Daming Yuanfu

Chapter 1496 Beiyang Expedition ([-])
The cause and effect were fully understood, and the master's intentions were also clear, so the expeditionary fleet requested to continue the talks.

The Spaniards didn't do anything else, and sat back at the negotiating table honestly.It is a pity that this time the expeditionary fleet has become tougher, insisting that the "entrusted guardianship system" implemented by the Spaniards in the Philippines is illegal because this system contradicts Luzon's vassal status.

This is very troublesome.For the Spaniards, this meant that the Ming Empire did not recognize Spanish rule over Luzon.

This kind of "non-recognition" is not only non-recognition in the diplomatic sense, it is very realistic now-more than 100 warships and more than 1 troops of the navy and army are close at hand, and they have also captured ten Spanish warships in their hands, and Two thousand naval officers and soldiers.

Warships are nothing more than a pile of money and time, that's all, but the two thousand Castilian naval officers and soldiers must not take it lightly.

Europe in this era is not Europe during World War I and World War II. A country with a population of several million can be regarded as a big country.Usually, if 2000 people die in a war, it can basically be regarded as a decisive battle.

You must know that in Europe about 40 years later, the famous "Battle of Lutzen" in the 30-year war was originally a key battle between the imperial army and the Protestant army, which almost determined the success or failure of the religious reformation.

At that time, the two sides were already in a state of real fire - if the imperial army was defeated, the emperor of the Habsburg family might abdicate; if the Protestant army failed, the religious reform might "collapse in the middle."

Therefore, both sides were fighting desperately, but how many casualties were there in the end?
5500 Protestant casualties, 4500 Imperial casualties, and that's it.

More than 40 years later, this is the ability to bear, let alone today, more than 40 years ago?What's more, it's still thousands of miles away in the Philippines?
Therefore, Governor De Villa simply put aside the issue of "whether the Philippine Governor's Palace is legal" and asked to discuss the issue of the redemption of prisoners first.

To tell the truth, Da Ming generally does not discuss such matters as redeeming captives, at least not as a major event. If Gao Wushi hadn't said hello a long time ago, Gao Zhenxin would definitely think that Governor De Villa Wrong medicine.

As for now, we can talk about it.Gao Zhenxin proposed that you don't need to spend money to redeem the two thousand prisoners of war, and just give up the city of Manila for exchange.

However, Governor de Villa still wanted to try other conditions, so he proposed: Redemption at the price of 100 pesos for a soldier or sailor, and 1000 pesos for officers.In total, the value is around 30 pesos—roughly equivalent to 24 taels of Kupin silver.

Gao Zhenxin categorically rejected the proposal.Although in his opinion, the Spaniards are worthless, and 24 taels is not a small amount, but now he has seized 85 taels of American silver and captured 10 large Galen warships. With 200 million taels of silver, why would you care about the "mere" 24 taels?

Therefore, Gao Zhenxin made it clear that he would not accept it. He still demanded the city of Manila, and even threatened unceremoniously: "If you don't accept this condition, when my Master Lu takes Manila, the price of these captives will not be the same as today's price." .”

Although De Villa was panicked, but as a nobleman who can be a governor, he was good at putting on a show, and naturally he looked confident, saying that Manila City is not only a fortified fortress city, the city wall is extremely strong, Moreover, the materials stored in the city are also extremely rich, even if it lasts for three years, it will not be a problem.

Who knew that Gao Zhenxin laughed loudly after hearing this, stood up proudly, and said coldly: "In this case, let's stop here first for today's meeting. Don't say three years, if you can still insist on this sentence after three days, this commander will respect you." You are a man!"

After finishing speaking, Gao Zhenxin turned around and left, and Gao Musan, who was accompanying him, also followed coldly.On the other hand, although Zhu Yingfeng doesn't know how to fight, he comes from a noble family and puts on airs very well. Before he left, he said: "Please kindly remind me, prepare a few small boats in the city, so that you won't feed the bastards when the time comes. We can't cut off the head and return to Beijing to discuss meritorious service."

These few sentences contained some colloquialisms, which Governor Devera couldn't quite understand, but after listening to the interpreter's translation, he was trembling with anger.But after thinking about it, I was a little puzzled: How could I need a boat in Manila?

However, he didn't want to understand it for a while, but the captain of the Portuguese "Grandura" Pedro de Difradis understood it-this man is not a good person, he can be regarded as an old colonist, and He specialized in mixing in India, Manila and Macau. He had heard some stories about Easterners fighting wars.

Among these stories is a story I heard when I was in Macau, which is called "Pang Lingming carried the mausoleum to the death, and Guan Yunchang flooded the Seventh Army."

In fact, "The Flooding of the Seven Armies" is just a romance in "The Romance of the Three Kingdoms". The natural flood caused Yu Jin and others to be trapped by the flood.Guan Yu took the opportunity to attack by boat, and Yu Jin and others surrendered.

The official history "Book of the Later Han Dynasty" determined that the flood was a natural flood, and placed it in "Book of the Later Han Dynasty No. 15 Five Elements and Three".And "Book of the Later Han Dynasty No. 15 Five Elements and Three" itself is a chapter dedicated to natural disasters.

But Di Fradish can know that "Flooding the Seventh Army" is very great. How can he know the difference of "Romance is not official history"?Immediately, he vividly told Governor De Villa the stories that had been misrepresented when he heard them.

God is pitiful, in the stories he heard, the power of "storing water to flush the city" has been exaggerated even more powerful than in "Romance of the Three Kingdoms". There are only fish and turtles in it.

Governor Devilla was really frightened this time, and could no longer maintain the posture of the noble lord.His complexion changed drastically, he said a few words in a hurry, then left, and immediately led people back to the city, climbed up the tower himself, and observed the movements in the northern outskirts of the city.

Seeing this, it turned out that the "Ming Army" moved extremely fast, and had already crossed the Bashi River at this time.However, they didn't move forward, but seized the time to build two lines of defense. On the river to the north of the line of defense, it was obvious that some kind of construction work was going on—what else could it be if it wasn't storing water?
In fact, although the "Flooding of the Seventh Army" was fabricated in the novel, similar battles have actually taken place, even in modern warfare, and major victories have been achieved.

For example, during the period of the Red Dynasty’s War to Resist US Aggression and Aid Korea, General Wu Xinquan, the commander of the 39th Army of the Red Dynasty Volunteer Army and the deputy commander of the West Coast Defense Command, once commanded a version of the "Flooded Seventh Army" to resist US aggression and aid Korea. Li Qiwei, the commander-in-chief, was dumbfounded.

It was April 1951, and Wu Xinquan led the 4th Army to Chuncheon and Hwacheon.Here, Wu Xinquan received an order from the headquarters, asking them to delay the attack of the US military.

During the period of the War to Resist US Aggression and Aid Korea, especially in the early stage, our army did not have air supremacy, so transportation and operations were quite difficult.How to hold back the U.S. military to seize the high ground was a big problem faced by the Volunteers at that time.The U.S. military has an advantage in equipment, and there are a large number of South Korean troops as cannon fodder. Under such circumstances, Wu Xinquan, as a frontline commander, had to figure out how to stop the U.S. military.

According to his many years of war experience, since he can't think of a good solution for a while, he has to look around.

In order to find a way to delay the US military's attack, Wu Xinquan first discovered the location of the Huachuan Reservoir on the map, and he had a way to block the US military in his mind.In order to plan this matter carefully, Wu Xinquan personally took the investigation chief Cai Yu to the Huachuan Reservoir to survey the terrain and see the situation there.

After the topographical survey, Wu Xinquan came back to play with the sand table.Replacing soldiers with water is a good way, but if it is not used properly, it can easily cause serious consequences.The huge disaster caused by the repeated failure of the Yellow River is a good example. Wu Xinquan, who was born in China, understood this truth very well, so he wanted to find a way to get the best of both worlds.

After finding out the terrain of the reservoir, the area it flows through, and the conditions along the coast, Wu Xinquan finally figured out how to block the US troops without harming the people along the coast.

He ordered his army to close all twelve gates of the Hwacheon Reservoir, and then began to store water and discharge it downstream according to the situation.In this way, after eight days of water storage, the U.S. military finally arrived.

Li Qiwei, commander-in-chief of the U.S. military, began to deploy troops to cross the Han River. The U.S. troops who crossed the river were very happy at first, because the Han River was so shallow, wouldn't it be easy to cross it?
At this time, following Wu Xinquan's order, the long-accumulated river water was finally "liberated", rushing and roaring, rushing down like a waterfall, like thousands of troops galloping away, and the vast sky The river water hits the American troops who are crossing the river.

The moment the Volunteer Army opened the gate, the "[-]st Marine Division" of the U.S. ace army was collectively dumbfounded.Floods rushed towards them like a lion from east to west. Two pontoon bridges were washed away and tanks and artillery were submerged.

The First Division of the U.S. Marine Corps claims to be extremely familiar with landing operations, but that does not mean that they are not afraid of floods.At this time, the waves of the raging North Han River, one after another, pressed the American soldiers hard under the water, unable to stick their heads out and out of breath.

About half an hour after the volunteers opened the gate, the water level rose by nearly 1.5 meters.One of the two pontoon bridges of the U.S. military was completely washed away, and the other was mostly destroyed, and was dragged back to the shore by the U.S. military in embarrassment.The cars, tanks, and artillery on the bridge were all washed into the river by the flood.Due to the rapid rise of the water level downstream, the flood rushed onto the highway, and a large group of American soldiers were washed away without a trace before they could react.

An artillery battalion of the [-]st U.S. Marine Division had just set up a fort on the position when the flood rushed over.The artillerymen ran fast and were not drowned by the flood, but materials such as cannons, ammunition, and tents were all washed away by the flood.Even some people in the tent were washed away.This battle-tested U.S. army never dreamed that the battle could be fought like this.

No matter how good the U.S. military's equipment is, it can't withstand natural forces like floods. This wave of floods directly washed away the U.S. troops who were about to cross the river.

Wu Xinquan was sitting next to the monitoring machine at this time. When the good news of "flooding the US military" came, he was so happy to hear that the US military was in a mess on the ground.But not long after, he sighed again and said, "What a pity! What a pity! If the dam can be blown up, no one will escape."

In fact, Shen Mu, the deputy chief of the Operations Section, had previously suggested blowing up the dam and sending the entire U.S. army crossing the river to feed bastards.But Wu Xinquan considered that North Korea is an ally, and the dam of this hydropower station will be used to generate electricity after the war and will be put into North Korea's production and construction. Therefore, for the benefit of the North Korean people, he can only regretfully give up this attractive project. results.

After the flood, roads were destroyed and bridges collapsed, and the land was washed muddy.The heavy equipment of the US military was stuck in the mud, unable to move forward.The Bukhan River, which can be crossed in half a day, finally took a full week for the U.S. military to cross.

Facing the U.S. military and even the entire "United Nations Army" who performed most brilliantly during the Korean War, Li Qiwei, the 39th Army still perfectly completed the task of lagging the U.S. military assigned by its superiors.

Since "Flooded Seven Armies" could be played in the 50s, what can't be played in the late [-]th century?General Wu didn't go all out to release the flood because he wanted to take care of the interests of his allies. Gao Yushi didn't have such pressure, and Gao Zhenxin didn't care much.

Seeing this situation, Devila was very anxious, and quickly held a military meeting to discuss how to deal with the water attack plan of the "Ming Army".But although this kind of battle has happened in Europe, it is rare, and there is no good way to deal with it. Generally speaking, there is only quick transfer, or sending troops to destroy the opponent's plan.

But at the moment, neither of these two methods can be implemented: if it is transferred, people cannot be transferred, but the city of Manila cannot be transferred. If all the people run away, the city of Manila will be given to the "Ming Army" as well?If this is done, it would be better to exchange Manila for 2000 captives!
As for sabotaging the enemy's actions, this one doesn't seem to be easy to handle.Although none of you have ever fought against the "Ming Army", judging from the results of the battle at sea, the Ming Army is undoubtedly very strong in artillery—the Spaniards can easily learn from observing the damage of their captured warships. Come to this conclusion: Although they have been repaired a lot temporarily, it can still be seen how heavily they have been bombarded before.

[Note: The reason for this is that the color of the wood in the newly repaired position will be significantly different from the color of the original hull wood, just like the repair shop you find after the vehicle is scratched is not qualified enough, resulting in serious color difference in the repaired area. ]
Especially judging from the battle damage of several warships of the Great Treasure Fleet, the artillery fire of the Ming army is by no means inferior to that of Europe at this time, and it may even be even worse.

Under such circumstances, the Spanish military officers agreed that the musketeers of the Ming army must also be very strong, and they still have an overwhelming force advantage. However, it may not be able to complete the task, or it may be taken by the well-prepared Ming army - the two lines of defense of the opponent have already shown that they are sufficiently prepared for the sabotage action that Manila may launch.

You can't even run, and if you stay, you will be attacked by water. De Villa is always so anxious that his mouth is bubbling, and he starts to regret it in his heart.If he had known this earlier, it would be better to think of a way at the negotiating table. Even if he couldn't take advantage of it, he might as well exchange the city of Manila for the two thousand captives. At least he could earn himself a reputation for caring about soldiers.

Moreover, even if Manila is lost, as long as the two thousand captives are exchanged and everyone withdraws to the southern Philippines and persists in resisting on Cebu Island, maybe after the country wins England and puts down the rebellion in the Netherlands, reinforcements can be sent To recover Luzon?
Once this idea came together, it couldn't be stopped like a spring grass.Although none of the Spanish military officers or senior officials of the Governor's Office were willing to make suggestions first, Governor de Villa couldn't hold back anymore, and took the initiative to say: "Go and contact Mr. Gao Zhenxin, the commander of the Ming Dynasty Fleet, and say that I sincerely hope and strongly recommend restarting the negotiating, while ... being willing to make significant concessions."
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(End of this chapter)