Song Xiance and Gu Junen looked at each other and couldn't help but frown.
The current situation is not quite right!
There is no need for a senior military advisor or a secondary military advisor. Ordinary soldiers can also tell that something is wrong. Since coming out of Beijing, how can Dashun's 60,000 veteran soldiers still have the same morale as when they entered Beijing? But the low morale of the old camp soldiers was not due to fear of the Tatars. But Li Zicheng didn't give him enough money!
Before entering Beijing, everyone felt that Emperor Chongzhen was stingy - many of the backbones of Li Zicheng's old camp were from the northwest frontier army. If Emperor Chongzhen had given enough money, they would still be officers and soldiers now!
But after entering the city of Beijing, these old soldiers realized that it was not Chongzhen who was stingy, but Chongzhen who was poor! He has no money, and the country's money has been swallowed up by a bunch of corrupt officials. The officials arrested in Beijing alone produced 30 to 40 million taels of dirty silver!
When the old camp soldiers knew the results of the payment, they were all very happy. But what happened next made them truly see what stinginess is.
Li Zicheng clearly had tens of millions of taels of silver and got a whole empire, but he was only willing to give ordinary old soldiers ten taels of silver... only ten taels!
Everyone’s contribution is so great, they all helped you take down the city of Beijing, and he only gave you ten taels of silver... Is this sending a beggar away? This guy is a founding hero!
Not enough money is provided, and other benefits, especially land that can support people for generations, are also not provided. A group of veteran soldiers now feel that they have conquered the world for nothing because of Li Zicheng, so how can they be more motivated?
But Li Zicheng also had difficulties. He has more than 60,000 old soldiers under his command, including those who stayed in Shaanxi, Henan, and Hubei, as well as those who conquered Hexi and Xining in the west, as well as the powerful and surrendered soldiers from all walks of life and the surrendered soldiers of the Ming Dynasty. All the miscellaneous items add up to hundreds of thousands! If one person is given more than ten taels or more than a million taels, it will be gone. Moreover, officers at all levels will have to pay more money. If they really want to give it out again, the reward will be at least tens of millions.
In addition, starting from April this year, Li Zicheng will be able to pay these hundreds of thousands of soldiers!
He can "not conscript the people for three years", but he cannot "not pay the soldiers for three years"! In the past, everyone followed Li Zicheng to conquer the world, and looked forward to conquering the world together in the future, so naturally they could not take any money for the time being. But now that the world has been conquered, Li Zicheng has not given everyone much benefit. If he doesn't pay his salary, people will start rebelling against him, a stingy emperor.
And the salary of hundreds of thousands of people... ten million taels a year may not be enough!
Therefore, Li Zicheng reluctantly gave everyone a reward for the 30 to 40 million taels of silver he plundered in Beijing, and then had to pay for the expenses during the three-year non-levy period. Li Zicheng didn't have a few cents left in his pocket. If his hand was too loose, the emperor would have to pay for it, and he would become a loser and make a profit!
Both Song Xiance and Gu Junen knew about Li Zicheng's difficulties. But they had no choice. They were military strategists, not financial experts. They didn't know how to get money for Li Zicheng, so they had to make plans without money.
Gu Junen frowned and said: "Your Majesty, now that the remaining power of our great success has not been exhausted, we can still deter the enemy... If we return without success this time, I am afraid that the Zhu Thief's momentum will revive, and the morale of our army will become even worse." It’s depressed, and the hearts of the people everywhere may change.”
Li Zicheng nodded. In fact, after the Battle of Tianjin, the Red Thieves' momentum began to recover, while Dashun's morale began to decline. If the attack on Shanhaiguan this time fails again, I am afraid that the forces all over the country who have attached themselves to Dashun will start to make small calculations...
"Great Military Advisor," Li Zicheng asked Song Xiance again, "the red bandit's notice said that one hundred thousand Manchu soldiers have been borrowed. Do you think this is true or false?"
Ah...what else?
Cold sweat broke out on Song Xiance's forehead. Why did Li Zicheng always allow himself to do such things?
The emperor has spoken of Chrysostom, so it cannot be ignored! Song Xiance had to pretend to count his fingers, one, two, three, four, five... they were all there.
"Your Majesty," Song Xiance had already calculated, "the Tatars are definitely coming. The question now is just whether they are coming from Shanhaiguan, or from Jizhou and Miyun. I think there is a possibility that they will come from Jizhou and Miyun." Larger. Because Shanhaiguan is the throat from western Liaoning to the capital, and there is a sea route to Denglai. With the cunningness of the Zhuthief Prince, it is impossible to take the initiative to hand over Shanhaiguan to the Donglu. Without the words of the Zhuthief Prince, the Tatars would not have It is possible that the troops came to Shanhaiguan. After all, Shanhaixiongguan is easy to defend and difficult to attack to the east. Even if there are only 30,000 weak brigade, it can last for a month or two. How can the 100,000 Tatar army stay outside the pass for so long? They have so much power. Is there more food? So the Tatars won’t dare to come if I’m not sure.
Most of the Zhu bandit leaders will use the sea route to evacuate the elite soldiers at Shanhaiguan, leaving only partial divisions to guard. At the same time, they will make a big show of their power, falsely claiming that the Eastern captives have arrived, in order to frighten our army. In this way, our Dashun army will fight against the Donglu near Beijing City. If both sides suffer losses, he can counterattack from Dagukou. Otherwise, he could go south from Dagu Pass and rely on the strength of the Wu family and his sons to guard the southeastern half.
Furthermore, if there were really an army of 100,000 Donglu troops, the Zhuthiers would not be shouting everywhere, but because they were keeping it a secret, they would wait until we got to Shanhaiguan before letting the Donglu army attack, catching us by surprise. Now they are posting notices everywhere, but they show cowardice, indicating that there is no Donglu army outside Shanhaiguan at all. "
A great military advisor is a great military advisor. With just a few clicks of his fingers, he figured out Zhu Cihong's wishful thinking! But he missed Wu Sangui - Wu Sangui was not an obedient child!
"It makes sense, it makes sense. If there were really 100,000 Tatars, they wouldn't tell them!" Li Zicheng nodded repeatedly, "And the Zhu Thief Prince is so cunning, he will definitely not give up Shanhaiguan to the Donglu... ..He will definitely let the Donglu go to Jizhou and Miyun, and fight to the death with us under the walls of Beijing.
But I won't give the Zhu Thief Prince a chance to sit on the mountain and watch the fight between tigers and tigers...he will go straight to Shanhaiguan, defeat the partial troops in the pass first, and then return to the division to deal with Donglu! "
Li Zicheng gritted his teeth and said: "I'm not afraid of the Tatars! As long as Shanhaiguan and the city of Beijing are in my hands, and there are tens of thousands of veteran soldiers who can ride horses and move like the wind, no matter how fierce the Tatars are, they will be defeated." Um, I'm so exhausted!"
Li Zicheng's self-confidence is not unreasonable. He is a bandit. The mobility of the old battalion soldiers is very high, no worse than that of the Eight Banners of Manchuria. Only Li Guo and Chen Yongfu can hold Beijing. With the pass of Shanhaiguan in his hands, he could use it in mobile warfare to deal with Dorgon. Dorgon is on an expedition to the Xu Kingdom. How long can he support it around Beijing?
At most, give him one or two million taels and send him out of seclusion as a gift...
Thinking of this, Li Zicheng became more confident and loudly ordered: "Command the three armies to increase their strength and go to the Shanhaiwei territory to build a stronghold... If we can defeat Shanhaiguan in this battle, everyone will be rewarded with ten taels of silver!" "
...
"Heroes of the China Normal University's Forward Association, I ask you, are you afraid of the Tatars?"
"Not afraid..."
"Old Taishan, Cao Weishuai, and Third Assistant, I didn't lie to you, did I? There are indeed heroes in our Ming army who are not afraid of the Tatars!"
Dagukou, Haisha Island, on a flat wasteland, Zhu Cixiang was leading Wu Xiang, Cao Youyi, and Wu Sanfu to test a newly formed new army - the Central Division's Forward Association of the New Army to overcome difficulties.
This unit is the ace unit that Zhu Cixiang plans to use to break the myth that the Eight Banners are invincible!
The nearly 1,500 officers and soldiers of the Forward Association are all heroes who are not afraid of the Tatars. The reason why they are not afraid of the Tatars is because most of them are not from the serious Ming army at all, but are selected from the captives of the rogue bandits.
Moreover, Prince Zhu was generous enough to them, giving them all the benefits they should receive, and treating them equally with the veterans of the New Army!
Hao Yaoqi, who "falsely surrendered" in the Tianjin Acropolis, was appointed by Zhu Cihong as the commander-in-chief of the Forward Association. His military rank was mentioned to Qianhu, which can be said to be a great favor!
However, Wu Xiang, Cao Youyi, and Wu Sanfu criticized Zhu Cixiang for being so important in promoting a group of bandits.
Being from a bandit background always makes people uneasy!
Who knows if they are pretending to surrender?
As for not being afraid of the Tatars, what's the point? Can you defeat the Tatars without fear? They are not afraid because they don’t know how powerful it is yet. Once they know how powerful it is, they should be afraid...
The corner of Zhu Cixiang's eye glanced over the faces of the three people, and a faint smile appeared on the corner of his mouth. He waved at his head guard, Chen Yidao, who immediately walked up and handed a spear-mounted turtle-dove-foot firegun to Zhu Cihong.
"Haha, it's so heavy!" Zhu Cixi took the gun in his hand and weighed it, "It must weigh about twenty kilograms!"
He raised the firecracker and showed it to the forwards and fellow heroes who were forming a neat square in front of him.
"Everyone, watch out, this is the guy for you to use to fight the Manchu Tatars!" Zhu Cixiang said loudly, "It's a fire gun with a sleeve and a spear! There are people who are skilled in gun skills in the distance to snipe the enemy. You will win. Most of the people are responsible for firing cannons within twenty steps, and then charging with spears!"
