My life skills in Daming Liver - Chapter 644

c634 Fight for Shaanxi

After sending Hao Xian away, Li Chengliang let out a long sigh.

As a counselor, Hao Xian’s perspective is relatively simple. He only needs to consider strategic matters.

But as the current ruler of the Ming Dynasty, I have too many things to consider.

Moreover, Guo Pu is deeply rooted in Shaanxi, and the Shaanxi New Army is also combat-effective. Military mobilization has not been completed, and preparations have not been made. How can we attack Shaanxi?

Li Chengliang’s last resort was to send an envoy, pretending to visit his daughter, and send a personal letter to Guo Pu, hoping that he could continue to fight against the southeastern thieves.

At the same time, he also implicitly proposed that if Shaanxi could not be defended, Guo Pu would just take his army out of Shaanxi, and Li Chengliang would immediately relocate his army and arrange a new location for him.

On the one hand, they began to deploy military forces in Shanxi, mobilize supplies, and make secret preparations.

It was against this background that Tong An embarked on the road to Shanxi.

The main goal of this newly formed Shanxi army is to face the threat from Shaanxi, but the quality of this army may not live up to Li Chengliang’s expectations.

Originally, the army was supposed to set off on the 20th of this month, but it was delayed until the 1st of next month, and the supplies were not fully prepared.

This cannot be blamed on Marshal Dai. During this period, the price of materials in the capital has soared. Many military workshops have no money to purchase materials and have stopped working. Raw materials cannot be transported, and workers refuse to go to work. In the end, the Ministry of War has to cobble together. , to collect basic supplies for this new Shanxi army.

As a scholar in this army, Tong An was appointed by Marshal Dai as a logistics staff officer, responsible for the army’s logistics work.

Only then did Tong An realize how difficult it was to do good logistics work.

Different from the past, the logistics of marching and fighting are extremely important nowadays. According to the latest military theory in the Southeast, “Whoever can arrange the battlefield in advance can win the war.”

In ancient times, all you needed to fight a war was weapons, armor, and food and grass. In many cases, you could fight without one or two of the above. Some armies relied on robbery for food and grass supplies, and weapons and equipment could be used at random.

But war is different now.

If a soldier has no food, who will fight with you? And not only food is needed, but other supplies are also needed.

According to the standards in the southeast, when each soldier is fighting, in addition to three meals of food and meat dishes every day, he must also ensure a supply of a bag of brown sugar.

Naturally, the Ming Dynasty cannot afford such a supply, but there must still be enough food every day.

In addition, Shanxi is colder than the capital. Soldiers also need winter clothes and hats to keep out the cold, and officers also need gloves to keep out the cold.

These daily necessities are only part of it, and the numerous military supplies are the biggest headache.

Due to the lack of equipment in the Ming Dynasty, the entire army used a lot of weapons.

From cold weapons such as swords and guns to the Fo Lang machine guns in stock, some of these can be traced back to the Wang Yangming period, which was when Wuzong of the Ming Dynasty was casting.

There are also newly cast artillery pieces, as well as some artillery pieces captured from the battles in the southeast.

In addition to the Western artillery purchased from Western merchants, these artillery were divided into naval guns removed from ships by Spanish merchants. The more advanced artillery in the Ming army was called the Hongyi cannon. There are also shoddy red cannons produced by Spanish merchants in Manila.

These artillery pieces come in many sizes and require different sizes of shells. Organizing these artillery pieces is simply a complex mathematical problem, not a military problem.

In addition to artillery, there are also many types of muskets, which require different ammunition. These require detailed calculations to deliver the appropriate ammunition to the soldiers.

These complex supply tasks were handed over to newcomers to the army like Tong An. Even if he worked very hard, mistakes would inevitably occur.

But these are no longer important. The problem of insufficient ammunition on the Ming Dynasty has been bothering the frontline troops for many days. The number of artillery shells of many armies is not enough to bombard with all their strength for a day. In fact, Marshal Dai’s request to everyone is to lead the troops Just arrive in Shanxi safely.

Such serious logistical problems were also the reason why Li Chengliang refused to accept Shanhaoxian’s suggestion and could only treat Guo Pu with gentleness.

By the time Guo Pu received the letter, Guo Ding happened to have returned to Shaanxi from the capital.

Guo Ding was a businessman on the surface, but in fact he had been helping Guo Pu in the capital to inquire about information and prepare supplies. He was Guo Pu’s confidant, so Guo Pu immediately summoned Guo Ding into the palace to discuss the situation in the Ming court.

Guo Pu threw Li Chengliang’s letter to Guo Ding and said:

“This is a private letter written by the general to me. It seems that the general does not have much expectation that I can hold Shaanxi. He just hopes that I will preserve my strength and take the army to Shanxi.”

After Guo Ding read the letter, he quickly said: “Absolutely not!”

“The general treats his subordinates very coldly. A few days ago, in order to weaken the military power of his commanders, he wanted to change the generals. In the end, the general’s son Li Rusong objected, so it could not be carried out.”

“He is so indifferent to his direct subordinates and must be on guard at all times. Although Ming Gong and the general are related to each other, this is originally a political marriage, and the general has so many children, so it may not be because of this. We should treat Ming Gong kindly.”

“Besides, even if the general wants to treat Duke Ming well, he will never allow Duke Ming to take charge of the army like he does now.”

“If we take the army to Shanxi, we will be sniping at each other. We are guest troops, and we will have to rely on the general for supplies. At that time, if we want to deal with Duke Ming, we only need a eunuch holding an imperial edict. ”

Guo Pu nodded repeatedly after hearing this. Li Chengliang originally wrote a letter, and Guo Pu had also thought about this retreat.

He could lead his elite troops to withdraw from Shanxi without betraying the imperial court or surrendering to the southeast, and he could continue to be his own governor.

But their officers also expressed opposition. Their reason was that the soldiers of the Shaanxi New Army were all locally recruited from Guanzhong. They were naturally willing to let them fight to defend their hometown, but if they were allowed to live in Shanxi, they would They will lose their will to fight and may even desert.

Guo Pu made up his mind that he would never go to Shanxi.

Guo Ding continued: “This letter should be the general’s plan to delay the war. The general has already had thoughts about our Shaanxi Province. The closure of Shaanxi shops means that the general has tacit approval.”

Guo Pu nodded repeatedly. Otherwise, why would Li Rubai specifically arrest Guo Ding if there were so many merchants using Southeast Silver Dollars in the capital?

If not for the death of Jiajing and the royal family’s amnesty, Shaanxi’s property would have been swallowed up by Li Rubai.

When he thought of this, Guo Pu asked:

“In your opinion, can Shaanxi be defended?”