I am not Yuan Shu

Chapter 345 Ants and Elephants

The severely damaged Yuchoutai was forced to surrender to Tanshihuai, and the Buyeo Kingdom submitted to the Xianbei tribal alliance. The Goguryeo army and the Han army retreated south, unable to continue fighting.

After this victory, Tan Shihuai was at ease for a while, and did not launch another offensive against Goguryeo until the end of September of the fourth year of the Zhengshi era.

The newly appointed governor of Xuantu County, Li Zhong, continued to lead his troops in cooperation with the Goguryeo army to deal with Tan Shihuai, but he suffered repeated setbacks and could not withstand Tan Shihuai.

In mid-November, the Han army withdrew to Xuantu Commandery, and King Goguryeo Go Bogu also led his relatives and important officials to flee south to Xuantu Commandery. Most of the Goguryeo territory was occupied by Tan Shihuai.

After this battle, Tan Shihuai did not further invade Xuantu County. Instead, he stopped his advance, gathered people within the territory of Goguryeo, and relocated a considerable portion of the Goguryeo population to the north.

After learning the intelligence, Yuan Shu was puzzled and wondered why Tan Shihuai wanted to relocate the population of Goguryeo to the north into the territory of Buyeo.

However, at the end of December, Yuan Shu learned the latest intelligence and that Tan Shihuai was selecting able-bodied men from among the Buyeo and Goguryeo people and reorganizing them into an army within the territory of Buyeo.

He was building an army with Buyeo and Goguryeo people, and most of them were infantry, not the cavalry that the Xianbei were best at.

Yuan Shu pondered for a long time and suspected that Tan Shihuai had a purpose in using the Goguryeo and Buyeo people to form an army. Moreover, the formation of infantry could not be for the purpose of competing for supremacy on the grasslands. The most suitable combat environment for infantry was in Han territory.

He speculated that Tan Shihuai might want to use the Goguryeo and Buyeo people, who had certain technical skills, to form an infantry corps with siege capabilities in order to deal with the combined defense line of cities and farms that he was building in Bingzhou.

His combined city and farm defense line focused on mobile defense. The city and farm each had strong defensive capabilities and were connected by roads. When the Xianbei people invaded, they would light smoke signals and beacon fires to warn of an impending invasion, and then hold their ground and wait for reinforcements.

If the Xianbei wanted to acquire wealth and people, they would have to stop attacking the city, thus losing a considerable amount of mobility.

Yuan Shuhui arranged for the Tianxiong Army cavalry to be the main force of mobile warfare. While the Xianbei people were preoccupied with cities and farms, the cavalry would launch a surprise attack and eliminate the Xianbei people through close-quarters combat, just like the battle fought in Yanmen County before.

The Xianbei people lacked the weaponry and equipment to fight the Han army head-on. Without sufficient mobility, they would inevitably suffer heavy losses and be unable to withstand close combat if the Han cavalry engaged them in close combat.

Yuan Shu intended to use this method to eliminate the Xianbei people's manpower, gradually weaken their combat capabilities, and eventually annihilate them completely.

However, if the Xianbei people formed an infantry legion and mastered the ability to siege cities, then the Xianbei people could use this infantry to besiege cities and farms, and the cavalry force would be freed up and regain the ability to conduct mobile warfare.

Therefore, the effectiveness of Yuan Shu's previously designed tactic of weakening the Xianbei people's mobility and thus enabling them to engage in close-quarters combat will be somewhat diminished.

If things are really as he imagined, then Tan Shihuai is indeed a capable leader; no wonder he has been able to wreak havoc on the border for over a decade without falling.

If the Xianbei people hadn't been so weak, unable to fully utilize Tan Shihuai's abilities, and if Tan Shihuai had led the later Murong Xianbei with the same strength, they would have been a truly formidable enemy.

At present, Yuan Shu is not worried that Tan Shihuai can really cause him a lot of trouble, because the size of both sides is what it is.

The Han Empire was too strong, while the Xianbei tribal alliance was too small and too weak.

As long as the Han Empire takes the Xianbei people seriously, appoints a capable border official, and has a few years to prepare, it will surely achieve final victory.

No matter how much an ant bites an elephant's skin and causes it pain, it cannot truly destroy the elephant.

An elephant can kill an ant simply by stomping its foot.

Yuan Shu believed that Tan Shihuai's tactical approach was sound, but he made a major strategic mistake by mistaking Yuan Shu's previous assertiveness for true strength.

In fact, the third and fourth years of the Zhengshi era were precisely when Yuan Shu's power in Bingzhou was at its weakest and most unstable. The strength he displayed was merely strength, not power.

There was an army and food, but most of it was not produced locally, but transported from other places. The losses during transportation were so great that this situation was unsustainable and the cost was too high.

If Tan Shihuai persists in his southward raids at this time, it will inevitably greatly affect Yuan Shu's farm and city construction plans, and will inevitably prolong the time needed for Yuan Shu to achieve results.

But he didn't.

He may have thought that he could deal with Yuan Shu's defense plan after he formed an infantry legion, but the problem was that the size of Yuan Shu's Bingzhou alone exceeded that of the entire Xianbei tribal alliance, and the energy he had accumulated during his two years of peaceful development was immeasurable to the Xianbei people.

Yes, the Xianbei people were also strengthening themselves, defeating the Buyeo and Goguryeo kingdoms, and defeating the Han army in Xuantu Commandery, thus gaining control of the territories of Buyeo and Goguryeo.

Their gains were indeed substantial.

However, Yuan Shu reaped even greater rewards.

Two years was enough time for him to repair the cities of the five northern prefectures and the roads. Then, twenty-five fertile villages sprang up and were put into production smoothly, with a considerable number of them already harvesting grain in the summer and autumn of the fourth year of the Zhengshi era.

Yuan Shu's joint defense line of cities and farms in the five northern prefectures and his mobile counterattack plan have gradually taken shape and are beginning to show results. This strategic counterattack capability has been initially prepared.

He even had the confidence to relocate the main body of Zhixing Academy to Jinyang County to continue running the school, and he himself continued to take time to guide the students of Zhixing Academy in their studies.

At the same time, due to the large-scale construction in Bingzhou, there are many more opportunities to help farmers. There are enough opportunities and positions for students of Zhixing Academy to participate without any special arrangements.

Therefore, after Zhixing Academy moved north, as many as 20,000 students were arranged by Yuan Shu to conduct agricultural internships in various Liangzhuang villages, which in a sense increased the construction efficiency of Liangzhuang villages.

Furthermore, after their experience assisting farmers, these students have also acquired the ability to assume grassroots official positions, becoming an important reserve of officials for Yuan Shu.

This group of students thus gained numerous opportunities to intern in government offices, allowing them to participate in actual government affairs and accumulate valuable experience before officially graduating.

This is a landmark event for Zhixing Academy.

It is precisely because of this situation that more and more people want to join the Zhixing Academy and study the philosophy of mind under Yuan Shu, and the influence of the philosophy of mind in the folk and political fields has been further expanded.

By the end of the fourth year of the Zhengshi era, in Luoyang, some people had begun to refer to the School of Mind as a "prominent school of thought in the world," believing that it was no longer a novel and unverified doctrine, but a "prominent school of thought" with real influence.

Even outside the Zhixing Academy, within the Imperial Academy, more and more people began to study the philosophy of mind, and Yuan Shu's "On Knowledge and Action" became a popular book that almost every scholar and student had read.

At that time, there was no printing technology or sufficiently sturdy, durable, and cheap paper. Books were spread entirely by word of mouth or by copying, and copying was mainly done using bamboo slips. Only a few wealthy households could afford paper.

Even so, copying still requires manpower. A book may not have many words, but copying is the main method, and the money and time spent are astronomical.

Despite so many unfavorable factors, "On Knowledge and Action" spread rapidly in the Luoyang area and quickly spread south, east, and north, generating more and more Confucian scholars with various insights.

Few people still regard the School of Mind as a heretical doctrine, but rather as a branch of Confucianism. Some even see Yuan Shu as a contemporary Dong Zhongshu, believing that Yuan Shu can become the second Dong Zhongshu and lead Confucianism toward revival.

Yuan Shu neither responded to nor denied this claim.

He certainly needed the banner of Confucian revival to get things done, but he couldn't so openly reveal his ambitions.

After all, Confucianism is still the undisputed national learning, yet you want to "revive" it. What are you really up to?

This kind of matter, which involves the debate over the orthodoxy of Confucianism, cannot be discussed too clearly or too directly. It would be best if someone could speak on his behalf, but he himself cannot publicly express his opinion.

Otherwise, it's hard to say what those powerful families who control the official schools and their vested interests in the court would be feeling.

Yuan Shu had no intention of starting a war with them right now, not to mention that his Yuan family was also part of it.

In addition, the recruitment plan that began in the third year of the Zhengshi era was basically completed by the end of the fourth year of the Zhengshi era, and the recruitment plan for 22,000 cavalrymen was officially completed.

Some of them, around 17,000, have already completed their training, acquired combat capabilities, and officially joined the Tianxiong Army to begin their service.

The remaining 13,000 men will be able to join the Tianxiong Army and begin their service in at most another six months.

Meanwhile, through purchasing warhorses from Liangzhou and Youzhou, as well as from the Southern Xiongnu, and through war spoils, Yuan Shu had equipped these 17,000 men with a combat configuration of two horses per person, giving them a certain degree of long-distance raiding capability.

They can now do what they couldn't do on horseback, and these 17,000 soldiers can also possess the speed advantage of the Xianbei.

With their superior equipment and physical strength, Yuan Shu believed that the 17,000 Tianxiong cavalrymen were capable of confronting about 20,000 Xianbei cavalrymen head-on, or even more, 25,000 or 30,000.

In addition, the Xihe Horse Ranch, located in the northern part of Xihe County and under the jurisdiction of Bingzhou Governor's Office, was officially established and began operation.

Yuan Shu integrated all the scattered and disorganized horse breeding resources in Bingzhou into this brand-new large horse ranch. All cavalrymen also trained here, focusing on training nearby, which was also beneficial for the breeding of warhorses.

Moreover, its proximity to the Southern Xiongnu settlements made it convenient for Yuan Shu to monitor and intimidate the Southern Xiongnu people.

The northeastern part of the horse pasture is the residence of the General of the Liao. The two armies are very close to each other, so they can monitor the Southern Xiongnu together and support each other when necessary, which is very beneficial.

Although the Southern Xiongnu had not caused any trouble recently, Yuan Shu was worried that these troublesome and criminals might join forces with the Xianbei to cause trouble. Therefore, he kept a close eye on the Southern Xiongnu.

(End of this chapter)