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Chapter 532 Military Family
Just one sentence "Xima Dong Li" cannot summarize the whole picture of the border town military group in the late Ming Dynasty. Ma Gui and Li Chengliang are just more representative figures. There are many small spots of light shining under their halos, which are particularly concentrated. The area is Yansui Town. For example, uncles and nephews Du Song and Du Wenhuan were born in the military in Yansui Town.

Yansui Town, one of the nine-border military towns established in the Ming Dynasty, was roughly located at the northern end of Shaanxi Province in later generations. It meanders westward along the Ming Great Wall from the west bank of the Yellow River in Fugu County, passing through Shenmu, Hengshan, Yulin, Jingbian, etc. It extends to Dingbian County, adjacent to Ningxia Weiwei, and is more than 600 kilometers wide from east to west.

Although this narrow area is not large, its location is very important. It is stuck at the northern end of the Loess Plateau. Further north is the Hetao, which is the main passage for nomadic people to go south.

In order to prevent the Oara Mongolian tribes from clearing the grass valley, Ming Yingzong ordered people to build forts, piers and warehouses here when he succeeded to the throne. After ten years of work, a relatively complete defense system was finally built, collectively known as 1 Town, 3 Roads and 39 Forts.

Town 1 refers to Yulin City, the seat of Yansui Bian Town. There are not many people in the city. They are basically all garrison troops, family members and logistics craftsmen. The city has high walls, thick walls, abundant food and grass, and maintains a population of people all year round. The General Military Mansion is also there. in.

Route 3 refers to three defense zones, divided into east, middle and west. Each route is led by a general. The east road governs 9 military forts, stationed in Shenmu Yingcheng, with more than 13 troops; the middle road governs 17 forts, stationed in Baoning Fort, with more than troops; the west road governs forts, stationed in Anbianyingcheng , commanding more than troops.

These military forts were not built along one line, but crisscrossed north and south to form two lines on the inside of the Great Wall. The one on the north side is called Dabian, and the one on the south side is called Erbian.
, the distance ranges from 5 or 6 miles to more than 20 miles.

The small fort has hundreds of troops, and the large one has thousands of troops. They are all located at strategic transportation points and in steep terrain. There are water sources inside, making it easy to defend but difficult to attack. Once the enemy situation is discovered, the military forts will use beacon fire to communicate with each other. If there are few enemies, they will take the initiative to attack. If there are many enemies, they will stay behind closed doors and wait for help.

This defense system is actually very familiar to Hong Tao. In the Northern Song Dynasty, it used a series of military forts to lock up Xixia, and then used woods and ponds hundreds of miles deep to block the Liao Kingdom, preventing them from going south at will, giving the infantry sufficient response and Dispatch time.

Hundreds of years have passed, but there has been no substantial progress in the tactics used by the farming people to deal with the nomads. They are still the same. What has changed may be that the military forts are equipped with a small number of artillery and soldiers holding firecrackers.

After hundreds of years of battles and repairs, some forts were abandoned, while others were added later. At this moment, there are still 36 troops left, but the troop strength has not been reduced and remains between 4 and 5. If there is a war, the stored grain, grass and weapons can support at least 20 troops in the short term.

Do you see, this is the fundamental reason why in history, although the farming people are richer than the nomadic peoples, they have always been unable to consume the other side, and they are in an absolutely passive position strategically.

Regardless of whether there are enemies going south, a huge force must be stationed on the border of thousands of kilometers all year round, and a large amount of military supplies must be kept, which are being lost every moment. On the other hand, when the nomadic people are weak, they can stay away from the farming people and go to the depths of the grassland to cultivate and recuperate, and only send a few people to harass the borders.

When to gather enough strength to gather enough manpower, when to choose one or two key breakthroughs with weak defense. As long as you break through the hard shell within a hundred miles of the border and get into the hinterland, you can run wildly anywhere and grab as much as you want.

When the pursuers come, use your strong mobility to throw them away and return along the original path or find a breakthrough again. It doesn't matter if they are defeated, most of them can still run back and just continue to lick their wounds deep in the grassland.

On the other hand, for the farming people, the cities were destroyed, the farmland was deserted, the population was reduced, and the accumulated wealth was gone. No matter how hard you work, you still have to put in twice as much effort and time to recover, and you will lose no matter how hard you work. It only happens once every few years, but it doesn't take ten or eight times. No matter how big the empire is, it will be exhausted and collapsed. There are only two ways to put an end to this no-win situation. Either find a way to prevent the nomadic tribes from unifying and always fighting among themselves; or take the initiative and attack the main force of the nomadic tribes, causing irreversible population losses. loss.

In fact, the Ming Dynasty was relatively lucky. After the Yuan Dynasty fled north, the grassland has never been quiet. There are endless sweats with various names. Infighting continues for a long time, and no one can truly unify.

Otherwise, according to the economic level of Lao Zhu's family, I am afraid that they will be tortured into death within a hundred years. The more military forts are built and the more troops are deployed, the faster one becomes poor. As long as there is no money in hand, there is no need for outsiders to fight, and internal chaos is guaranteed first.

So why does Yansui Town have the most famous generals? In fact, we shouldn't ask this. We should ask why Yansui Town has the most famous military families.

In the Du family, like Du Song and Du Wenhuan, it was not just the uncle and nephew who joined the army and reached high positions, but almost all the men in the family joined the army. If Du Tong, Jun Song's brother and Du Wenhuan's father, had not died early, his achievements would have been higher than those of Jun Song.

While Hong Tao was still walking around in Jingyang Palace, he was already the governor signing the affairs and the commander-in-chief of Baoding. Being a soldier is their family business, which means the same thing as Shanxi merchants passing down their business from generation to generation.

As for why only Yansui Town produces many and famous military families, Hong Tao has not studied it too carefully, but he has some ideas. To sum up, it can be summed up in one sentence: a person is dependent on the mountains and rivers, and the soil and water support the people.

Why have Fujian, Guangdong, and Zhejiang been engaged in maritime trade since ancient times, but not so many people in Guangxi, Jiangsu, Shandong, and Hebei, which are also close to the sea, are keen on going to sea? It’s not just that there is too little arable land in Fujian and Guangdong, and there are too many typhoons. It’s really hard to feed people by growing crops. If they don’t want to starve to death, they have to turn to the sea for a living.

The situation in Yansui Town is similar to that of Fujian and Guangdong. It is located on the Loess Plateau, has a dry and cold climate, little arable land and year-round fighting. It is really impossible to farm the land and herd sheep while earning a living.

From ancient times to the present, it has been a battleground for military strategists, with farming peoples and nomadic peoples coming and going endlessly. As a result, the outcome was not clear, but the races were integrated first, making it impossible to distinguish between Han and Hu. They are tougher and braver than the pure Han people, and shrewder and more calculating than the pure Hu people. Their character is more suitable for the army.

Just like the whole village of Haishang in Guangdong, Fujian, went to sea in a regiment, the military households in Yansui Town also used their family surnames as a link. They were brothers fighting tigers, and father and son soldiers went into battle. They were blood related and their combat effectiveness was naturally higher than that of stragglers.

As long as one person accumulates military exploits and is promoted to a mid-to-high-level official position, a son does not need to start as a big-headed soldier. At any rate, he can be hereditary for hundreds of thousands of households, and then lead his children to fight. The military exploits will be accumulated faster, and there will be a virtuous cycle.

The Ma family, the Li family, and the Du family all followed this path. Their glory was not the good luck of one generation, but the result of the gradual struggle of several generations, the so-called accumulation of wealth.

(End of this chapter)