Whether to withdraw or not, this matter is not to be decided now, Pang Tong must at least defend until Chen Zhi leads the troops to help.

In case Pang Tong withdrew in advance, the scouts who sent Chen Zhi to notify Chen Zhi failed to notify him in time for some reasons, and Chen Zhi still led the army to stupidly go straight to the public security, which would be a big trouble.

Therefore, Pang Tong pondered, as long as he could hold it, he would try his best to stick to the public security, and wait for Chen Dao's reinforcements to arrive, and then decide whether to retreat to Jiangling.

And this guard is another five days.

Zhu Ran, who was outside the city, was still stepping up his attack on the public security at his own pace.

Although Zhu Ran was ready to fight the public security to the end, the difficulty of attacking the city was a bit too much for Zhu Ran to imagine.

It has been half a month since the siege began, and its own casualties have been about 8,000 people, but until now, the soldiers of the Eastern Wu Army have still not found a way to break through the city wall.

Although with the help of the siege equipment prepared in advance, the Eastern Wu army could reduce casualties close to the city wall, but once they entered the city wall hand-to-hand combat, the Eastern Wu soldiers were never able to break through the interception of the defenders and establish a sufficiently stable landing point on the city wall.

This shows that the defenders in the city still have enough morale and combat strength, and the public security guards also have a very good command level, which can completely block the attack of all the Eastern Wu soldiers on the three city walls.

On several occasions, Zhu Ran did have the intention to copy General Lü Meng's tactics, divide his troops to besiege the public security, and break into Jiangling with his own light troops, but the consequences of doing so, Lü Meng has already proved to Zhu Ran.

It's hard for you to say that General Lü Meng finally died of illness, not because of the depression caused by the defeat of this battle and finally did not take the public security, Zhu Ran really did not dare to attack Jiangling.

Therefore, Zhu Ran repeatedly warned himself that he must not be impetuous, after all, the strategic purpose of this dispatch of troops is different from that of General Lu Meng before.

The main purpose of this attack on Jingzhou is to attract the Jingzhou army to come back for reinforcements, and the secondary purpose is to capture Jiangling Obviously, from the perspective of the purpose of this strategy, Emperor Sun Quan of Wu did not mean to completely turn his face with the Han Dynasty.

If it is considered from the perspective of personal combat merits, Zhu Ran certainly hopes to be able to lead the troops to conquer Jiangling and prove his ability. But Zhu Ran is a very sober-minded general in the end, not the kind of reckless man who is easy to get up in battle.

Rather than taking the risk of attacking Gangneung, it is better to take the public security first.

In today's Jingnan, the Han army occupies the two counties of Wuling and Lingling, but the soldiers and horses of these two counties have already been transferred back to Gong'an and Jiangling four months ago.

The only bridgehead that the Han army still retains on the south bank of the Yangtze River is the public security, which is not only a barrier to defend Jiangling, but also a foothold for the Han army to return to Jingnan in the future.

Therefore, it is also very important strategically to capture the public security and clear the last stronghold city of the Han in Jingnan.

As for Jiangling, it is naturally best to attack it, and if it can't be attacked, it is not an unacceptable result to capture the public security and take it all on the south bank of Chang'an.

Thinking of this, Zhu Ran decided that he still wanted to continue to strengthen the offensive and seize the public security.

But. Soon, Zhu Ran received a not-so-good news.

The news was transmitted through Jiangxia County, and it has a certain timeliness, but it still has a lot of reference value for Zhu Ran, who is now fighting in the public security.

The Jingzhou army finally came back to help.

This should have been good news, and the biggest purpose of this strategy was to force the Jingzhou army to come back to help.

But the problem is that the military information transmitted from Jiangxia County told Zhu Ran that although the Jingzhou army came back, it only came back about 20,000 people.

Among them, 10,000 people returned to Xiangyang, and the other 10,000 continued to go south, if nothing else, they should have gone to support Gangneung.

This news was transmitted back by Zhou Yu on the front line of Xiangfan, and there is no doubt about its reliability, and Zhou Yu's judgment is rarely wrong.

Therefore, along with this military information transmitted to Zhu Ran's side, there was also a secret letter from Sun Quan.

In the secret letter, Sun Quan emphasized that no matter whether or not the 10,000 Jingzhou troops returned to help, he hoped that Zhu Ran would conquer the public security as soon as possible, and then cross the river to the north and attack Jiangling.

Obviously, Sun Quan was not very satisfied with only attracting 20,000 Jingzhou troops to come back, and still hoped that Zhu Ran's side could create pressure on Jiangling and force more Jingzhou troops to come back.

From Sun Quan's standpoint, it is actually very easy to understand.

Forcing the Jingzhou army to return to help is Sun Quan's ultimate goal, but the problem is that the Zhou Yu army that attacked Xiangyang died 20,000 people, and with the 10,000 Jingzhou army returning to Xiangyang, Wen Ping also had 20,000 defenders in his hands, as well as the Xiangfan defense system in hand. No matter how powerful Zhou Yu is, he will not be able to pose a threat to Xiangyang in a short period of time.

In this case, the only place where the Jingzhou army can feel threatened and have to withdraw is Jiangling. Zhu Ran must come out with oppressive results in Gangneung.

For this reason, Sun Quan also told Zhu Ran that if he felt that there were difficulties or insufficient troops, he could write back to him, and he would find a way to help Zhu Ran solve these problems.

Hawkers, although he said so, with Zhu Ran's understanding of Sun Quan, if he really replied to the letter and made a request, it would not help at all except to embarrass Sun Quan.

Therefore, you still have to rely on yourself and continue to attack.

At the same time, in the public security city, Pang Tong, who was still holding on, also received a secret letter sent by Shi Bao from Jiangbei.

Of course, Shi Bao knew that the public security was now besieged by the Eastern Wu Army, so he hoped to know the specific situation of the public security now, and whether it could continue to hold on.

If they can hold on, it will naturally be the best, but if they feel that it is difficult, Shi Bao also suggested that Zhang Ren and Li Qiu let them try to hold on for another five days, and then they can lead the troops to retreat across the river from the direction of Yidu County and retreat to Jiangling.

The reason why Shi Bao hoped that the public security would continue to hold out for five days was because Shi Bao received a notice from the messenger sent by Wen Ping in advance, knowing that it would take about eight days for Liao Hua to lead 10,000 troops to Jiangling. Counting the time it took for the messenger to secretly cross the river and deliver the secret message, Shi Bao judged that if the public security held on for another five days, the reinforcements from Jiangling would be in place in time, so at that time, it would not be of much significance for the public security to continue to hold on.

If you can defend it, it is naturally better to defend it, after all, it is a bridgehead passage to the south of the Yangtze River, and it is in your own hands, and you can save a lot of things when you counterattack in the future.

But if you really can't hold it, Shibao is suggesting, it is better to save your troops, take the initiative to abandon the defense, retreat to Jiangling, and block the Wu army with Jiangling's city defense.

There's really no need to fight hard.

This secret letter was finally successfully delivered to Pang Tong, who was stationed in the public security, and Pang Tong recognized Shi Bao's judgment very much.

To be honest, if Jiangling can be guaranteed not to be lost, the public security will not lose it, Pang Tong really doesn't care much.

Pang Tongtong has always been engaged in strategy, and he has always considered problems from a strategic angle, and as long as he can win the entire campaign, he can weigh the gains and losses of some interests.

But Zhang Ren disagreed.

First of all, Zhang Ren is not engaged in strategy, he is a general who guards the city, and the gains and losses of this city are his responsibilities.

Secondly, Zhang Ren did not want to oppose Pang Tong's initiative to give up the public security, he just hoped that he could stay and stick to the public security city until the last moment.

This is his duty, and it is also his last concern.

Zhang Ren is old and sick, and he is very sick.

As a general, he didn't want to die on the march because of the fatigue of the journey. It's better to let him live and die with the public security city, so that his last wish can be fulfilled.

The old general's last wish moved Li Qiu and Jiang Wei, who were also military generals, but Pang Tong said that he couldn't understand.

After all, the way of thinking of civilian officials and military generals is not very similar.

The decision to abandon the public security was made by Pang Tong, and he was also mentally prepared to be responsible.

can leave Zhang Ren to defend the city, lead the troops to retreat, and finally let Zhang Ren, an old general who has made meritorious contributions to the country, fall into a "defeated and dead" end, this responsibility Pang Tong can't afford.

Therefore, even if Zhang Ren asked for this, Pang Tong was still only vague and did not agree, and turned around and sent someone to find Zhang Ren's eldest son Zhang Lin, asking him to go home overnight to get ready, take the old general's frame, and evacuate the public security first.

Whether it is to go to Gangneung, or to go upriver to Padang County, anyway, the old general can't die in the battle in Gong'an City.

After arranging all this, Pang Tong began to make formal calculations. Chen still has a few days to reach the Public Security City.

As long as Chen Dao's reinforcements arrive, it will be the time for Pang Tong to lead his troops to break through.

(End of chapter)