mtl008 Chapter 349 349 The advantage is mine
Chapter 349 349 The advantage is mine
Chapter 349 The Advantage is in Me
Zhu Di's guess was absolutely correct.
At the beginning of the "rebellion", Zhu Di had no advantage at all.
The number of troops under his command, including those mobilized and forced to surrender, was no more than tens of thousands.
Most of them were soldiers who participated in the siege of Peking.
He was unable to control any territory other than his fiefdom of Peking.
Emperor Jianwen had a standing army several times larger than that of Prince of Yan, abundant resources, and had abolished several vassal states.
This way, it seems that I have the advantage.
but.
Wars since ancient times have not been simple horizontal comparisons.
Compared with the central court, Zhu Di experienced wars in the north for many years and commanded large troops in battle many times.
He has outstanding leadership skills, his soldiers are highly combat-effective, and he is also the first in strategy at this time.
On the other hand, Emperor Jianwen's army suffered greatly due to indecisiveness in command and poor coordination.
Don't underestimate Geng Bingwen, he is a veteran.
But for an ordinary person, leading an army of 100,000 people would be considered a top commander, not to mention an army of 300,000. The difficulty is simply exponentially multiplied.
At the same time, the imperial court did not take the fact that Prince of Yan had started a rebellion seriously, thinking that Zhu Di could destroy him in a snap, and focused its energy on some reform issues.
"Brother-in-law, why didn't our eldest nephew use you as his military advisor? Instead, he picked an unknown editor from the Imperial Academy to do the job. Does he have the brains to do that?"
Zhu Di took a deep breath and suddenly thought of the result: "Could it be that Wang Buli died early because of mental damage?"
He looked at Wang Buli standing aside.
Wang Buli almost believed what he said, because he knew he was pretending.
However, he was a little worried about what Zhu Yuanzhang had seen about the future of the Ming Dynasty. What if Zhu Yuanzhang was not in a clear mind and wanted to take him with him before he died?
Wang Buli was also stunned.
"I don't think so." Zhu Yuanzhang knew that Wang Buli was not dead, so he sat down again:
"This good son-in-law of mine has a good relationship with you kings. My eldest grandson may not trust him and may have imprisoned him long ago. I let him come forward as a military advisor and didn't kill him. This means I have given him an explanation."
After listening to Zhu Yuanzhang's words, Zhu Di understood that his father knew more than he did.
Since his own brother was treated so badly, how could Wang Buli be treated any better?
Wang Buli took a sip
This made Zhu Di make up his mind that after his father died, he would find a way to get Wang Buli and his son, who was held hostage, to return to Beiping together, so that Wang Buli could help him.
At that time, he would directly announce to the public that Wang Buli had been detained to prevent Zhu Yunwen from ruining his son's name.
Zhu Di believed that at that time, with Wang Buli's help, even with only 800 people, he could quickly conquer the entire Ming Dynasty.
Zhu Yuanzhang also shook his head slightly. Geng Bingwen was already old, and it was not a good job for him to lead so many people.
At that time, Geng Bingwen should have been enjoying his retirement at home, and it would be difficult for him to have much prestige if he suddenly came out to lead the soldiers.
"Geng Bingwen's plan was to use superior military forces to restrict the Prince of Yan to the Beiping area and prevent him from roaming around. So he placed 130,000 troops in Zhending, and assigned 100,000 troops to Xu Kai to garrison Henan. Pan Zhong stationed a part of his troops in Mozhou, and Yang Song led 9,000 troops to attack Xiongxian, agreeing that Pan Zhong would provide support from behind.
Zhu Di gathered his troops and analyzed that Pan Zhong and Yang Song's troops were advancing lightly, were closest to Beiping, and had not yet established a firm foothold, so they should be attacked by surprise.
Zhu Yuanzhang was very satisfied with Zhu Di's actions, because that was how he fought wars in the past. Everyone came up with ideas and he made the final decision.
“This is a really good habit.”
Wang Buli believed that this was the time to pool ideas and give full play to the subjective initiative of his subordinates, as everyone was a grasshopper on the same rope.
"The King of Yan personally led his army to Zhuozhou. It was the Mid-Autumn Festival. He guessed that the enemy did not expect me to come and must be drinking and having fun, so he launched an attack in the middle of the night, wiped out Yang Song's 9,000 men, and captured 8,000 war horses.
After Zhu Di conquered Xiong County, he thought that Pan Zhong was still unaware of the situation, so he sent someone with more than a thousand soldiers to ambush at the bridge. When Pan Zhong led his troops across the bridge to provide support, Zhu Di took the opportunity to lead his troops to meet the attack. Pan Zhong was defeated and captured, and Zhu Di took advantage of the victory to conquer Mozhou in one fell swoop.
After clipping his wings twice, Zhu Di summoned all the generals to discuss again. Now Geng Bingwen doesn't know that we are approaching him suddenly, so it's a good opportunity to catch him off guard again.
It happened that Zhang Bao, a young general under Geng Bingwen, came to surrender. Zhu Di learned about Geng Bingwen's plan from Zhang Bao. 130,000 people were stationed on both sides of the Hutuo River, and Zhu Di formulated a strategy.
Zhang Bao returned to Geng's army and said that he had been defeated and captured. He took advantage of the fact that Prince Yan's soldiers were negligent in guarding and stole a horse to escape. He also spread the news that Prince Yan would attack Zhending. The plan was to transfer Geng Bingwen's troops on the south bank to the north bank so as to wipe them out in one fell swoop. As expected, Geng Bingwen fell into the trap and moved his camp.
Upon receiving the news, Zhu Di attacked from a small path to the east gate of Zhending. At that time, Geng Bingwen was busy receiving envoys from the court. Zhu Di led his troops around the city and destroyed Geng Bingwen's two camps. Geng Bingwen fought hastily, but was defeated and retreated back into the city, defending himself behind closed doors.
Those who did not enter the city fled south across the river. Several generals were captured, and tens of thousands of people were killed, wounded or captured.
Zhu Di knew that Geng Bingwen, the veteran general, was good at defense, so after three days of siege, he decisively returned to Peking.
"In the past half month or so, Lao Si has deployed his troops with great speed, attacked the enemy unexpectedly, used spies, understood both ourselves and the enemy, misled the enemy, and lured the enemy into action. His military talent is worthy of praise."
Wang Buli praised Zhu Di repeatedly and said that he had quite a few ideas when it came to commanding battles.
Zhu Di looked at his own swiftness and called everyone together to discuss.
In addition to the teachings of his father-in-law Xu Da, he was also trained through occasional battles with Wang Buli.
One person is short-term, two people are long-term.
Zhu Yuanzhang vaguely felt that Wang Buli was involved in this, especially since the general surrender was so timely.
And Geng Bingwen doesn't seem to be that dedicated.
Zhu Yuanzhang laughed a few times and said, "These battles were indeed well fought. It's worth it that we handed the North to you and gave you some experience."
"Thank you, Father."
Zhu Di had some confidence. According to the current trend, he still had a good chance of winning.
"When Zhu Yunwen heard that Geng Bingwen had been defeated, he appointed Li Jinglong, the son of the late Cao Gongzi, as the general to replace Geng Bingwen, based on Huang Zicheng's recommendation.
In September, Li Jinglong went to Dezhou, gathered the defeated soldiers, and mobilized 500,000 troops to station in Hejian.
"what?"
Wang Buli, Zhu Yuanzhang and Zhu Di were all very surprised.
Even though Zhu Yuanzhang praised Li Jinglong as a qualified second-generation general, he actually did not have high expectations for Li Jinglong in terms of military affairs.
Zhu Di couldn't help but glance at Wang Buli and whispered, "Did you arrange this?"
"How should I know?" Wang Buli immediately argued:
"It was this kid Li Jinglong who took your brother away earlier. He is deeply trusted by your eldest nephew. With our relationship, can Zhu Yunwen trust me?"
Zhu Di thought so too, there was actually no one in the Ming Dynasty who could lead the troops.
Half a million people?
Zhu Yuanzhang himself had never led so many troops, let alone Li Jinglong, whom he did not think highly of.
Is it true that the Ming Dynasty has no more commanders available?
Five hundred thousand soldiers and horses, facing a veteran like Zhu Di.
Coupled with Li Jinglong's command ability, Zhu Yuanzhang even felt that Zhu Yunwen deliberately wanted Zhu Di to win.
It seems that this grandson has not received much military education. He only knows how to use military force to defeat others and has no military awareness at all.
Then Qi Tai has a solution.
But after all, he had never been in the army, and many of his battles were based on his own imagination.
If the Ming Dynasty was invaded by foreign enemies at this time, and the Mongols attacked, without Zhu Di, the king of the border, to provide support, wouldn't the north be lost?
However, Zhu Yuanzhang thought about it for a while. Li Jinglong had a good relationship with Zhu Di. He wondered if Wang Buli deliberately pushed him to Zhu Yunwen so that he could gain the trust of the new emperor and play a decisive role in some things in the future.
Although Li Jinglong is the oldest, he trusts Wang Buli very much.
All ideas were secretly obtained from him, and even the dandy boy who went to the border to act as a smuggler with the Mongols did it in a very professional manner.
Thinking of this, Zhu Yuanzhang glanced at Wang Buli silently.
He didn't believe that Wang Buli would stay out of the fight for the throne, just like Li Shimin and Li Jing did when Li Shimin and Li Jing did not help each other during the Xuanwu Gate Incident.
This is not Wang Buli's character.
What happened next was exactly as Zhu Yuanzhang had expected. This time Zhu Di was attacked from two large armies in the southeast. Wu Gao, Marquis of Jiangyin, led his troops from Liaodong to attack Yongping.
Zhu Di decided to concentrate his superior forces to rescue Yongping first, and then come back to rescue Beiping.
Because he knew Li Jinglong, who was a man of few strategies and lacked practical combat experience, especially in large-scale troop operations. Even his father had never fought such a large battle.
Especially in Zhu Di's view, Jianwen was not a good fighter, and 500,000 people were gathered here.
The government's policies were not well implemented, the military discipline was not in good order, it was cold early in Peking, and the soldiers lacked food and clothing.
In addition, Li Jinglong lacked wisdom and courage, and his authority was not strong enough, so he was doomed to fail.
Zhu Di warned the crown prince Zhu Gaochi that if Li Jinglong came to attack Beiping, he should only hold his ground and not go into battle, and wait for his father to come back and beat him up.
In six days, Zhu Di arrived in Yongping. Wu Gao and others immediately fled to Shanhaiguan. Zhu Di sent light cavalry to pursue them and captured and killed thousands of them.
Because the war progressed quickly, Zhu Di once again summoned his generals to discuss the strategy of marching north to take Daning.
Zhu Di and Zhu Quan had a good relationship, and the two brothers often joined forces to fight, especially since Zhu Quan had far more troops than Zhu Di.
Because they had a good relationship, Zhu Yunwen once again provided assists.
I want to deprive Ning Wang Zhu Quan of his three guards to prevent the two of them from forming an alliance.
Then Zhu Di forcibly abducted Prince Ning, gathered all his subordinates, and took over the Three Guards of Doyan.
It strengthened military strength, expanded territory, and consolidated the rear security from Peking to the Northeast.
Li Jinglong's actions were completely within Zhu Di's expectations. He divided his troops into three routes. First, he used the main force to attack the gates of Peking. Second, he used part of his forces to attack Tongzhou and cut off the Yan army's way back to Peking. Third, he led nine battalions to station in Zhengba Village to intercept the Yan army returning there.
Zhu Di integrated his troops on the road and divided them into five armies.
It snowed heavily that day and the Baihe River froze. The Yan army crossed the river on the ice early the next morning, defeated more than 10,000 sentries of Li Jinglong, and then attacked Li Jinglong's main force.
Most of Li Jinglong's troops were from the south. They arrived in September, and it was cold early in Peking. Heavy snow fell, and the soldiers suffered from the severe cold. Many froze to death or were disabled. Their morale was low and their formation was in chaos.
Zhu Di took the opportunity to launch a fierce attack, breaking seven camps in a row and killing and capturing tens of thousands of people.
Li Jinglong led the remaining troops to flee to Dezhou.
After reorganizing his troops, Zhu Di continued to attack Li Jinglong's troops under the city of Beiping, destroyed four of their camps, and the rest fled to Dezhou.
The siege of Peking was lifted, but Zhu Yunwen was still unaware of the situation. He felt that Li Jinglong's arrangement would allow him to capture Zhu Di in no time, so he promoted him to the position of Prince Grand Tutor and gave him a generous reward.
Zhu Di looked at his middle-aged self in the picture. He was really full of vigor and vitality, as if he was saying that no one in the world could match him.
"Insight into the enemy's situation, accurate judgment, decisive decision-making, and clever deployment."