It took more than half a month to besiege the city, and it also repelled two Li Zicheng's attacks, causing huge casualties. As the army returned to silence, Huang Degong's mentality was also a little tired and anxious, and he urgently needed to move his muscles and bones again.

He was originally reckless, and being more patient than his style was not his style.

Therefore, hearing that Shen Futai finally planned to take the initiative to take some action, Huang Degong immediately became excited again, and hurriedly asked for help: "Shen Futai, if you have a plan, hurry up and give an order!" ”

Shen Shuren couldn't help but laugh: "You don't even know where I'm going to fight." ”

Huang Degong also did not contain a lake: "Anyway, as long as you speak, I will do it!" You can hit wherever you want! ”

After getting along with each other during this time, his trust in Shenshu people has subtly risen several steps.

Shen Shuren was of course very satisfied with this attitude, he knew that he had finally succeeded in subduing the other party, and he had also thoroughly figured out his temperament, talents, and usage.

Huang Degong should be the most capable general under his command, and his courage and courage are better than Liu Guoneng.

In contrast, Liu Guoneng's advantage at the military level is only that he is more resolute, willing to pay the price, and more resolute in execution - to put it bluntly, Huang Degong is "brothers follow me", and Liu Guoneng is more inclined to "brothers give me up".

may be born in the relationship of thieves, accustomed to life and death, how many old buddies have died after licking blood with knives, so that Liu Guoneng will not spare the lives of his subordinates, Shen Shuren will give him an order, he will do it at any cost.

Huang Degong cherishes his soldiers, takes the lead, and when he encounters absolute adversity, he may not dare to gamble with the whole army.

But in any case, these two are famous generals in the history books. Especially Huang Degong was not ranked in the first echelon at the end of the Ming Dynasty, at least he was the top in the second echelon.

Shen Shuren has spent three years to develop, and the generals he has trained under his own command, except for Zheng Chenggong, the pure military talent of others is inferior to Huang and Liu.

For example, Zuo Zixiong, who was single-handedly promoted by Shen Shuren, was originally only at the level of a thousand households, although his personal martial arts are indeed excellent, not under Huang Degong, and the execution of the army is also okay, but in terms of the overall situation and the ability to take charge of themselves, it is a big difference compared to these two people.

To put it bluntly, none of the original generals under the command of Shen Shuren, except for Zheng Chenggong, have the ability to be a single town and a province and be as stable as Mount Tai. Now that Shen Shuren's territory is still only in Huguang, he can personally sit in the center and his subordinates can implement his strategic decisions.

In the future, if the power spans several provinces, and even has to face the struggle for power and profit with the center of the Ming court, then there must be a few such famous generals who are willing to serve him completely and desperately.

It's like Liu Bei entered Sichuan in history, so he had to leave a Guan Yu to be in charge and guard Jingzhou.

Half of the southern part of the country, because of the natural geographical environment since ancient times, is destined to be divided into three major areas: Yi, Jing and Yang, and the Ming Dynasty will add the two Guangxi of Lingnan.

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Therefore, Shen Shuren really wants to plan for the world, even in the southern half of the wall, he must have three governors who can absolutely trust and be absolutely loyal to him, plus three provincial guards, otherwise even if he controls the emperor in the future, there is a risk of being cleared by the monarch.

Originally, before Shen Shuren became the governor of a province, these problems were a little too far to consider, and even if he wanted to think about it, he didn't have the strength to do it, and it was too arrogant.

But now that he has officially become the governor of Huguang for a month or two, and he has begun to lay out a broader stage, the work of discovering these talents must be put on the agenda.

Beating Li Zicheng this time, Shen Shuren never thought of completely beating Li Zicheng from beginning to end, and he didn't have the strength.

The key is to be able to fight for a few years of peace in one battle, and to establish a prestige that makes Li Zicheng afraid of him, and he will not dare to go south easily in the future, which is enough.

Compared with the military victory, for Shen Shuren, what is more important is to completely unite Liu Guoneng and Huang Degong by beating Li Zicheng, so that they can be convinced and admire themselves.

It's best to make them more loyal to themselves than to Daming.

For this purpose, no matter how slow the work is, it is not an exaggeration.

……

Since he was very clear about the overall program of fighting against Li Zicheng in his heart, Shen Shuren certainly knew what he could and could not fight in the follow-up battles, and what specific goals he wanted to pursue.

Everything that is conducive to establishing authority, attacking the heart, and deterring Li Zicheng in the follow-up must be done decisively.

And anything that directly causes casualties, purely detracts from Li Zicheng's troops, and will lead to a large amount of consumption of itself, then we must do as little as possible, and try to surrender without a fight.

Otherwise, if Li Zicheng is really broken, who else do you expect to entangle Chongzhen and kill the shameless Beijing officials in Beijing by the way.

With a clear goal and program in place, Shen Shuren naturally announced his plan:

"The thief is powerful, even if he can't afford to fight us now, it is impossible to fight with him, so our goal is still to force him to temporarily give up the siege of Kaifeng before this winter, and give Kaifeng a chance to breathe.

As you said just now, you have already found out that the invading army has given up and continued to attack the city, and there is still a shortage of food, so the troops are divided to go out to get food. Although you haven't found out where to go for food, but if you think about it, I can guess the general direction-

The thieves came from the west, the west has been eaten and wiped clean for hundreds of miles, Luoyang is even more dilapidated, and then there is Sun Chuanting in the direction of Tongguan.

Huaiqing Mansion and Weihui Mansion in the north, at the turn of summer and autumn, have just been slaughtered and looted by Li Zicheng, and now the population is estimated to be not one, if it weren't for the original robbery of Huaiqing and Weihui's grain, maybe Li Zicheng can't hold it this autumn, and can't keep besieging Kaifeng.

There is Zuo Liangyu in the southwest, and we are in the south and southeast, so the only direction for Li Zi's troops to go out to get grain is most likely to be Guide Mansion (Shangqiu) in the east, although it is also poor, it has not been systematically slaughtered, and maybe some autumn grain is harvested.

Even if the food is not enough for the people to eat until next year, as long as most of the locals are killed and the people's living food is snatched, it will definitely be enough for hundreds of thousands of troops to eat for a while, and Li Zicheng will definitely do this kind of thing.

In this way, we must go out of the city to take the initiative to seek fighters, and the most important direction is to divide our troops to the east, to the east of the thieves, and the northeast of our army. If we can attack the lone food troops and break through each of them, we will be able to reap considerable results.

If we can't meet the troops who are divided into thieves and have food and food, we can also gradually attack and recover some key county towns, or help defend some Henan county towns along the Yingchuan and Shahe rivers that are still under the control of the official army, and continue to fight steadily and steadily.

If the intrusive army comes to intercept it, we will copy the hard-walled village that has been tried and tested on the Shangcai side to fight in a dumb battle, if the intrusive army does not intercept, we can approach Kaifeng all the way along Yingchuan and Shahe......"

Shen Shuren just talked about this, and there was still a lot to explain, but Huang Degong was a little uneasy when he heard it, and couldn't help but interrupt: "My lord, if we don't take Yuncheng, we will divide our troops in the northeast direction and go around the city, so how can we solve the grain route of our troops?"

Yuncheng is blocked at the mouth of the canal between Ruying, our previous grain ships, from Rushui, bypassing Yuncheng only in Shangcai unloading and loading, land transport to Yingchuan in unloading and loading, every flaw, will be seriously threatened by the invasion army. You won't be prepared for ......."

Shen Shuren nodded: "Of course, do you remember, a few days ago, when the thieves just retreated and stopped attacking the city, I asked you to send someone to make trouble and find Ma Shiying, the prefect of Fengyang, to transport food to us, didn't you also send someone according to my request." ”

Now four or five days have passed since Li Zicheng's second failed siege of the city has stopped, so this time is enough time to send people from Xinyang to Fengyang Mansion in Nanzhili next door to do some errands and make a round trip. Shen Shuren arranged this idle move the day after Li Zicheng gave up the attack.

When Huang Degong heard this, he also remembered this, he actually knew the result of the coordination, but he was embarrassed to open his mouth to Shen Shuren and didn't know how to report it.

was mentioned at this moment, and he could only say ashamedly: "This matter is not reliable, my lord, you asked the last general to send someone at that time, but the letters were prepared by you personally, the wording is too blunt, Ma Shiying can play official, and he doesn't have to cooperate with you in the rules of officialdom."

If you had asked me to prepare some gifts and say something nice, it might have been different...... The last general has heard that you have a holiday with Ma Shiying's best friend Ruan Dacheng, but this is not inexplicable. ”

Shen Shuren listened, but smiled proudly: "I didn't plan to let Ma Shiying raise food for us, what I want is his uncooperative attitude."

Fengyang's side is where the central capital is located, and the officialdom must have been infiltrated into a sieve by thieves, you said that if the news of Ma Shiying's disagreement with me spreads, wouldn't Li Zicheng relax his vigilance more and more?

As for how to solve the grain route after we bypassed Yuncheng, of course, the official raised his own transportation capacity, and used sand boats from Shou County to Yingchuan to the north from Shou County, and there was always a waterway that could lead all the way to Kaifeng.

Our Shen family is responsible for the imperial court's transportation and sea transformation, and Li Zicheng, a landlubber, has no idea the power of our Shen family on the water.

We can even transport the daily consumption of grain from the vicinity of the Beijing Division and even the garrison in Liaodong, and millions of people every year, and transport military rations to the army of 70,000 or 80,000, even if it is divided into several routes, and each road has enough full capacity for backup, it is more than enough.

Before I sent out the army last month, I had secretly discussed this with my father, so that he could always keep enough sailors, sailors, warships, and transport ships ready. Because there are very few people who handle it, they don't tell outsiders, and it's very confidential.

The two ends of the canal that communicates Ruying are Yuncheng and Chen County, Yuncheng is at the intersection of the canal and Rushui, and Chen County is at the intersection of the canal and Yingchuan.

We start from Shangcai, due north is Yuncheng, northeast is Chen County, as long as the land route only brings a few days of food, caught off guard against the enemy army neglected to garrison Chen County, you can switch the grain road to Shou County to Chen County Yingchuan River Basin, Li Zicheng Ka Yuncheng what is the use?

On the other hand, Li Zicheng's garrison on the side of Yuncheng will not be able to get the grain raised east of the Yingchuan Valley because we are stuck in Chen County, and even if Li Zicheng robs the Guide Mansion, he will not be able to directly transport it to Yuncheng by water, and it will be meaningless for him to defend Yuncheng again. In this way, Yuncheng has become a lonely fruit on a withered vine, why bother to attack again, just wait for the melons to ripen and fall. ”

Shen Shuren said as he pointed out on the map, and after he finished speaking, Huang Degong was completely enlightened.

In addition, as an aside, Huang Degong may be able to easily understand Shen Shuren's plan, but most modern people who are not familiar with history and geography may have obstacles to understanding at some points -

The modern Yingchuan River and the Shahe River are both small rivers with a small flow, so many people will be surprised that "how can you take a big boat from here all the way to Bianshui and approach Kaifeng". But this problem did not exist in the Ming Dynasty.

This is because, since the Southern Song Dynasty, the Jin State in the north neglected to control the water, the Yellow River broke the embankment and diverted the route, and seized the Huai River into the sea, until the Taiping Rebellion of the Qing Dynasty in history (1855), the Yellow River in the Yuan and Ming dynasties has maintained the Huai River as the estuary.

At that time, Bianshui, Shahe and Yingchuan were all one of the several rivers in which the Yellow River flowed into Huai, and the water level and flow were much higher than those of later generations, and all of them could easily cross the big boats all the way, and it was difficult for only the army troops to intercept most of the sections of these rivers.

In contrast, the lower reaches of the Yellow River after being rerouted to the north in later generations were actually a few small rivers such as "Jishui" in this era. Because the diversion of the main stream of the Yellow River only allowed the water from the middle and upper reaches to go south. However, there is still rainfall on both sides of the lower reaches of the Yellow River that needs to be confluent, and this little bit of water will still follow the old path of Huangge, forming small water pipes such as Jishui.

Of course, most people in the 21st century do not know about these geographical common senses, but Huang Degong was a person at that time, and of course he knew it well, so he would not doubt the passability of the road of the grain transportation logistics plan mentioned by Shen Shuren.

So he said with sincere admiration: "My lord is so planned, and he is like a chess game, which is really an immortal talent!" However, if our army wants to sneak attack Chen County, and then approach Kaifeng along the Yingchuan River and Shahe River, the road will be smoother, and it will not be better than Shangcai is still on the edge of the Runan Mountains.

What if you advance on the plains, there is no danger to defend, and you are besieged by the main force of thieves and seek a decisive battle? ”

Shen Shuren shook his head speechlessly: "Didn't I say, 'Tie up a hard village, fight a dumb battle', not 'Tie a hard city', even if there is no city, we can build a village, set up a car formation, and rely on the big river to advance slowly,

We have the advantage of the navy, and when Li Zicheng besieges us, it will be impossible for us to cut off our grain route, and my grain route can pass through the camp through the big river, so he can only attack.

And you have already seen the end of the strong attack, when we have a city like Shang Cai, it is easy to withstand ten times the enemy, even if the city becomes an ordinary camp, it is no problem to withstand five times.

Moreover, the thieves have lost two games in a row, and the casualties, attrition, and morale decline are very serious. Discouraged soldiers are not available, and the further he goes, the less daring he will be to make a desperate attempt and pay a heavy price to attack. As long as we can support Kaifeng, the goal will be achieved, and we will be able to give Your Majesty an explanation. ”

Huang Degong gritted his teeth, this time he finally didn't question it again, he still had the courage, but he cherished his subordinates and didn't want to send them to death, so he had to ask clearly at the beginning.

As soon as he found that it was feasible, he immediately became very executing like a different person, thinking only about how to achieve his goals.

Huang Degong picked up the wine bowl, took a big bowl, and asked decisively: "I don't know how many soldiers and horses will be left to continue to defend Xinyang Mansion and how many soldiers and horses will be used to attack?" The last general is willing to be the vanguard of the front! ”

Shen Shuren smiled comfortingly: "The pioneer has yielded, and Mr. Huang will follow his official and lead the main force to act." In this battle, I will draw 20,000 people from the 30,000 defenders in Shangcai, and then 20,000 from the 30,000 people in Ruyang.

In addition to all the cavalry, the new musket troops, all the 300-pound light Franc machines that are easy to move, plus the transferred sailors, a total of 50,000 or 60,000 mobile troops will be sought.

Let Liu Guoneng continue to lead his headquarters, as well as our army's old-fashioned musketeers, and all the heavy artillery units that are not convenient for maneuvering, to resist the defensive line on the ground of Xinyang Mansion and drag the enemy in Yuncheng. In the past two days, the troops in Ruyang have been slowly prepared to assemble, and when the time comes, they will attack Chen County and attack Chen County three days later, firing the first shot of our army's initiative to fight. ”

"The last general obeys!" Huang Degong answered the order and went to prepare for war without mentioning it.

82 Chinese Net