Most of the Qing army in Xuzhou was heavily damaged by the Taiping army in the first battle of Yangzhou, and the commander Belle Tuntai was almost beheaded by the Taiping army. In addition, Li Yongfang's son, Xuanfu general soldier Gang Atai and Kangxi's uncle Tong Guowei, Dorobelle Chang Adai and others were also stubbornly resisted by the fifth town of the Taiping Army in Daijiazhuang, and Meng Xiongbi, the general soldier of Henan, was killed in that battle.www.biquge.info Although the Fifth Town was almost wiped out in this battle, the Qing army also almost collapsed after the battle.

The Battle of Daijiazhuang was the first head-on battle with the superior heavy troops of the Qing Army under the condition that there was no geographical advantage since the establishment of the Taiping Army. In this battle, the fifth town will be killed by Shizhong, and less than 1,000 people survived in the fifth town, but nearly 10,000 Qing troops were killed. This battle played the prestige of the fifth town, and also left an indelible imprint in the hearts of those Qing troops who participated in this battle.

It is also ridiculous to say that the Manchurian soldiers, who claim to be descendants of the Jurchens, have since given birth to the impression that "the peace is less than 10,000, and the Manchurian is invincible".

Now the Qing army in Xuzhou, whether it is the leader of the Manchurian and Mongolian Eight Banners, or the general of the Han army's green battalion, as long as the Taiping Army is mentioned, three words will always subconsciously appear in his mind - "can't be defeated".

As the fifth town that killed and injured the Qing army the most, the blood-stained "Qi" banner also became the flag that the Qing army did not want to see, and even for a long time after the war, the Qing army that participated in the battle of Daijiazhuang would always be awakened by the blood-stained Qi banner in their dreams.

Fortunately for the Qing army in Xuzhou, the terrible Fifth Town was not in front of them, but returned to Zhenjiang after the war to receive replenishment.

According to the military department's intelligence, the total strength of the Qing army in Xuzhou is less than 20,000. Among them, the eight banners are mainly Manchurian inlaid with yellow flags and blue flags, there are about six to eight Niu Lu, and the other is a dozen Niu Lu of the Mongolian army, two white and two red, plus about 3,000 Han army flags. The rest were the northern green battalion soldiers who ran out of Yangzhou.

Whether it is morale or combat effectiveness, the Qing army of less than 20,000 people assembled in Xuzhou cannot be compared with the Taiping army, but after the battle of Yangzhou, the Taiping army suffered great losses, and the elite fifth town was almost wiped out. The rest of the towns that participated in the war also suffered more casualties, and the original first and second towns lost one-third of their troops. Below the general, there were more than 50 generals and colonels killed in battle, and some of the battalion guards under the town were only a few people left, and they lost their formation, so after seizing Yangzhou, facing the overall collapse of the Qing army, and the good situation of Fu Lin fleeing in embarrassment, Zhou Shixiang had to order the whole army to stop the pursuit, because at that time the Taiping army was not much better than the Qing army, and there was no ability to take advantage of the victory to advance north and conquer Xuzhou in one fell swoop.

Zhou Shixiang once said helplessly to the generals who asked for battle: "The steps are too big, and it is easy to pull the eggs." ”

The Qing army that withdrew to Xuzhou finally got a chance to breathe, and Belle Tuntai was ordered to be in danger, and was pinned on high hopes by Fulin, and gathered the defeated troops in Xuzhou to form a defensive line, and formed a confrontation situation with the Taiping army, which was unable to advance north. After that, Zhou Shixiang reorganized the towns in Jiangbei and formed the Jiangbei Army, with Ge Yi as the Jianghuai Economic Strategy and the Jiangbei Army as the commander.

After the formation of the Jiangbei Army, a large number of Qing troops were used to expand the towns, resulting in a sharp decline in combat effectiveness. Both sides of the Ming and Qing dynasties needed time to reorganize and train their armies at this time, so the "peace talks" proposed by Zhou Shixiang were "responded" by Fulin. For eight months, the Jiangbei Army and the Qing Army in Xuzhou could be said to be at peace, and both sides were licking their wounds.

However, unlike Tuntai, who barely supported themselves in Xuzhou and were involved in the Henan war from time to time, the Jiangbei Army has been rested in the past few months, and the placement and training of the surrendered army have also been put on track, and initial results have been achieved. The commander of the Jiangbei Army, Ge Yi, is now gearing up every day, waiting for the next big battle with the Qing army.

Auxiliary Minister Sonny also knew that there was a certain danger in transferring Xuzhou troops to Shandong to quell the turmoil, but if the chaos in Shandong could not be calmed down, it would directly threaten the liaison between Beijing and Xuzhou, as well as the transportation of grain and grass. If chaos is allowed to spread from Denglai to the hinterland of Shandong, it will be a matter of time before the canal is cut off. The fire in the rear was a disaster for Tuntai, who was alone in Xuzhou.

Tuntai also knew that it was dangerous to go to Shandong to quell the turmoil, not because the rebels in Shandong would bring him any danger, but because of the Taiping army in front of him. Therefore, his secrecy work was done very well, and the Taiping army in Xuzhou did not notice it at all. It's just that what Tuntai never dreamed of was that the Qufu Kong family sold him.

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After hearing that the marshal had formulated a strategic plan to go north to Liaodong in Fujian, Ge Yi was so anxious that he couldn't do it, because his Jiangbei Army was now the main force facing the Qing army in the north, and it was also on the front line of the war against the Qing Dynasty. If the marshal goes north to Liaodong, then it means that it is impossible for the Jiangbei Army to go north as the main force and lose the opportunity to continue to make meritorious contributions.

Not only is Ge Yi not satisfied with his current status and title, but all the generals in the Jiangbei Army are counting on being able to achieve military exploits in the Northern Expedition, so that the Jiangbei Army and political system headed by Ge Yi began to build momentum in Jiangnan.

Ge Yi personally lobbied the staff officers of the Qi Wangfu and the military department, hoping to influence the plan to go north to Liaodong. However, because this plan was formulated by Zhou Shixiang himself, the people below could not change it, and Ge Yi's efforts became meaningless. Fortunately, a riot suddenly broke out in Jiangnan, which put the plan to go north to Liaodong on hold for the time being, which gave Ge Yi hope. Of course, in addition to trying to persuade Xiucai to give up the purpose of going north to Liaodong and directly from Xuzhou's Northern Expedition, Ge Yi came to Zhenjiang this time for another purpose, that is, to win the title of "five main forces" for the four towns under the Jiangbei Army.

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After the Battle of Yangzhou, Zhou Shixiang had already begun to fully integrate his army, because with the continuous victory of the war and the surrender of rebels, the Taiping army was now very large and chaotic. Even Zhou Shixiang didn't know how many soldiers and horses he brought out of the army now.

The Taiping Army's major heavy army groups were the newly established Jiangbei Army, the Southwest Army, the Central South Army, and the Jiangsu-Zhejiang Garrison Army.

The four towns of the Jiangbei Army were the first town of Qihao, the second town of Zhu Qinglai, the third town of Shang Keyuan, and the second town of Shao Chengguo's cavalry. These four towns were adapted from the original first, second, and third towns, the thirteenth and fifteenth towns, and the first cavalry town, with a total strength of 41,250 people. The commander of the legion is Ge Yi.

The Southwest Army is also the establishment of four towns, namely Wang Youxi's fourth town, Lu Guangzu's second town of the expeditionary force brought back from Annan, Wang Xing's tenth town, and the third town of the newly built Guangxi wolf soldiers. The total strength is 39,500 people, and the commander of the legion is Shao Jiugong.

The Central South Army is now controlled by Zhao Sihai, the governor of Hunan, and the Hunan Field Corps includes the ninth town of Guo Dengdi and the four towns of the former Xiangxi Bandit Army. Originally, the main force of the Hunan Field Corps was Tie Yi's Second Town, but the Second Town was later transferred to the lower reaches of the Yangtze River to participate in the Jiangbei War, so the combat effectiveness of the five towns of the Hunan Field Corps was the lowest among the three major armies. Fortunately, there has been no war pressure on the Hunan side in the past two years, and with the occupation of Guizhou by the Southwest Army, the Hunan side is even more peaceful.

In addition to these three heavy army groups, Zhou Shixiang also had the sixth town of Suna, the two towns adapted from the original Zhejiang Qing Army and Ma Fengzhibu, the fifth town after restoration and replenishment, the second town of Tieyi, the two newly built towns in the hands of Jiang He, the governor of Anhui, the eighth town of Zhu Tong, the seventh town of Hu Qili, the first town of Wang Fuchen's cavalry, the twelve towns of Niu Gensheng, the fourteen towns of Geng Zhongde, the sixteen towns of Gan Hui, and the seventeen towns of Han Chaozong. In addition, there are also surrendered troops of the Southwest Field Army in Guizhou, such as Ta Xince, Lu Sangui, Tan Yi and others, as well as the former Western Army such as Yu Sanpin, who broke away from Qingyang Wang Feng Shuangli and took the initiative to lead his troops to Guiyang to accept the reorganization.

On the Annan side, there were three towns of the expeditionary force, and Song Xianggong, the governor of Liangguang, also had local troops in two towns. The military department has now approved the establishment of a total of 37 towns, and according to the military system of the Taiping Army, the Taiping Army's land division and horses have exceeded 350,000 soldiers and horses, excluding the water division.

In fact, these 37 towns have a lot of water, and many towns have more or less the problem of reporting empty quotas and eating empty salaries.

For example, Zhu Tong's eighth town, Guo Dengdi's ninth town, and Wang Xing's tenth town, because these three towns had the meaning of "cooperative" allies from the beginning of their formation, Zhou Shixiang could not directly intervene in the specific affairs of these towns. And these towns themselves were also formed by the integration of various anti-Qing forces at that time, and there were several princes of Yonglifeng in some towns.

In order to unite them and form a united front against the Qing Dynasty, Zhou Shixiang gave them the establishment of several towns with a stroke of his pen in Zhaoqing, and promised that the territory he had conquered in the future could be "divided" among them, so that he successfully organized the Western Expedition. However, compared with the towns of the Taiping Army, the actual number of soldiers in these three towns is less than half of the quota, resulting in a marquis may only be a general flag with dozens of soldiers in the army.

After the official establishment of the Dingwu Imperial Court, Zhou Shixiang has begun to rectify these messy lords, either cutting them or demoting them, which makes those original "allies" very dissatisfied with the more and more "domineering" Zhou Shixiang. If it weren't for the fact that they really didn't have the strength to rise up and make trouble, I was afraid that it would be another turmoil.

It's just that the tense situation and the constant war made Zhou Shixiang unable to clean up these towns, and more and more Qing troops and Wu troops surrendered later. For example, Li Zhiting in Guizhou had gold in one hand and a Manchurian noblewoman in the other, and forcibly disintegrated the defense line of the Wu army in Guizhou, and brought dozens of Wu army generals. As a result, as many as 37 towns were attached to the military headquarters, but in fact half of them were made up, with no combat effectiveness, and there was a serious vacancy.

In order to get more benefits from the Taiping army, the generals who surrendered often only had a few hundred people under their command, but he dared to report several times, and in order to appease them and stabilize them, from the army to the military headquarters, they turned a blind eye at every level, and the final result was to raise a large amount of waste and consume not much finance.

This situation is just like when Li Zicheng entered Beijing, but the army of tens of thousands of people collected hundreds of thousands of Ming Dynasty troops along the way, and it snowballed, but finally collapsed in an instant.

The situation faced by Zhou Shixiang is that it has changed from "fighting the country" at the beginning to how to "sit on the country" now.

Rectifying the army, like cleaning up the court and thoroughly purging the opposition forces, has become Zhou Shixiang's top priority now.

Building the "five main forces" is the first step in Zhou Shixiang's army reorganization plan.