L.F-Hist.Novelist Chapter 112 What goes around comes around
Chapter 112 What goes around comes around
Chapter 113 What goes around comes around
Chapter 112 "Father!"
Abatai rode up, his face filled with panic: "The pursuers are increasing in number, at least eight or nine thousand cavalry!"
Nurhaci gritted his teeth. He had actually sent troops to counterattack long ago. Chen Ying did not fight them. He would run away if they chased him, and chase them if they ran away.
Especially now that the mountains are blocked by heavy snow, and there is a lot of snow on the slopes, making movement difficult and slowing down both sides. More importantly, while Chen Ying was chasing from behind, all the tribes of the Haixi Jurchen had already mobilized.
Seeing the Jurchens retreat, this was a perfect opportunity to strike them while they were down, just like a farmer seeing a bountiful harvest, where a single head was worth as much as an ox.
A calf takes a year and a half to grow up and requires careful care. But the problem is, now they can get a bull's head with just a swing of their sword. Even though they know that the Jurchens are powerful, they are still fearless and keep going.
Nurhaci said angrily, "Speed up! Throw away all the baggage, throw away everything you can, just take dry rations and weapons!"
"twitter!"
Once the order was given, the Jurchen army began to frantically discard their supplies, including wagons, tents, provisions, and even the cattle and sheep they had plundered, all of which were left by the roadside.
But the wolf cavalry, like wolves that have smelled blood, pursued even more relentlessly.
Hada came to Chen Ying's side and said excitedly, "My lord, the Jurchens have fled, leaving behind a trail of cargo, cattle, sheep, and horses everywhere. We've made a fortune!"
Although Chen Ying led the wolf cavalry to participate in the pursuit, the problem was that he did not ride a horse. It wasn't that he couldn't, but the cavalry was too cold; apart from his crotch being warm, the rest of his body was icy.
He was riding in a modified four-wheeled carriage, now a sled, of course. Although it was a bit bumpy, the problem was that there was a stove burning inside. The heat from the stove was expelled outside through the chimney. Outside, the wind howled and your breath turned to ice, but inside the carriage it was warm as spring.
One of his concubines, Ilha, was roasting mutton for her in the carriage, filling the entire carriage with the aroma of roasted mutton.
"This is a reward for you!"
Chen Ying picked up a cup of piping hot milk tea. Of course, this was a modified version of milk tea by Chen Ying, somewhat similar to milk tea in later generations. It contained sugar, tea leaves, and milk bricks. After boiling, the tea leaves were filtered out, resulting in a sweet and delicious drink.
"Thank you for the reward, Master!"
Hada received a full cup of hot milk tea, and without even thinking it was too hot, she drank it all in one gulp.
"Master, this servant has gone to pursue the Jurchens!"
"No rush!"
"But speed is of the essence in war. The Jurchens abandoned their baggage and armor precisely to slow us down—"
"What's the rush? Let me tell you, the next battle will be easy. We can just chase them slowly until we reach Fushun—"
"But the Jurchens have almost all fled."
"Such excellent volunteer propagandists! If you kill them all, who will spread the word about my heroic deeds?"
Chen Ying was very clear that the problem of the Ming Dynasty was not just the problem of the Jurchens. Even if the Jurchens were gone, could the people of the Ming Dynasty live a good life?
The answer is definitely no.
Could Chen Ying destroy the Jurchens?
The answer is definitely no, absolutely not.
Before he had the strength to crush the Jurchens, he could not hope to wipe them out in one battle. If the Jurchens found themselves outmatched, they would run away. Now, the Russian expeditionary force had crossed the Ural Mountains, burning, killing, and looting all the way eastward.
Why did the Mongol Chechen Khanate surrender to the Jurchens? It was because they were so defeated by Tsarist Russia that they didn't even want their homeland anymore. Outer Mongolia, unable to defeat them, could only flee and surrender to the Jurchens.
This means that the Far East and Siberia were actually habitable regions, but they were not forced into it. If the Jurchens had fled to Siberia, it would have been difficult for them to launch further expeditions.
More importantly, the Ming Dynasty's civil service group did not allow the extermination of the Jurchens, thinking it was merely a matter of Shanxi merchants smuggling goods to the Jurchens? Why is no one bringing up the Shanxi merchants?
Because the Shanxi merchants only made small profits, the real big money came from the Liaodong military tax. The highest amount collected from the Liaodong army in any given year was 12 million taels of silver, and the next highest was 6 to 7 million taels of silver. In fact, the amount of silver collected from the Liaodong military tax far exceeded the prescribed amount, and the imperial court ordered a tax of 9 li per mu of land.
That is, nine coins per mu of land. No one can say for sure how much was levied. Some levied as much as two or three coins per mu, which is almost twenty or thirty times the amount stipulated by the imperial court.
That's not all. Once the silver leaves the Ministry of Revenue, it loses value, a phenomenon known as "drifting away" or "fire loss." This has fostered a huge interest group.
In August of the fifth year of the Tianqi reign, the Battle of Liuhe was a defeat, with Ma Shilong suffering more than 1,700 casualties. As a result, Sun Chengzong was impeached and dismissed from his post. It should be noted that Sun Chengzong was one of the bigwigs of the Donglin Party. This time, the people who impeached him were not only his political enemy Wei Zhongxian, but also members of the Donglin Party.
Sun Chengzong had already seen through their scheme. They feared that he would destroy the Jurchens. After more than three years of development, Sun Chengzong had already harvested over 500,000 shi of grain through land reclamation. If he continued to cultivate the land, the harvest would be much larger than 500,000 shi. It was precisely because Sun Chengzong's strategic initial investment had begun to show results that they had to get rid of him immediately. Otherwise, once the land reclamation reached a certain scale, the court would no longer need to transport grain from inside the pass to outside the pass, and Sun Chengzong would have not just 110,000 troops, but possibly 200,000, 300,000, or even 500,000.
Did the Ming Dynasty lack soldiers? Actually, it didn't. Just look at the five garrisons in Xingzhou. The central garrison in Xingzhou was located within Liangxiang County and did not have military farmland, so its population was relatively small, only 50,000. However, the four garrisons in Xingzhou, left, right, front, and rear, had a total of nearly 300,000 people, which is equivalent to 75,000 people in each garrison.
The number of military households in the national garrisons is not just two or three million registered, but twenty or thirty million, or even more. Take Guide Prefecture, where Chen Ying is located, as an example. The Suiyang Garrison is stationed in Suizhou. Because nearly half of the four major clans and eight major households in Guide Garrison are military households, they are relatively more lenient towards the military. The total population of Suizhou is about 480,000, and the registered military households account for nearly 40% of the total population of Suizhou. The Suiyang Garrison alone has more than 200,000 military households.
Despite the fierce and brutal infighting within the court, the military households below remained very simple and honest. The Ming Dynasty's military households still upheld the belief that military merit could change orders, which was why the Ming Dynasty was able to persevere despite suffering multiple defeats and losing more than 300,000 troops when facing the Jurchens.
The most fundamental problem restricting the Ming army was the lack of funds in the imperial court. If Sun Chengzong could achieve a balance between income and expenditure, he could rapidly expand the army and even overwhelm the Jurchens with sheer numbers. Therefore, not only did Wei Zhongxian deal with Sun Chengzong, but the Donglin Party also dealt with him. The financial backers behind the Donglin Party were the true fathers of the Jurchens. The Shanxi merchants were merely front men; they were only involved in minor affairs. The eight major Shanxi merchant families had assets exceeding ten million, making them incredibly wealthy.
In fact, the truly wealthy were the financial backers of the Donglin Party. The same principle applies to Chen Ying. He could defeat the Jurchens once, twice, or even countless times, but now that he was thin and weak, he couldn't withstand the financial onslaught from his backers.
The wolf cavalry pursued the Jurchens at a slow pace, but with deadly speed. In particular, the Daning army under Chen Ying's command, in addition to the Shahe New Army, also included three thousand elite Daning New Army soldiers from the four garrisons of Xingzhou, who joined Chen Ying in the pursuit.
Now they have upgraded from muskets to cannons. Not only did they capture a large amount of grain and fodder from the Jurchens, but they also captured seven or eight thousand warhorses. This loss made the Jurchens feel like they were going to vomit blood.
Originally, the Da Ning New Army was entirely composed of infantry. With the sponsorship of the Jurchens, those infantrymen who could ride horses rode them, and those who could not ride horses could ride in carriages or sleds. As for speed, if one horse pulling one sled was not fast enough, then two or even three horses would be used. With more horses, the speed would increase.
Chen Ying's soldiers marched towards Fushun at a speed of fifty kilometers per hour. As the Jurchens retreated faster and faster, the distance between the two sides was getting closer and closer. The Haixi Jurchen and Wild Jurchen tribes also received a lot of warhorses and weapons and equipment, which made them very happy. They all said that following Lord Chen Boying was too cost-effective. No matter whether they participated in the battle or not, as long as they did what he asked them to do, they would always get a share of the spoils.
This point quickly became a consensus among everyone within the Nurgan Commandery, leading to a very interesting phenomenon: whenever Chen Ying fought, regardless of whether the Haixi Jurchen tribes or the Wild Jurchen tribes, including the Solon tribe, were invited, they would actively participate in the battle.
The Ming army is now in high spirits, fierce and powerful, and its combat effectiveness has increased dramatically. Even when the Da Ning New Army was ambushed by the Jurchen rearguard, they were able to fight the Jurchens to a standstill.
Seeing that the Jurchen army was fleeing too quickly, not only Hada was anxious, but the other generals were also anxious.
"My lord, I, Shang Qingyun, the Vice Commander of the Left Garrison of Xingzhou, request permission to engage in battle!"
"Shang Qingyun?"
Chen Ying was slightly taken aback: "What is your relationship with Shang Kexi?"
"Shang Kexi? This humble servant does not know him!"
Shang Qingyun said, "This humble servant has heard of a military commander named Shang Xueli in Dongjiang Town, but he died in battle in the spring. Mao Wenlong petitioned the emperor to bestow upon him the title of Guerrilla General!"
In fact, the term "Dusi" in the Ming Dynasty had two meanings. One was the Dusi like Chen Ying, who was now the commander of the Da Ning Dusi. The other was the Dusi in the border army. This Dusi was a mid-ranking military officer, positioned between a guerrilla and a garrison commander. He was usually promoted from a garrison commander or a centurion and was responsible for the functions of commanding the central army, managing the wagon camp, and assisting in border defense.
"My sword is already itching for battle, and I can't wait to catch up with the Jurchens and have a good fight."
"No!"
Chen Ying refused without hesitation. "You're not afraid of exhausting yourselves, but I'm afraid you'll run your horses to death. Do you think it was easy for me to capture these horses?" Of course, Chen Ying couldn't say this outright. He said calmly, "Nurhaci is very cunning. Don't fall for his tricks. Be steady and follow my central army. Haste makes waste. He can run, but can Shenyang City escape? We can take Shenyang City without losing a single soldier. Wouldn't that be a great achievement? I want to show Nurhaci what it means to pursue the fleeing enemy to the death."
Shang Qingyun was taken aback at first, then overjoyed: "This subordinate obeys!"
Nurhaci had already established Shenyang as his capital. Recapturing Shenyang would be a great achievement, bringing promotion and wealth. With Chen Ying's order, the Wolf Cavalry, the Shahe New Army, and the Daning New Army spread out like a tide, chasing after the Jurchens.
On the snowy plains, the chase had lasted for three days and three nights. The Jurchen army was exhausted, both men and horses weary. They dared not stop, for if they did, the pursuers would pounce. But running fast was not an easy task either, for ahead lay the Haixi Jurchens and the Solons. Both Hamutai and Bomubogor wanted to make a good impression on Chen Ying, and they even spared no effort, bringing out their most prized possessions.
Like Bomubogor, who personally led two thousand cavalrymen, all of whom were equipped with Mongol iron-hoofed horses. These horses were actually the key to the Mongol army's sweep across Eurasia. The iron-hoofed horses had excellent endurance and could easily travel 150 kilometers a day. No matter how fast the Jurchen cavalry were, they could not outrun the iron-hoofed horses.
"Finally caught up with those bastards!"
Bomubogor, his face flushed with excitement as he watched the Jurchens setting up camp, shouted, "Brothers, charge! Kill Jurchens for cattle—kill one, get one cattle; kill two, get two cattle!"
More than two thousand Solon cavalrymen shouted in unison, like a torrent, and crashed into the vanguard of the Jurchens. Another fierce battle ensued. When the Jurchens saw that it was not the Ming army that had come, and that they did not have the kind of firearms that could blow up large areas with a single blow, and that the Jurchens were also horsemen who wielded swords, they thought, "Who is afraid of who in a battle?"
Although the Solon tribe was brave and skilled in battle, the Jurchen cavalry was no less formidable. Both sides suffered heavy casualties, with men frequently falling from their horses. Despite Bomubogor's desperate fighting, the problem was that he only had two thousand cavalrymen, yet they were routed by the Jurchen's tens of thousands of cavalry. He watched as his personal guards fell one by one, and in the end, he could only retreat in frustration.
Before the Jurchens could catch their breath, Hamutai led the Xibe cavalry to circle around to the front of the Jurchens. After a fierce battle, the Jurchens defeated the Xibe tribe, and then Menggun took over.
By this time it was already dark. The Jurchen vanguard, Abatai, counted that more than a thousand people around him had died and more than two thousand had been wounded. Although they had killed many enemies, the problem was that they didn't even have time to set up camp. In this cold weather, people would freeze to death.
After nightfall, the territory became the domain of the Haixi Jurchen tribes and the Wild Jurchen tribes. They were all small tribes and did not have the strength to confront the Jurchens head-on. However, they also wanted to live, and even more so, to live better. The threat of losing a head or a cow was too great. Some of them crawled forward in snowdrifts, while others would ambush the Jurchens when they came out to urinate or defecate, or set traps. In short, killing even one Jurchen was a bonus.
Faced with an endless stream of enemies, the Jurchen soldiers were utterly devastated.
The Jurchen princes and generals all hung their heads, not daring to raise their heads. They couldn't understand when the Jurchens had become trash that everyone could beat up.
Reality is so surreal; they don't really understand this principle: "What goes around comes around!"
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