Ji Han Da Sima

Chapter 705: Cutting off the Military Food Supply
Leading the army to raid Beishan Fort was Huo Jun's strategy of making a feint to the east and attacking in the west, essentially to attract Wang Ling's attention. Now that the strategy has been completed, there is no need to waste energy on Beishan Fort, and the army can return.

Huo Jun had no intention of advancing on Wang Ling or engaging him in a field battle. Instead, he wanted to cut off his food supplies first, wait until the morale of Wang Ling's men was demoralized, and then engage in battle with him.

How to cut off their food supply?
It was said before that Wang Ling occupied the steep south bank and confronted Huo Jun's army. If we want to cut off their food supply, we need to start from the current terrain.

The Sishui River section in Lu County flows from northeast to southwest. Wang Ling occupied a steep position, probably intending to stop Huo Jun from going downstream and joining Gao Xiang downstream.

The food for Wang Ling's troops was gathered from all over Henan, and flowed along many small tributaries to the Jishui River, and then turned into the Sishui River from Shimen and Hulu. The food and grass were then transported upstream to the army, so Wang Ling's army relied on supplies from the southwest.

If the river can be cut off downstream, Wang Ling's army will be in a state of shortage of food and grass. At that time, whether to fight or not will not be decided by Wang Ling, but by Huo Jun.

Wang Ling's lifeline was at Sishui, so he would naturally pay close attention to the safety of the downstream. In order to distract Wang Ling's attention, Huo Jun used a feint to the east and attacked in the west, pretending to raid Beishan Fort in order to help Ding Feng lead his troops across the river and set up camp downstream of Sishui.

The plan seemed simple, but it was not so easy to implement. The lower reaches of the Si River were flat and almost defenseless. If too many soldiers were sent, Wang Ling would be easily noticed; if too few soldiers were sent, Wang Ling would be easily defeated. And the crossing of the river must be synchronized to prevent a time difference, giving Wang Ling time to prepare.

Therefore, in order to ensure that the strategy was foolproof, Huo Jun personally led the troops to supervise the battle, while the lower reaches were left to Jiang Ji and Ding Feng to lead the Hun Hu army to sneak across.

After the two of them gain a foothold on the other side of the river, Huo Jun will lead his troops across the Si River to cut off Wang Ling's retreat.

As for the food and grass supply for Huo Jun's army, it will not be transported from Yishui to Zhishui and then to Sishui, but will be transported directly upstream from Sishui, that is, from Gaoxiang Army downstream, and transported to Huo Jun's army when the river water rises in spring.

The river course is more than 300 miles long, and although there are cities such as Pengcheng, Liuxian, Hulu, and Peixian, if Huo Jun can gain a foothold in Sinan, most of the cities will surrender to the Han because of the emptiness. If they do not surrender, Huo Jun can confront Wang Ling while sending troops downstream.

River transportation is different from road transportation. Road transportation requires ensuring safety along the way and worrying about being robbed by cavalry. However, if you use river transportation, in the absence of a large enemy force, you only need to ensure the safety of the ports along the way.

For example, when Liu Yu attacked Guanzhong, boats and ships could pass through the Yellow River. Even if Hebei was not used by him and there were large troops in the north to interfere, he could still use the Yellow River to transport food and grass.

Although the cities within the 300-li river channel are not used by Huo Jun, the transportation of food and grass is not a problem because of the strong navy of the Southern Han Dynasty and the lack of interference from the army along the way. If two or three cities along the way are captured or surrendered, Huo Jun will not have to worry about food and soldiers at all.

Even if it is impossible to ensure that the grain route is completely unobstructed in the short term, Huo Jun has enough food reserves of two months to open up the river and confront Wang Ling.

When they learned of Huo Jun's strategy, his generals were amazed.

Inside the big tent, Huo Jun burst into laughter when he learned that Ding Feng had successfully crossed the river and set up camp near Confucius Forest.

Huo Jun said humorously: "I am afraid I am disturbing Confucius, I hope he won't mind!"

It is estimated that it is rare for more than 100,000 Han and Wei armies to fight at Confucius' tomb. In the future, when someone visits Confucius's tomb, they will probably mention his fight with Wang Ling.

Zhou Cang said with a smile: "After this battle, you should hold a proper memorial ceremony to ask Confucius for forgiveness!"

Huo Jun looked around at the officers and soldiers in the tent and said with a smile: "I have 100,000 soldiers in the tent now. Confucius dare not disobey him. This is probably to convince others with virtue!"

"Convince others with virtue?"

Upon hearing this, Xue Zong, the prefect of Pei County, was stunned and could not understand what Huo Jun said.

Seeing that people couldn't understand, Huo Jun smiled and said, "Confucius is nine feet tall, his strength can lift the gate of a country, and his archery can make the spectators feel like they are blocking a wall. He has three thousand followers under his tent, and he travels to various countries without being disturbed. If he encounters bandits, how can he subdue them? Only by martial virtue can he subdue them, so I follow Confucius!"

As soon as this was said, the civil and military officials instantly understood what Huo Jun meant, and they all felt at a loss whether to laugh or cry. After all, this kind of explanation that defies the heavens can only be found in later internet jokes. Moreover, in the impression of those who study Confucianism today, Confucius is good at literature, not martial arts.

Sharing Confucius' contrasting jokes, we now get to the point. "Commander-in-chief, General Ding has already crossed the river and set up camp. How should our army deploy its troops next?" Huo Du asked.

Huo Jun pondered for a moment and said, "Chengyuan will defend Sinan. I will lead the army across the Si River and camp there to cut off Wang Ling's food supply and shake his army's morale. When the Wei army is out of food and their morale is low, we will engage in battle with them."

After a pause, Huo Jun added, "In order to prevent Wang Ling from crossing the Si River and escaping, General Huo is leading 10,000 people to guard the Sibei camp, and they will support me at the Si River. If the enemy wants to cross the river and escape, you and I will attack them together and defeat them when they are halfway across. If the enemy comes out of the camp to challenge us, we can just hold our ground and not come out."

After more than 20 years of military service, his elder brother Huo Du has become a veteran in the army. He has a calm temperament and never relies on his status to bully others in the army, so he is deeply loved by the generals in the army. Now that the north bank is handed over to others to guard, Huo Jun is worried and has to hand it over to his brother.

Although Huo Jun often complained about Cao Cao's preference for clan generals, he could also understand Cao Cao sometimes. Without discussing political topics such as clan generals controlling local military power, from the perspective of using troops alone, when it comes to important military tasks, people are afraid that others will make mistakes, so they will feel more at ease when handing them over to their own family members.

During the years of fighting, most of the tasks of guarding the home and leading the battle were entrusted to Huo Du. However, Huo Jun also dared to use people. Xu Sheng, Ding Feng, Gao Xiang, and Pang Tong were all outsiders. But no matter what, under the influence of personal feelings, if the talents were the same, Huo Jun would favor his own family members more.

Yu Shao bowed and stepped out of the line, saying, "Commander-in-chief, although Cheng Yuan has led 5,000 soldiers to camp, his troops are few and they are camping near the river. To prevent any mishaps, Shao is willing to lead his own soldiers as the vanguard to support the soldiers."

The Hun Kui Army was previously led by Ding Feng, Yu Shao, and Gao Xin. As their status and military achievements changed, Huo Jun asked the three to draw lots, one stayed to lead the army, and the other two went out to lead the army. Ding Feng drew a red lot, so he stayed to lead the Hun Kui Army, while Yu and Gao were given the title of generals and took charge of other armies.

"Can!"

Huo Jun nodded and said, "Today, I would like to trouble Gongli to lead the troops to support Chengyuan."

"promise!"

Not to mention that Huo Jun will lead his troops to march, now Wang Ling learned that Ding Feng crossed the Si River and set up camp at night, and he felt something was wrong.

Inside the big tent, Wen Qin was still boasting about his military exploits in repelling the Han army, exaggerating the hundreds of beheadings into thousands, and was very complacent.

"General, last night Qin led his troops to kill 2,000 enemy leaders and repelled the Han army's surprise attack on the mountain fortress. I hope you can report the truth to your majesty now." Wen Qin said with a bow.

Linghu Jun was young and full of energy, and he didn't like Wen Qin. He sneered and said, "If Jun hadn't pretended to take the pontoon bridge last night, how could you have defeated the Han army? And the general only brought more than 500 heads to the tent, how dare you claim to have captured 2,000?"

Seeing that the truth was exposed by Linghu Jun, Wen Qin said angrily: "The Han army often takes away the bodies of fallen soldiers. It is not surprising that more than a thousand bodies are missing. How dare you criticize the general when you have not made any great achievements?"

"hehe!"

Linghu Jun wanted to say something in rebuttal, but was interrupted by his uncle Wang Ling.

Wang Ling was furious and said, "The raid on Beishan Fort was a tactic of the bandits to attack from the east while making a feint to the east. Last night, the bandit general Ding Feng sneaked into Konglinxia's camp and wanted to cut off our army's food supply. Now the two of you are fighting for merit instead of solving the current difficulties. If the bandit generals find out, it will be a joke!"

Seeing that it was Wang Ling who spoke, Wen Qin thought that he was speaking in support of his nephew Linghu Jun, and sneered, "General, your nephew has the ability to repel the enemy. Why don't you send him out to lead the troops to drive out Ding Feng's troops?"

"General, I am willing to go there!"

Unable to bear Wen Qin's sarcasm, the young Linghu Jun immediately asked for a fight, saying: "The enemy has its back to the water and camped underwater. I will lead my elite infantry and cavalry to them, and I will surely be able to lead the troops to defeat them and break the enemy's strategy of cutting off their food supply."

Seeing Linghu Jun asking for battle, Wang Ling hesitated for a moment, and finally said: "The military affairs today are of great importance, and we cannot afford to make mistakes. Linghu Jun and Guanqiu Jian can go to the battle together, and we must defeat the enemy before most of the enemy army crosses the river."

"promise!"

(End of this chapter)