The Han culture is spreading strongly in Southeast Asia

Chapter 656: This is not Siberia, this is the Xianbei Wasteland

Irkutsk, its name may come from the Ergou River, an important tributary of the Angara River that flows into the city.

It may also come from the original name of the Angara River, which does not inject water into Lake Baikal but instead draws water away from it - the Angara River.

The word "Anggala" should be a Mongolian word mixed with a little pronunciation of the Northeastern wild Jurchens, and it has a certain connection with the "Kalaha" spoken by the Manchus.

So in China, Irkutsk is generally called Erka or Erkou, and the Angara River is called Angara River, all of which are variations of this word.

However, the city of Irkutsk was indeed built by the Russians from a small riverside pasture that could shelter from the wind and snow to its current size.

During the Qing Dynasty, this place was the most critical city for trade between the two empires. It had a permanent population of over 40,000, and in summer it could reach 60,000 to 70,000 people, which was very rare in the far north.

However, after the establishment of Dayu, relations between the two countries quickly turned cold, and Irkutsk immediately became deserted.

In the Irkutsk Governor's Palace, Lieutenant General Jacob Ivanovich, the regional governor in charge of the entire Lake Baikal and the area east of it, was taking out several of his medals and wiping them carefully.

The first to be wiped were a first-class medal of the Order of St. Anna and a third-class medal of the Order of St. George.

This was achieved by Governor Jacob during the Crimean Campaign in the Fifth Russo-Turkish War in 1772, when he was a lieutenant colonel in the grenadiers and led the charge. He fought hard, even at the cost of blowing himself up into a concussion and having to stay in the hospital for two months.

As for the last medal of the Order of St. Alexander Nevsky, it is a summary of the Governor's life.

Because this medal, named after the famous Grand Duke of Kievan Rus Alexander Nevsky, has undergone changes in history from the Order of the Knights Templar, the Imperial Order, the Order of the Soviet Red Army to the Order of the Russian Federation.

It is one of the highest honors in the Russian Empire. It was passed down during the Soviet period and is an important medal that carries the national sentiments of the Russian people.

During the military operations launched by Emperor Putin in later generations, the Chechen Khan Kadyrov, who was very good at using performances to gain points for himself, was awarded the Order of Alexander Nevsky by the Emperor.

"Father, everyone outside is scolding you. Some spineless people are even thinking of surrendering to the Tatars in the south." Annenkov, the second son of the governor and lieutenant colonel of the Irkutsk City Defense Force, said angrily.

"Don't blame them, kid. When people face death, they will become crazy and unreasonable. Some madness is understandable." Governor Jacob said slowly without raising his head.

Lieutenant Colonel Annenkov, who had come to complain, was immediately choked. His expression became terrified, and after a while he stammered, "Father, are we all going to be killed by the Tatars?"

Governor Jacob then raised his head and looked at his son Annenkov, and said very seriously: "Yes, if the Banner Emperor is still in charge in the south at this time, then we have a great chance of saving our lives.

Just like Emperor Kangxi a hundred years ago, he would be happy to treat us with courtesy and incorporate us into his guards to demonstrate his power to his subjects, especially the ruled Khitans.

But now it’s different. The Khitan emperor doesn’t need us to embellish his merit book.

He needed to use the vast land to prove that he was the most suitable person to be the Khitan emperor and that the Han people were the most suitable people to dominate the Eastern Continent.

You know what, what this Russian lieutenant general said makes quite a bit of sense.

The Qing emperor was a foreigner ruling the Central Plains, so he needed these tricks to prove his strength to hundreds of millions of Han people.

As for Mo Zibu, one of the reasons why he was so eager to expand his territory was that he wanted to build an unprecedented empire to prove that the existence of Dayu was supreme and correct.

However, this signal is not sent to the Han people, because the Han people will definitely support Dayu.

Mo Zibu's expansion of territory was to prove the correctness of their choice to ethnic groups such as Hoa, Korea, Vietnam, Thailand, and Cambodia who took the initiative to approach China.

Governor Jacob was able to have this understanding because he was a typical St. Petersburg aristocrat with rich knowledge, and he was also one of the few China experts in Russia.

Because his great-grandfather participated in the Battle of Yalu River in 1689, which was almost a hundred years ago.

His father was the garrison commander of Selenginsky Otrog Fort, which is Yang Kaijia's current base, a strong fortress on the banks of the Selenge River.

Twenty years ago, Lieutenant General Jacob lived here, and the area around this fortress was like their family's fiefdom.

His father sent him as a business representative several times to the southern part of the desert and even to Xuanhua and Chengde to negotiate with Qing officials and exchange herders who had crossed the border between the two sides.

Therefore, Lieutenant General Jacob has a good understanding of China and can speak simple Chinese and Mongolian with a northern Mongolian accent.

However, his son, Lieutenant Colonel Annenkov, was much inferior. He was in his thirties and could not even manage the Irkutsk city defense forces, let alone understand China in the south.

Therefore, he did not understand Governor Jacob's analysis at all. He only knew that he might have to explain himself this time, and a very frightened expression appeared on his face.

Even the anger that had arisen when he first came in to complain disappeared completely in fear.

"Father, the Tatars...is it really necessary to do this? Aren't they a civilized country? How could they practice massacres?" Annenkov muttered.

"Furthermore, I don't believe Her Majesty is willing to abandon Xianberia, which the Empire has managed for over a hundred years. Aid from St. Petersburg must be on the way."

Lieutenant General Jacob nodded and said, "Yes, my child, Her Majesty the Queen will certainly not be willing to abandon Xianberia."

But before Annenkov could show a surprised smile on his face, Governor Jacob quickly said:
"But Her Majesty is not the Almighty God. Faced with such a situation, her reluctance can only become a sigh in the Winter Palace.

I believe that the Empire's envoys and reinforcements have already set out, but they have no way of arriving.

The reinforcements may have been defeated by the Khitan army outside the city somewhere, and the envoy was arrested as soon as he entered the Khitan border and was unable to meet the Khitan emperor.

This is because the Khitan Emperor's desire for Xianbelia was strong, and no one could stop him."

This time, Annenkov understood, and he sat down on a stool covered with bear skin in a daze.

"Father, if we had known this would happen, we should not have provoked the Khitans. If we hadn't taken the initiative to attack, perhaps they wouldn't have launched a war of this scale."

In fact, what Annenkov wanted to say was that if they did not take the initiative to challenge, the Khitans might not want to kill them all and might show leniency.

Governor Jacob pondered for a moment, as if weighing the pros and cons. After a while, he shook his head and said, "For the Empire, for Her Majesty the Queen, I must do this!"

Governor Jacob stood up, and the determination and tenacity of a veteran soldier immediately filled the room.

“Although the Third Rome has been operating in Xianberia for over a hundred years, and our family can even be considered native to Xianberia, the empire’s roots here are still very shallow.

If we want to defend this land, which is cold but holds infinite possibilities, Irkutsk is the most crucial one.

If Irkutsk falls, the connection between Eastern Xianbeilia and Western Xianbeilia will be cut off, and the aid from the Ural Mountains will lose its bridgehead.

Over the past decade, the revival of the Khitans has posed a serious threat to Irkutsk.

I know the Khitan Emperor. He will definitely attack Irkutsk. If we wait until he is ready, we will have no chance of winning."

"So, father, you accepted the Tatars who lost their empire and even wanted to unite with them at one point," Annenkov whispered.

"Yes, my child, but I did not expect that the Tatars who lost their empire were so fragile and that they fell to the Khitans in the south so quickly.

So I had no choice but to take the risk and plan the battle of Xinwan Town, hoping to gain the upper hand while the power balance between the two sides was still intact, and then negotiate with the Khitan Emperor."

Having said this, Governor Jacob fell silent, and for the first time, a look of frustration appeared on his old, fleshy face.

"But I still underestimated this terrifying empire, this Eastern Rome that has existed for thousands of years. Even if they only used a small part of their strength, they easily defeated us."

"Yes, yes, they were too strong. It's not that we didn't fight bravely, but there were gaps in all aspects.

They have steamboats that can run on the river, and they have all kinds of artillery, and rifles that have a range twice as great as ours."

Although the steam engine was inefficient in the cold Xianbei wilderness and only lasted three or four months, it was enough to bring about a qualitative change. The rifled rifles dealt a crushing blow to the Luosha people's matchlock muskets.

"Father, please let the Patriarch pray for us. We are about to offer our complete loyalty to the Third Rome and His Majesty the Tsar. Merciful Lord, please accept us and let our souls ascend to heaven."

After realizing that he really had no chance of survival, Annenkov still had some of the ruthlessness of a Russian and immediately accepted his fate and decided to get hospice care.

But Governor Jacob smiled at this time. He looked at his son Annenkov and said, "Although most men in this city will die, you are not one of them."

"What!" Annenkov almost thought he had misheard. He stared at his father with wide eyes, "Father, you mean the Khitan Emperor will let us go!"

When he heard that he didn't have to die, the determination that had just risen in his heart disappeared without a trace, and he was completely enveloped in great surprise.

“Yes, because Xianberia is so vast, and we Russians have actually become the natives here.

Even though the Khitan army swept in from west to east, and various Tatar tribes assisted in the cleanup, they still could not wipe us out.

But there are nearly 300,000 Russians living in this land of ice and snow.

The serfs and Cossacks from the Volga River were the most hardworking and persevering people. As long as they were not captured by the Khitans, they would have a way to survive.

After the main force of the Khitan retreats south, those Tatars will not be our opponents at all, so the Khitan emperor must give us a way out.

He will need you, a nobleman who was born and raised in Xianberia and studied at the Menshikov Palace Boyar Academy, to recruit the Cossacks and serfs hiding in Xianberia."

After hearing this, Annenkov's eyes lit up, but he quickly shook his head and looked at his father, Governor Jacob, hopefully.

"Father, I can't do this. Ilya Alexeev and his men won't obey my orders. We should live together."

Governor Jacob shook his head and said, "I cannot become a captive of the Khitans, let alone surrender to them, because that would bring devastating disaster to your mother, your wife, and your daughter.

Only if I shed my last drop of blood for the Third Rome will Her Majesty forgive them.

And you, my son, remember this: never use the word Tartar again to refer to those people in the south.

Don't even mention the word Khitan; you should call them Hua or Han, and consider yourself a servant of the Han emperor."

Governor Jacob began to make his final explanation, and his son Annenkov finally shed tears.

He knelt in front of his father, shaking his head with tears in his eyes, "No, father, no, I can't convince everyone, we all need you!"

Governor Jacob's eyes began to turn cold, and he looked quietly at his son with tears streaming down his face.

"Annenkov, if you don't grow up, you're dead. The only way you can survive is to find a way to get all the Cossacks hiding in Xianberia to follow you."

"This is the final advice a father gives you."

. . . .

North of the Altai Mountains, north of the Eastern Sayan Mountains, in the lower reaches of the Angara River, near the Yenisei River, at the easternmost end of the Balaba Steppe.

Here is Bratsk, the most important city of the Russian Empire in Xianbeilia after Irkutsk.

Governor Jacob guessed very accurately that Chen Guangyao was going to intercept the Russian army coming from the Ural Mountains. For this purpose, he sold everything he had to get 5,000 infantry and cavalry, as well as more than 60,000 cattle and sheep as military supplies.

The blocking army was mainly composed of 1,200 dragoons of the Longxiang Guards Cavalry Regiment, led by Major General Zhu Wenjie, who was a Yuancong who had followed the emperor after the Battle of Jiading.

The rest included 800 Solon cavalrymen led by Hailancha, 600 Lingbei soldiers led by Fukangan, the Jibei cavalry transferred from the Northeast Envoy, the Dongyang feudal army's dragoons, and some Mongolian Qiexue.

The city of Bratsk is located on the banks of the Angara River. Here, the Angara River makes a big turn, leaving behind a series of river channels that are similar to lakes.

Even outside the city of Bratsk is an icy frigid swamp. If you want to enter the city, there is only a very narrow area to pass through. It is easy to defend but difficult to attack, and the terrain is very dangerous.

But all this is the same as in Yakutsk. If the army outside the city can withstand the wind and snow, it will be dangerous.

Because this kind of location in the cold zone, with mountains behind and water at its back, is easy to defend and difficult to attack, it also means that people can easily strangle you and surround you to death.

The Chinese blocking army took advantage of this. After they survived the cold winter of the previous year, the people in Bratsk were already in a panic, causing the Russian reinforcements, who had arrived after going through untold hardships, to have to take the risk to break through.

Otherwise, once the city of Bratsk collapses, it will be meaningless for them to travel more than a thousand kilometers to provide support.

Most of the Russian reinforcements came from several fortress cities such as Semipalatinsk Oblast in Siberia. They were originally the elite Russian troops who existed to control the Kazakhs.

But now the situation in Irkutsk is urgent, and they have to be mobilized to the East.

This Romanian army had a total of 7,000 people, with three Russian European regiments, totaling 2,700 people, as the main force
Most of them were line infantry, and there were only more than 200 Cossacks.

The remaining 4,000 people were basically cavalry, composed of Tatars, vassal states of the Russian Empire from the Ural Mountains to Central Asia.

On the other hand, there are still about 4,000 people in the Chinese Empire who can fight.

The wind and snow in the Far North were still terrifying, and the imperial blocking force was reduced by nearly 20% in just one winter.

Fortunately, not many people froze to death, and less than half suffered mild disabilities. The rest were sent back to the south for a few months of recuperation and were basically able to recover.

The battle first broke out among the cavalry. The Mongolian Qiexue and Solon cavalry belonging to the Chinese Empire attacked the Tatar cavalry belonging to the Russian Empire without any hesitation.

The two sides engaged in a fierce chase on the grassland within a radius of more than ten miles.

In the end, the two thousand cavalrymen led by Hailancha won the victory. After all, one side was the vassal army, and the other side was the imperial cavalry that was directly bathed in the compassionate light of the Incarnation of the Vajra King.

These cavalrymen who came from the Mongolian headquarters were violently called Tatars, but in fact they were just cavalrymen who were second-class citizens of the Yuan Dynasty and were beaten and fled in a panic.

On the fourth day of the battle, Dayu's grassland cavalry won a decisive victory.

The Russian Tatar cavalry, which had lost more than 15 percent of their force, dared not continue to protect the Russian infantry and could only retreat more than 30 miles away to wait and see.

As for the Russian Empire, after losing the cover of their cavalry, they could only take the initiative to seek battle, hoping to defeat the Dayu infantry and regain the initiative on the battlefield.

After all, this is an ice field. When it is cold, there is ice on the ground, which is very slippery. When it is warm, the ground is muddy. The role of the cavalry is greatly weakened. Otherwise, Hailancha would not have stopped chasing after driving the Russian Tatar cavalry far away.

The decisive battle was fought by infantry.

Fu Kang'an quickly made a suggestion to Zhu Wenjie, pushing the 600 Toyo Japanese samurai army and his Lingbei soldiers to the front to resist damage, while Zhu Wenjie's Longxiong Guards stayed in the back to recuperate.

The battle started on the 18th day of the fourth lunar month. The fanatical Japanese samurai and the remaining bannermen who wanted to change their own destiny displayed extremely strong fighting power.

More than 900 of them relied on simple fortifications to withstand the fierce attack of more than 2,000 Russian infantry for ten days. Although they suffered heavy casualties, they did not allow the enemy to advance much.

When the old Russian soldiers were tired and could not fight anymore, Zhu Wenjie's cavalry suddenly appeared. There were more than a thousand mixed infantry and cavalry. After three battles in two days, they won three games in a row and the Russian army was directly defeated.

Of the three Russian European regiments, only a small number of officers and Cossack cavalry successfully withdrew from the battle and escaped with the help of Tatar cavalry dozens of miles away. The remaining 2,000 people were basically wiped out.

At this point, if the Russian Empire did not choose to end the Russo-Turkish War and mobilize the real elite imperial troops to fight for it, they would not be able to defend the Xianbei Desert.

(End of this chapter)