Ming Empire

Chapter 166 Dangerous situation
(Thank you Gongsun Tang Shuyou for your reward)
The ultimate goal of this military operation is to break the siege and drive the rogues out of Henan.

Today's Henan territory has been mostly occupied by bandits, and the situation is extremely critical.

In the first month of the 14th year of Chongzhen, after Li Zicheng led his troops to conquer Luoyang, Henan, he heard that the Kaifeng defenders were weak, and after discussing with the generals, he led more than 14 people in February of the [-]th year of Chongzhen, and rushed to Kaifeng City for three days and three nights.

Gao Mingheng, the governor of Kaifeng, led his army to stick to it, and also raised a lot of money to raise warriors to attack the city.Ming general Gao Qian was ordered to lead his troops to Kaifeng, and joined forces with the general Chen Yongfu to fight against the city. They won all three battles.

In the 15th year of Chongzhen, which is the first month of this year, Li Zicheng once again led his army to attack Kaifeng.

Kaifeng defenders Gao Mingheng and Chen Yongfu led the army to defend the city, and once again severely damaged the bandits.Li Zicheng was hit by an arrow in the left eye, but he still led his army to fight hard and repelled the reinforcements of the Ming general Ding Qirui.Later, Li Zicheng took the advice of his staff and buried the city with explosives by digging tunnels.However, the city walls of Kaifeng were so strong that tens of thousands of catties of explosives could not collapse the city walls. The earth and rocks flying horizontally after the explosives exploded actually injured many bandits.

Li Zicheng, who failed to attack Kaifeng twice, was furious, and led his army to storm Xiangcheng, and after breaking through the city, he killed Wang Qiaonian, the governor of the three sides.

In March of the [-]th Chongzhen Institute, Li Zicheng's troops smashed more than ten cities in eastern Henan. In order to prevent reinforcements from the Ming army, Li Zicheng sent Li Yan and Liu Zongmin to lead tens of thousands of horses northward to attack Taiyuan and Datong, threatening the capital of the Ming Dynasty.

In May, Li Zicheng and Luo Rucai once again joined forces to attack Kaifeng three times, but they still could not break through Kaifeng. They could only besiege the city with a large army, and another group of troops attacked Bozhou eastward.Now Gao Mingheng and Chen Yongfu in Kaifeng City have only more than ten thousand defenders under their command, and their food and wages are scarce day by day.

Dozens of urgent rescue reports from Kaifeng have been placed on Emperor Chongzhen's desk. But at that time, the army of Jiannu was suppressing the border. Although Emperor Chongzhen ordered Sun Chuanting to lead the army to reinforce Henan, Jiannu did not retreat, and Sun Chuanting could not make the trip.

Emperor Chongzhen did not dare to send other troops to reinforce Henan. He was afraid that the capital would lose, so he recruited Qin Wang's teachers.The mobile forces of the Ming army moved in large numbers in the direction of Beijing.In the end, Jiannu was defeated in Datong, and the crisis in the capital was resolved. Emperor Chongzhen did not forget the danger of Kaifeng, and immediately ordered Sun Chuanting to lead an army to reinforce Kaifeng.Sun Chuanting naturally knew the urgency of the situation, and led his army westward at the fastest speed, and he didn't even have time to attend Cao Yue's wedding.

Now Sun Chuanting now has three trump cards in his hand: one is the Shaanxi soldiers, that is, He Wenlong's original troops; the other is Cao Bianjiao's Dongxie Army;These armies are the people he relies on most, especially Cao Bianjiao's tens of thousands of elites.

These armies are the ones that Sun Chuanting is confident that he can fully command them. The Datong Army trained by Cao Yue, he will personally take charge of it as his own central army.The newly promoted general soldier of Datong, Zhao Xin, is also very kind, and he gives the best treatment in terms of money and food.

In addition to these three troops that Sun Chuanting could surely command, there were Zuo Liangyu's Huguang soldiers, Kong Zhenhui's Sichuan soldiers, Liu Qingze's Shandong soldiers, and Zhu Dadian's Jiangsu and Zhejiang soldiers.These few people are also under the command of Sun Chuanting.

It can be said that, except for those who belonged to Hong Chengchou in Liaodong, most of the other Ming officials and troops were under the command of Sun Chuanting.

In terms of numbers, there are nearly 30 troops under the command of Sun Chuanting, but anyone with a discerning eye knows that no matter whether it is Zuo Liangyu, Liu Qingze, or Kong Zhenhui, they will not completely obey the orders of Sun Chuanting, the three-party governor. Selfish, want to preserve their own strength.

This point, Sun Chuanting is also well aware.He didn't count too much on the coordination of these groups of people, he could only pin his hopes on the Datong Army trained by Cao Bianjiao and Cao Yue.

Kaifeng was at stake, and Sun Chuanting knew that the consequences of Kaifeng's fall would be serious, so he ordered his troops to move west quickly, preparing to attack the bandits from several directions, and join forces under the city of Kaifeng.

Sun Chuanting's arrangement was as follows. He personally led Cao Bianjiao, Gao Jie, and Zhao Xin to attack the rogues in Shaanxi, and ordered Zuo Liangyu, Liu Zeqing, Kong Zhenhui, and Zhu Dadian to attack Henan.

Sun Chuanting's arrangement was well thought out.He planned to use this battle to completely wipe out the main force of the rogues, so that Li Zicheng would no longer be able to recover.Therefore, adopt the combat strategy of attacking in a roundabout way with several troops and attacking from several directions.

As long as the other groups can attack, Sun Chuanting is satisfied as long as they can restrain Li Zicheng's troops, and don't expect them to win.

Under Sun Chuanting's order, hundreds of thousands of troops will enter Shaanxi and Henan, preparing to attack Li Zicheng's troops left and right.

Cao Yue didn't know the specific arrangement of Sun Chuanting, but he had an unreasonable worry, because in history, Sun Chuanting was defeated in this battle and eventually died.He didn't know if his arrival as a time-traveler could change history, Peng Ming's fate, and Sun Chuanting's ending.But he predicted that this military operation would not go according to Sun Chuanting's wishes.

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Shengjing, Dorgon's palace.

During this period of time, Dorgon has been in a bad mood. The main reason is of course that he has been defeated by Cao Yue several times.

He knew that compared with the Ming army, the overall combat power of the Qing army was not inferior, and the disadvantage was only in weapons and equipment.Dorgon is not a rigid person. After seeing the power of firearms, he also had the idea of ​​​​equipping a large number of firearms in the Qing army.

On this day, Dorgon called Fan Wencheng and Tong Yangxing to his house.

"The two of you must be aware of the current situation. My Qing army was defeated twice by the city of Datong, and my military advantage has disappeared. If this crisis is not solved, the situation in the Qing Dynasty will become more and more critical in the future. My king called today The two of you came here just to discuss countermeasures with you!"

"Master, don't worry too much. The Ming court is troubled internally and externally, and Chongzhen's children are suspicious. Even if there are capable people like Sun Chuanting, Cao Yue, and Cao Bianjiao, he can't reverse the situation. Presumably the master already knows that Cao Yue has been relieved of the general army of Datong. This must be because of Chongzhen’s children’s precautions, and the Datong Army was taken away by Sun Chuanting. Today’s Nine Soldiers of Ming Dynasty, the defensive force is not as good as before,” Fan Wencheng said cautiously on the side, “Master , now that Hauge is dead, master, your serious headache will be cured, and Prince Zheng is sick again. The affairs of the Qing Dynasty are all up to you. Master Zixiong is a general plan, and he must have such a plan to deal with the Ming court. "

Earlier, Fan Wencheng suggested to Dorgon to send secret agents to Beijing to drive a wedge between the emperor and ministers of the Ming Dynasty, spreading Cao Yue and Cao Bianjiao in large numbers, as well as Sun Chuanting and Hong Chengchou who had dissent, and wanted to support their own self-reliance.Previously, he successfully induced Emperor Chongzhen to behead Yuan Chonghuan through the divorce plan, and he hoped that the divorce plan would work again.

However, Fan Wencheng knew that Dorgon summoned him and Tong Yangxing today, certainly not to discuss the divorce plan, there should be another purpose, maybe related to the development of firearms.

(End of this chapter)