In the first month of the sixth year of Chongzhen, an army returned from Guyuan Prefecture to Jinglu Guard in Gansu Province.
Along the yellow sand road, the dust-stained sergeants with merit medals hanging on their waists, wearing old and blood-stained armors, leading the emaciated war horses, and the donkey cart dragging the body of Pao Ze, their resolute and solemn faces did not have the joy of surviving the disaster, only the indescribable joy. Puzzled.
They were soldiers from the Lutang Camp under the command of General Mo Yujing of the Jinglu Guards in Gansu Province. In the fourth year of Chongzhen's reign, the bandit King Huhu besieged Zhuanglang, so they went on an expedition after hearing the news.
Later, he entered Guyuan Prefecture with Li Hongsi, deputy commander-in-chief of Gansu Province, and joined forces with Wang Xingshan, deputy commander-in-chief of Guyuan, to pursue the rogue bandits from Guyuan Prefecture to Baoji, and then fought in Jingning Prefecture and Luoshui City until Wang Laohu was driven into the mountains.
The situation of the war between pirates and invaders has changed. There are swarms of thieves including pond horses, warriors, pack guns, and armors. Those bowls and helmets with flags removed clearly remind every soldier that they are the right and left of the border soldiers. Fight each other.
The soldiers had not relaxed their armor for half a month for a whole year. Even the toughest sergeants were exhausted, and the generals were even more heartbroken and regretful. It is certainly worthy of pride to persist in the pursuit of men without armor and horses without saddles.
But what appeared in the eyes of General Mo Yujing was not just the enemy falling to death due to exhaustion, his soldiers were also urinating blood and fell one after another during the pursuit.
In the end, there was no talk of victory at all. Although the good news was sent to Shaanxi one after another, Mo Yujing knew that they did not win, but Wang Laohu won.
Because Wang Laohu will win as long as he lives, not to mention that there are thousands of bandits who are skilled in riding and shooting at the mountain, making the pursuers unable to penetrate deeply. .
When Lutang camp withdrew from the difficult war, the severe drought continued, and tens of thousands of refugees gathered in Pingliang, Longzhou, Huating, Wu'an, Zhuanglang, and Jingning to plunder.
Victory after victory, victory after victory, and nothing has changed except thousands of deaths.
Mo Yujing's performance in the war could not be said to be outstanding. He was just one of the many Shaanxi generals who had no credit and worked hard. He could neither kill the rebels nor turn a blind eye to the looting because he knew he could not win this war. A war.
They want to fight, but they have no arms to lift; although they face the enemy, they have no goal to fight; although they hold weapons, it seems as if they have no weapons.
They don't even know who the enemy is.
When a group of hungry people passed by with a hoe, he would wave the soldiers to get out of the way; and when the hungry people started looting, he would lead his army to attack them.
After the victory, the hungry people fled in all directions and reported success to the court. Soon these people would gather together again and continue to rob.
It seems that there is no solution other than killing everyone in sight, but every soldier does not join the army to kill everyone in sight.
If this is not the case, it is better to become a rebel. At least the rebels know who they should kill.
In the General's Office of Lutang Camp, Mo and Jing had no time to examine the scars on their bodies caused by wearing armor for a long time. The messenger from the imperial court had arrived, and a letter of appointment for promotion to deputy commander-in-chief of Xining made Lutang Camp almost mutiny.
Xining is Mo Yujing’s hometown.
The camp soldiers who had gone through life and death were tired of the war against the rebels. Everyone knew their final destination if they stayed here, becoming deserters or dying in the war against the rebels... People asked the generals to take them away.
People thought that once we reached Xining, there would be no counter-insurgency war.
However, a letter from General Lanzhou shattered the illusions of the veterans. An order came from Shaanxi, and Mo Yujing was allowed to lead 700 troops to take office - the people of Hehuang rebelled.
The civil uprising in Hehuang was not instigated by Liu Chengzong. Although inciting the uprising was indeed part of Liu Shizi's plan to raise troops for the Eastern Expedition, the Han people in the Hehuang Valley had already revolted before he sent Huang Cheng and others to instigate it.
Hehuang is a very special area. It is generally the Huangshui River Valley running east-west from Juerwan to Lanzhou, but includes more than a dozen small valleys running north-south.
The settlement range of the local people is also clearly defined. The chieftains' territories are all in the small valleys running from north to south. The Han Hui people whose ancestors moved from the southeast and the army, generals, and native officials have lived in the middle of the Hehuang Valley. The Tusi people are in the north and south. Inhabit river valleys and mountains.
However, due to the large number of troops stationed in the river valley, the difficulty of the civil uprising here was higher than at the beginning of the Northern Shaanxi Rebellion. People passively skipped the stage of converging to eat big households. They might have just grabbed a fence, and in the blink of an eye they would have to fight against the Tuliu garrison.
Liu Chengzong received the news on the sixteenth day of the first lunar month that the army had not yet been prepared. However, Liu Chengzu of the Xining Guard had selected 2,000 sergeants from the Zhenhai Battalion and 2,000 banner troops from the Xining Guard to complete the preparations. He immediately ordered his brother and Li Wanqing as the vanguard to advance towards the Hehuang Valley. .
Until the 19th day of the first lunar month, Haibei County Magistrate Chen Qindai, Haixi County Magistrate Liu Guoneng and Nanshan Zhong Hu jointly received the order of westward defense at the Marshal's Mansion, and then Wang Wenxiu led 3,000 infantry to the new city.
For a time, the guards, Tang soldiers, Yang Yao's horse camp, Huang Shengxiao's artillery camp, as well as the Fan soldiers from the hunting camp and the Mongolian soldiers from the fishing camp were stationed in the east and west of the new city. Tens of thousands of troops were assembled and ready to go. The chieftain who lived in the Marshal's Mansion We are worried and everyone is in danger.
Chen Shiwen made great achievements in these few days, lobbying and persuading the chieftains that the Hehuang Valley would change sooner or later. Instead of staying in the new city and being a lamb to be slaughtered, it was better to follow the expedition, at least to preserve the clan.
Later, Li Tianyu, the largest chieftain in Xining, immediately rebelled and took the lead in requesting Liu Chengzong to join the army. He said that if he met the Li family's children on the way, he would try to persuade them to put down their weapons... However, he did not dare to vouch for this. There were too many people with the surname Li in Hehuang. Now, even the clan leader cannot restrain everyone.
Li Tianyu only had one request. After the war, he would be allowed to lead at least 10,000 clan members to move away from Hehuang. He neither wanted to be a springboard for the imperial court to attack the Marshal's Mansion, nor was he willing to be a pawn in Liu Chengzong's eastward attack.
If you stay in Hehuang, it is obvious that you will suffer from splints.
Of course, even if you go to the west, you still won't be able to spare yourself from the splint... The chieftains all know that Hu Duntu is going to Qinghai. Li Tianyu's move to the west is, at best, the lesser of two evils.
At least Hu Duntu is easier to deal with than Hong Chengchou.
Liu Chengzong readily agreed to this request and immediately stated that, let alone taking 10,000 people away, if Li Tianyu had the ability, he would not have any objection even if he took away all 30,000 households with the surname Li in Hehuang.
When people leave, they stay, so why not?
In fact, it is difficult for people to be shrewd when dealing with official matters, but when they are self-centered, their intelligence slowly rises.
For example, Lord Chongzhen and Hu Duntu Khan both need to cut off their own flesh to win over others, but if they cannot cut off their own flesh, they will fall into the situation of cutting off other people's flesh to win over others.
Qi Guoping and other chieftains were reluctant to join the expedition at first. No matter how much Chen Shiwen tried to persuade him, even telling him about the merits of Conglong, it had no effect.
On the contrary, Li Tianyu persuaded him, and the remaining twelve chieftains all expressed their intention to join the conquest.
For no other reason, the two of them stood from different angles. Chen Shiwen really thought that all the chieftains were like him. There were hundreds of descendants in the clan, and they were all close family members. In essence, he, the little chieftain, was like a The village chief joined Liu Chengzong because he wanted to make the whole village rich.
But other chieftains are not like this. Li Tianyu has tens of thousands of clan members, who the hell knows each other. He started to persuade him: "If Qi Guoping doesn't surrender, can you guarantee that none of your three thousand Qi family members will surrender?"
"If you don't surrender, how can you defeat tens of thousands of soldiers with just a hundred soldiers? If you can't defeat the Qi family, you will be gone. If one of you surrenders, your family will have the twelfth chieftain. If you stay in Xincheng, you will only have There is a way to be slaughtered.”
"Why don't you follow me to the west, no matter what the intruders are, the thirteen of our families will be twisted into one, and we will still guard the west."
Li Tianyu said to the chieftains: "Instead of protecting the clan, let's protect ourselves first."
After some consideration, the twelve chieftains all agreed with Li Tianyu's statement and looked at Chen Shiwen with strange expressions.
Chen Shiwen was so angry that he shouted in his heart: His grandma’s Xining Tusi belongs to the 14th family! Fourteen families!
Liu Chengzong was very satisfied with this result except for the rope. He did not regard Chen Shiwen as a chieftain in his heart. He immediately made a promise to grant the chieftains of the four tribes of Li, Li, and Qi to the north and south of Wulan Mountain, and allowed them to move 30,000 people. Clan members go out.
The remaining little chieftains were sealed to Xiaohetao in the south of Huangnan, and 20,000 tribesmen were allowed to be relocated. There were fields cultivated by the Tumut Mongols in the past, and they were directly under the jurisdiction of Guide City Deputy Qianhu Baohu and Bajiao City Counselor Chen Shiwen. .
Anyway, the chieftains had food in their hands, so they moved out those who could. When the people who stayed in Hehuang faced the food crisis, they only needed to organize farming to solve the problem faster.
After finishing this matter, it was not until the 22nd day of the first lunar month that Liu Chengzong personally led an army composed of various troops under his command and marched all the way to the Hehuang Valley.
Liu Chengzong spent a lot of energy on the selection of soldiers and horses for the Eastern Expedition. He placed a thousand artillery battalions under the direct control of more than a thousand soldiers from Tang Bing and Huang Shengxiao, and more than 100 students from Baifu accompanied the army to prepare for their placement. The Chinese army never caught up with the participating generals for the Southern Expedition. It consisted of 3,600 horse battalions under Yang Yao's command.
In Liu Chengzong's design, the Chinese army was only used to suppress the formation and play a decisive role in the war. Regular operations needed to be fought by conscripted troops.
Basang from the third battalion was designated as the hunting camp, Xie Erhu from the fishing camp, and Ahai Daiqing from the heavy supply camp. They each recruited men from the coast of Qinghai Lake to Xining to form a regular army with nearly 20,000 troops.
Most of Liu Chengzong's army preparations were for Xie Erhu and Ahai Daiqing to select soldiers for recruitment.
Today, there are countless Mongolians under the rule of Xining Prefecture who are capable and willing to fight. For these people, serving as soldiers and eating food is much more comfortable than working as a laborer.
Whether it was Tumut or Khalkha, most of the captives who surrendered were soldiers. Xie Erhu and Ahai Daiqing were able to choose the best among them calmly.
As for Basang, Basang is different from others. Although he was born as a slave, he is very confident and has his own ideas, and he is even better than many nobles in adhering to his ideas.
Both Xie Erhu and Ahai Daiqing were from Mongolian nobles, but when Liu Chengzong asked them to choose soldiers, they would immediately think that their own subordinates were not good enough. Even if they didn't think so, they would agree from a flattering point of view.
Basang was different and rejected the suggestion of selecting soldiers. He said that his slave boys were well fed, slept well and used well. After more than ten battles, they were afraid but no one retreated and ran away.
The rebellious Western nobles were also dispersed by the Mongols, and they were convinced and organized into a slave cavalry team.
Basang said: "With just a little help from the generalissimo, Basang can lead the slave boys to establish meritorious deeds and will never give up the chance of promotion to others."
It was only then that Liu Chengzong discovered that those Xifan nobles had also become Basang's slave soldiers... Although this was slightly different from Liu Shizi's original intention, at least the desire for equality within the hunting camp was achieved.
Their living standards, treatment and personality status have changed, but their names in Basang's mind have not changed. They are still the slaves of the fucking generalissimo.
Liu Chengzong thought for a moment. Although the hunting battalion's combat effectiveness was not strong, it did have super strong willpower. Not to mention the heavy elite troops of Gas and Ah Liu, it was actually a more comprehensive team than the two Mongolian battalions.
He asked, "What kind of help do you need?"
Basang said: "Please ask the generalissimo to organize 600 Han troops for me, the kind of gunners who can lead the charge after firing cannons."
When Basang said this, Huang Shengxiao was next to Liu Chengzong and almost kowtowed to apologize.
Huang Shengxiao's artillerymen were a group of artillerymen whose main focus was not on manipulating artillery.
His commander, Cao Yao, summed up a set of close-range artillery tactics when he moved to northern Shaanxi.
Later, during the reorganization of Xining, because Liu Chengzong originally wanted to establish a training and recruitment mechanism, the commander of the third infantry, cavalry and artillery battalion came up with a joint training method. The artillery must know the tactics of the infantry and cavalry, and the infantry must know the tactics of the cavalry and artillery. .
As a result, all three arms have mastered the tactics of the other two arms. At this time, it is not surprising that the soldiers in the training camp are just artillerymen who can ride horses and infantrymen who can fire cannons.
The problem lies in the fact that Huang Shengxiao has been guarding Nangsuoqianmo Palace for more than half a year and still trains artillery in this way.
In this way, the soldiers under his command are a bit strange. They can be said to be jumping infantry equipped with guns, or they can be said to be artillerymen who are good at charging. Each of them can even fire a gun on horseback... provided that the gun is relatively short.
Skills are learned evenly.
Unexpectedly, Basang was so good at this. He explained: "Slave cubs can endure hardship, are timid, and easily frightened. Gun charges boost morale."
When Liu Chengzong heard this reason, he immediately waved his hand and transferred 600 soldiers from Nanshan Fort... Zhong Hu's soldiers were infantry who knew how to use guns and cannons. They were not as good at charging as Huang Shengxiao's people, but they had another advantage.
This group of people did not catch up with the southern expedition, so they stayed in the north and learned a lot of knowledge. They were good at speaking Xifan language, which was enough to strengthen them and become officers.
The mighty army shook its head and tail all the way, following Liu Chengzu's vanguard army to advance eastward. All the enemies they could encounter were taken out by Liu Chengzu in advance. They took over the fields and manors along the way and advanced to Nianbo in a blink of an eye. This was a bitter experience for his brothers Liu Chengzu and Li Wanqing. I got beaten a lot on the way.
When the people rebelled, no matter whose soldiers they were, they would fight anyone they saw, and robbing anyone was not robbing. The key point was that Li Wanqing did not have many soldiers, and the rebellious people wanted to fight when they saw him.
Until Nianbo was approaching, Huang Cheng, who had been sent out to instigate Gaodianzi Camp earlier, sent people to rush for help. They were defeated by the monks led by the leader of Xining's Seng Gangsi, the master of Qutan Temple, and the great national master Ban Zhuer Lingzhen. Even the rebels in the Nianbo area were almost completely defeated by Ban Zhuer Lingzhen.
