The successful operation of the steam train only caused a sensation among the top wealthy merchants in the Suzhou area and some provinces. Pen % fun % Pavilion www.biquge.info

As for the imperial court, even with the help of some Donglin Party members, the economic development of Suzhou can basically be concealed, and it is really unavoidable, and it is just a passing pass.

Therefore, major projects such as steam trains have not been discussed in the court, which is also the main reason why Li Hongfei convened private businessmen, it doesn't matter if the court doesn't support it, as long as they don't oppose it, when the steam train makes a lot of money, some people don't blush.

It's just that Li Hongfei's idea is still too simple, the prospect of the steam train is really good, but the initial investment is also sky-high, although Wu Hao has opened the right to use the railway for 30 years, but he still can't impress too many businessmen, not all businessmen are like Zhou Furen, more than one million silver, said to invest in it.

At the end of the whole maiden voyage ceremony, in addition to some railway lines in Suzhou, only some local tyrants in the mining areas in other provinces expressed their intention to buy, which had to return to the local area and discuss with the local government before the final decision could be made.

To put it bluntly, although the prospects of steam trains are very good, without the support of the imperial court and the local yamen, it is basically difficult to move an inch, especially the construction of a grand project such as an inter-provincial railway, which is no less than the construction of the Great Wall at the beginning.

At present, the eyes of most officials, including Zhu Youzhen, are focused on the Northern Expedition, and if they want to fully launch the inter-provincial railway, it is estimated that it will be possible to start implementing it after the reunification of the whole country.

The Northern Expedition, which lasted for half a year, soon had a series of twists and turns after Dolgon's response...........

After Qi Hongying and Li Dingguo's army converged, under the cover of the Yangtze River Naval Division, they successfully crossed the Yellow River, but they only stopped there, and suffered a big loss in the first battle against Cangzhou, which was heavily guarded by the Qing army.

After Dolgon decided to abandon the Guannei, the entire Manchu camp was also a lot easier, and let the people on horseback defend the city, which was originally to attack the enemy's strength with their own shortcomings, and now the Qing army, which has let go of its hands and feet, has increased its combat effectiveness a lot in the case of a sharp reduction in troops.

The Ming generals Shang Kexi, Kong Youde and others, who were good at defense, laid an iron bucket-like defensive front in Cangzhou..........

The Qing army, which had seen the power of the Ming army's artillery, invested more than 3,000 large and small artillery pieces in Cangzhou this time, which exceeded the total number of artillery of the five Ming army groups in terms of artillery alone.

In addition to the battalion and company-level support artillery such as the Tiger Squat Artillery, the average number of heavy artillery pieces in each group army was nearly 500 (the first group army had the largest number of heavy artillery, and there were 800 army units alone, and the rest of the troops, especially the four group armies ranked lower, had a relatively short formation time and a relatively small number of artillery, but each group army also had about 300 heavy artillery).

But even if all the artillery on the front line of the Ming army was concentrated, it was not numerically advantageous.

Moreover, most of the guns used by the Qing army were dismantled from the battleships (the Qing army knew that the water war was not the opponent of the Ming army, so they simply dismantled the ships that fled back and applied the artillery to the land, and the number of guns on the two hundred ships alone reached 4,800, of which three-fifths were placed in Cangzhou).

Therefore, the artillery of the Qing army, both in terms of quantity and range, surpassed the Ming army's Franc heavy artillery, and in a simple artillery battle, the Ming army had already fallen behind.

What's more, during this expedition of the Ming army, the logistics and supply were often harassed by the cavalry of the Qing army, and the transportation capacity of the Yangtze River Naval Division alone could not meet the ammunition consumption of more than 2,000 artillery.

However, under the constant urging of the imperial court, under the offensive that was overwhelming all the way, generals like Stilwell, who acted cautiously, began to be a little fluttering.

Especially when it was learned that the defenders of Cangzhou turned out to be the defeated generals of the three subordinates in the past, the Ming army did not even fully understand the situation, so they sent two group armies (Qi Zhifeng's Second Group Army, and the newly promoted Sixth Group Army) under the leadership of Qi Hongying to attack Cangzhou.

However, the final result was that they didn't even see the Cangzhou city gate, so they were attacked by the Qing army's fierce artillery fire, and in just three days, 7,000 Ming troops were lost, including two heavy artillery regiments and more than 200 artillery pieces.

If Li Dingguo hadn't sent a large army to support him later, the Qing army was worried that the war would be stalemate and would have directly fought a decisive battle, and the Ming army would have lost more than 7,000 people this time.

The task of the Qing army is to delay time, and they have no advantage at all in a decisive battle.

When the Ming army supported Cangzhou on all fronts, Manchu generals such as Azig and Duoduo led more than 50,000 cavalry to travel 200 miles in three days, and attacked the Ming army's supply town in Hejian Province (Dezhou) in one fell swoop.

The defeat in the first battle, coupled with the attack on logistics supplies, Li Dingguo did not dare to launch an offensive rashly, so he could only consolidate the front while sending more manpower to stabilize the rear and prevent the Qing cavalry from sneaking up again.

After this battle, the situation of the Northern Expedition seemed to have become serious..........

In the court, Zhu Youzhen still put the front line on the ground, and reprimanded loudly: "Will this Li Dingguo fight in the end!" Cangzhou didn't take it, but lost one-third of the supplies, did he fight like this in this battle? ”

Zhu Youzhen only mentioned the loss of materials, and did not care about the battle damage at all, in his opinion, there will always be deaths in war, as long as it is not tens of thousands of hundreds of thousands of war deaths, he will not ask too much.

The key is the loss of materials, although Hejian Mansion is only one of the supply depots in this Northern Expedition, but because it is closest to the front line, the materials stored in it are still very rich.

The food and ammunition stored in it were enough for the 500,000 troops of the Northern Expedition to fight continuously for a month, and a third of it was lost at once, which directly made the already fragile supply line more and more strained.

Moreover, the Qing army has tasted the sweetness once, and will definitely keep an eye on the supply station in the future, and even the more fragile logistics and transportation lines will become the objects of frequent patronage by the Qing cavalry.

Relying solely on the transportation of the Yangtze River Naval Division could not meet the operational needs of the 500,000-strong army.

"The Holy Lord is angry, this Northern Expedition, the battle line is too long, and the battle time is too tight, General Li and they have not been able to adapt for a while, which is also understandable." Shi Kefa said in mediation.

He used to be a leading general, so he naturally understood that the longer the battle line, the greater the test of logistics, and it was better to say that there were not many troops, and not everyone could play with an army of 500,000.

"What does Shi Cabinet mean by that? Losing so many materials, can you pay the tuition? Gao Hongtu said in a strange manner.

It seems to be the duty of civil servants to suppress military generals, especially since wars have broken out in recent years, and the status of military generals has risen sharply, which has made the ministers of the DPRK and China feel uncomfortable.

"That's it, this Li Dingguo used to be a thief, who knows what kind of heart he has?"

"Even if Li Dingguo didn't mean it, but what he led before was just a group of bandits, but now he is 500,000 Ming elites, can he command it?"

“............”

The ministers chimed in.

If you talk about the ability to break and turn over old accounts, even Li Hongfei can only bow down in front of these ministers.

"Okay, is it useful to say so much? You've given me ideas! "Zhu Youzhen doesn't have a good airway.

However, these people have a way of suppressing their opponents, and they really let them come up with ideas, who could have thought that they would not see a stalemate on the front line?

Zhu Youzhen's mind is the Northern Expedition, and at this time he came up with an idea, if it succeeded, it would be easy to say, if it led to the failure of the Northern Expedition, the person who came up with the idea would definitely not be able to eat and walk around.

"Qiqi Sheng, since Gao Ge Lao feels that General Dingguo's command ability is problematic, then why not replace him and replace him with someone with higher command ability." Shi Kefa said suddenly.

Since Gao Hongtu likes to disagree with him, he simply "pits" the other party.

"Substitutions? For whom? Zhu Youzhen asked.

"Naturally, he is the prince of the dynasty, and Li Menghui, the prince of Chu." Shi Kefa replied without thinking.

Li Menghui's three words can be said to be a taboo in the court today, and no minister in the court dares to mention this person's name in the court.

For the guy who broke the "rules" of officialdom and canceled the privileges of scholars, all the officials hated it in their hearts, and when they suddenly heard Shi Kefa mention this person, the entire court instantly became silent.

If you want to say why the ministers hate Li Hongfei, the biggest reason is that Li Hongfei usurped Zhu Youzhen and canceled the privileges of the scholar class.

Don't underestimate this "privilege", the national policy of the Ming Dynasty is: the monarch and the scholars share the world.

That is to say, the higher the scholar class, the more privileges they get, and the ministers who enter the cabinet can be said to control half of the world, and even a few Ming Dynasty emperors who do not go to court all the year round, their rights have been hollowed out by scholars.

Chongzhen was forced to commit six edicts to himself, also because the scholar class was exercising its "power".

However, now everything has been "stirred up" by Li Hongfei, and in the entire civil and official system, except for Shi Kefa, no one wants Li Hongfei to return to military power.

So after everyone was stunned, without waiting for Zhu Youzhen to speak, Gao Hongtu preemptively said: "Don't do it!" The change of commander in the battle is detrimental to the morale of the army, and please think twice about it. ”

"That's right, this Northern Expedition, our army won big victories one after another, the troops are inevitably a little careless, fortunately, this loss is not too serious, it can be regarded as a lesson for them, presumably they will not make the same mistake again in the future, if the commander is replaced at this time, it will definitely make the army unstable, it was originally just a small mistake, but when the time comes, because of the fear of another problem, it is easy to make a big mistake!"

With Gao Hongtu's reminder, the remaining ministers also reacted, "Li Hongfei must not be allowed to regain military power!" ”

"Lord Taifu has indeed led his troops to win a few battles, but that was a few years ago, and now who can guarantee that he has this ability? And when he led the troops, the most time was only to lead an army of 100,000, and now it is 500,000 Ming elites, if he takes over halfway, he may not be able to adapt in a short time, and when the time comes, Dolgon retreats outside the pass, and it is not so easy to pursue again, and the soldiers are very fast! ”

Well, when it came to letting Li Hongfei take command, they all became "military experts", Shi Kefa shook his head from the sidelines.

Zhu Youzhen also showed a disdainful look, but this look disappeared in a flash, and no one paid attention to it.

"Everyone Aiqing is right, but someone has to be responsible for the defeat of this battle. Otherwise, how can I explain to the people of the world! After a group of people made a noise, Zhu Youzhen spoke.

Zhu Youzhen will not agree to the change of commander, although a group of ministers are full of ugliness, but what they said is not unreasonable, even if Li Hongfei is really the reincarnation of the god of war, it will take a lot of time to go to the front line to integrate the army, and what the Ming army and the Qing army are now robbing is time.

Dolgon planned to transport half of the wealth of the Ming Dynasty to Guanwai, which Zhu Youzhen did not allow.

If it weren't for her greed for merit and being under siege, General Dingguo would not have led the army to help, thus ignoring the rear. The minister felt that if he wanted to be held responsible, General Qi should be removed! Gao Hongtu said.

Since Zhu Youzhen needs to explain, then give him an explanation, this Li Dingguo can't do it, and it is also a good choice to pull down a deputy commander-in-chief to show the authority of Wenchen, not to mention that the other party is still a female streamer, which has long made the ministers unhappy.

Everyone present understood why Qi Hongying, who has always been steady, would be greedy for merit, if it weren't for the constant urging of the imperial court, when Qi Hongying attacked Xuzhou, he would have been able to wipe out Shang Kexi and Kong Youde in one fell swoop.

Without these two people, Cangzhou alone has no fear of Wu Sangui, after all, Wu Sangui is better at cavalry field warfare, and Cangzhou's iron bucket-like defensive formation is mostly from the hands of Shang Kexi and Kong Youde.

But now it's useless to say anything, there is no reason for political struggle, Li Hongfei's kind of "scoundrel" has been cleaned up by a group of politicians, not to mention a mere Qi Hongying.

You must know that although Qi Hongying has won a lot of big battles, her reputation among the people is far less than that of Li Hongfei, machismo was very popular in the Ming Dynasty, and the people's right to speak is in the hands of men, who would be willing to worship a female general, although this female general has been silently protecting these people...........

Now that the two armies are united, there is no longer a need for a deputy commander-in-chief, and the removal of Qi Hongying will not have much impact.

And Zhu Youzhen has long wanted to move Qi Hongying, if nothing else, just because of the three words "Qi Family's Army".

Qi Jiguang was moved back then, and it was also because the three words "Qi Jiajun" touched the interests of those in power.

It's not just the "Qi Family Army", "Zheng Family Army" and "Li Family Army" that these are all armies that are not allowed to appear, even if it is just a banner.