Song Gexing

Chapter 256 New War Situation in the Western Regions

In March of the fourth year of Xining, the Liao Kingdom's Northwest Road Recruitment Division suddenly launched an attack on the eastern Khan of the Black Khanate. When the Song Dynasty received the news, it immediately understood the Liao people's plan.

This is the rhythm of taking advantage of your illness and killing you. When the Khotan Kingdom was destroyed, the Liao Kingdom did not care. When the Gaochang Uighurs were bullied, the Liao Kingdom only sent out [-] herdsmen in a symbolic way.

They said they were going to support them, but in fact these herdsmen were not Khitans, but other small tribes on the grassland, and they were driven to nomads.

However, both Khotan and the Gaochang Uighurs sent letters of distress to the Liao Kingdom, and both countries also recognized the Liao Kingdom as their suzerainty.

Now seeing the Song army seizing half of the land of the eastern Khan of the Black Khanate, the Liao Kingdom could not sit still. While the Song Dynasty was digesting it, it wanted to take over the eastern part of the Black Khanate in one fell swoop.

Zhao Fang was overjoyed, Yelu Hongji really became more unreliable as he got older, no wonder he was played by Yelu Yixin and killed his wife and children.

"Pass a message to tell the Gaochang Uighurs that they should make a choice. If they are still divided, we will no longer care about them the next time the Black Khanate invades them."

Zhao Fang immediately issued an order and did not respond to the affairs of the Liao Kingdom. Instead, he asked Liu Changzuo, Li Shunju and others in the Western Regions to put pressure on the Gaochang Uighurs.

Han Qi frowned in confusion and said, "Did Your Majesty allow the Liao Kingdom to attack the Black Khanate? If the rest of the eastern part of the Black Khanate is occupied by the Liao Kingdom, the Western Region will be under great pressure."

Zhao Fang smiled slightly, looked at him and signaled not to ask, and then said: "It is enough for us to capture Shule. The Seljuk Empire's trade routes are now unblocked. We don't even need to go to the Gaochang Uighur side, we can go directly from From Uzbeli Pass to Khotan, take the Qingtang route to Xining.”

This is a new route. The original southern route of the Silk Road took Shule, passed through Gaochang Uighurs, and entered the territory of Xixia.

Or go south after the Gaochang Uighur and trade with Tibet in the territory of the Yellow-headed Uighur. Although it is also in the Qingtang area, it is north of the Kunlun Mountains.

But according to Zhao Fang's plan, this time we will go to the southern part of the Kunlun Mountains, directly enter the snow area from the Kriya Pass in the middle, or the Karamilan Pass, and then follow the direction of the Kunlun Mountains to Qinghai.

Xinjiang actually has a pass leading to Tibet. A fortress was built at the Keriya Pass during the Tang Dynasty, and it was called the Tang-Tibet Passage, because at that time Xinjiang was the territory of the Tang Dynasty and was under the jurisdiction of the Western Region Protectorate.

This road leads from Khotan to Houzang, but it has always been a military road, and no caravans used it.

Moreover, this road remained until the end of the Qing Dynasty, and was not destroyed until Zuo Zongtang chased the rebel Bai Yanhu.

After the founding of the People's Republic of China, they originally wanted to reopen a road here, but a volcanic eruption occurred just after the construction started, so they had to give up and switch to another road.

That was in 1951. The volcanoes in this section of the mountain range were very active, but they happened to erupt after the founding of the People's Republic of China for thousands of years, hindering the reopening of roads here.

The Karamilan Pass is closer to the eastern end of the Kunlun Mountains and is the dividing line between the two eastern ends. But why didn’t the ancient Silk Road go through Tibet? Obviously Xinjiang can pass through Tibet.

This has to do with the situation in the south of the Kunlun Mountains. To the north of the mountain is Xinjiang, which has borders and deserts but is dotted with oases. As long as there are oases, people will gather to live there.

But although there is no desert in Tibet in the south of the mountains, it is thousands of miles of no man's land. This is the famous no man's land in northern Tibet, which is Hoh Xil.

This area covers 60 square kilometers. The reason is that the air here is thin, climate change cannot be controlled, and there are many water sources, but most of them are saline-alkali water.

Zhao Fang just took it for granted and thought it would be more convenient for the caravan to go here. However, Sima Guang, who was well-read in poetry, pointed out that this place was impassable and he was dumbfounded. It turned out that this was Hoh Xil.

However, he did not admit defeat and immediately proposed another route, which was to go from Khotan to the territory of today's Yellow-headed Uighur after Yuechang City, and then to Qinghai.This time no one objected, but someone immediately suggested that the Yellow-headed Uighur incident should be concluded. If they still refused to surrender, they would start fighting directly.

The great victory in the Western Regions made the civil servants of the Song Dynasty feel more excited. They were all very excited when talking about the war. Some even proposed to teach the Liao Kingdom a lesson and forget the alliance between the two countries.

But Zhao Fang obviously had his own plans, otherwise Han Qi would have spoken out if he had any objections, so he stopped everyone from talking about the Liao Kingdom and concentrated on discussing the Yellow-headed Uighurs.

"I suggest that the imperial court favors raising eight tribes of Tatars, firstly to deter the yellow-headed Uighurs, and secondly, to obtain tens of thousands of elite troops for use in the Western Regions."

Han Qi stepped forward and suggested. Zhao Fang pondered for a moment and said "Yes" and asked: "The eight tribes of Tatar are in a barren place. If we support them, should we move them to the Guazhou area?"

Han Qi replied: "You can move the old, weak, women and children to the sandbank to cultivate. The young and strong can stay where they are and send generals to reorganize them."

Zhao Fang nodded and turned to ask the officials if they had any opinions. Most people understood what Han Qi meant and supported him, and the matter was settled.

The Cao-headed Tatars are located between the Yellow-headed Uighurs and Xixia, that is, outside the former Xixia border from Shazhou, Guazhou to Suzhou, and have been following the Yellow-headed Uighurs.

At the same time, together with the Yellow-headed Uighurs, they were the vanguards following the Xixia to fight against the Xixia before they were destroyed.

Different from the tribal leadership system of the Yellow-headed Uighur, the Grass-headed Tatars are called eight tribes, but they have no real leaders. They are usually nomadic in their own way.

Moreover, in fact, the relationship between Tatars and Tatars is not deep. They should be the mixed descendants of Uighurs, Dangxiang, Qiang and Tatars.

Since they are not authentic Uighurs, the Yellow-headed Uighurs did not include them into their own tribe, but the number of this group of people is not large.

There are over [-] men, women, old and children, and all of them can ride and shoot, because they originally made a living by herding horses and cattle.

There is no real tribal leader system, firstly because the place they live in is too barren, except for the Gobi, it is a salt-alkali land.

Lack of food and clothing prevented them from forming a joint force, and the so-called eight tribes were actually herdsmen who gathered together in local units.

This is the life of the people at the bottom. In order to survive, they work as a family unit and look for places to graze.

In order to resist the attack and stay together as a group, no one can command others. All matters are decided by the elders and the nobles.

Because they are close to the border of Xixia, the plunder of the Tangut people is their biggest disaster, so they follow those who oppose Xixia.

Therefore, they were recruited by the Yellow-headed Uighurs to help Zusiluo fight against Xixia. And because Zusiluo was close to the Song Dynasty, they also paid tribute to the Song Dynasty.

Now that Zusiluo has completely surrendered to the Song Dynasty, they originally wanted to wander around with the Yellow-headed Uighurs, but after seeing the Song army's conquest of the Western Regions, they no longer had any thoughts.

After Liu Changzuo led his army through their territory and heard the news of the Song army's great victory, the Eight Divisions decided to completely submit to the Song Dynasty. This was the reason why Han Qi said he would support them.

(End of this chapter)