Late Tang Dynasty Floating Life

Chapter 1244 Active Defense
In fact, Gubeikou is also located in a Xingdao, and its length is even similar to the Xingdao where Juyongguan is located-the Xingdao, the capital of the army, is forty miles long, and the Gubeikou Xingdao is slightly longer than it.

The width is also similar, "the two sides are steep, there is a road in the middle, and only the rails can be accommodated", that is, the width is only as wide as the "rails".

When Shao Shude climbed the mountain and looked down at the entire Xingdao, he couldn't help but feel a lot of emotion in his heart.

If this kind of dangerous place is defended by Tutuan peasants, they can keep the enemy out.

The terrain is just like this. If the enemy comes with hundreds, thousands, or even hundreds of thousands of people, the effect is the same. If you can't deploy troops, there will always be only a few people on the contact surface.

He couldn't understand why such a dangerous place had been repeatedly breached in history?What kind of "man of God" is guarding?
Even if the enemy made a detour to the rear of Guancheng, it must be a small group of troops, and they marched lightly, and their physical strength was greatly weakened. Many weapons and armor could not be carried, and the food was only enough to last for a few days. This cannot be wiped out?

Perhaps this is not just a military issue, but also political and economic issues, and it must be rotten to a certain extent to cause this effect. For example, the Shence Army, which is about to collapse at a touch, is not even as powerful as the Xiangyong.

"The frontier town army, Yang Qing has to worry a lot." Shao Shude turned his gaze to the mountains farther away, where there was already a dilapidated place, as dead and silent as a ghost.

"Don't worry, Your Majesty, just leave it to the old man to fix it." Yang Yue, deputy envoy of the Nanya Privy Council, said with a smile.

It has been a long time since Lao Yangtou came to Luoyang as a deputy envoy of the Privy Council.To be honest, his vigor and vigor were far worse than when he was leading troops on the front line to fight, so much so that Shao Shude wondered if he would die of illness when he was nearly seventy years old.

Some people, when standing on the stage they like, are often radiant and energetic.But once he loses his stage, he will be unhappy all day long, and he will never return to the vigorous state of the year.

Yang Yue is such a person.

Shao Shude has already decided to hand over the formation of the town army in the Yanshan area to him.This is much more suitable than handing it over to other generals, and the hidden dangers are much smaller-Yang Yue has very little friendship in the army. It is impossible to be supported by others.

Therefore, he is a person who does things, and it is very suitable for him to form the town army.

"The source of the town army, how do you solve it?" Shao Shude asked.

"Your Majesty, I think the Xiaojie Army is good." Yang Yue said: "They have been fighting for several years. Although they are not very good, they are not weak. It is enough to be a town army."

"You are giving me a problem." Shao Shude said with a smile: "Hezhong and Weibo are so rich, are these soldiers willing to move?"

"That's what you have to do, Your Majesty. I just need to build the army, train the troops, and deploy defenses." Yang Yue said: "I think the rest of the Zhongwu Army back then obediently went to Yinshan to be a town soldier?"

Town soldiers are also professional soldiers, who are rewarded with military pay, which is not the same as government soldiers.To be precise, they are frontier soldiers, and their home is near the border.But there are not many of them, and they are mainly responsible for the defense of important places, such as important military strongholds and traffic tunnels.The main force of the border operations is still the soldiers, and they will fight the enemy in field battles.

If the government soldiers can't solve it, then it is necessary to mobilize the rear, gather more state soldiers, township bravery, and even the forbidden army to go out.

The main source of the first town and the second town of Yinshan Township is the strength of Xinquan Army and Zhongwu and Huaining Second Fanzhen soldiers.The former stationed in Feng and Sheng, originally had 8000 people, but recently sent a thousand recruits from the Lingzhou Institute, and a thousand Qingtang Tubo elites, and the number increased to ten thousand; the latter stationed in Rouzhou, originally had five thousand people, and the court just The prisoners in Youzhou were interrogated, and those who were willing to move their families to Rouzhou were paid travel expenses and incorporated into the town army. A total of 2000 people were obtained, so the department will soon be expanded to [-].

There are 5000 people in the first town of Qingtang Town Army, most of whom are Wei Bowu soldiers recruited by Liang Huaijin himself. Shao Shude just approved the expansion of the army by another [-] people, and Liang Huaijin recruited himself in Weibo, and asked his family to move to Qinghai.

This kind of thing is the easiest for Wei Bo traitors like him to do.In a short period of time, Liang Huaijin has no possibility of rebellion. As for how to rectify it in the future, we will see.

Now Beiping Prefecture, Jizhou, Pingzhou, and Guizhou areas also need to form a town army.Shao Shude's plan is for 5000 people to be stationed mainly in the military village. Beikou Shouzhu City near Gubeikou is a big stronghold.

"Private Yang, you give me all the troubles." Shao Shude didn't take his attitude as disobedience, and just smiled: "So soon, you are eyeing the Xiaojie Army."

"Actually, the Youguo Army that is going north is not bad." Yang Yue said again: "They are all from Zhu Quanzhong's old background. I heard that some Qi people, An people, and Huang people have been recruited into the army in the past few years, but the skeleton is still there. With the old leading the new, the combat power should be pretty good. If it is not possible, just transfer the Weisheng army from Yuezhou. Anyway, they fight on the ship every day, and they are not very strong. It is better to transfer all of them to the north. Anyway, His Majesty will not Make them into the Imperial Army, right?"

Shao Shude laughed out loud when he heard this.

Old Yang's words offended many people.

First of all, the attitude is not very good, which makes Shao Shude not sound very good.Secondly, Zhe Zongben, his immediate boss, was also offended by him, and he actually planned on Weisheng Army, with a hint of ridicule and ridicule in his words, satirizing the low combat effectiveness of Weisheng Army; Together, in Yang Yue's view, the more than 6000 people in the Youguo Army should be dismantled or even dismissed.

But what he said was right. Shao Shude had indeed revealed to the officials of the Privy Council just now that he did not intend to expand the Forbidden Army.

According to his original words, "nine" is the extreme number, and ten will not appear.

At present, the Forbidden Army is divided into two parts: infantry and cavalry.

Among them, there are nine teams of Tielin, Wuwei, Tianxiong, Yicong, Tujiang, Tiande, Jinglue, Longxiang, and Konghe. If they are all reduced to 5000 according to the plan, there will be 22.5 people .

The cavalry team has nine teams of flying dragons, black horses, golden swords, silver guns, iron cavalry, Dingnan, flying bears, silver saddles, and Cong Mazhi, totaling more than 10.6 people.

Adding up the two parts, the total number of forbidden troops exceeds 33, which is actually very large, and Shao Shude even wants to continue to compress it.

The other troops are not forbidden troops, whether they are old troops or new troops.And since you can't be a member of the imperial army, you need to deal with it, or retire when you are old, or turn into a local state soldier, or go to the frontier fortress as a town soldier, or go to be a government soldier, or even be consumed on the battlefield—of course, if they If you are willing to disarm and return to the fields, and go home to farm, the court also welcomes it.

Of course this kind of news cannot be concealed.Shao Shude didn't intend to hide it either, otherwise he wouldn't "bloom" in public.

He understood very well Zhu Quanzhong's determination to reduce the number of imperial troops from 30 million to less than 15 in history, rather than offending Wufu of the Central Plains.

His doing so may indeed have brought some side effects, but it defuses a big bomb for the next few dynasties.All the backlash was borne by Zhu Quanzhong, his dynasty was also destroyed, and the debts of death were eliminated. The warriors have the courage to dig his ancestral grave.But the later Tang, later Jin, later Han, and later Zhou were able to go into battle lightly. Those who stayed in the imperial army were all elites, and the imperial court could afford the military expenditure.

In the final analysis, the expense of raising troops in this era is really too large, which has never been seen since ancient times.Not to mention food and lodging for a soldier, it is more than enough to feed the whole family, but this "support" is still in a state of extremely high living standards, and the expenses of the county officials are probably at this level, which is really outrageous.

With more than 30 forbidden troops, the burden is too heavy.When Zhao Dagang became emperor in the Northern Song Dynasty, the territory was slightly smaller than Shao Shude's today, with only 20 forbidden troops. It was not until Zhao Erhui that the number began to increase rapidly.Shao Shude's ultimate goal is to reduce the imperial army to less than 30 people and to more than 25 people, supplemented by state soldiers and town soldiers, which is almost enough-the number of state soldiers will be gradually reduced in the future, although their expenditure is relatively low .

"You have to eat every bite." Shao Shude glared at Yang Yue, and said, "There are some things that you don't want to spread out loudly. If you suffer from it, you will suffer from it. Why don't you change it when you are old?"

"I can't change it, and I don't want to change it." Yang Yue said nonchalantly: "Your Majesty, it is best to have 2 people in the Yanshan town army, at least [-]. Juyongguan is currently guarded by a part of the Crane Control Army. Fill up the town soldiers. After the Qingyi army left Linyu Pass, they also needed people. There are two places on the north side, one is Beikou City, and the other is Dongjun City, both of which need soldiers.”

Shao Shude nodded, agreeing with Yang Yue's statement.

In fact, the small roads are ignored, and only three avenues can be grasped.Because only Juyongguan, Gubeikou, and Linyuguan can "pass through square rails", the others are rugged paths, and people and horses may be able to pass, but it is too difficult for a carriage.Even the horse-drawn carriage conditions at Juyongguan and Gubeikou are very average, and Linyuguan is the thoroughfare and the key point.

This is also the defense strategy of the Tang Dynasty.

Both the Northern Qi Dynasty and the Sui Dynasty built the Great Wall, but the Tang Dynasty did not build it, and only built cities and garrisoned troops in important places.Even this city was built hastily, and its defense facilities were far inferior to those in the Central Plains where the feudal towns fought for more than a hundred years.

This kind of military deployment is obviously giving up the path and letting you come. After you come, we will fight in the field to decide the outcome.

Back then, there was a fierce quarrel over whether or not the Urn City was repaired in the three surrendered cities. The reason was that some people believed that the city defense facilities were perfect, which would give the soldiers psychological support and would not dare to go out of the city to fight Hu Qi in the field.

With this kind of thinking of a steel macho, don't expect to build the Great Wall like other dynasties. A Youzhou has dozens of military fortresses, with layers of defenses, and blocked everywhere. It is impossible, and there are not so many soldiers.

The Dongjun City mentioned by Yang Yue just now is called "Dongjun Shouzhuo City". It was originally one of the garrison strongholds of Youzhou Town behind the mountain, and it was located in the Luanping area of ​​later generations.

Starting from Beikou City, walk northward for fifty miles, pass Jiexing Ridge, and then walk about a hundred miles to Dongjun Shouzhuo City.Historically, when Liu Rengong was in charge of Youzhou, he often went to Zhaixingling to burn, kill and loot the grassland, and even burned the grassland after the frost. When the dry grass was burned, the Khitan people could not store enough hay for the winter, so they could only ask for peace. , and Liu Ren Gongxu and Wei Snake, silently waiting for his capital to be consumed by Jin Jun and Liang Jun, and then find his place again.

Twenty or thirty miles northeast of Dongjuncheng, there is Modoujuncheng.Another twenty miles away is almost the default dividing line between Youzhou Town and the Eight Khitan tribes when it was strong and prosperous.However, after the Youzhou forces completely withdrew from the area behind the mountain, the Khitans and their vassal tribes began to invade the south, until they were beaten back to their original form in the battle the year before last.

"The defense of the area behind the mountain should be restored as soon as possible." Shao Shude said, "I will figure out a solution for the soldiers, so you don't need to worry about it."

Shao Shude actually approved of Yang Yue's defense strategy.Youzhou Town knew the importance of the area behind the mountain, built a city there, garrisoned troops, and vassalized the tribe for its own use. How could he do worse than the Yan people?

He always believed that it was very unwise for the Ming Dynasty to establish its capital in Beijing in history, but allow the area behind the mountains to be occupied by Mongolian tribes, losing the buffer zone of the Yanshan defense line.

It is true that it is more difficult and costly to send supplies from Youzhou across Yanshan Mountain.However, the agricultural conditions in the area behind the mountain were actually not that bad. The Qing Dynasty was able to reclaim a large area of ​​wasteland, and the garrison families in the Tang Dynasty also reclaimed wasteland and farmed land.If it is not possible, there is always a way to ask the vassal tribe to make a confession.

The tribes are also very realistic.When an enemy comes, you go out to fight in the city and help us drive the enemy away. We will provide you with cattle, sheep, horses and even soldiers, help each other, and form a defense line together. You don’t even need to repair the Great Wall, okay?

This is also Shao Shude's thinking all the time. To guard against death behind the Great Wall and station an astonishingly large army may cost even more financially.

An active defense strategy may not necessarily cost more.Although it is not without disadvantages, for example, in the Tang Dynasty, Fan Yang and the border generals of the second town of Pinglu "provoked frontier provocations without authorization", and the Khitan people didn't want to rebel, so I forced you to rebel.But there are some things, no one should be more confused than Xuanzong... right?

(End of this chapter)