In February of the seventh year of Chongzhen, Liu Chengzong personally led five battalions of troops to set off from Xining.
Compared with the offensive route at the southern foot of the Qilian Mountains, the advance route of his main Chinese army is further away. They must first go south from Xining to the Heka Grassland, then pass through Chaka Yanchi and Wulan Mountain to the west to Delingha, and then turn around. Heading north to Guazhou, the total length is 2,200 miles.
This road was chosen by Liu Shizi. It was nearly 800 miles farther than the road that marched along the southern foot of the Qilian Mountains through Hala Lake to Yumen, and there were fewer water sources along the way.
However, the advantage of this route is its strong population carrying capacity. Heka, Ulan, Dulan, Delingha, Golmud, and Big and Little Huidan are all the marshal's military camps and chieftain stations. Although there are fewer water sources, they are still All under his control.
Although due to the extreme terrain and environmental conditions, the march time needs to be calculated in fifty days, there is a stronger guarantee.
At first, Liu Chengzong's advance was slow because the imperial court's counterattack from Lanzhou in the east was slow, which made him uneasy. But when a letter from Ren Quan'er arrived, he felt relieved.
In his heart, Liu Chengzong never considered the leaders and compatriots who stayed in Yan'an Mansion as his subordinates.
They were once friends fighting against the wind and waves in difficult times. Sometimes people are close, and sometimes people are far away. As close as monkeys in the sky, they share the same interests and we work together; as far away as King Chuang, Gao Yingxiang, he can be tolerated but he doesn't want to. If you live under others, then join forces.
Anyway, at that time, no matter whether it was General Liu or King Gao Chuang, no one had any hope of overthrowing the Ming Dynasty. Everyone was very tolerant.
But there are also special times when people have different aspirations.
Even if they are all surnamed Liu, not everyone is willing to rebel even after having a full meal. Even because they are from the same clan, this one is an uncle and that one is a brother, they are not willing to rebel in the first place, which makes it more difficult to manage.
It's all your fault to say something rude and insist on breaking up my family and property. Shouldn't you be supporting me now that you're the leader?
In order to avoid the escalation of conflicts, many people named Yan'an Guard were established.
Yan'an Guard was essentially a reservoir for Liu Chengzong to get rid of his conflicts. In his early years, his father Liu Xiangyu's Yuziying also had this role.
There are three types of people originally. Liu Chengzong's Lion Battalion is his subordinates and can command as they wish; Yuziying is a person who has no problem with his mind but it is more difficult to command; and Yan'an Guard is a person who may not have a hard time commanding, but it is difficult to command. Rebellion is a group of people forced by circumstances.
The only person in his hometown who could be called a subordinate was Ren Quan'er, but Liu Chengzong also did not dare to treat him as a subordinate in his heart. After all, times had changed, and the poor boy at the time had become a commander with real power in the court, and he could still be obeyed. His order?
It doesn't matter whether he is a subordinate or not. Ren Quan'er treats him as a superior, that's what counts.
Ren Quan'er's letter had three pages. The first page told him that the imperial court would dispatch at least three battalions to attack Lanzhou in the direction of Lintao, and also gave a clear explanation of the generals of the three battalions.
This puzzled Liu Chengzong, because the Marshal's Mansion's garrison force on both sides of the Yellow River in Lanzhou was very sufficient, and because the call for surrender of the old Ming army was so huge that the court should know how many troops they had.
Lanzhou was guarded by a battalion led by General Wang Wenxiu, and there were three nearly full battalions of Luo Rucai, Li Wanqing, and Yang Chengzu. This was already the direct army of the Marshal's Mansion with more than 10,000 yuan.
In several counties around Lintao Prefecture, there is also the Lintao Brigade composed of the old Ming army under the command of three generals Shi Xiang, Li Zude, and Zhang Yunqi. When Liu Chengzong awarded them the official positions of deputy general and staff general, he made it clear that he wanted their surrender. Title.
Therefore, the three of them fought fiercely against several surrounding counties when they recruited and surrendered the camp and flag army. Moreover, it was the responsibility of the three of them to surrender Kaicheng, and the troops they led were also paid by the marshal's government, so they had a certain degree of loyalty.
Facing this army, the governors of the five provinces of the imperial court sent out three battalions with more than 10,000 troops. It seemed too shabby. They wanted to fight one against two in the siege. They are all heavenly soldiers and generals?
However, on the second page, Ren Quan'er explained in detail the melee in the Central Plains, Huguang, and Sichuan, the court's dragnet, the official army's successive victories, and the peasant army's march in, and everything made sense.
Liu Chengzong believed in the court's battle reports because he had experience in joint operations and also knew the difficulty of commanding coordinated operations on a battlefield that spanned hundreds of miles.
This situation appears in the Ming army's battle report, not because the Ming army generals lied about their military exploits, but because hundreds of thousands of peasant troops were breaking through.
Among the hundreds of thousands of peasant soldiers, some of the leaders' direct descendants of the old battalions have the ability to fight head-on with the official army, but they are still not regular armies, and the leaders of the powerful old battalions are often relatively independent leaders.
After four years of war, Liu Chengzong established the Marshal's Mansion and had his own political structure. Although the peasant army who stayed in the Central Plains did not have this set of things, they also lost their innocence and learned cruelty in the war.
They are breaking through, and no one will hold a strong army to give others the rear, leaving their direct lineage to be surrounded by the official army.
Ren Quan'er summed up this situation sharply in his letter: The strong are rampant, and the weak fill the gaps.
Those who were able to march quickly were in front of them, killing generals, destroying cities and looting territory. Those who were incompetent, the old and the weak, were intercepted and chased by the army on the road, leaving headless corpses on the ground, which became the military exploits of the army.
Liu Chengzong was a little disappointed.
He originally thought that the Marshal's Mansion's capture of Lanzhou would make him the number one enemy of Shaanxi and reduce the threat of the peasant army. However, he did not expect that in Chen Qiyu's eyes, he would become a secondary target of the imperial court.
As for the third page of Ren Quan'er's letter, it was his plan for defecting on the battlefield of Yan'an Camp. Liu Chengzong didn't worry about these matters and sent it to Wang Wenxiu. Matters on the frontline battlefield still had to be decided by the frontline generals.
Liu Chengzong just informed the whole army about the situation of the peasant army in the Central Plains and told the soldiers to hurry up. Only by winning Gansu quickly and decisively can the peasant army die less.
The five battalions of soldiers he commanded turned into nine battalions when they reached Delingha.
However, the four extra battalions were just traveling with him. One battalion was composed of nobles and guards from the Oirat tribes. Batur Hutaiji and other Mongolian nobles left happily, but many tribesmen cried when they left Xining. .
Their mighty army left the Tianshan Mountains, and when they came back, only more than 3,000 people were left, along with two fierce-looking Han military camps. Not to mention how uncomfortable they felt.
Batur Hutaiji and others were happy. Firstly, they could go home. Secondly, Liu Chengzong gave them many gifts and agreed on a comprehensive trade agreement for furs, arms, and daily necessities.
Although many people were lost in the war, the nobles were richer, and in the foreseeable future they would become richer along the trade routes.
Batur Hutaiji was the most serious person during the march, not only because Oirat was responsible for leading the army of the Marshal's Mansion, but also because he was learning marching from the Marshal's Mansion, mainly towing heavy artillery in the sand and the Gobi.
Ever since he was defeated and surrendered, he had been thrown into the school of the Marshal's Mansion to learn Chinese language. In a militaristic place like the Marshal's Mansion, even if he studied Chinese, he would accidentally pick up some military knowledge. He really learned a lot. thing.
At this moment, more than 30,000 people dragged out the winding snake array in three parallel ways along the Gobi Desert at the foot of the snow-capped mountains. Batur Huitaiji followed Tang Qi, who was sentrying in the highlands, on the top of the hill holding notes and recording The size of the army's camp.
In the more than half a year at the Marshal's Mansion, Batur Hutaiji gained not only familiarity with various firearms in the Marshal's Mansion, but more importantly, learned a lot of history and armed his mind.
His teacher is an old scholar who worships the past. He always talks about Confucius and even the Five Emperors. He also teaches about the Spring and Autumn Period. These histories have no practical significance for guiding the students of the Marshal's Mansion, so they are not welcome in Xincheng Academy. Then he was sent to another courtyard to teach a group of Mongolian nobles how to speak.
But these things are different for Batur Hutaiji. In his view, the Central Plains, a fertile land in the world, became the Central Plains of the Han people, and it was based on that period.
People built strong cities, enfeoffed princes in various places, connected vast areas with roads, divided countries by blood, formulated rituals to respect kings and repel barbarians, and waged endless wars against the barbarians, making the Central Plains an impregnable country for generations. .
This has a strong guiding significance for the tribal form of Junggar, which fully illustrates the significance of development. Three thousand years ago, a seed was planted in Haojing, and the Han people carefully watered the branches and spread the leaves, creating the Ming Dynasty today.
He will return to Tianshan today to build a city, enfeoff nobles in key areas, build official roads based on rivers and mountains, lock all the barbarians he sees inside, and send elite horse teams to plunder. In three thousand years, a Mongol power will appear in the vast Siberia. , when the time comes, Genghis Khan will become a figure like the Yellow Emperor, and he will be called Zhou Wen... no, King Wen of Mongolia.
He is ready to return to the Tianshan Mountains for a big fight. He has two standing Mongolian battalions. He only needs to transport furs and downs this year and buy weapons and equipment for the two battalions.
Next year, we will bring in thirty-three light and heavy artillery pieces to talk to the Rakshasa people about free trade in Siberia.
In fact, the normal march of more than 30,000 people was nothing special for Batur Hutaiji except that he needed to learn how to transport heavy artillery. Until Liu Chengzong sent an order to the entire army to speed up, all the Oirat nobles were frightened.
It's not like they have never seen emergency marches before. The Mongolian cavalry itself is an expert in emergency marches. However, the soldiers marched towards Jiayuguan Pass where "the barbarians dismounted here", a pass that has never been breached. The soldiers were extremely happy... no one had seen it. .
The nearly 20,000 troops in the fifth battalion of the Marshal's Mansion enjoyed good food and drink on this road. As we walked down the march, we could see that the livestock in the several herding camps along the way, except for those who were still giving birth, were almost all dead. They ate up all the food, and if it weren't for the melting snow in the mountains, even the water in the river would have been drank up by them.
Batur Hutaiji didn't understand why these troops wanted to go to Jiayuguan to die in such a hurry despite having such a good life. If the troops of the Marshal's Mansion had such a high fighting enthusiasm, why did they come to Qinghai? ?
In fact, not only Batur Hutaiji didn't understand, but even Liu Chengzong didn't quite understand. He ordered the rapid advance in order not to waste time. Zhuang Langhe was facing a confrontation, and the battle in Lintao Mansion was about to begin. The sooner he arrived at Jiayuguan, the better. The sooner Zhang Tianlin's troops can take action, distracting the enemy's attention on the two battlefields.
The troops in the Marshal's Mansion did not always have such high fighting enthusiasm.
When the army was leaving Xining and Xincheng, Liu Chengzong specially summoned the military commanders to ask them to pay attention to the mentality of the soldiers and tell them the justice of the trip.
When they started walking slowly, the morale of the army was neither low nor high. However, when they ordered a rapid march, the people cheered up.
Liu Chengzong only found out what happened after summoning his subordinates to inquire. In fact, the reason is quite funny, because the soldiers finally left Hehuang.
Not to fight back home, but as they left Hehuang, their sense of being superior to others as soldiers of the Marshal's Mansion returned.
Hehuang was doing well, but in the months after the harvest in the fields in Hehuang, all the soldiers in the Marshal's Mansion, except the locals in Hehuang, lived a miserable life.
Before the equalization of land, the people of Hehuang suffered from both scarcity and inequality. Although the soldiers in the Marshal's Mansion did not have much military pay, each of them had enough food to survive for several families. Even if there was no war, they could feed their whole family with food rations. You can also help others.
The soldiers of the Generalissimo's Mansion are the most proud soldiers in the world. Even if they are surrendering, they will hold their chests and heads high while walking on the road.
But after the harvest of the equal fields, the psychological gap came. Everyone was better off, and every household had almost endless amounts of grain. They sold the surplus grain to the Marshal's Mansion and had endless money to spend.
The soldiers at the Marshal's Mansion suddenly found that they didn't seem to have that much food on hand, and even less money. It was better to plant a few acres of land at home than to shed blood.
People vaguely felt that something was wrong, but they couldn't tell what was wrong. They rebelled because they couldn't survive. Now that they saw the people living happily under the marshal's rule, they were also happy from the bottom of their hearts, but they just felt like they were at a loss.
They don't blame the commander-in-chief, who has never treated them badly. The soldiers' food and salary have never been cut off at any time, but it is true that many people have the idea of returning to their fields.
Fortunately, the time did not last long enough for them to make up their mind to disband and return to the fields. After all, these foreign warriors were really not very good at farming.
This gap finally disappeared until they entered the Tuen Mu camp and the Tusi territory. Although the people here lived a good life, animal husbandry was the main industry. Food was still a scarce hard currency here, and their fixed worth doubled again.
Only then did people suddenly realize that not everything in the world was like Hehuang under the general's rule. They were going to Gansu. There was no equalization of land in Gansu yet, and the people there were still living a miserable life under the rule of unruly people. They were going to Gansu. Will once again change everything through ups and downs and enjoy people's love.
After breaking through Jiayuguan, they are still respected and proud warriors.
With such faith and small thoughts in mind, the sergeants of the fifth battalion of the Marshal's Mansion heading to Jiayuguan were extremely excited, and the people were full of energy during the march in the smoke-filled Gobi.
When people arrived in Subei, Liu Chengzong finally issued an order, and thousands of Tangqi shuttled alternately through the Gobi valley.
The simple command followed the yellow command flag and red cotton armor of Tangqi riding on horseback. They carried the dust from the Gobi sand dunes, echoed in the melting snow mountain canyon, passed through the endless salt lake and the rushing snow-melting river, and finally passed clearly into the In Zhang Tianlin's ears.
The password only has four words: "March to Gansu!"
