I want to be emperor

Chapter 358
The Forbidden City in November has already been covered with thick snow.

The thick white snow not only brought the cold air, but also buried a lot of filth in the Forbidden City.

In the main hall, a group of ministers lowered their heads, and above them was Chongzhen who was roaring.

"Trash, it's a bunch of trash!"

"Last year, how did you tell me that the Chu thieves can be arrogant for a while, but sooner or later they can be wiped out, and they can be contained in the northern part of Chu!"

"But Chu Nan was lost at the beginning of the year, Jiujiang was lost, and An Qing was gone too!"

"Okay, even if you lose Jiujiang and Anqing, I still trust you."

"But now, the city of Jinling is lost. That's where the ancestor's foundation is, and where the Taizu's mausoleum is. Now it's all in the hands of Chu thieves. How do you let me see my ancestors in the future?"

"And that Fan Jingwen, he thought that death was enough? I asked him to guard Jinling and defend the south of the Yangtze River, but when the Chu thieves attacked, he died immediately."

"Does he think that committing suicide is loyalty? It's a big joke, pass the decree, Fan Jingwen loses the city and land, commits suicide in fear of crime, the crime should be exterminated!"

"And that bastard Li Yuankui, who is honored as the right servant of the Ministry of Industry, dares to turn himself into a thief as a traitor and pass down an order to destroy his family."

"Yu Sixun, the governor of Zhejiang Province, came out with troops and watched the situation in the south of the Yangtze River deteriorate, and was demoted to three ranks!"

After finishing speaking, Chongzhen, who still retained the last sliver of reason, finally knew that under such circumstances, the governor of Zhejiang might not be able to replace him, so he immediately added: "Order him to commit crimes and make meritorious deeds, otherwise he will not be spared!"

Chongzhen roared from above alone!

All the ministers below lowered their heads and dared not speak.

As for what's on his mind, no one knows.

And there must be more than one person complaining about Chongzhen in their hearts: It's not all because of you, an idiot. Although Wang Jiazhen lost Jiujiang and Hukou, but at that time, why did you withdraw Wang Jiazhen? If Wang Jiazhen was allowed to commit crimes and meritorious deeds, he might be able to jump around for a while.

With the situation so turbulent, kill Wang Jiazhen and temporarily replace him with Fan Jingwen who can't even keep the scene...

Isn't this pushing the already corrupt situation in the south of the Yangtze River into the pit of fire?
And they who thought this way never thought about why the huge Ming Dynasty was reduced to what it is today.

Chongzhen spent his frugal money and used it to fight against the captives in the east and encircle and suppress the Chu thieves. How much money and food were embezzled by them through corruption.

There are several million taels of silver in the household department a year, some of which go into the private pockets of many ministers in the court, and how many of them actually go into the frontline soldiers.

Many shameless people are always used to putting the blame on others, thinking that they are innocent.

And now the officials in the court are definitely the best in the shameless group.

Therefore, they were right, and it was Chongzhen who was wrong.

Chongzhen was furious because of the news of the fall of Jinling City, and there were naturally many officials who were implicated.

Fan Jingwen who had committed suicide was pulled out by Chongzhen to flog the corpse, and ordered the Fan family to be ransacked and exterminated.

The governor of Zhejiang was also implicated. He was demoted to the third level to serve a crime and made meritorious service. He was ordered to send troops to Yingtianfu to counterattack Jinling City and so on.

Even Zhu Dadian, the governor of Fengyang, was scolded again by decree, ordering him to quickly send troops south to destroy the thieves.

Many ministers in Gyeonggi were also implicated.

But these actually have no effect on the corrupt situation in Jiangnan.

What was really useful was that Chongzhen ordered the governor of Shandong, the governor of water transportation, and even some Jiliao frontier troops to rush south to participate in the encirclement and suppression of Chu thieves.

In the same way, Sun Chuanting, who had performed fairly well recently, and Zuo Liangyu, who was located in Henan, led troops to counterattack all parts of northern Chu.

However, it is difficult to see any effect of these measures in a short period of time, and they cannot even have any practical impact on the Chu army.

For example, on Sun Chuanting's side, although Sun Chuanting has good abilities and has trained a new standard army with good combat effectiveness, it is very difficult to enter Yunyang Mansion from the front line of Guanzhong Mansion and then counterattack Chubei.

The Chu army deployed a mixed regiment on the front line of Guanzhong Mansion and Yunyang Mansion, a garrison division with a total strength of more than 5000 troops, and possessed nearly [-] two-and-a-half-jin field guns and six five-jin field guns.

Although it was a bit difficult to attack Guanzhong Mansion, Sun Chuanting was unlikely to be able to attack if he relied on the complex terrain in the eastern part of Guanzhong Mansion and Yunyang Mansion for defensive operations.

As for the northern line such as Nanyang Mansion, let alone, although Zuo Liangyu has a lot of troops, the Chu army has been operating the northern line of defense for more than a year. The strategic bulletin is even more heavily garrisoned, and it was built by the Chu army just like Tietong.

Among them, Luyangguan has a garrison brigade and a main regiment stationed all year round, with a total strength of more than 9000 people. There are more than 20 field artillery pieces and more than 30 old-style traditional general artillery pieces and Flang machine guns stationed here.

If Zuo Liangyu wanted to beat Luyang Pass to death, he might not be able to defeat all his tens of thousands of people.

Not to mention the Fangcheng Ancient Road, relying on Yuzhou City, the Chu Army has built dozens of fortresses, large and small. The main force of the Second Division is stationed here all year round, and there are more than 5000 garrison divisions to assist. Defensive combat.

There are also many kinds of artillery.

There are also a lot of ammunition reserves, and there is a Xiangyang arsenal behind which can replenish weapons and ammunition in large quantities at any time.

Although most of the production capacity of the Xiangyang Arsenal is transported thousands of miles to the east line, but if necessary, this part of the production capacity can be used for the north or west line at any time.

I dare not say that the western and northern routes are as stable as Mount Tai, but trying to take them down with the strength of the Ming army on the opposite side is simply a dream.

And if there is no threat to the Chu army in these two directions, it will be even more difficult in the other directions.

In the eastern Sichuan area, due to the complex terrain and the characteristics of easy defense and difficult attack, it is not easy for the Chu army to fight in, but it is a dream for the chieftain soldiers led by Qin Liangyu to fight out.

The terrain on the southern line of Chu is also complex, and the Chu army on the southern line is quite strong. There are several garrison divisions. It is impossible for troops from Guangdong, Guangxi, Yunnan, Guizhou and other areas to launch a counterattack across the mountains.

Not to mention the counterattack, now they can hardly protect themselves.

In the past six months, although the Chu army in the south of Chu has not launched any large-scale strategic offensives, they have never heard of small and medium-scale offensives.

In October, Quanzhou, which is close to southern Chu in Guangxi, had just been won, and the door to Guilin had already been opened.

And further south, He County was taken.

Along these two directions, the Chu army has already burned the flames of war to the territory of Guangxi, and at the same time threatened the two strategic places of Guilin and Wuzhou.

Xiong Wencan, governor of the Southwest, has already dispatched troops to Guilin Mansion, Pingyue Mansion and other places to prevent the Chu army from going south, and even made mental preparations to retreat to Liuzhou and Wuzhou.

Counterattack, it can only talk about it.

On the front line of Jiangxi, the Chu army swept across the north-central area of ​​Jiangxi with thunderous momentum during the Eastward Campaign, and the soldiers attacked the front lines of Longquan and Wan'an.

Although the army moved eastward in the follow-up, resource supplies were also given priority to the eastward troops. The seventh division and the two garrison divisions who stayed in Jiangxi to fight did not get much resources, but they could also continue to launch offensives.

With the cooperation of the Navy's Xiangjiang Fleet, the Seventh Division went all the way south along the Xiangjiang River, directly reaching Ganzhou, and strategically surrounded the city of Ganzhou.

It's just because the supplies are not usual and the ammunition is insufficient, and Pan Zenghong, the governor of Nangan, also made preparations early, mobilized a large number of troops to garrison Ganzhou City, and also obtained a batch of guns from Guangdong.

Therefore, it is not too smooth for the Seventh Division to win Ganzhou, and it may take some time.

In addition, there is another problem that the governor Pan Zenghong, the leader of the Southern Jiangxi region, was already seriously ill and was bedridden before the Chu army arrived.

After the Chu army killed the city of Ganzhou, under internal and external difficulties, Pan Zenghong, the governor of Southern Jiangxi, finally couldn't bear the illness and died in the army. The news, because of the long distance and the fact that the north had been blocked by Chu thieves, it was troublesome to transmit the news. If it is not in time, the Chongzhen monarchs and ministers in Jingjili of the Ming court still don't know about it.

Now the defenders in Ganzhou City, under the leadership of the prefect of Ganzhou Prefecture and others, can barely maintain the situation, but if they want to counterattack, that is a dream.

On many fronts such as the north, west, and south, the local Ming army was either unable to counterattack, or it was difficult to protect itself, and it was impossible to pose any actual threat to Yujun.

And in Jiangbei and Jiangnan.

Needless to say on the Jiangnan side, the Ming soldiers in various places in the south of the Yangtze River are now trembling in fear. When many officials and defenders in the city saw the Chu army coming, they didn't even have the courage to resist. They either fled or surrendered on the spot.

On the Jiangbei side, although the Fengyang governor's troops led by Zhu Dadian and the Jiangbei New Standard Army left by Wang Jiazhen and other Jiangbei front-line troops are struggling to support them, they can only barely hold the Hefei front line, and even Hezhou may not be able to defend it. live.

Looking at the entire battle situation, in fact, the Ming court has completely lost the possibility of controlling the Chu army's capture of Jiangnan and seizing half of Jiangnan.

It's just that neither Chongzhen nor the other courtiers are reconciled.

It's just that their reluctance doesn't change anything.

In the first ten days of November, after the blizzard stopped in the Jiangnan area, the two main divisions of the Chu army, two garrison divisions and two mortar regiments, launched a fierce offensive to the east and southeast at the same time.

On the eastern front, although the Zhenjiang defenders resisted for a while, they were still neatly cleaned up by the Chu army advancing eastward, and the main force attacking the city at the beginning was not the first division, but the newly reorganized No. 15 garrison division.

After taking Zhenjiang, this led to a very important and extremely bad consequence for the Ming court, which could even use its rule in the north.

That is, the important lifeline of the Ming court, the Beijing-Hangzhou Grand Canal, was cut off by the Chu army. After the Chu army took control of Zhenjiang, a large amount of rice grains in the Jiangnan area could no longer be transported northward through the Beijing-Hangzhou Grand Canal.

I'm afraid it won't be long before the capital will be short of food.

(End of this chapter)