My life is like walking on thin ice

Chapter 338 The First Practice of the New Rules

As time went by, the court in Chang'an calmed down a little from the cheers of the basic victory of the war.

——As the central administrative center of the Han regime, the Chang'an court had a lot to do.

Apart from other daily operations and annual routine affairs, there are still many things that need to be handled by the Chang'an court.

Even just this war, which has not yet been officially declared a victory but is basically a foregone conclusion, has countless things to do, and it will take the Chang'an court one to two years to deal with.

In December of the winter, the two battlefields of Mayi and Hetao respectively submitted the lists of casualties of the battle to the court in Chang'an.

In the Mayi battlefield, due to the huge disparity in military strength between the Han and the Xiongnu, there were slightly more casualties.

The war lasted no more than twenty days, but the Mayi defenders under Cheng Buzhi suffered huge losses, with more than 6,000 people killed and tens of thousands of people injured to varying degrees.

Of course, as the defending party, the losses of Cheng Buzhi's troops were definitely not as great as those of the main force of the Xiongnu Chanyu Ting as the attacking party.

However, the Huns' custom of "robbing corpses" interfered. Although Cheng Buzhi's troops caused no less than 10,000 casualties to Junchen's main force, they could not produce the most direct evidence: heads, to prove their military achievements.

Combining data from various parties - such as the rough visual observations and estimates of the generals on the Mayi battlefield, and the news channels of the grassland, that is, the approximate news sent back by Chang'an Hou Lu Tazhi, in this battle, the main force of the Shanyu court led by Junchen picked up no less than tens of thousands of corpses outside the city of Mayi.

At the same time, no less than 10,000 people were wounded on the battlefield, and some died or became disabled because they failed to receive timely and effective medical treatment.

On the grassland, being disabled is no different from dying in battle.

Therefore, after a brief discussion in the Chang'an court, preparations were made for the compensation of the fallen soldiers, the resettlement of the wounded soldiers, and the approval of the military merits of the generals of the Mayi Front Army.

——Earlier, when Liu Rong took out the new rules for approving military merits, no one had yet realized that this new system would actually increase the workload of the Chang'an court after the war to such an appalling level!

Because according to the regulations in Liu Rong's "New Rules", the approval of the military merits of the fallen soldiers requires endorsement from at least three comrades in the same squad and a direct superior three levels above.

for example;

You are a soldier. In the Battle of Mayi, you are unfortunately shot down by a stray arrow on the top of the city wall of Mayi.

There are eight privates, two sergeants and one sergeant in your squad. In addition to you, another private was killed in battle and a sergeant was injured.

After the war, your captain unit reported to the court in Chang'an, saying that you had won military honors before your death in battle, and that the approval of the court was required.

At this time, three of your six surviving comrades-in-arms must testify and endorse your military exploits.

At the same time, your wounded sergeant, the squad leader of your ten men, and the garrison commander who you rarely see and has command over fifty men, will all testify for you and the other fallen soldier: these two men were not deserters, nor were they missing on the battlefield, but they actually died in battle on the city wall of Mayi.

At the same time, they will endorse your military achievements based on the information they have learned.

For example, your three comrades said: Well, this guy shot and killed two Huns on the top of Mayi City and hacked one to death. We saw it all.
Your sergeant agrees: Yes, the bodies of the two Huns who were shot were snatched back by other Huns outside the city, and the head of the one who was hacked to death was cut off and handed over to the military supervisor.

Your squad leader looked at the village chief and said: Have I reported this matter to you, my superior?
The village chief replied: Yes, this is true. I still have a written report on file, and I have also reported this matter specifically to the military supervisor.

At this point, the military honors of you, the fallen soldier, have been verified with a complete chain of evidence.

——Your corpse, the type of weapon that killed you, and the part of your body where you were fatally wounded prove that you were a hero who died in Mayi;

Your comrades-in-arms, superiors, and the Hun head recorded by the military inspector, are proof of your military exploits during your lifetime.

Then, the court in Chang'an will look through a copy of "New Rules" and determine your level of merit according to the regulations.

Take the above case for example. As the first war that occurred in the Han Dynasty after the promulgation of the "New Rules", whether it was the battlefield of Mayi or the battlefield of Hetao, the personal military merit rating of generals and commanders was undoubtedly based on whether they could reach the standard of the third-class merit.

The reason is simple: the second-class merit is based on the prerequisite of "having won the third-class merit", the first-class merit is based on the prerequisite of "having won the second-class merit", and so on;

This was the first war after the release of the "New Rules". Naturally, no one had won the third-class individual merit before this war.

Therefore, in this battle, the Han army had a total of more than 200,000 soldiers and horses in the two battlefields of Mayi and Hetao, and in fact, it only needed to be judged whether they had achieved the third-class individual merit.

According to the New Rules on the third-class individual merit, there are three situations that can be judged as meeting the requirements for the third-class individual merit.

First: beheading at level three, and not crippled, and allowed to continue serving after recovery;
Second: beheading level 2, disabled retired;
Third: Behead those who died in battle and became martyrs for their country.

As long as you achieve any one of the above three points in a war where the two sides are at least evenly matched, you will be awarded the third-class individual merit.

In the above case, you are outnumbered in the Mayi battlefield, which undoubtedly meets the difficulty requirement of "the enemy and us are at least evenly matched";

At the same time, you who died in battle had committed three levels of beheadings during your lifetime, which far exceeded the requirements of the "New Regulations" for the third-class individual merit: one level of beheading and then dying in battle.

Although you can produce a head as proof of only one Feat of Arms, there are witnesses for the other two.

Even if you have to give some discounts, it will definitely not be completely worthless - at least it can win you some emotional points.

In addition, since you died in the battle, you will most likely be set as a positive example: the hero who won the third-class merit on the Mayi battlefield and sacrificed heroically for the great victory!

Your wife and children can receive your third-class meritorious service reward of 100,000 yuan, a piece of cloth, and a plaque with the words "Household of the Third-Class Meritorious Service";
Your death pension is calculated separately, which is probably about 100,000 coins for the Chang'an court, 50,000 to 60,000 coins for the local county government, and 20,000 to 30,000 coins for the county government - a total of about 200,000 coins.

All expenses for your funeral, including funeral rites and welcoming and seeing off guests, will be borne by the government and superiors. There is no need to spend the death pension and third-class merit reward you left behind.

At this point, as a deceased third-class hero who died on the battlefield, you left about 300,000 coins for your wife and children - money worth about the total assets of three middle-class families;

At the same time, your descendants will be labeled with the political benefit label of "descendants of heroes", and one of them can enter the palace as a palace attendant and serve the current emperor for a year!
After the internship in the palace, your most promising son can choose to become an official of the 100-stone level, or join the army and become a low-level officer: a sergeant...

The above is the treatment a meritorious soldier who died on the battlefield of Mayi can receive after the war, as well as the process of determining military merit.

It doesn’t seem too complicated?

It is just to find the three comrades, three superiors and the military supervisor in the army - the military merit accounting officer to understand the situation, and then let them guarantee to determine the military merit of this person before his death;

After the war is over, the superiors will send the bodies of the fallen soldiers, as well as the rewards and pensions issued by the Chang'an court, back to the man's hometown and hand them over to his wife and children...

But you have to know: this is just the amount of work that needs to be done by the Chang'an court for a meritorious soldier who died in battle. And there are at least 2,000 such meritorious soldiers who died in the Mayi battlefield.

In addition, there are nearly 4,000 people who, although they did not have any real military achievements during their lifetime and did not meet the criteria for third-class individual merit, are also martyrs who have made contributions to the ancestral temple and the country.

These people also need relief;
Moreover, although these people did not achieve the third-class merit individually, they were able to share in the collective merit gained by the Mayi Front Army in this war.

That’s right;

In this battle, the Mayi Front Army discussed in the Chang'an court and finally decided to award the collective first-class merit.

This was the second time that Cheng Bushi, Marquis of Bowang, led his troops to win the first-class collective merit as the main general.

It should have been a special merit.

After all, according to Liu Rong's pre-war promise: In this battle, Cheng Buzhi's troops will be stationed in Mayi. As long as they can prevent the main force of Shanyu Ting from returning to Hetao in time, no matter what the final result is - whether Hetao is obtained or not, Cheng Buzhi's Mayi Front Army will be awarded collective special merit!

This is not Liu Rong opening a back door for Cheng Buzhi.

Because according to the criteria for judging collective merit in the "New Rules", the most core basis for judging collective special merit is nothing more than this: under [obviously] inferior forces, [completely] thwart the enemy's strategic intentions, and at the cost of [reasonable losses], make [great contributions] to our own strategic goals.

Obviously, the performance of Cheng Buzhi's troops in this battle could barely meet this standard.

With only 50,000 soldiers and horses, facing the main force of the Chanyu Court with more than 100,000 or 200,000 soldiers and horses - [obviously] inferior forces;

The Chanyu Ting was not able to open a gap in the Han border wall from Mayi, thus causing trouble for the Han border, nor was he able to preserve the Hetao area - [completely] defeating the enemy's strategic intention;
At the cost of 6,000 casualties, which is more than 10% of the total military force, the Han Dynasty made a "great contribution" to the seizure of Hetao in this battle, and there is obviously nothing wrong with it.

But in the end, Liu Rong did not insist any longer and agreed that the outer court should judge the collective military merit of Cheng Buzhi's troops as a first-class collective merit, rather than a higher-level special merit.

As for the reason, some people said that Cheng Buzhi's action of giving up Mayi voluntarily was too bold and too risky. Due to the pressure from the outer court, Liu Rong reluctantly agreed to downgrade the collective military merit of Cheng Buzhi's troops by one level.

Some people also said that Liu Rong didn't want to give Cheng Buzhi's troops a collective special merit.

In the end, it was downgraded to a first-class collective merit, but it was just a matter of going with the flow and using the power of the outer court to achieve their own goals.

But in fact, only Liu Rong knew that in this battle, Cheng Buzhi's troops would definitely not be awarded a collective special merit.

——The Northern Front Army expanded the territory and took over the entire Hetao area!

In the end, just because you, Cheng Buzhi, defended a city in Mayi, you were awarded the collective special merit?
What about our Northern Front Army?
Super invincible spiral cool and awesome, collective special merit?

What a joke!
Can the achievement of expanding territory be compared with defending a city?

Although in Liu Rong's opinion, in this battle, Cheng Buzhi's troops, who defended Mayi and tied up the main force of the Chanyu Court, made no less contribution than the Northern Front Army, which expanded the territory and took over the entire Hetao;

But Liu Rong had to admit: in the face of such a great achievement as expanding territory and making his name in history, Liu Rong had to protect Cheng Buzhi as much as possible.

After all, Cheng Buzhi was one of the few trusted and capable people Liu Rong had when he was in the palace.

And Cheng Buzhi is very young.

At the beginning of last year, I had just won the first-class collective merit in Chaonasai, and I was awarded the title of marquis;

If we win a first-class collective merit in this battle, we will already stand out from the crowd.

If Cheng Buzhi's troops were really awarded a collective special merit, then from now on, the generals and commanders of the Han Dynasty would no longer have to work hard to win battles - they could just learn how to defend a city from Cheng Buzhi.

Obviously, this is what Liu Rong does not want to see.

——Defending the city is certainly useful.

In certain specific situations, such as this battle, Liu Rong needs a robot like Cheng Buzhi who is as steady as an old dog to ensure that a strategic point is not controlled by the enemy.

But Liu Rong absolutely could not accept that the entire Han army was composed of emotionless robots like Cheng Buzhi.

Because in a sense, war is actually a kind of art.

Art requires creativity and imagination.

When it comes to the topic of "The Art of War", Cheng Buzhi is obviously not a qualified artist.

To be precise, the artist Cheng Buzhi is involved in the "art of defense."

And in this category, it is enough for the Han family to have one Cheng Buzhi.

Speaking of creativity, Liu Rong still expects the two to grow up as soon as possible.

The Mayi Front Army won the first-class collective merit, and the Beidi Front Army that captured the Hetao area naturally won the special-class collective merit.

The entire Northern Front Army, whether it is the soldiers, cooks, or grooms and civilians responsible for logistics support, will share the reward for the collective special merit!
Even a laborer with the lowest status and who contributed the least - just carrying a bag of grain to Henan - could get a reward of 20,000 coins!

This means that the Chang'an court will have to reward and approve the merits of at least 100,000 individuals in the Northern Front Army.

Although it is not as complicated as the approval of individual military merits - it only requires approval of whether these people participated in the war and what they did specifically, but it is also a large-scale approval and judgment involving hundreds of thousands of people.

All I can say is: in the next three months or even half a year, more than 80% of the energy of the Chang'an court will be used on these matters.

The two armies of Mayi and Beidi, the compensation for the fallen soldiers, the rewards for the meritorious soldiers, and the judgment and approval of the two;
In addition, after the beginning of spring, the possible military threats to Hetao, namely Shuofang and Wuyuan counties, prompted the court in Chang'an to make preparations...

how to say……

Who says civil servants have an easy time?

I’m so busy!
(End of this chapter)