"Your Excellency, this is a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity, just to catch it all and never suffer in the future."

The head of the group, Nolunga, shouted for a duel, and Mooney frowned, and the more he thought about it, the more suspicious he became:

"Even the people we all know about the trapping, don't the northerners who are better at water warfare know?"

"But there is no great river in the west of the Bedmis, and what can they do when they go to Bedmis. If it is to take away the Central Plains people, their warships will not be able to fit much at all, our cavalry will follow their warships, they will not even have a chance to land, even if they rob the Central Plains people, their warships will not be able to fit, they can only take the land route, and Bedmis is far away from the Drankey, the land route is blocked by us, and their warships have no other choice but to go west. ”

Norenga's analysis was reasonable, and Mooney couldn't think of any other reason for the coalition forces, so he entered Berdemis without any scruples, and after thinking for a moment, he said:

"Command the navy, each draw eighty boats, enter the two rivers of Tarun and Bertila, and I will personally go ashore to find out!"

"Yes, Your Excellency."

When Mooney divided his troops, Bailiyan's fleet entered a nameless river to the west a few days later, the river was barely wide enough for two large boats to travel side by side, Bailiyan decisively ordered to put down the boats and fast boats to go forward, hundreds of boats and clippers, taking advantage of the night to raise fire to attack, the fire stretched for miles and was very spectacular.

On the second day after the departure of the boat, the main force of more than 70 ships of the navy was divided into two routes, one led by Sikong Nan, and continued to wander in the waters of the eastern section of the nameless river, blocking the enemy's infantry to block the river, and Bailiyan led the other road to the western section to control the Tarun and Bertilla rivers into the upper estuary of the nameless river.

The two rivers of Taren and Bertila are long and meandering, with a number of large S-shaped bends in general, from the nameless river to Lake Boglat, the distance is 300 miles by land, the section of the Taron River is 600 miles long, and the section of the Bertila River is 530 miles long, and it is a boat going south against the current.

The Nameless River went west to the waterway for only two hundred and fifty miles, and the water flow was stable and downwind, much faster than the arrival of the Mooney fleet at the Nameless River, and the time wasted on the way to the news transmission was much faster than the speed of the Jinxuedi people's sailors.

On the way south for Mooney, the news of the coalition division taking a small boat to the west reached the camp.

"Commander of the Qiyu Army, the northerners fleet suddenly changed to hundreds of boats and clippers two days ago, and divided their troops into the west of the nameless small river, and they also loaded the sails on the small boats and fishing boats, which were extremely fast."

The scout said quickly, and Mooney asked in a deep voice:

"How many small boats did they dispatch, and how many people did they have in each?"

"Small fishing boats are four people per boat, let alone two or three hundred, and fast boats have about dozens of people, there are more than 20 boats."

"And what about the main force of their fleet?"

"One wandered back and forth on the eastern section of the nameless river, and our army tried to narrow the river several times, but was thwarted by it. The other cruises in the western section of the Nameless River, and its two armies now control the east and west estuaries of the upper reaches of the Taron and Bertila rivers leading to the Nameless River. ”

During the Xishan docking, Bailiyan ordered craftsmen to make small sails to modify small boats and fishing boats.

The fishing boats of the Jinxuedi people were strange, and they equipped the stern of the boat with a manual rudder, one at the helm and one rowing. Small fishing boats in the Central Plains are usually a combination of oars and rudders, which not only have the function of rudders, but also facilitate the boatman to paddle at the stern, and only need one person to operate.

Therefore, the stern of the Jin Xuedi boat is preset with deep perforations, the tail rudder and the hand rod are removed, and the special small sail is fixed when used, and pulled out when not in use, so that the boat can be driven by the wind and let the boat rowed by manpower also run at high speed, and the current southeast wind is flourishing, which is conducive to westward expansion.

The coalition division tactics caught Mooney off guard, which was equivalent to hundreds of free-flowing small warships in one night, and it was too late to send ships from Boglaat to block them.

"Norunga, immediately send someone to intercept the southbound naval army, and form a formation on the shore, without my order, you are not allowed to attack!"

"Your Excellency, their troops are divided into three routes, and our army is just dividing and surrounding them, and now the ship is stopped halfway, we will miss the opportunity."

"You know what!" Mooney retorted, "They have occupied the two estuaries of the upper reaches of Tarun and Bertila, and we are going upriver from the two rivers, and they only need a few dozen small boats full of black fire powder to blow us to pieces!" ”

"But we can divide our forces from Bograt, and go after their boats."

"Then do you know that we are at least seven or eight hundred miles away from Boglath Westward, or we are still going against the current, we are all big ships, and the speed is only more than half of theirs, and when we reach behind them, it will be eight or nine days later, plus the previous four days, that is, thirteen days later. At that time, they had already taken the ships and expanded themselves.

Now do as I command it at once, and let the fleets of Tarun and Bertila come to shore. ”

Mooney knew very well that he was swimming against the current, and Bailiyan occupied the two estuaries upstream, which was extremely unfavorable to him, and he could only suffer under the strong attack.

The upper reaches of the two rivers of Tarun and Bertila were blocked, and whether it was a detour from the lower reaches or the westward advance from Boglatte, it was necessary to detour seven or eight hundred miles against the current, and the big ships had to travel for eight or nine days, and it was too late in time.

At this time, Bailiyan was taking a boat to and from the western section of the nameless river, and from time to time the cavalry on the shore dragged a stone artillery cart and launched artillery shots at the not wide river, but with little success.

Bai Liyan moved the few bed crossbows captured by the coalition forces to the ship, plus some of the original ones on the ship, and reluctantly equipped with long-range weapons, and the giant crossbow arrows were tied with a hollow tin cylinder with a diameter of seven or eight centimeters and a length of half a foot, and the barrel was filled with gunpowder.

The technology of Jin Xuedi's crossbow is unsatisfactory, its bed crossbow is only slightly farther than the single crossbow of the Central Plains at best, and even the range of the Zhiguo Chaotian crossbow can not be reached, and the crossbow arrow can only strike at the target within 150 steps in a straight line after being equipped with a powder cartridge, so Bailiyan mostly uses a large elevation angle and a high throw trajectory, so that it can reach more than 200 steps, or even farther. Of course, there is no precision to speak of.

The simple stone artillery truck pulled by manpower, the ultimate range is more than 200 steps, the farther the distance, the worse the accuracy, the worse the destructive power of the stone, the two sides several rounds of shooting, the low efficiency of the stone artillery car, and the position that cannot move quickly is quickly defeated.

On this day, when the boat arrived near the village of the Central Plains, Jin Xuedi's cavalry shuttled back and forth on the shore, which Bailiyan had long been accustomed to, but Jiang Jie beside him said:

"My lord, my subordinates have something unclear, and I would like to ask you for advice."

"What?"

"The subordinates found that our army had invaded the inland river in May and plundered its land no less than dozens of times, and it is said that if it were our Central Plains countries, they would have already moved all the villagers along the river to the rear, concentrated their garrisons, moved garrisons to prepare for war, or trained the young and strong people in the villages to train the people's army to resist the attacks of the water bandits. Now it is contrary to common sense that it only has cavalry with it, and has not moved the people along the coast or trained the civilian army. ”

"This is not surprising. As far as the general knows, in the early years, in order to open up the land outside the Guan, the Jinxuedi people promised the land to the nobles and priests. Nominally, the aristocracy could not own land privately, but in fact the aristocracy controlled the industrial and commercial handicrafts and mining industries, and their income outside the customs was not subject to any taxes, but their families outside the customs needed a lot of money to maintain the political interests of the customs area.

Therefore, under the long-term pioneering rule outside the Guanxi, interest families with generations of family groups as the sphere of influence have gradually formed in various localities, with the village as the system, the small city as the springboard, and the big city as the political center, forming layers of dense interest networks.

The aristocracy held positions in various places, and the upper rulers to which they depended, all inherited the title from generation to generation, and the relationship was extremely strong. Once the interests of the lower-class families are lost, they must absolutely safeguard their own interests.

The villages plundered by our army all belonged to the jurisdiction of families with different interests, and our army only looted materials and rarely killed people, so the main losses were the victims of the Jinxuedi people. The losses of the various interest families are not large.

However, if the people of the village are moved, the losses incurred and the money and food spent on the resettlement of the victims will be far greater than the losses caused by the plundering of our army, so they will not easily move the people.

If all the thousands of miles of land that our army has plundered along both sides of the river since May are removed, the population involved will reach hundreds of thousands, and the losses will be extremely heavy. And how to settle after moving away is another huge expense. Therefore, when our naval army is still weak and insufficient to cause a great disaster, they will categorically not move away from the coastal villages.

The same is true for the Central Plains people, the Central Plains villages belong to families with different interests, and all the fruits and harvests belong to the rulers, and if it is not necessary, the cost of moving hundreds of thousands of Central Plains citizens is incalculable. ”

If you want to say that the people of Jinxuedi are worthy of learning from the Central Plains, their tax system is worth learning and learning from. The taxation system of the Jinxuedi people basically matches the current production relations and productive forces.

Of course, the premise is that it has a large number of exploited slaves in order to pass on its own internal economic interests, and if it does not have the great value generated by slaves, it has to maintain an army of more than two million people, and its tax system will inevitably collapse.

In the early years, in order to open up the land outside the Guan, the ruler of Jin Xuedi promised the tax privileges outside the Guanxi to the nobles at all levels in the country, and there were huge and complex family lines under the nobles, plus the participation of religious priests, which made the distribution of interests outside the Guanxi intertwined.

The essence of the economy is people, and people are the source of all economy. Bailiyan led the army to invade the inland river, only robbed the baggage and rarely killed, and slaughtered the whole village, so that the stop loss point of the capital was just right.

It is the common people who suffer the most from the robbery of the coalition forces, not the elite group, and as long as people live, they can still continue to farm and produce cash crops, and the powerful can collect taxes.

Secondly, in the era of farming, agriculture is the most downstream of the supply chain of the three major industries, and it takes a while for the supply chain to respond to the upstream industry if there is a problem in the supply chain. The direct source of tax revenue for the magnates and the indirect income from the city's commerce, handicrafts, mining, and agricultural villages could not directly deal a heavy blow to them.

Third, the area of Posong Province is very large, and the area infested by Baili Yan is only the northeast of it, with an area of less than one-fifth at best, and it is a dragonfly along the river, without a large-scale invasion of inland and devastating blows, nor an attack on cities and towns, and far from reaching the stop-loss point of capital.

Under such circumstances, the loss of hundreds of thousands of people will be even greater, and the gains will outweigh the losses.

Not to mention that it is not easy to move hundreds of thousands of people in modern society, and the cost of moving hundreds of thousands of people in the agricultural era is huge.

It is easy to relocate, but the problem of resettlement after relocation is the biggest problem of capital expenditure. Moreover, the land outside the customs has been divided into spheres of influence, and refugees have been resettled on other aristocratic lands, and the land has been divided again, which involves more complex entanglements of interests, which is not a problem that can be solved overnight and can be solved by a few words.

Jiang Jie works in the military and neglects government affairs, so it is not surprising that he does not understand his reasoning.

(End of chapter)