Hong Chengchou lowered his head and thought for a while, and then said: "Your Majesty, of course this is also a solution, but the problem now is that the Zheng family has money and soldiers, and they have never suffered defeats. The DPRK and China are afraid that even if there are people who are dissatisfied with them, if there is no military support, who will really dare to oppose them? But now in the Ming Kingdom, which army dares to challenge the Zheng family's army? Your Majesty, if you want someone in the Ming Dynasty to dare to challenge the Zheng family, someone must first be able to defeat them on the battlefield once, otherwise, whether it is Wu Sangui's Guan Ning army or other armies, who would dare to confront them even secretly? So Your Majesty, the most important thing is to defeat them on the battlefield once. ”

Huang Taiji nodded and said, "What Mr. said is also that if you can't get it on the battlefield, other means are limited." It's just that the Zheng family army is indeed very elite, and their supplies and baggage are self-contained, and they don't rely too much on the Ming court. However, this also made those officials in the Ming court have not many opportunities to make money, and I am afraid that many people will hate them. However, in the end, it is necessary to win on the battlefield first, and these dissatisfaction can dare to come out. Sir, how can our army defeat the Zheng family army on the battlefield? ”

Hong Chengchou said: "Zheng Jiajun is well-trained and well-armed, if it is a hard fight, although I am the elite of the Qing Dynasty and am not afraid of them, but I have few people in the Qing Dynasty, and if I fight with them, it is really not cost-effective." Therefore, Chen felt that he still had to find a way to win with a strategy. The Zheng army mainly relied on firearms to fight and was better than artillery, but their army must have consumed a lot.

When Chen was in the Southern Dynasty, he was quite familiar with Zheng Zhihu and Zheng Sen, and he also talked about military affairs with them. The Zheng family's infantry army actually originated from their sailors. The Zheng family's sailors laid a large piece of land. Naturally, there is a place where infantry will be used. It's just that the sailor's boat can only fit a limited number of people, and if you want to load a lot of people, you need a lot of boats, so the Zheng family can't afford to pay so much money. Therefore, the infantry of the Zheng family has always emphasized the elite, and they are willing to spend money on individual soldiers.

When Zheng Zhihu and his ministers talked about his infantry, they said that if they could make one soldier serve as two soldiers, his family would be willing to spend four soldiers on this soldier, and if they could use it as three soldiers, they would be willing to spend six soldiers for him. Because of the ocean-wide expedition, if you can reduce half of the soldiers, you can reduce half of the troop carriers, half of the grain ships, and the supporting sailors and ports, so it is worth spending several times the price on a soldier.

Your Majesty, because of this, the infantry of the Zheng family army is sharp and unusual. During the Battle of Jinzhou, Wechen also hired his family's infantry, and at that time they also pretended to be 'Dutch soldiers'. At that time, Wei Chen noticed that even the most ordinary soldiers had iron armor and iron helmets when they went into battle. I've actually seen their iron armor in the Qing Dynasty. It was the armor of General Cao Bianjiao back then, but it was just the arm armor and shin armor removed. His Majesty also knew that this set of armor was unusually strong, and ordinary swords could not hurt them at all, let alone bows and arrows. ”

Hearing this, Huang Taiji also nodded and said: "This armor, after Cao Bianjiao died in battle, I have also seen it, it is extremely delicate, extremely strong, and only things like maces can deal with it." Such an armor, even if the arm armor and shin armor are removed, I am afraid it is worth a lot. How can the Zheng family afford this? ”

Hong Chengchou said: "This Weichen doesn't know anymore, Weichen thinks, maybe they have some secret method to make this armor at a cheap price." In fact, it was not only the armor, but also their soldiers who ate well. There is meat every day, and speaking of which, it is no less than those who eat as much as Zu Dashou. Their muskets are also exquisite, Zu Dashou also bought some from them back then, and His Majesty has also made them imitate, but they can't compare. Generally, the pipes are rolled out of wrought iron, and there are always welds on them, and if there is too much gunpowder, it will explode. But the Zheng family's pipe has no welds at all, and I don't know how this pipe is made? Therefore, their firecrackers and their strength and range are not comparable to Wuzhen Chaoha's firearms. Alas, where is the Zheng family using the money to raise a few soldiers, they are completely using the money of Zu Dashou to raise a soldier. But in this way, Wei Chen thought, they naturally have a weakness. ”

Huang Taiji asked, "What weakness?" ”

Hong Chengchou said: "With such an elite and such an expensive army, although the Zheng family is rich, how much can they raise?" Your Majesty, since the appearance of the Zheng family's army, they have the most, how many people have been on the battlefield? ”

Since the Model Army officially landed on the battlefield on the mainland, the world has attracted attention, and Huang Taiji naturally has a lot of relevant information here. Huang Taiji thought for a moment and said, "There have never been more than 40,000 on one battlefield. ”

Hong Chengchou said again: "In this way, the infantry they can use will not exceed 60,000 at most. And how many really elite soldiers can there be in these armies? It should be no more than 10,000 people. How rare is such an elite, Your Majesty naturally knows that we can't afford to die, can the Zheng family afford to die? These soldiers are the foundation of the Zheng family, as long as we defeat them a little, they are afraid that they will be reluctant to use these troops indiscriminately. This is the first weakness of the Zheng family. ”

"What else?" Huang Taiji asked in a deep voice.

"Your Majesty, the army of the Zheng family, the soldiers eat meat every day, the horses in the army eat beans every day, plus there are many cannons, in order to pull the cannons, you need to pull the horses, and the horses have to consume forage. As a result, their army consumes more than twice as much as an ordinary army every day. Your Majesty, after Li Zicheng withdrew from Beijing, Wu Sangui pursued all the way. But Zheng Jiajun's army did not chase all the way, they first retreated to Jinghai from the vicinity of Jingshi, then got on the boat, turned to Zhenjiang, and then traced along the Yangtze River, and even attacked Xiangyang, all relying on the Han River. Your Majesty, this is not without reason. ”

"I understand what you mean, you mean that the Zheng family's supply is extremely dependent on water transportation." Huang Taiji nodded and said, "Yes, few of the many actions of the Zheng family army are too far away from the waterway. This is indeed another weakness of theirs. It's just that it's not easy to take advantage of this weakness, but it's not easy to ......."

"Your Majesty, the Zheng family occupies Niuzhuang Fort, and the area around Niuzhuang Fort will be frozen in a few months, if you can take this opportunity to recapture Niuzhuang Fort or Beacon Mountain, it will not be bad. It's just that the enemy army naturally knows this, and they will naturally be prepared, and these two places are still not easy to fight. Chen felt that if we could not defeat it this winter, it was estimated that by next spring, they would attack us along the Da Liao River. If it......" Hong Chengchou's voice lowered.

"Sir's right, it's a bit difficult, but it's worth a try." Huang Taiji listened, nodded and said.

……

After occupying Xiangyang and killing Li Zicheng, the main force of the Model Army began to pursue the rest of Li Zicheng. Zheng Sen issued a letter demanding that the rest of Li Zicheng's troops surrender, and wrote to Hongguang, asking the Son of Heaven to issue an edict that Li Zicheng's remaining troops would not be blamed after surrendering. Neither Emperor Hongguang nor the cabinet objected, and with an expedited eight hundred li, the holy decree of pardoning those who surrendered was sent to Xiangyang. Under such circumstances, most of the remaining Li Zicheng's troops surrendered to Zheng Sen, and the remaining part of the generals who were related to Li Zicheng went to Sichuan to defect to Zhang Xianzhong. In this way, it will be the seventh month of the year (lunar calendar). Zheng Sen handed over the model army of about one infantry regiment to Zheng Zhihu, and then led the rest of the troops, including those who had surrendered, down the Yangtze River, and by mid-July, arrived at the mouth of the Yangtze River, where the army was slightly repaired and then boarded again, where the surrendered Shun troops were sent to the Philippines and Taiwan, respectively, while the main force headed for Jeju Island.

The autumn harvest in Liaodong will begin in mid-August, and the main force of the Model Army will arrive on Jeju Island at the end of August, where most of the soldiers will be repaired for a few months, but the light cavalry units have not done such a good thing, and after changing some new horses on Jeju Island, they will get on the ship again and arrive at Niuzhuang Fort on September 12 of that year.

The fort has undergone a number of expansions over the years. The core fortress area followed the original city walls, and some auxiliary low walls were built, transforming Niuzhuang Fort from a traditional castle into a new fortress. Beyond the core bastions, there were four more trenches, as well as four snake-bellied barbed wire.

However, the Jianxuan on the opposite side was not idle. Their fortress along the river has also been basically completed, this is two fortresses across the Da Liao River opposite each other, a total of more than 40 guns of all kinds are deployed on it, considering the width of the Da Liao River, although the performance of these guns is not good, but anyway, the width of the Da Liao River is limited, such a fort is enough to block the river very effectively during the day. In addition, they also laid two barrage chains on the river to prevent the boats of the Model Army from sneaking over at night.

With this series of measures, it has become more difficult for the Model Army to effectively harass the opponent's deep areas. In recent times, especially after the Manchus pulled up two chains on the river, it has become increasingly difficult to attack the Manchu rear, and in recent times it has even largely stopped.

However, the appearance of a large number of light cavalry, as well as more war horses, changed the situation again. This time, Zheng Sen deliberately reduced the number of light cavalry, but equipped them with two horses, which greatly enhanced their ability to run long distances. In this way, Zheng Sen hoped to easily cross the Manchu barrage and launch another attack on the deep grain-producing areas, so as to continuously weaken the Manchus and force them to launch a large-scale attack on the heavily fortified Niuzhuang Fort in winter.