Song Nan listened to the ministers talking about this matter, although he didn't know what the specific situation was, but it was an indisputable fact that the Tartars had brazenly attacked the border towns of Gansu and had made a breakthrough. Nearly six years have passed since the Battle of Xinpingbao, and the Battle of Xinpingbao has caused huge losses to the Tartars, and for a long time the Tatar Dayan Khan did not dare to disturb the border.

Originally, after the Battle of Xinpingbao, it was a good opportunity to fight back against the Tartars, but it was a pity that the Ming Dynasty itself did not have this condition, and the Liu Liu and Liu Seven uprisings that broke out soon after, so that the Ming Dynasty had no time to look north, objectively speaking, it gave the bald man a chance to breathe.

In recent years, the Ming Dynasty has been recuperating, and the Tatars are also recuperating; Five years is not short, it is not long, it is just enough for them to grow into a new crop of grassland warriors, hundreds of thousands of war horses are also fat and strong in these five years, in recent years, the grass and water in the Hetao Plain are clear, God seems to give the Tatars an excellent opportunity, so that they quickly recover their original strength.

In the battle of Xinpingbao, Bald Meng also understood one thing, fighting with the Ming army, it was not enough to have brave and invincible grassland cavalry, and tens of thousands of people could not capture a high beacon tower is proof; And in the next battle, the power of the artillery fire and fire of the Ming army's Shenji battalion also left a deep impression on Bald Mengke, who understood that blind killing may not be able to defeat the Ming army.

In five years, he accumulated a large number of cattle, sheep and horses, as well as hundreds of thousands of catties of iron ingots minted in a huge iron ore field found at the northern foot of Daqing Mountain. The country of Vultures in the west is a poorer country than himself, and it has little use value, and the Goryeo Kingdom in the east is also a vassal who succumbed to the majesty of the Ming Dynasty, and the only one that can be traded is the Rakshasa Kingdom in the north.

After the unremitting efforts of the Bald Mengke, the envoys finally brought the agreement reached from the Rakshasa Kingdom, the Bald Warrior could exchange the capital for cattle, sheep, horses, rice, minerals, etc., and the Rakshasa Kingdom would give the Bald Warrior the exchange of military materials such as firearms, siege equipment, large chariots and horses.

Although the high-nosed and blue-eyed savages of the Rakshasa Kingdom were extremely slippery and took advantage of them, Bald still swallowed their anger and paid a high price to buy strategic materials such as firearms, artillery, trebuchets, and heavy chariots, and finally decided to do it after several years of preparation.

The location of this attack was chosen very smartly, and the focus of the Ming army's defense was on the two border towns of Xuanfu and Datong, which were slightly closer to the Beijing division, and the soldiers and horses in these two places added up to more than 100,000; In the border towns of Ningxia and Gansu to the west, due to the distance from Beijing, they received more or less less attention to Cheng Dù. Moreover, most of these places have the Great Wall of the Mountains as a basis, and the Ming army, which is good at defending it, does not care too much that the Tartar soldiers will break through from here.

Bald Meng did a lot of research, and finally decided to take it by surprise, attack from the most impossible place, break through the Great Wall Pass in one fell swoop, and then advance to the southeast in a big way, the difficulty is to break through this pass. After several studies, the place of attack was chosen in the area of Jiayuguan, and he knew that the Han people paid attention to the use of soldiers to surprise them, but at the same time, they also paid attention to the constraints of various combat factors such as the right time, the right place and the people; The reason for choosing Jiayuguan to break through is very simple, the Ming Dynasty boasted that Jiayuguan was the first Xiongguan in the world, based on the self-confidence that Jiayuguan was located in a dangerous place, and of course, it was also because, north of Jiayuguan, the territory of Tatar was bare Montenegro, and then to the north was an endless desert, hundreds of miles of people, birds and beasts were extinct, and the wind and sand were flying all over the sky, and it was impossible to pass Guò from here; With these reasons, Jiayuguan is known as an insurmountable barrier.

It is in self-confidence that the defenders of Jiayuguan have only 1,500 people, and a guerrilla general's palace has been set up to garrison here, as long as they can pass through the desert of Guò, reach the south of Montenegro, and use the cover of the night and the power of the Rakshasa firearms to launch a thunderous attack, and they can take this Xiongguan in an instant. More importantly, this qiē would never be noticed by the Ming border army.

Although he suffered the opposition of many of his tribal leaders, Bald Meng still insisted on his decision, gathered an army of 90,000, known as 150,000 soldiers and horses, 50,000 for 80,000, and 40,000 for 70,000, and attacked Jiayuguan in two ways, one according to the plan, and the other road quietly lurked, rushing to the front line north of Gansu Town.

After paying the price of thousands of dead in the desert, the guide finally brought the army attacking Jiayuguan to the south of Montenegro; Standing on the hillside and looking far away, among the lofty mountains, the Great Wall winds and stretches, and Jiayuguan is in front of you.

After a day of rest to recuperate, the commander of the right army who was pinned on high hopes was the eldest son of Bald Mengke, Tulu Borot, who was expected to command an army of 50,000 troops alone to attack Jiayu Pass. That night, he issued an order to take Jiayu Pass at any cost and break through the Great Wall Pass here. The heavy artillery purchased from the Rakshasa country sent out an earth-shattering roar, shattering the calm night in the northwest, under the bombardment of more than 80 heavy artillery, Xiongguan Jiayuguan could not withstand such a fierce firearm bombardment, the wall of the outer city of the city of more than three zhang high was successively collapsed in several places, these city walls were compacted according to strict standards, and the strong fortress that could not be shot with iron arrows at twenty steps away when it was completed and accepted failed to withstand the bombardment of firearms, and their collapse also indicated that the Ming Dynasty's border town was out of date.

The soldiers guarding the pass fought bloodily, did not retreat half a step, fought at night and shook the sky, to the dawn, the corner tower of Jiayuguan fluttered above the dragon flag of the Ming Dynasty, but the giant eagle battle flag of the bald and fierce people, Jiayuguan was lost.

Fifteen hundred soldiers, almost none of the more than 3,000 people in the city were spared, corpses and rubble were everywhere, and the first male in the world bowed his noble head.

The footsteps of the Tartar soldiers did not stop, after taking Jiayu Pass, they immediately attacked Suzhou, and in one day connected Suzhou and its surrounding counties, and after a little rest, they waved their troops to the southeast and went straight to the rear of Gansu Town; After learning the news, the Gansu General Military Office of the Gansu Xingdu Division immediately dispatched troops and mobilized 40,000 soldiers and horses to intercept it, and a major battle between the two sides was about to break out.

This is all that Song Nan has learned about the battle situation, and the ministers in the imperial study tried their best to comfort Zhengde, expressing that they would be able to block the footsteps of this Tartar who claimed to be an army of 80,000, but Song Nan frowned tightly on the side.

"Your Majesty, Chang Ning has been guarding the border for more than ten years, and is known as a victorious general. The emperor asked the emperor to appoint Chang Ning as the general, with full responsibility for the battle against the Tartars; The military department will immediately mobilize logistics and baggage to give the greatest support, and strive to eliminate the future troubles in the first battle east of Gansu and completely defeat the Tartars. Lu Wan said confidently.

Zhengde's brows stretched slightly, everyone expressed optimism, and he naturally had less worries, Lu Wan's words caused a response from the cabinet scholars, and they also said that it should be so, the war is imminent, and Chang Ning should be given full rights and titles, so that he can fully devote himself to the planning of the war.

"Okay, I will give you permission to play, and I will immediately issue an order to appoint Chang Ning, the general of Gansu, as the general of Pingyu, and the commander-in-chief of the military affairs in Gansu, and be sure to exterminate and expel the invading Tartar soldiers and horses. Not...... The military department must do a good job in logistics scheduling at any time, and the reserve soldiers and horses must keep up with the food and salary, and they must not go on business trips. ”

"The emperor is wise, I will do this immediately." Lu Wan and the others kowtowed.

Zhengde sighed, and when his eyes were hesitant, his eyes fell on the face of Song Nan who was sitting in the corner; Song Nan sat there frowning, thoughtful, and his face seemed to be deeply worried.

"Song Nan, you haven't spoken, I want to hear what you think, you are also a person who has experienced a hundred battles, you should have your own judgment." Zhengde asked.

Song Nan came back to his senses, stepped forward and arched his hand: "The minister does have some questions, if the emperor allows, the minister wants to ask a few questions." ”

Zhengde smiled: "Of course you can ask, didn't I ask you to come back just to listen to your opinion." ”

Song Nan thanked him, came to Lu Wan and saluted: "Lu Shangshu, can I ask a few questions about the battlefield?" Please ask Lu Shangshu to give an answer. ”

Lu Wanmu said: "Excuse me, but be quick, the war in the border town is in flames, and the emperor's holy decree is coming, I will be busy with this matter, but I can't delay." Every hour of delay can cause huge losses. ”

Song Nan nodded and said, "Okay, I'll try to be as brief as possible." The first question is that I heard Lu Shangshu say just now that the Tartars carried hundreds of powerful artillery, but I don't know if this is true. ”

"Naturally, it's true, with the steepness and solidity of Jiayu Pass, without firearms, tens of thousands of tartars are slow, and it is difficult to capture even twice as much."

Song Nan nodded and said: "The matter of firearms seems to be a certainty, and no matter where this firearm comes from, it can be seen from it that this time the Tartars are fully prepared, not the previous tactics of fighting and rushing, looting and running, from which it can be concluded that the Tartars have ill intentions this time, but it seems that they have the intention of annexing in one fell swoop, I don't know if you agree with my opinion." ”

Everyone nodded, and Lu Wan said coldly: "Then you still need to say?" The Tartars have coveted my Daming anointed land for a long time, and they drool all the time, of course, it is true. ”

Song Nan said: "Yes, then the second question comes." Since the Tartars came with more than 100 artillery pieces and thousands of chariots and siege weapons, they had the heart to destroy our Ming Dynasty, and the war report said that they were 80,000 troops, but we all know that most of the troops who went out on the expedition were falsely numbered in order to strengthen the army's might. I'm afraid these 80,000 people are not a real number. ”

Lu Wan said: "Then it needs to be said; Otherwise, we won't let Changning take Gansu Wuwei and Shandan Yongchangwei to fight with them, our seven guards have more than 40,000 people, and the number of Tartars is not at a disadvantage, and the 80,000 people of Tartars are only 50,000 at most. ”

Song Nan nodded and said: "That's right, the third question, since the Tartars have only sent 50,000 soldiers and horses to attack this time, isn't there any contradiction between the two?" The Tatars also have 150,000 or 60,000 standing troops, and if the whole country is mobilized, I am afraid that there are 200,000 or 300,000 soldiers and horses available; Why didn't you send more men and horses, but only 50,000 soldiers and horses to attack? Do you think that with these 50,000 soldiers and horses, you can destroy my Ming Dynasty? ”

The ministers were silent for a while, yes, thinking about this thing, there is indeed something wrong, the Tartars can't be so stupid, thinking that with these 50,000 soldiers and horses and newly obtained artillery chariots and other things, they can sweep the Ming Dynasty, is there an article in this?