Before Li Zicheng broke into the camp and crossed the Yellow River, his propaganda work had already been carried out in Shanxi. There are rumors among the people: breaking into the camp does not kill or commit adultery, and what you do is not taxed. The people of Shanxi are looking forward to the arrival of the camp.

In order to counter this public opinion offensive, Cai Maode, the governor of Shanxi, concocted a post under the pretext of "Qin Min, Wang Guotai, Li Da'an" "The Misery of Thieves and Poisonous Torture", and posted posts everywhere inside and outside the provincial capital of Taiyuan. He also privately fabricated a nursery rhyme: "It is difficult for horses to walk inside the door, and this year it is Bi Ma Wen" to deceive the masses.

However, no matter how well the propaganda war is carried out, it will ultimately depend on the strength of the army.

When the camp was headed for Henan Prefecture and Shaanzhou, in order to intercept the camp from crossing the river, Cai Maode, as a provincial governor, went to Pingyang to deploy river prevention matters, in a vain attempt to hold the Yellow River crossing. Due to the lack of food, he asked the two county kings of the Jin Domain, Xihe and Jiaocheng, who were sealed in Pingyang, to take the lead in persuading the gentlemen and people to donate money, but none of them agreed to donate money. As a result, the anti-river plan was completely frustrated.

At this time, the king of Jin in Taiyuan sent someone to urge Cai Maode to return to Taiyuan to defend the city. And Cai Maode could only return in vain, watching the camp enter Shanxi. Then, Cai Maode was stabbed in the back by his own people.

As soon as Cai Maode returned to Taiyuan, Wang Zongyou, the governor of the imperial history, impeached him for giving up Pingyang without authorization. Emperor Chongzhen had to play, and immediately ordered him to be dismissed from the court without asking for reason, and Guo Jingchang was sent to take over as the governor of Shanxi.

In order to keep the defense line of the Yellow River, Cai Maode has no credit and hard work, and this official has indeed been wronged. But from another point of view, is it a blessing for Seong to lose his horse? Cai Maode finally stopped sitting in the furnace-like position of the governor of Shanxi and was roasted, it is better to lose his official position than to lose his life! Therefore, Cai Maode did not end up in the worst end.

I didn't expect Cai Maode to be really unlucky, and his bad luck has not passed.

As soon as Guo Jingchang arrived in Guguan, he got the news that he had broken into the camp and occupied Fenzhou, so he did not dare to go to Taiyuan to take up his post. Although Cai Maode has been dismissed, his replacement has not yet arrived. I had to bite the bullet and plot with Zhao Jianji, the political envoy of Zuobu, Bi Gongchen and others to defend Taiyuan.

At this time, Fu Shan and Han Lin, famous literati in Shanxi, were hired as the pre-military praise paintings of Li Jiantai of the Governor's Cabinet. Fu Shan looked at protecting the township from being occupied by the camp, and personally rushed to Hebei to ask Li Jiantai to rescue Taiyuan. It is said that only by keeping Taiyuan can the Jinnan region have hope of recovery, and Jifu can have a barrier, which is the responsibility of the superintendent.

However, Li Jiantai had his own considerations, and he was ordered to supervise the original plan to use the property of Quwo's hometown to recruit troops, and cobble together a local armed force to block the peasant army in Shanxi. But now that Quwo has been occupied by the camp, there is no way to realize the plan.

The 30,000 forbidden brigades that set out from Beijing saw that the situation was not good, and the whole army had already fled. Rescuing Taiyuan in this situation is really easier said than done. Therefore. He categorically rejected Fu Shan's request and returned to Baoding.

In this case, Taiyuan has become a lonely city.

On the tenth day of the lunar month, the camp entered the city of Taiyuan. Zhu Qiugui, the king of Jin, took out three thousand taels of silver and sent it to the city to "recruit dead soldiers to kill thieves". However, Li Zhichen, a scholar in Shanxi, deducted from it and replaced the cash with a paper ticket. The morale of the officers and soldiers was even lower. Early morning of the 12th. Governor Biaoying opened the new south gate and surrendered, and the Dashun army occupied Taiyuan. Taiyuan, a strong city in the northwest, has been held for less than two days from beginning to end.

Zhu Qiugui, the king of Jin, was captured alive, Cai Maode committed suicide, and Zhao Jianji, the political envoy, Bi Gongchen of Xunning Dao, Mao Bingyi of Shouning Dao, Lin Gangzhong, and Sun Kangzhou, the prefect of Taiyuan, were all executed. What's funnier is the fate of the best pig teammate - Shanxi Tixue Dao Li Zhichen. After he was captured, he knelt in front of the general of the camp and said: "This province has been in office for three months. has not yet entered the examination booth", trying his best to wash himself. Han Lin, a scribe who had surrendered and broke into the camp, also boasted, "This world is also a scholar." So he was hired immediately and let him preside over the exam. Selection of civil servants.

Then, the camp rested in Taiyuan for eight days. And in these eight short days, Chuang Ying felt that the time was ripe to completely overthrow the Ming Dynasty. In order to effectively promote the change of dynasty and expand political influence, Li Zicheng and others decided to formally establish the country and change the yuan, and further formalize the central power in the camp.

Li Zicheng and others decided: on the first day of the first month of the first month of 1643 A.D. (the sixteenth year of Chongzhen of the Ming Dynasty), the country was officially established, the country name was Dashun, and the yuan Yongchang was changed. The measures taken at that time can be roughly summarized as follows:

First of all, Taiyuan is tentatively designated as Xijing; Take the palace of the Ming and Jin Dynasty as the palace. Posthumously honored his great-grandfather as the emperor, his mother Lu as the queen mother, canonized Gao as the queen, and Chen as the concubine. promulgated regulations for Li Zicheng and his father and ancestors to avoid secrecy, and formulated an almanac.

All this shows that Li Zicheng began to officially become emperor.

Secondly, the meritorious hero was awarded the fifth class. General Quan, General of the system, marquis; General Guo Yi, mighty general Feng Bo, son, male. This also gave the civil and military officials who followed Li Zicheng a formal official reward.

Third, the bureaucratic system should be changed. The cabinet was changed to the Heavenly Blessing Palace, and the university was set up to serve as a military and state officer, with Niu Venus as it. Song Xiance was a military advisor. The central administrative organs are six governments, with Shangshu and Shilang as the heads of the government; The subordinate member changed the middle lang to the middle lang, and the principal was engaged. Hanlin Temple is the Hongwen Museum, the six departments are the counselors, the imperial history is the direct commander, the Shangbao Temple is the Shangqi Division, the Taifu Temple is the Horse Inspection Temple, and the General Administration Department is the political envoy. At the same time as appointing official positions, the Dashun regime confiscated the seals of the Ming Dynasty in various places and issued new seals.

The local officials increased the provincial level and set up festival envoys, which were equivalent to the governors of the Ming Dynasty. Soon after, he imitated the system of lighting the imperial history and sent additional inspectors in various provinces to supervise on behalf of the Central Division. Other provinces, prefectures, prefectures, and counties have defense envoys, governors, state pastors, and county commanders.

And this kind of official position formulation, in fact, is the same as the Ming Dynasty, at most, it is an official name, and the content and official authority are also changed without changing the medicine, so it has not changed the political result of the whole society at all, it is nothing more than a simple change of dynasty.

Fourth, in terms of military system, the names of the five battalions are Zhongji, Left Spoke (Auxiliary), Right Wing, Forward, and Stamina; The front camp is black, the rear camp is yellow, the left camp is white, the right camp is red, and the middle camp is blue. The military positions are set up as General Quan, General System, General Guoyi, Mighty General, Captain, Brigade Commander, Department Commander, Sentinel General and other officers.

And the army has also strengthened military training and discipline. It is stipulated that the horsemen shall be beheaded if they cross the ranks of disorder. The horse ridden "slashed by the one who vacated into the field seedlings" and so on. The latter discipline is clearly aimed at protecting agricultural production.

Fifth, in the economic aspect, in addition to continuing to adhere to the policy of "exempting taxes for three years," the Ming Dynasty officials and gentry were also given stolen goods and subsidies, that is, the money obtained by bureaucratic corruption was confiscated and used for government funds and military rations.

In order to stabilize prices and facilitate private trade, the Ming Dynasty Chongzhen period of the official and private cast of small money, open the furnace to cast Yongchang Tongbao, the big money is worth one tael of silver, and the other cast is ten or five coins.

However, the policy of recovering stolen goods and subsidizing salaries has completely pushed the official and gentry class to the opposite side of the camp. Although some people of insight in the camp also opposed this, Li Zicheng and these people were all very strong-willed to rebel, and their hatred for the Ming Dynasty was unforgettable. For example, Li Zicheng, the king of Chuang, refused to surrender to the imperial court, and would rather drill the ravine than surrender symbolically. And in order to rebel, he was willing to kill his wife and children. Although Song Xiance, the representative of the civil government, is a man, he is also oppressed by the Ming government, and he is inseparable from the Ming Dynasty.

So in this context, the civil and military personnel who broke into the camp unanimously agreed to the policy of recovering stolen goods and subsidy. Of course, this can also solve the current problem of supplying military salaries, grain and grass to the camp.

But there is no doubt that the camp was essentially the establishment of a feudal dynasty, and it pushed the pillar of the feudal dynasty, the official gentry and landlord class, to the opposite side, which doomed his policy to be unsustainable.

Although the forces of the camp were great at this time and controlled a large area, the landlords' armed forces also took advantage of the strength of their local clans to launch fierce guerrilla warfare against the camp in remote mountainous areas and other weak places. Although this kind of battle does not have a great impact on the current camp, as long as the camp is defeated, those landlords' armed forces will definitely fall into the ground. Therefore, this policy is also a bad method that only has the function of venting anger, but it brings a lot of enemies to the camp.

The last is to open a department. In order to recruit talents to serve as officials at all levels, the government of Li made questions and selected officials by imperial examination. The Chinese-style will be awarded to the government, state, and county officials.

The founding of Taiyuan by Li Zicheng marked the end of the Ming Dynasty to the period of "Three Kingdoms Hegemony". This also means that the strength of the Shun army at this time is no less than that of the Ming Dynasty.

At this time, in order to prevent the Qing troops from entering the customs, the Ming Dynasty set up four governors of Liaodong, Shanhai, Changping and Baoding on the line from Shanhaiguan to Beijing, six governors of Ningyuan, Yongping, Shuntian, Miyun, Tianjin and Baoding, and eight general military officers of Ningyuan, Shanhai, Zhongxie, Xixie, Changping, Tongzhou, Tianjin and Baoding.

However, due to the inconsistency of powers, the cowardice of the generals, and the low morale, these Ming troops, which belonged to the Governor, Fu, and Zhenbiao, could not effectively mobilize to deal with the Qing army. Soldiers and horses from all walks of life may flee first when they see the enemy; or deliberately avoiding the enemy's frontal offensive and staying from afar; Or keep your distance and follow behind the enemy's buttocks, acting as a containment team for the Qing army.

But in this way, the Qing army was extremely easy after entering the customs, and almost never encountered any resistance. And the Ming army near Kifu was even more unlikely to go west to encircle and suppress the Shun army that had already established the country.

However, the founding of the camp has also touched the bottom line of the Ming court, no matter what, it is necessary to encircle and exterminate this peasant army that is the most powerful, the closest to the capital, and the first to propose a change of dynasty.

However, it was impossible to mobilize the Ming army near Jifu, and the Runing army and the Heiyun army in Henan had issued an edict to the imperial court that they were all in violation, so the only hope of confronting the Shun army was the Qin army led by Sun Chuanting, the governor of the three sides of Shaanxi. (To be continued......)

PS: Since it has now reached the climax of the book, several battlefields are fighting at the same time, in order to ensure that things can be explained clearly, there may be some overlap in the timeline, please pay attention to readers and friends. I've also tried to be as clear as I am.

Also: Regarding the reply to the "essence" of the book review, I didn't care much about it, and I gave the essence as long as there was a book review, but I found that this was very unfair to the friends who subscribed. For this reason, I will not give the "essence" to those who have not subscribed, and will not reply. Thank you for your understanding!