In the fifth year of Tianshun, at the end of December, the Tatar Ministry sweated in the tent.

After Uketu Khan brought the 40,000 iron cavalry army back to the grassland, he publicized the results of this southward attack on the Ming Dynasty.

In the version propagated by the Young, the Tatar army was divided into two routes, one of which was fought inextricably between the Ming army in Datong Town, and finally the attack was unfavorable and retreated; And the soldiers and horses led by Xiao Lai personally gathered and annihilated nearly 10,000 Ming troops in Xiawu Mountain under the unfavorable situation of attacking Yanmen Pass, which was a real victory!

Moreover, after returning to the grassland, the rout troops that had been withdrawn from various departments were gathered together, and the army was reorganized to nearly 60,000.

For a while, Xiaolai's prestige increased greatly, but it was not damaged because of this southward trip, and it was also recognized by various departments of the grassland, which I am afraid was also unexpected by Xiaolai himself.

Although he claimed to have fought to a draw with the Ming army in his propaganda to the outside world, the battle was also rumored to be a victory among the Tatar tribes.

In just a few days, hundreds of generals and patriarchs were captured from various departments, and after these people were captured in the sweat tent, they were all killed on the spot in front of the envoys of the various departments!

After that, he reorganized the soldiers and horses involved with lightning speed, and integrated all these soldiers and horses into the army directly under the Khan Tent, so that the strength of the Tatar Khan Tent increased directly from 60,000 to 120,000!

At this time, in addition to the 120,000 troops directly under the Khan's tent, the strength of the rest of the troops of the rest of the departments also increased after the unified reorganization of the Badlai, and the soldiers and horses that each ministry could mobilize were at least about 100,000.

The population of the Tatar Department is about one million, and this has already counted the various tribes of the vassal Tatar Department, among the million population, the Tatar Department has gathered more than 200,000 troops, and the strength of the Tatar Department is still increasing, and the Tatar Department has all the men from the age of 14 to 60 years old, which shows the toughness of its means!

Such news was like a hurricane, which first swept the entire prairie, which shocked all the departments on the prairie, and at the same time alerted Daming.

The Ministry of War sorted out all the actions of the United States, and together with the battle report of the Shanxi War, all of them were reported to Emperor Tianshun.

Emperor Tianshun was furious when he heard the news, and realized that the Tatar tribe was becoming a life-and-death enemy like the Warat tribe, and he was also the same steppe overlord as before!

Therefore, Emperor Tianshun hurriedly issued an order to order Liu Juntao, the governor of Shanxi, to reorganize his troops and horses, and immediately mobilize troops and horses to attack, preparing to go to the grassland to burn the famine and attack the strength of the Tatar department!

In fact, the so-called burning of the famine is to burn all the grasslands and grasslands where the Hu people live, so that the livestock and war horses of the Hu people have no food, and their strength is greatly reduced!

This move has been in place since ancient times, in the pre-Qin era there is a record of burning the pasture grass to fight against the righteous canal and quite effective, and at the end of the Tang Dynasty, there was also a record of "Liu Rengong possessed Youzhou, and several troops were sent to attack Xingling, and every year the autumn frost fell, then burned its weeds, and the Khitan horses starved to death, that is, to bribe Ren Gong to ask for the city pastureland, please listen to the covenant very carefully." In the late Ming Dynasty of later generations, Gu Yanwu also recorded in the "Daily Knowledge": "The soldiers guarding the border, every autumn moon and grass wither, out of the plug and arson, called burning." ”

Fang Fengshi wrote in "Burning the Waste": "The Han family has no miracle strategy, and the wasteland is burned out of the north every year. ”

The "Xuanfu Town Chronicles" of the Jiajing period of later generations recorded: "At the beginning of winter and October every year, starting with the grass withering, the town led the officers and troops out of the country and burned the weeds, so that the Tartar army could not graze south, starting from the orthodox year. The chief officer commanded 5,000 officers and troops, leaving the country from Qingbiankou, passing through the Sancha River and the dry grass beach, to the Shanghe River, and burning them, and returning to the army in the evening, where two days. The deputy commander-in-chief commanded 3,000 officers and soldiers of the battalion, leaving the country from the mouth of the big poplar, passing through Wachanger, Lone Elm, and Shanghe River, meeting with the chief soldiers, and burning them, and returning to the army in the evening, all two days. The guerrilla general commanded 3,000 officers and troops, left Zhangjiakou, passed through Hongya'er, and went to the Yangquan River, and burned them, and returned to the army in the evening, and ...... on the second day."

It can be seen that the act of burning wasteland has been a common practice in the Ming Dynasty, and it has been carried out repeatedly since the orthodox years.

However, due to the fact that after the orthodox period, the combat strength of the border army began to decline, and the soldiers and horses of the various departments who attacked and burned the famine were afraid of the Warat and Tatar armies, and each time the land was burned, it was basically perfunctory, and the blow to the Warat and Tatar departments was very small.

This time, in order to curb the expansion of the Tatar department, Emperor Tianshun directly ordered Liu Juntao, the governor of Shanxi, to lead his troops to attack and burn the wasteland, hoping to hit the Tatar department hard.

But after this holy decree was issued, Emperor Tianshun had no follow-up, and did not give Liu Juntao the time and size of the army to attack (without the order of the emperor or the military department, Liu Juntao had no right to lead his troops to cross the border), because Emperor Tianshun was entangled in the quarrel between the court and the court, and the court and the central government once again disagreed on the issue of the reward of Liu Juntao and his subordinates!

In this case, even if Liu Juntao received the will of Emperor Tianshun to attack, he could only anxiously urge the next will, but could not directly lead his troops to attack.

If the time drags on, it will snow heavily on the grassland, and after the beginning of spring, the rain will increase, and it will be even more impossible to burn the wasteland!

This gave the Tatars precious time!

Taking advantage of the opportunity of the Ming Dynasty to further counterattack, he directly transferred 10,000 elite iron cavalry from the sweat tent and established his own cowardly Xue army, which is not only elite soldiers, but also elite soldiers and horses selected from various departments of soldiers and horses, and is also loyal to Xiaolai, and the horses, blades, and armor that arm this iron cavalry army are also the most sophisticated in the entire Tatar department!

After the establishment of the Cowardly Xue Army, he said to his subordinates in high spirits: "This iron cavalry of Ben Khan is enough to fight against 100,000 Ming troops!" ”

Of course, although the cowardly Xue army established by the Lai is very strong, but it is good against the general Ming army, if it is not the elite border army, or the elite soldiers and strong generals in the capital of the Ming Dynasty, it may be able to fight against 100,000 Ming troops, even if it is those border armies, Beijing camp soldiers and horses, it can also fight against tens of thousands, this is no problem.

"But what if you encounter the Tiance Army?"

All the generals are a little lacking in confidence in their hearts, if they meet the Tiance Army, can this 10,000 cowardly Xue Army fight against the less? In other words, can this 10,000-strong cowardly Xue army defeat the Tiance army?

Everyone subconsciously denied it, and even when they thought of the strong combat power of the Tiance Army, as well as the steel-like military spirit and morale, their hearts were also weak for a while. There are not no capable people in the Tatar department, and Xiao Lai is the leader among them, and originally Xiao Lai and some of his subordinates also wanted to build firearms and create a firearms army like the Tiance Army.

However, the Tatars did not have enough people to support an army of firearms, so they had to give up this idea in the end.

Since it was impossible to build an army of firearms, he was ready to temper the existing soldiers and horses of the Tatar Ministry to be more powerful, not only with stronger combat skills, but also with more troops, so as to gain the upper hand in the next war against the Ming.

He knew very well in his heart that he was able to withdraw from Datong and Yanmen Pass this time, which can be said to be very lucky, and the slightest carelessness will wipe out the whole army, which also shows that the Tatar Department at this time has not yet had the strength to fight for life and death with the Ming Dynasty.

Therefore, he thought that the Ming army would definitely take advantage of the situation to enter the steppe and carry out a retaliatory attack on the Tatar army, so he did not hesitate to fish all the men who could go into battle in the entire Tatar department into the army, and carried out large-scale training in various Tatar departments to improve the combat power of the Tatar army.

February of the sixth year of Tianshun.

At this time, it is already the season when the ice and snow melt and the spring breeze is cool, but the grassland is still icy and snowy, and there is a cold wind everywhere and the world is vast.

Suddenly, thousands of golden iron horses galloped out of the snow, leaving starry hoof prints in the vast wilderness.

I saw that these thousands of iron cavalry army were galloping in the vast snow, and the entire army's riding formation was very strict, even in the snow, it was not chaotic at all, which showed that this iron cavalry army was well-trained.

On a hill in the distance, dense heavy armored iron cavalry surrounded this place, and two thousand Tatar sweat tents were tightly guarded here, and the entire army was like a huge iron bucket, even if the cold wind was cold and the snow was biting, it could not penetrate from here!

Uketu Khan of the Tatar Ministry and dozens of Tatar nobles and generals were watching the battle here, and everyone's faces were full of excitement, and their faces were full of pride.

In less than three months, the Tatar army has been tempered, although the overall Tatar soldiers and horses are far less powerful than the Tiance army, but the overall strength is already stronger than or equal to the Ming army's nine-sided elite!

Under the hill, those thousands of iron horsemen are the ordinary soldiers and horses of the Tartar sweat tent, but even if they are just ordinary iron horses, they are so majestic, and they are confident that they can use such 10,000 iron horsemen to defeat the phalanx of tens of thousands of Ming troops head-on!

Of course, the premise is that the Ming army cannot have firearms that are "against the sky" like the Tiance Army.

At this time, on the hill, in addition to the generals and nobles under the sweat tent, there were also princes and nobles of the Tatar tribes, and these people were all shocked by the sweat tent soldiers and horses in front of them.

If the ordinary soldiers and horses in the sweat tent are so majestic, what about the 10,000 cowardly Xue troops in the sweat tent?

For a time, all the Tatar tribes were extremely deferential to Uketu Khan, for fear that their words and deeds would cause dissatisfaction.

It can be said that up to now, the prestige of Uketu Khan has reached its peak, and there is even a vague tendency to surpass that of the Great Khan of Warat.