People in the Song Dynasty were lawless

Chapter 522: Destroy the Jin Dynasty, Just That Quickly
"boom!"

The chaos on the battlefield came to a halt as a warning shell fell into the Yu River, creating a huge splash.

Immediately afterwards, the remaining Liao troops scattered to both sides like birds and beasts, and the Jurchens in the distance began to chase them.

The crowd came and went in a rush, as if it were a farce.

The Song army on the border breathed a sigh of relief.

The Liao-Song border in the northeast region was divided by the Daling River, Yuli River and other rivers, which was almost in the area from Lingyuan City to Chaoyang City in later generations.

The border line is more than two or three hundred miles from west to east. Although the Northern Imperial Army is strong, they cannot defend such a long border line.

If a large number of Liao and Jin defeated soldiers crossed the border and killed people indiscriminately, and they failed to arrive in time, they would be in trouble.

Now that the enemy has not crossed the Yu River, it is already the best outcome.

At this moment, the north bank was still in chaos. In addition to the Liao army soldiers, there were many Khitan nobles in Dading Prefecture who were also fleeing in all directions.

Many of them chose to flee to the Song Dynasty border on the south bank. In addition to rivers, there were many mountains and rivers that could be crossed, and the Song army was simply unable to guard such a long border.

As a result, a large number of Khitan nobles and defeated soldiers fled into the border of the Song Dynasty, causing considerable chaos.

Fortunately, those Khitan nobles and the defeated soldiers were trying to escape, not to die. They also knew what would happen if they caused trouble or even killed people in Song territory.

So when the villagers discovered them and immediately reported it to the nearby government, they all just waited obediently for the Song people to come.

Compared to the Jurchens who killed them on sight, the Song people always gave them the impression of being reasonable and easy to deal with.

This is actually true.

After the Liao and Song dynasties changed their offensive and defensive strategies, the relationship between the two sides did not take a sharp turn for the worse.

The Song Dynasty also needed to trade with the Liao Kingdom for a long time and import a large amount of raw materials. Therefore, the principle of peaceful diplomacy was adopted, and both sides opened their borders to deepen trade cooperation.

The economic and trade exchanges between the two sides are very frequent, and there are also many exchanges among the people, resulting in the official relationship seeming ordinary, but the people-to-people relationship is still very warm.

This is a bit like the previous relationship between Song and Japan. There were not many official exchanges, but there was a lot of overlap due to the prosperous private business.

What's more, the Song Dynasty's military power is now strong. If the Liao people run to the west, they will die. If they run to the east, they will die even more. The north is the direction where the enemy is coming. Only by running to the south can they have a chance of survival.

The fact was just as the Liao people had guessed. Basically, the Liao people fled across the border, but the Song army did not drive them away. Instead, they gathered them together and detained them in local military camps in various states and counties, waiting for the court's decision.

Now the Constitutional Council is in charge of all military and political affairs of the country. This war not only concerns the fate of Liao and Jin, but also the diplomacy of the Song Dynasty. Therefore, how to deal with it has never been something that can be decided by the local governments.

However, just after the first day of the Lunar New Year, that is, on the third day after the Liao Dynasty's Zhongjing Dading Prefecture was captured, Shengji, located north of Ande, sent a piece of news that cheered up the Pacifier and Transport Envoy of Youyan Road.

After crossing the Daling River, the Liao emperor Yelu Chongyuan and his family members were walking in a panic through a forest when they were met by local garrisons, who politely invited them to the Shengji County government office.

The Youyan Road side originally planned to wait until Yelu Chongyuan's death before making a big fuss, finding reasons and excuses to go north and destroy the Jin Kingdom, thereby achieving a situation where the fishermen benefit.

But capturing the Liao emperor was another matter.

Although Liao and Song did not declare war, most of the wars between Liao and Song before were initiated by Liao.

If they could take the Emperor of Liao to Bianliang and let the current emperor question him, it would be a great honor for them and the officials of Youyan Road would have accomplished a great feat, wouldn't it?
The officials of Youyan Road immediately reported the news.

Not long after, just a few days later, the imperial court sent a receipt asking them to send Yelu Chongyuan to Bianliang.

Just after the New Year of the 14th year of the Qingli period of the Song Dynasty, a piece of news quietly appeared in the newspapers: "The Liao Kingdom was destroyed by internal rebellion, and the emperor Yelu Chongyuan surrendered to the Song Dynasty with his family."

Immediately afterwards, the Jinzouyuan propaganda machine, which was equivalent to the Propaganda Department of later generations, began to be fully activated, and newspapers of all sizes began to publish various news.

Some said that Yelu Chongyuan wanted to offer the northern territory of the Liao Kingdom to the Song Dynasty, while others began to argue that the Northeast has been the territory of the Han people since the Tang Dynasty, and that the Song Dynasty inherited the orthodoxy of the Tang Dynasty and should also have the right to inherit the northern territory.

All kinds of rumors are flying around.

When Yelu Chongyuan arrived in Bianliang and accidentally heard the news, he could only sigh. When he was received by the Emperor Zhao Zhen of the Song Dynasty, he knelt on the ground with his forehead touching the ground and offered the entire territory of the Liao Kingdom to the Song Dynasty.

Under normal circumstances, as a king of a fallen country, Yelu Chongyuan no longer had his country and was not qualified to do so. Even if he did, the Song Dynasty would not be able to take over these territories.

But that refers to the situation where the power of the Jin Kingdom and the Song Dynasty was not much different. Now the Song Dynasty has everything ready, except for a righteous cause, and Yelu Chongyuan gave it this cause.

So what happens next is simple.

Zhao Zhen waved his hand, and the Privy Council and the Ministry of War took immediate action, sending three lieutenant generals to Youyan Road to lead troops and attack Huanglong Prefecture directly.

Under the policy of strengthening the trunk and weakening the branches of the Song Dynasty, although there were more than one hundred major generals, each major general in the garrison could only command five thousand people. In addition, due to the different system and the lack of dual leadership by the political commissar, the procedures for mobilizing troops were very complicated.

In addition to the conventional method of mobilizing troops by the Privy Council, the Ministry of War and the Emperor, the second method of mobilizing troops is one of the provisions of the "Basic Law of Territorial Defense" promulgated by the Song Dynasty a few years ago.

That is to say, if there is an invasion by foreign enemies and the imperial court is unable to give timely instructions, local government officials and generals can lead troops to resist the foreign enemies in accordance with this law.

This means that the conditions for generals to lead troops are very harsh, so as to prevent what happened to Park Kaka from happening.

Moreover, there is only a major general among the generals stationed outside the province, and the rest of the lieutenant generals and generals are all in Bianliang. Unless a high-level battle is encountered, it is basically impossible to deploy them.

But it is obvious that destroying the Jin Dynasty was not a particularly high standard. Even in the war of annihilation, only three lieutenant generals were sent, and that was for the purpose of decentralization. Otherwise, one lieutenant general would be enough.

Soon, in early January of the 14th year of the Qingli period, the Song Dynasty announced to all quarters that the Liao Dynasty's offering of territory and the Jurchens' unauthorized establishment of a nation were acts of rebellion, and officially marched north to attack the newly established pseudo-regime of the Jin Dynasty.

This reason seems strange to later generations.

The winner is the king and the loser is the bandit.

Since the Liao Dynasty was destroyed by the Jin Dynasty, it should be the Jin Dynasty that inherited the territory of the Liao Dynasty.

But in ancient society, especially in the Confucian cultural circle of East Asia, what was emphasized was the righteousness of the relationship between ruler and subject, father and son.

The Jurchens were formerly subjects of the Liao Kingdom, and their rebellion now is a manifestation of their disloyalty to the Liao Kingdom.

In name, the Liao regime was recognized by all parties. The Liao offered its territory, which should belong to the Song Dynasty. It was reasonable for the Song Dynasty to attack it in this name. Of course.

In fact, this is just an excuse. There were too many rebellions in ancient times. Cao Pi usurped the Han Dynasty, Sima usurped the Wei Dynasty, Liu Yu usurped the Jin Dynasty, and the Tang Dynasty also rebelled to establish the Sui Dynasty. Can this deny their legitimacy?

So in essence it is about whoever has the bigger fist is right, but since the four countries are now vassal states of the Song Dynasty, they naturally need such an excuse to justify their actions.

When Wanyan Ugunai of the Great Jin Dynasty learned about this, he was naturally shocked and hurriedly sent an envoy again, writing a sincere letter, stating that he had never thought of being an enemy of the Great Song Dynasty and that he was willing to become a vassal state of the Great Song Dynasty after the founding of his country.

However, as the saying goes, if you have a big fist, you have the right. Now the Song Dynasty has a big fist, and the Jin Dynasty is afraid of it, so of course it will be humble. But if the Jin Dynasty finds that the Song Dynasty is weak and can be bullied after destroying the Liao Dynasty, how could it miss the opportunity?

Isn’t this how the Northern Song Dynasty fell in history?
Therefore, the Song Dynasty did not pay any attention to the Jin Kingdom at all. Instead, it sent 30,000 troops from Youyan Road, and with more than 10,000 troops each from Yunshuo Road and Liaoyang Prefecture, they advanced in three routes.

After two days of discussion, Wanyan Wugunai, who was acting arrogantly in Dading Prefecture, Zhongjing of the Liao Dynasty, finally did not choose a head-on confrontation, but planned to lure the enemy deeper into his territory.

It has to be said that he was wise. Just like the Ming Dynasty when it tried to wipe out Nurhaci, Nurhaci did not fight hard, but chose to retreat first, lure the enemy deep into his territory, and then defeat them one by one, thus achieving a great victory in the Battle of Sarhu.

Unfortunately, the Song army was not the Ming army. Although the Song army still had major problems in overall command, such as the three routes were led by a total of five lieutenant generals, there was no main general to unify the command of the battle, resulting in each fighting on their own.

However, in the absence of a unified command from above, the intermediate combat units, each consisting of an army, were well-equipped and well-commanded. Basically, a lieutenant general led two armies in combat, and one army was commanded by a major general, totaling more than 50,000 people, working together to encircle the Jurchens.

The first to head north were the troops stationed in Liaoyang Prefecture. They adopted an unstoppable fighting style and the army marched northward along the main road. In just a few days, they first captured Shenzhou, then took Guide without stopping, and headed straight for Huanglong Prefecture.

Wanyan Wugunai immediately mobilized a large number of troops to evacuate the heartland of the former Liao Kingdom, and then in Tongzhou, which is the area around Siping City in Liaoning Province in later generations, he planned to use the terrain advantage to intercept the invading Song army halfway.

But what made Wanyan Ugunai collapse was that the army did not even reach the ambush point. When a large number of Liao army surrendered soldiers heard that they were going to fight with the Song army, most of them ran away halfway. Many even killed the Jurchen supervisors and fled in all directions.

After all, the number of Jurchens was still smaller than that of Khitans, and they were obedient after being captured because of their natural fear of the Jurchens. But once the fear of the Song army prevailed in their hearts, the fear of the Jurchens was naturally overwhelmed, and they fought desperately.

Compared to being shot to death by the Song army from hundreds of feet away on the battlefield, or being bombarded to death by cannons from miles away, they would rather fight a desperate battle with the Jurchens, whose main weapons were still cold weapons, in exchange for a glimmer of hope of survival.

When this happened at this critical juncture, Wanyan Wugunai had no way to deal with it. In fact, even the Jurchens themselves were in a panic, let alone the captives.

So he had no choice but to continue advancing.

After finally arriving at the place, arranging the ambush position, and listening to the scouts' reports on the enemy's movements, they calmly waited for the Song army to arrive.

As a result, just as I saw the figure, I suddenly heard a faint "whoosh whoosh whoosh" sound coming from a mile or two away.

then.

"Bang, bang, bang, bang, bang, bang, bang!"

The Jin people were stunned by the mortar bombardment and didn't know what was happening. Explosions were heard everywhere, as if the surrounding mountains and hills were about to be flattened to the ground.

It can only be said that this is just a first-generation light mortar, weighing more than 200 kilograms and with a maximum range of only one kilometer.

During World War II, the Japanese Type 94 mortar had a range of up to four kilometers, and the Type 96 and Type 4 mortars with a range of two to three kilometers were also standard.

In comparison, the weapons of the Song army still had a certain gap compared to those of the more advanced industrial countries during World War II.

But compared with the Jin Dynasty during the cold weapon period, the situation is completely different.

The Jin people had just seen human figures in the distance, and it was the scouts in front who saw them. The main force behind them was still in the ambush circle, and they couldn't even see the people, but they were hit by artillery fire.

Soon after, a large number of Song troops came charging in, with continuous "bang bang bang bang" sounds of gunfire and even "da da da da" sounds of machine guns with blue patterns on them.

The bullets flying all over the mountains and fields splashed up countless dust and startled countless Jin soldiers who screamed.

After just over a dozen seconds of artillery fire and gun fire, the ambushed Jin army could no longer hold on and fled one after another. The cavalry troops in the rear ran away even faster.

At this time, the Song army, which was a mile away, arrived at the battlefield more than ten minutes later.

They themselves did not expect the battle to end so quickly. The team leader, Major General Yang Wenguang, simply observed the enemy's ambush circle with a telescope on the mountain, and then ordered the mortar team to bomb in that direction.

After the mortar bombs were finished the infantry charged again, the two sides were far apart, there was no actual fighting, no close contact, and the war was over.

And this is the absolute advantage that industrial countries have over nomadic peoples who are not even agricultural countries.

The Jin army was defeated in one battle.

The total war was just an encounter battle in Tongzhou where Yang Wenguang led 5,000 men.

Afterwards, the main force of Youyan Road and the detachment of Liaoyang Prefecture gathered at Huanglong Prefecture and began to attack the capital of the Jin Dynasty, Huanglong City.

Historically, after Wanyan Aguda established the Jin Dynasty, he first established his capital in Duning Prefecture, which is around Harbin, because this was the old nest of the Wanyan tribe, and then he began to expand outward.

As the Liao Kingdom was now greatly weakened, Wanyan Ugunai was in a much stronger position than Wanyan Aguda after his rise. He had already controlled most of the Northeast and established his capital in Huanglongfu.

Therefore, Huanglongfu became the center of the Jin Dynasty. Wanyan Wugunai also fought all the way from here to Changchun Prefecture, and then went south to destroy the Liao Dynasty.

But the glory lasted only less than half a year. The Jin Dynasty quickly declined and was besieged by the Song Dynasty.

Half a month later.

In early February, the Song army surrounded Huanglong City tightly.

Wanyan Wugunai chose to leave the city and surrender.

He didn't want to go to war with the Song Dynasty in the first place, but now that he was forced to fight, he naturally had no choice but to surrender.

It took less than a month from the time the troops were sent out in January to the demise of the Jin Dynasty in February.

In fact, the Song army spent most of this month on the road, and only fought one battle with a small force. The rest of the time it just marched northward.

It’s that quick to destroy the Jin Dynasty.

(End of this chapter)