Late Tang Dynasty Floating Life

Chapter 1537 No.70 Seven boring marches

Grassland campaign has its own characteristics.

First of all, the army cannot be gathered together, because there is not enough pasture, it must be dispersed.

Secondly, this place is not like the Central Plains, or even Yunnan, where it has just been conquered. It is difficult to plunder enough food. Everything depends on the livestock carried during the expedition. They must march and graze at the same time, and the speed is limited.

Third, although the grassland is vast and flat, there are roads everywhere, but limited by the water source, there are actually only a few routes.

Most of Zhu Jin's military experience in his life was obtained in the Central Plains. In the past year, he has made up for the grassland combat model and gained some understanding, but such a long-distance march still makes him feel incredible.

But looking at other people's natural appearance, I can't help feeling: Shao Xia's regime is very rich in Hu Feng!
On May 23, Zhu Jin, who was appointed as the envoy of vanguard and chopping, led 600 cavalrymen of the national army and Jurchen volunteers as vanguards, and [-] tribal soldiers as auxiliary soldiers. Headed west and embarked on a journey.

Shao Shude felt a little emotional when he thought of Zhu Jin's impatient look. When I was 30 years old, I didn't come here, I went out to hang out, and when I was almost [-], I was in a hurry to say "Coach, I want to play basketball", why bother?
After Zhu Jin set out, Wang Yanzhang was appointed as the envoy of the right-wing Youyi to attack. He led the Fubing, Zhenbing, Zhoubing, and Pinglu and Hengye cavalry, a total of 25 people, with [-] tribal soldiers as auxiliary troops. On May [-], drove the livestock to the west.

On May 26, Zhe Siyu, the left-wing Youyi striker, led an iron cavalry army of [-] people, and set off on a detour to the south line, and assigned [-] tribal soldiers to serve as guard rangers and herd cattle and sheep.

Shao Shude was hunting in Heichengzi, waiting for further gathering of supplies and personnel.

At the end of May, he received news from Beijing.

Yan Wang Shao Mingyi quelled the rebellion in Tonghai Dudufu, but fell ill after returning to Kunzhou, and he recovered in early May.

Shao Shude carefully read the memorial three times before putting it down.

Fortunately, the prince immediately sent a good doctor to the south.Although King Yan had already recovered by the time the medical officer arrived, his attitude was good.

Another thing Shao Shude was interested in was that Liu Lang studied martial arts diligently, and his physical fitness could not only be described as good, it could even be said to be very outstanding, but the reason for still falling ill is unknown.After all this, are you still willing to go to Yunnan?
In the first ten days of May, the Crown Princess Zhu gave birth to a son, and all the officials congratulated her.

Shao Shude was also slightly relieved, but it was also a problem that the prince didn't like playing with women. He is 30 years old and has only one son and one daughter. Shao Shude deeply suspects that he is the type of King Karl XII of Sweden during the Great Northern War. .

If he hadn't pressed Erlang's head forcibly, he would have preferred to live in the military camp rather than the prince's mansion.

Thinking of this, Shao Shude touched Wang's gradually bulging belly and smiled."Created" so many younger brothers and sisters for the prince, will you still laugh when you pay Lumi in the future?

Mrs. Wang, on the other hand, looked ashamed.The sage brought four women to accompany him to serve, but she was determined to get her pregnant, and she couldn't help it.As the empress dowager of a country, such things as pregnancy and childbirth really challenged her past outlook on life, but she didn't have the courage to commit suicide, so she could only live in a daze.

A few days ago, when the sage was allied with the chieftains, what he said in public made her doubt her own ears.She is from Nanzhao, but her Sinicization is very deep. This kind of naked grassland khan style really makes her unbearable.

Oh, by the way, she is not Wang's now, but Montessori.Because the saint heard that her great-grandfather, Wang Cuodian, had been granted royal status and changed her name to Meng Cuodian, so she was allowed to restore the surname Meng.

have a good day...

Shao Shude continued to read the memorials.

An inspector censor sent to Yunnan impeached Li Tangbin, saying that he had killed too much, and the army and people in Yunnan were uneasy.Finally, he secretly mentioned King Yan's "dereliction of duty", saying that when he fell ill in Kunzhou, the Dragon and Tiger Army went on a rampage in the Tonghai Governor's Mansion, plundering countless people's wealth.

Shao Shude actually believed these words of the censor.

What kind of army is the Dragon Tiger Army?The old foundation of Huainan Black Cloud Long Sword Army.

This army is certainly capable of fighting, but military discipline is notoriously poor, and the Yang Xingmi era was the focus of supervision.Shao Shude didn't believe that they just surrendered to Da Xia, and immediately changed their minds.

There were probably killings, and they might even have been downplayed.

He is slightly regretful now.

How many people are there in Yunnan?Because Nanzhao is neglected in household statistics, it is difficult to make it clear.But in its heyday, there must have been more than 100 million people. Otherwise, it is hard to imagine that there are large-scale armored cavalry, large cavalry, and 10,000+ troops at every turn. Since the founding of the country, in the 11-year history of Nanzhao, there have been 752 years of fighting with the Tang Dynasty, Tubo, Pyu people and even various tribes in the territory, and the number of times that more than 140 troops have been dispatched is extremely high.

Without a certain population size, without a certain economic foundation, it is impossible to support such a militarism—of course, it is true that it will not be able to support it two to thirty years before its demise, otherwise Zheng Maisi would not be so easy to change the dynasty, it is really the livelihood of the people Withered, everyone can't stand Montessori anymore.

What is the population of Yunnan now?No one can tell.

Reminiscent of the early Ming Dynasty, when 30 troops attacked Yunnan, most of the supplies in history were captured due to the geographical reasons of mountains and rivers. It can be seen that the local population and economic scale should not be underestimated. The attack on Yunnan started from Yu Zhongtong in the Tang Dynasty and North Korea , There has never been a practice of transporting grain thousands of miles from other places, because the traffic conditions do not support it.

Being able to support 30 troops in a short period of time is quite powerful. At that time, the population of Yunnan was more than 200 million—but most of them should not have registered residence. In fact, until the late Ming Dynasty, most of the population of Yunnan should still have no registered permanent residence account.

Shao Shude guessed that the population of Yunnan at this time is likely to be less than one million, and the proportion of "invalid population" (unregistered households and non-payment of taxes) is very high.Li Tangbin and Zhu Yanshou's random killings, according to the secret reports of the military supervisors sent out, no less than 10 people, which is a bit too much. In fact, it exceeds the needs of raising food.

If it goes on, I'm afraid it will cause wars all over the country and cause chaos everywhere.Considering that there have been frequent outbreaks of epidemics in the military, it is time to stop.So he called the palace official Xie Shi and asked him to write a letter and send it to the prince.

"Your Majesty yelled at the Gaochang Uighurs to be beaten and killed, and then ordered to stop the killings in Yunnan, why?" Mengshi asked suddenly, stroking his belly.

"Oh, I want to pray for our unborn child." Shao Shude replied casually, continuing to read the next military newspaper.

Montessori bowed his head.

Nanzhao worshiped Buddha, she really believed in this rhetoric.

"Wait a while, let my son recruit people in Jiangnan and Jiangxi, and send them to—" Shao Shude thought for a while, and said: "The Tonghai Governor's Mansion has killed a little bit, so let's send it here."

At the beginning of the Ming Dynasty, the 30 troops basically stayed in Yunnan and were distributed to various places.These soldiers were actually the best immigrants, but Shao Shude knew that he didn't have the conditions at this time.

You let the dragon and tiger army stay in Yunnan to burn, kill and loot, they are willing, but let them settle down and cultivate, don't be kidding.If you really want to issue this order, the most likely thing is to separate the city and cause chaos.

There is no way, we still have to relocate the authentic common people.Zhu Yanshou killed the Tonghai Governor's Mansion a little bit, leaving a lot of space, so let the Jiangnan people take over first.

Shao Shude is also selfish in this matter.

Tonghai Governor's Mansion, that is Duan Siping's "Land of Prosperity".It can be regarded as a place with a relatively large area of ​​plains in Yunnan, and the mountains are relatively gentle, not as steep as other places, which is conducive to reclamation of slope fields.

Nanban has been developing that area for more than a hundred years, and it will be much easier for the Han people to do it next time.

The last one is about the country of Tian.

Their monarch died the year before last, and the new monarch has been on the throne for two years and has just stabilized the domestic situation.However, it was reported by Wang Simi that the new king changed his name to "Li Shengtian" because his ancestors had married the daughter of Li Tang's family and admired the Tang Dynasty very much.Similar to the various vassal states in the Central Plains, they closed their doors to be emperors, celebrated the founding of the Yuan Dynasty, and made a title for themselves: Dachao Datian, Dazheng Daming, and Tomorrow, all canonized as the Emperor of Filial Piety.

Proclaiming the emperor behind closed doors has been impossible since ancient times, and Shao Shude doesn't care about it. As long as it is not made public, it is fine to still claim to be a vassal state entrusted by the Central Plains.

Li Shengtian sent envoys to Luoyang, saying that he would send [-] troops in July to attack the Uighurs, and he looked forward to meeting with the Chinese kings in Xizhou.

Luoyang comforted the envoy, and sent someone to return to urge Khotan to send troops.

After reading it, Shao Shude felt that there was nothing wrong with it, and he didn't plan to operate remotely in this matter.

After dealing with this mess, on the first day of June, he appointed Xu Hao, the deputy envoy of the Privy Council, as the military envoy to stay in Heichengzi to receive the cattle, sheep, horses and camels sent by various ministries. Go west and start the westward expedition.

******
It is already June, which is the best season on the grassland.

It was the first time for many accompanying officials, palace men and sergeants to march on the grassland for such a long time, and they felt very fresh.

Because it is on the prairie, there is a lack of camping equipment, so every evening, except for unloading wood from some carriages and thickly surrounding a small fence for the saint to live in, most people pitch tents in the wild , even the sky and the ground.

Before dawn every day, the auxiliary soldiers recruited from various tribes began to milk and cook.

Livestock have not yet been slaughtered in large quantities, because they brought a lot of dried meat with them when they set off. After collecting some wild vegetables and mushrooms on the grassland, they mixed them with a pot of broth to make a big meal.

The jerky tasted weird.

Lingzhou has a large-scale meat processing industry.Before the Western Expedition, the government bought old cattle from farmers’ homes, slaughtered them in large quantities, and took out the red meat with less fat. Compress it and put it into a sealed jar—if you don’t care, you can just stuff it into the cow’s bladder, which is more convenient to carry.

The process of making this meat is long.When taken out to eat, it swells several times when exposed to water, and can feed ten people for half a month—of course, this is in theory, but it is not enough in practice, and the taste is not flattering.

Compared with meat, dairy products are still the main food.Cheese, milk powder carried with the army, freshly squeezed cow and goat milk, etc., even the saints with the best conditions eat porridge with wild vegetables in the morning.

Life is hard, and those who feel new at first can't bear it after marching for more than ten days.

The scenery is monotonous, except that the grassland is still a grassland. Occasionally, when I see a little mountain, I feel happy like something.

There are too many mosquitoes, and I was bitten every night so I couldn't sleep well.They are not saints, they have twins to help repel mosquitoes, and they have dedicated personnel to dry bedding and clothes every day, as well as sufficient insect repellent drugs.

What you eat makes you angry, and the corners of your mouth foam.

Cheese, milk powder, physalis, milk tofu... In addition to milk, there is still milk. A handful of wild vegetables and a bag of mushrooms will make people's eyes shine. Ultimate enjoyment.

In addition to dry manure, there is no twigs and dead grass, and there is an extreme lack of fuel.Eating cold food most of the time makes people want to die.

Another point is that water is in short supply.

I don’t march along the river every day. Sometimes I can’t find any water source for several days in a row. I have to count the drinking water in the cowhide water bag I carry with me, let alone bathe.

At this time, the accompanying literati also had to laugh and scold those warriors.No wonder they can march day and night when there is seven feet of snow on the flat ground, chasing the enemy and hacking. They are really incomparable in terms of the strength of animals.

At the beginning of July, after more than a month of long-distance marching, towering mountains finally appeared in front of us.

The secretary Lang Cui Yan and You Buque Cui Miao met and wrote several poems excitedly.

"What is this mountain?" Shao Shude asked.

Cui Yan carefully studied the military records and historical documents, and immediately replied after hearing the words: "Your Majesty, this is the southeast tail of Jinshan Mountain, and it has no name."

Jinshan is a Chinese name, and the Tibetans call it "Altai".

Shao Shude didn't know where the southeast end of Jinshan Mountain was.The guide only knows the way to go, but if you ask him to say the name of each mountain, he can't call it.Perhaps, even the Tibetans don't have the time to name every mountain, do they?
Shao Shude guessed that this place should be the Gobi Altai Province of Outer Mongolia in later generations, not far from the Sino-Mongolian border.The northern line of the ancient Silk Road often walked here, because there is a flat corridor on the south side of the Altai Mountains, and the grassy marshes are suitable for replenishing aquatic plants and food.

This place is still about [-] miles away from Beiting, and the road is only half way!

But proceed with caution.Zhu Jin, who was acting as the vanguard, was more than two hundred miles away from here. He had just raided a small tribe, and he didn't know the enemy or friends.

The fighting process was very easy, because the enemy was killed directly before they had time to gather their hands.But this incident itself has already sounded the alarm to Xia Jun: if you go any further, you will enter the enemy's hinterland.

In fact, this is also the southwest border of the Uyghur Khanate in history.

"Tell Zhu Jin not to stop and keep moving forward." Shao Shude ordered: "Another order is given to Wang Yanzhang and Zhe Siyu to follow closely and each keep a three-day journey."

(End of this chapter)