From Chengdu to Yufu, Pang Tong chatted with Jiang Wei, and there was a risk of reshaping Jiang Wei's outlook on life, but Pang Tong himself looked very satisfied.
I have long wanted to talk to my juniors about it, but none of the people around me are easy to watch.
Although neither is he himself.
When he arrived in Yufu and saw Chen Dao, Pang Tong made a straightforward request - to take five thousand soldiers to patrol along the river to prevent Soochow from sneak attacks.
Chen was shocked by Pang Tong's request and didn't know what to say.
Yufu is located in Badong County. Changsha County, the closest territory to Soochow, is separated by Yidu County and most of Nanjun. Across the river is Wuling County, which is in a semi-abandoned state. A sneak attack by Soochow is possible anywhere, but it is absolutely impossible. Come to Badong County.
So, where is Pang Tong going to lead his troops on patrol? !
Not to mention that Chen Dao felt depressed about this issue, even Jiang Wei also raised objections.
Pang Tong's answer to this is - who stipulated that when inspecting Jiangfang, he must not leave the scope of Badong County? !
According to the Northern Expedition strategy formulated by Pang Tong, Zhuge Liang and others on the eve of the Northern Expedition, the task that Chen Daojun in Badong County needs to undertake is only to be responsible for responding to the safety of Jingzhou, but no one has stipulated that the response can only occur when the Soochow Army sneaks into Jingzhou. After that? !
Pang Tong's idea was to expand the patrol scope of Yizhou Navy in Badong County to Yidu County and even the vicinity of the Public Security Bureau, so as to give Soochow a sense that the Han Dynasty had already prepared for it, and then let Soochow use rat weapons to attack Jingzhou.
Only five thousand people are needed to achieve such a goal, why not? !
But Chen Dao still had objections to this.
If it was just to frighten the Soochow Army and prevent them from easily violating the border, it was actually not impossible for the public security to increase the number of patrols. There was no need to let the Yizhou navy go down the river.
Let’s not talk about how much deterrence the five thousand people can have, let’s just say that the logistical support of these five thousand people is also a problem.
It takes about seven or eight days to get from Yufu to the police station at the speed of going down the river. It takes less than half a month to go back and forth. Who will be responsible for the food and grass supplies in the meantime? !
Naval warfare also requires food and grass supplies. For inland river warfare, there is no need to prepare special transport ships to transport food.
For these two questions raised by Chen Dao, Pang Tong gave his own explanation.
First, the public security garrison itself is insufficient in strength. If the troops are further divided to strengthen patrols on the river, it is very likely that the Soochow navy will find the opportunity to eat them up. At that time, who will guard the public security? ! As soon as the public security was broken, Jiangling was directly exposed to the front of the Soochow Army.
Therefore, the public security garrison could not take the initiative to patrol the river and create opportunities for the enemy to defeat them one by one. On the contrary, the Yizhou navy, which set out from Yufu, did not have this concern.
Second, you don’t have to worry too much about logistical issues. Although it’s a long way to go to the police station, there are still places in between where you can get it.
Yidu County is still in the hands of the Han Dynasty. As long as the Yidu Grand Administrator is notified in advance to make preparations and supplies are carried out in Yidu County on the way, the logistical supply problem will be solved.
Therefore, Pang Tong believes that there is no problem with his disposal methods.
These answers convinced Chen Dao, but not Jiang Wei.
Chen Dao raised the question from a tactical perspective, but Jiang Wei directly raised the question to a strategic perspective.
Taking such a proactive attack and using the Yizhou navy to patrol the Yangtze River waterways would cause misjudgment to Soochow, thinking that the Han Dynasty was going to send troops from Yizhou to attack Changsha County of Soochow, or to recapture Jiangxia County.
Once this misjudgment was caused, Soochow Wu had no intention of sneak attack on Jingzhou, and had to accumulate combat troops on the border to guard against the Han Dynasty's active attack.
Once Dongwu stationed troops in Changsha and Jiangxia, it would inevitably cause tension. If a chain reaction was triggered, the Jingzhou Army on the front line would be worried about losses in the rear and had to return to the army to protect themselves. But what? !
In this way, the entire Northern Expedition strategy will be completely destroyed.
In response, Pang Tong just smiled and told Jiang Wei - you underestimate Sun Quan too much.
Although Sun Quan's ability to lead troops was a mess, as the leader of a country, he was indeed qualified to be compared with the late emperor and Cao Cao.
Sun Quan has been thinking about Jingzhou for more than a day or two. You can exchange benefits for him to send troops northward today, but as long as he thinks it is profitable, he will not be afraid of falling out with you and attacking Jingzhou.
As a purely political creature, Sun Quan's way of thinking about issues is more rational. In addition to the two previous betrayals of alliances, Sun Quan's reputation has not been much better. This time he did not formally form an alliance with the Han Dynasty. So with Sun Quan's urine , what else could he have to worry about? !
Pang Tong was willing to bet that Sun Quan must have an army hidden in his hands and be prepared for both.
If the Soochow Army is unfavorable in the war in the north, then it is not bad. Sun Quan should not have any thoughts about Jingzhou, and his troops will definitely go north to support the Soochow Army in the fierce battle in Shouchun.
But now that the Soochow Army's war in the north is going well and they have counterattacked into Runan, Sun Quan will definitely look for opportunities in Jingzhou to see if he can take advantage.
After all, the Han Dynasty's Northern Expedition is now going smoothly, and Wancheng is about to fall. Once the Han Dynasty really invades the Central Plains, or even captures Luoyang, this is not what Sun Quan wants to see.
Therefore, under the current situation, it is inevitable that Sun Quan will be delayed, but it is impossible to judge how determined Sun Quan is and how far he will fall out with the big man.
It would be okay if they could only occupy the two counties of Wuling and Lingling with a tacit understanding between the two parties. But Pang Tong believed that even if Sun Quan only wanted to separate the country for self-protection, his ambitions would not be limited to this.
Therefore, Pang Tong judged that Sun Quan would definitely attack Gong'an and Jiangling again.
And once that time comes, the five thousand soldiers he brings will, at best, be able to intimidate Soochow for a while and buy time for the Jingzhou Army in the Northern Expedition to achieve their strategic goals. At worst, they can be regarded as sending urgently needed troops to the police. That is combat power.
As for Jiang Wei's worry about stimulating Soochow, that is simply impossible.
Even if Sun Quan has no future, he will not be frightened by the 5,000 Yizhou Navy troops to change his strategy. Going to the border to station troops desperately is looking down on Sun Quan.
Even if Sun Quan wanted to make excuses for sending troops, he would not make such excuses. He said that it was Sun Shiwan who was embarrassed.
So, from a strategic perspective, if Soochow has no idea of a sneak attack on Jingzhou, Pang Tong’s five thousand men will not be enough to arouse Soochow’s vigilance. But if Soochow has already had the idea of a sneak attack on Jingzhou, Pang Tong’s five thousand men , may be the key to delaying time and waiting for Jingzhou reinforcements to return.
In this way, Pang Tong persuaded Jiang Wei and Chen Dao, and asked Chen Dao to allocate 3,000 Yizhou navy troops to him, and set out eastward to patrol the river.
Yes, Pang Tong asked for 5,000 people, but in the end, Chen only gave Pang Tong 3,000 people.
Chen Dao also has Chen Dao's difficulties.
Now the Yufu defenders in Chen Dao's hands are no longer Baijie soldiers. The Baijie soldiers have been incorporated into the Northern Army of the Han Dynasty. The ones guarding Yufu now are just ordinary Badong County soldiers.
Now is the time of the Northern Expedition of the Han Dynasty. Many soldiers from various counties have been transferred to fight north. The Yufu garrison has also been transferred a lot, and its strength is insufficient.
Even if they need to undertake the task of supporting Jingzhou, the total number of navy and army left behind in Yufu is only 10,000.
Among them, there are 5,000 naval troops and 5,000 land troops.
If Pang Tong sent all five thousand naval troops to patrol the river, and there really was a war in Jingzhou, Chen Daoke would be aggrieved.
Even if they want to march eastward to support Jiangling, but the navy is gone, will the army rely on swimming to reach the police? !
Therefore, Pang Tong can only be given 3,000 naval troops, and the remaining 2,000 naval troops and warships are used to ensure that he can quickly maneuver to support Jingzhou.
Pang Tong had nothing to say about this. Anyway, he just went to patrol the river to deter Soochow. There was actually no big difference between the three thousand navy and the five thousand navy. The really important deterrent condition was the identity of the Yizhou navy.
Besides, Pang Tong is really not picky. After all, it is rare to have an opportunity to lead an army alone.
Pang Tong has always been accustomed to the position of strategist and advisor. When leading troops into battle, he rarely has the experience of leading troops alone. But this does not mean that Pang Tong does not have such ability.
The ability to lead tens of thousands or hundreds of thousands of troops in combat must have been beyond Pang Tong's ability, but he could still easily do it with 3,000 men patrolling the river.
Besides, even if Pang Tong really couldn't do it, he still had Jiang Wei by his side.
Although Jiang Wei was still young, he had led troops to guard the late emperor during his early expedition. When he was the prince, he was also the general in charge of the guards of the East Palace. I dare not say more, but he could command three thousand men in battle, which was more than enough.
Chen Dao actually took this into consideration before agreeing to allocate troops to Pang Tong.
In this way, Pang Tong led three thousand naval troops and marched eastward along the river.
When passing through Yidu County, we carried out a supply operation under the arrangement of Yidu County Grand Administrator Zong Yu, and then headed directly towards the police.
But in fact, Pang Tong's three thousand naval troops had no plan to directly enter the Public Security City.
Patrolling the river for deterrence does not mean actually sending more troops to the police, so Pang Tong's original intention was to rest and resupply there after the navy patrolled the port near the public security city, and meet with the public security guards Zhang Ren and Li Qiu. Let’s meet and explain why we’re here, and then return to Yufu.
But before reaching the public security port, Pang Tong discovered that densely packed Soochow naval forces appeared on the river.
The most terrible thing is that the three thousand naval troops led by Pang Tong are less than fifty miles away from Soochow's vanguard fleet.
On the unobstructed view of the river, the scale of the Soochow military fleet can be clearly seen.
Soochow, indeed, chose to attack Jingzhou secretly.
(End of chapter)
