Rise of the 1630s South America

Chapter 1887 Turning point?

On December 1683, 12, he arrived in Thessaloniki, an important town in the Ottoman Empire, on a fast liaison ship.

In this city that was rapidly busy due to the war, Gao Wen just failed to find Sultan Muhammad IV who was rumored to have been stationed here. It is reported that he has already led part of the Ganishari Army to Sofia to raise funds for the frontline army. Grain, funds.This news surprised Gao Wengang, and he wondered if the Ottomans had lost their minds and planned to fight a war that would destroy the country.

That night, he found the head of the Thessaloniki trading station and asked him about the recent situation, focusing on the information about the Austrian-Turkish war-people on the east coast called this war "the fourth war." Second Austrian-Turkish War".

The head of the trading station is a cadre of sailor origin. He had been the head of the Tirana trading station that had been withdrawn and merged for many years, and also married a Serbian wife who believed in the Orthodox Church. Therefore, he has some connections in the Balkans and is relatively well-informed.

"Special Envoy Gao, the news coming from ahead is quite confusing, and there are all kinds of things. I asked someone to analyze it, and then confirmed it with the more reliable news I found from some friends of the imperial officials. At present, it is basically certain that the Ottoman Empire The main army has arrived at the city of Vienna, and the two sides have been fighting for a while, but it is not clear who has the upper hand." The head of the commercial station pondered for a moment, and then said: "But what is certain is that this time Hasty preparations for military operations are certainly insufficient. Judging from the situation in Thessaloniki and its surrounding areas, the Ottoman Empire temporarily requested a large amount of military supplies, including food, livestock, ammunition, tents, medicines, etc. The imperial officials who came to collect supplies were in a hurry, wishing they could get everything together on the spot. As for the city, the preparations were completely inadequate, or they had never received an order to hoard large quantities of war supplies beforehand, so they fell into a This chaos and contradictions are probably a direct manifestation of the confusion of the upper echelon of the entire empire. In my opinion, the Ottoman Empire had no intention of attacking the hinterland of Austria before. This time, Sultan Mehmed IV It's just an act of patting the head."

As soon as Gao Wen heard this, he smiled wryly.This station master really deserved to be a straightforward guy, and he didn't turn his head at all when he spoke.However, there are some new things in his words, that is, the march from Hungary to Austria may not be because Grand Vizikara Mustafa was coerced by his subordinate officers, but because they really received the highest order from Istanbul, Therefore, the army that had been retreating one after another took a sharp turn. While collecting food and draft animals in Hungary, they began to plan a route to enter Austria.At this time, the armies of the lords from all over the country with a number of more than [-] people had actually withdrawn, but Vizi Mustafa did not summon them, and replaced them with a large number of servants from Hungary.

"How is the Austrian's response?" Gao Wen just asked the question he was most concerned about. He wanted to judge more different meanings from the Austrian's response.

"Their response is to shrink their troops and wait for changes. This is probably because their elite main force is still on the western front and has not had time to come back." It will take time, and the Turks are also dividing their troops to plunder everywhere, firstly to obtain supplies, and secondly to contain the Austrian garrisons everywhere so that they cannot quickly approach the capital Vienna."

"Still dividing the troops?" Gao Wengang raised his eyebrows.

"Yes, most of them are servants, the headquarters led by the Grand Duke of Transylvania and a large number of temporarily recruited Hungarian soldiers, but it is rumored that they failed miserably two months ago. The poor Grand Duke only brought They escaped with more than a thousand cavalry, and are currently taking in the rout in the rear, but they probably don’t have the guts to provoke the Austrian troops in Bratislava and other places.” The station master said.

"Has this news been confirmed?" Gao Wen just couldn't sit still after hearing this. Even though it was already winter, his forehead still involuntarily oozes some fine beads of sweat. This is a failure all the way. What are the Ottomans doing?

A Hungarian Grand Duke marched west with more than 3 people. The generals were not famous generals, and the soldiers were not elite soldiers. He was easily defeated by thousands of Austrian soldiers.Gao Wengang felt that if he remembered correctly, it was the Grand Duke of Transylvania who invaded Poland to take advantage of it, but was defeated. Then, on the way to retreat, 3 horses were raided by the Crimean Tatar cavalry (at that time this king Has not yet surrendered to the Ottoman Sultan, swinging between Austria and Turkey), this guy fled back to the country with only [-] cavalry.And since there was such a bad record of failure, why did Grand Vizier Mustafa still put so many people in his hands with confidence, instead of sending a seasoned officer to command?You know, even these rubbish-looking Romanian and Hungarian soldiers can play a big role if they are well operated. As a result, they have lost one of the Austrian flanks and not only let the Austrian garrison in Slovakia It is unreasonable to be able to sit back and relax, and it is convenient for reinforcements from the German princes to come in!

The Ottomans are stupid!Both the Sultan and the Grand Vizier are extremely stupid!Gao Wengang was already cursing in his heart.

"It can almost be confirmed. I got the news through some special channels." The store manager looked at Gao Wengang and said in a certain tone: "They entered the army earlier than the 15 main force led by Dawei Qi. It may be that he directly accepted the remote command of Sultan Muhammad IV, and the grand vizier didn't know it at the beginning."

Hearing this, Gao Wengang didn't know what to say anymore, he was not very optimistic about the outcome of this battle.

"Is there any news?" Gao Wengang asked again.

"Yes. There is a verifiable news that the Ottoman army massacred the city when they attacked Perchtoldsdorf, the southern barrier of Vienna. It is worth mentioning that the city was slaughtered after the surrender , all surrendered soldiers and city residents were massacred. This news spread throughout Austria in a short period of time, and then began to spread to Poland, Germany, Italy and other places. Since then, no one has surrendered on the way the Ottomans marched. They all fought to the death, which caused them serious losses." The head of the merchant station said in a helpless tone: "It can be said that the massacre of Perchtoldsdorf was a meaningless massacre. After the surrender They also engage in massacres. Apart from arousing the will of the Austrians to resist to the death and the resentment of the Christian world, what effect can this have? The Ottomans don’t know how they did it, and they were all stupid along the way. I can’t say anything. "

"Stupid! Extremely stupid!" Gao Wengang slammed the table and said angrily.After finishing speaking, he grabbed a cup of warm tea on the table and drank it down with his neck up. Then he let out a long breath and relieved his mood a little.

"Besides, it's winter right now?" Gao Wengang asked abruptly as if he suddenly thought of something.

"It's winter, what's the matter? Special envoy?" the head of the commercial station asked a little dull.Living in the city all year round, he didn't think of anything for a while, so he asked a little foolishly.

"What's wrong with winter?" Gawain stared at him and said, "This is Thessaloniki and Greece, of course there is nothing wrong with winter! But the winter in Germany is still very cold. In winter, they besieged Vienna, a strong city that has been in operation for hundreds of years. , Do the Ottomans think that their troubles are not big enough? They were very warm when they were in Hungary, and they didn't plan to go deep into the hinterland of Austria, but now the plan has been temporarily changed. What are they doing? Are there enough supplies to keep out the cold? A winter siege without enough supplies to keep out the cold is a disaster in itself."

"What's more! Many rivers are frozen in winter, making it impossible for boats to sail, but it's not cold enough to use sledges to transport supplies on ice, so the Ottomans' logistics line is bound to become extremely difficult. If my information is correct When attacking Hungary before, the Ottomans didn't bring much artillery because of the bad roads. Now they decided to attack Vienna temporarily. The number of artillery is probably even less? Many unfavorable factors are gathered here. What are the Ottomans doing? What about it?" Gao Wengang felt as if he was looking up to the sky and sighing. The Ottomans' operation in the past year was really terrible, but they were still self-righteous and could not listen to other people's opinions. , have been ignored by others, and it also makes people speechless.

If Gao Wengang had a little bit of luck in the Ottoman attack on Vienna before, now that he heard the report from the stationmaster of Thessaloniki Commercial Station, even the last bit of luck has been removed.In his view, the Ottomans had three disadvantages in this battle. One was the hasty dispatch of troops and insufficient preparation;With these three disadvantages, even if they have an advantage in military strength, facing the Austrians who are sitting on a strong city and have a favorable geographical position, I am afraid that the chances of winning will not be very high, so it will be very troublesome!

"Why did Sultan Muhammad go to Sofia? Is this the end of their war preparation road?" Gao Wengang suddenly thought of this again, and sneered for a while: "At the beginning, our country sent technical engineers to guide them to build the road from Istanbul to Adrian. Fort road, and then extended all the way to Sofia through Plovdiv. The result? I almost didn’t get back the project money, and I got a discount after being in arrears for several years! Later, my father asked if they would continue to build the road from Sofia to Belgrade The war preparation road, but those idiots still think it is expensive, and they are unwilling to repair it. Now everyone is stupid, right? If there is a high-level war preparation road from Istanbul to Budapest, the war of the Ottomans will become easier. A lot. It’s a pity that there is no regret medicine in the world, the Ottomans themselves gave up this opportunity, and the resulting bitterness can only be swallowed by themselves.”

"Forget it, it's useless to scold here again. I need to see Muhammad Sultan, the sooner the better, you can contact the local Alkan Aja for me in a while, he is our old friend, and he should help with this Busy. It is too late to go to Istanbul now, not to mention that the bureaucrats there may not be able to contact the Sultan himself as soon as possible. In comparison, it is already faster from Thessaloniki." Gao Wengang said: "I hope that when things change Contact them before it’s too bad. Well, by the way, the intelligence gathering work can’t be left behind. Now that the front line has been fighting for a while, it’s impossible that no information will come back. Don’t be afraid to spend money at this time. I’ll grant you [-] ducats. You throw money at me and collect intelligence as quickly as possible."

"It's much easier to do if you have money." The store manager heard this and said with a smile: "I'll do these things right now."

The next few days were spent in frantic intelligence gathering and analysis.Under the magic of money, Gao Wengang quickly learned more useful information. For example, the Habsburg royal family and officials in Vienna had retreated to the hinterland, leaving only 1.5 to 2 defenders in the city. There may be "hundreds" of artillery pieces, and most of them are heavy artillery placed on the top of the city. The number is several times that of the Ottomans; for example, Charles V, Duke of Lorraine led 1 elite Austrian field groups From the beginning, he left the capital Vienna and retreated to Linz, an important town west of Vienna. On the one hand, he gathered the local defenders, and on the other hand, he was also spying on the Ottoman army that besieged Vienna; The Ottomans had to divide their troops to stop the reinforcements, which further weakened the siege forces, making Vienna still unable to attack for a long time despite the loss of more than [-] soldiers.

In this way, even if Gao Wen just didn't know anything about military affairs, he could see that the Austrians were using the fortified city as a shield, trying their best to delay and consume the strength, supplies and vigor of the main Ottoman army, waiting for the assembly of their own main force and reinforcements from the Christian world. collection.This strategy was actually very successful. Vienna is actually an empty city now. The Habsburg royal family and most of the nobles and wealthy merchants have moved to other regions. .Even if it is finally broken by the Ottomans, it is actually nothing. The Ottomans must have suffered heavy casualties, and hardly got anything useful.

At that time, the Austrians themselves had almost assembled tens of thousands of elite main forces, and at the same time tens of thousands of reinforcements from Germany, Italy and Poland also arrived. for different.At that time, if the two sides started a decisive battle, what chance would the Ottomans have?

On December 1683, 12, news finally came from the Ottoman Sultan: Sultan Mehmed IV had led part of the guards to Belgrade, and it was temporarily inconvenient for anyone to see him.This news made Gao Wengang furious, but there was nothing he could do about it.

"Contact the Venetian immediately, it's urgent." Gao Wengang then ordered the station manager in a serious tone.

(End of this chapter)