In the early hours of the morning, Li Mingyuan had just fallen asleep when he was woken up by a quick knock on the door.

"What's the matter?" The long-term mercenary life in his previous life made Li Mingyuan develop the habit of dressing and sleeping, putting on a military coat and shoes, Li Mingyuan opened the doorway.

"Shizi, the urgent letter from Master Li and Master Luo, please take a look."

"Tell all officers at and above the regimental level to come to the council chamber for a meeting." After reading the letter, Li Mingyuan immediately lost his sleepiness and ordered.

Arequipa's intelligence was an accident, Li Mingyuan's original plan was to wait for work and meet the Peruvian army at Balangca, but the actions of Li Sandou and Luo Linshan disrupted the original plan, and everything had to be redeployed.

"That's the way it is now, and everyone has to say what they think."

After a staff officer finished his belief, Li Mingyuan spoke.

After conquering Balangka, Li Mingyuan remembered the establishment of a staff officer system, so the day before yesterday he appointed Liu Pu as chief of staff of the Chinese Independence Army, and recruited several flexible-minded officers as staff officers.

"Division Commander Li and Division Commander Luo are almost in Arequipa now, and it is impossible to recruit them back, so we can only send troops to support." As the newly appointed chief of staff, Liu Pu spoke first.

"Lao Li was a little impatient this time, and he acted without reporting the situation, making the entire Chinese Independence Army very passive, and it was impossible not to support them, and supporting them would disrupt the original deployment of the prince." Chen Guozhu said.

"Lao Chen, I can't say that, Arequipa's situation is in our favor, Lao Li decided to surround Arequipa on the spot, and if I were in his position, I would do the same."

Zhang Ansong, who rarely speaks, said.

Li Mingyuan listened carefully to everyone's speeches and comprehensively considered the gains and losses of sending troops.

Li Mingyuan has some military acumen, but his ideas are not all correct, so every time something major happens, Li Mingyuan will always listen to different opinions before making a decision.

There is no doubt about sending troops, Li Sandou and Luo Linshan's two divisions have already surrounded Arequipa according to the time, and giving them the order to retreat now will not only hit the morale of the Chinese soldiers, but also startle the snake, and it will not be so easy to lure the enemy deep in the future.

Li Mingyuan walked to the sand table that had just been drawn up and carefully inspected the spheres of influence of the Chinese and Peruvia.

Arequipa is followed by a road to Cusco, along which Puno and Kusca can transport reinforcements to Arequipa. And these two places are also the heavy concentration of troops in Peru.

Puno, because of its proximity to Lake Titicaca, had 15,000 Peruvian troops, while Cusco also had 10 million or 20 million troops, plus 5,000 troops from Moyendo, south of Arequipa, the number of troops supporting Arequipa reached 30,000, almost a quarter of the total number of Peruvian troops.

The Peruvian army of 30,000 men was not to be underestimated, because they were equipped with brand-new muskets and artillery, and if they fought a tough battle with the existing numbers and equipment of the Chinese army, the final result could be a defeat for both sides.

Peru was the mining base of South America during the Spanish rule, the Peruvians relied on the sale of mineral resources after independence, but made a lot of money, the rich Peruvians naturally did not treat their own army, Peru bought a large number of arms and equipment from the British and French armed soldiers, and in addition to buying arms, Peruvians also developed their own military industry, Arequipa is the Peruvians spent a lot of effort to establish the arms base, so when Arequipa faced the attack of the Chinese army, the other Peruvian troops will definitely fully support.

"Luo Cannon, according to the information provided by Sun Qisheng, does your artillery regiment have the confidence to take Arequipa?" After thinking about it for a while, Li Mingyuan asked.

"Arequipa's fortifications are stronger than those of Barangca, and if the artillery regiment wants to break through the walls, it must use all the cannons."

The last time he attacked Duraya, the Luo cannon didn't blast open the city gate, and he didn't dare to say big things this time.

"Chief of Staff, how long will it take to capture Arequipa with the support of the artillery regiment?"

"Because of Arequipa's fortifications, if we attack strongly, we can take it in two days, but in two days, other Peruvian reinforcements will also arrive, and we are likely to be attacked by the enemy at that time."

Liu Pudao.

"You don't care about this for now, I want to know if there is a problem with taking Arequipa."

"Shizi, there is no problem in taking the city, the key is that we don't have so much time." Liu Pudao.

"No, Chief of Staff, you misunderstood what I meant, I don't plan to storm Arequipa, taking all the circumstances, it is not difficult to capture the city, but we have to take a big risk, and we don't have the capital to fight back, so we decided to give up attacking Arequipa."

As soon as Li Mingyuan's words fell, Zhang Ansong hurriedly said, "Shizi, Division Commander Li, Division Commander Luo, and twenty or thirty thousand Chinese brothers are still waiting for us to support, if we don't go, they may be attacked by Peruvian reinforcements and the whole army will be annihilated, Shizi should think twice." ”

In fact, the situation is not as serious as Zhang Ansong said, because it takes two days for Peruvian reinforcements to arrive at Arequipa from receiving the news, and Li Sandou will definitely not take two days from receiving the retreat order from the headquarters to arranging the retreat.

Zhang Ansong said this, on the one hand, because he was worried that Li Sandou would disobey Li Mingyuan's order and insist on taking Arequipa and falling into the encirclement of Peruvians. On the other hand, Zhang Ansong also agreed with Li Sandou's approach.

"Since the prince doesn't plan to attack Arequipa, he still sends someone to send a letter to Senior Commander Li and them, asking them to retreat overnight."

Li Mingyuan did not plan to storm Arequipa, Liu Pu regretted it and relieved at the same time, although he lost a good opportunity to capture Arequipa, but he could also ensure the safety of the troops.

"Shizi, no one can guarantee victory in a war, in order to capture Arequipa, I think it's okay for the army to take a little risk, and the risk of attacking Arequipa this time is not as big as imagined, if the Peruvian reinforcements arrive, we haven't captured the city, it's a big deal to retreat to Barangca and fight them, the heavenly Kyoto of the heavenly kingdom has been defended for eleven years, can't so many of us still hold Barangca?" Zhang Ansong did not give up and continued.

"Uncle Zhang said the worst outcome, but I wouldn't choose to do it."

Seeing that Zhang Ansong was still going to say, Li Mingyuan stopped going around in circles with them, and said with a smile, "You misunderstood what I meant, although I said that I would not fight Arequipa, but I did not say that I would not fight Peruvian reinforcements." ”

When he was looking at the sand table just now, Li Mingyuan suddenly thought that he would be worried about Peruvian reinforcements when he fought Arequipa, so it was better to use Arequipa City as a bait to encircle the reinforcements, concentrate superior forces, and eat the three Peruvian reinforcements respectively, and Arequipa City, which had no reinforcements, would not be taken at that time.

"What does the prince mean to encircle and send reinforcements?" Just now, I was struggling with the question of whether to fight Arequipa, and Liu Pu didn't think of fighting Peruvian reinforcements first.

As soon as Li Mingyuan said this, the officers, including Liu Puzainei, instantly understood.

Encirclement and reinforcement was not the initiative of a certain party in later generations, Sun Bin besieged Wei to save Zhao, and annihilated the Wei army on the way is a familiar example. Therefore, the officers present are no strangers to encirclement and reinforcements.

"Did the prince say it earlier, I made a false alarm." Zhang Ansong said.

"Hehe, I just thought of this method." Li Mingyuan chuckled, and then said, "Moyando and Puno are relatively close to Arequipa, and they will definitely send troops first, so I decided to eat these 20,000 people first, and then fight Cusco's reinforcements." ”

"Shizi's hand is very large, and after eating the three reinforcements, the defenders of Arequipa will become a turtle in an urn, and it doesn't take much effort to solve them." Liu Pudao.

"Yes, I am going to fight a big battle this time, to kill the main forces in southern Peru in one battle, so that the Peruvians have to make peace with us." Li Mingyuan said in high spirits.

"Shizi, after we annihilate the Peruvian reinforcements and occupy Arequipa, the problem of weapons and equipment that plagues the army can be solved, and the combat effectiveness of our soldiers can be fully brought into play." Liu Pu said happily.

"Liu Pu, after occupying Arequipa, you are responsible for protecting the military industry, and you can't make the slightest mistake."

"Humble duty understands."

"Uncle Chen, Dashan, you lead your respective troops to ambush on the path that Moyando must take to support Arequipa, and annihilate all the reinforcements."

"Yes," the two said in unison.

"Division Commander Zhang, lead your division and headquarters troops to attack the enemy forces on the Puno side."

"Yes"

"Chief of Staff Liu, send a letter to Division Commander Li, asking him to transfer Division Commander Luo's troops to meet with the headquarters. He led a division and the rescued Chinese laborers to continue the siege of the city, and waited until we had settled the reinforcements before making peace with them. ”

"Yes."

After the task was issued, Li Mingyuan smiled and said, "Uncle Chen, it's no problem for a division and a brigade of 16,000 people to eat 5,000 Mo Yanduo." ”

"The total strength of three to one can't annihilate the Peruvians, so I twisted my head off and kicked it as a ball for the son." Chen Guozhu said.

The officers on one side laughed when they heard his words.

After everyone stopped laughing, Li Mingyuan said, "Our weapons and equipment are still a little different from the Peruvians, so we have to use the numerical advantage to make up for the shortcomings, but after the mobilization of Peru, the army will definitely be more than us, so I hope that you will lead the troops well, and when you capture Arequipa and have abundant weapons and equipment, you can be outnumbered, even if you can win with one dozen or three." Are you confident that you can do it? ”

"Yes," the officer in the hall shouted.

"Very well, it's one o'clock in the morning, and the whole army will leave in an hour."

"Yes" Everyone responded, quickly left the council hall, and rushed to the garrisons of the troops.