Lu Xiangsheng keenly discovered that the Shandong Army has begun to develop in the direction of emphasizing the use of weapons and the coordination of arms from emphasizing individual combat capability.

And what made Lu Xiangsheng feel the most different this time was that the Shandong Army had become very attached to the personal lives of its soldiers, with each company equipped with a medical soldier and each brigade a field hospital.

When the commander of the Shandong Army was fighting, he began to reduce casualties as the first criterion, and he could use long-range to kill the enemy, and there was absolutely no need to progress in hand-to-hand combat.

And the terrifying range of the artillery and the increase in the range of Cheeto's muskets made the Mongols often flee without rushing in front of them.

The gap between the soldiers and horses of the imperial court and the soldiers and horses of Shandong has become wider and wider, and the imperial court has only begun to organize and train the new army, and such a new army has long been an outdated establishment for the Shandong army, and the weapons are also outdated equipment of the Shandong army.

And in terms of financial resources, the imperial court simply cannot be compared with the Shandong army.

What is even more incomparable is the loyalty of the soldiers, few of the civil and military generals of the imperial court are willing to die for Chongzhen, and the Shandong army can serve Zhao Yan at any time.

That's the big gap.

When the two tigers fight, one will be injured, so the temporary calm will not last long, and the court will definitely be defeated. Lu Xiangsheng thought a lot in the process of cooperating with the eastward advance of the infantry brigade of the 1st Division, and he was very conflicted in his heart.

As a minister, the word loyalty has never been abandoned.

However, the court is erosive, and it is no longer the master of the world. The Shandong Military Group, headed by Zhao Yan, is a group with a strong sense of development, and at the same time, it is also a group that thinks about the people of the world.

Strictly speaking, this is a group that fights for the nation, but it is very iron-blooded against foreigners.

Lu Xiangsheng did support the Shandong Army in his heart, but he was bound by loyalty and filial piety, and he was never able to decide which camp he wanted to stand on, and in general it was very contradictory.

According to the best outcome, it is to keep the status quo ante - constitutional!

However, judging from Chongzhen's various methods recently, Lu Xiangsheng understands that it may be difficult for the constitution to last for many years, maybe two years, maybe three years, maybe five years, and definitely not more than five years.

Chongzhen has recently been vigorously dismantling the officials and troops of various provinces, and the Xuanda soldiers and horses trained by Lu Xiangsheng are the first to learn from the establishment of the Shandong Army, so they have not been abolished.

While Chongzhen was disarmed, the Shandong Army was expanding its army and constantly sending troops and horses to various provinces. Lu Xiangsheng understood that this was Chongzhen concentrating his own forces and dispersing the strength of the Shandong army.

But what's the use?

The last time he went to Shandong to attend Zhao Yan's wedding banquet, he learned from some naval officers that the Shandong army had seized a large amount of gold and silver overseas last year.

With such financial support, coupled with the fact that Shandong now adopts the compulsory military service system, soldiers are no longer paid, and those who join the army are paid one Japanese slave, and production is not affected.

What's the use of cutting off all the officers and troops in all provinces? Moreover, the territory was taken over by the Shandong army, and with Shandong's operating ability, the financial resources will inevitably be extensive.

Even if Shandong's defense was empty, it was impossible for the imperial court to win.

Shandong's defense system Lu Xiangsheng has seen it, and the whole of Shandong is full of fortresses, and just attacking these fortresses can consume people to death. Moreover, most of the young and strong people in Shandong have participated in military training, and there are even women in the shooting range who are learning to use muskets.

Moreover, Zhao Yan can evacuate Zhaojiabao at any time, and there are many places where he can be transferred, he can hide at sea, he can hide in Liaodong, and he can hide in North Korea.

As long as Zhao Yan is still there, when the main force of the Shandong army returns, the end of the imperial court will come. If Zhao Yan is gone, the result will be even more terrible, the Shandong army is very likely to split, but there will definitely be no one to take refuge in the imperial court, but there will be a bloody Ming court.

Helping the imperial court is unlikely to succeed, and it may lead to irreversible results.

Recently, Lu Xiangsheng and Liu Heng learned in a conversation that the Shandong Army had opened the Nuergan Capital Division and began to expand to the north and west, and after the Shandong Army defeated Mongolia, it planned to re-establish the Tang Dynasty's 'Western Regions Protectorate', Lu Xiangsheng couldn't help but be in his heart, and a thought appeared in his heart, it was better to go to the Western Regions to fight against foreign races, and never participate in the battle between the emperor and Zhao Yan.

On the one hand, he is loyal to the emperor, and on the other hand, he is his ally, and he does not participate in it, but goes to conquer other races, so loyalty and righteousness can be both.

...... "The Mongols are meeting in the Hetao?" Liu Heng received the information from the west, and couldn't help but confirm again.

"Tell the chief of staff that more than 100,000 Mongolians are all in the Ordos Department of Hetao."

"Aren't they looking for death?" Liu Heng wondered, and spread out the map as he spoke, the Hetao Plain, which is an area surrounded by water on three sides and rich in water and grass.

The Yellow River originates on the Tibetan Plateau, then flows through Lanzhou and turns north, then east, then south, and then east.

Therefore, a door font has been formed, and the door font is the Hetao Plain, and the Hetao Plain in a broad sense also refers to the surrounding of the door font, and under this door is northern Shaanxi.

And the Mongols will join the alliance in Ordos, which is equivalent to assembling at the top of the gate shape.

"What if we shut down and beat the dogs?" Liu Hengyan said, Zhang Zhi shook his head and said, "We don't have so many troops. ”

"There are still two infantry brigades in Shaanxi that can be transferred." Liu Heng said. Zhang Zhi thought for a while and said: "Enough is enough, but the significance of this battle may not be too great, even if these Mongols are wiped out, their tribe will still run, and if we chase it again, it will be a beat slower." But if we don't fight this battle, the Mongols may attack us everywhere. ”

"That still makes sense." Liu Heng nodded and said, "It doesn't hurt for those tribes to let them run, we are mainly here to clear the field now, there are no Mongolian tribes allowed in this grassland, and they can run the first year of junior high school, and they can't run the fifteenth." ”

"Pass my order, the 01, 02, 03, and 04 cavalry brigades patrol along the Yellow River, destroy the river-crossing facilities, and say that they will patrol and not let anyone cross the river."

"The Infantry Brigade of the First Division, and the Xuanda Friendly Army, crossed the river from the meandering crossing, and joined the 03 and 04 Infantry Brigades of the Second Division of Shaanxi to comprehensively eliminate the turtle ...... in this urn."

The operational command issued several orders in succession, and the cavalry brigade received the order to advance quickly to the west, and on April 12, it reached the bank of the Yellow River, opposite the Hetao Plain, which was called Tumochuan in this era.

The Yellow River has thawed in April, and the water in the upper reaches of the Yellow River is relatively gentle, but the river is also wider. After the cavalry brigade reached the banks of the Yellow River, the 01, 02, 03, and 04 cavalry brigades marched along the banks of the Yellow River, leaving behind a cavalry battalion and a number of artillery pieces for each distance of the march.

And along the Yellow River, scouts were planted everywhere, keeping an eye on whether the Mongols were crossing the river, and once the Mongols were found crossing the river, they immediately notified the nearby cavalry battalion to come and stop them.

Four cavalry battalions deployed troops and horses along the Yellow River, and in just eight days, they surrounded the entire Yellow River perimeter in the Hetao area.

During this period, three bridges used by the Mongols to cross the river were destroyed.

The infantry brigade and the Xuanda soldiers and horses were heading towards the river meandering from Datong Road.

Hequ, where there is a Yellow River crossing, think of it is a place where thieves and officials and soldiers compete and focus on defense, Chongzhen six years, Hequ was captured by thieves, resulting in a large influx of thieves from northern Shaanxi into Shanxi.

After learning a lesson, the Shanxi authorities greatly strengthened the defense line of the Yellow River, resulting in Li Zicheng's failure to cross the river in the ninth year of Chongzhen, and he had to turn west.

When the Mongols who came to Ordos were still arguing about who would lead the allied forces, they suddenly found that a large number of Ming troops appeared along the Yellow River, and they were completely blocked in the encirclement of the Yellow River.

Unexpectedly, the Ming army came so quickly and suddenly returned from the Eastern Front.

However, many Mongols did not know what this meant, and their intention to meet the alliance in Hetao was also to attack the south, and they wanted to come, since the Ming army came to fight the Mongols, and now the troops were concentrated in the east, then they would go to Shaanxi to plunder.

When the Mongols saw that the Yellow River was besieged, it was unlikely that they would cross the river and return, so the warriors of the 130,000 Huimeng marched southward.

The Alliance needs a lot of food and grass.

Obviously, it is impossible for the tribes to carry it, so they naturally have to go to the Ming Kingdom to grab it, otherwise they will not be able to support it. As for the leader, the leader has not yet been elected, and after the Manchu Qing Dynasty, the Mongols have become a headless snake again.

But under the aggressive momentum of the Ming army, they still chose to unite.

Although the natural form of the Hetao area has been formed since ancient times, the naming of the area after the Hetao began in the Ming Dynasty. The appearance of the name "Hetao" is related to the migration of the Mongolian tribes under the Northern Yuan Khan in the middle of the Ming Dynasty, that is, the "Beiyu" in the Chinese translation, to the Monan region. In the fifth year of Jingtai (1454), the Northern Yuan Dynasty was also killed first, and the "Northern Captives" went south one after another. The Northern Yuan Taishi came to Jingtai in the seventh year and led the department into the set. After that, Polai and Luo went out of the Hetao and repeatedly committed Mingbian. In the first year of Chenghua (1465), there were Maoli children in the set. Since the sixth year of Chenghua (1470), Gathlan, Polohu and Mandulu have also entered and exited the river loop, frozen into the loop, and out of the loop before the river ice melts. Six years after Chenghua, the "Beiyu" lived in the Hetao for a long time, and the Ming tried to prevent it from living in the Hetao.

"Search set" and "discussion and re-set" became one of the topics of the Ming court, and the name of the Hetao was seen in the annals of history. In the second year of Tomorrow Shun (1458), there was a "saying that more than 2,000 of his subordinates were still living in the Yellow River Loop", and this "Yellow River Loop" refers to the Hetao area. By the sixth year of Chenghua (1470), the name "Hetao" appeared in the report of the governor of Ningxia in the Ming Dynasty (this title may have been earlier among the people). The article said: "The close chieftain Ah Luo led the crowd to sneak into the Hetao, moving tens of thousands. Shooting and hunting for a living, water and grass as a residence, no worries about enemies, and the benefits of stealing. ”

The Mongol tribes settled in the Hetao, which put great pressure on the border defense of the Ming Dynasty, and the Mongol tribes often used the Hetao as a base to invade the interior.

The northern Shaanxi border army took advantage of the Mongol campaign to go to the north to 'search for a set'.

At the beginning of the 16th century, Dayan Khan unified the Mongols, and the Hetao was given to the Ordos Ministry, and the Mongols occupied the region for a long time.

In the twenty-fifth year of the reign of Emperor Shizong of the Ming Dynasty, the Ming court launched a long-term debate on the re-set, and the representative official Zeng Miao, who advocated the re-set, was arrested, and Xia Yan was dismissed from office and killed, and the discussion of the re-set ended.

With the military decay of the Ming court and the improvement of the border walls, the conflicts between the two sides began to decrease.

This time, Mongolia was menacing, and 130,000 people were killing Shaanxi. As a result, they collided headlong with the 03 and 04 infantry brigades that had just arrived in Shaanxi.

Suddenly the sound of guns and cannons on the border was endless, and the Mongols tried to storm the Great Wall, but they chose an easier gap, but as soon as the Mongols began to charge, they were heavily bombarded by artillery.

The Great Wall in northern Shaanxi was repaired very well, and the Mongols crashed down, under the defense of the 03 and 04 infantry brigades, there was nowhere to go down, and they could not find the gap to break into the interior.

The Mongols wandered in the north of Yulin for three days, and the 03 and 04 infantry brigades relied on the Great Wall, although their forces were scattered along the long border, but they repelled the Mongols again and again.

When the governor of Yantuo heard that the Mongols were attacking, he hurriedly summoned the people of northern Shaanxi and went to cooperate with the 03 and 04 infantry brigades to defend.

After the people of northern Shaanxi arrived in the Yulin area, the defensive pressure of the 03 and 04 infantry brigades was greatly reduced, because these people began to repair the gaps in the border walls, which allowed the two infantry brigades to withdraw their hands in those places.

As soon as these Mongols went south, their hometown was quickly copied by Qin Zhiyuan, and he detected that the Mongols in the Hetao area were empty, so he directly erected a pontoon bridge to cross the Yellow River and began to search for the set.

The search went smoothly, and there were some old and weak women and children in the Ordos Department left in the northern part of the Hetao, as well as some cattle and sheep. Qin Zhiyuan led the 03 Cavalry Brigade to jump the chickens, flies and dogs in the Ordos Department, and within two days, he grabbed all the cattle, sheep and horses, cut down all the men who were higher than the wheels, and then crossed the Yellow River quickly.

When they retreated, the Ordos Department no longer existed. When the Ordos Ministry received the news, Qin Zhiyuan had already crossed the river.

The Mongols, who were pondering how to enter the pass in the south, heard that the rear had been attacked, and the front could not enter, and they were a little confused for a while, and many Mongolian tribes finally realized that they had entered the encirclement of the Ming army.

And the river meandering ferry is busy at the moment.

The sappers quickly erected the pontoon bridge at the meander, and it took a full day to build the pontoon bridge, and then the infantry brigades that reached the meandering part of the river quickly passed through the pontoon bridge and entered the Hetao area.

The combat headquarters also came to the meander, Lu Xiangsheng looked at the boiling Yellow River in front of him, and said with a smile: "Now that most of Mongolia is surrounded in the Hetao, we can win the battle in one battle." ”

"The encirclement is not tight yet, and the gap must be plugged in time." Liu Heng said.

"Where's the sparseness? The officer led his troops to block it. Lu Xiangsheng volunteered, he knew that with the strength of Xuanda's soldiers and horses, his performance in the field battle with the Mongols was far less free than that of the Shandong army, so it was better to lead the troops to plug the mouth.

After discussion, the final combat command asked Lu Xiangsheng to lead his troops to defend the Yulin line, and the 03 and 04 infantry brigades of the second division also defended on this line.

The gate-shaped area surrounded by water on three sides is surrounded by four cavalry brigades relying on the natural danger of the Yellow River, although there are several places in the Hetao area that are easy to get out and enter, but there are only a few, and it is very simple for four cavalry brigades to surround these three sides.

Below the door shape is the Yulin defense line, Lu Xiangsheng's 50,000 Xuanda soldiers and horses, plus the 03 and 04 infantry brigades of the second division of the Shandong Army, are even more blocked.

The door was quickly shut.

The five infantry brigades of the 1st Division, which had crossed the meandering crossing, were not in a hurry to go to the Mongols and rested for five days north of Yulin.

In the past five days, all the units responsible for the containment were in place, and the Mongols were trapped in a square, and it was almost impossible to get out.

Here's the process of clearing it slowly.

The 1st Division, which had rested for five days, quickly pulled out of camp and set out. Unhurriedly, they bit the main force of the Mongols, anyway, the Mongols couldn't run, and the food they carried couldn't last a few days.

What if there is no food?

Only to kill the horse.

What if you don't have horses?

I can only fight on foot.

Therefore, the operational command was not in a hurry, everything was steady and steady, and the Mongols were not given a chance to exploit the loopholes.

The Mongols, who had been completely surrounded and attacked in the rear, realized that it was too late at this moment, and they retreated to the original site of the Ordos Department, but there was nothing left.

What tents, all burned.

The cattle and sheep were also robbed, and the tribesmen of the Ordos tribe were also killed and captured, and they could not find any supplies, so they could only hunt some yellow sheep in the field.

But can this support an army of 130,000?

130,000 people, a day's food and drink is a terrifying number, some tribesmen's warriors have begun to kill horses, but killing horses is just drinking to quench thirst.

After deliberation, the leaders of the various tribes felt that they should surrender to the Ming army first, and then negotiate terms. If they don't agree, they fight quickly and finally fight together.

Soon, the Mongol envoys entered the barracks of the Shandong army.

The envoy of the Mongols proposed that the Mongol tribes were willing to serve General Jianwei as the Khan of Heaven, and that they would submit to the feet of the Celestial Empire for generations to never rebel.

The Mongols are going to surrender?

Of course not, they are conditional, and the condition is to let them out of the loop, which is of course impossible.

Liu Heng immediately put the matter aside on the grounds that he wanted to ask General Jianwei, and at the same time stopped the march and sent people back to Shandong to report.

They could afford to drag it, but the Mongols couldn't.

However, the Mongols really had a little intention of surrendering, after all, the sudden rise of the Ming Dynasty and the aggressive troops entered Mongolia, which made the Mongols very uneasy.

They did not dare to offend the Ming Dynasty easily, and their clansmen who fled back from the battlefield were terrified of the combat power displayed by the Shandong army on the battlefield in Liaodong.

But many Mongolian tribes feel that the sky is high and the emperor is far away, and they can't beat it and can't run? As long as they get out of the Hetao, they can turn their faces immediately, but to their disappointment, the Ming army did not refuse or agree.

The war correspondent sent the war report back.

Soon an article appeared in the "Daming Bao" that "the Mongolian army of 100,000 troops was besieged by the Hetao and was about to be destroyed." With the start of the war against Mongolia, the military page of the "Daming Bao" sent back operational information from the front every day.

Everyone in the Ming Dynasty knows that the Shandong army swept all the way in eastern Mongolia, annihilating and capturing 310,000 Mongols, which greatly damaged the vitality of Mongolia.

And this time Mongolia is directly surrounded in the Hetao, which is even more exciting news.

(To be continued)