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In the early morning of 30 July, the Expeditionary Force's front-line command made a decision to retreat to Liaodong for rest.

This decision was made based on the latest situation on the battlefield of the Eastern Crusade. The latest situation on the battlefield of the Eastern Expedition was that the expeditionary force was defeated at Sashui, with more than half of its strength lost, and it had lost the strength to fight again, and was no longer able to hold on to Yalushui, nor was it able to occupy and consolidate all the territory south of Yalushui.

The "two-step" strategy proposed by the military is based on the fact that the expeditionary force's attack this year stops at Yalushui, or the expeditionary force can safely withdraw to Yalushui after attacking Pyongyang from a distance. Later, the edict issued by the Holy Lord and the Central Council on the 25th of this month, although it asked the expeditionary force to implement the "two-step" strategy, did not know that the expeditionary force had been defeated at Sashui on the 24th, and had lost the basis for implementing the "two-step" strategy, so this edict was actually unenforceable before it was issued.

The debate in the High Command is about whether the "two-step" strategy is still possible to implement under the current Eastern Crusade shape.

Some military commanders, with Yu Zhongwen as the commander-in-chief, not only directly "vetoed" the "two-step" strategy, but also directly vetoed the possibility of continuing the crusade to the east.

The Eastern Crusade was no longer sustainable, for the simple reason that the crushing defeat of Pyongyang and Sasu led to the destruction of 200,000 government soldiers, which was not only the most painful defeat since the reunification of China and Turkey, but also dealt a heavy blow to the 12 Wei Prefectures.

How many people are in the Twelve Guards? Millions of soldiers, including more than 100,000 garrisons in the two capitals, there are also 100,000 garrisons in important towns and passes in the country, 190 counties in Middle-earth have about 200,000 garrisons in addition to the border counties, and about 100,000 sailors, and the rest are all frontier garrisons, with more than 500,000 people, of which the Northwest Army is the largest, about 200,000 or more, and the northern Xinjiang including Daibei, Youyan, Liaoxi and Liaodong has less than 200,000 garrisons, while the southwest has the least number of garrisons, about 100,000.

In this Eastern Expedition, the troops transferred mainly came from the Eastern Capital Garrison Army, the Northern Xinjiang Town Garrison Army, the garrison forces of dozens of counties and counties in Shandong, part of the Jiangzuo Garrison Army, and the Naval Division, with a total number of about 400,000 or more, that is to say, all the government soldiers who could be recruited and transferred to the battlefield of the Eastern Expedition were transferred, and it can be said that the Twelve Guards did their best.

When the eastern expedition was out, it was divided into two roads, left and right, twelve armies on each road, and met at Liaoshui, but the army that crossed Liaoshui and besieged Liaodong City was only about 100,000 people. The reason why only more than 100,000 people crossed the Liaoshui is related to the earliest eastward crusade strategy of the center. This time to fight Goguryeo, with a knife to kill chickens to show the monkey, in fact, to show off the strength of Middle-earth, in order to achieve the purpose of deterring the northern captives, so of course to diplomacy as the mainstay, supplemented by war means, with the minimum cost in exchange for the greatest benefits, in this way, with 100,000 people to cross the Liaoshui to force Goguryeo to surrender is enough, and the rest of the army plays a role of showing off and deterrence, if more than 400,000 troops cross the Liaoshui to fight, the consumption of manpower, material and financial resources will be too great, pure waste.

Originally, as long as the Goguryeo people surrendered, gave up their dream of dominating the Far East, and honestly became vassals of Middle-earth, the Eastern Crusade would be over, but since the Holy Lord ascended the throne, whether it was through the Western Regions or the Western Expedition to Tuyuhun, it eventually evolved into a frontier expansion, and those monarchs of the dead countries such as Yiwu Tutunshe, Gaochang King Qu Boya, and the Western Turkic Luo Khan have all become the "prisoners" of the Emperor of Middle-earth. With such a bloody lesson from the past, how dare Goguryeo King Gao Yuan repeat the mistakes of the past? He will never surrender until he is exhausted and cornered. Just like Murong Fuyun, the Busabo Khan of Tuyuhun, he refused to surrender and fled into the Great Snow Mountain with the remnants, waiting for the opportunity to restore the country.

On the one hand, Gao Yuan refused to surrender, and on the other hand, he deceived the Holy Lord again and again under the guise of surrender, and played with the Holy Lord in the palm of his hand, which the Holy Lord did not expect, and as a result, he had to change his strategy, so the army left west of Liaoshui all marched eastward, and began to leap thousands of miles to attack Pyongyang with more than 300,000 horses. In other words, since June 11, more than 400,000 troops from China have all entered the territory of Goguryeo to fight, and the consumption of manpower, material and financial resources has reached an unprecedented scale.

Now, let's not talk about whether material and financial resources will continue to support the war, but only about manpower.

There are still more than 200,000 troops left on the battlefield of the Eastern Expedition, among which the Praetorian Guard has already protected the Holy Lord and the center to return to the Eastern Capital, and the naval division has also lost its combat effectiveness and will definitely return to Dongnae, and the 130,000 expeditionary soldiers who have just returned from Pyongyang are physically and mentally exhausted, and the result can be imagined to attack the fortified city of the Goguryeo people with such a demoralized army. As for the tens of thousands of troops besieging Liaodong City, they have been fighting continuously for almost five months, exhausted, and they are also in urgent need of rest.

Under such circumstances, if the Expeditionary Force Command forcibly implements the "two-step" strategy, it is not impossible, and it will stick to the Yalu Water at any cost and attack the fortified positions at any cost, but after paying the price of tens of thousands of horses, will it be able to complete this important task?

If this important task cannot be completed, and tens of thousands of soldiers are killed on the battlefield of the Eastern Expedition, and the expeditionary force is defeated, it will bring an extremely strict problem, what should be done with the northern Xinjiang town? What about the garrisons of dozens of counties in Shandong?

Now the relations between the north and the south are tense, and the northern captives on the desert are eyeing the middle earth, and once the northern Xinjiang garrison force is severely weakened because of the fiasco of the Eastern Expedition, not only will the security of the northern Xinjiang be lost, but there will also be a danger of breaking out into the civil war. Similarly, the current domestic situation is not good, especially in Shandong, the north and south of the river rebels are repeated, which is of course due to natural disasters, but more importantly, almost all of the Shandong garrison army has been transferred to the battlefield of the Eastern Expedition, and the local government and the Yingyang Mansion are simply unable to suppress the thieves, if the Eastern Expedition fails miserably, and there are few troops who eventually return to Shandong, then it is conceivable that the chaos in the north and south of the Great River will become more and more intense, and the scale of the rebellion will become larger and larger.

Of course, it is possible that the expeditionary force will be lucky enough to complete this important task, but after paying such a heavy price, what will happen to the crusade next year?

The number of soldiers in the Middle Kingdom is limited, more than 200,000 people died in the first war, it will take more than ten or twenty years to replenish it, and it will take a generation to grow up, so in the short term, the total strength of the twelve Weifu will inevitably be short, and the Weifu will inevitably be overstretched in terms of troop deployment, and there is basically no way to transfer more troops to the battlefield of the Eastern Expedition, so that although the remaining 100,000 troops on the battlefield of the Eastern Expedition can consolidate the occupied area, it will be too difficult to capture Pyongyang. At the same time, don't forget jì, where will the Zhenshu army in Northern Xinjiang, especially Youyan and the front line of Liaoxi, be replenished? Do you want a garrison in Shandong? Is it only concerned about the Eastern Crusade, ignoring the security of northern Xinjiang and the stability of Shandong? Isn't this a matter of ignoring the end and losing sight of one or the other?

Yu Zhongwen and some other commanders analyzed purely from the military perspective of focusing on troops, and came to the conclusion that now that even the Eastern Crusade could not be continued, where was it still necessary to implement the "two-step" strategy?

However, some commanders such as Yu Wenshu, the general of Zuo Yiwei, Liu Shilong, the right of Shangshu, and Wei Wensheng, the general of the right Houwei, insisted on implementing the "two-step" strategy and resolutely obeyed the decision of the Holy Lord and the Central Committee to continue the crusade to the east.

Wei Wensheng's right candidate for the general Wei is temporary, before this he was one of the important ministers of the Criminal Department, and the reason why the Holy Lord temporarily took out his Shangshu of the Criminal Department and let him participate in the long-range attack on Pyongyang as the commander of the military, on the one hand, is to ensure that the expeditionary force can follow the orders of the Holy Lord and the center, and ensure that the decision-making of the headquarters is completely controlled, but the combined strength of Yuwenshu and Liu Shilong is still a little weaker, so he put Wei Wensheng, who is a major minister of the center, in. But on the other hand, if Wei Wensheng is allowed to directly enter the decision-making level of the Command Department as the secretary of the Criminal Department and the leader of the right waiting for the general Wei, it will be difficult to arrange, there are already Yu Wenshu and Liu Shilong, plus one Wei Wensheng, Yu Zhongwen will be completely hollowed out, purely for decoration, Yu Zhongwen is definitely not there, and other commanders also have opinions, so the Holy Lord "flexible" a little, let Wei Wensheng go down as a military commander, and join forces with Yu Wenshu and Liu Shilong to suppress Yu Zhongwen.

This arrangement of the Holy Lord still played a role, especially after Yuwenshu and Liu Shilong suffered heavy setbacks and their authority was greatly reduced, and Wei Wensheng made great achievements in seizing Yalu Water at a critical moment, Wei Wensheng's voice in the commanders of the armies greatly increased. But Wei Wensheng is not from the army after all, and his reputation in the military is very limited. Wei Wensheng has served as a local governor for a long time, responsible for local military and political affairs, although he also has the experience of leading troops to fight, but compared with Yu Zhongwen, Li Jing, Zhao Xiaocai, these famous generals in China, the disparity in combat results is too great, the reason why he was able to enter the center, on the one hand, is that he has outstanding political achievements and a good official reputation, on the other hand, because he supports reform and resolutely implements the reform policy of the central government when he is a local official, which is the most crucial.

Therefore, although Wei Wensheng's voice is greater, in the military and in the military, he cannot compete with Yu Zhongwen, even if he has a special status, he will still return to the central officer after the end of the Eastern Crusade to resume his post, but at this critical moment, he also has to submit to Yu Zhongwen.

Yu Zhongwen said cruel words, first cut and then play, first withdraw the army to Liaodong, and then report to the Holy Lord, all the consequences and all the responsibilities arising from this will be borne by me alone.

As soon as these words came out, all the commanders, whether they were for Yu Zhongwen or against him, closed their mouths.

Yu Zhongwen is a broken jar, anyway, he was originally the "scapegoat" arranged by the Holy Lord and the center, Sashui was defeated, the Eastern Crusade failed, and all the military responsibility for the Eastern Crusade was borne by him, the supreme commander of the expeditionary force, in this case, what is the difference between bearing one responsibility and bearing more responsibility? And of all the sins, which one is more than the guilt of the defeat of the Eastern Crusade? Since the biggest culpability has been shouldered, it doesn't matter how many other smaller culpas there are.

Yu Zhongwen's purpose now is very simple, do his best to bring back the 130,000 surviving soldiers safely, so that even if he dies and loses his head, he can talk about masturbation, otherwise he will not be able to look at it so far, and he will not be able to see the "Jiangdong fathers" without shame.

On the morning of 30 July, the expeditionary force began to evacuate across the river one after another.

Gao Yuan and Eozhi Wende did not take advantage of the situation to attack, but went all out to plan how to recover the territory south of Yalu Water and how to drive Middle-earth out of the country.

In their view, after the defeat of the Chinese attack on Pyongyang, they must change their strategy, and the most realistic strategy is to stick to the Yalu River line, occupy and consolidate the area west of the Yalu River, and then rest for a winter, and then attack Pyongyang again in the spring of the next year. Therefore, the means of war cannot save Goguryeo, and it is necessary to use diplomatic means to win the space and time for survival, and the most realistic strategy is to exchange land for peace.

However, contrary to the expectations of the Goguryeo people, after crossing the Yalu River, the Middle-earth people retreated in great strides, and it seems that they did not have the intention of holding the Yalu River line and occupying the area west of the Yalu River.

What did the people of Middle-earth intend to? Was he really beaten and defeated? Gao Yuan and Yizhi Wende repeatedly analyzed and deduced, but in the end they did not dare to cross the river, but Chen Bing Yalu water, quietly watching the changes, and responding to the inconvenience.