The Wanli Emperor of the Ming Dynasty was extremely rebellious

Chapter 391: The Japanese pirates captured able-bodied men, and we captured prisoners
Japan, Kitakyushu, Nagoya Castle.

At about 5 p.m., when the sun should have been setting, the sky was covered with dark clouds and there was no trace of sunset glow at all.

The newly built city was also stained with a layer of light ink and became extremely dark.

The light was extremely dim at this moment, and it was impossible to see anything while sitting in the room.

Toyotomi Hideyoshi was sitting alone in a quiet room, holding the urgent report from Mori Terumoto, frowning and thinking silently.

He didn't even order the lights to be lit.

Because he didn't need the light at the moment.

What he needs is to reflect on the gains and losses.

This time he seemed to have underestimated the enemy.

The commander-in-chief of the Ming Dynasty is no simple man.

This guy doesn't have many soldiers, but every time he comes up with some unexpected tricks, he leaves him with no way to deal with them.

The reason why he hesitated for so long and did not send troops to reinforce his vassal state, Korea, was that he wanted to withdraw his troops.

It was true that he couldn't lose this battle, but he found that he couldn't continue fighting like this.

Now they are essentially wasting time fighting with the remnants of the vassal state of Korea and the rebel army, which is completely meaningless.

He had to find a way or an excuse to withdraw his troops and let the officials of the vassal state of Korea deal with the remnants and the rebel army.

The problem was, before he could come up with a solution, his vassal state, North Korea, actually started a counterattack!

With 50,000 troops, Mori Terumoto definitely won't fight to the death with them.

Uesugi Kagekatsu, Gamo Ujisato, and Date Masamune would definitely not go there, because that was not their defense area, and they had reasons not to go.

Now that Geochang has fallen, the gates of Gyeongsang Province are wide open. If we don’t send troops to reinforce, we may really lose this battle!
If it were before invading the vassal state of Korea, he would never have thought so.

In his eyes, the vassal state of Korea was vulnerable.

However, things are different now. With the reinforcement of weapons and equipment from the Ming Dynasty and the training of the elite Ming army, the remnants of the vassal state of Korea and the rebel army are becoming stronger and stronger, and there is no problem in fighting against them.

In fact, now these guys can no longer be called remnants and rebels, because they have all changed into uniform military uniforms and raised distinctive flags, and their lineup is becoming more and more neat.

This is the brilliance of the Ming army commander.

Qi Jiguang, the war god of the Ming Dynasty.

He had already gotten to know this person in detail.

What this person is best at is training troops. He can even train unemployed miners into the invincible Qi family army!
If this guy is allowed to continue training, the remaining soldiers and the rebel army of the vassal state of Korea will probably be stronger than them.

There was no other choice but to conscript able-bodied men to provide support. If he didn't, Mori Terumoto would lose both Seongju and Miryang, which would be a big trouble.

He was quite familiar with able-bodied men, because his fight for supremacy in the world began with conscripting able-bodied men!

At that time, he was the captain of a squad of men conscripted by Oda Nobunaga, and he served as this squad leader for several years.

He knew very well that able-bodied men would not be able to fight in the beginning, but those who survived a few battles could be compared to the elite warriors.

This time, the able-bodied men were sent to the front to attract the enemy's firepower and break all the trenches outside Jeolla Province. The able-bodied men who could survive after breaking the trenches were the elite!

Toyotomi Hideyoshi finally ordered the conscription of able-bodied men. He conscripted men from Kyushu and Shikoku, and the number he conscripted was 100,000 at a time.

He had just started to arrest people when Li Yuansheng's confidants who stayed in Hirado secretly passed the news back to the Ming Dynasty.

When Wanli received the news, he immediately ordered people to call Qi Jiguang back.

Toyotomi Hideyoshi thought that Qi Jiguang was the commander-in-chief of the Ming army.

This guy also studied Qi Jiguang's battle examples, trying to understand the Ming army's strategies and tactics from them.

If Wanli knew this, he would probably laugh his head off.

It is true that Qi Jiguang was the Grand Marshal of the Army. On the surface, it was indeed Qi Jiguang who was in charge of the war between the Ming Dynasty and Japan. In fact, the strategy and even the tactics were formulated by him, and Qi Jiguang was only responsible for on-site command.

The main reason why he did not lead the army in person this time was that he was afraid of problems in the rear.

When the Ming Dynasty and Japan fought a great war, the number of troops and horses often reached tens or even hundreds of millions, and the amount of food and fodder consumed every month was enormous.

What's more, the army needs to consume ammunition, kerosene cans, bombs, etc. when fighting, and the soldiers cannot just eat and do nothing. He also wants to improve the treatment of the soldiers.

All of these will consume a huge amount of supplies. If he is not in the capital to allocate supplies, if there is a problem with the supplies, it will be a big trouble.

Those civil servants with ulterior motives are capable of anything. There are many who deliberately drag their feet while fighting in the front.

There are many famous cases in history. For example, in the first year of the Tianqi reign, when the Ming Dynasty was at war with the Later Jin in Liaodong, Feng Shengming, the Left Governor of Henan Province who was in charge of collecting and transporting grain, suddenly asked for leave. The governor refused, and Feng Shengming actually ran away. Moreover, no one knew where he went during the war!

Later, the Ming army was defeated in the Battle of Liaodong, and this guy appeared again. There was a huge trick involved. After the demise of the Ming Dynasty, his son Feng Quan actually became the chief minister of the Qing cabinet!
These civil servants are really capable of doing anything for their own personal gain.

He didn't want to be stabbed from behind by these guys while he was leading an army of tens of millions.

Therefore, he did not lead the army in person to fight against Japan. Instead, he let Qi Jiguang command the front line on his behalf.

Qi Jiguang was not only good at training troops, but also good at commanding battles. As long as the strategies and tactics were well formulated, there would be no problem in letting him command on the battlefield.

At this moment, Toyotomi Hideyoshi has started to conscript young men, so they can also start to close the net. This time he wants to catch all the Japanese pirates that Toyotomi Hideyoshi sent to the vassal state of Korea!

Qi Jiguang didn't know that Toyotomi Hideyoshi had started conscripting young men, and he was still in Juchang commanding the war, so it took him two more days to return to Beijing.

It was still about 5 p.m. that day, and it was getting dark when he entered the palace and came to the Grand Council Hall where maps were specially displayed.

After the emperor and his ministers exchanged greetings, Wanli solemnly announced, "Toyotomi Hideyoshi has begun conscripting men from Kyushu and Shikoku, and this time he is conscripting 100,000 men to reinforce Korea, our vassal state.

We have almost wiped out the main force of the Japanese pirates. We can now start preparing to close the net on Korea, our vassal state."

Qi Jiguang didn't show any excitement when he heard this. Instead, he nodded solemnly and said, "I understand."

This time they are not targeting a few thousand Japanese pirates, nor tens of thousands of Japanese pirates, but hundreds of thousands of Japanese pirates!

Throughout history, there have been only a handful of major battles in which hundreds of thousands of enemies were annihilated.

The Battle of Changping was the battle in which the Qin army annihilated the most enemy troops in history. At that time, the Qin army annihilated 400,000 Zhao troops.

This time they are going to annihilate more than 400,000 Japanese pirates!

It can be said that this was an unprecedented war in history. It was not so easy to annihilate four or five hundred thousand Japanese pirates.

Wanli pointed at the map with a serious expression and said, "The key to this battle is to blockade the southern waters of Korea. You must make careful arrangements. After the war begins, we cannot allow a Japanese warship to pick up a single Japanese pirate from Korea."

If we really let them take away a ship full of Japanese pirates, I guess all the important figures of the pirates would escape.

Qi Jiguang nodded slowly and said, "I understand, Your Majesty. I believe that the waters to the east and west of Korea, our vassal state, must not be spared.

We can mobilize a thousand naval centipede ships and anchor them on the east and west sides of Korea, with one ship every four or five miles. We can use telescopes to observe continuously for twelve hours, taking turns. This way, we will be absolutely safe."

Wanli nodded slightly and said, "Well, you will be in charge of the deployment. My requirement is that we cannot let go of any important figures of the Japanese pirates. We will need these people later.

Therefore, in this battle, we don't need to aim to annihilate all the Japanese pirates. Our goal is to force as many Japanese pirates as possible to surrender. Even ordinary Japanese pirates who surrender can be useful. We can take them to mine coal."

Oh, no need to wipe out completely.

This makes it easier to fight.

After all, not everyone can take life and death lightly. If they clearly want to kill all the Japanese pirates who landed in the vassal state of Korea, the Japanese pirates would definitely resist desperately, because they would die anyway if they didn't fight.

If they had clearly stated that they would not kill those who surrendered, the Japanese pirates' will to resist would probably not have been so strong. They would be defeated even if they died, and they could live if they surrendered. How many of them would really fight to the death?

Upon hearing this, Qi Jiguang nodded repeatedly and said, "I understand."

The next step is troop deployment.

Wanli pointed to the map and explained in detail: "Our main goal this time is to force the Japanese pirates to surrender, so the more troops we send out, the better.

Unless the naval vessels must be used to transport supplies between the two capitals and thirteen provinces of the Ming Dynasty, all will be pulled to the waters of the vassal state of Korea. All 1,000-ton and 2,000-ton Fuzhou ships will participate in the battle. At least 8,000 centipede ships and at least 300,000 naval officers and soldiers will be mobilized.

In addition, the 400,000 Sichuan troops led by General Qin Liangyu of Zhendong were all sent out to attack. They were divided into two groups and transported to the south of the vassal state of Korea by swift naval ships. Liaodong Town, including Zhendong Fort, was handed over to the Liaodong Army for garrison.

The Sichuan troops were pulled over in two batches. The first batch of 200,000 Sichuan troops landed in the west of Jeolla Province, and this batch crossed Jeolla Province to encircle the west of Gyeongsang Province. They could be pulled over before the war started and directly sent to Gyeongsang Province from land.

The second batch was pulled to the south of Gyeongsang Province. This batch would be pulled over after the navy captured Busan Port and blockaded the southern waters of the vassal state of Korea. Their mission was to attack the Japanese pirates in Gyeongsang Province from the southwest.

The twelve battalions of the vassal state of Korea concentrated their forces to deal with the four legions of Japanese pirates in the north of Jeolla Province.

Tell Yi Sun-sin not to rush to attack the four Japanese pirate legions in the north of Jeolla Province. Wait until the soldiers of the Beijing camp cut off their retreat and capture Gongju before attacking.

The 360,000 soldiers of the Gyeong Camp were divided into four groups, each equipped with 30,000 cavalrymen from the Sinmu Camp, 30,000 charioteers from the Sinji Camp, and 30,000 charioteers from the Sinshu Camp. One group landed from the east of Chungcheong Province and headed straight for Gongju, one group landed from the west of Gyeonggi Province and headed straight for Wangjing, and the other two groups built a pontoon bridge from Uiju to cross the river and advance southward from Pyeongan Province and Hamgyong Province.

Another 80,000 elite cavalrymen from eight other border towns also crossed the river from the floating bridge in Yizhou and followed the Beijing garrison troops from Pyeongan Province southward.

This time, there are more than one million soldiers from the Beijing Army, the Navy and the Sichuan Army alone!
Qi Jiguang thought about it carefully, then said cautiously, "Your Majesty, if all the troops in Beijing are sent to Korea to participate in the war, what will happen to the capital?"

Wanli said calmly: "You don't have to worry about this. Most of the infantrymen in Xuanfu Town and Jizhou Town have returned to defend. Together with the Jinyiwei and the Imperial Guards, there are more than 100,000 troops. No one can turn the tables.

You only need to command the war in Korea, our vassal state. Remember, our main goal is to force the Japanese pirates to surrender. We need to capture prisoners, especially those important Japanese pirates. It would be best if we could capture them all."

Upon hearing this, Qi Jiguang bowed solemnly and said, "I understand."

(End of this chapter)