If the Taiping Heavenly Kingdom in history is really more true, it is not the traditional Qing army destroyed at all, but the local army composed of the village warriors was defeated, and the landlord gentry relied on nepotism to win over the villagers to form an army, and then gathered together, the small gentry were loyal to the big gentry, and the big gentry were loyal to the famous family of Zeng Guofan, and in this way, a stable relationship was established for the hometown soldiers!

For example, the Hunan army is a typical example!

Since the officers at the grassroots level are all relatives, teachers, friends and other people who care about their close to them, fighting a war can be described as a father and son soldiers, and the morale value of supporting each other is definitely comparable to the commanding heights of the feudal system!

It is this bond of blood and inheritance that makes the combat effectiveness of the troops formed by the local gentry surpass that of the regular Manchu army!

Therefore, in the eyes of Hong Tiancheng, a later generation, it is not difficult to overthrow the Manchu Empire, which oppressed the Han people for foreign rule, but we must not offend the vast number of gentry classes, otherwise we will wait for one Hunan army after another to rise up and fight against the Taiping army!

Zeng Guofan's rise was not because he liked to kneel and lick the Manchus, but he was forced to a dead end, Hong Xiuquan was one-size-fits-all to the gentry class back then, no matter who you are, as long as you are a landlord, you will all be wiped out!

In this way, what will the gentry in other places do?

Wash your neck and wait to be chopped?

Of course not!

Since you can't compromise with the new regime, you naturally have to organize desperately and fight the long-haired thief to the end!

The Manchu Qing Dynasty ruled the world with the gentry, and Hong Xiuquan wanted to clean up the gentry, isn't this forcing the gentry class to work hard?

Of course, this kind of stupid mistake Hong Tiancheng will naturally not repeat the mistakes of the past, not to mention, his Taiping army is not short of money, nor is there a shortage of people, there is no need to rob and offend people from the gentry landlords' homes, maintain the situation of ruling the world with the gentry, stabilize these local snakes, and specifically scare the Manchu Qing Dynasty, which is the key to strategic victory.

When the Manchu Qing Dynasty entered the customs and swept through the Southern Ming Dynasty, it was actually related to the Manchu Empire's policy of compromise with the gentry class, otherwise, why would the Manchu Emperor rule the world with the local gentry?

It's not yet that the fear of the war being dragged into an endless war of attrition!

In an agrarian society, the power of the gentry class who controlled the land was quite powerful, and it was completely different from the society after the industrial revolution.

Because in the agricultural civilization, having land is equivalent to mastering the population and financial resources, and with these two things, it is naturally easy to train troops and fight wars.

Fortunately, the gentry class is a plate of scattered sand, as long as the gentry class is not driven to a dead end, it is impossible to fight against the army of the current dynasty, the gentry have money and land, and their brains will be caught by the door before they will take their lives to fight with the army!

The common people may be more interested in the slogan of destroying the Qing Dynasty and restoring the Han Dynasty propagated by the Taiping Army, but for the gentry class, it is still in the wait-and-see stage, and the gentry class, except for a few angry young families, does not care whether the Manchus rule the world or the Han rule the world, and the ruling class that can safeguard their vested interests is what they welcome!

What Hong Tiancheng has to do is to satisfy the vested interests of the gentry class!

Hong Tiancheng wants a territory, not a great society where everyone is equal, and ruling the world with the gentry will leave a lot of unnecessary trouble, and he will not set off large-scale massacres in his homeland, so why not?

Of course, this kind of thing can't just shout slogans, what the Taiping Army needs is to set an example!

Hainan Island was a deserted island in this era, there were few gentry and landlords on it, and the occupation and rule of the Taiping army on Hainan Island would not have much exemplary effect, and if the Han gentry of the Manchu Qing Dynasty saw Hong Tiancheng's friendly face, they must really occupy a prosperous province!

The slogan of the Taiping Army was only to destroy the Qing Dynasty and restore the Han Dynasty, and did not mention the matter of tax revenue and land division for the acres of land, in fact, it was to reassure the local gentry and tell them that the Taiping Army did not come to divide their fields, and that you should live a happy life as your landlord in peace and stability, so don't blindly toss and scatter all your wealth to recruit troops to confront the Taiping Army......

Of course, this slogan of the Taiping Army also has certain drawbacks, unable to win the support of the majority of the civilian class, the gentry class is concerned about their vested interests, and the civilian class is concerned about the problem of having enough to eat......

The Taiping army really came over, they naturally welcomed it, and the Han rule was literally better than the Manchus, and they didn't have to wear an ugly braid, but if the Taiping army didn't fight, these Han civilians wouldn't really raise the banner and respond to the Taiping army......

The slogan of destroying the Qing Dynasty and restoring the Han Dynasty has at most eliminated the vigilance of the Han people, and if you want to say how many hardcore supporters you can get, it is to insult the IQ of the common people......

However, the Taiping army does not need the support of Han civilians to join the army at all, what the Taiping army needs is that when fighting with the Qing army, the Han people in the occupied areas can quickly accept themselves, and the local gentry will not come out to make trouble and maintain the original order!

If the local gentry do a good job, the Taiping Army will not even be stingy with grassroots administrators such as county magistrates!

As long as the rule of the Manchu Empire is overthrown in peace, everything is negotiable!

Who called the Taiping army weak and did not have too many troops to bomb and suppress the place?

The Command of the Taiping Army's Expeditionary Force has even drawn up a perfect and detailed plan to win over the local goodwill gentry, intending to use the local patrol police and security team to pull those local gentry families who have a good impression of the Taiping Army into the chariot of the Taiping Army!

To put it simply, as long as the local gentry are willing to be officials of the Taiping Heavenly Kingdom, it means that there is no way out, and the literati gentry who have always been thieves will not end well after the orthodox court fights back, and the nine clans abound!

Of course, if you want to do these things, the first step is to annihilate the 100,000 Qing army green battalions entrenched in the coastal areas of Guangdong!

In February 1703, when the spring flowers were blooming, the Taiping Expeditionary Fleet, escorted by ironclad ships, officially landed in the port outside Guangzhou, the capital of Guangdong Province in the Manchu Dynasty!

Landing here, not only has perfect port facilities, which allows the Taiping army to calmly unload all kinds of ammunition and materials, but also directly use naval guns to bombard the fortress of Guangzhou City!

The most important thing is that this is a place that the Qing army in Guangdong Province must guard, just to attract the attention of the main force of the 100,000 Qing army!

As expected by the Taiping Army, as soon as the Taiping Army's ironclad ships appeared outside Guangzhou, the main force of the Manchu Green Battalion, which was scattered in various key towns along the coast of Guangdong, received an order.

The first battle is about to begin!