Magui and Qataiji were in the battle ahead, and Gao Jingzhi didn't care about it after laying out the strategy. He stayed peacefully behind the low wall of Ixibal, waiting for the results, and dealt with the reports sent to him from all parties.
The difference between Wen Shuai and Wu Shuai is very clear in the Ming Dynasty. If we want to put it simply, it is that no matter how high the military commander is, he is basically responsible for fighting, but Wen Shuai is different. He has to take care of all aspects of things.
Fortunately, he is only temporarily in charge of the northwest military affairs as the commander of the reinforcements, and the governors will take care of the government affairs, so it is easier to just ask about the military affairs.
However, given the current situation in the northwest, military affairs are also in great trouble, and can even be said to be a mess.
Gao Guangxian is certainly responsible for this messy situation, but in fact it cannot be said that he is entirely to blame, because in the final analysis, the Ming army's own problems are the root cause of the Ming army's inability to cope with various situations.
what is the problem? The same old problem, lack of money. The root of all evil is lack of money.
Although the three sides of Shaanxi are a "nine-border" region, it is actually the area that is relatively least valued among the nine-borders. This "relative" has not appeared recently. Wang Yangming once said that there are four most important places in the Ming Dynasty, and they must not be missed. If they are missed, the Ming Dynasty will be in danger.
Which four places? Ji Liao Xuanda.
In fact, this is not Wang Yangming’s unique opinion. The top brass of the Ming Dynasty are all aware of this. Otherwise, why would Gao Pragmatic be able to nominally control more than 800,000 troops after he also served as the manager of the seven towns? The reason is that Ming Dynasty placed almost all its elites in these four places.
With limited resources, Ji Liao Xuanda took the big head, and the rest obviously had to take the small head. Although the Shaanxi Trilateral is more valued than the southern regions from a military perspective, the economic conditions of the southern provinces are better, and the Shaanxi Trilateral is here... Since the decline of Guanzhong, it has long since lost the prosperity of the Han and Tang Dynasties. How is this possible? Comparable to the South? Therefore, as long as the imperial court's financial tilt is not enough, the three parties in Shaanxi will have to live a hard life.
It’s not enough to begin with. In addition, this year’s military pay cuts have been drastically reduced and vassal bans have been implemented. Even relying on the existing financial system alone to maintain the situation is in jeopardy. How can it not be bad if something goes wrong? The reason why Gao Guangxian always wanted to calm him down before was because he felt he couldn't afford to fight?
Of course, this issue requires a dichotomy. For example, Gao Pragmatic believes that Mr. Gao Guang hopes that the other party will not make a big fuss, but seriously lacks subjective initiative and the ability to make decisions on major issues. Because of this, after he tried to make up for his failure, he decisively gave up on Gao Guangxian, and then went into battle himself to wipe the butt of the Three Side Real School.
From the perspective of outsiders, the current problem for the three sides is that they are being beaten from multiple directions. As long as the highly pragmatic army defeats the rebels in one fell swoop, whether it is Kuaibai, Boshu Ketu, or the Huo Luochi brothers, they will all be defeated or even defeated. With annihilation, the problems of the three sides will naturally be solved.
This idea, if you have to say it is wrong, is correct, but it is really just treating a headache and treating a pain, and treating the symptoms rather than the root cause. Since ancient times, in the confrontation between the agricultural and mulberry civilization of the Central Plains and the nomadic civilization of the north, most of the time, the agricultural and mulberry civilization has been the main defender, and the nomadic civilization has been the main attacker.
During the two prosperous periods of the Han and Tang dynasties, they launched counterattacks at the peak of their national power and achieved brilliant results. However, the problem was not solved because as long as you weakened slightly, the offensive and defensive transitions would immediately come back.
Some people say that this is determined by national characteristics, saying that they are wolf totems and advocate offense. However, Gao Pragmatic disagrees with this view. He believes that this is mainly determined by the level of weapons and the development of military tactics.
In later generations, Outer Mongolia still maintained most of the traditions and characteristics of the nomadic people. Why didn't they see them going south?
This analogy may be a bit inappropriate, but the truth is still obvious: when hot weapons have developed to a certain extent, and the weapon advantage of the nomads has been reversed, what else do they do to go south and give away their lives?
The cavalry horses are also weapons themselves, just like the transport vehicles of mechanized troops. Even if they are not equipped with weapons, you cannot say that they are not part of the weapons.
So here is a question: Why is Jiliao Xuanda rarely beaten now, but the three sides of Shaanxi are beaten this time? Military strength is one thing, financial resources is another, and the two aspects together can give an answer: the leaders of the nomadic people believe that it is dangerous to attack Ji Liao, but it is safe to attack Shaanxi.
Ji Liao Xuanda responded to the Mongols through two battles: the Battle of Monan and the Battle of Southern Liao. In these two directions, as long as you dare to take action, I dare to cut off your hand, and I will certainly be able to cut it off. !
War must have a purpose. If it fails to achieve its purpose, it will cause serious losses to itself. No matter who is in power, they will not be stupid enough to keep fighting. The Mongols are certainly no exception, not to mention the Mongolians' tolerance for losses. In fact, his ability is far worse than that of Ming Dynasty.
Because of this, after Burihatu became the mastermind of the Tumen, he persuaded the Tumen to give up the futile border raids in the past, and instead seize the time to recuperate, develop agriculture and commerce, and actively work for the fire. Luo Chi and others made suggestions and encouraged them to cause trouble for Daming.
For Burihatu or the left-wing Chahar Department, the border raids against Jiliao have become a loss-making business. Rather than inflicting heavy losses and no benefits every time, it is better to find other ways. In order to obtain the daily necessities produced by the Ming Dynasty, as for the increasingly severe and urgent military pressure from the Ming Dynasty on them, they need to be released through other means.
Tumote had a good life with the Ming Dynasty, and he was definitely not willing to take this "path", so Burihatu set his sights on the northwest, stirring up chaos in the entire northwest.
It has to be said that Burihatu is indeed a talent. Not only did he hit Ming Dynasty's seven inches with this move, it can at least be regarded as hitting Ming Dynasty's weak spot.
But in this way, the problem that Gao Pragmatic needs to solve is divided into two parts. The first is of course to solve the immediate military crisis, and then to smooth out other unstable factors as much as possible.
In Gao Pragmatic's view, the current military crisis is not terrible in itself. Although the Kuaibai Rebellion in history was not as violent as the Northwest Rebellion this time, several forces were basically involved, but only to a limited extent. Not as serious as this time.
From a military point of view, as long as today's operation is successful - Gao Pragmatic has no doubt about this - then the Northwest Rebellion will only consist of the Kuaibai Party, Huo Luochi, and the Jilitu brothers, without Boshu Ketu. The set department is elite and pragmatic and confident that it can be settled in a not too long time.
At least it can be put down much faster than the Kuaibai Rebellion in the original history.
However, the next question is more complicated. After all, it is an objective fact that the court has no money, and now that the matter has come to this, it is impossible for the court to suppress the ban on the opening of vassal states and go back to repay military pay to the three sides of Shaanxi.
The most taboo thing about national plans is to change them overnight. At most, some adjustments can be made to small details. Otherwise, the impact will be too great and difficult to control. If the issue of opening the vassal ban caused trouble due to insufficient funds, not only would the losses caused by it be difficult to estimate, but it would also have a serious impact on the prestige of the emperor, the cabinet, and even the entire imperial court. Search for books
In a unified country, the prestige of the central government must not decline. Once it declines, it is a sign of impending troubled times. Therefore, Gao Pragmatic cannot rely on the court to allocate money for help, and can only find a solution on his own.
Of course, Jinghua is the leading commercial giant in the Ming Dynasty, but Jinghua has already invested a lot of money in southern Xinjiang, and it seems to be a bottomless pit for the time being. Who knows how much money it will cost in the future, so it is impossible to let Jinghua directly Spending money in the northwest - not to mention the political danger of "buying people's hearts" in this move, Gao Pragmatic would not dare to try it easily.
The best way is of course to find money on the spot, but this sounds almost like nonsense. Where can I find money in places like Shaanxi, Gansu and Ningxia?
Even though Gao Pragmatic can use his prestige within the Real School to mobilize local treasury money, that is, the money that each locality does not have to hand over to the central government, the quantity of the money may not be enough, and secondly, Gao Pragmatic cannot really control other people's houses. The warehouses have all been emptied, and there is no surplus food left for anyone. So it is hard to say how far we can go, but it will definitely not be enough.
Gao Pragmatic thought about it and even began to consider whether the punitive treaty against Myanmar during the Yunnan-Burma War could also be applied to the Ordos Department.
Unfortunately, the situation in Ordos and Myanmar are really different and cannot be copied so simply.
why? Because of Tumut.
Under the manipulation of Gao Gong and Gao Pragmatic uncles, Tumut can now be regarded as the more loyal little brother of the Ming Dynasty. However, although this little brother is relatively loyal, his status is still quite special. Even the Ming Dynasty must Be cautious. It was impossible for the Ming Dynasty to treat Tumut like the pragmatic way it had treated Nurhachi before, just sending him a letter and asking him to withdraw his troops without even bothering to give him a reason.
After all, Nurhachi only has three to five thousand soldiers now, but Tumut's core of the Mongolian right wing can pull out one hundred thousand cavalry in minutes. Can this be compared?
As for the Ordos tribe, it happens to be the "sphere of influence" that Tumut has defaulted to, and it is even part of what they consider to be their own strength. Otherwise, no matter how high pragmatism persuades Hannaji to be in their own body this time, it is "possible" that they will be attacked. In the case of Tumen's sneak attack, they still sent Qataiji to lead 30,000 troops to Hetao?
Without him, Tumut regards Ordos as just a part of himself.
In other words, if Gao Pragmatic asks the Ordos Ministry to cut off its flesh, it is equivalent to Tumut's cutting off its flesh. When the time comes, there may be trouble in how to balance the internal affairs of Han Naji and Zhongjin Hatun.
Tumut cannot get into trouble now, because the premise of the Eastern System is Western Huai. If the right wing cannot stabilize the situation, the Eastern System will be out of the question - at least it will greatly delay the success of the Ming Eastern System. This will It is tantamount to running counter to national policy.
According to Gao's pragmatic calculations, the punishment that Hannaji or Tumote can accept for the Ordos tribe is probably limited to the punishment of Boshu Ketu himself. If we add a few "war criminals", the scope of the attack will be very large. It cannot be expanded too much, especially it cannot seriously damage the strength of the Ordos Department.
However, it is not that nothing can be done here. For example, Hannaji will definitely not object to suppressing Boshu Ketu more severely, and even depose Boshu Ketu from the position of Jinong as planned. The intimidation greatly weakened Boshu Ketu's prestige within Ordos - Gao Pragmatic and Han Naji had no real intention to depose him for the time being, because the current situation did not allow for too much turmoil within Ordos.
But in any case, this is another matter, and has nothing to do with solving the financial difficulties in the northwest in a pragmatic way.
As for brothers Kuai Bai and Huo Luochi, Kuai Bai has nothing to say. He must have returned to the father-in-law after all the fighting. But after Kuai Bai started recruiting troops and buying horses, he didn’t know how much money was left in Ningxia’s treasury. He hoped to get it from him. Getting rich is basically unreliable. If you don't lose too much, you will be lucky.
And Brother Huo Luochi... How much money can these two have? Even if the tribes are wiped out, they will probably be able to get some cattle, sheep and horses. Although this is also property, the digestion capacity of the northwest must also be considered. Now that there is a war in the northwest, it is even more impossible for the people to spend money to buy cattle and sheep. There are many horses that are not allowed to be purchased by the people, so even if everything goes well, it will be even more difficult to cash out these things.
What's more, this matter may not go so smoothly - Huo Luochi and Zhulitu are no better than Boshu Ketu. These two are not impulsive young people. It is difficult for them to have the courage to think about arresting Gao Pragmatic, so they lured Strategies such as the enemy's deep penetration, ambush, encirclement and annihilation are basically unfeasible.
If they can't lure the enemy deep, ambush and annihilate them, then the Ming army really has no good way to deal with these tens of thousands of cavalry. With bayonet formations and hot weapons that far exceed the original historical level, if the two brothers come to a head-on confrontation, of course they are not afraid. What they are afraid of is that they will not come.
Qinghai is so big, if the two brothers turn around and run away when the situation is bad, even Gao Pragmatic can only stare. If he dares to assemble all the Gao family cavalry deployed in the Ming Dynasty, and cooperate with the cavalry troops in the Ming army, or he can persuade Tumote to send troops to assist, it does not mean that he cannot pursue the pursuit in depth, but the problem is that he does not have the ability now. this time.
There is no doubt that his main mission in coming to the northwest is to re-stabilize the situation in the northwest, not to pursue two long-legged Mongolian generals for thousands of miles.
Therefore, Huo Luochi couldn't make any money here, so he had to find another way to spend the money needed to stabilize the northwest.
Just when Gao Pangshi, the God of Wealth of the Ming Dynasty, was starting to feel dizzy, the battle report came - Ilduzi immediately found out the situation and came to report the battle situation in person.
Gao Pragmatic was a little surprised, because Ilduqi only had two tasks in his plan, first to lure the enemy, and then once Boshu Ketu successfully broke through, Ilduqi and Chaterji would work together to pursue him. suppress.
Since he should be chasing and suppressing, shouldn't the one who came to report the situation be Ma Gui, who completed the ambush but couldn't outrun Boshu Ketu?
However, Ilduzi brought good news. The smoothest possibility in the original combat plan appeared-Boshu Ketu did not run away.
After it was surrounded, due to the sudden appearance of Tuotuo, the morale of the Ordos tribe, which had been stunned by the ambush, collapsed directly. Boshu Ketu himself also lost confidence and finally led his troops to surrender.
At the same time, Ilduzi also brought another unexpected good news. This news made Gao Pragmatic extremely happy, and he even seemed to see the dawn of solving the financial problems in the northwest.
----------
Thanks to book friends "143023.qdcn", "Cao Mianzi", "Nn", "Blue Eagle 008185", "Altay's Old West" and "CQYchina" for their monthly ticket support, thank you!
