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Chapter 410 Capital Defense Battle 5

Some of them will use repair artillery, and all of them will serve as gunners. Some of them know how to use muskets, and they need to be supplemented by the Kato Division to serve as musketeers for climbing the city. Although the remaining ones do not know how to fire cannons, they are more accustomed to collaborative work and discipline than anyone else in this era. They are very good engineers and are responsible for assembling artillery and transporting ammunition.

These people and weapons were Hong Tao's trump card. Compared with the 50,000 to 60,000 Beijing soldiers whose training was neglected and whose morale was low, they were obviously more reliable, easier to command, and more capable in combat.

There is no need to fight hard to the end. You only need to hold on for three to five days and cause certain losses to the enemy. It is best to drag it under the city. The navy, which also has horses to travel, will follow and attack from both front and rear.

Then why do we have to send all three battalions with little combat effectiveness to the front line? This is called the ruthlessness of politicians. In order to achieve their goals, politicians can abandon all morals and ethics in the world.

Although Hong Tao does not consider himself a politician, he is already more of a politician than a politician in some aspects and does not take human life seriously at all. Only those who conform to his ideals deserve to live. The rest are better off dead. Living is troublesome. If it can be killed by an enemy, that's a great deal.

In his eyes, the Ming Dynasty's army was in complete ruins. It was in the advanced stage of bone cancer and could not be cured by any known means. But you can’t keep it, because the cancer cells will metastasize, and if you don’t cut off your wrist, the new body will soon be infected.

But how can a strong man cut off his wrist so as not to be accused of being a butcher and be despised by everyone? He has been thinking hard since he was a teenager, but he has never found a suitable solution.

In fact, the simplest and least bloody thing is to disband and transform the old army into workers and construction corps batch by batch in a planned and orderly manner. On the premise of increasing income and ensuring living conditions, these meritorious people who have worked hard for the country and risked their lives will not be abandoned and can continue to exert their remaining talents.

But this method is obviously impossible to achieve in a short period of time. Civil and military forces are complementary to each other. If the civil service group is not dealt with, the system will not allow itself to get too involved in the military.

If you just go ahead and do it, it is likely to trigger a series of side effects such as mutiny, mutiny, rebellion, etc. When your own people attack your own people, not only will corpses litter the fields, but the scope of damage will also be expanded, affecting the lives of more innocent people.

Jianlu suddenly succeeded in seizing the border, which brought the war to the Great Wall and seriously threatened the capital. In the eyes of most normal people, it was a huge crisis. But when Hong Tao saw the battle report, the first thought that popped into his mind was not how to solve the crisis, but actually killing someone with a borrowed knife!

Although the little humanity left in his heart immediately jumped out and criticized this despicable idea, the result was that evil still defeated good. There is no way, countless bloody examples are supporting evil. Whoever is soft-hearted will become a loser. The less human he is, the closer he is to success.

Moreover, this kind of behavior will not be scorned by the public, but will be praised and worshiped, and will be given lofty names such as greatness, wisdom, talent and strategy. In the end, it can also lead to great events without sticking to trivial matters, winners, princes, and losers. A thief, a tycoon, something like that.

Of course, there are some things that can be done but cannot be said. Even if everyone knows the sinister intentions, as long as they are not disclosed, they can find sufficient reasons to cover up afterwards. The key is not the process but the result. If you win, you are a genius; if you lose, you are a fool.

After thinking about it for less than half an hour, Hong Tao found a reasonable excuse to convince his conscience to accept the reality. As a standing army, the three major battalions in Gyeonggi Province have not only become useless, but also consume a large amount of military expenditures every year. They are also used by the civil servants as a weight to restrict the imperial power, and they are weighed heavily on their heads.

Now the opportunity has come. Since he is an elite member of the military, his responsibility is to protect the capital. When the capital is in danger, it is natural and unshirkable to fight bravely. At this time, if anyone dares to stand up and say that he is keeping this army for fear of suffering losses, then he has evil intentions and is clearly planning to rebel.

Therefore, in the imperial meeting, everyone from the Minister of War to the Grand Master of the Cabinet knew that the three battalions were unable to bear the heavy responsibility, but no one could raise objections to the emperor's insistence, let alone compromise at the execution stage.

In order to completely sacrifice the three battalions, Hong Tao pinned Du Song and the Xuanfu general soldiers to the spot, and did not send the border troops back to defend in case the Mongols and Jurchens took the opportunity to launch a large-scale attack. This is also a conspiracy, even if everyone knew the intention, they would not dare to object. If there is a real problem at the border, whoever advocated sending troops back for reinforcements will have to bear the responsibility. No one wants to be beheaded and their homes confiscated for this.

At this time, Hong Tao's plan had only been half completed. It was useless to just push the three battalions to the front and consume them. If the capital really allowed Jianlu to take the opportunity to attack, all the previous work would be in vain, so he had to find a way to hold on.

It is basically impossible to rely on human defense. The Warrior Battalion and the Four Guards Battalion led by Yu Majian have gone to Tongzhou. There are only less than 1,000 Kaihusi and more than 2,000 Jinyiwei left in the capital.

Have combat effectiveness. The troops of Dongchang and Wucheng Army and Horses Division can be ignored. They are not sure of crushing the refugees and bandits, so why go into battle to kill the enemy.

But Hong Tao was not worried at all. Even when no one realized it, including Wang An and Yuan Keli, he still had a relatively reliable reserve team in his hands, workers in the factory.

Can workers fight? It may be embarrassing in later generations, but it will definitely be OK in the Ming Dynasty. Especially in factories that were established earlier, the workers inside were basically the same as those in the army.

The dormitory is like a military camp, with food, accommodation and transportation all together. The workshop is the training ground, and the foremen, section leaders, directors, and supervisors at each level are the middle and lower-level commanders in the army.

After years of work, the workers have long been familiar with following orders and commands, and have learned many skills related to weapon operation through work and military training. Coupled with a strong body and sharp weapons and equipment, as long as they can be organized effectively, fighting in the field may not be interesting. Relying on a solid city wall for defense is no worse than the frontier army.

Now that we have weapons, we have people, and we have ready-made fortifications, can we rest easy now? Hong Tao's answer is, no! At this time, history popped up and issued a warning. The reason why many defensive battles failed was not because of the incompetence of the defenders, but because of internal problems that caused riots.

Hong Tao didn't dare to guarantee whether there would be problems within the capital, but he could take precautions. In order to prevent the enemy from making trouble and the people from fear, handing over the power of public security to the Jin Yiwei is the solution.

At this time, whoever dares to disobey orders and fan the evil wind to light a will-o'-the-wisp can be arrested or even beheaded directly on the street without obtaining too much real evidence. Don't ask, asking means that we are facing a formidable enemy, and stability is the most important thing.

Now Hong Tao is not only not afraid of someone taking the opportunity to cause trouble, he is also always looking forward to someone who will jump out and sing the opposite. Most of the Cuju team members have also been sent out, and they are setting up checkpoints at more than a dozen major street intersections with Dongchang Fanzi.

If you can catch one, you can pull out a lot of them, even without trial, and the big hat will click on the head. Then they ransacked the houses and threw all the people into the three major camps as laborers. It was faster and more economical. The water was hot and the knives were quickly bald and a lot of them!

It's a pity that except for a few petty bastards like the housekeeper of the Hou Mansion and the guerrilla general of the Shenji Camp, they were too stupid to see the seriousness of the situation. The big and respectable guys were more thieves than each other, and they all stayed at home behind closed doors to thank guests. She is more peaceful than an unmarried yellow flower girl. A dog bites a hedgehog and has nowhere to bite.

(End of this chapter)