In April of the first year of Xingyan, the Song lord, who had just ascended the throne for less than two months, announced that he was about to drive the royal expedition in person, go north to Fujian and Guangzhou, and fight to the death with Boyan and 500,000 yuan army!

The news is like spring thunder, the earth is shocked, and the world is shaken.

Zhao Lie is indeed going to conquer in person.

Generally, when the new emperor ascends the throne, it is very good to be able to completely sort out all aspects of the court and China in two years, but it is impossible to do so in two months. It's too late to sit in the center, how can you play the big action of the royal driving and personal expedition that affects the nerves of the internal and external courts? A large part of the reason why Zhao Lie was able to do this and dared to do this was because his family background, that is, the Xing Dynasty was too small.

In the Xiangxing period, the line of the dynasty, to put it ugly, is that "there are many small ghosts in the temple", and they have reached the critical point of life and death, and the party and the ministers are still suspicious of each other, tearing down each other, and fighting endlessly, coupled with the lack of military strength, there is a grudge against the mountain.

But since the Yacheng Incident in the third year of Xiangxing, the entire dynasty has been completely under the control of Zhao Lie, although he is the king of the county, he is no different from the emperor. In other words, how long he has been in charge of the country is equal to how long he has been the emperor, and his ascension to the throne is just the trend of the times, and it is just a matter of course. So strictly speaking, Zhao Lie has been the "emperor" for a full year.

In the past year, Zhao Lie has also completely controlled the military and political affairs of the Xing Dynasty. At present, the downward trend sounds like the structure of a country, but the handling of political affairs and staffing is similar to that of a state capital. The so-called "small ship is good to turn around", coupled with a vigorous and resolute new monarch, a group of prime ministers, and a group of ruling elites with prime ministers and scholars, it took two months to complete the internal and external integration after ascending the throne.

The imperial expedition is a major event in any dynasty, especially in the Song Dynasty, which has suffered losses and lost face, it is even more cautious.

When Zhao Lie proposed to drive the expedition in person, Wen Tianxiang, Chen Yizhong, Zeng Yuanzi, Zhang Shijie, Su Liuyi and other ministers all fiercely opposed, and even the Queen Mother summoned him several times to persuade him to dispel this idea.

Zhao Lie was very puzzled, after he went south to hunt the cliff city, he had been "pro-conquest", how could there be no objection, but now as soon as he ascended the throne, he jumped out one by one to obstruct it? As a result, when I inquired, I learned that the crux of the problem was Zhao Lao'er, Taizong Zhao Guangyi.

In the fourth year of the Taiping rejuvenation of the Song Dynasty (979), the Song and Liao countries had a tragic battle in the Gaoliang River in order to seize Youzhou. As a result of the battle, the Song army was defeated, and Zhao Guangyi, the lord of the Song Dynasty, was beaten and fled in a donkey cart. Since then, there has been no personal conquest of the official family of the Great Song Dynasty.

Was he beaten and fled in a donkey cart? Zhao Lie was speechless and expressed his understanding, but this pro-expedition was imperative.

Zhao Lie asked himself if he was not a famous general, nor did he want to endure hardships or be afraid of death, but if he didn't go, he couldn't do his job - if he sat in this position, he had to do his job well, and he couldn't tolerate any difference, let alone fail.

This Northern Expedition is related to the fortunes of the country, and if you win, the country will prosper, and if you lose, the country will die. Zhao Lie must do everything he can to do his best, and he will fight an unprecedented tough battle against the powerful Yuan army with all the firearms of the Dragon Bird Army.

In this era, no one can compare with him in terms of command of infantry and artillery coordination and in terms of firearms combat experience. In such an important battle, how could he sit on the dragon chair and watch from across the sea? Not to mention the strongest and only firearms unit and artillery unit in the Great Song Dynasty, how could he hand it over to others to command? This is a terrifying force capable of subverting a dynasty, and the commander of this force at any time can only be one - Zhao Lie, the lord of the Great Song Dynasty.

If this battle is to be won, Zhao Lie must go!

After ten long days, the fierce arguments of the three inner court meetings before and after can even be said to be quarrels - well, in the Song Dynasty, arguments between officials and ministers were still very common. In the end, Zhao Lie simply pulled out his pistol and slapped it at the dragon case: "Whoever wants to be in charge, take this gun!" The martial arts team, the artillery battalion, and the five battalions of five thousand musketeers are all under his command! ”

Having said that, who would dare not be interested in hindering the emperor's personal conquest?

On the first day of April, the edict was issued. Although the edict claimed to be 100,000, Zhao Lie did not have 100,000 soldiers. In other words, he had, more than 100,000, but on the other hand, he didn't actually have it, only tens of thousands.

How so? Li Heng was worried about the lack of soldiers and food, and Zhao Hunt was similar.

If you really count it, including the Zhulu rebels who responded to the Jiangnan provinces and came under his name, I am afraid that there are hundreds of thousands. However, not to mention how many imaginary numbers there are in these hundreds of thousands of people and what their combat effectiveness is, even if they are real people, they are all elite soldiers, and they are far from quenching their thirst. What can quench his "hunger and thirst" is that only Qiongzhou, one government and three military states have less than 20,000 soldiers and horses.

The tens of thousands of Qinwang troops controlled by Su Liuyi's Guangnan Governor's Mansion can barely make up the number, but these people have their own mountains and horses, and their combat power is worrying, and before they have been reorganized and trained, and they are all just a rabble, and they cannot be Li Heng's opponents at all. No matter how many soldiers and horses are recruited, it is useless, and the soldiers are expensive but not much more expensive. I don't know if there is a lot of strength or not, but the amount of food must be large! And the current problem of eating is the number one problem in front of Zhao Lie.

In the second and third years of Xiangxing, Zhao Lie led the Longque Army to fight against the powerful Yuan Army, and basically did not worry about the soldiers' food. The reasons for this are: First, at the beginning of the establishment of the Dragon Bird Army, there were not many soldiers, and thousands of people died. The grain purchased from Champa and Annam by sea, as well as the large amount of baggage captured after the defeat of the Yuan army, were fully sufficient to support it. The second is that the entire battlefield is basically in Qiongzhou, at most across a strait and into a Leizhou city on the other side. The scope of local operations is limited, and the loss of grain is not large, which is also an important reason.

Even after defeating the Yuan army many times, surrendering a large number of prisoners, and receiving nearly 10,000 volunteers, the Longque Army has expanded to more than 38,000 people, but with the support of large grain producers such as Champa and Annam, and the support of developed shipping, the continuous flow of grain has never made the Xing Dynasty sad about this.

However, the garrison is one thing, the march is another.

If the Dragon Bird Army is stationed in Qiongzhou and does not move, it will fight a defensive counterattack, just like defeating Ali Hague and Zhang Hongfan's army, with the current background of the dynasty and the number of troops, the food supply will basically not be a problem. However, if a cross-sea operation is carried out, from the coast to the southeastern hinterland, or even to the north of the Yangtze River, the consumption of grain will be 10 times, 20 times, or even more than that of the garrison.

After the Xing Dynasty defeated Zhang Hongfan at the end of the third year of Xiangxing, until April of the first year of Xingyan, in almost half a year, a large number of granaries were built to stock up on grain and grass for the counterattack on Mengyuan, and the grain accumulated so far was only more than 100,000 stones, which could only support the 30,000 dragon bird army to fight for three months. After deducting the marching time, I am afraid that there will not even be two months. At this time, not to mention fighting a big war that will determine the fortunes of the country, even a medium-sized battle of World War I is not enough.

If we can accumulate it for another two or three years, the problem of military rations will naturally be solved. It's a pity that the fighter waits for no one. Don't take advantage of the current emptiness in the southeast and the strength of the Yuan army is weak to recover the rivers and mountains with rapid momentum, and wait for the Meng Yuan to react, mobilize heavy troops, calm the chaos, and stabilize the situation. At that time, even if there are ten times more troops and there is no shortage of food, if you want to pacify the coast, recover the southeast, and advance into the Central Plains, I am afraid that it will be ten times more difficult, and the price you will have to pay ten times more.

War will never wait for you to be ready, like a movie director shouting "action" before calmly starting to fight.

Therefore, this battle must be fought if it is well prepared, and it must be fought if it is not sufficient, and it is better to fight late than early, and it is better to fight a small battle than to fight a big one.

Since Meng Yuan sent their best generals and strongest military appearances, Zhao Lie was also determined to do a big job!

Defeating Ali Hague was to stun Meng Yuan; Defeating Zhang Hongfan hurt Meng Yuan; If you can defeat Boyan this time, you will definitely be able to cripple Meng Yuan!

Since the food of the soldiers is insufficient, then do not bring so many soldiers, attack with elites, and be flexible.

5,000 musketeers, 300 martial arts teams, elite sentry battalions, plagiarism battalions, plus artillery battalions, baggage battalions, boat bridge battalions and logistics troops, the whole army totaled more than 11,000 people. This is all the horses and horses of Zhao Hunt's personal expedition, and it is estimated that among all the emperors who have driven the personal expedition throughout the ages, they have led the least number of soldiers and horses. The quantity is small, but in terms of quality, it is definitely the highest.

10,000 VS 500,000.

This battle has attracted the attention of the world.