Gou was a member of the imperial family in the late Ming Dynasty

Chapter 773 Trophies

Heiyunlong and Zhang Keda soon received the imperial order and immediately gathered troops to reinforce Liaodong. In Liaodong, Wu Sangui also received information from the capital. He learned that Xuanda and Jizhou Town would reinforce Liaodong and let him serve as Heiyunlong's deputy general to harass the enemy besieging Jinzhou. Wu Sangui was overjoyed and excited.

Wu Sangui already knew about the great things that Zheng Hongkui and Li You had done in Liaodong. He never imagined that these two men, with only two thousand troops, could cause unrest in the rear of the Jiannu army and achieve such amazing results.

Wu Sangui had always been conceited, and was even called the best of the younger generation in the Liao army. But after the last battle of the Great Wall, Wu Sangui fought under Wang Jinwu, and only then did he realize that there were many capable people and heroes in the world.

Wu Sangui was a veteran of many battles and was extremely brave, but he had never thought that the battle could be fought like this. Before, the Liao army, including the Guanning army, fought against the Jiannu, and each time they fought, they were pinned down by the Jiannu and often had to passively defend. Even though they had many small victories, they were basically defeated in major battles.

The low combat effectiveness of the Ming army was one reason, but the more important reason was that the Ming army's tactical application was far inferior to that of the Jiannu. Moreover, the Ming army's shortcomings, including the three tricks of tactical application, had long been understood by the enemy. In addition, whether it was the commander-in-chief or the main general, they all had the idea of ​​​​not seeking merit but avoiding mistakes after the war, which made them even more restricted.

How could such a mentality and arrangement win the battle? Wu Sangui had only vaguely sensed this before, but he did not really recognize the problem. After the Battle of the Great Wall, Wu Sangui finally understood the fundamental difference between the two sides, and also understood the difference between him and Wang Jinwu and others.

The Battle of the Great Wall can be said to be the most important step in Wu Sangui's life experience. It was this battle that greatly improved his military command ability. It was also because of this that after Zu Dashou's Jinzhou was besieged, Wu Xiang, who originally planned to send troops to rescue, was stopped by Wu Sangui. Wu Sangui keenly perceived Huang Taiji's true intentions and said that rescue must not be carried out easily under such circumstances, and that we must strictly guard against Huang Taiji's plan of besieging the city and attacking reinforcements.

This is also the reason why the Ming army in Liaodong has not suffered much loss since the siege of Jinzhou, and the two sides are still in a stalemate.

Wu Sangui volunteered to go to Ningyuan, relying on Ningyuan as a defense line to personally lead the most elite Guanning Army and Huang Taiji's troops to deal with each other, trying to find a way to open a gap and rescue Jinzhou. But all along, Wu Sangui has been unable to break the deadlock due to insufficient troops and the combat effectiveness of other Liao troops, which is also very helpless. But because of his actions, it really brought pressure to Huang Taiji, so that Huang Taiji could not be unscrupulously besieged Jinzhou, and had to send part of the troops to prevent Wu Sangui's attack, which reduced Zu Dashou's pressure in Jinzhou a lot.

As Zheng Hongkui and Li You opened up the situation in the rear of Liaodong, Wu Sangui clearly felt the weakening of the attack power of Huang Taiji's troops besieging Jinzhou. Although Wu Sangui had a hunch that this might be Huang Taiji's deliberate act to attract his troops to advance and find an opportunity to annihilate him, Wu Sangui was still bold and careful. He led his troops to launch several sneak attacks on the enemy. He did not get too entangled in the battle, and took advantage of it when he had an advantage, and left when he was not sure. This tactic was almost the same as that of the Eight Banners, which gave the Eight Banners a headache.

Compared to Wu Sangui in Liaodong, Shandong was in a jubilant mood. Li Xin, the governor of Shandong, was in a good mood these days, not only because of the battle record of Zheng Hongkui and Li You in the rear of Liaodong, but also because since they started the war in Liaodong, Shandong not only did not bear the pressure and logistical urgency brought by the war, but instead gained many benefits.

Zheng Hongkui was worthy of his pirate background. While crossing the sea to attack the rear of Liaodong, this guy also used all his pirate skills.

After repeatedly defeating the Eight Banners stationed in Liaodong and making great suffering for them by taking advantage of the convenience of boats to come and go like the wind, Zheng Hongkui and Li You secretly hit it off and looted the local area on a large scale, reaping rich rewards.

In the eyes of the Ming Dynasty, the Eight Banners were all barbarians, and from the time Nurhaci established the Later Jin until Huang Taiji changed the Later Jin into the Qing Dynasty, everyone was still poor. How could they be compared with the glamorous world of the Ming Dynasty?

But in fact, Huang Taiji was not poor, or the local Liao people and Baoyi were not rich, but the Eight Banners were very rich. You should know that from the time of Nurhaci to the present, the Jiannu relied on plundering the Ming Dynasty to develop. After so many years of plunder and war, the Eight Banners, especially the nobles and officers of the Eight Banners, had rich family wealth and owned a lot of gold, silver, jewelry and other valuables.

In addition, although Liaodong is bitter and cold, it also has products. For example, Liaodong's famous ginseng and mink fur have always been luxury goods in the Ming Dynasty. Otherwise, how could Yuan Chonghuan and his brothers, including some Shanxi merchants, make so much money by smuggling secretly? If Liaodong was a barren land with no output, how could merchants do these things?
While conducting guerrilla warfare and sabotage operations, Zheng Hongkui and Li You naturally did not forget to look for spoils of war, which included not only food and fodder needed by the army, but also a large amount of property. The battle of Fu County alone yielded a huge harvest, and the property seized in the city alone was quite a lot.

This does not include the other spoils of the soldiers. According to Zheng Hongkui's suggestion, Li You relaxed the restrictions on his subordinates and promised that they could keep a portion of all the spoils after the war as personal spoils, especially the spoils of the search after defeating the enemy. The personal portion can be kept for one-fifth, and the remaining four-fifths can be handed over. This greatly inspired the morale of the soldiers and made the morale of the troops under their command high, and the combat effectiveness doubled. The treatment of the new army was good. When Zhu Shenzhui first trained the new army, this army was formed based on the original model of the Qi Family Army. All soldiers were recruited, and the military pay was several times that of the ordinary Ming army. Moreover, it was actually issued without any deduction. The food treatment in the army was not bad. Not only could they eat enough, but they could also eat well. Once they went to the battlefield, there were additional rewards.

Such treatment plus strict training led to the success of the new army. However, the military expenditure of the new army was too high. When Zhu Shenzhui started his army, the scale of his new army was not large. Compared with the Ming army, which could easily send out tens of thousands or even hundreds of thousands of troops, his new army was pitifully small in number.

Even now, Wang Jinwu is in charge of the new army to expand and reorganize it. With the financial resources of the Ming Dynasty, they dare not raise too many troops. And the new troops going to Liaodong this time are all the elite of the new army. Fighting is as easy as eating and sleeping for them. In addition, with Zheng Hongkui and the elite cavalry troops, how can they not be strong in combat?
As the saying goes, if the Jurchens have less than 10,000 men, they are invincible. This saying has long been spread all over the world, but in fact the Ming army was not invincible. There is even a joke that "the Ming army is invincible if it is not fully paid." Although this is a joke, it is not false. The Ming army owed countless men wages, and even more of them did not have enough food to eat when they were not fighting. Such troops could not even meet the normal training requirements, so how could they have any combat effectiveness on the battlefield?
It's not that the Ming army was incapable of fighting, but because of morale and combat effectiveness problems caused by various reasons. In history, when the Ming army surrendered to the bandits and even the Qing Dynasty, and no longer had to worry about food and wages, the combat effectiveness that the Ming army unleashed was simply jaw-dropping, not to mention the new army commanded by Li You.

Stimulated by the rich spoils of war and the harvest from the war, the morale of the troops under Zheng Hongkui and Li You became higher and higher, and they were more eager to fight. And because of this tactic, they did not have to consider any consequences, and they could move freely in the rear of the Liaodong Jiannu and harvested a lot.

With one victory after another, the fleet originally used for sea crossing operations was divided into two parts by Zheng Hongkui. A large proportion of the fleet continued to cooperate with the army in combat, so as to be ready to transport troops at any time. A small part of the fleet was used as transport ships. These transport ships did not transport supplies from Shandong to Liaodong to meet the needs of the army, but instead continuously transported supplies from Liaodong to Shandong. In less than a month, more than ten ships of supplies were transported back. When Li Xin got the news and went to the dock to check it out, he was so shocked to see the supplies transported ashore from the ship that his glasses almost fell to the ground.

Ginseng, mink fur, fungus, horses, food, gold, silver, and jewelry are all innumerable. These are all good things! I don't know where the two guys got so many from.

The Ming army had always spent huge amounts of money on each war and had to bear extremely severe logistical pressure. However, this time, the sea crossing operation really opened Li Xin's eyes. Not only was there no pressure in Shandong, but so many things were even shipped back.

"Your Excellency, Governor, our Marshal Zheng said that we need your help in dealing with these things. Marshal Zheng and General Li also have a letter for me to bring to you." Zheng Hongkui's subordinate, the one who landed at Lushunkou, Zheng Laodao, saluted towards Li Xin and handed him a letter.

Li Xin took the letter, opened the envelope and started reading. After a while he burst into laughter. These two guys were not going to fight, but to do business, and it was a business with no capital.

In the letter, Zheng Hongkui and Li You told Li Xin that these supplies were only the first batch and more supplies would be delivered later.

The transported materials were entrusted to Li Xin to sell in Shandong. Isn't Shandong preparing to open the sea now? There are many merchants from Shanxi and other regions in Shandong. Li Xin can gather these merchants and sell to them in the name of the government. One third of the money obtained will belong to Li Xin, and the other two thirds will belong to Zheng Hongkui and Li You.

It's not that Zheng Hongkui and Li You wanted to take advantage of Li Xin, it's mainly because part of this two-thirds were spoils of war by the soldiers. These spoils of war had been promised to all the soldiers and would be distributed after the war, but now Li Xin was just holding them on their behalf.

The remaining part belonged to Zheng Hongkui, Li You and military officers of all levels. In addition, there was some money as a tribute to the court. It must be said that these two guys had made a good calculation and the division was quite reasonable. Li Xin couldn't help laughing and shaking his head when he saw it.

Li Xin was not sure whether to laugh or cry when he was entrusted with such a task as the governor of Shandong. However, Li Xin did not refuse the task. In his opinion, it was not a bad thing. Not only did he not spend any money on the war, but he also gained so much. How could it not be a good thing? Moreover, Li Xin was not a bookworm. His personality and style were completely different from those of other scholars. In addition, Li Xin was a man of both literary and military skills. How could he care about the secular views?
Li Xin immediately asked Zheng Laodao to go back and tell Zheng Hongkui and Li You that he would take care of this matter, and asked them to fight hard in Liaodong and make the Jiannu suffer as much as possible. When he returned to the government office, Li Xin had people spread the news and contacted the merchants in Shandong. How could those merchants sit still when they heard about such a good thing? In less than half a day, they came one after another, all of them were very interested in the Liaodong materials described by Li Xin.

(End of this chapter)