"Pass it in..." Zhang Rui, who was in the room, put down what he was doing and slowly ordered the guards who were following him.
In Fujian, Li Guozhong (Army Commander) and Jiang Hong (Army Commander) are currently in charge.
Bai Ding, a country boy at the beginning, grew up to be the leader of the bandit suppression army. Li Guozhong relied not only on his unwavering loyalty to Zhang Rui, but also on his calmness and ability that reassured Zhang Rui.
As for Jiang Hong, he was the backbone of the bandit suppression army when he was in Zhilian Mountain, and his behavior was also that of a calm and steady person.
Zhang Rui is a little confused. Judging from the information collected by the film department and the staff department, there should be no big problems if the two of them act according to the plan formulated by the staff department. Why is there still an emergency military situation?
"yes…"
A short while later, a veteran communications soldier came in from the door.
"Report, Sixth Brother. Urgent report of Fujian military information..." The signal soldier gave a respectful military salute to Zhang Rui and handed over the military information letter with both hands.
Seeing this, Liu Shitou naturally walked over and took the letter, then opened it and handed it to Zhang Rui.
Liu Shitou acted like this not because Zhang Rui was lazy or because he didn't respect the signal corpsmen who sent military information. But today is different from the past. As the territory of the bandit suppression army continues to expand, Zhang Rui has to pay attention to his own safety.
At the same time, under the influence of various assassinations, poisonings, spy killings... and other movies and TV series in later generations, how dare Zhang Rui do anything arbitrarily with his own safety? After all, I am no longer a poor and poor village man with no real power. With all kinds of messy and intertwined interests now, if you have any shortcomings, the bandit-suppressing army may fall apart in an instant and disappear.
In fact, some people suggested to Zhang Rui that getting married as soon as possible would calm the hearts of the army and ministers as long as he gave birth to an heir.
Zhang Rui naturally understood their proposal. However, it has only been a little over a year and a half since the uprising of the bandit suppressing army. Even Zhang Rui had not expected that the anti-bandit army would develop so rapidly. It can only be said that people's hearts are not clear.
But when it comes to the issue of heirs, Zhang Rui is only seventeen years old now, and will only be eighteen after the New Year.
This coming-of-age ceremony has not yet arrived, which is considered early for the ancients who got married at an early age. Having sex too early is always harmful to the body. Zhang Rui didn't say why. Even if he wanted to compete with Qianlong on who could live longer in this world, Zhang Rui also hoped to live longer than the 46-year-old Qianlong, otherwise he would become a joke to the world. .
However, compared with these, Zhang Rui believed that the top priority was to capture Nanjing and then occupy half of the country in the southeast. If Nanjing cannot be taken, it will be counterattacked by the Qing Dynasty. Then let's not talk about any heirs, lest he suffer the consequences when he is born, just like Hong Xiuquan's son Hong Tianfu was executed by the Qing Dynasty.
The letter paper is not large, and the content is not many words, probably only a few hundred words. The names of Li Guozhong and Jiang Hong were clearly signed at the end of the right side of the letter.
At this moment, Zhang Rui took the letter from Liu Shitou and glanced at it.
I saw it said above that Fujian had suffered a strong typhoon in recent days, and the ship transporting military supplies was hit by the storm and sank in the sea. Even if the Guangdong side could receive the information as quickly as possible, it would still take nearly three months to prepare the delivery of military rations and arrive at the Fujian military camp. The army had already run out of food.
A typhoon passes through and people are affected. The local government officials were so corrupt that they ran short of grain reserves, so that Fujian did not have enough grain stores to provide disaster relief at the moment. The grain merchants in Fujian had grain in hand, but they refused to sell it to the bandit suppressing army for disaster relief. Instead, they sold it to the people at a high price, making the people miserable.
Disaster relief is like putting out fires. Currently, the two of them are discussing Zhang Rui's request whether to suspend the offensive in Hangzhou first and go all out to provide disaster relief. Can unscrupulous profiteers be treated cheaply? At the same time, the two of them are currently "detaining" two grain ships from North Korea to use them to price grain. How do you plan to view North Korea?
Zhang Rui frowned slightly after reading it. As more and more matters were dealt with, wrinkles even appeared between Zhang Rui's eyebrows.
At this time, Zhang Rui sat down with the letter. I picked up the brush on the table and stuck the ink in the inkstone, and wrote quickly:
The attack cannot be stopped, and only a few soldiers and horses can be left to supervise local officials in disaster relief. As for those profiteers, they are allowed to act cheaply. Don’t worry about the North Korean grain ships, just pay them at a fair price.
After Zhang Rui finished reviewing it quickly, he folded the letter and handed it to Liu Shitou, asking him to arrange someone to send it back to Li Guozhong.
"Taiping, go find Qin Yan for me." Zhang Rui called as if he suddenly remembered something.
"Yes, Sixth Brother. I will arrange for someone to go find Captain Qin." Chen Taiping replied.
after a while
"This subordinate has met Sixth Brother." Qin Yan came quickly and said with a military salute.
"Captain Qin, have the squires and landlords in Chizhou sent all their food?" Zhang Rui asked.
"Yes, Sixth Brother. They have all been transported here." Qin Yan replied respectfully.
No wonder Zhang Rui was nervous. With the rapid advance of the anti-bandit army, the logistical pressure of the anti-bandit army is getting heavier and heavier. In order to ensure that the war could advance faster, Zhang Rui had no choice but to use local food as much as possible. Only in this way can the pressure on logistics and food transportation be reduced, allowing them to transport more combat materials such as weapons and artillery, guns and ammunition.
This method is not necessarily good, and may easily cause the army to run out of food. It was precisely this, so Zhang Rui had to wait in Chizhou and hoard enough food and grass.
It is said that they eat locally, but in fact the main purpose is to ask the landlords and gentry to provide money and food. This method is naturally unfair to the local landowners and gentry, but compared with their own army. Zhang Rui could only say sorry in a low voice.
Money and food never fall from the sky.
Since you need money and food, you can only ask for it from those who have it. Ordinary people can't cut a few ounces of meat even with a knife. Furthermore, Zhang Rui didn't ask them for nothing. They took it, it was just a "borrowing", and they would pay it back with interest.
In fact, it is not Zhang Ruiduo's "benevolence and righteousness". For those Han local wealthy people who have not committed crimes, it is not easy for them to get money and food. As for those who are completely unwilling to cooperate, they have no choice but to kill the chicken to scare the monkeys.
You know, the landlords and gentry of this period had absolute say in front of the local people. Sometimes the court's orders may not be as effective as their words.
In order to tie more landlords and gentry onto the bandit-suppressing army's chariot, Zhang Rui's method was not bright but it had to be said to be a good thing.
Victory over the Manchus, everything is easy to say. Unable to defeat the Manchus, they have no money or food, so they seek more blessings from themselves.
For this reason, the local landowners and gentry had no choice but to cooperate with the propaganda team of the bandit suppression army in recruiting troops.
Suddenly, the task of recruiting soldiers for the bandit-suppressing army became much easier from being increasingly difficult...
