A Good Landlord in the Tang Dynasty: Emperor Yuan Cong

Chapter 1277 The imperial commander’s personal expedition
"The Xueyantuo have been destroyed, and I have finally gotten rid of one of my biggest worries."

In the hot spring, Li Shimin asked Wu Huaiyu to stay. "I will send people to investigate and severely punish those rumors recently. Don't take them to heart. I didn't believe those rumors back then, and I won't believe them now."

"What suggestions do you have for Mobei?" The emperor talked about business. Wu Huaiyu always mentioned retirement, and every time he said he wanted to go to Luzon Island. He was less than 40 years old, so why would he want to retire? Luzon was far away, and Li Shimin was really worried about him being there. It was like a kite with a broken string, and he couldn't control it at all.

It’s safer to keep it under your nose.

Moreover, Li Shimin has always admired Wu Huaiyu's talents. As long as he is not given actual power, then making him one of the Three Dukes and allowing him to discuss philosophy with the emperor and serve as an advisor is quite good.

Just like now, there are frequent reports of victory in Mobei. Yinan is dead, and his two sons Bazhuo and Yimang are also dead. The Huihe are taking the opportunity to attack and kill Xueyantuo.

The desperate Xueyantuo people supported Yi Nan's nephew as Khan and surrendered to Li Ji. As a result, Li Ji did not gain any great achievements in Mobei, and Wu Huaiyi led the Anxi Army to grab the first merit. Li Ji felt aggrieved. In addition, Su Dingfang had made great achievements in Liaodong before.
Li Ji was so eager to prove himself that his eyes turned red with anxiety and his mouth was full of anger.

Since he didn't get the credit, he killed the so-called new Xueyantuo Khan who came to surrender. Li Ji accepted them on the grounds that they were pretending to surrender but actually planning to attack. Then he attacked the camp in the middle of the night and killed all the Xueyantuo people.
He chopped off more than 8,000 heads and captured more than 50,000 people.

You, Wu Huaiyi, defeated the Xueyantuo and killed Yinan Khan in battle, beheading more than 5,000 people and taking more than 30,000 prisoners. Then I will behead Dumozhi Khan, behead more than 8,000 people and take more than 50,000 prisoners, and I will have the upper hand.

This time, Xueyantuo was completely defeated.

But Mobei is far away, and how to manage it is also a problem.

From the perspective of the interests of the Tang Dynasty, Li Ji's sudden visit to Yu Dujun Mountain this time was not only suspected of competing for merit, but also quite unkind and dishonest. He accepted people's surrender while secretly attacking others.

Using the corpses of tens of thousands of Xueyantuo people as a stepping stone for advancement is in line with the interests of the Tang Dynasty. After all, the Xueyantuo people thought they would surrender if they couldn't win, but this surrender was not sincere.

Li Ji took action at this time to prevent them from having the opportunity to recuperate and make a comeback.

"Now the Huihe, Pugu and Tongluo are trying to seize the territory of Xueyantuo," Wu Huaiyu leaned against the hot spring pool, relaxed his body and mind, and gave advice to the emperor. He had no reservations about this. "The court can appropriately support the Huihe and others, but it must also prevent the Huihe from taking advantage of the opportunity to become more powerful.
We cannot do the same as before, where we united with Xueyantuo to destroy the Turks, and then let Xueyantuo become the hegemon in Mobei and then betray the court."

Li Shimin nodded,
The imperial court suffered a heavy loss at the hands of the Xueyantuo, but at the beginning of the Zhenguan period, it was necessary to unite with the Xueyantuo to deal with the Eastern Turks.

All I can say is that Mobei is too far away.

"Can the imperial court control Mobei as well as the Western Regions?" Li Shimin asked.

Wu Huaiyu shook his head. "It's difficult. The situation is very different. The Western Regions are connected to the Central Plains by rivers and corridors, and there are many oases in the south of the Tianshan Mountains. There are cities, industry and commerce, and agriculture. They are not all nomadic tribes. The Tang Dynasty relies on the three directly subordinate states in the east of the Tianshan Mountains, plus the four military governors and military towns of Yanqi, Qiuci, Shule, and Yutian, which are stationed in the south of the Tianshan Mountains today, so that the Anxi Army has a stable foundation in the Western Regions.

Together with the four military towns of Suiye, Yili, Qianquan and Dayuan in the north of the Tianshan Mountains, we can intimidate the Western Turkic tribes in the north of the Tianshan Mountains.

But Mobei doesn't have this foundation.

Agriculture cannot be developed in Mobei, and people can only live in nomadic life there, or at most fish and hunt in the forests further north.

"The imperial court can establish a Protectorate in Mobei, but it is impossible to control the tribes like it did in Anxi Beiting. The imperial court cannot really build cities, station troops and cultivate farmland there. It can only station a small number of troops there to maintain maintenance."

After the war, Mobei must readjust its structure.

When a whale falls, all things are born.

If Xueyantuo fell, there would definitely be Huihe, Tongluo, Pugu and other tribes that would annex the remnants of Xueyantuo and rise up. The most important thing for the court to do is to divide them as much as possible and prevent one from dominating.

"I suggest setting up the Anbei Protectorate in the northern desert to protect the eleven Tiele tribes including the Huihe in the northern desert, with the desert as the boundary with the Shanyu Protectorate in the southern desert. The Tiele tribes in the northern desert will be under the jurisdiction of the Yanran Protectorate, while the Eastern Turkic tribes in the southern desert will be under the jurisdiction of the Shanyu Protectorate."

This time, the Uighurs turned against the Xueyantuo and were the most active in the encirclement and suppression of the Xueyantuo after the war. Their purpose was very clear, they wanted to replace them and become the new master of Mobei.

But the court must not let them succeed.

"I suggest that the Uighur tribe be assigned the Hanhai Governorate, the Duolangge tribe be assigned the Yanran Governorate, the Pugu tribe be assigned the Jinwei Governorate, the Bayegu tribe be assigned the Youling Governorate, the Tongluo tribe be assigned the Guilin Governorate, and the Sijie tribe be assigned the Lushan Governorate.
These six tribes were relatively strong in Mobei, so they each set up a military governor's office, drew boundaries, killed white horses as an oath, and engraved stones on monuments to establish their agreement.

The six military governorates were all under the jurisdiction of the Anbei Protectorate. The six military governorates were not subordinate to each other, and were not allowed to cross borders for roaming or attack each other.

In addition, for the seven relatively weaker tribes, namely the Hun, Huxue, Xijie, Adie, Qibi, Sijiebie and Bai, each of them was given a prefecture but no governor's office. However, these seven prefectures were directly under the Anbei Protectorate and did not belong to any tribe such as the Huihe or Pugu. "

There are not only these thirteen tribes in Mobei, there are also some more remote tribes, such as the Guli tribe and the Jiegu tribe. If they come to submit in the future or are recruited by the court, they can also be established as states and granted officials, and be under the jurisdiction of Anbei.

The most important measure,
It's about demarcation.

After setting up military governorships and prefectures for each tribe, the boundaries of each prefecture and prefecture were drawn.

The thirteen tribes, seven military governorates and six states were all under the jurisdiction of the Anbei Protectorate of the Tang Dynasty, rather than the thirteen tribes electing a Khan of Mobei.

From then on, in Mobei, there were only governors, provincial governors, chief secretaries, Sima, military officers, generals, and colonels appointed by the Tang Dynasty, but no more Khans or Shijins.

The Uighurs certainly wanted to become the new overlord of the Tiele the most, but the Tang Dynasty could not let him do as he wished.

The territory of Xueyantuo cannot be given entirely to Huihe, but must be redistributed to the thirteen tribes. Huihe can get more, but he cannot become the new master of Mobei.

Carving a stone tablet at Yanran,
In the future, whoever dares to cross the border and wants to become the ruler of Mobei will be provoking the Tang Dynasty and betraying the alliance. The Tang Dynasty can then legitimately summon the people of Mobei and the Western Regions to attack and destroy him.

As long as this bottom line is not violated, then within the framework drawn by the Tang Dynasty, each tribe will still be autonomous and can do whatever they want behind closed doors, but they cannot cross the line and give orders to other tribes.

Every year, they had to pay tribute to the Tang Dynasty.
Another option is marriage alliance.

As in the Western Regions before, a group of sons of the tribal leaders and nobles in Mobei would be selected to go to Chang'an every year, either to study in the Imperial Academy or to serve as imperial guards. A group of daughters of the tribal leaders and nobles would also be selected to be sent to Chang'an every year, first to learn cultural etiquette, and then the emperor and the court would arrange marriages for them.

Some were brought into the emperor's palace, and some were bestowed upon the crown prince, kings, princes, nobles and ministers.

Of course, in the future, the Tang Dynasty would select a group of royal women, daughters of princes, nobles and ministers, or beautiful girls from the common people every year and grant them marriages to the various tribes in Mobei.

Intermarriage between Chinese and foreigners improves relations and strengthens exchanges.

"The Thirteen Tiele tribes have six governorates and seven prefectures," Li Shimin nodded. In this way, the Huihe would be just one of the six governorates and seven prefectures, and no longer the ruler of Mobei. "Can the Huihe accept this?"

Wu Huaiyu smiled and said, "If the Huihe people disagree, that's even better. Lord Ying is not satisfied with killing people in Mobei, so let Lord Ying destroy the Huihe people as well."

In fact, he was also mentioning Li Ji in his words.

Li Ji's so-called victory at Yudujun Mountain and Wu Huaiyi's victory are too exaggerated. It is not an exaggeration to say that they killed the prisoners, which is suspected of being treacherous.

The emperor was of course aware of this.
However, the Xueyantuo deserved to be killed, so the emperor turned a blind eye to the matter. If he really wanted to investigate and accuse Li Ji of deliberately killing the surrendered soldiers, it would damage the prestige of the Tang Dynasty.

"Who is suitable to be the Protector General of Anbei?" asked the emperor.

"Your Majesty must have a suitable candidate in mind," Wu Huaiyu laughed, but did not recommend anyone. Andong Protector Su Dingfang was his senior brother, and Anxi Protector Wu Huaiyi was his elder brother.

As the current Grand Protector of Anbei, Wu Huaiyu naturally had to avoid suspicion. He did have many suitable candidates to recommend, but he could not reject them.

The generals guarding the border are all your men. The emperor can't sleep peacefully.

"Let Zhang Shigui go to Mobei." The emperor thought for a moment and said,
The most suitable candidate in his mind was actually Qibi Heli. After all, he was a Tiele people, and there was still the Qibi tribe in Mobei. But thinking of the previous defection of the Qibi tribe in Liangzhou, Li Shimin finally gave up the idea.

Duan Zhixuan was appointed as the Chanyu Grand Protector in the south of the desert, and Zhang Shigui was appointed as the commander of the north of the desert. Both of them were great generals in the Qin Palace.

Cheng Yaojin, Xue Wanjun, Fan Xing and others were actually very good candidates, but for various reasons, the emperor did not choose them in the end.

Compared with the current importance of the Western Regions, although Mobei is also important, it will definitely be far less important than the Western Regions in the future. Mobei is just a vassal state. Even if we don’t take into account that Mobei has just been conquered and a new structure needs to be rebuilt, we can simply send a governor or civil official there to serve as the protector general.

But the emperor finally chose the great general Zhang Shigui, still wanting to completely intimidate the Tiele tribes in northern Mobei with military force.

"Huaiyu, I plan to formally launch an expedition against Goguryeo next year, and I will lead the army in person."

"You must accompany me,"

The emperor also prepared a list of candidates for the expedition, and asked the crown prince to stay in Youzhou to supervise the country, while Fang Xuanling stayed in Chang'an. Wei Zheng, Ma Zhou, Chu Suiliang, Cen Wenben, Liu Li and other prime ministers assisted the crown prince.

The emperor personally led the army.

Qin Qiong and Yuchi Gong were appointed as the generals of the cavalry.

Cheng Yaojin and Su Dingfang were the left and right vanguards.

Li Ji commanded the infantry of the central army and was the commander-in-chief of the Liaodong Road, Li Daozon was the deputy commander-in-chief, and Liu Hongji was the commander-in-chief of the vanguard army.

Li Jing and Wu Huaiyu were the chief secretary and the general, responsible for accompanying the emperor and serving as advisors.

The two prime ministers, Zhangsun Wuji and Yang Shidao, were responsible for logistics, food, wages, and equipment.

Yan Liben and Jiang Xingben were in charge of the engineering corps, and they were responsible for building roads and bridges, constructing siege equipment, catapults, firearms, etc.

The emperor planned to send 150,000 troops, of which 100,000 were to be led by the emperor himself on the Liaohe front. Then, from Denglai and Liaonan, there were 50,000 naval and land forces.

The emperor was naturally the commander-in-chief of the expedition to Liao, and Li Jing and Wu Huaiyu were equivalent to the chief of staff and deputy chief of staff of the emperor's eastern expedition. Li Ji was the commander-in-chief of the army, Li Daozon was the deputy commander-in-chief, and Liu Hongji was the commander of the first army group.

The two door gods, Qin Qiong and Yuchi Gong, are cavalry commanders.

It is also necessary to mobilize a number of generals such as Zhishisili, She'er, Simo, Qibiheli, Duan Zhixuan, and Zhang Shigui to serve as commanders of various armies.

"Your Majesty, there is no need for you to go out in person to conquer Liao. Just select a general. Take a city today, break a city tomorrow, and then unite with Silla and Baekje. Within ten years, you can make Goguryeo bleed to death and completely collapse and perish." Wu Huaiyu said.

"No, I will not rely on others to lead this battle. I must lead the army myself. I will personally destroy Goguryeo and avenge the Chinese people." Li Shimin said firmly, "You, Duke Weiguo, Shubao and Jingde, all come with me!"

"Let's destroy Goguryeo together!"

(End of this chapter)