As the Taiyuan garrison surrendered without a fight, most of the remnants of the Ximing Army in the surrounding areas also lost their will to resist and surrendered one after another or fled to the plateau mountains in the west.
Especially among the thousands of remnants of the Ming army in Pingyang Mansion, seeing that the situation had deteriorated to an irreversible level, internal differences began to form.
In the end, some generals fled westward with their troops across the Yellow River to find Zuo Liangyu, while others took the initiative to surrender to the Chu army.
By May, all parts of Shanxi east of the Yellow River had been brought under the control of the Chu army. A large number of officials from the civil affairs department of the Chu Empire, especially tax officials, began to station in various parts of Shanxi and establish effective administrative rule.
Subsequently, the forward troops of the Chu army continued to march towards the Shaanxi plateau area.
Because it was a plateau and mountainous area, supplies were difficult and marching was inconvenient. The Chu army did not advance quickly and adopted a steady and gradual advance.
However, this steady and gradual approach made Zuo Liangyu's remnants feel desperate!
You can't fight again and again, you can't defend, and even if you want to escape, you don't know where to escape!
To the west of them is Lanzhou, which has been actually controlled by the Chu army. To the east of Lanzhou, the northern area of Gongchang Prefecture, and even parts of Pingliang Prefecture, including the important town of Guyuan Prefecture, have been actually controlled by the Chu army.
When the Shaanxi-Gansu Campaign Headquarters headed west, after defeating Sun Chuanting in April and killing the remaining troops of Emperor Longxing who fled west, they did not stop the pace of the western expedition. They continued to go west.
During this process, a large number of local officials and border troops surrendered, and the border troops of Shaanxi Xingdusi in the northwest surrendered directly as a whole. Therefore, the Chu army did not encounter much actual resistance during its subsequent westward advance. Sometimes they marched all the way, or even marched lightly to take over the place and reorganize the local surrendered troops.
So by late May, most of the area in the west had actually come under the rule of the Da Chu Empire. Well, although the Gansu Town in the northwest of Lanzhou was still garrisoned by local frontier troops, it was at least nominally under the Da Chu Empire. The Empire took control.
Not to mention the south of Zuo Liangyu, that is the Guanzhong area, which is already the hinterland of the area controlled by the Chu army and has a lot of troops.
To the east of Zuo Liangyu's headquarters is the Shanxi area east of the Yellow River, which is currently under the control of the Chu army.
To the north is the Hetao area controlled by the Tatars.
Zuo Liangyu's troops are currently besieged in a small plateau and mountainous area in northern Shaanxi.
In addition, the Chu army was pressing on Zuo Liangyu's troops from three directions at the same time. Under such circumstances, many civil and military officials under Zuo Liangyu's troops felt desperate, so there were more and more surrenders. .
Not to mention the generals under his command, even Zuo Liangyu himself was thinking of surrendering at this time.
Although he is very ambitious and wants to occupy a place and become a local emperor, he is not stupid. He knows that it is impossible for him to make a comeback now.
It's a pity that Zuo Liangyu was killed with a knife before he could take action!
It was not the external enemies who killed him, but his generals!
Zuo Liangyu himself wanted to surrender, and his generals wanted to surrender even more. No one wanted to follow Zuo Liangyu on the road to death.
As a result, there were a few bold generals who contacted the Military Intelligence Department of the Chu Empire. After obtaining the Chu army's commitment, they decisively raised troops to kill Zuo Liangyu.
So, on May 28th, Zuo Liangyu, who had once conquered several provinces in the Central Plains and was an important general in the Ming Dynasty to resist the Chu army. Zuo Liangyu, who was increasingly ambitious, was killed by his generals.
Immediately afterwards, several generals of the Western Ming Army who killed Zuo Liangyu conveniently killed Shao'an Emperor Zhu Changzi, who had just proclaimed himself emperor less than a month ago, and then announced his overall surrender to the Chu Empire!
On June 1, General Huang Dingquan officially accepted the surrender of Zuo Liangyu's remaining troops on behalf of the empire.
As a result, all of Shaanxi surrendered to the Chu Empire!
The Western Front Campaign came to a successful conclusion!
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In mid-June, news of the complete surrender of Zuo Liangyu's remnants reached Jinling City, and Luo Zhixue immediately issued an order to reward the soldiers of the Western Expedition.
At the same time, according to the strategic situation on the northern and western fronts, especially after Sun Chuanting's headquarters and Zuo Liangyu's headquarters had been destroyed, the Shaanxi-Gansu Campaign Command and Shanxi Campaign Command originally set up specifically for these two enemies were also cancelled.
Shaanxi Xingdusi was changed to Gansu Province and military control was implemented.
Subsequently, the Northwest Frontier Defense Command was established to take charge of border military affairs in Gansu, Yulin, Shaanxi, Ningxia and other areas, with Army General Huang Dingquan as commander.
The Xuanda Border Defense Command was established to take charge of military affairs in Datong, Shanxi, Xuanfu, Hebei and other places, with General Li Dongshao as commander.
These two headquarters are border defense headquarters specializing in external operations. Behind them, there are four regular local garrison headquarters: Shanxi Garrison Command, Shaanxi Garrison Command, Gansu Garrison Command, and Hebei Garrison Command. .
At the same time, it is required to reorganize the surrendered troops in the northwest and northern border towns, and to rely on the elite descendants to gradually reorganize six second-class divisions for inland suppression in Shaanxi, Gansu and Shanxi, and to support the main frontier army operations.
Just when the northwest and northern regions were initially being pacified, Army Lieutenant General Huang Guangmao, who was on the front line of Guanzhong Prefecture, also resigned from the post of Shaanxi garrison commander, and was assigned the new title of Sichuan garrison commander. At the same time, the number of troops under his command also increased. A main force.
This division was the newly reorganized 26th Division in the Chu Army. This division had just formed into the army. Due to the shortage of troops on the front line, the empire's senior officials sent this division to Hanzhong Preparation to prepare for the battle into Sichuan.
Also accompanying this division was the temporary fourth howitzer battalion, which was also the fourth 18-pound light howitzer battalion in the Chu army.
The Ministry of Industry of the Dachu Empire began to comprehensively organize the production of 18-pound light howitzers in late December last year. Although the output was not high at the beginning, it increased rapidly after March.
At present, hundreds of 18-pound light howitzers have been produced. These artillery pieces are temporarily organized into multiple independent howitzer battalions. Each battalion is tentatively equipped with twelve artillery pieces. The first battalion is from Shaanxi and Gansu and is also participating. The first howitzer battalion of the Chu army fought in Tongguan, the second battalion was deployed on the Shanhaiguan front line, and the third battalion pulled down the Xuanfu front line, mainly used to fight against the Dongji people.
The Fourth Battalion, now dispatched to Hanzhong, is expected to participate in the battle in the direction of Sichuan.
In addition, there are the 5th, 6th, and 7th battalions in the rear who are training, if nothing unexpected happens.
According to the plan of the Chu Army, ten independent howitzer battalions will be established this year for emergency response, and then the new main infantry division will be gradually equipped with such light howitzers, which will be used directly as divisional firepower.
The Chu army fighting south from Hanzhong to Sichuan had two first-class divisions, one new and one old, as well as the fire support of an eighteen-pound light howitzer battalion.
The strong strength is simply not something that the local troops in Sichuan can resist.
There are not many New Standard Army troops in Sichuan. Previously, the Sichuan governor established a Sichuan New Standard Army, but the strength could not be increased for a long time. There were only a few thousand people. Sichuan resisted the Chu army, especially in the eastern Sichuan area. The battle mainly relied on the chieftain forces headed by Qin Liangyu.
Rely on the terrain to carry out stubborn resistance.
For this kind of enemy who is still in the cold weapon era, it doesn't matter that the Chu army did not invest its main energy in Sichuan before. Now large quantities of strategic materials, especially artillery shells, are transported to the front lines of eastern Sichuan and Hanzhong for free, and massive quantities of them are used. The civilian husband carried out the transportation.
Under the indiscriminate bombardment of artillery, Qin Liangyu fought fiercely. He was able to resist the attack of the 18th Division of the Chu Army in eastern Sichuan. However, in Baoding Prefecture in northern Sichuan, some local guardsmen and some The chieftain soldiers could not stop the fierce attack of tens of thousands of Chu army's main force.
In July, Lieutenant General Huang Guangmao led a group of Chu troops who were exhausted from climbing mountains and wading rivers to Bazhong, Baoding Prefecture. They successfully crossed the mountains and entered the hinterland of Sichuan.
After Huang Guangmao led his army into Sichuan, the local situation boiled over instantly.
A large number of local officials directly changed their flags, and many local defenders surrendered anyway.
When Huang Guangmao and his main force stayed in Bazhong to rest and restock ammunition and food, he inexplicably discovered that many surrounding places had become the territory of their Chu Empire...
When I asked, good guys, many local officials directly changed their banners, and then declared themselves to be ministers of the Great Chu...
Under such circumstances, the battle into Sichuan became almost the same as an armed march. There were not a few decent battles at all, and then they went all the way to Chengdu smoothly.
Shao Jiechun, the governor of Sichuan, simply beheaded Zhu Zhishu, the prisoner who had been supported by him personally, and then led an army of 5,000 people out of the city to surrender!
Zhu Zhishu was also very unlucky. At first, he was unwilling to be a prisoner, but Shao Jiechun forced him to do it. If he didn't do it right, he would die of illness, and then let the son of the King of Shu become...
After becoming the governor, he did not have any real power. Well, in fact, after the death of Chongzhen, the vassal kings who emerged from various places and proclaimed themselves emperors or the governor basically had no real power. Emperor Longxing was a little better. At any rate, Sun Chuanting was Finally, the Ming court gave him a certain amount of power, otherwise Emperor Longxing wouldn't even be able to build a temple...
But the others are basically nothing more than a flag for those ambitious people.
Not long after Zhu Zhishu's miserable life as a prisoner, he was chopped down by Shao Jiechun, who was determined to switch to Da Chu. Then Shao Jiechun took his head and surrendered to the Da Chu Empire...
The Chu army did not embarrass these few people when the Chengdu defenders voluntarily surrendered without resisting at all, and even took the initiative to lead the troops of the Chu Empire to confiscate various dignitaries in the city, including the assets of the Prince of Shu's palace.
As a result, Shao Jiechun was lucky enough to avoid the disaster of annihilation and became an official of the Chu Empire.
Because Shao Jiechun later took the initiative to recruit and surrender other armies in Sichuan, including personally going to eastern Sichuan to persuade Qin Liangyu to surrender to Chu, and succeeded, so this guy made meritorious service as soon as he surrendered to Chu, and was awarded the rank of Cong San.
Although it is just a fictitious title, and the department may hold practical positions in a short period of time, it is still a junior rank.
Time has entered September, and Sichuan is fully under the rule of the Chu Empire!
Nowadays, except for the two provinces of Yunnan and Guizhou, all the other places within the pass have come under the control of the Chu Empire!
As for the Yunnan-Guizhou region, the Chu Empire did not intend to delay for too long. Taking advantage of the official end of the Sichuan War, the Chuping of Shaanxi-Gansu, Jiliao and the Northern War Zone were not subject to large-scale attacks by the Dongqiu, and decisively launched the offensive in September. Southwest campaign against Yunnan and Guizhou.
After the battle in the southwest is completed, the Chu Empire will be able to concentrate its efforts on launching a war of annihilation against the Dongluo.
Luo Zhixue is looking forward to this!
