Chapter 146: War forces peace
Finally, at the end of the letter, he wrote that if he agreed to peace talks, he would send a mission from Lingao in a few days. [Read full text] As for the location of the negotiations, it can be in Macau. If there is a reply from Guangdong, they can also ask the Jesuits in Macao to forward the letter.
"In view of my humble position, the only thing left to do now is to negotiate." Li Xijue said cautiously.
The only way to suppress it is to pay. Wang Zunde's heart was shrouded in pain. He knew very well that it was probably not his turn to recruit someone. And the emperor may not allow him to recruit.
That is, it cannot be suppressed, nor can it be caressed. There is not even any countermeasures that can be taken. This feeling of being helpless enveloped him and made him silent for a long time. It wasn't until Li Xijue reminded him in a low voice that he should submit a memorial to the emperor that he became alarmed.
Such a huge defeat cannot be concealed at any cost. Once someone else’s memorial comes up, they lose even more initiative. Li Xijue could only remind Dong Weng that this matter should be done early and quickly, and there should be no delay.
Wang Zunde nodded. Although he couldn't think of how to write this memorial, what Li Xijue said was completely correct.
A feeling of mental fatigue enveloped his heart. He just nodded and said, "Mr. Just Yi." He waved his hand feebly to let Li Xijue go out.
"Letter drawn by Lu Zan——"
"Let's discuss this another day."
After Li Xijue came out, he called other staff to discuss. Everyone agreed to draft a memorial first and submit it to the court as soon as possible, leaving one person behind. At that time, a staff member specially responsible for drafting the memorial was arranged to draft the memorial overnight. On the other hand, he sent people to Guangzhou City to discuss the aftermath with Governor Li Fengjie and others.
As for negotiating peace, Li Xijue did not have the courage to make his own opinions, and Lu Yizhong's letters could not be leaked out. He just sent people to Macau secretly to see if the Australians came to Macau before discussing.
The most difficult thing is the remnants of He Rubin who are currently trapped in Haikou: Thousands of troops are now trapped in Haikou and Qiongshan, with no food and grass inside and no reinforcements outside. Even the news has been completely cut off, and they are under siege by the army of Kun thieves. , I’m afraid it won’t take long for the whole army to be wiped out.
The death of many classic military generals in Chengmai is shocking. If He Rubin also died in battle or was captured, it would shock the government and the public even more than the defeat of the army in Chengmai - comparable to the defeat and death of Lu Qin in the sixth year of Apocalypse. That would really shock Guangdong and Guangxi.
Li Xijue mused at the staff meeting: "It would be great if He Zhen and others could be withdrawn safely."
"Now that the strait is locked, our troops and navy are at a disadvantage. How can we get across?" A staff member shook his head repeatedly.
The Kun Thieves' navy showed their superiority in the small-scale battle to block the Qiongzhou Strait, and the Guangdong Navy was simply unable to compete with them.
"We have to sneak into Qiongzhou quietly in advance and get in touch with He Zhen. After all, there must be news about how many troops are left in the army and how their morale and food are."
"So what if we know. If we don't recruit the bandits, I'm afraid there will be no way to control our troops..."
"Should we ask Master Zhijun to dispatch Chen Zhentai to Zhaoqing to discuss and see if he can mobilize more troops to support He Zhen?"
Chen Ting is the deputy commander-in-chief of the Guangdong Association and is stationed in Nan'ao. Although he was named "Deputy Commander-in-Chief" in name, he was not actually controlled by He Rubin. He is a member of the town army who guards one side alone.
"He only has such a small number of troops, what's the use?" Li Xijue had no hope of any military action to resolve the deadlock - since even 20,000 troops couldn't defeat Lingao and were completely defeated, a mere few thousand men would be defeated. It's even more unreasonable.
There was silence in the Nuan Pavilion, and the staff and assistants of the Governor's Yamen looked at each other in shock. After much deliberation, there really is no other solution except "stroking".
In the combat command room of the Naval Command Building in Bopu, in front of the wall hung with a huge Guangdong-Hainan chart, Navy Command Chief Chen Haiyang was holding a staff meeting.
Participating in the meeting were the Navy's staff and several veteran officers. There were also two non-naval officer elders attending the meeting, one of whom was naval adviser Wen Desi. As an authority on navy and shipbuilding in the age of sail, he had great say. Then there is the permission to work in the Intelligence Bureau. This person's current title is Naval Intelligence Staff Officer, who is responsible for collecting and organizing naval military intelligence. However, according to Permit, he was a "do-it-all handyman" at the S.A.R.
This unprofessional naval staff team highlights the navy's professional dilemma. There are fewer people in Chuanzhongli who have been in the navy than in the Army, and none who have served as staff officers. This caused most of the work of staff operations to fall on the heads of the two highest naval agencies, the People's Commissar of the Navy and the Chief of Naval Command, who were both regular naval officers. As for Li Di, a naval officer who could not go to sea, he had always served as commander of the naval fortress and port director. Now Chen Haiyang simply appointed him as chief of staff to learn the staff business.
Of course, Li Di's academic performance as a staff officer was not very good, and he was still at the lowest level of failure. An amateur naval officer who knew very little about basic naval business had too many lessons to make up for being a professional staff officer.
The navy has already undertaken the task of blocking the Qiongzhou Strait. Strictly speaking, this cannot be regarded as a blockade of the strait, because the navy actually only blocked ports under the control of the government troops such as Shenying Port in Qiongshan County to prevent the remnants of the government troops from receiving reinforcements from the mainland. Other ships entering and exiting the strait are ignored.
Any ships entering or leaving these ports will be captured and escorted to Ma Niao for processing. All ships attempting to transport cargo in and out of Qiongshan ports will be confiscated. If a civilian ship is indeed sealed by the government, the owner is allowed to redeem the ship at a low price.
This blockade is devastating to the flow of materials in Qiongshan. Indeed, the Fubo Army did not blockade the ports in Wenchang and other places that were still in the hands of the official army, but the ports in other states and counties were of no help to Qiongshan's own transportation - in Hainan's states and counties, bulk cargo transportation was almost completely blocked. Depends on sea transport along coastal routes. Given the poor condition of the post roads, it is almost impossible to transport goods over long distances to six places.
Tang Yunwen saw that most of the blockade warships were small and medium-sized ships, and their number was not large. Several attempts were made to break the blockade at sea, but they were defeated each time - the navy's ships were not comparable to the medieval Ming Navy in terms of equipment and training levels. In the end, the navy ships completely retreated to Baisha Water Village and stopped dispatching.
In this way, Qiongshan is equivalent to being under siege. Although Qiongshan itself does not lack grain, and summer grain will soon be available, this sense of despair of losing external contact makes the officers and soldiers trapped in Qiongshan desperate. Morale becomes even lower.
The initial objectives of the naval blockade have been achieved. The Executive Committee believes that the state of war cannot continue like this and must end as soon as possible - the impact of the war on the economy is too great, especially the stagnation of foreign trade. Originally, a large amount of materials, manpower and money could be obtained from Guangzhou Station every month. Now, except for a small amount of people and materials that can be transported from Foshan, Leizhou and other places, this channel is basically cut off.
What is lost is not only transportation channels, but also business networks. Until the situation becomes clearer, business partners on the continent are hesitant to continue distributing "Australian goods". As a result, exporting goods to Lingao has become a potentially high-risk business and has become expensive.
Originally, the executive committee planned to wait for Xiong Wencan to come to appease the two sides and conduct peace talks. However, it seems that Lao Xiong will have to wait until he becomes governor of Guangdong and Guangxi - according to the historical process, it will take him five years from Chongzhen to serve as governor of Guangdong and Guangdong and governor of Guangdong. Travelers can’t wait. Decided to carry out "peace work" as soon as possible to end the state of war between the two sides - at the very least, to resume the flow of materials
Although many senators have doubts about how Wang Zunde or Li Fengjie are planning to deceive the superiors and conceal the defeat before suing for peace, the executive committee believes that this is their matter and has nothing to do with the Senate - provided they are willing to seek peace. .
The Executive Committee once held a secret meeting on the development of the post-war situation. About thirty elders were invited to discuss and predict how the situation would develop in the future. The elders believe that it is extremely unlikely that Guangdong's officialdom will fight again, but they should be wary of the possibility that the other side will adopt the "no war, no peace, no surrender, no retreat" routine.
"During the Opium War, after the local officials of the Manchu Qing Dynasty realized that the means of war could not fight the British at all, they did not dare to negotiate peace in private, but they were not willing to die in vain, so they adopted such a turtle tactic." Yu Eshui said in The meeting warned, "If the Guangdong government adopts such methods, it will pose the greatest threat to us."
In this way, the Crossing Group had no choice but to follow the example of the British and continue to expand the scale of the war until the emperor himself was forced to make the decision to sue for peace. However, the war potential and combat machines of the Crossing Group cannot be compared with the British in 184o. The last straw that broke Daoguang's resistance was the arrival of troops at the gates of Nanjing. The long-distance projection of power required to carry out military operations to cut off water transportation was beyond the capabilities of the navy.
"In addition, we have to consider that Qiongzhou itself is too remote and is not an important place in the Ming Dynasty's territory. It was not a particularly important thing for the Ming Dynasty regime, which is now surrounded by smoke, to fall for five or six years. It can be completely ignored To put it another way, this is a long-term war situation for us - although there is no armed conflict."
Therefore, the tone of the meeting was to take advantage of the chaos in the Guangdong officialdom to quickly bring the war to Guangzhou, the richest city in South China, and force the Guangdong officialdom to seek peace before a worse situation occurs - since Qiongzhou Guangdong is just a frontier place. Directly invading the Pearl River Delta should shock the officials all over Guangdong. At least Li Fengjie will definitely not be able to sit still. As long as he can't sit still, he has to sue for peace. a! ~!
