At the moment, Zhao Min can no longer listen to any valuable suggestions. He stubbornly believes that what he did is the most correct thing.
He didn't want to hear any other suggestions. In panic, he believed that only a court that followed his instructions wholeheartedly could bring him a sense of security.
The three of them tried hard to persuade them, but in the end they could only agree to send 5,000 troops to take the initiative.
This was the maximum number of men and horses they could dispatch.
However, they didn't even know where the enemy appeared from, nor did they know the exact number.
But because they could only use so many troops to attack, they sent out so many troops. At the same time, they were given the task of spying to find out where the enemy troops were.
This is important.
The Privy Council, which was supposed to provide military advice to the emperor, was now reduced to a coward under the leadership of Shi Hao. If the emperor did not speak, they would not speak and remained silent collectively, which made the knowledgeable people in the Privy Council anxious.
For example, Yu Yunwen.
He was shocked to learn that the imperial court had decided to take the initiative to fight against an unknown number of thieves. He immediately found Shi Hao, who had locked himself in the office, hoping that Shi Hao could stand up and advise the emperor not to do this.
"It is very dangerous to send troops to fight when the enemy's situation is unknown. Although the situation is dangerous now, Lin'an City's walls are tall and reliable, and its moat is wide and deep. It is definitely not something that can be conquered easily.
The most important thing to do now is to stay calm. You should choose to defend the city with all your strength, wait and see the situation, and then quickly call in troops from the three Jiangnan towns to come for reinforcements. If the armies from the three Jiangnan towns arrive, the bandits will inevitably retreat and dare not invade Lin'an!
The tight defense of Lin'an City prevented the 60,000 Ming army from attacking by force. The bandit army on Jiangnan West Road had just started an uprising. How could it be possible to send 60,000 people on a thousand-mile expedition? The logistics required for a thousand-mile expedition cannot be provided by Jiangnan West Road. The official believes that they can only have 5,000 people at most, and it is absolutely impossible to threaten Lin'an! "
What Yu Yunwen said was reasonable and well-founded, and Shi Hao also thought what he said was reasonable and right, but Shi Hao did nothing.
"What else can I say now? I am just a guilty person waiting to be questioned. There is no need to say anything, Binfu. There is no need to do anything. Just wait for the result."
Yu Yunwen was anxious and spoke again.
"Prime Minister, please don't give up. The matter is far from as serious as outsiders speculate. As long as the Prime Minister speaks out and the court remains calm, everything will be fine! They are just a group of daring madmen!"
Shi Hao shook his head.
"When you sit in my seat, you will know that there are many things that are obviously right, but you can't do them. You can only watch the best and worst consequences happen, and then become the scapegoat."
Shi Hao smiled bitterly and said: "Binfu, do you know that when I went to see His Majesty to plead guilty, His Majesty had already drawn a sword on me? Now that we have reached this point, how can I appear in front of him at this moment?"
Yu Yunwen was shocked.
Even though Shi Hao made mistakes, his diligence and seriousness in handling affairs were noticed by his subordinates. Moreover, he was also the emperor's teacher. It is said that he played an irreplaceable and important role in the emperor's ascension to the throne.
Can the emperor draw his sword against such a person?
Have some of the rules of the Song Dynasty court been irreversibly distorted?
Yu Yunwen looked at Shi Hao with a wry smile on his face, thought for a moment, silently closed his mouth and said no more words.
Although the decision-making of the Southern Song Dynasty court was outrageous, if you think about it carefully, it is not surprising.
Because at this moment, the central government of the Southern Song Dynasty was completely out of order and in complete chaos. There was no unified order that could convince everyone to direct everyone's actions.
The Supreme Emperor fled and was already dead in the political circles of the Song Dynasty.
The emperor had no master, and he was beaten to the imperial capital twice by enemy forces in the two years after he took the throne. He looked like a country in ruins, and he really couldn't be trusted.
The emperor's master, Guatian Li Xia, had just been on the verge of death due to defeat in the war, and had also lost the emperor's trust.
The Prime Minister and the Deputy Prime Minister are rubber stamps, they have no authority and cannot be trusted.
The only loud-mouthed fighter who might be willing to stand up and take the blame, and who also gained some people's trust, Zhang Jun, was killed not long ago, and the grass on his grave began to grow.
At this moment, the Central Court of the Southern Song Dynasty had reached a point where no one could stand up to stabilize people's hearts and the situation and tell everyone that everything was not so bad.
No one can stand up, no one is willing to stand up, and no one can say anything that will convince everyone.
In fact, as long as they analyze carefully, they can know that this enemy army is unlikely to bring any threat to Lin'an, but such people do not exist.
Perhaps the fact that the Ming army came to the city gave them severe PTSD, so that when they had no idea how many peasant soldiers came and where they were, they already believed in their hearts that the Southern Song Dynasty had lost.
Losing miserably.
Facing the army on Jiangnan West Road that had already launched a thousand-mile counterattack and had a smooth journey, the Southern Song Dynasty could not defeat it. It could only parry, not fight back, and even Lin'an was in danger.
It is tantamount to self-handicapping.
The attack of these 5,000 people seemed to Zhao Hao as a gesture, an attitude that let the ministers know that he, the emperor, had not given up resistance.
So he must send troops.
He didn't even have the idea of winning a battle to stabilize people's hearts. He just hoped that the army sent out could draw a draw with the invading enemy forces.
He didn't expect the general he sent out to be Wang Ping, he just hoped he wasn't Zhuge Zhan, that's all.
However, this extremely chaotic command only added to the chaos. Song general Meng Chao, who led his troops out of the city, even sent people to search for the enemy on the spot to investigate where the enemy was and how many there were before he could decide where to attack.
The news in the city was very messy, and there was everything from everywhere, but I couldn't be sure of it, but the general direction was to the southwest, so Meng Chao had to lead his troops to slowly advance toward the southwest, searching for the enemy as he advanced, and he was very nervous.
Meng Chao was nervous, and Song Bing was even more nervous, because when they went on an expedition, news spread everywhere in the city, and the number of invading enemy troops was also the worst hit area by rumors.
It was pretty good at first, saying that there were 10,000 or 20,000 enemy troops, but then the news became more and more outrageous, and when it reached the ears of the soldiers, it turned into a hundred thousand troops approaching the city.
In terms of scaring oneself and setting up obstacles for oneself, the Southern Song Dynasty said that it was second, and few people could compete with it.
No matter from which perspective, the behavior of the Southern Song Dynasty government can be regarded as outrageous.
Therefore, the soldiers of the Song Dynasty were very scared from the beginning, worried that their active attack was an act of suicide, and that the people above were trying to kill them. As soon as they left the city and started to march, people kept deserting and escaping from the team, trying to survive.
Meng Chao didn't notice it at first. He didn't know about it until the soldiers reported that someone was deserting, and he was furious.
Where in the world can a general go to his death and a soldier escape for his life?
If you don’t want to follow me to death, then just die first!
Meng Chao decisively used beheadings to shock his troops, which at least made the soldiers' desertion less upright.
But it is impossible to do more.
Xu Tong had no idea how much his behavior of showing off to Zhao Guan's family had frightened the small court of the Southern Song Dynasty. He only knew that his enemy-seeking team discovered that a Song army of thousands of people was heading towards them.
"It seems that Zhao Guan's family is still a little brave. They directly sent people to confront us face to face, but... don't we have the courage?"
Xu Tong shouted loudly: "From the base camp to Lin'an, we are invincible! Invincible! The Song army can't even think of blocking our progress! Don't think of blocking our progress! Charge forward! Crush the Song army! Go to Lin'an City to show Zhao Guan's family some color. look!!"
"Give Zhao Guan's family some color!!"
The instructors and officers led the soldiers to chant together.
At this moment, it was a good time to unite the morale and soul of the army. This army seemed to have an elite posture as it continued to advance, so Xu Tong could not retreat.
After giving the order, the peasant army immediately formed a formation according to the formation. After seizing the horses along the way, more than 500 cavalry organized by the formation lined up on both sides of the formation and moved forward bravely under the leadership of Xu Tong.
