Rise of the 1630s South America

Chapter 1733 Manchurian Strategy

Dandong and Kuandian counties have been at peace for a while.But if you look closely, you can see that the scars of the war are still everywhere: destroyed farmland, blocked wells, collapsed warehouses, charred houses, and new graves everywhere...

The Tartars wreaked havoc together, and the harm they brought was not small!

And precisely because of this, at the request of Major Liao Degong, Li Ziqian's Department of the 1000th Mixed Battalion of the Army, which should have ended the battle and returned to the camp for rest as planned, was similar to the [-]th Mixed Battalion, the main force of the [-]th Mixed Battalion The elite troops are now under the direct control of the Denglai Security Command, and local military and political officials can only negotiate with them if there is anything to do—the more than [-] officers and soldiers of the department just extended the time for a few months, and severely attacked the surrounding areas of Phoenix City. After some grass valley.

To be honest, this kind of grass-grazing behavior is actually a loss from an economic point of view!Phoenix City is an outpost area on the border between the Qing Dynasty and the East Coast. The few residents who were originally moved to other places, and the rest are scattered in various places. It is very remote. The local leading party may not be able to find it, let alone the first place. Ten mixed camps of these outsiders.As a result, more than 1000 officers and soldiers of the battalion and a large number of draft animals were eaten by outsiders, which cost a lot of money every day. In the end, only a few flies were killed, and only two or three hundred Tartar residents were killed and captured. However, a lot of ammunition, equipment, medicine, food, quilts, shoes and even draft animals have been posted.

The above is viewed from an economic point of view.If you look at it from a military point of view, the cost of this kind of mopping up is actually not as high as you think, because it ensures that there is a relatively empty space between Dandong and Kuandian, which are mainly cultivated by the people on the east coast, and Phoenix City. buffer.In this buffer zone, various villages of the Qing Dynasty have been greatly reduced due to the sweeping factors (in fact, after several years of war, many of these villages have been dilapidated, this time it was the last blow), Phoenix City or If small units of the Qing army from other places want to attack the east bank reclamation area, supplies will be a big problem, unless they store food in a hidden place in advance, but in any case it is not as convenient as before.

In addition, from a political point of view, the large-scale and long-range raids carried out by the Tenth Mixed Battalion (the First Division of the Liaodong New Army also sent some cavalry to help from time to time) in this ravine also greatly damaged the prestige of the Qing government. And the courage of the soldiers and civilians.Things like prestige and courage are quite suspenseful. Sometimes they seem useless, but sometimes they are extremely important.

To be honest, if the Qing army hadn’t broken through the customs five times in the Chongzhen Dynasty, the main force of the Ming army hadn’t been hanged and beaten by the Qing army who entered the pass repeatedly, and there were even scenes where dozens of Qing troops chased thousands of Ming troops and ran away. Will there be subtle changes in psychology so that it is recognized that the Qing Dynasty has the qualifications to compete for the world, instead of a wild man living in a corner outside the pass?

This kind of psychological change is actually very important, because it can weaken the resistance awareness of the enemy's soldiers and civilians, and it is beneficial to recruit a large number of surrendered troops. After all, you can't rely on yourself to conquer the world, and the cost is too high.The same is true of the mopping up of the East Coast people in Liaodong, that is, it is clearly proved by the facts that the Eight Banners soldiers you are proud of are no good in front of the modern army!If you don't want to burn everything, then surrendering in time is also a good choice. Anyway, we people on the east coast are reasonable and civilized people, and we will not plunder your property, children and land at will (of course, this is open to discussion, per capita More than [-] acres of land may be forcibly bought), as long as you pay taxes on time, undertake military service and labor service, and do not rebel or endanger the country, then everything will be fine!

The Tenth Mixed Battalion has been active from last year (1675) to the middle of this year. At the beginning, the Phoenix City of the Qing Dynasty sent some people to stop them. After two or three disastrous defeats, they gave up the idea of ​​stopping them head-on. Instead, they used ambushes, guerrilla attacks, etc. to harass, but the effect was minimal. So far, only less than 200 people in the Tenth Mixed Battalion have been killed or injured, and their own casualties are still more than a few, so now they have almost given up. Dandong, The wild area between Kuandian and Phoenix City has almost become a paradise for people on the east coast to have fun.

On July 1676, 7, two months after the last official confrontation with the Qing army, Major Liao Degong, who was in charge of the military and political affairs of the entire Liaodong reclamation area, formally wrote a letter to Yantai, requesting that about 20 people living in North Korea be reclaimed The people (previously diverted a group to Shandong and the outer Northeast) were transported back to the right bank of the Yalu River in batches to carry out the reconstruction work after the war. Liao Xiaoyao has officially approved this matter and allocated it from Shandong's already tight grain reserves A batch of wheat, corn, and potatoes were brought over to serve as their rations for the next period of time.

These rations will definitely not be able to fully support the grain harvest next year, so it is necessary to "borrow" some more from the Kingdom of Korea, which will cost about 20 shi.Undoubtedly, this is not a small amount, and the people on the east bank have already owed more than 80 shi of grain to the North Koreans on credit before, and this batch has broken a million shi. According to the current market price of grain, this A total of more than 500 million yuan of food money has not been given to North Koreans (on average, each North Korean person pays one yuan), and the average annual figure is 10 yuan, which is also amazing.

Of course, the North Koreans should not have much room to object, not to mention that there are troops stationed on the east coast of this country (in fact, there are only about 2000 people, that is, the Busan garrison). Supported by one hand (there are more than 1 soldiers and horses with relatively well-equipped equipment under his command), the ruling class of the country is now more and more closely tied to the people on the east coast. Materials, medicinal materials, and tobacco are exported to the east bank control area, and a large amount of iron products, weapons, silk fabrics and a large number of Nanyang luxury goods are imported from the east bank control area.For things like asking for some food from them, although the North Koreans are reluctant, they will not refuse it outright. As long as the people on the east bank pay more or less money, not too much, 20 yuan is enough, they should be willing The grains were delivered one after another, although they were probably old grains and miscellaneous grains, but they could still be used to save lives, couldn't they?

"The two counties of Kuandian and Dandong have been terribly damaged. The damage to the city wall needs to be repaired first. This is a major event, and it is also the foundation of our survival. Otherwise, it will be difficult to defend if the enemy comes again. The tenth mixed No matter how strong the battalion is, there are only 1000 people, how many nails can they drive?" Standing outside the dilapidated city of Dandong County, Liao Degong touched the city wall built of red bricks and rammed earth with his hands, and said with some discomfort: "There are still Some small fortresses in the wild, outposts on traffic nodes, and grain depots in various counties and townships were also destroyed. These have to be repaired or rebuilt one by one. It’s very sad to think about it. It was built, and now it is destroyed like this, this Tartar is really hateful."

In fact, compared with city walls and warehouses, farmland water conservancy facilities were damaged more severely.Many micro-reservoirs, irrigation canals, etc. that were excavated manually in the early stage were largely destroyed during the years when the Tartar army was raging.If we want to resume agricultural production in the future, these are obstacles that cannot be overcome. We must reorganize a large number of manpower and spend a lot of money to repair it, otherwise everything will be out of the question.

In addition, the houses built successively over the years were either demolished during the Tatars' attack to build barracks, warehouses and even various equipment, or they were burned down before the Tatars retreated, which can be called a loss. heavy.This inhumane behavior of the Tartars undoubtedly aroused great indignation on the East Bank, and they all threatened to take revenge when they recovered.

"Well, the cement and lime supported by Yantai are used first to repair the city walls and various fortresses. By the way, the construction of the brick and tile wheel kiln has also been approved by the higher authorities. It is in Dandong County, which also needs some You have to reserve building materials for me, and the technicians from Denglai will arrive probably next month." Major Liao Degong said to a group of cadres following him: "As for agricultural production, it will definitely be difficult to resume this year. Forget it. Since it is absolutely impossible to resume agricultural production this year, we might as well organize people to repair the city walls and forts first, and then dig the canals and ponds. We can plant wheat in the spring of next year. When we get there At that time, we can finally breathe a sigh of relief, and don’t have to live under the fence every year and suffer from hunger like we do now.”

The cadres following Liao Degong nodded lightly when they heard the words, but their expressions were somewhat dignified, probably because the consequences of this war with the Qing Dynasty were more tragic.

Liao Degong saw that these people's spirits were not very high, thought for a while, and said in an encouraging tone: "Look at you all looking downcast, what do you look like? Huh? You can't laugh your ass off when you see it! That's all, I'm now Let me give you guys a little bit of an overview. Commander Liao of Denglai just formulated the Liaodong strategy earlier this month. It is magnificent! It scares you to death. In the future, we will directly point to Shenyang, Liaoyang, and Jinzhou Yes, swallow all the vast land east of Liaodong, and then rely on the Yanshan Mountains and Shanhaiguan as a defensive boundary with the Qing Dynasty. In other words, we may all go to Shenyang for work in the future. This little Phoenix in front of us The city is a fart, I still can't see it."

Liao Degong's words really shocked many people, this is indeed what they did not expect.It's just that everyone is a little confused. Now they have 2 to [-] people in Liaodong, and thousands of soldiers and horses. Is it really enough to support them to occupy the entire Liaodong?This may sound a little unrealistic, but you must know that the Eight Banners outside the pass are not dead people, they have [-] horses, how can they be so easy to get along with?

Liao Degong saw their doubts, but he didn't intend to explain them more. He believed that smart people would naturally be able to see the clues from all kinds of information today.The Qing Dynasty will start a war on all fronts in Sichuan, Huguang, and Zhejiang, and the scale of the war will gradually expand from less than 10 people a year or two ago to more than 20 people now, and the intensity will also increase day by day. This will consume a lot of their national power. of.And now it is no better than before. In the first few years after entering the customs, the Beijing court could easily send captives and reorganized hundreds of thousands of surrendered troops to the south, so that they would not have to bear any expenses because of food for the enemy, and they could even pay for it. Sit on the ground and share the spoils.But it can't work now. Zhejiang has been unable to make a breakthrough because of the relationship between the people on the east bank. Sichuan is in a mess. With gunboats on the east coast, they couldn't quickly break into the enemy's territory to obtain supplies, so all expenses could only be borne by themselves, which was terrible, and it was also one of the reasons why they hadn't launched a large-scale southern expedition for many years.

Moreover, according to the information held by the people on the east coast, the trend of Oirat Mongolian unification is becoming more and more obvious, and the talented Gazan (Gerdan) has shown amazing ability and great ambition.His rise is both a good thing and a bad thing for the Mongolian tribes on the grassland, depending on their respective positions.Of course, for the Manchu and Mongolian courts who have always advocated the integration of Manchu and Mongolian, the rise of Junggar and Mongolia is indeed a big hidden danger, because this is digging their walls and destroying their foundations, which they cannot tolerate, and even more so. It takes a lot of effort to take care of it.

With these two things on their heads, the power of the Qing court was greatly limited, and the people from the east coast were definitely not under as much pressure as they imagined when they were engaged in troubles in Liaodong.To put it bluntly, although Manchuria is the so-called land of prosperity of the Eight Banners, you don’t even look at where the vast majority of Manchus live. Is it really absolutely impossible to give up?

From this point of view, the Liaodong strategy of the people on the east bank may not have no possibility of success at all.Of course, the premise is that Denglei and even the wealthy Ningbo will provide a lot of assistance, otherwise it will be very difficult, and it cannot conflict with the grand strategy of immigration, which is the number one ranking, otherwise everything will be out of the question.

"Do well, don't worry too much about the pressure from the Qing Dynasty. They didn't gain much this time. Even if they organize the same offensive in the future, I believe that we, who are already stronger, will face it more calmly. Time is on our side. That’s it.” Major Liao Degong finally said: “Besides, the Blackwater Pioneering Team has now set the tone. After making peace with the Russians, they will devote more energy to the south, along the Songhua River, Wusu The two roads of Lijiang go southward, occupy more land, control more population, and control all this large area of ​​land in our hands. Think about it, we have established a land that reaches the ocean in the north, the whale sea in the east, and the sea in the west. Albazin, a large colony that reaches the Yanshan Mountains in the south, controls millions of people, what a great achievement!"

There was a dinner last night, and it was past ten o'clock when I came back. I was so drunk that I fell asleep after reading the news for a while.In fact, weekends are quite busy. Taking the children out to play or something, I don’t have time for myself, so I might as well go to work.I just finished typing, and I sent it before I could check it. Fortunately, I didn’t stop updating for two consecutive days, which is very dangerous.Finally, thank you for your support.

(End of this chapter)