New Book Collection: The Rise of Great Powers 1900

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It was three days after I woke up.

Yang Chao found himself lying on a boat, next to anxious generals, Li Wuliu, Zhao Kang and many other men and others were there.

"How's it going?"

The subordinate gave a brief report.

Zheng Chenggong has fled back to Fujian. Li Dingguo had returned to Hunan from Wuchang and fought fiercely with Sun Kewang in the vicinity of Yuanzhou and Jingzhou. Kui Dong's army was pursued by Li Guohan and routed all the way, and had been driven back to Bazhou, and the Qing army and Hong Chengchou had a round. Wu Sangui has already occupied Kunming.

The situation of Yang Chao's army is also very not optimistic, Azig led 400,000 eight banners to surround Kaifeng Mansion, Wang Pu is desperately returning to help, and the two sides are facing each other in Kaifeng. Li Wuliu's army was still in Tianjin, but it was persecuted by 300,000 Qing troops.

"Let's go back to the army, the Qing army doesn't want to start a war in Tianjinwei. There is no need for our army to make senseless sacrifices. The tide is over. ”

Yang Chao sighed, the three-way army of the Northern Expedition, as a result of the two-way retreat, this is really too big a blow to him, he naively thought that he could shorten the preparation time of the Northern Expedition by forming an alliance, in the end he still had to rely on himself, could the Chinese really learn not to cooperate?

"It's all Sun Kewang's thief, he deserves to die, and he will return to the army to destroy Sun Kewang!"

Yang Chao felt angry in his heart, and felt that he had a splitting headache, and it took a long time for his breath to calm down.

"The situation in Jiangnan is not optimistic, is it?"

Yang Chao didn't seem to have heard his subordinates talk about the situation in Jiangnan, and after asking, he saw a few subordinates looking at each other.

"Say, Lao Tzu can't die yet."

Many men said: "Hong Chengchou borrowed Sun Kewang to cross the river, except for Wuchang and Changsha in Hunan. It's all gone. Hong Chengchou and Sun Kewang are attacking Li Dingguo. ”

Yang Chao sighed: "Once back to before liberation." Many men listened to orders. Immediately in the Hutuo River area, from Zhending to Qingxian line is our army's defense line. After you have been properly armed, the Tianjin army retreated alternately. Kaifeng must not be lost, after Zhao Kangbu covered the retreat of the army, he immediately went to support Kaifeng. ”

Things have developed to the present, and there is no point in holding on to the Qing army, and sometimes the war is a kind of momentum. If several armies can work together with one heart and one mind, the Qing court is afraid that it will have perished, but it is a pity that the hearts of the people are separated from the belly, and Yang Chao still underestimated Sun Kewang's wolf ambitions.

Therefore, we can only retreat, but we can't let the retreat turn into a rout, and there is still a chance to regain our strength if we preserve it.

Sun Kewang, the initiator of everything, was actually worried in his heart, although he returned to Guizhou, but Li Dingguo returned thousands of miles to help, almost catching him off guard. Fortunately, Hong Chengchou crossed the river in time to help him stabilize the situation, but at this time, Hong Chengchou decided not to mention the matter of the three provinces.

Sun Kewang didn't dare to ask Hong Chengchou for it. After all, the current war situation in Hunan still depends on Hong Chengchou, Hong Chengchou's 30,000 green battalions in his hands are even better than his 100,000 army, and when facing Li Dingguo, this Qing army has now become the main force.

In fact, Sun Kewang's 100,000 old subordinates have no combat effectiveness, but they have no heart, and they don't know what they are fighting for, when they first came out of Yunnan the year before last, everyone was holding back a lot of strength in their hearts, and they all knew that they were going to go on a northern expedition, but suddenly several kings themselves were infighting, Sun Kewang beat Li Dingguo, Li Dingguo beat Sun Kewang, and these soldiers who fought had no heart in their hearts.

Especially Li Dingguo has always been very prestigious, charging forward when fighting, and can share weal and woe with the soldiers, such a general is naturally full of personality charm, very revered by the soldiers, even if it is Sun Kewang's soldiers, they also worship Li Dingguo in their hearts, so when they face Li Dingguo, they have a deep idea in their hearts that they don't want to fight, and it is difficult to win under this mood.

But Li Dingguo was not comfortable, he sent 100,000 troops, and lost more than 10,000 in the process of the Northern Expedition, but on the way to withdraw the troops, he lost 30,000 people, and when he arrived in Hunan, he was left to write more than 50,000, but the road into Yunnan was blocked by Sun Kewang, and he did not hesitate to kill and die Sun Kewang, and naturally suffered heavy losses, especially many old brothers who had followed him for more than ten years were sacrificed, which made Li Dingguo seriously injured both emotionally and in strength, and the army was full of a kind of pathos.

Later, after being attacked by Hong Chengchou, it was really difficult to hold on, and he could only be forced to move to Guangxi. When they arrived at the border of Guangxi, there were only more than 20,000 people left, and they lost their armor one by one, which was even more miserable than when they were chased by the Ming army in Zhang Xianzhong's army.

Especially the future is uncertain, I don't know if I can enter Guangxi, if Yang Chao keeps them out of Guangxi, Li Dingguo can only wait for death, and can only watch Hong Chengchou catch up and eat him.

When he saw Song Kun in Guangxi, prepared hot soup and hot rice, clean clothes, and opened the city gate to welcome them, Li Dingguo's eyes were a little hot, he had never regarded Yang Chao as a loyal minister, but at this moment he seemed to be able to be thousands of miles away, and he felt each other with another sincere heart, Yang Chao is not a loyal minister, but Yang Chao is a righteous man!

Li Dingguo strongly supported the army to bring the army into Guangxi, and stopped in the border town of Yongzhou, the soldiers had long been overdrawn, not only the body was tired, the most tired was the heart, not only the soldiers were tired, Li Dingguo was even more tired.

The little emperor Zhu Cihuan, who has entered Myanmar, is relieved, it seems that it is no longer appropriate to call him the little emperor, because he is nearly twenty years old this year, and he has suffered so many setbacks, whether it is his mind or ability, it is a pity that he is still missing one thing, his ancestors Zhu Yuanzhang and Zhu Di, who dared to kill people with knives.

Even under Sun Kewang, Zhu Cihuan still has a large number of loyal courtiers, and his prestige among the people is also there.

But it's a pity that there is no Son of Heaven immediately after Ming Wuzong, the Ming Wuzong who likes to fight, was later scolded by Wenchen and used as a negative teaching material to educate the later emperor.

Without courage, Zhu Cihuan was already panicked when he heard that Wu Sangui was attacking Chishui, and then Sun Kewang came back in the name of rescue, but instead surrendered the defenders of Guizhou, allowing Wu Sangui to advance lightly and drive directly to Kunming.

The emperor was flustered, and the ministers were also flustered, some said that they should go to Guangxi, but some ministers said that Guangxi was in the hands of Yang Chao, and Yang Chao had already had the heart of not being subordinate, and going to Guangxi was to surrender to the tiger.

Then some said that they went to Sichuan to defect to Wen Anzhi, but Wu Sangui fought from Sichuan to Guizhou and then to Yunnan, and no one knew the situation in Sichuan and did not dare to act rashly.

At this time, Ma Jixiang said that he would go to Myanmar, when he was in Guangxi, Kong Youde chased them, and the officials had discussed going to Vietnam, but they did not make up their minds at that time, and it seemed that there was only one way at this time.

Without waiting for them to discuss a clear plan, Wu Sangui's troops had already arrived in Yunnan Mansion, but the imperial court panicked and did not have any plan, so they pulled up people and ran to the southwest, and tens of thousands of Kunming defenders also ran with the emperor, trampling on each other along the way, and they had already suffered heavy losses without encountering Wu Sangui.

Finally with thousands of people and their families to Burma, the Burmese asked them to lay down their arms in order to enter the customs, the courtiers thought that the other party's concerns were reasonable, so they put down their weapons, but at this time the Burmese still felt that they had too many people, especially the Wenchen who dragged their families with their mouths, the Burmese felt that they were useless, so they placed these Wenchen and their families separately in the people's homes on the road, and served these people as slaves, many Wenchen could not stand this humiliation, could not bear the humiliation of their wives and daughters by the Burmese, and committed suicide.

Despite this, there were still about 3,000 people who were escorted to Donghu in Burma, at this time the king of Burma sent people to send food, sent all kinds of supplies, and the attitude was quite friendly, at this time the frightened Zhu Cihuan breathed a sigh of relief.

And Wu Sangui, who scared Zhu Cihuan to Burma, sat comfortably in the city of Kunming, the Ji palace built by Sun Kewang in the past, and later in the palace of Emperor Longwu, he only had 10,000 people, not to mention the pursuit of Longwu, even the occupation of Yunnan was enough.

He was very happy, he didn't expect Emperor Longwu to run away, otherwise relying on the city of Kunming, tens of thousands of defenders, Wu Sangui's long-distance surprise attack, no logistics, no reinforcements, almost no chance of winning, but the emperor's order was so expensive that he didn't dare to take the risk himself, and his ministers would not let the emperor take risks, so the emperor ran away.

Yang Chao has arrived in Huai'an, his body has recovered a little, he is in a hurry, the hope of revenge is too great, and the greater the disappointment, the prince who used to fight with the Qing army in the Northern Expedition, no matter whether he wins or loses, he has never been like this, but this time he saw that success was in sight, but he suddenly fell short.

Yang Chao felt that he was still young, and the city government was not enough, just like Wu Zixu, who had just fled, and could not pass the pass to be in a hurry.

Although the cultivation of the city government is not thick enough, but the IQ is still there, Yang Chao has long clearly recognized the form in front of him, and knows that he can't do anything, so he can only use his best efforts to correct his mistakes and make up for it with his greatest efforts.

Henan doesn't have to think about it, even Huguang has been lost, Yang Chao can only let Song Kun hold on to Guangxi, and let Lu Mo stick to Changsha and Wuchang Mansion, especially Wuchang Mansion, the hub that links Jingxiang Hanshui, if it is a last resort, Changsha can give up, but Wuchang must not give up.

The fleet had to pass through the locks at Qingjiangpo.

A lot of the material is even unloaded and turned overland, and then the ship passes lightly through the sluice and goes to the other side to be loaded.

Yang Chao saw the artillery wagons experiencing the smoke of gunpowder, pulling heavy cannons and plowing deep ruts under the pull of the horses with their heads bowed and hard.

A recent heavy rain had made the ground very muddy, and soon the gun carriage was stuck in the mud, and the clever soldiers found targets and laid them in the rutted places, and the wheels were finally able to move normally on the planks.

Two long planks look forward from under the wheels, forming two wood-made roads, winding and twisting, giving the feeling of not knowing where it leads! (To be continued......)