Five Dynasties River Mountains Fengyue

Chapter 219 Great News
At the end of the fifth year of Xiande, the government held a solemn ceremony to sacrifice to the heavens, reporting to the ancestors and gods the achievements of Dazhou in the past year, and at the same time wishing that the coming year will have good weather and everything goes well.

What the officials say is written by someone, and it is difficult to understand. There are many grammars and specific expressions in ancient books. Among them, it mainly talks about the achievements of Shi Congyun in calming Jingchu this year. greatest achievement.

However, it was not a Privy Council member who wrote these, but a person Shi Congyun knew well, Tao Gu, Minister of the Ministry of War.

Judging from Shi Congyun's contact with him, this man is an out-and-out literati. He usually speaks politely and has a mild temper. Sometimes he endures conflicts with others mostly by himself.

Because of his literary talents, in addition to serving as the Minister of the Ministry of War, he also served as the imperial edict, that is to say, he wrote all the official edicts.

Shi Congyun was also surprised that such a literati actually served as the Minister of the Ministry of War.

When asking Feng Jisheng and the artisans of the Ministry of War, he always told Tao Gu, and Tao Gu agreed very happily, and because the Ministry of War was in charge of the military registration and arsenal, Shi Congyun had to coordinate and communicate with him on many things.

Gradually, I also understood why the dignified Ministry of War let a literati serve as the servant.

The system of three provinces and six ministries in the Tang Dynasty has been deformed. The six ministries were originally the departments with real power, and the three provinces were the decision-making and order-making institutions. However, many powers of the six ministries have been emptied.

The most serious of these are the Ministry of Households and the Ministry of War.

The Ministry of Households and the Ministry of War are two departments with great power. Needless to say, the Ministry of Households is in charge of taxation and money in the world;

Up to now, due to the embarrassment of the emperor's generals and officials, it is common for months and months of fighting to require power concentration, quick response and other reasons.

The main functions and responsibilities of the Ministry of War were replaced by the Privy Council.

However, the considerations of the two are different.

The reason why the three divisions replaced the household department is because the household department has too much power in charge of taxation and wealth in the world and needs to be dispersed. It is divided into three divisions: Duzhi, Yantie, and household department (in charge of taxation) to disperse the power of the household department to prevent officials from becoming bigger.

The Privy Council is the other way around. Because of the perennial wars, the military decision-making body needs to respond quickly, while the Ministry of War has a large number of personnel and scattered powers, making it impossible to respond quickly.

Coupled with the emperor's distrust of generals, he trusted his confidants more in military decision-making.

So gradually, the Privy Council, which is more streamlined, has fewer people, and has more power, and is composed of a few people trusted by the emperor, replaced the military decision-making power of the Ministry of War and the power to issue military orders.

The Ministry of War is only left with the function of managing military registration and arsenal, and the war is no longer something that the Ministry of War can intervene in. Since it is only a matter of managing military registration and arsenal, it is more handy for literati to come.

Tao Gu is so miraculously concurrently serving as the Minister of the Ministry of War and the Minister of the Privy Council, these two positions seem to be the ultimate in martial arts and literature.

Officials such as Shi Congyun also followed the official family to sacrifice to heaven. The so-called Sheji is actually a place where the gods of grain and land are sacrificed. The ancients used this to represent the political power, because China is an agricultural country.

But this time is very different, Shi Congyun is no longer an unknown person standing at the end.

Behind the officials, civil and military are divided into lines, and on the side of warriors, he is the number one!

And behind him is his father Shi Yanchao, standing number two in the generals team.

Shi Congyun is about the same size as his father now, and he is very tall standing among the crowd. The father and son are 1.9 meters tall and stand in front.

After the ceremony of offering sacrifices to heaven, Shi Congyun was held back by the smiling Wei Renpu before he had time to leave, and told him to go to the Privy Council, saying that he had good news to tell him.

Seeing that the old man was so happy, Shi Congyun became interested, and curiously followed him to the Privy Council Office.

The Chinese New Year was supposed to be the day after tomorrow, but now all the officials are resting. When they went to the Privy Council office, there was no one there. Even the soldiers on duty outside went home early. It was Wei Renpu who opened the door with the key himself.

Following him through the snow-covered courtyard, to the wing room where he was working, Wei Renpu found two of the many official documents and newspapers and handed them to him.

Seeing the old man smiling at him and stroking his Li Kui-like beard, Shi Congyun was also very curious.

I immediately picked up the first battle report and looked at it, and I was overjoyed after reading it.

The battle report said that in November of this year, Chen Sixang, who stayed in Xingzhou, fought with Yizhou soldiers, defeated more than 1000 puppet Han bandit troops in Hedong at the foot of Xishan Mountain, and beheaded more than [-] ranks.

At that time, because the Northern Han Dynasty could not defeat Li Jun, the Jiedu envoy of the Zhaoyi Army in Liaozhou (near Zuoquan County, Shanxi), he was beaten by Li Yun and lost troops and generals. He retreated steadily, and several counties in Liaozhou were almost lost. It was the Liaozhou Zhisuozhou City that was attacked by the Zhaoyi Army led by Li Yun, and even the governor of Liaozhou was arrested.

So the Northern Han Dynasty wanted to send troops to the south, make a surprise attack from the side, and go east to the Taihang Mountains to reverse the situation.

Unexpectedly, after Xingzhou stayed, Chen Sirang was already prepared. His scouts deployed on the mountain road out of Taihang Mountain very early. After discovering the whereabouts of the Northern Han army, he immediately led people to set up an ambush at the mountain pass.

The Northern Han army was ambushed as soon as it came out of the Taihang Mountains. As a result, more than 1000 of the army of more than 500 were killed. This can be said to be a very big victory, and the ratio of killing and killing is very impressive.

Shi Congyun laughed happily after seeing it. Although Li Yun was a stabbing head, he was very disrespectful to the officials and the court, and even dared to imprison the military supervisor sent by the court, but he fought fiercely.

In fact, in the past few years, the state of Zhou has been fighting on three fronts, and the war continues, but the scale of the war is different.

The main battlefield is in the south, while the eastern side of Taihang Mountain is still at war with the Northern Han Dynasty, and the northern side of Hebei and the Liao Kingdom are also often at odds.

In contrast, the war with the Northern Han Dynasty was much more intense than the war with the Liao Kingdom.

Over the past few years, the two countries in the Liao Kingdom have had border conflicts most of the time, but they have been at constant war with the Northern Han Dynasty.

In the first battle of Gaoping, although finally forced to rescue by the Liao army, Zhou Jun actually walked in a very embarrassed way, because he was afraid of being chased by the Liao army. Burn it all.

The officials also knew very well that once the Liao army arrived in Jinyang, if they were not careful, their entire army might be wiped out in Hedong.

But in the first half of the Battle of Gaoping, the Northern Han army lost over [-], and almost all the main elites were wiped out. It is certain that the Northern Han Dynasty will not recover from a setback. If it is not afraid that the Liao Kingdom will cross the Yanmen Pass again and send reinforcements from Daizhou to the south, it will not be difficult to destroy the Northern Han Dynasty. up.

As long as the army of the Central Plains besieges Jinyang, no matter how strong the city is, it’s only a matter of time. It’s not like the siege of Shouzhou. Will they surrender when the city runs out of ammunition and food? Shouzhou has been besieged by tens of thousands of troops and tens of thousands of people for more than a year , It's not that the city is broken.

The key is that Shouzhou is in Huainan, and the Liao Kingdom cannot intervene, and it is too easy for the Liao army to go south to Jinyang.

If troops are stationed in Jinyang for a long time, the Liao army will inevitably go south to rescue. At that time, they will cooperate with each other inside and outside, and the siege army will be in danger.

Therefore, whether the Northern Han Dynasty will perish or not has never been determined by the Northern Han Dynasty. Since the official Gaoping fought a beautiful battle, the Northern Han Dynasty has no qualifications to fight against the Central Plains. The key lies in how to make the Liao Kingdom not dare to intervene in the Northern Han Dynasty.

The method adopted by the Great Zhou was to encroach. The army did not care about him, but the generals on the border continued to send troops to attack it from time to time. Most of the elite of the Northern Han Dynasty were lost in the Battle of Gaoping. Li Yun and others were all powerful generals. Can't resist this encroachment.

In this kind of continuous small-scale war, it is impossible for the Liao Kingdom to send large troops to the rescue, which is laborious and costly.

It has to be said that this kind of decision-making is very clever.

Shi Congyun also admired the decision-making of the prime ministers and officials of the Great Zhou on this matter, especially Wang Pu's strategic vision.

Concentrate forces to attack the easy-to-fight countries in the south, continuously expand its territory and population, and still make profits, while in the north, it will continue to use local warfare against the Northern Han Dynasty to erode it, weaken it, and make it exhausted.

The national strength of the Northern Han Dynasty was not as good as that of the Great Zhou Dynasty. After the war, it was exhausted to deal with the border wars, so it could only be dragged on and weakened, and the more it fought, the worse it was. Anyway, our country is strong and can afford it, but the Northern Han Dynasty can't afford it.

By the fall of this year, Li Yun had taken down several county towns in the Taihang Mountains, opened up the way for the Zhou army to enter the Taihang Mountains, and took over the Liaozhou Governorate.

Shi Congyun was happy not only for the blow to the Northern Han army, but also for the failure of the Northern Han's attempt to retake Liaozhou.

He is going to fight the Liao Kingdom soon, and what he is most afraid of is that the Liao Kingdom or the Northern Han Dynasty will go southeast from the river, then go east out of the Taihang Mountains and enter the central part of Hebei, and attack his army from behind.

There are two roads for the Liao army or the Northern Han army to go east out of the Taihang Mountains. One is to go south from Jinyang, from Liaozhou (Zuoquan County) to Guzhen (Wuan City) and Xingzhou (Xingtai City).

The other is to go to Jinyang Wangdong, leave Mengzhou (Meng County) and arrive at Zhenzhou (Shijiazhuang North).

This forced him to think about confronting the Liao soldiers in the north, and at the same time think about sending a large number of troops to block these two roads, so that the reinforcements from the Northern Han Dynasty or the Liao Kingdom could not leave the Taihang Mountains from the east of the river. He retreats.

This is all right, the situation in Liaozhou is stable, he can send a lot of people less, and keep his troops on the front to fight Liao.

Just when he was grinning happily, Wei Renpu said: "Don't be happy, just look at the rest."

"It's still good news!" Shi Congyun's eyes lit up, and he quickly picked up the remaining battle reports to read.

After seeing it, the whole person almost jumped up!Because the news is so good.

The rest of the battle report was sent by Li Yun, the Jiedu envoy of the Zhaoyi Army.

On the ninth day of the twelfth lunar month, Li Yun led an army to capture the last county town of Liaozhou in the Northern Han Dynasty, beheaded more than 1000 soldiers, and captured more than [-] soldiers of the Northern Han Dynasty.

The Zhaoyi Army controlled Heshun County to the north, and sent troops to the west to garrison Yushe County and Lianghouyi (near Bi County today), completely blocking the road from Jinyang to the east, and blocked the east exit of the Northern Han and Liao Kingdoms in the southern section of Taihang Mountains. Death, complete control of Liaozhou.

Since then, the Zhou army's sphere of influence has expanded to the middle of the Taihang Mountains, and troops can be dispatched from Liaozhou to Jinyang at any time.

The reason why Shi Congyun was so happy was that in this way, one of his major worries was relieved, and when he wanted to sleep, someone handed him a pillow.

Li Yun took control of Liaozhou and guarded Heshun County, Yushe County, and Lianghouyi. It was impossible for the Northern Han Dynasty and the Liao Kingdom to copy his army's back route from that line.

The only possibility is the Mengzhou and Zhenzhou lines further north.

"This is good, the eastern defense line is single, we have fewer places to defend, and the worries are gone.

The frontlines of Mengzhou and Zhenzhou are already close to the front line, and they are not afraid of losing contact with the army when they send reinforcements. This battle suddenly becomes much easier!Hahahahaha." Shi Congyun couldn't help laughing.

Wei Renpu also stroked his beard and laughed, "Yeah, I really didn't expect such a big turning point in the war. If Li Yun didn't win Liaozhou, he would have to send 2 people to the front line alone. Only by forming an army can we rest assured. Now All right, all right."

Shi Congyun nodded: "This Li Yun is good at fighting."

"It's a pity that he is too rebellious and doesn't obey orders. It's not like you. He even dares to imprison the military supervisor." Wei Renpu shook his head, feeling a little helpless.

"Don't worry about him, at least the court needs him right now, let's talk about the future." Shi Congyun said, his mind is full of fighting the Liao Kingdom at this time, he has never been so nervous in his life, and it is too late to think about other things .

Wei Renpu also nodded in agreement, "We can only take one step at a time."

It is impossible not to have a lot of pressure. The Great Zhou Dynasty at this time is not the Northern Song Dynasty.

The Kingdom of Shu, the Southern Han Dynasty, the Southern Tang Dynasty, and Wuyue were all still separated from one side, and there was no strategic depth to the south. It is acceptable for him to go north this time, whether it is a big victory or a tie.

But once defeated, Da Zhou is likely to perish directly.
This is not a joke, it is like this in a country without strategic depth. If the Liao Kingdom wins big and the army takes advantage of the victory to pursue southward, the only thing that can protect them is the Yellow River, and there are too many crossings in the Yellow River, it is difficult to hold on, and it will end in winter icy.

In this way, Da Zhou might have a successful post-promotion.

It is impossible for officials to run across the Yangtze River to become emperor, so this heavy burden is actually very heavy.

It was so heavy that Shi Congyun couldn't even sleep well most of the time, and he was often awakened by nightmares.

And during the day, he didn't dare to rest for a moment. While supervising the training of Shenhuo Capital, he personally led the generals to supervise the training of soldiers.

The tactics of the soldiers of the imperial army of the Great Zhou also needed some adjustments. If they were to deal with the troops of the Southern Academy of Liao, the original tactics of the Zhou army were very good, and the soldiers were also experienced.

But it would be different if elite soldiers from the Northern Academy went south. Most of the Northern Academy were Khitan nobles who fought in the South and North during these years, mainly cavalry.

To deal with the cavalry of the Central Plains Dynasty, there is a set of tactics that has been used for many years, which is easy to use and timeless, and that is the chariot formation.

This was carried forward by Wei Qing to deal with the Xiongnu back then, and has been continuously improved since then, and has continued to become an important strategy for the Central Plains Dynasty to deal with the northern nomads, almost like a textbook.

To put it simply, the outer circle is surrounded by military vehicles to prevent the horses from rushing in, and then the shieldmen and pikemen form a defensive formation behind the vehicles. Arrows, clear water and other supplies are surrounded in the middle.At the same time, the cavalry of one's own side will be placed behind the two wings and wait for opportunities.

Once the nomadic cavalry wanted to break through the central vehicle position and suffered too many casualties or were exhausted, the light and heavy cavalry recuperating on both sides would quickly attack and fight them decisively.

This style of play is not a secret. Wei Qing defeated the Xiongnu army in such a way back then. The key lies in using it skillfully, forming formations quickly, and being able to judge the timing of the attack.

The military cart is the cart used by the soldiers to transport armor, weapons, pots and pans. They usually accompany the army. After they are surrounded and laid flat, there is a base at the front end, which can be inserted with knives and guns to prevent the horses from approaching.

In the past, the Zhou army rarely used this method of warfare, because there were very few cavalry when fighting against the southern troops, and that cavalry was not enough for his father Shi Yanchao to hang up to fight, but now he had to make preparations if he wanted to fight the Khitans up.

Because Shi Congyun has won many battles over the years and has a very high prestige in the army, the soldiers also obeyed him. He went to various camps to give speeches, telling the soldiers the necessity of training this kind of warfare, and everyone obeyed.

As soon as the order was issued, the whole army began to train in full swing.

In such an atmosphere, the time came to the middle of February in the sixth year of Xiande, and the day of dispatching troops was approaching.

(End of this chapter)