous pastures to change hands, which was equivalent to providing material support to the Zhou army out of thin air.
It is late autumn at this time. The so-called autumn is high, the horses are fat, and the weather is cool. For thousands of years, it has been a good time for the grassland people to go south. It happened that Zhou Dynasty launched troops at this time, which made all the grassland tribes embarrassed. This was really difficult for many grassland herdsmen to accept.
Six thousand Mongolian families who had previously surrendered to the Zhou Dynasty went north to fight, causing huge turmoil. The Golden Family sent out cavalry from the Western Regions to fight, and it was still difficult to contain them. At this moment, the Dazhou headquarters is mobilizing step by step, but the backbone of the grassland is still holding on to some trivial matters and has not given the people below a clear response plan.
Judging from various signs, the Mongols neither had the courage to take the initiative to attack south, nor were they prepared for a decisive battle with the Zhou army on the grasslands.
Compared with them, the Zhou army's preparations and assembly were more orderly and had a clear purpose.
In mid-October, Tongzhou Defense Envoy Shi Qing had already led a team of more than 5,000 auxiliary troops to northern Xinjiang.
According to the Dajin system, Tongzhou was a branch county of Daxing Prefecture and had no defense or command. However, several years after the founding of the Zhou Dynasty, due to the continuous expansion of the scale of material transfer between Daxing Prefecture and Tianjin Prefecture, Tongzhou's status as a water and land transportation hub also continued to rise. Therefore, in the second year of Longwu, Tongzhou was promoted to a defensive state. , with Shi Qing as the defense envoy.
Shi Qing was a powerful general of the Red Coat Army in Shandong in his early years. He had a reputation for being shrewd and capable, and could even be said to be cunning.
When Yang An'er's rebellion failed, he was one of the first people to ask for help; when Yang An'er raised troops and became king for the second time, he often persuaded Liu Erzu to contact Guo Ning, and even met with Yin Chang in person to bring the two families together; when Liu Erzu and Guo Ning Cooperating, he allowed his subordinates Shao Zhen and Du Guoen to contact Kaifeng.
Of this person's ten talents, probably only three points are used in the battlefield and seven points are used in all directions. He may not be suitable for taking a firm stand and fighting to the death, but he is very suitable for taking charge of the military affairs of a place and handling various complicated political affairs. Therefore, he had considerable political achievements as the Tongzhou Defense Envoy. The local auxiliary troops he formed performed well in transportation, construction, and basic military training. He was also commended by the Marshal's Office of Zhongdu many times.
The three recruiting divisions of the Great Zhou Dynasty in northern Xinjiang had a total of fifty-five forts, with 34,000 regular troops and 41,000 auxiliary troops. The number of troops was less than one-fifth of the troops stationed in the northern border trenches of Dajin.
The Zhou army was far more elite and good at fighting than the Jin army. With this strength, it was enough to gain an advantage, and it still had room to mobilize the large troops heading north.
But also because the military's equipment and treatment levels have been greatly improved, there are many requirements for logistical support. Since Guo Ning intended to fight on the grassland, he needed to add some additional auxiliary troops. Shi Qing's troops were the one who was ordered to go north.
In recent years, the auxiliary troops in the mainland have become more and more professional and subdivided. Some auxiliary troops are responsible for garrisoning places and maintaining law and order, while others are responsible for transportation projects, mainly repairing bridges and roads and transporting and distributing goods.
Shi Qing's subordinates in Tongzhou are good at this.
The total number of his men was more than 4,000, and he brought half of them this time. There are more than 200 large and small vehicles accompanying the army, as well as hundreds of mules, horses and livestock. In addition to grain and fodder, there were also a large number of tools loaded on the vehicle, such as spades, shovels, ropes, wheelbarrows and even mosquito repellent incense, which were distributed when the march passed Juyong Pass.
During the march, many old soldiers sitting in the car could not hold back and had already taken out their own set of equipment to see if the shovels and shovels had good steel fire, to see if the ropes were long and strong, and then smelled the incense. The smell, he laughed and commented a few words.
These veterans are usually experienced, and some of them have retired from the regular army. Therefore, even if they are faced with the possibility of fighting, they will not panic. Of course, they are not the same as those auxiliary soldiers of the Jin Kingdom who were like walking corpses.
Shi Qing himself also withdrew from the main Army Command Division. The Great Zhou Dynasty always gave preferential treatment to the old members of the Red Coat Army. Generals of his level who were better off were able to serve as governors of the imperial palace. However, when
Qing Xiaquan, Huo Yi, and Shi Gui all started out as rebellious farmers. After more than twenty years of ups and downs, they were tired and a little afraid of the ups and downs of the waves.
So they decided to let themselves sit in a more relaxed and less critical position, so that they could rest assured and their superiors could rest assured.
The imperial court considered that these people's morale had declined and was not willing to force them. Talents from the military academy are coming out in waves, and there is no shortage of generals who can lead troops in a wild way. On the contrary, there are fewer senior officers who are senior, prestigious and willing to take charge of trivial matters. Shi Qing's future prospects are not bad.
He led his troops northward, and happened to be traveling between two forts in the past two days. When we crossed the lonely grassland, we looked around and saw the withered yellow grass growing up to waist and chest height.
He personally chose several directions and walked deep into the meadow to take a look, but found no traces of cutting.
According to records in military school textbooks, there were originally Mongolian tribes grazing in this area. Mongolians store grass before autumn. A large amount of grass will be cut, tied and stored. But now the Mongols are shrinking and heading north, and the number of people behind the Monan Mountains has dropped sharply. In areas covered by the force of the Zhou Dynasty, the pastoral areas are facing the squeeze of the army's reclamation areas.
Obviously, the Mongolian herders have not been here for a long time.
I heard that many Mongolians who defected to the Zhou Dynasty simply gave up herding as a career and turned to weaving wool felt to make money, and their lives were pretty good.
This is the traditional craftsmanship of the Mongolians, which is no worse than that of the Han people. Some Mongolians use a soldering iron to create lifelike patterns on felt, and the selling price is more than double that of ordinary felt.
Of course, there are Mongolians who engage in handicrafts, and there are also Han people who rely on military forts to develop pastures. After all, the food and clothing of so many garrison troops are inseparable from the meat, milk, and fur produced in northern Xinjiang. There are several ranches run by government officials and merchants that are very well managed and their output can be sold in large quantities.
For example, since last year, a large number of cheeses sold in Zhongdu and Tianjin are produced in Northern Xinjiang. The warriors who invested in the relevant ranches all received dividends, and everyone was happy.
Since this year, many generals and commanders on Zhongdu Road have tried to get involved in the grassland, and some have approached Shi Qing. Unfortunately, Shi Qing's family fortune has all been lost at sea, and his eldest wife lights candles every night to read the nautical charts, figuring out where her family and the ship's cargo have gone. She really can't take care of both ends.
There have always been only so many benefits on the grassland, but under the rule of the Zhou Dynasty, the profit output has been greatly improved due to the huge commercial exchanges between the grassland and the Central Plains.
The Zhou Dynasty's control of the grasslands was therefore different from the simple military sweeps of the Han Dynasty, and different from the Tang Dynasty's use of foreign barbarians as frontier generals. This military regime clearly knew what the military people needed, so it bundled military, political and economic interests together without any scruples, and used the interests to firmly root the Han people in the grasslands.
Over the past few years, Dazhou has been working steadily on the grassland. The progress seems not to be fast, but with every step they take, no one can move them away.
The station where Shi Qing arrived was located in the deep mountains and huge ravines behind Yehu Ridge.
The old Jin army's garrison had become ruins. The newly built camp of the Zhou army was higher and more dangerous, but it was not enough to accommodate the army. Fortunately, Shi Qing's department was here to do the project. After arriving, he immediately started work, from leveling the ground to ramming trenches and walls. He was very busy for several days.
During the few days they were expanding their camp, several troops came from behind to station themselves. Shi Qing estimated that there were more than 20,000 people stationed in the hundreds of miles from Wusha Castle to the rear, including auxiliary troops.
An army of this size is enough to go deep into the grasslands and carry out large-scale raids and annihilations. All the soldiers stationed in the military camp were excited to be able to participate in such a military operation, and even the auxiliary soldiers under Shi Qing were also in high spirits.
In order to let the soldiers relax, each ministry reduced their training and gave them holidays in turns. However, the soldiers had nothing to do in this barren mountain. After the holidays, they either slept in the camp to refresh their mind, or formed small teams and took turns hunting or fishing.
The treatment of the auxiliary soldiers cannot be compared with that of the regular soldiers, but Shi Qing understands the mood of the soldiers very well, and also gives the auxiliary soldiers a holiday and allows them to take turns to rest.
As for Shi Qing himself, if he has free time, he reads every day. There are two kinds of books. One is the teaching book specially issued by Tianjin Military Academy to senior officers.
The other material is the classics, history and other books prepared for him by his uncle Shiquan.
Shi Quan is a serious scholar, and now serves as an experience officer in the Shandong Tongjun Department, so the books he recommends to his nephew are naturally good. However, what Shi Qing reads on a daily basis is mainly textbooks.
He estimated that he would not participate in any more wars, but even if he were to command the auxiliary troops, there was still a lot of knowledge worth studying.
Especially after he served as the Tongzhou Defense Envoy, he had to lead a large group of subordinates to direct the transfer of supplies on site every day. In the past, he only relied on gesticulating and urging his subordinates to run around for this kind of thing. Later, after learning a lot, he knew how to enter, pay, deposit, and do things, and figured out how to schedule them to achieve the highest efficiency.
Even building bridges and roads makes sense. Under different terrains, different soil textures, and different climate environments, there are particularities in how the rammed earth is arranged and how the accumulated water flows out.
Shi Qing used to frantically build strongholds in Mount Tai to fight against the Jin army, and he had great experience in this. On the recommendation of Liu Erzu, he dictated an article about his experience. After being polished by others, it was included in the military academy's teaching materials.
The military academy's teaching materials are compiled by the Marshal's Office. It is a great honor for the article to be included in the teaching materials. Who would have thought that a warrior with a rough background could become famous among people by relying on his writing skills? Shi Qing was proud of this for a long time, and even paid a lot of money to hire a master craftsman from Ningjin County, Xingzhou to engrave the article and hide it at home.
After feeling proud, he felt that since he had become a famous figure, he must not lose his face, and he had to learn other things that he should learn. After all, there are still twenty years of military career left. Even if you don't fight in battle, you can steadily reach a higher position. ,
The higher the status, the more benefits. Shi Qing is not a particularly greedy person, and he also knows how to advance and retreat. He would never do it if he really wanted to lose his head by drinking soldiers' blood. But whatever the country is willing to give, it will not be taken in vain.
Maybe in two or three years, we can buy a boat on the sea and create a pasture with others on the grassland?
In this case, when the three sons grow up, each of them will have a family business... It makes people happy to think about it!
