With the guarantee of extermination, Sun Chuanting, the governor of the five provinces, finally saw the hope of exterminating the Liukou, and the operational deployment of four positive and six corners and ambushes on ten sides has been spread to all places, and the next thing is to see how Sun Chuanting deploys.

During the autumn harvest season, Sun Chuanting locked himself in the house for half a month, he has been thinking and deciding how to exterminate Li Zicheng and Zhang Xianzhong, Li Zicheng and Zhang Xianzhong's Liukou, known as hundreds of thousands of people, from the information that Sun Chuanting has mastered, the strength of the two Liukou is more than 100,000 people, and after a long period of fighting, the combat effectiveness of the Liukou has also been improved to a certain extent, and the imperial army wants to exterminate the two Liukou at the same time at one time, obviously there is a great difficulty, The best operational arrangement is to break through each one, use the main force to destroy one of the rogue bandits, and use the army of various places to defend the other way of the rogue bandits, so as to prevent the union of Li Zicheng and Zhang Xianzhong.

After careful consideration, Sun Chuanting thought that he should deal with Zhang Xianzhong first, because Zhang Xianzhong's strength was relatively weak, and Liu Wenxiu, Li Dingguo and Ai Nengqi under Zhang Xianzhong's command fought bravely, and these people had the ability to take charge of themselves.

Zhang Xianzhong was entrenched in Xiangyang and Yunyang in Huguang, and began to infiltrate into Sichuan, Sichuan's terrain is extremely complex, many places are easy to defend and difficult to attack, if Zhang Xianzhong completely opened the road to Sichuan, then the future battle will become more difficult.

Sun Chuanting's army is stationed in the area of Wuchang Mansion, not very far from Xiangyang, according to the operational deployment of the four positive and six corners, requiring Sichuan, Shaanxi, Henan and other places to cooperate in the operation, it can completely block all Zhang Xianzhong's escape routes, of course, Sun Chuanting is most worried about the union, that is, the union of Zhang Xianzhong and Li Zicheng.

In general. It is impossible for Zhang Xianzhong and Li Zicheng to unite, both of them have been the leaders of the rogue for many years, and they are not convinced, and the union will form a situation where one mountain cannot tolerate two tigers, so Sun Chuanting can rest assured and boldly supply Zhang Xianzhong, but there is also a condition in this. That is, it is necessary to attack Zhang Xianzhong alone with the main force, and stop Li Zicheng with other forces, maybe Li Zicheng would like such a situation to appear.

At the end of June, Sun Chuanting's operational thinking was basically formed.

What Sun Chuanting didn't expect was that his combat ideas first encountered opposition from the prison army Wang Yongji.

The emperor ordered to levy and exclude salaries to ensure that the imperial army exterminated the grain and grass of the Liukou, which was to completely exterminate the Liukou in the shortest possible time, and the emperor made it clear in the holy decree that the people of the Ming Dynasty would endure it for a year. This shows that the emperor is already very bitter about the situation of the rogue robbery, and does not hesitate to increase the burden of the people, and uses the strength of the whole country to exterminate the rogue bandits.

Sun Chuanting argued on the basis of reason, and even had contradictions and opinions with Wang Yongji.

Neither Sun Chuanting nor Wang Yongji could convince anyone. In desperation, Sun Chuanting's combat ideas were reported to the imperial court.

Yang Sichang, a cabinet minister and secretary of the Ministry of War, carefully looked at Sun Chuanting's operational arrangements. After all, there are only less than 100,000 troops under Sun Chuanting's command, and they are also the main force to exterminate the Liukou, and the rest of the provinces are only assisting in the battle, and they still have to rely on the army under Sun Chuanting's command at the critical moment.

But Yang Sichang did not dare to express his approval. Because he knew the emperor's thoughts, the emperor was already very dissatisfied with the situation in Nanzhili, and eagerly hoped to eliminate the Liukou in the shortest possible time and let the north completely stabilize after freeing up his hands to solve the affairs of Nanzhili. According to Sun Chuanting's combat ideas, it would take at least a year to exterminate the Liukou.

When the cabinet discussed Sun Chuanting's battle plan, Yang Sichang did not make a clear statement.

Zhou Yanru and Zhang Fengyi both clearly expressed their opposition to such a combat arrangement.

Zhang Fengyi used to be the secretary of the Ministry of War, he believes that such an operational arrangement, has not been able to reflect the real role of the strategic deployment of the four positive six corners and ten ambushes, let alone the great significance of the imperial court's collection and extermination, and the tactical thinking of exterminating the rogue in the past, although it must be very difficult to exterminate Li Zicheng and Zhang Xianzhong at the same time, but according to the arrangement of the four positive and six corners, it is still possible to attack from two directions, and the operation to exterminate the rogue is mainly to first exterminate and focus on attacking Zhang Xianzhong, In order to weaken Li Zicheng's strength, such a two-way blow can receive the best effect.

The cabinet quickly formed an opinion and presented it to the emperor.

In the final analysis, the cabinet still basically supported the battle plan drawn up by Sun Chuanting, but it only changed the arrangement for besieging Li Zicheng, and demanded that Henan, Shaanxi, Shanxi, and other places must transfer troops, and at the same time besiege Li Zicheng, they should launch a timely attack, so that Li Zicheng would be in a state of high tension and would have no time to take care of himself.

The deep-seated meaning of the cabinet is to prevent the union of Li Zicheng and Zhang Xianzhong, and the difficulty of exterminating the rogues will increase exponentially.

It's a pity that this opinion of the cabinet was ruthlessly reprimanded by the emperor.

Forbidden City, Qianqing Palace.

The emperor's face was pale, and he held the cabinet vote in his hand, and spoke unceremoniously to the cabinet group.

"I agreed to levy and expropriate the salaries, exhaust the financial resources of my Ming Dynasty, that is, I want to completely exterminate the Liukou, my people of the Ming Dynasty, always look forward to the situation can be stable, I do not hesitate to spend the people's power to ensure the supply of food and grass to exterminate the Liukou, but in exchange for such a situation, is the imperial army afraid of the Liukou, I have long said that there are still many people among the Liukou, but desperate farmers, as long as they can be appeased well, they will definitely leave the ranks of the Liukou, return to their hometown to farm......"

The emperor talked eloquently, but he didn't lose his temper.

Zhou Yanru and the others looked at each other, and they couldn't imagine that the battle plan they had painstakingly revised was actually questioned and opposed by the emperor, such a situation is too rare, if it were not for the fact that the Liukou has become a major problem for the imperial court, if it were not for the delicate situation of the Ming Dynasty, it would be impossible for the cabinet to participate in the battle plan to exterminate the Liukou, this is a matter of the Ministry of War, and there is no need for the cabinet to discuss, let alone the emperor to decide.

At the same time, it is indeed very difficult to launch a large-scale encirclement and suppression of Li Zicheng and Zhang Xianzhong, not to mention that Sun Chuanting is a little powerless, even if the cabinet and the military department coordinate as a whole, they may not be able to achieve the goal, and the encirclement and suppression of Li Zicheng and Zhang Xianzhong at the same time is very likely to allow the two to join forces to fight, so that the strength of the rogue will be greatly improved.

As for the emperor's statement that most of the rogues are poor people, this is true, but since they have thrown themselves into the rogues, they are no longer poor people, and the rogues have rebelled for more than ten years, and the imperial court has adopted countless surrender strategies, all of which have failed, and it makes no sense to conclude that the rogue's combat effectiveness is not strong.

After the emperor finished speaking, Zhou Yanru, the first assistant of the cabinet, spoke.

"Your Majesty, the battle plan discussed by the cabinet is not to exterminate a group of rogue gangsters, but to exterminate Zhang Xianzhong as the main thing, supplemented by the extermination of Li Zicheng, and to completely exterminate Zhang Xianzhong and weaken Li Zicheng's strength as the first stage, and after the complete elimination of Zhang Xianzhong, the army will continue to exterminate Li Zicheng......"

"I know what you mean, so I don't need to explain more."

Before Zhou Yanru finished speaking, he was directly interrupted by the emperor.

"I have decided, at the same time to fight Li Zicheng and Zhang Xianzhong two rogue bandits, and strive to completely exterminate the rogue within the year, so that the north can stabilize, I decided to levy and expropriate the salary, the people can not bear it, Yang Aiqing's proposed four positive six corners, ten ambushes on all sides, I think it is very good, as long as the governors of all provinces work together, they will be able to exterminate the rogue in one fell swoop."

The emperor's words are tantamount to setting the tone, Li Zicheng and Zhang Xianzhong are the focus of the attack, and there is no distinction between priority and priority.

No one in the cabinet opened his mouth to argue, since the emperor has made up his mind, the cabinet is useless in arguing, but everyone does not understand why the emperor will make a decision arbitrarily, the so-called general will not be subject to the orders of the monarch outside, and the specific arrangements and deployments of the battle should respect the will of the commander, rather than the emperor or the court directly decided.

Of course, the cabinet also has a certain degree of optimism, that is, the emperor is determined to levy and suppress salaries, and ensure the supply of the imperial army from the grain and grass, so as to ensure the smooth operation of the operation.

Zhou Yanru spoke again.

"Your Majesty, Sun Chuanting, the governor of the five provinces, commanded this battle alone, which is quite difficult, and the minister suggested that the imperial court send one person to assist in commanding, but Sun Chuanting can be responsible for eliminating Zhang Xianzhong, and another person is responsible for eliminating Li Zicheng."

"This suggestion, I think it is feasible, so I will send Chen Xinjia, the squire of the military department, to assist in the battle."

After leaving the Qianqing Palace, Zhou Yanru sighed softly.

Chen Xinjia is the left squire of the military department, his status in the court is not ordinary, sent to participate in the battle of the Liukou, how can it be possible to assist Sun Chuanting in the battle, according to the rank and status, Sun Chuanting is slightly inferior, so how can Sun Chuanting command the battle without distraction, such an arrangement, it is very likely to let Sun Chuanting and Chen Xinjia go their own way, the two are difficult to unite, and it is nonsense to cooperate in combat, such a large-scale operation, there must be a core commander, doesn't the emperor know this.

Faintly, Zhou Yanru felt that the emperor was not only not at ease with the cabinet, but also at ease with the commanders who commanded the operations below. (To be continued......)