The Ming Dynasty: A bookstore sells the history of the Ming Dynasty, leaving Emperor Chongzhen bewil

To trap a dog by closing the door.

Emperor Chongzhen felt that Zhu Ziming's analogy was quite apt.

We now know that a vicious dog is coming, and it will be here in a few months, but how do we fight it?

The first thing that comes to mind is setting up an ambush.

However, the enemy is said to have an army of 100,000, or at least tens of thousands. If you set up an ambush, you can at most take down the enemy's vanguard, but the cost is that you alert them and your advantage of being ahead of the game is gone in an instant.

What should we do next? How can we achieve the greatest results?

To be honest, Emperor Chongzhen really didn't know.

Therefore, even with foresight, when Emperor Chongzhen was asked to figure out how to deal with the aggressive Huang Taiji, he was still at a loss. He felt he had a great advantage, but he didn't know where to start and was very anxious.

This is similar to the original historical timeline, where Huang Taiji's army was at the city gates, and all he could do was urge the war, urge the war, and urge the war again.

This was true of the Jisi Incident, and it was also true of Sun Chuanting, Lu Xiangshan, and Hong Chengchou!

I thought about it seriously for a while.

Emperor Chongzhen finally looked at Zhu Ziming and said, "Please enlighten me, sir!"

After taking a sip of tea, Zhu Ziming said, "To be honest, I don't have any practical experience either. I'm just a book buyer and novelist. What I'm saying is just my thoughts when I read books and write novels. I might be okay at commenting on history, but when it comes to strategic issues, I really can't guarantee that what I say is correct."

"I believe you, sir."

Emperor Chongzhen looked at Zhu Ziming with unwavering eyes.

Zhu Ziming was somewhat helpless, because he knew that everything he was saying was actually affecting a world on another timeline.

How about this?

Zhu Ziming thought for a moment and said, "I'll put these issues that we discussed into my novel and let the readers discuss them and offer suggestions."

"Readers?" Chongzhen frowned. "Is this feasible?"

"feasible!"

Zhu Ziming nodded: "In my world, there is something called the Internet. When I put my writing online, anyone who goes online can see it. I can also see their feedback immediately. It's like gathering ideas from all sides in my novel. They say three cobblers are equal to one Zhuge Liang. Now all the readers are helping you with your opinions. And let me tell you, the readers are not just cobblers. Although they come in all shapes and sizes, they are all very capable."

Emperor Chongzhen listened with a mixture of understanding and confusion.

Zhu Ziming said, "In short, I'll first tell you my understanding, then incorporate it into the novel, and finally, I'll take into account the readers' opinions and revise it gradually, okay?"

"it is good."

Emperor Chongzhen nodded emphatically in agreement.

Zhu Ziming said, "According to the original historical timeline, there are still six to seven months before the Jisi Incident. It is almost impossible to suddenly and significantly increase the power of weapons within these six or seven months."

Why do I say that? Just look at an example and you'll understand.

"In the original historical timeline, when the Jin army besieged the city, Tao Chongdao, a supervising secretary of the Ministry of War, took some firearms made by the armory to ask the generals of the three major camps in the capital to teach them. As a result, the generals stared at each other blankly, 'all of them were at a loss.' So he went to ask the soldiers, but the soldiers were even more clueless. Therefore, even if you spend a lot of manpower and resources to make a batch of more advanced firearms, the soldiers may not know how to use them for a while."

"Therefore, it is unrealistic to increase the power of weapons in a short period of time. We still need to win by strategic deployment based on our current combat capabilities."

Emperor Chongzhen continued to nod in deep agreement.

As for building new weapons, Emperor Chongzhen has absolutely no interest in it now. Even if he were interested, to be honest, he wouldn't know where to find the money to build them.

Zhu Ziming's words were exactly what he wanted to say.

Zhu Ziming continued, "Now that we know the time, place, and route of Huang Taiji's advance, the best tactic is naturally an ambush. But where should we set up the ambush? I think there are two options: one is inside the pass, and the other is outside the pass."

"Setting up an ambush outside the pass means setting up an ambush outside the three passes of the Great Wall: Da'ankou, Longjingguan, and Malanyu, and waiting for Huang Taiji to arrive. The advantage is that this can quickly eliminate a part of Huang Taiji's manpower, and by defending the passes, Huang Taiji cannot enter the pass, so the risk is small. The disadvantage is that if Huang Taiji cannot win, he will choose to retreat quickly, making it difficult to expand the gains and not be able to cause fatal damage to the Later Jin."

"What if they set up an ambush inside the pass?"

"At this time, Huang Taiji had already crossed the Great Wall. We set up an ambush inside the Great Wall. The advantage of this was that Huang Taiji would not be able to retreat easily once the battle started, and it would be easy to form a cornered beast fighting. The disadvantage was that there was a risk of falling into the same situation as Yuan Chonghuan. If you close the door, you can't beat the dog. At that time, you will not only be bitten by the dog, but also let the dog run away."

Which option do you think is better?

Although he had thoroughly analyzed the advantages and disadvantages, Chongzhen was still somewhat bewildered by Zhu Ziming's question and asked in return, "What do you think, sir?"

Zhu Ziming said, "If I had to choose, I would choose to ambush them inside the pass."

Why?

"Because setting up an ambush outside the pass, although the risk is small, the results are also small. If we cannot deliver a fatal blow to the Later Jin, then the Ming Dynasty cannot truly be considered to have gained a chance to breathe."

"Setting up an ambush inside the pass is risky, but the rewards are equally high."

"If Huang Taiji enters the pass, as long as the Ming Dynasty seals off a few passes, his retreat will be cut off, and he will become a trapped beast. Not to mention that the Ming Dynasty can devour this trapped beast, even if it only sheds a layer of skin, it will be enough to give the Later Jin a hard time."

"Only in this way can we truly strike at the heart of the Later Jin, preventing them from invading the Ming Dynasty for at least five years, thus giving the Ming Dynasty a real chance to breathe."

Emperor Chongzhen nodded, indicating his agreement with Zhu Ziming's statement.

Zhu Ziming continued, "But have you noticed the problem? If we let Huang Taiji enter the pass, wouldn't that be the same strategy Yuan Chonghuan used to trap and defeat Huang Taiji? Yuan Chonghuan has already failed once, resulting in such a painful lesson. Aren't we afraid of repeating the same mistake and history repeating itself?"

"To be honest, it's not impossible."

"Therefore, the key issue now is how to learn from Yuan Chonghuan's failure and avoid falling into the same predicament as him."

Emperor Chongzhen listened very attentively.

Zhu Ziming continued, "I think Yuan Chonghuan's strategy of trapping the dog by closing the door was not wrong. His mistake was choosing the wrong place, or rather, he didn't really have a choice."

"Because when he arrived, Zunhua and Santunying had already fallen, leaving only the isolated Jizhou."

"In order to form a pincer movement and surround Huang Taiji, this mad dog, he could only choose Jizhou, Hexiwu, and Beiping. However, he overlooked an important place: Beiping was different from other places. Beiping was the capital of the Ming Dynasty, not a strategic location that Yuan Chonghuan could control."