Lu Ming

Chapter 549 Ming-Portuguese War ([-])

On April 1631, 4, on the morning of the eighth day after the ultimatum from the Ming Dynasty was issued, the Ming and Portuguese sides officially started war.

Standing in front of the gate, Andrade, the clerk of the Macau City Council, couldn't help but heave a long sigh when he saw the tough scene.

As the last envoy, he came to the front of the two armies to receive the war documents.

At this moment, in front of the gate of the formerly prosperous Lotus Stem, the guards have become heavily guarded, and there are Ming soldiers with guns on their backs and short jackets and shorts everywhere.Barbed wire, antlers, and circular strongholds made of sandbags were erected around the gate.

The lush vegetation nearby has also been cleared away, exposing a flat land, which is green and black, as if it indicates that the ominous is coming.

As the last envoy, Andrade didn't see any Ming officials at all this time—whether traditional bureaucrats in robes or officials with short hair under a certain earl.

And the one who handed over the documents to Andrade was just a low-ranking officer with a cold face and a big-brimmed hat.

After slightly bowing his head and maintaining the etiquette that a nobleman should have, Andrade, who took over the documents, walked in the direction of the carriage when the people turned around.

Get in the car, reach out to close the carved car door with beautiful glass windows, and Andrade said to the two servants: "Gentlemen, a long and arduous war is inevitable, if I want to say it. Take back what you see Well, the governor is waiting for you."

Andrade came here, in addition to fulfilling the formalities for starting the war, spying on the military situation is also the meaning of the title.

In this era, as well as in the thousands of years before and the centuries after, the side with a strong fortress has a strategic advantage that is difficult to shake.

In ancient siege warfare, for thousands of years, the attacking side spent ten times as much resources and twenty times as many soldiers, and then spent years and months to attack strong cities.People may think that wars are "siege of cities and territories", but in the long history, there are more examples of various tortoises that make the enemy return home.

European lords in the Middle Ages relied on the castles inherited by their families to control their subjects from the Roman Empire to the Industrial Revolution.

Even in later generations when hot weapons have begun to become popular, the Sevastopol Fortress in the Crimean War and the Brest Fortress in World War II are still telling the indispensable influence of the strong city on the war: the so-called The siege, as long as it takes a long time, the attacker's army will definitely produce various cholera, dysentery and syphilis plagues, which is a big killer for all defenders.

In the colonial era of the 17th century, strong strongholds or fortresses were the core essence of ensuring colonial activities.

You only need to build a fort anywhere, set up arquebus guns, and a few more cannons, and you can safely and boldly do business with the natives. The fort is a trading center, and it can also effectively prevent the natives and rogues from various countries who are also colonists from coveting attacks. shelter.

Fortresses built by colonists around the world are almost commonplace in the face of a large number of indigenous sieges, and the number of indigenous people is less than ten times that they are embarrassed to go out.Not to mention, what is close at hand is that the Dutch were besieged by the indigenous empire in Batavia.In history, Governor Cohen died of dysentery during the siege period. However, the natives faced the strong city and finally returned home.

The most important reason why Comrade Zheng Damu was able to leave his name in the annals of history and become a national hero was that he defeated the city of Zeelandia built by the Dutch in Taiwan.However, what most people in later generations don’t know is that Zheng Damu led the army at that time. With a huge advantage in military strength (3+), he besieged the city of Zeelandia for a year, until the Dutchmen in the city (1000 +) After running out of ammunition and food, he went out of the city and signed the surrender treaty peacefully.

In other words, if the Dutchman has sufficient supplies, he can continue to consume more than [-] times the Zheng army-this is the meaning of the existence of the fortress.

You must know that in areas other than the Ming Dynasty, colonists from various countries are fighting each other all the time, and among them, there are very few battles that can really take down the opponent's stronghold.In contrast, the colonists had to voluntarily abandon a certain stronghold due to various infectious diseases and the blockade of the natives, which was much more than a frontal war.

In fact, the countless defense experiences of fortresses on the coast of Africa, North and South America, and India are the real reliance that contributed to the final decision of the Portuguese in Macau to fight hard.

From the perspective of the Portuguese senior officials in Macau, it is entirely possible to block the enemy for a long time with the help of several forts around the city and the city defense of Macau City itself.This time will be very long, long enough to cause the opponent's army to suffer from epidemic diseases and lose combat effectiveness. This situation will definitely occur in the hot and humid south of the Ming Dynasty.

At that time, everyone can sit down and sign a decent "business" agreement.

Based on this strategic thinking, the two entourages who accompanied Andrade to receive the letter of war today are actually regular Portuguese military officers specially sent by the governor.Both of these officers had previously served in different Portuguese colonies and had extensive war experience.

The main object of their observation today is the combat readiness of the Ming army, but the outcome obviously will not make the Portuguese happy.

In terms of the situation seen along the way, in addition to the expected large number of soldiers, another symptom also shows signs of the long-term war that the Portuguese fear most: the construction site.

Just by the roadside when they came, a large number of migrant workers started their work early in the morning.Although it was not clear what the project was until Andrade and the others left, but no matter what the project was, it meant that the Ming government had mobilized more resources than expected.

In Andrade's view, those migrant workers were laying the foundations for military barracks or military warehouses.In this way, the possibility of the Portuguese facing a long-term war has greatly increased.

"Gentlemen, a long and arduous battle is inevitable, if my observations are followed. Now, take back what you have seen, the governor is waiting for you."

After hearing Andrade's judgment, the other two attendants nodded, and the next moment the carriage started. Half an hour later, Andrade returned to the St. Paul's Fort, commonly known as the Cannon Fort.

At this critical moment of the war, as the commander-in-chief of the battle, Sir Shivela, the governor from Lisbon, must be in uniform to receive first-hand information at the fort.

So at the front of Cannon Taipei, facing the direction of the Ming Dynasty, Shivela got the war document immediately.Although there was no rumble of cannons, at the moment the governor took over the document, Ming and Portugal officially started a war.

"Pick it up, the thief chief is picking up the document!"

What the Portuguese didn't expect was that at the moment when the governor took over the document, an excited voice yelled loudly at the gate of the lotus stem five miles away, which represented the start of war.

On the gate at this moment, the big flag was fluttering, crowds of people were crowded, there were many armored people, big bosses gathered, and all the senior military personnel from the Guangdong side of the Ming Dynasty were present.

The big banner inserted in the middle of the gate tower was naturally not for pulling the cool Zongbing Cao.There is a big "He" written on this big banner, which is naturally the flag of He Rubin and He Zhentai, the commander-in-chief guarding Guangdong in the Ming Dynasty.

The one next to Lord He's general flag is Cao Zhongchen's general Zhang Chao's flag.

Along the left and right sides of the tooth banners of the two big brothers, there is a row of banners of local generals in Guangdong.Among them are not only the garrison general flags of Chaozhou, Leilian, Nanxiong and other places, but also the generals who have never been taken lightly in the East and West Mountains to defend against Yao, and even Lianshan, Luo Ding and other generals who defend Yao with heavy troops. , occupying a place on the city tower at the moment.

As mentioned earlier, the war against Portugal was an excellent opportunity for publicity.

In the [-]th century, when information exchange was underdeveloped, when it was time to get real, the most troublesome thing for the traversers was that the opponent became "reckless" due to poor information.

And this time's war propaganda is a good opportunity for the traversers to solve this problem based on a long-term perspective: to show their muscles to the high-level officers and soldiers in Guangdong, to deter the opponent, so as to reduce the opponent's resistance in a certain "confrontation" state that will inevitably occur in the future Determined to shake the other party's will and create conditions for peaceful negotiations.

So this time in the war against Portugal, General Cao spread heroic posts widely. In the name of the deputy commander of the Guangdong Military Region, he invited as many powerful generals as possible from all over the province to be guests. , reimbursement of expenses, and exquisite gifts after the meeting.

This is the scene where someone shouted on the tower just now.

The one who shouted excitedly was a tall, dark-skinned, big-faced Ming military officer with a big beard——former mountain ginseng general Ma Lianzuo.

During the Wanli period, the Ming court established the Guangzhou Haiphong Tongzhi Yamen in Yongmo, which is only one day away from Macau, and deployed thousands of troops to defend it and set up generals.In the first year of Tianqi (1621), the General Office was moved to the former cottage a few miles west of Lianhuastem, and the number of guarding officers and soldiers increased greatly.

Yes, the so-called Qianshan general is the chief military general of the Ming Dynasty who is responsible for the defense of Macau.That is to say, in theory, the defense of the lotus stem and even the surrounding Macau area was originally in charge of the bearded Ma Shenfu.It's just that Captain Ma has now met Commander Cao who mobilized a large number of troops to do things, and his defense duties have been taken over.

However, these did not affect the excitement of Ma Shenjiang today.At this moment, General Ma Shen, with his butt pouted and his horse gait lowered his head, stopped one of his eyes on a Zeiss 150mm 66x digital auto-zoom single mounted on a cast-iron tripod erected at the top of the city. Through the binoculars, greedily staring at every move in the lens.

General Ma Shen not only watched it by himself, but also kept broadcasting the Portuguese governor's every move live: "The enemy chief received the document, and the enemy chief interrogated the three envoys. Ha, the enemy chief threw the document. This is watching our army from a distance. Array!"

(End of this chapter)