On September 28, the 11th year of Zhenguan of the Tang Dynasty, a coup d'état occurred in Pyongyang, the capital of Goguryeo, and the Yuan clan invited King Rongliu and his ministers in the name of inspecting the army, but King Rongliu had already received information that the Yuan family was going to be unfavorable to him, so he not only refused to go, but also reduced his forces to keep the palace secret.

Seeing that this plan could not be achieved, Genji immediately and decisively changed his strategy, gathered a large army and marched into the city of Pyongyang, and began to forcibly besiege the palace. Fortunately, King Rongliu had been prepared, and when he saw that the other party was strong, he immediately took his loyal guards to fight his way out of Pyongyang City, but in the chaos of the army, his family and the ministers around him were captured by the Yuan clan, and then all of them were beheaded under the city of Pyongyang.

And the escaped King Rongliu did not stop, and led people to gather the army loyal to him while avoiding the pursuit of the Yuan army, ready to fight back at any time, but unfortunately, the army loyal to him could not be compared with the Yuan clan in terms of quantity and quality, so several counterattacks ended in failure, and finally in desperation, he had to flee to the loyal city of Anshi to hide, and at the same time issued a royal decree to the whole country, calling on people of insight throughout the country to gather and jointly resist the tyranny of the Yuan clan.

For this situation, the Yuan clan naturally would not let King Rongliu live in the world, so Yuan Gai Suwen personally led tens of thousands of troops to attack Anshi City, but what everyone didn't expect was that Yang Wanchun, the city lord of Anshi, with his dangerous terrain and an extremely elite garrison force, actually blocked Yuan Gai Suwen's attack.

Under the failure of the siege, Yuangai Suwen was very annoyed and was preparing to increase the troops attacking the city, but at this time, the Tang army, which had been eyeing the city for a long time, couldn't help it. Despite the bitter cold of Liaodong, in the name of helping Goguryeo quell the civil strife, troops were finally dispatched in mid-October, but the first to do so were not Niu Jinda and Li Ji, who had been prepared long ago. It was Zhang Jian, the governor of Yingzhou.

Speaking of this Zhang Dudu, he and Li Su are still relatives, Zhang Jian's mother is Li Yuan's daughter, that is, Li Su's aunt, the two are cousins, but Zhang Jian is older, both are in their twenties this year, and they are considered the younger generation among the generals of the Tang Dynasty.

In addition, Zhang Jian's leading talent is still secondary. The key is that this guy is very shady, Yingzhou is surrounded by Hu tribes, this time when conquering Liaodong, Zhang Jian recruited Khitan, Xi, Yan and other tribesmen. Whether it was a siege or a field battle, he ordered these alien soldiers to rush in front as cannon fodder, and then take the government soldiers of Yingzhou and Youzhou as supervisors. It can be said that it is extremely cruel.

However, this method is excellent, the Hu people are originally afraid of power and not virtue, and the more they use this kind of powerful and cruel means, the more they can stimulate the combat effectiveness of foreign soldiers. Therefore, Zhang Jian, who was originally only the vanguard of Goguryeo's reaction, sang all the way. From Yingzhou to the city of Jian'an, an important town of Goguryeo, and the tens of thousands of defenders of Jian'an City who fought were defeated. beheaded more than thousands, this time Goguryeo was shocked, and the entire Tang Dynasty was also shocked by this fierce young governor.

However, it was from this incident that the Tang Dynasty saw the weakness of Goguryeo and strengthened the confidence of the Tang Dynasty in victory, so General Niu Jinda of the waterway and Li Ji of the land route almost unanimously chose to send troops at the end of October.

At the beginning of the war, there was a one-sided situation immediately, Li Ji, an old Yin man, used the strategy of attacking the east and the west, and set off from Huaiyuan Town, but in fact, he led his troops out of the city and crossed the Liaoshui, and on November 10, he took Xuansu, which was occupied by Goguryeo, and then the whole Goguryeo was even more panicked, and almost all the towns were closed to themselves.

At the same time, Li Daozong, who was Li Ji's deputy, also led the army to Xincheng, but because there were few people, he had to shout and scold under the city, wanting to lead out the other party, but the Xincheng defenders did not dare to fight, so they had no choice but to leave, and on the 22nd of the same month, they converged with Li Ji's army under Gaimu City, which was the second fortified city of Goguryeo in Liaodong, second only to Liaodong City, which was known as the first fortified city in Liaodong.

And just when Li Ji was advancing all the way, Niu Jinda's waterway army was not idle, after gathering the naval armies of several states, he crossed the sea in Laizhou, and went straight to the opposite Beisha City, after landing from the weakly defended west, facing Beisha City, which was surrounded by cliffs on all sides, the Tang army finally came up with its secret weapon.

After landing, the general Cheng Mingzhen led the army to attack from the front, and the deputy governor Wang Dadu personally led a team of dead soldiers, braved the rain of arrows to rush to the city wall, chiseled a few holes, and stuffed three blasting canisters for siege at once. As a result, the western city wall was blown down into a big hole, and when the Goguryeo people thought it was the wrath of the gods, the Tang army rushed to the city in one fell swoop, but the Goguryeo army in the city was also the elite of the elite, although the city was broken, but refused to surrender, and the Tang army started a street battle, and the result was that it took the Tang army two days to clear the entire Beisha City.

The Tang army on the southern route first used gunpowder, and Li Ji's western route army was naturally not to be outdone, and when facing the fortified city of Gaimu City, they almost completely copied the results of Beisha City, and rushed into the city after blowing up the city wall. The Goguryeo defenders in the city were intimidated by the power of explosives, and they did not dare to resist, and the more than 40,000 defenders in the entire city were almost completely captured by the Tang army, and the hundreds of thousands of stone of grain in the city were also obtained by the Tang army.

After effortlessly taking Gaimu City, Li Ji rushed to the city of Liaodong almost non-stop, although at this time Goguryeo already knew that the Tang army had a powerful weapon that could blow up the city wall, but it was helpless, and could only watch this first fortified city in Liaodong fall into the hands of the Tang army, and at the same time, the defenders in the city were killed more than 10,000, and tens of thousands were taken prisoner.

Niu Jinda's army also swept the Liaodong Peninsula, occupying all the places south of Anshi City and Wugu City. At the beginning of December, the two armies of Li Ji and Niu Jinda successfully joined forces under the city of Anshi, and the Tang army's early strategic goals were finally completed.

Now the entire Liaodong has almost completely fallen into the hands of the Tang army, except for the line of Anshi City and Wugu City, which is still connected with Goguryeo. For Anshi City, the Tang Army can't attack it for the time being, because the Tang Dynasty raised troops in the name of helping King Rongliu to pacify the civil strife, and now King Rongliu is in the city of Anshi.

In addition, this Anshi City is not so easy to attack, it is a strong city not to mention, and the city lord is also a very difficult opponent, after hearing that the Tang Army has a weapon to break the city, but extremely clever thought of the way to crack it, with the help of the extremely cold weather in Liaodong, he ordered people to keep pouring water down on the city wall, and as a result, the entire Anshi City became a frozen city, even if the Tang Army did not count the consumption of gunpowder, desperately bombed did not know when to bomb. And now the weather is getting colder and colder, even if most of the Tang army is equipped with cotton jackets and quilts, many soldiers are still frostbitten or even frozen to death.

In such a harsh environment, after Niu Jinda and Li Ji discussed, they decided to disperse the army to several nearby cities and station, and wait until this winter, while only 10,000 elite cavalry were stationed under the city of Anshi to observe the movements in the city at any time. After this order was transmitted to Chang'an, Li Shimin also greatly supported it.

So at the beginning of December of the 11th year of Zhenguan, the war that lasted for more than a month was finally temporarily stopped, and the Tang army won consecutive battles with high morale, waiting for the next spring to capture Anshi City in one fell swoop, and then wave the army to Pyongyang, when Goguryeo, an ancient country of hundreds of years, will no longer exist. Goguryeo, which was in chaos by the Tang army's fierce offensive, finally had a chance to breathe, and began to reorganize the remaining forces, strengthening the defense while waiting for an opportunity to counterattack.

The Tang army on the front line of Liaodong fought very happily, but the various states and counties in the rear were complaining, Goguryeo's early turmoil, not only disrupted their own positions, but even the Tang Dynasty's positions were also disrupted, the Tang army's army was well prepared, and the two armies of 100,000 horses were not a problem at all, but the states and counties did not expect this war to come so suddenly, so the preparation of various materials was seriously insufficient, coupled with the very rare winter soldiers, the consumption of various materials in the army was greater, not to mention anything else, The consumption of food alone is a big problem, and in order to supply the front line, the local governors of many prefectures and counties even have the mind to be bandits.

For this problem, Li Su also has a deep understanding that Dengzhou was originally the closest place to the Liaodong Peninsula, so almost all the supplies of the waterway army of Niu Jinda were loaded from Dengzhou and then transported to the opposite side. Among the supplies, most of them are food and weapons, and half of these food and weapons are from Dengzhou, and Li Su can't push it off if he wants to, because Li Shimin gave him a hard apportionment. After all, after nearly a year of development under Li Su, Dengzhou's tax revenue has not only increased several times, but the people under his rule are much richer than those in other states. Since Dengzhou is so rich, it is natural to have to pay more.

If it is apportioned to others, Li Su is not worried, such as salt, canned food, etc., Dengzhou produces this thing, how much is how much, but weapons and food are a little troublesome, among which the weapons are better, and there are many local weapon workshops in Dengzhou, plus some bought from other places, they can barely cope with it, but the food is troublesome.

Dengzhou is not a grain production area, most of the local grain has to be transported from outside, although canned food is good, but Dengzhou's main canned seafood can only be used as a supplementary food, and it is impossible to make a staple food. Fortunately, there were several large granaries in Dengzhou before, which could cope with a period of time, but the grain stored in it could not be supplied indefinitely, and it would be exhausted many years ago, but now this war is only halfway through, and it will continue to be fought after the New Year, and the price of grain in Dengzhou has risen three times, and the people are also miserable.

In order to solve this problem, and at the same time, in order to stop worrying about food in Dengzhou in the future, Li Su thought of a good way, and after discussing it with Zhao Fu, Yanbei, and Liu Renliang, they also felt that it was a good governance, so they sorted out a policy by a few of them and promulgated it. (Your support on this site is my biggest motivation.) )