The situation deteriorated instantly, and it was no longer up to the bear to continue to wait and see.

In the seventeenth year of Chongzhen, on December 9, the two hundred and forty-sixth year of Jianwen (1644), Prince Xiong finally agreed to ascend the throne and claim the emperor, and the country name was Daming, and the following year was changed to the first year of Xinghan. The capital of Myanmar and Yue Palace, with Guilin Mansion as the accompanying capital.

The left prime minister Wan Lian, the right prime minister Miao Sanguan, the military department secretary Peng Wuying, the official department secretary Zhang Yuxiu, the criminal department secretary Hou Mingde, the household department secretary Sun Xueyi, and the Ministry of Industry Meng Fan.

With Lan'er as the queen, Yuan Liqing as Concubine Wen, Yan Erniang as Concubine Ming, Miao Ruolan as Concubine Lan, Muto Lan as Concubine Li, and Mandeli as Concubine Zhen.

Prince Xiong's ascension to the throne as emperor is the same as when he was the prince, and he also did not sacrifice to heaven and earth.

Because he has never believed in God, and now that the situation is precarious, it is not at all the time to add officials to knighthood and enjoy peace.

The purpose of being called emperor is for the overall strategic situation, mainly for outsiders to see, so the only proclamation that Prince Xiong announced to be the emperor is a "Asking for the Female Zhen":

"I was a slave and a killer. Mixed in the grass, hidden in the folk. Interpret the original meaning of chivalry, I don't know what this life is. There are two or three loyal and brave people, who go against the ear and the words of advice, and I know the true meaning of chivalry. ”

"But I am very difficult, the mountains and rivers are broken, and it is the time when the loyal ministers and righteous people are willing to axe. I am a descendant of Emperor Jianwen, and I should stand up to the difficulties, turn the tide of the tide, and the whole country will fall. ”

"The ancients said: The rise and fall of the world is the responsibility of the husband. Fang Jin's Jurchen slaves destroyed my Great Wall, destroyed my society, lost my inheritance, and slaughtered my people. The sin is as big as the sky, and it is difficult to write about it, and it is not enough to appease the world unless it is destroyed. All my subjects in the Central Plains, whether they are obedient or disobedient, have the important task of slaughtering Fannu and reviving the Han family. ”

"As for the number of classics and forgetting the sect, the enemies of the shameful affairs are all traitors who should destroy the nine clans in the Ming Dynasty, and everyone will be punished. Today's Ming Ge reward is as good as left: those who kill Fan Wencheng, Hong Chengchou, Zu Dashou, Shang Kexi, Geng Jingzhong, Kong Youde, Wu Sangui and other traitors will be rewarded with 10,000 gold, and they will be awarded the rank of general and general. Spread the world, salty and knowledgeable. ”

Prince Xiong finally decided to ascend the throne and become emperor, not because he had figured out all the problems, but because there was nothing that made him happy in the past six months.

In June of the seventeenth year of Chongzhen, the whole Hebei was a lone army fighting against the Qing soldiers. Although the Dashun regime took some measures to ease the contradictions and tried to stabilize the situation, it had no practical effect. There are two main reasons for this:

The first reason is that Li Zicheng killed too few people after entering the capital, and Niu Jinxing wantonly used the Ming Dynasty to demote officials and generals. The Dashun army fought alone against the elite cavalry of the Manchu Qing Dynasty and lost nine battles in a row, and those generals rebelled one after another. Because the Manchu Qing Dynasty entered the customs, the banner was "to destroy the rebellion and avenge Emperor Chongzhen." ”

Li Zicheng is not a person who cannot tolerate others, and he rarely pursues responsibility for those who disobey him in person, let alone kills people in anger.

Li Guozhen, the uncle of Xiangcheng, who was in charge of the defense of the Beijing Division, refused to kneel after being arrested, but stood with his back to Li Zicheng.

Li Zicheng was a little annoyed: "Why don't you kneel?"

Li Guozhen replied proudly: "I am a minister of the Ming Dynasty, and there is no reason to kneel down to you!"

Li Zicheng threatened: "If you don't kneel, you will be put to death!"

Li Guozhen replied angrily: "Whatever you want!"

Li Zicheng threatened again: "If you don't kneel, your whole family will be executed!" A: It's still up to you.

When Li Zicheng said that if he didn't kneel, he would put the people of the whole city to death, Li Guozhen knelt down, but he still knelt in the opposite direction, and he still said: "I kneel for the people of the city, not to you!"

For this kind of prisoner of war who repeatedly contradicted him, Li Zicheng did not execute him, but temporarily imprisoned him.

Because of this, there were thousands of military generals in Beijing, less than 30 of whom died for the Ming Dynasty, but more than 1,000 of them were re-appointed officials.

The second reason is that there are 43,000 remnants of the former enemy general Liu Zongmin's subordinates, and each of them has a gold ticket in his pocket, with a maximum of several thousand gold and a minimum of two or three hundred gold. A homeless person is a homeless person, and now that he has money, he wants to go home and enjoy his happiness, and he doesn't want to continue fighting and lose his life.

In July, the Dashun army was defeated again and again in Hebei, and the 700,000-strong army was already less than 400,000, and was forced to cross the Yellow River south and return to Chang'an.

The 130,000-strong army of Prince Azig of Ying, Wu Sangui, King of Pingxi, and Shang Kexi pursued closely, and Li Zicheng still could not gain a foothold in Chang'an. Soon gave up Chang'an, passed through Lantian and Shangzhou, and went to Wuguan.

In September, after Li Zicheng arrived in Pingyang, he regrouped more than 350,000 troops near Chang'an and prepared to launch a full-scale counterattack against the Qing army.

Duoduo urged Kong Youde, Geng Zhongming and other Ming generals to surrender to the Ming Dynasty, commanding more than 150,000 people of the Han White Banner and the Han Red Banner, and according to Dolgon's orders, they formed an army on the Eastern Route to attack Shandong, preparing to take the small court of the Southern Ming Dynasty that had just been established in one fell swoop.

In mid-October, the westward advance of the Qing army under the command of Azig, Wu Sangui, and Shang Kexi was blocked, forcing Dolgon to change his original plan: suspend the use of troops against the Southern Ming Dynasty, send Duoduo to reinforcements, and ask to rescue Huaiqing first, then take Tongguan, and then attack Chang'an with Azig's troops, thus forming a two-sided attack on Henan and Shaanxi.

On 20 October, Li Zicheng's Dashun army and Duoduo's troops, totaling more than 600,000 people, set up a battlefield 20 miles west of Hangu Pass and 20 miles east of Tongguan.

On the 29th, the Battle of Tongguan began. Because Azig and Duoduo concentrated more than 400 cannons to bombard, Li Zicheng's main force of 160,000 people under the leadership of Liu Zongmin, although they were fearless and repeatedly rushed and killed, but the losses were extremely great, and the main force was not left with three out of ten.

In November, Zhang Xianzhong changed the yuan to "Dashun", took Chengdu as Xijing, and took the original Ming Shu palace as the palace, and ascended the throne as the emperor.

The Great Western Kingdom officially became the fourth state power established with Li Zicheng of Chang'an, the Hongguang Emperor of the Southern Ming Dynasty in Nanjing, and the Qing Dynasty, which had already entered Beijing.

After Zhang Xianzhong became emperor, of course, he had to expand his territory, but there was no choice in the direction in which he could expand, and he couldn't go south or east, so Zhang Xianzhong chose to go north into Hanzhong to attack Li Zicheng's rear.

Li Zicheng didn't expect Zhang Xianzhong to stab himself at this time.

Faced with the three-way attack of Azig, Duoduo, and Zhang Xianzhong, Li Zicheng was forced to abandon Guanzhong and go south.

This was a huge strategic mistake and a desperate move.

Since the establishment of the Dashun Army, it has fought against the Ming Guards, and has not been fully mentally prepared for the field cavalry shooting ability of the Manchu cavalry, nor has it found a better way to deal with it.

As a result, the Dashun army retreated south to the Henan Plain and became the world of the Manchu cavalry and archery troops. The two armies fought eight large-scale battles, and the Dashun army suffered a crushing defeat under the repeated onslaught of the Manchu cavalry and archery troops.

However, what really dealt a fatal blow to the Dashun army was not the elite cavalry of the Manchu Qing Dynasty, but the prime minister Niu Jinxing, who saw the wind and turned the rudder, and fled.

Niu Jinxing was the most relied on military advisor in the later period of Li Zicheng, participated in the decision-making process of all major military aircraft events, and mastered the plan for the deployment of all troops.

Song Xiance was marginalized, and Niu Jinxing defected again, which was Li Zicheng's retribution for improper employment, and also made all his deployments known to the world.

While the defection of military divisions undermined morale, the danger of leaking secrets in the deployment of troops was even greater. The Dashun army suddenly became a rout situation in which it was unilaterally pursued by the elite cavalry, and could only desperately flee to the southern Huguang area.

That is, when Li Zicheng lost Xiangyang City and Nanyang City, and Liu Zongmin's forward troops had retreated to Lishan County (now Dawu County), Xiong Chu knew that he could not continue to wait and see.

The current situation is that although Li Zicheng's Dashun army still has hundreds of thousands of people, it is scattered in the vast area of Shaanxi, Henan, and Huguang, and it is no longer possible to form a joint force to resist the Manchu Qing Dynasty head-on.

Prince Xiong immediately announced his ascension to the throne as emperor, with the aim of making the division famous and at the same time completing the strategic deployment as much as possible.

"Now is the time to do so, we need to form two battalions to form a corner, and prepare for the cruel situation in the future. ”

Prince Xiong didn't have any emperor's shelf, let alone wear any dragon robes, and was still wearing a white shirt to hold the last strategic meeting in the Yingwu Palace.

"Miao Sanguan is the main general, Peng Wuying and Shen Xiyue are the deputy generals, set up the Changsha battalion, immediately recover the entire territory of Guangxi, make every effort to manage the Jiangbei Huguang region, unify the command of the troops in Huguang, Guangxi, and Nanyue provinces, and complete the deployment of troops as much as possible. ”

"Wan Lian is the main general, Zhang Yuxiu and Hou Mingde are the deputy generals, set up a Guizhou battalion, immediately recover the entire territory of Yunnan and Guizhou, Kunming Muwangfu, Lijiang Wangfu and all their Tusi regimes are destroyed, unified command of the troops in the southwest of the Burma-Yue Palace, and complete the deployment of troops as much as possible. ”

"We don't have time to waste, the vast area west of Poyang Lake, east of Kuizhou, and south of the Great River is the territory of our Ming Dynasty, and it is also the battlefield of our decisive battle with the Manchu Tartars. All forces that run counter to our strategic goals will be eradicated. ”

"It should be noted that whether it is Zhu Youxiang's Hongguang Imperial Court in Nanjing, Li Zicheng's Dashun Army, or Zhang Xianzhong's Daxi Army, everyone does not interfere in each other's internal affairs. As long as we fight against the Manchu Tartars, we can cooperate. If you dare to disadvantage our Ming, you will be annihilated. ”

"In the process of recovering Guangxi, Yunnan, and Guizhou, all Tusi were banned and all slaves were eliminated. The original local court officials were not killed. Those who are willing to stay and continue to do things, and those who have no bad deeds after review can continue to stay in office. For those who want to leave, they will be released with a customs clearance document. ”

"For a long time to come, I will be in Guilin Mansion, Miao Sanguan will be in Hengyang, and Wan Lian will be in Guiyang Mansion. Our main enemy was the Manchu Tartars and hostile forces, and our main strategic goal was to stabilize the Dajiang front. Now let Master Meng of the Ministry of Industry talk about the situation. ”

Xiong Chu concisely explained the overall deployment for the future, and the next thing is, of course, the equipment of the troops. If you can't stop the Manchu cavalry, it's all empty talk.

"Your Majesty, ladies and gentlemen, in the past three years, our craftsman battalion has made full use of the resources of Yunnan and the southwestern coastal areas, coupled with the intensive study of the firearms of the British, Dutch, and Portuguese, and has made great progress in the improvement of bird guns and artillery. ”

Meng Fan spread out the thick account book, shook his head and said: "Through the efforts of Daoist Wuyazi and his more than 100 junior brothers, the power of gunpowder has been greatly improved, so the bird gun has improved, from the flint bird gun to the impact bird gun. ”

"Because of the increased power of gunpowder, there are now two kinds of birds and insects: one is to spray 45 grains of iron sand, mainly for surface strikes. One is to shoot a projectile, which is mainly to shoot an important target at a fixed point. ”

"The train invented by Sun Chuanting actually has its benefits. It's just that they lack animal power, so it is inconvenient to move. On the basis of the original artillery carriages, our craftsman battalion combined with Sun Chuanting's train to improve the artillery, the cannon is lighter in weight and has a longer firing range, which is specially designed to deal with the enemy's cavalry. ”

"The current gun carriage has increased in size, and is uniformly equipped with a 480-pound four-inch caliber cannon, which adopts the impact firing method and is equipped with 12 charge guns. Using the principle of gallows on a warship, a winch was installed on the gun carriage, which made it possible to fire twelve guns in a row in a very short time, striking at a distance of five miles. ”

"Because of the abundance of horns and tendons here, our ballista carts have a longer range, firing twelve copper crossbow arrows at a time, which is more powerful than before, and the main purpose is to strike at the enemy's charging group infantry. ”

Looking at Sun Xueyi and Peng Wuying, Xiong Chu smiled and said, "Lord Sun and Lord Peng, Lord Meng has solved the equipment problem. What is the current situation of your reserve army? I know that you have been planning for today, and now you have reached the last moment of exhaustion. ”

"The Manchu Tartars wanted to enter the Central Plains from Nurhachi, and now Dolgon has moved his base camp to Jingshi. Once a full-scale war begins, it will certainly not be possible to resolve the battle in a short time. We need to be prepared for a long war, and it would be bad if the war could not be sustained if there were not enough troops to replenish it. ”

This book was first published from 17K Novel Network, and the first time to see the genuine content!I734