It has indeed become a tradition for the Mongols to kill each other. Many descendants of the Mongolian Khanate have fought for hundreds of years in such a vast old territory from Northeast Asia to Eastern Europe, from Russia to West Asia. It is really hard to beat the brains out. The various khanates fought among themselves, each khanate fought within themselves, and each khanate fought with outsiders... In short, it was just fighting, fighting at random, and almost never stopped.
Gao pragmatically said that these descendants of the Mongol Khanate lack political wisdom, which is true. However, when Gao Pragmatic said this, it was not entirely because he was strategically contemptuous of his opponents, but because he knew what happened to Torgut in the original history. Overall, this tribe is really unlucky.
To make a long story short, first of all, the location of the Turgut tribe's territory is very important. It is surrounded by Junggar in the east, Keshote in the southeast, and is surrounded by the Kazakh Khanate, which was still very powerful at that time, in the west and south. Only the Turbot tribe in the north seems A little weaker.
But it seems to be just a seeming fact. In fact, the Durbot tribe is also one of the Wala (also known as the Weitra Alliance), but this tribe does not cause much trouble and is less famous in the Ming Dynasty. In fact, in terms of strength, the Dulbert tribe is stronger than the Huite tribe, which has been repeatedly attacked by Tumut and Ordos.
From this we can see how awkward the position of the Torgut Ministry is - it is surrounded by powerful neighbors, and none of them are fuel-efficient lamps. For this reason, in history, Torgut simply moved his entire family westward soon after, in order to avoid being implicated in the Wara Civil War (mainly the dispute between Junggar and Heshuote). About thirty years later (referring to the time in the book), he passed through the Kazakh grassland, crossed the Ural River, and came to the lower reaches of the Volga River to graze.
They were stable there for a while, but the good times did not last long. When Tsarist Russia expanded its territory to the banks of the Volga River, it began to oppress Turgut. At that time, the tribe wanted to return to their motherland several times.
In 1712, Torgut Khan Ayuqi sent an envoy to Siberia to pay tribute to the Qing Dynasty in Beijing. On January 5, 1771, the Torguts set out to return home and began an arduous journey. Russian Empress Catherine II immediately sent troops to pursue them.
After many battles and enduring hunger and disease, Torgut finally entered Xinjiang at the end of June and early July. When Turgut set out to return home, there were more than 170,000 people in more than 30,000 households. In just a few months, half of the people died on the way back. After Qianlong received the report, he immediately issued an edict and placed the Turgut troops in Xinjiang - a rare personnel matter.
The highly pragmatic judgment comes from this: the reason why Torgut moved westward is because Torgut was either unwilling or unable to intervene in the Oara Civil War, so he could only avoid it. It has only been about thirty years since they moved westward in history. For the Mongols, it is only one generation or less than two generations. The strength of the Torgut tribe will not change much.
So, by now they should have felt the smell of gunpowder between Junggar and Heshuote, and maybe they have already started thinking of migrating. But one thing is very important here: Historically, there was a premise for the Turguts to move westward, that is, the "Mongolia Headquarters (actually the Turmut + Ordos Alliance)" in the east was too strong, and they, Oara, had long been beaten. Therefore, I never thought about moving eastward.
The reason for not moving eastward is because the opponents in the east are too strong, not because they don't want to move eastward. The east is the hometown of Mongolia, who wouldn’t want to go home? Even Mongolians are attracted by spiritual totems - Genghis Khan's tomb is in Ordos.
This is easy to handle, because although the Tumut and Ordos alliance are insurmountable mountains for them, this alliance has already surrendered to the Ming Dynasty! As long as Ming Dynasty speaks, hundreds of thousands of people like Turgut can go home at any time!
Ah, of course, Gao Pragmatic does not intend to let them return to the Mongolian Plateau. What he means is that you can just go south to Yarkand - follow my great soldiers. When the Heavenly Soldiers defeat Can Yuan, you will have a share of the territory they gave up.
Why is it arranged this way? Because the Western Region is so large, although the Ming cavalry is well equipped, its mobility is definitely not as good as that of the Mongolian cavalry because it is half-equipped. Therefore, Gao Pragmatic needs to have a Mongolian cavalry that can be driven to quell general rebellions for the court, or to do other things. Some jobs that require a lot of effort and speed.
In the highly pragmatic plan, the future force ratio in the Western Region will be that the Ming army's infantry and cavalry will serve as the core force, mainly stationed in the Ili Valley and several important cities, while the surrendered Mongolian cavalry will be dynamically deployed as mobile forces.
In this way, the two sides cooperated in fighting the war, the Mongols settled the small battle, and the court could save trouble, effort and money. It was a real win. Of course, specific situations still need to be treated on a case-by-case basis. In short, this is the grand strategy.
According to this plan, the number of Mongolians needed to guard the Western Regions in the future cannot be too many, nor too few. If all the Wala tribes were incorporated, then the number of people in each tribe would probably be more than half a million. In order to frighten so many Mongolians who were almost all soldiers, the imperial court had to station not only 100,000 troops, but also at least 70,000 to 80,000 troops in the Western Regions. This was absolutely unacceptable financially.
In this way, they only accept about 200,000 Mongolians, and the cavalry they can usually gather is probably less than 50,000. In this way, the court's troops can range from 30,000 to 50,000, which is enough to support the sky.
Considering that Gao Pragmatic also had an economic "Ili Valley Development Plan" and stationed 30,000 to 50,000 troops at that time, this scale should not put too much pressure on the central government's finances, and the total strength of both sides was eight to ten. Ten thousand, relying on the Ming army's superiority in weapons and equipment, it is enough to deal with all threats further west, including Tsarist Russia - the core of Tsarist Russia is west of the Urals, and its transportation capacity also limits their power projection.
Gao pragmatically confessed these thoughts to the emperor, and Zhu Yijun nodded repeatedly. He thought that the issues he considered as a junior chief minister were really in line with his own wishes. He took one step at a time and planned three steps at a time. He also planned all the long-term governance issues to the best of his ability. It’s clear, you just need to nod your head when you hear it.
If all the ministers of the imperial court can achieve this level, why should I worry! It's a pity that pragmatism is just that...
"I agree with all your considerations, but I still have a question: If the imperial court only has the Turghut and Huite tribes, what will happen to the remnants of Canyuan, Heshuote, Junggar and other tribes? Is it possible that you want to eradicate them all? ?”
"There is no way to eradicate the Mongols." Gao Pragmatic shook his head: "The most difficult battle today is probably to annihilate the Mongols... This is almost impossible, even if the Mongols are defeated No matter how miserable it is, it’s impossible for the whole army to be wiped out, some of them will definitely escape.”
This time it was Zhu Yijun's turn to frown. He seemed to have lost his appetite, so he put down his chopsticks, took a white towel from the side and wiped his mouth, frowning and said: "I have chased the enemy for thousands of miles, but I still can't annihilate them all..."
"There are advantages to not annihilating all." Gao Pragmatic said, seeming to comfort and explain: "Chahar, Junggar, and Heshuote are all strong units. Even if they suffer a major defeat, as long as someone can integrate the remaining forces , you can continue to flee westward... This is a good thing."
"A good thing?" Zhu Yijun couldn't understand it for a while.
Gao pragmatically said: "Of course it's a good thing. Once they flee west, they have to have a place to stay, right? But after the defeat, the losses are too great, and they probably won't be able to escape far. In this way, they can only rob other pastures nearby...that is, Kazakh and Buha The three countries of La and Khiva are in trouble. Oh, once these forces start fighting, won’t our Ming court have time to reorganize the Western Regions?”
After hearing this, Zhu Yijun immediately turned from worry to joy and laughed: "Okay, okay, Rixin is more thoughtful. This is indeed the best way to drive away tigers and devour wolves. It is better than cutting the grass and eradicating the roots!"
Gao pragmatic smiled and said nothing, but Zhu Yijun seemed to think of something when he said this. He rolled his eyes and asked Gao pragmatic: "Speaking of eradicating the roots... Do you now know what your good son did in Chittagong? How about, Is it as I said?"
Zhu Yijun said at the time that Gao Yuan had done some things in southern Xinjiang, and the things themselves were good, but Gao Pingshi's hope of naming him "Yuan" might have been in vain.
Zhu Yijun's understanding of "Yuan" is probably that he has a relatively calm personality. This is not surprising. In his opinion, Gao's pragmatic character is mature in youth, but as an adult, he becomes more calm, emphasizing one decision before taking action. Therefore, he believed that Gao pragmatically named his eldest son "Yuan" in the hope that his son would be "like his father".
However, Gao Yuan "killed and captured more than ten thousand people" in Chittagong. This incident certainly proved that Gao Pragmatic's hopes were frustrated. This kid is not "calm" at all, but is very decisive in killing, much more evil than his father.
However, Gao Wuzhi has now figured out the causes and consequences and even some related issues: First of all, Jinyiwei must have deployed some people in southern Xinjiang, but these people should not have reached too high a level, so the information the emperor received was not comprehensive and Without going in-depth, one would not know that Gao Jing was actually responsible for the incident in Chittagong, and Gao Yuan just hesitated and failed to stop it in time, seeming to acquiesce, or simply took the lead in the matter.
Secondly, Zhu Yijun had no objection to this matter, but simply felt that Gao Yuan was quite evil. This could be confirmed by his repeated emphasis on Gao Yuan's "actually doing a good job."
Of course, although Gao Pragmatic may not agree with the emperor's views, he can understand it - the Ming Dynasty is famous for its strength to the outside world, and things like Chenghua Liting will not only not be criticized by scholarly public opinion in the Ming Dynasty, but will be greatly praised.
In the final analysis, the underlying logic of the Ming Dynasty's social public opinion is based on revenge against Mongolia. Generally speaking, it is a strong Chinese-Barbarian debate thinking - look at the good things the Mongols did back then, it can be seen that there are barbarians outside China, and they are not These barbarians must not be soft-hearted.
Finally, the emperor seemed to have a faint concern about Gao Yuan: This boy would inherit various legacies of Gao Pragmatic in the future - including political legacies, wealth legacies and even military legacies. He is so angry that he won't cause any trouble when he inherits such a rich inheritance in the future, right?
Although Gao Pragmatic has figured out the problem, but now the emperor asks, how should he answer it? ——
Thanks to book friend "Book Friends 20180712195517273" for your monthly ticket support, thank you!
PS: I came back early today to pay for my 1K debt.
(End of chapter)
