Emperor Chongzhen was furious because of the successive defeats in the Chu Southern War, and Yang Sichang abandoned Hengyang and retreated to Guangdong because of his lack of strength.
Out of anger, Chongzhen directly ordered the arrests, and then appointed a new candidate for the governor of the Southern Front.
Yang Sichang was about to be arrested and imprisoned, so naturally he had to find a replacement, and the scope of jurisdiction of this new replacement was also different from that of Yang Sichang's era.
After Chunan is lost, the war in the southwest will spread from Chunan and Sichuan to Guizhou and Guangdong and Guangxi.
Therefore, in addition to the governor of Huguang and Sichuan, the new governor will also governor the military affairs of Guangxi, Guangdong, and Guizhou.
The discussions among the court officials came to no conclusion. Chongzhen looked upset. Finally, he considered that the situation in the southwest was tense and it would be troublesome to transfer new people, so he simply asked Xiong Wencan, the governor of Guangdong and Guangxi, to oversee the war in the southwest.
After all, Xiong Wencan also did a good job when he was the governor of Guangdong and Guangxi, dealing with pirates and calming down local unrest.
For this reason, Chongzhen once again showed his importance to his ministers.
Xiong Wencan was directly given the title of Minister of the Ministry of War, the right deputy imperial envoy, and the governor of the military affairs of the five provinces of Guangdong, Guangxi, Guizhou, Sichuan, and Huguang.
This official hat is much better than Yang Sichang's previous official hat.
When Yang Sichang served as Prime Minister for military affairs in the five provinces, his official title was still the right minister of the Ministry of War and the right deputy governor of the capital.
But as for Xiong Wencan, Chongzhen directly gave him the title of Minister of War.
After killing Yang Sichang, Chongzhen still didn't feel relieved!
In just a few days, Chongzhen dismissed more than ten ministers one after another, and even Zhang Fengyi, the Minister of War, was greatly implicated.
In addition, Hong Chengchou who was in charge of Guanzhong in Shaanxi Province, Chen Biqian who was in charge of Ruzhou in Henan Province, and Shi Kefa who was in charge of Anqing were all reprimanded or even dismissed by Chongzhen. The reason?
When the Chu thieves mobilized their troops southward in large numbers and swept through all the state capitals in southern Chu, the Ming army's heavy troops from other directions remained indifferent... and watched as the situation in southern Chu completely deteriorated.
In this regard, Chongzhen really wronged the above three people.
In Shaanxi, Hong Chengchou not only had to fight against the westward march of the Chu bandits on the front line of Guanzhong Prefecture, but also continued to encircle and suppress Gao Yingxiang, Li Zicheng, Zhang Xianzhong and others internally. Although the current bandits of various tribes were not as good as before, they were still jumping around.
According to the strategy supported by Hong Chengchou and some important officials of the imperial court, the officers and soldiers on the front line of Shaanxi defended Guanzhong Mansion while continuing to mobilize forces to encircle and suppress Gao Yingxiang and other bandits. After Gao Yingxiang and other bandits were dealt with, they sent troops eastward to northern Chu.
Chen Biqian in Henan doesn't even know how many troops he has under his command, and he can't command an arrogant and powerful general like Zuo Liangyu. As for the border troops led by Wu Sangui who were transferred from the Jiliao front line, they are even more powerful. Bu bird Chen Biqian...
Shi Kefa, even though he has received military and food support from almost all of Jiangbei, Jiangxi, and even parts of Jiangnan.
But even so, it is already very good that he can stabilize the east line of Jiujiang, Susong and Taihu on both sides of the Yangtze River. As for counterattack, it is impossible.
There are several main divisions among the Chu thieves alone on the eastern front, and one of them is the absolute ace main division among the Chu thieves.
The First Division of the Chu Bandits deployed in Xingguo Prefecture southeast of Han Tianfu and Ruichang County, Jiujiang Prefecture, Jiangxi Province. It was only one step away from Jiujiang Prefecture's Dehua, which is often called Jiujiang City. In addition to the First Division in this direction, and the 4th Mortar Regiment.
The Fourth Division of the Chu Bandits was stationed on the front line of Huangzhou Prefecture, and heavy troops were stationed in Huangmei, Guangji and other places on the front line.
In addition to these two main divisions on the front line, there is also the Sixth Division of the Chu Bandits garrisoned in Wuchang and Daye.
At the same time, the eastern front is to the north, that is, De'an Mansion still has the troops of the 1st Brigade of the 3rd Division of the Chu Thieves.
Finally, the Chu bandits continued to train the 7th Division in the camp in the southern suburbs of Wuchang, the capital, and the 8th Division in the Hanyang Military Camp in the north of the Yangtze River.
Although the Seventh Division and the Eighth Division, the two main divisions of the Chu bandits, have not yet formed an army, they currently have tens of thousands of troops combined.
The above are only the main forces. In addition, there are the Fifth Garrison Division on the front line of Huangzhou Prefecture and the Seventh Garrison Division on the southeast line of Hantian Prefecture.
And these troops can eventually be used in the battle on the Eastern Front.
Shi Kefa is now cautiously guarding against the Chu army's eastward advance. There is still room for a counterattack westward.
But Hong Chengchou and Shi Kefa were still reprimanded by Chongzhen, and Chen Biqian was even worse!
He was directly dismissed from office by Chongzhen...
But, Chen Biqian seems to be the governor of the Eastern Front, but in fact, the troops he can directly mobilize are only a mere 20,000 to 30,000 people, most of whom are still defending Luyang County, Xinyang and other places, and cannot be easily mobilized at all.
Therefore, after Chen Biqian learned that the Chu thieves were making big moves in Chunan, he once tried to launch a counterattack on the northern front. However, Wu Sangui never came. Until May, he was still wandering around and looting everywhere. Zuo Liangyu He also refused to send troops many times on the excuse that he was short of troops, food, guns and ammunition, etc., so his planned northern offensive was delayed in launching.
But Chongzhen may not know the hardships of the frontline commanders and civilian officials, or he may know but pretend not to know.
Anyway, he didn't have any other good ideas, and he couldn't produce hundreds of millions of taels of silver, let alone tens of thousands or hundreds of thousands of soldiers who fought to the death for the Ming Dynasty.
Therefore, he could only use his status as emperor to force these ministers to find ways to do things.
It doesn’t matter whether the matter is difficult or not, but you have to do it for me. Do you want support? No... Anyway, if it doesn't work well, I'll take your head off. If it works well, it means I have good leadership!
Speaking of which, it was quite difficult for the ministers of the Chongzhen Dynasty. They were dismissed from office accidentally.
The frequency with which Chongzhen changed his central ministers was definitely rare in history. No other emperor liked to mess around as much as he did.
Over the past ten years, there have been a total of more than fifty bachelors, or cabinet ministers, changed, including seventeen chief ministers.
Before him, there were only about a hundred chief ministers in the Ming Dynasty for more than two hundred years. He changed more than a dozen in the ten years he was emperor. This man's brain circuit was not comparable to that of ordinary emperors.
Moreover, Chongzhen had a special characteristic when using his ministers. When he first hired you, he would take your heart and soul, but once something happened, he would directly push you out to take the blame, dismiss you from office, and kill you...
This man is not suitable to be an emperor.
As long as he makes the center a little more stable and doesn't replace players every two days, he won't end up hanging himself.
The center is in turmoil every day throughout the year. The ministers are either frightened or plotting against each other. They even beat up the thieves and destroy the bandits!
In this context, Yang Sichang was arrested and imprisoned by Chongzhen himself. The Jin Yiwei who arrested the person had already left Beijing overnight. However, Yang Sichang was in Guangdong now. The Jin Yiwei wanted to go to Guangdong to deliver the order and arrest people, so he probably had to run away. Many months…
At the same time, Hong Chengchou, Shi Kefa, Sun Chuanting and other important governors were all reprimanded by Chongzhen.
And Chen Biqian was so unlucky that he was dismissed from office!
The reason is that Chen Biqian has been in Henan for a long time, but he has not made any achievements, and he has just sat back and watched the Chu thieves grow bigger...
Several of Chen Biqian's opponents were caught and started to spray violently at the same time... Chongzhen followed the words of his ministers and dismissed Chen Biqian from office.
At least they saved Chen Biqian's face and did not arrest him and put him in jail. Instead, he allowed him to voluntarily beg for his bones...
Chen Biqian, who was still working hard in Ruzhou, trying every means to coordinate Zuo Liangyu, Wu Sangui and other arrogant generals who wanted to launch the Nanyang offensive, didn't even know that he had been dismissed from office.
He was promoted inexplicably and dismissed from office inexplicably...
Immediately afterwards, after some overt and covert fighting among the courtiers, a new governor of the Eastern Front was elected, Wang Jiazhen!
Ever since, Wang Jiazhen, who had offended Chongzhen because of the noise of the Liaodong troops, was once again restored by Chongzhen and given the title of Shangshu of the Ministry of War. He was also the right deputy imperial envoy to the military affairs of Nanzhili, Henan, Jiangxi and Zhejiang. .
Because he was directly in charge of the military affairs of South Zhili, his important task was to guard the eastern front and prevent Chu thieves from advancing eastward. If nothing else, his headquarters should be Nanjing, Jinling City, Yingtian Prefecture.
Therefore, Wang Jiazhen is also commonly known as the Governor of Nanjing.
As for Xiong Wencan, he was also commonly known as the Governor of the Southwest because he was in charge of the war in the Southwest.
Hong Chengchou was still the governor of the three sides, but he had the title of Minister of the Ministry of War, and he was also the prince's Taibao.
As a result, the Ming court formed a situation where the three governors jointly encircled and suppressed the Chu thieves.
These changes took place within just half a month after the news of Chu Nan's defeat reached the capital.
By June, in just half a month, the Ming court had replaced as many as seven senior civil servants targeting the Chu thieves, that is, officials at the level of governors and governors.
Of course, these are only document exchanges for the time being, because it takes time to issue and notify the imperial edict. Many people seem to have been removed, but they are still in their positions.
For example, in early June, even though the Ming court had officially issued an order to arrest Yang Sichang, Yang Sichang was still with him in Shaoguan, focusing on restoring the new standard army formation and asking Xiong Wencan for money, food, and guns.
Its new standard army, the Right Army, quickly recovered to a size of more than 30,000 to 7,000 people in less than half a month, and is still rapidly expanding.
Because of the impact of the defeat of Chu Nan, it not only caused the ups and downs of Yang Sichang, but also Chen Biqian and other senior civil servants who led troops to fight outside, and also caused drastic changes at the cabinet level.
Due to the turmoil after last year, only Wen Tiren, Qian Shisheng, and Zhang Zhifa were left in the cabinet. In April and May, Qian Shisheng was affected again, and after the Chunan War continued to spread, Qian Shisheng also He was implicated and was finally forced to "claim illness and become an official".
As a result, there are only two people left in the cabinet!
For this reason, the Ming court set off a fierce struggle for the throne of cabinet ministers!
Finally, Kong Zhenyun, the minister of the Ministry of official affairs, He Fengsheng, and Huang Shijun, both the ministers of the Ministry of rites and the bachelor of Dongge, became the new cabinet ministers.
Naturally, this change in the cabinet had a huge impact on the Chu-Nan War.
The rise of the Chu Empire has directly affected the high-level political struggles within the Ming court, and even more affected the high-level strategic choices of the Ming court. It even affected the strategic decision of Liaodong's Eastern Capture.
In April this year, Huang Taiji, the leader of the East Captive, proclaimed himself the emperor and founded the country in Shengjing. He changed the name of the country to Qing Dynasty and the reign name to Chongde. It is difficult to say that he was not influenced by Luo Zhixue who proclaimed himself emperor in Wuchang and founded the country of Chu. The influence of Chengshun in determining the year name.
Seeing that Luo Zhixue had proclaimed himself emperor in Wuchang, he was naturally unwilling to lag behind others when he captured Huang Taiji's head, so he let a group of bandits and traitors persuade him to join him. He should not be a big khan, but become an emperor!
And to a certain extent, it led to Dongli's decision to enter the customs via Mongolia!
They wanted to take advantage of the fact that the Ming court was restrained by the Chu army, and ran to Beizhili to grab a wave.
