Ming Empire

Chapter 266 Change Strategy
"What? The Ming army split up to attack Tianjin Wei?" After receiving the news, Dorgon was even more stunned. He overturned the case in front of him and roared furiously: "How is this possible? With such a small force, how dare you divide your troops to attack Tianjin Guard? Didn’t Tianjin Guard have tens of thousands of defenders? Why was it so easily captured by the Ming army?”

Dorgon felt that his world view had been overturned. Cao Yue was far inferior to him in terms of military strength, but he dared to divide his troops boldly. In addition to sending many troops to guard the canal, he also sent troops to attack Tianjin Wei.In an instant, Cao Yue became synonymous with conspiracy in Dorgon's heart. This Ming upstart was really cunning. It turned out that sending troops to capture Linqing and Dezhou and preparing to attack Cangzhou were just smoke bombs. The real purpose was to capture Tianjin Wei.

Of course, Dorgon knew the importance of Tianjin Wei. Tianjin Wei was only two hundred miles away from Beijing. It could be reached by a fast horse in a day and a night, and it only took two or three days by boat on the canal.In other words, the Ming army that captured Tianjin Wei could immediately move northward and attack Beijing directly.

Dorgon couldn't help being frightened into a cold sweat. This Cao Yue was really ruthless. He personally led the troops to contain the main force of the Qing army, but sent other generals to lead the army to attack Tianjin Wei.Tianjin Wei was captured by the Ming army, and the target of the next attack by the Ming army who captured Tianjin Wei was Beijing.In Beijing now, there are not many defenders, and the brothers Jiang Xiang and Jiang Rang rebelled against the Qing Dynasty, and they may attack Beijing at any time.

If several Ming armies jointly attacked Beijing, the tens of thousands of defenders in Beijing would definitely not be able to defend it.

It is necessary to immediately return to aid Beijing. This is Dorgon's first idea after receiving the fall of Tianjin Wei.

After this idea came up, Dorgon couldn't help but smile wryly, what happened to him?During this period of time, strategic mistakes were frequently made, and no matter what he did, he was wrong. Now Dorgon feels powerless to deal with the situation.Only a few months and a few defeats ruined most of his ambitions. At this time, he no longer has the energy to think about winning the world. What he thinks about is how to deal with the crisis in front of him.

The Ming army captured Tianjin Wei, which was the greatest crisis for the Qing Dynasty. After all, members of the Qing royal family were in Beijing, and the main force of the Qing army was on the front line of Dezhou. Dezhou is more than [-] miles away from Beijing. It will take a few days.At present, it is not known how many Ming troops captured Tianjin Wei, and he did not find out exactly how many new Ming troops he could command in Cao Yue's hands.

If there were tens of thousands or hundreds of thousands of troops to capture Tianjin Wei, with the terrible firepower configuration of the Ming army, it would not be difficult to break through the city of Beijing.There are also quite a few defenders in Tianjin Guard, and they sit in a strong city. Judging from the information sent back, it only took one day to break through Tianjin Guard and wipe out most of the Qing defenders in Tianjin Guard.If the Ming army with such terrifying attack power reached the city of Beijing, the consequences would be disastrous.

Dorgon also immediately convened cronies to discuss countermeasures.

Everyone changed their faces when they heard that Tianjin Wei was captured by the Ming army.They all knew the importance of Tianjin Wei, and they also knew that in order to avoid the fall of Tianjin Wei, Dorgon deployed a lot of troops in Cangzhou, because they were worried that after the Ming army captured Cangzhou, they would go up the canal to capture Tianjin Wei.

Now that Cangzhou is still in the hands of the Qing Dynasty, it is impossible for the Ming army to cross Cangzhou to attack Tianjin Wei. The only possibility is that it was the navy of the Ming army who captured Tianjin Wei.They arrived at Tianjin Wei by sea, and successfully concealed the news of the march from the Qing spies, which caught the Tianjin guards by surprise.Next, the target of the Ming army's attack must be the city of Beijing, and it is even possible that after capturing the city of Beijing, they will try to destroy all the Qing troops with a north-south attack.Thinking of these possibilities, who would not tremble with fear.

In the past, even if the Ming army dared to attack like this, the whole Qing Dynasty would not be afraid. At that time, the fighting power of the Qing army was invincible in the world, and no matter how many Ming troops could defeat it.But now, the situation is completely different. The Ming army equipped with a huge amount of firearms is terribly powerful. The Qing army is far from being an opponent. Even if it has an absolute advantage in numbers, there is no way to win.

There are not many defenders in Beijing, how can they resist the attack of the Ming army?And their family members, as well as property, are all in Beijing. If Beijing falls, the Qing Dynasty is over, and they are all over.Therefore, almost everyone suggested that Dorgon immediately lead his army back to Beijing.

Most people asked to return to Beijing, and Dorgon himself thought so, so there was no suspense in the final result of the discussion. He immediately stopped the battle of Dezhou and led his army back to rescue Beijing.

And just when Dorgon made a decision to suspend the Dezhou War and return to Beijing, Dorgon received another bad news, that is, Li Zicheng rejected the proposal of cooperation between the two parties.In reply to Dorgon's letter, Li Zicheng stated that Dashun and Jiannu are sworn enemies, and the people of Dashun will fight Jiannu to the end, and will never stop until they eliminate Jiannu.Dashun will never join forces with Jiannu, and the Dashun army will continue to fight against Jiannu, recover Beijing, and restore peace to the people of the world.After receiving Li Zicheng's reply, Dorgon no longer dared to have too many expectations, and immediately decided that the whole army would retreat and return to Beijing, preparing to organize the defense of Beijing.

And Cao Yue received the news that the Daming Navy had captured Tianjin Wei before Dorgon.After receiving the news, Cao Yue again ordered the navy officers and soldiers to leave some troops to guard Tianjin Guard, and the rest went north along the canal to attack Beijing, trying to reach the city of Beijing before Dorgon led his army back to Beijing.And he immediately sent Gao Jie to lead two guards north to attack Cangzhou.

Gao Jie, who accidentally gained the trust of Cao Yue and was temporarily assisted to lead two guards to attack Cangzhou, was really surprised and happy.He has always been eager to have the opportunity to lead the army again, to add to his merits, so he did not hesitate to be careful in front of Cao Yue, and to serve him again and again.But he also thinks that it is quite difficult to gain Cao Yue's trust in a short period of time.But unexpectedly, in such a short period of time, Cao Yue gave him great importance and ordered him to lead his army northward to attack Cangzhou, an important town on the canal.

When Cao Yue announced the order, he was dumbfounded. Jier was overjoyed, and immediately stood up to accept the order, and issued a military order on the spot, saying that he would lead the army to capture Cangzhou, otherwise he would be willing to follow the law.

However, Cao Yue then told Gao Jie that letting him lead the army to attack Cangzhou was only the first step in the attack on Beijing, and that Cangzhou must be captured in the shortest possible time, because he would personally lead the army to reinforce Tianjin Wei and attack Beijing City to seize Dorgon regained Beijing before returning to rescue Beijing.

After Gao Jie was stunned for a while, he immediately understood what Cao Yue's arrangement was, and felt that the mission he was leading was more important.

Gao Jie also immediately led the two newly formed guard divisions, No. 13 and No. 14 guard divisions, to go north along the canal, preparing to capture this important town connecting Tianjin Wei and Dezhou as soon as possible.

After Gao Jie led the army to leave Dezhou, Cao Yue, who received the news that Dorgon had led his army to withdraw to the north overnight, immediately made new arrangements.

(End of this chapter)