Wei Ni

Compared with military victory, post-war appeasement and treatment are more important.

Because if the resettlement is not appropriate and the basis for future rebellion cannot be eradicated, it means that the war has been fought in vain.

After entering the city, they first let the Zhenhu Department take over the city defense and confined all the surrendered Liaodong soldiers in the barracks and kept them under strict guard. Xiahou Hui and Guanqiu Jian then began to consider the aftermath of the incident.

The first thing is to deal with Gongsun Yuan’s family.

There was nothing to discuss about this. Except for the imprisoned Gongsun Gong, all the people, regardless of gender, age or status, were exterminated.

After all, he is the king.

Moreover, if Gongsun Gong had not suffered from a hidden illness and had not become a eunuch and been imprisoned, he would not have been able to escape.

The second is the treatment of the ministers appointed by Gongsun Yuan after he became king.

According to the court's laws, they would also face the fate of the barbarians, but Xiahou Hui had a different opinion.

He felt that these fake ministers who had accepted official positions could be killed, but there was no need to destroy their families. It would be better to directly relocate them to Linyu County in Liaoxi County to serve as soldiers to cultivate land and provide food and fodder for the border troops.

This treatment also applies to Gongsun Yuan's loyal followers and relatives in law in the army as well as senior generals, such as Bei Yan.

Youzhou is bitterly cold, vast and sparsely populated.

Rather than killing them all, it is better to squeeze out the last bit of value from them.

To put it more bluntly, it is the foundation for a country to be strong, not the people living and working in peace and contentment as Confucianism says, but how many people the country can completely control. The poor who are like cattle and horses and can get whatever they want are the greatest wealth of the powerful class.

The third is the troops belonging to Goguryeo and Han Ye’s vassal army.

These foreign tribes, who were attached to the Gongsun family and were like mercenaries, had almost no contact with the Wei State before. Both sides lacked the basis to win their hearts by showing kindness. In order to prevent them from defecting to their homeland and becoming a scourge to Liaodong in the future, the best way was to follow the example of Emperor Wu of Wei, Cao Cao, who relocated the Wuhuan in three counties.

They and their families were relocated back to Youzhou or Jizhou for resettlement, and soldiers were conscripted at the rate of one man per household.

It would only take a few decades, and even if they were not completely consumed by the war, they would be completely assimilated into the Central Plains culture.

Fourthly, there are the powerful families and their former students and officials who are related to the false ministers.

According to the official practice of punishing thieves, these people will also be punished collectively. The most severe punishment is beheading or exile, while the more lenient punishment is confiscation of property or fines.

Even if the system of collective responsibility may lead to injustice, it cannot be tolerated.

Because they are also the beneficiaries of Gongsun Yuan's kingship. If they are not punished, the majesty of the court that the guilty must be punished will not be demonstrated.

But Xiahou Hui thought that he could be given a lighter sentence.

All we need to do is follow the "Tomb Town System" of the Western Han Dynasty and move their families away from Liaodong.

Migrating to the heartland of the Central Plains with their property would promote local prosperity and free up a lot of farmland and pastures for the soldiers stationed there to cultivate and support themselves, thus saving the court's military expenses for maintaining Liaodong.

If the two thousand county soldiers and three thousand new soldiers from the Shijia army led by Xiahou Ba were allowed to cultivate the land, the court would be able to greatly alleviate the military expenses of maintaining the other troops stationed at the border of Youzhou.

As mentioned above, for all the families that were executed or migrated away, their tenants and servants were not allowed to be taken away. Instead, they were left behind and registered by the government and settled in the abandoned land of Liaodong.

This practice is not simply to add households to the country.

Instead, it followed the policy of relocating people to settle and garrison the border since the Qin and Han dynasties.

The four counties of Liaodong are isolated in the east of the sea. Because of the existence of Banhai Road and Liaoze, their connection with the Central Plains has always been very weak. It is a place where ambitions and separatist forces are extremely easy to breed.

If we do not develop the Liaoxi County's sea route and Liaodong's vassal states, and strengthen the ties between the four Liaodong counties and Youzhou and the Central Plains, it will breed rebellion in the future.

Furthermore, this was also a consideration to prevent the Xianbei tribe from becoming too powerful.

Since the destruction of the Wuhuan in the three counties, the Bai tribe of the Xianbei moved south and lingered in the northern part of Liaoxi County. If the vassal state of Liaodong, which was suitable for both farming and animal husbandry, had remained uninhabited, how could it not attract other Xianbei tribes to move south?

And when they went south, they cut off the connection between Youzhou and Liaodong.

Therefore, placing those followers and servants there was a good choice. No one was willing to have their offspring become servants. If Wei gave them the opportunity to be human beings and permanent property, they would become loyal to Wei and protect the borders.

Guanqiu Jian thought about these suggestions and felt that they made sense, so he did not object.

Although he felt that things were a bit complicated and difficult to implement.

But with the power of a great victory, the scholars and common people would not dare to disobey; and when the punitive army returned, it would not take much effort to bring back those migrating families.

The most important thing is that the grain and fodder stored in Liaosui are enough to support Xiahou Hui's actions.

However, he could not agree with Xiahou Hui's next proposal.

Because Xiahou Hui planned to show leniency to the low-ranking generals and officials in the army, citing the emperor's edict that "all the Liaodong officers, officers, soldiers and civilians who were threatened by Yuan and refused to surrender will be pardoned." He also planned to select some of the surrendered Liaodong troops to continue serving as soldiers to maintain the security of the counties and resist the invasion of Goguryeo and Han Ye, and send the rest back to their hometowns and return to the fields.

After hearing this, Guanqiu Jian's first thought was that Xiahou Hui had caught a cold and had a fever and was talking nonsense, and his second reaction was to ask if he was Xiahou Yuan's son. In the past, Xiahou Yuan had slaughtered Fu Han without leaving any survivors!

Gongsun Yuan, who usurped the title of King of Yan, is of the same nature as Song Jian, who calls himself "King of Pinghan River", and their treatment must be the same!

Now, it would have been fine if Xiahou Hui didn't carry out a massacre in Xiangping, but he actually treated the soldiers in Liaodong so kindly and simply let bygones be bygones?

Is it because you feel that this battle went too smoothly, so your confidence has skyrocketed and you don't mind doing it again?

You know, the number of Liaodong soldiers who surrendered and were detained was more than that of Wei troops!

Aren’t you afraid that they will cause chaos in the local area in the future?

If you don't remove the roots, the grass will grow again in the spring breeze.
Now that we have finally destroyed the Gongsun family, we should kill all the rebels and relocate the young and strong men and soldiers to Qingzhou or Jizhou to eradicate the vitality and foundation of future rebellion here and completely eliminate the hidden dangers!

Guanqiu Jian also knew that Emperor Cao Rui intended to let Xiahou Ba guard Liaodong in the future, and he never doubted that Xiahou Ba would establish his own regime in Liaodong.

But did Xiahou Ba stay in Liaodong all his life?

No promotion or transfer?

As long as Liaodong still has its vitality, who can guarantee that there will be no rebellion here in the future?
As for this, it was in accordance with the previous imperial decree.
What is meant by this is different times.

Liaodong did not surrender at the beginning, and the people of Xiangping did not welcome the royal army with food and drink. Instead, they fought with the Wei army several times and were unable to defeat the enemy. The situation was only pacified after Gongsun Yuan was beheaded.

It is only natural that I died by the sword.

If Xiahou Hui feels that causing massacres will bring him a bad reputation, then just say it. He doesn't mind wielding the knife in the name of the deputy general of the Wei army and the governor of Youzhou!

Therefore, Guanqiu Jian firmly disagreed with Xiahou Hui's approach on the grounds that "we should not tolerate evil and leave future troubles."

Even though Xiahou Hui explained that the biggest reason he wanted to do this was to prevent Liaodong from suffering a serious loss of vitality and giving Goguryeo and Han Wei, who had always coveted the fertile land of the four counties of Liaodong, an opportunity to invade; moreover, Goguryeo was now at peace with Jiangdong, and the border troops stationed in Liaodong would definitely launch an attack in the future. Treating these Liaodong soldiers well now was also a preparation for the future.

After all, in the eyes of the Liaodong gentry, attacking Goguryeo was an obligation.

However, these reasons still failed to convince Guanqiu Jian.

He still adheres to the idea of ​​"eradicating all evil".

In his opinion, both Goguryeo and Han Ye mentioned by Xiahou Hui were minor troubles and not worth mentioning.

It’s not like the imperial court didn’t want to keep the Youzhou border troops stationed in Liaodong!

Moreover, does the State of Wei need to take seriously a group of people who can even crush the Gongsun family?

Are Goguryeo and Han Ye a good match?

Therefore, he was silent for a while, and then he reminded him tactfully, "Zhi Quan, have you forgotten that the four counties of Liaodong have less than 50,000 households and a population of no more than 300,000, and yet the thief Gongsun was able to gather more than 60,000 infantry and cavalry in Liaosui?"

Of course Xiahou Hui did not forget.

It was not that Gongsun Yuan had become so mad as to force every household to send two or three men to join the army.

Rather, it was the result of Liaodong’s special military system and a problem left over from the time of Gongsun Du.

Gongsun Du, who was of humble origin, was appointed as the governor of Liaodong. In order to dominate Haidong as soon as possible, he resorted to killing people to establish his authority and punishing the powerful. He also adopted the same system as Sun Ce did in order to quickly capture Jiangdong.

It is a call to join the army. If you can bring ten people, you can be the leader of a squad; if you bring a hundred people, you can be the commander of a hundred people; if you bring five hundred people, you can be the commander of five hundred people. Of course, if you can gather a thousand people to join the army, you can either choose to become Gongsun Du's in-laws, or you will be regarded as a potential threat and be eliminated with an excuse.

Therefore, many people at that time joined the army with their slaves and servants.

Moreover, there were many foreign tribes around the four counties of Liaodong, and the slave trade was very prevalent. Therefore, these generals who had already become the commanders of a hundred or five hundred men would frequently purchase or capture slaves and incorporate them into the army in order to protect their positions in the army, thus keeping the number of Liaodong's troops at a considerable level.

Naturally, this approach also has great disadvantages.

This can be seen from the fact that Xiahou Hui and Guanqiu Jian came to conquer the country, and they won every battle with inferior forces and were invincible.

This is also the reason why Guanqiu Jian was worried.

He felt that sending these "military heroes" with many troops back home would inevitably become a hidden danger to the future instability of Liaodong.

Bullying the weak, violating laws with force, and disrupting local order are still minor harms.

Dissatisfied with the loss of power in the army, he secretly colluded with others to negotiate peace and coerced the people into rebellion, which truly shook the Wei Kingdom's rule over the four counties of Liaodong.

"I know what Brother Zhonggong meant."

Nodding slightly, Xiahou Hui said slowly, "And my original intention was not to turn a blind eye to these hidden dangers, but to make them 'the vanguard of the king'!" (End of this chapter)