prosperous age

Chapter 1083 1174 Journey to the West

"Master, the Ministry of War has sent an urgent report."

Wei Guangde was reading memorials in the duty room when Lu Bu came in hurriedly, stood beside him, bowed and said something, then handed him a document with both hands.

Wei Guangde slowly put down the memorial in his hand, reached out to take it, unfolded it and took a look.

"News from the Old Port."

Just seeing him looking up, Wei Guangde couldn't help but murmur something.

Yes, this urgent report from the Ministry of War was issued by Yu Dayou a few days before leaving Jiugang, reporting the departure time and expected arrival time in Myanmar.

This is a very important node because after the Ming navy arrives in the waters near Myanmar, it will look for a landing point and begin a military attack on Myanmar from the south.

After the war broke out in the south, the Burmese King Mang Yinglong would receive the news within ten days at most.

Yu Dayou did not know about Li Chengliang's plan in Yunnan, but he knew that the Ming Dynasty had already fought with the Burmese army in Yunnan.

Yes, after the war broke out, the battle reports were transmitted to Guangdong, and the South China Sea Navy's centipede ship delivered the battle reports to Jiugang.

Since the fighting had already started in the north, the South China Sea Navy naturally did not need to stay in Jiugang for long. After sorting out the situation here, Yu Dayou led the fleet and set off towards Myanmar.

During his stay in the old port, he had learned some information about Myanmar from the merchants here. He knew that the main ports in Myanmar at that time were Pegu, Matuba, etc., and that the Portuguese had built a small dock near Thanlyin for their merchant ships to rest and replenish.

However, although Thanlyin is close to the Yangon River, the water transportation resources of the Yangon River are not well developed, so it is not considered an important port in Myanmar. Instead, Bago has been targeted by Yu Dayou because it is closer to the capital Toungoo City.

When talking about Myanmar, people in China generally think that the capital of Myanmar should be Yangon. After all, it is the largest city in Myanmar and a port city with a long history and a strong influence in the country.

However, this was only true before 2005, because in that year, the Myanmar government made a decision to move the capital.

Yes, Myanmar moved its capital from Yangon to Naypyidaw, a city surrounded by mountains in central Myanmar.

Less than a hundred kilometers away from Naypyidaw is Taungoo City, which is surrounded by flat terrain.

It is not known whether this capital relocation is similar to the idea of ​​the King of the Toungoo Dynasty. Choosing to establish the capital in central Myanmar seems to be more conducive to the rule of the kingdom.

In fact, Myanmar has always been a multi-ethnic country. Influenced by history, chieftains were rampant in ancient times and the central government had limited control over local areas.

In modern times, local armed forces are still prevalent in Myanmar, which is also related to the multi-ethnic population.

There are as many as 135 ethnic groups of all sizes in Myanmar. In fact, they are just slightly larger tribes, or the leaders of their tribes were the chieftains of that time.

Among these tribes, the Burmese are the largest ethnic group.

During the feudal dynasty period, many violent conflicts broke out among various ethnic groups and tribes in order to fight for power and profit, and they also constituted the main force of the local armed forces later.

In modern times, hostility among ethnic groups in Myanmar is strong, especially the resentment of ethnic minorities towards the Burmese.

The Burmese have long been the country's main ruling group, living in coastal areas.

Most ethnic minorities live in remote mountainous areas, where economic and social conditions are extremely harsh.

Such conflicts do not exist now, because the domestic ethnic conflicts were largely provoked by the British as the colonizers, who needed obedient and docile Burmese people under their control to manage other Burmese on their behalf.

At this time, Yu Dayou had to face the situation of landing in Pegu, then heading north to attack Toungoo City, threatening the foundation of the Burmese king's rule.

In his opinion, this would be beneficial to Li Chengliang's battle against the Burmese army in Yunnan.

When his nest is threatened, any normal ruler will know what to do.

What's more, they were facing a powerful country, the Ming Dynasty. It would undoubtedly be a pipe dream to defeat the Ming army in a short period of time and then return for support.

However, at this time, because he did not know Li Chengliang's plan, he judged that it was obviously not appropriate to launch the attack now, as this would create loopholes in the huge encirclement prepared by Li Chengliang.

That is, after knowing that the Ming army landed in southern Myanmar and attacked Toungoo City, Mang Yinglong led the main force back to support Toungoo City. After defeating the Ming navy that came from afar, he returned to fight Li Chengliang.

Don’t think that the Myanmar army can’t do it. You have to know that northern Myanmar is full of mountains and hills.

As long as Mang Yinglong led his troops south and used the mountainous terrain to set up defenses along the way, it would be difficult for Li Chengliang's troops to quickly break through the Burmese army's blockade and gain the opportunity to attack the Burmese army from both the north and the south.

Such tactics were almost impossible to implement in that era, because without fast means of communication, the two Ming armies in the south and the north could not communicate with each other.

Once such a war situation occurs, the consequences are obvious. There is a high probability that we will be defeated one by one by the Burmese army.

Well, even Wei Guangde, a half-baked military civil servant, could have imagined such a trend of development, not to mention the people from the Ministry of War.

Therefore, Yu Dayou's military intelligence was urgently sent to the cabinet and handed over to Wei Guangde to see how to deal with it.

After reading the military intelligence, Wei Guangde was silent for a moment and then he realized that the final decision-making power on this matter was not in the capital, but in Yunnan.

First of all, Li Chengliang must be informed of the movements of the Ming Dynasty's South China Sea navy so that he can launch the encirclement tactics at the right time.

If the Burmese army could be surrounded after they learned that the Ming army had landed on the southern coast of Myanmar, the tactical impact would be maximized, not only undermining the morale of the Burmese army, but also causing them to panic.

Myanmar's terrain is characterized by high mountains in the north and relatively flat terrain in the south. Except for a few rivers, there are almost no natural barriers to stop the Ming army's advance.

If the southern plains of Myanmar were lost, the Burmese army would be surrounded by the Ming army in the northern mountains. With so many troops gathered, the supply would be enough to overwhelm them.

A siege war is not necessarily a war of encirclement and annihilation. Arranging defenses on the periphery means surrounding the enemy without using any knives or guns, and you can force the enemy to either take the initiative to fight or starve to death in the encirclement.

When the Burmese army rushed south to rescue the capital, it was an excellent opportunity to destroy the main force of the Burmese army.

The Ming army did not need to take the initiative to attack. As long as they blocked the Burmese army's retreat route, the enemy would be thrown into disarray and forced to fight against the Ming army passively.

These were just what Wei Guangde was considering at the time, because the specific implementation depended entirely on Li Chengliang, and he had no way of directly commanding the Ming army thousands of miles away.

Moreover, with his half-baked military ability, it was absolutely impossible for him to surpass real generals like Li Chengliang and Yu Dayou.

His only advantage is that he has more experience and knowledge, and his vision is slightly higher than those famous generals.

For example, if it were not for Wei Guangde's plan, no one in the Ming court would have thought of sending the navy from Southeast Asia to southern Myanmar if the war was not going on this time.

People of this era simply don’t have this kind of thinking.

Of course, this is not all. In fact, the navy has always existed in the Ming Dynasty, but most people who think this way are officials in the navy. They have little power and low status, and no one pays attention to what they say.

As for the civil servants, they knew that it was very close to go to Liaodong by sea from Shandong, which was easier than taking the Liaoxi Corridor, but they still did not realize the importance of the sea route.

After all, China has been a continental country since ancient times, and its thinking is also limited to it. Thinking of this, Wei Guangde acted quickly, took out a piece of paper, picked up the pen and started writing.

The content was very simple. It was to copy the military intelligence of the South China Sea Navy and send it to Li Chengliang in Yunnan at an express delivery of 800 miles.

Yes, Wei Guangde did not write anything else. Knowing the intelligence and how to respond was the generals' business. There was no need for him and the Ministry of War to interfere.

If Li Chengliang still doesn't know what to do after seeing the military situation, then his career as a commander-in-chief is over.

After writing the note, Wei Guangde blew on it to make the ink dry faster.

After a while, he handed it to Lu Bu and ordered: "You go in person and deliver it to the Ministry of War immediately. Ask them to send the news to Governor Li of Yunnan as quickly as possible."

The ink on the note had not yet dried, so Lu Bu naturally did not dare to fold it. He could only take it with both hands, then turned around and ran out.

Wei Guangde had to send the message out as quickly as possible, and he understood it, so naturally he didn't dare to delay for a moment.

"Today is the eighth day of the first lunar month. It will take the navy about ten days to reach the Burmese waters. We should still be in time."

After Lu Bu left, Wei Guangde was still muttering to himself.

It would take at least half a month to travel 800 miles from the capital to Yunnan by express train.

By this calculation, when Li Chengliang received the military intelligence documents, Yu Dayou's navy might have already approached Pegu, or had landed for a day or two.

It took another ten days for the news to be transmitted from Pegu to Toungoo City, and then to Yunnan and handed over to Mang Yinglong. These few days were the time window for the Ming army to dispatch troops from Mengding Prefecture.

It was probably too late to implement Li Chengliang's original encirclement tactics, but by attacking Mubang from Mengding and then advancing to Mengmi, he could still block the Burmese army's retreat route to the south.

Since the encirclement could not be launched, we could take advantage of the Burmese army's eagerness to move south and set up defense lines along the way to stop them. We still had the opportunity to inflict huge casualties on the main force of the Burmese army.

What's more, the Ming troops in Baoshan and Shidian would not just sit there and watch the Burmese army retreat. They would take advantage of the situation to attack and chase after them, thus slowing down the Burmese army's retreat.

Thinking of this, Wei Guangde felt a little upset. He didn't know how capable Li Chengliang was in commanding mobile warfare. If they fought like this, things would probably be a mess, and it would all depend on the frontline generals' ability to command the battle.

Of course, Yu Dayou, who was already on the ocean, didn't know all this.

At this time, the South China Sea Navy led by him was safely passing through the Strait of Malacca. Of course, in the Ming Dynasty, this place was still called Malacca.

The arrival of the Ming navy again scared the Portuguese in Malacca.

Although they had received documents from the Ming Dynasty and knew that the Ming navy came here to recover a piece of land they had lost before, namely Jiugang.

But the arrival of the Ming navy here again still deeply stimulated the Portuguese.

Yes, if they set their eyes on a piece of land or a town, they would not launch an offensive the first time and send troops to occupy it. They would usually go back and forth many times, and only after confirming the importance of the place would they think of occupying it.

The Ming navy rarely came to Southeast Asia before, so naturally they had no interest in this place.

But if they come here often in the future, they may develop some ideas about this place over time.

At least by occupying the city of Malacca, the fleet can sail here and dock, and the soldiers and ships can be repaired and maintained.

As for the Old Port, after all, it is some distance away from the entrance and exit of the Strait of Malacca and cannot control this important waterway.

Fortunately, the Ming navy had no idea of ​​this place. The fleet went straight over and headed towards the Indian Ocean. They just watched the Ming fleet leave silently on the top floor of the castle.

"Hurry up and build new artillery batteries. We must strengthen the city's defenses."

The Governor of Malacca gave orders to the city defense commander, Sequeira.

When the Portuguese saw the Ming fleet appear for the first time, they treated it as a powerful enemy and selected several locations around Malacca, preparing to build more artillery batteries to strengthen the city's defenses.

"Yes, Your Excellency."

Lopez Sequeira naturally agreed.

He wanted to build it before, but the government didn’t give him money, so how could he do it?

Now, the Ming fleet has passed by twice, and the governor has become anxious and urged them to go.

Just as the Portuguese were paying attention to the Ming fleet, some princes and ministers of the Aceh Kingdom on Sumatra Island rushed to the beach to watch after learning that the Ming navy had entered the strait again.

When the Ming Dynasty's South China Sea Navy entered the Strait of Malacca for the first time, it chose to return after only halfway through. So although it entered the sphere of influence of the Kingdom of Aceh, the Kingdom of Aceh was not prepared at all. From the king to the ministers, they only knew about this after hearing the reports from the soldiers stationed on the coast.

However, hearing the soldiers mention the scale of hundreds of warships still shocked everyone in the Aceh Kingdom.

The Kingdom of Aceh also had stories about Zheng He's fleet sailing to the West, so they had no doubts about the scenes described by the soldiers.

In their eyes, the Ming Dynasty has the strength to do so.

This could be done more than a hundred years ago, let alone now.

After receiving the documents sent from Old Port, the top leaders of the Kingdom of Aceh knew that there was little hope of continuing to infiltrate southwards and seek Old Port.

The original owner of the old port has returned. With the tiger of Ming Dynasty at their side, what they are considering now is no longer how to live in peace with them, but to be careful in dealing with a behemoth like Ming Dynasty to avoid being found an excuse to completely seize Sumatra Island through war.

You should know that the so-called Strait of Malacca is actually a waterway between Sumatra Island and the Malay Peninsula.

Controlling the Malay Peninsula is somewhat difficult, but it becomes much easier if you only target Sumatra.

Moreover, controlling Sumatra would also allow for the effective deployment of troops to intercept ships that bypass the Strait of Malacca from the south.

In peacetime, ships will certainly not go far away instead of near, but this may not be the case in wartime.

In fact, Yu Dayou was also very surprised by the Portuguese choice. They set their sights on Malacca rather than the north of Sumatra.

In fact, blocking the strait can be done in the middle or at both ends. In Yu Dayou's opinion, blocking the strait north of Sumatra seems to be more effective.

This is also the reason why Yu Dayou had already set his sights on the Kingdom of Aceh at this time. He wanted to monopolize Sumatra, so that Malacca's strategic advantage would no longer exist.

Moreover, the Ming Dynasty could build a city in Temasek and completely surround the city of Malacca.

The people on the shore were looking at the Ming navy, and the people on the boat were also looking at them.