Zhao Chisong relied on his own rich experience in intelligence work and his background in Dongchang. He was very familiar with the working methods and habits of Mingting intelligence systems such as Dongchang and Jinyiwei, and he did a very good job in counterintelligence matters. Excellent.
In just a few months, several batches of Ming army spies were arrested, but this still could not stop numerous Ming army spies from flying towards Wuchang like moths.
There were not only the official spies of the Ming army, but also many people sent by the surrounding Ming court officials or gentry and dignitaries to inquire for information.
The strong rise of the rural protection army in the past six months can be said to have frightened a large number of people. They could not understand why such a powerful rebel army suddenly appeared in the good Huguang area.
Moreover, this thief army is completely different from ordinary thief armies.
Usually, the bandit army engages in mobile warfare, rarely or unable to stay firmly in a certain area. They are constantly on the move.
The Baoxiang Army was different. Since their rise during the Funiu Mountain period, they had been following a more difficult and more feared bandit mode by the Ming court.
Rogue bandits and sitting bandits brought completely different harms to the rule of the Ming Dynasty.
Rogue bandits can at most destroy places and bring difficulties to local people's livelihood, but it is actually very difficult to shake the rule of the Ming court.
But the sitting bandits were different. Once the sitting bandits were allowed to gain a firm foothold, they would become a local separatist regime, an existence that could directly shake the rule of the Ming court.
Everyone knows the benefits of sitting in bandits, and Li Zicheng and the others know it even better, but why didn't Li Zicheng and the others play the sitting bandits mode before, occupying a place and continuing to develop and expand?
Because they can't withstand the Ming army's attack!
The thieves led by Gao Yingxiang are running around because they have no choice!
As long as there is a territory and it is a territory that can be defended, they will live by guarding the territory in order to develop.
But why was the Baoxiang Army able to withstand the Ming Army's counterattack and win consecutive battles?
This is the direct reason why the Ming court and many dignitaries sent so many spies into the areas controlled by the Chu Empire and into the Wuchang City area to collect information.
They don't understand, they have doubts.
At the same time, they were even more curious about how the Baoxiang Army did it.
Everyone says that the enemy can only be protected by sharp guns and artillery. The reason why they were able to win consecutive battles and defeat the main force of officers and soldiers several times was because of their sharp guns and artillery.
But what a sharp method?
How did the security thieves come up with so many guns?
These are of interest to the high-ranking officials of the Ming court and the surrounding Ming court officials and gentry.
Of course, many of them are also curious about other things about the Dachu Empire and need to understand it clearly so that they can make more favorable choices when it comes time to make choices in the future.
For example, when the security thief attacked you that day, should you resist or run away, or surrender or even revolt on the spot?
These choices are related to their own wealth, life, and even family wealth. They must be cautious and cautious before making a choice.
And when so many people sneak into the areas controlled by the Da Chu Empire to spy on various information, it is inevitable that many situations in the Da Chu Empire will be known to the outside world.
In Changsha, Yang Sichang was looking at a summary of how to protect thieves compiled by his staff.
This summary covers all aspects, from the military system to protect thieves, to the official system to protect thieves, and even some policies implemented to protect thieves.
Basically, there is all the public information that can be collected, and there are also some confidential information that spies secretly inquire about.
At the top of the list is the summary of high-level figures who protect the thief and fake Luo Chu.
The pseudo-Chu Luo thief, named Zhixue, was a sixteen-year-old native of Gong County, Luoyang. He was born as a child. His father, Luo Zhide, was a member of the family; his ancestor, Luo Kaihong, was a member of the family.
The Luo thieves raised an army in Funiu Mountain and were named the General of the Baoxiang Army. At the beginning, they had no more than a thousand soldiers. When they invaded Luyang County at the beginning of the year, they had 5,000 soldiers.
In April, the Luo bandits marched south to Nanyang Mansion with tens of thousands of troops, defeated Chen Yongfu, and fell into Nanyang. The bandits had expanded to 50,000 people.
In May, the three prefectures of Xiangyang, Junzhou and Xunyang were captured. Lu Xiangsheng, the governor of Yunyang, was defeated and died for his country.
In June, 50,000 bandits arrived north to Yuzhou. He Renlong surrendered to the bandits, and Zuo Liangyu retreated to Ye County.
In July, Luo Thief led his troops southward to Chengtian Prefecture, Hanyang Prefecture, De'an Prefecture, Jingzhou Prefecture, and Huangzhou Prefecture. Everyone in northern Chu was in mourning. Tang Hui, the governor of Huguang, was defeated by Zhongxiang and fled.
In September, the Luo thieves proclaimed themselves emperor in Hanyang City, named the country "Chu", and issued the pseudo-year name "Chengshun".
In October, the Bao thieves crossed the Yangtze River and conquered Wuchang. The officers and soldiers of Wuchang were either killed or captured. In the same month, the Luo thieves established their capital in Wuchang and changed the two prefectures of Wuchang and Hanyang into the puppet Han Tianfu.
As of now, the Luo bandit's army protecting the bandits has numbered 200,000.
The leader of the Luo thief was Guo Quanshu, who was twenty-six years old and a native of Lushan County. He was a child-born minister and was the Minister of the Ministry of Civil Affairs. It was said that this thief was naturally promiscuous and often plundered women.
There is also the leader of the thieves, Chen Xingkai, whose place of origin and age are unknown. He is a fake minister of the Ministry of Taxation. He is greedy and loves money, collects taxes and levies, has a ghost-like appearance, and likes to eat boys raw. This thief likes gold and silver the most, and often drives his thieves to plunder good people. A good family, in Huguang, there are so many people who have lost their homes because of this.
It is also said that Huang Dingquan, the leader of the bandits, whose place of origin and age is unknown, is the commander of the bandit army's North Route Army and pretends to be Chu Yue Lieutenant General. He has 50,000 troops and is stationed in Nanyang, blocking the two major passes of Yuzhou and Luyang Pass! , according to Zuo Liangyu's report, the thief will be cautious by nature and will never waste time in a fight.
It is said that the leader of the thieves is Li Chengtong, whose place of origin is unknown...the commander of the first division of the thieves' army, pretending to be the major general of Chu...
The thief Huang Guangmao was born in Fengyang, Nanzhili. He was the commander of our army. Last year, he was defeated and led his troops to surrender to the thief. Now he is the commander of the thief's West Route Army. He pretends to be a major general in Chu...
Thief Chen Yongfu...
Congratulations to Renlong...
When Yang Sichang looked at the briefings of the senior figures of the Puppet Chu Thief Army above, he frowned more and more.
Because he found that there were quite a few surrendered generals in the rebel army, and several of them were relatively famous generals in the Ming army before, such as He Renlong and Chen Yongfu.
These two people are already quite famous. Chen Yongfu is a little better, just an ordinary deputy general. But He Renlong, this person was a Wu Jinshi. He was awarded the garrison in his early years and served under Hong Chengchou, the governor of Yansui Town. .
Over the years, he has made many military exploits in the battle station. He is a fierce general under Hong Chengchou who can fight, dares to fight, and can win battles. He leads troops to fight extremely fiercely, and has severely wounded bandits many times, earning him the reputation of being a madman.
Among the many generals of the Ming army who encircled and suppressed the bandits in Shaanxi and Henan, this man was considered one of the top generals, and his reputation was basically comparable to that of Zuo Liangyu and others.
However, such a fierce general surrendered to the traitors in the Battle of Yuzhou.
And He Renlong was just one of the many surrendered generals, and Yang Sichang knew better that the garrison in the army to protect the thieves were all surrendered soldiers, numbering tens of thousands or even more than one hundred thousand.
Just seeing these surrendered troops and generals was enough to make Yang Sichang frown.
Before, there had never been such a large-scale situation of officers and soldiers defecting to thieves. At most, it was just some deserters or small-scale troops who surrendered to thieves. To be honest, there had never been such large-scale officers, soldiers and even senior generals who defected to thieves.
Well, there are quite a few who surrendered and went into captivity.
The fact that this thief was able to accept so many surrendered soldiers and generals was enough to prove his great harm to the Ming court.
"This thief is really..." Yang Sichang didn't know how to describe it.
Because to be honest, my position is wrong...
He disdains telling lies!
So he simply stopped thinking and continued to look at other information about the Thieves Protection Army, many of which he actually knew in advance.
For example, the general organization of the rebel army is that a battalion is divided into five or six hundred men, three battalions are a regiment, two regiments are a brigade, and two brigades are a division.
After all, this kind of superficial organization is basically semi-public information, which may be unfamiliar or even secretive to ordinary people. However, for the Ming army officials who have spies to inquire about the information, these semi-public information are not secrets. .
Even the formation of the battalion-level formations in the Baoxiang Army is relatively clear.
After all, the Ming Army and the Bao Thief Army have been fighting for more than half a year. Although they have been fighting and losing, they can't say that they have been fighting for so long, and they don't even know the basic situation of the opponent.
Yang Sichang knew that there were real thieves and fake thieves among the rebel army. The so-called fake thieves were actually various garrison armies composed of soldiers surrendered by the Ming army. Most of these garrison armies even had the original military uniforms of the Ming army... Weapons and equipment They are also the original Ming army standard equipment.
The real thieves are naturally pure thieves who wear gray military uniforms. However, military uniforms cannot be used to distinguish real thieves from fake thieves, because some fake thieves also wear gray military uniforms.
The biggest characteristic of real thieves is the large-scale use of guns, and the guns used are very special, and can even be said to be the only ones in the world: lightweight long-barreled small cannons of about five to six hundred kilograms and firecrackers with relatively large calibers.
This kind of artillery and muskets were also the guns that Yang Sichang asked craftsmen to imitate on a large scale.
The counterfeit artillery was called the thief-killing cannon by Yang Sichang and others, and the musket was called the thief-killing blunderbuss. Just by looking at the names, you can tell that these two counterfeit weapons were specially used to protect the thief.
It embodies the strengths of teachers and thieves in order to destroy thieves.
Yang Sichang was on the Chunan front line and knew a lot of information about the rebel army. He had almost found out the detailed organization.
The Biao Army directly under him is organized according to the organization of protecting thieves in all aspects, including the staffing and weapons and equipment.
The only difference is that the food supply is different...
Those security thieves didn't know why they were crazy, but they actually fed the ordinary big-headed soldiers so well. According to the food supply standards of the security thieves, Yang Sichang could feed him at least twice the number of troops.
Yang Sichang, who had no money or food under his command, had to be frugal, otherwise he would not be able to produce a new standard army of 5,000 men in one go.
As for the fact that you can't train every day because you don't have enough food, why should you train every day? If you can train every three to five days, it's good.
Anyway, a new army like the New Standard Army relies entirely on guns to fight. An army that fires guns from a distance does not need a bunch of strong men. It is completely feasible to be thinner.
In Yang Sichang's opinion, if he wanted one strong soldier, it would be better to have two ordinary soldiers.
Because when fighting with a thieves-killing gun, a strong soldier can only fire one bullet, but two ordinary soldiers can fire two bullets!
One to two!
A very simple multiple choice question!
However, even if the new standard army under his command has lowered the standard of food and grass supply, the cost is still very huge.
Most of the simple food expenses are pretty good. You can always find a way to supply it. If it can't be done, just let the soldiers solve it on the spot. Anyway, the Changsha area is a land of fish and rice, and there is a lot of food...
What’s really difficult is the guns!
To be more precise, a lot of guns!
