Before hanging himself, Chongzhen lifted the table

Chapter 233: Prosecution against Captives

I saw those Dutchmen falling to the ground one by one, with a hit rate of at least 30%!

From this distance, the hit rate is actually 30%?

Zheng Zhilong was really shocked. You know, at this distance, the Dutch didn't even think about shooting!

He immediately discovered that the Dutch seemed to be stunned by the range and accuracy of the Ming army. After a round of gunfire on the Ming army's side, and more than fifty people were killed or injured, they no longer had the courage to attack and retreated back into the castle.

The brave ones would think of dragging their injured friends back, while the timid ones would run very fast without caring about others.

Anthony's head wound has been bandaged, but his head still hurts. After seeing the casualties among his men who left the fort, his head hurt even more.

Why did the Ming army's artillery and muskets have such a long range and accurate accuracy? So how could they fight?

He was not stupid, he immediately thought of this situation where they were beaten and unable to fight back. The final result would be their doom!

The decisive battle between the warships on the inland sea has not started. Fortunately, it has not started. Otherwise, if the ship had sunk, there would be no chance at all and there would be no way to go back.

For Anthony to be able to sit in the position of Dutch Governor in Batavia, he must have had vision and determination.

After realizing that he would definitely be beaten passively, he immediately asked his subordinates to hold white flags and negotiate with the Ming army without any hesitation.

Zheng Zhilong was not stupid. After seeing that his guns and artillery had such a huge advantage, he immediately stopped being anxious.

However, although he was actually a good negotiator, he did not make the decision without authorization. Instead, he consulted Jin Zhensun for his opinion: "These Dutch people want to surrender. What does the commander-in-chief think of their conditions?"

After hearing this, Jin Zhensun did not hesitate and immediately replied: "Your Majesty once said that these Dutch are different from the Spaniards and have not committed crimes against overseas Ming people, so they can be given a way to survive, but they must not They go back to their hometowns."

At this time, the Dutch treated overseas Ming people fairly well, and they would not carry out massacres against Ming people until after the 18th century.

At this point, he remembered something and continued: "As for the Spaniards in Luzon, they massacred our overseas Ming people many times, and they were all killed without mercy."

Regarding this, Zheng Zhilong had actually heard Emperor Chongzhen mention this before, and also received an order asking him to inquire about news about the Western Yi in Nanyang for future preparation.

In the past, when the world was in chaos, the emperor could not control overseas affairs. Now that the world is at peace except for Liaodong, and the emperor has the intention of elevating the status of the navy, the settlement with the Nanyang Western Barbarians is definitely inevitable.

So, he quickly said: "Everything will be in compliance with His Majesty's will!"

Jin Zhensun smiled after hearing this and said: "By the way, before leaving, His Majesty also told the Marquis to mobilize troops to form a Marine Corps, and I will be responsible for training the use of new firearms. When the production in the capital increases, we will I will allocate new firearms to you, and leave the conquest of the Western Yi in Nanyang to you. We still have to return to the north and prepare to fight against the Jianlu."

When Zheng Zhilong heard this, he was immediately overjoyed. He has seen the power of these new firearms. If he can possess such a good new firearm, not to mention other things, at least in this part of Nanyang, he will definitely be invincible!

So he quickly thanked him.

Negotiations with the Dutch lasted for three days. In the end, Anthony was forced to accept the unreasonable demands of the Ming army. Everyone put down their weapons, left supplies, crowded into five warships, left the city of Geranje, and returned to Bada. Via.

The Ming army accepted the supplies, firearms and castles left by the Dutch, as well as the remaining warships. The battle to liberate senior officials was far easier than that of Zheng Chenggong in history.

Emperor Chongzhen had expected this result and didn't pay much attention to it. After all, there were not many Europeans in the Far East. After losing their advantage in equipment, the imperial officers and soldiers could defeat them no matter what.

His focus is still on improving Daming's productivity.

In almost every industry, he has insights that can improve the production capacity of each industry.

This view is actually just common sense to people of later generations, but for this era, it is a change in concept and a sudden change in efficiency!

It is almost visible to the naked eye that all walks of life are booming. In particular, the North-South Bank, as the core driving force of economic development, has greatly promoted the development of various industries.

Based on the feedback, Emperor Chongzhen decided to set up banks in Luoyang, Xi'an and Kunming, and let each bank carry out cash withdrawal business in different places to facilitate the flow of funds in the Ming Dynasty.

Of course, in this era without the Internet, or even without telephones and telegraphs, it is not easy to withdraw money from another place.

But no matter what, this is the backing of the state. It also imposes some conditions on people who can withdraw money from other places, such as family background, guarantee, etc., and adds a set of passwords to the voucher that only special personnel of the bank can understand. In terms of security, That's about it.

Thanks to this new policy, business in the Ming Dynasty developed as never before, and it also put forward higher requirements for transportation, making the renovation of official roads in various provinces a top priority.

In short, when the world was first settled and the deflation problem was encountered when productivity was released by printing money, it can almost be said that the society of the Ming Dynasty was full of vigor and vitality. Almost everyone has work to do, everyone has money to make, and everyone can live a life they had never imagined before.

After sweet potato was promoted nationwide, corn was also discovered in Yunnan and began to be promoted nationwide. With sufficient food rations, the population of the Ming Dynasty began to increase dramatically.

However, in the middle of the 22nd year of Chongzhen, Emperor Chongzhen received news that the butterfly effect, good or bad, was beginning to affect other places.

For example, the promotion of sweet potatoes was also brought to the grasslands and Liaodong. According to information from Jin Yiwei's spies, the Manchu Qing Dynasty began to vigorously promote sweet potato cultivation in Liaodong and North Korea.

Liaodong is actually full of black soil and the soil is very fertile. Once sweet potatoes and corn are promoted in Liaodong, the Manchu Qing Dynasty will no longer be short of food.

With the current organizational strength of the Manchu Qing Dynasty, coupled with the population size brought about by the annexation of North Korea, and if they can have sufficient food security, their national strength will inevitably become very strong.

Therefore, after receiving the news, Emperor Chongzhen decided not to wait any longer and sent troops to conquer the Manchu Qing Dynasty, destroy the Manchu Qing Dynasty and take revenge.

As a result, Emperor Chongzhen began to mobilize troops and generals, and transferred all elite soldiers to the north. As for grain and grass supplies, they have accumulated a lot in the past two years. They just need to mobilize some from the south through canals and sea transportation.

When groups of soldiers and horses set off from Yunnan, Sichuan, Central Plains and other places to the capital, many people guessed that the imperial court was preparing to send troops to Liaodong. If it had been before, once we knew that we were going to send troops to Liaodong, we would have relied on them whenever we could, hid whenever we could, and fled whenever we could. It even happened that the Shaanxi army suddenly mutinied and collapsed on its way to Liaodong, and an army even scattered and fled!

The reason is that at that time, the imperial court had never won a war against Jianlu. If you go to Liaodong, you will definitely die, so this incredible situation happened reasonably.

But now, the situation is very different.

First, the emperor personally led the army to pacify the world, which was the process of rebuilding the confidence of the court officials and soldiers. And in the second half of the seventeenth year of Chongzhen, the Jianlu army invaded the capital, but they were defeated by the emperor's army and even captured a slave chief alive, breaking the myth of the Jianlu invincibility in one fell swoop.

In addition, military merit can lead to knighthood, which is obvious to all. In just the past few years, the emperor has granted so many titles. If you want to be knighted, then fighting in Liaodong is a good opportunity.

If you can win, you can achieve military merit and be awarded a title. If you pacify the rebels, there will be no more rebels in the country, and there will be no military merit to achieve.

Based on this idea, each army ordered to be transferred to the capital not only did not collapse, but also had high morale, as if it had won a prize.

The troops that had not even received transfer orders, after hearing the news that troops from various places were gathering in the capital, reported to their superiors one after another, requesting to participate in the war.

Today is really different from the past. It was Hedong in thirty years and Hexi in thirty years!

In early March of the 23rd year of Chongzhen, Emperor Chongzhen decided to personally lead troops to conquer the Manchu Qing Dynasty and destroy the Manchu Qing Dynasty in one fell swoop.

For this reason, he decided to attack Manchu Korea and Liaodong simultaneously from both sea and land routes.

The army's food and fodder mainly rely on sea transportation, which can effectively reduce the consumption on the road and the proportion of logistics force.

As for the navy, there are a total of four naval divisions, namely those under Kong Youde, Zheng Zhibao, Shi Lang, and Yan Yingyuan. The scale of the warships has reached nearly 3,000.

Among them, Zheng Zhibao's navy mainly fought in the Bohai Bay and was responsible for transporting the army's food and grass to the Haizhou area; the other three naval divisions attacked Pyongyang, Seoul and Busan in North Korea respectively, cutting the Manchu and Qing troops in North Korea into three sections , unable to support the war in Liaodong.

On the army side, generals gathered, including Zhou Yuji, Huang Degong, Wu Sangui, Gao Jie and more than 30 generals, including 100,000 cavalry and 250,000 infantry.

The general strategy was that Chief Assistant Fan Jingwen would lead 50,000 cavalrymen out of the Great Wall and fight in a roundabout way to Liaodong via the Mongolian grasslands. At the same time, they would also take into account the mopping up of the Mongolian tribes that had surrendered to the Qing Dynasty.

Emperor Chongzhen himself led 50,000 cavalry and 250,000 infantry, starting from Shanhaiguan, passing through the Liaodong Corridor, and walking along the Haizhou and Liaoyang lines to attack Shenyang.

The purpose of bringing so many troops this time was to defeat the Jianlu, reoccupy Liaodong, and establish a government office. Therefore, when a place is captured, a garrison must be left behind.

To this end, Emperor Chongzhen also asked the Ministry of Personnel to select a group of local officials for the local government offices in Liaodong.

As for the timing of the attack, Emperor Chongzhen also had a plan, which was to wait until the grain harvest in Liaodong and North Korea was about to be carried out, so that he could replenish grain on the spot and reduce logistical pressure. It can also force the Manchu Qing Dynasty to have to fight hard with the imperial army in order to harvest grain and grass.

A war is not just a battle of forces, but also a variety of factors that must be taken into consideration.

As time went by, seeing more and more troops in the capital, including around the capital, even the people began to speculate that the emperor was probably going to use troops against Liaodong.

Some people are optimistic about this and hope that the invincible emperor can lead the imperial army to destroy all the Jianlu, avenge their dead relatives and friends, and also permanently solve the problem for them that the Jianlu outside the pass may invade the pass at any time. threats.

However, some people are not optimistic about it. After all, the imperial army only defeated Jianlu once inside the pass, but they never won a battle when they went out to fight against Jianlu. Even if the emperor is victorious in all battles within the pass, it's hard to say whether he can still win in other people's territory. After all, Jianlu and rogue bandits are different, that's really awesome!

Some people are even afraid that, especially if the emperor suffers a big defeat after coming out of seclusion, the hard-won good days will be ruined. Therefore, they prefer to maintain the status quo. As for the Jianlu in the bitter cold land, as long as they don't enter the pass, then do whatever you want.

Regardless of what the public thinks, Emperor Chongzhen is acting in accordance with the decision. The Ordnance Supervision and the War Bureau are working day and night to build ordnance and armor in preparation for war.

The various armies stationed around the capital also received military orders to change their weapons and equipment from time to time.

On this side of the Beijing-Hangzhou Grand Canal, boatloads of grain and grass were transported to Tianjin Wei, and they were hoarded like mountains. Zheng Zhibao's navy was stationed there, and transport ships from all over the country were also gathering at Tianjin Wei.

Preparations for war are becoming more and more abundant day by day.

Finally, in early August of the 23rd year of Chongzhen, Emperor Chongzhen issued a proclamation to attack Jianlu:

Since I ascended the throne, I have been diligent in government and caring for the people, and I have worked hard to ensure peace in the world. However, the Jian captives committed evil deeds and devastated Liaodong, causing the people to be displaced. I was heartbroken and determined to conquer Liaodong myself to avenge my previous humiliation.

Thinking about the Ming Dynasty, Emperor Taizu Gao ruled the world with his martial arts, and Emperor Chengzu Wen conquered Mongolia five times. How heroic! Today I am leading millions of heavenly troops to the Northern Expedition, vowing to wipe out the Jianqi and restore peace to my people.

The captives were cruel and unkind, burning, killing, looting, and committing all kinds of evil. Since I ascended the throne, the Jianlu invaders broke into the capital and invaded the capital. My imperial mausoleum was also burned down by them. This is a great shame and humiliation, and a sworn hatred! The purpose of my expedition this time is to exterminate the Jianlu and calm the people. All our officers and men should fight bravely to kill the enemy and avenge their previous humiliation.

The people of Liaodong have suffered a lot from the rebels. My expedition this time is also to save the people from the fire and water. All my people, in public, will unite as a city, assist the officers and soldiers, and fight against the invaders together.

I firmly believe that the teacher of justice will surely defeat evil. I swear to live and die with the soldiers and the people, advance and retreat together, and never give up until I destroy the rebels!

There is no special literary talent in this statement, but there is a sense of determination, that is, the emperor will definitely destroy the Jianlu!

When the proclamation was issued, Emperor Chongzhen led the army on an expedition, and Prince Zhu Cixiang, who had been traveling for a year, once again sat in the capital to supervise the country.

Together with Queen Zhou, he led hundreds of civil and military officials to the army to see Emperor Chongzhen off. The people of the capital, regardless of whether they wanted the emperor to go on an expedition, spontaneously went out to the capital to see him off.

No matter what, only by annihilating the Jianlu can the world truly be at peace!

The sky is filled with gods and Buddhas, bless the emperor and the Ming Dynasty!

(End of this chapter)