My younger brother Zhuge Liang

Chapter 378 Zhao Yun: You don’t want me to fake defeat again, do you?
Half an hour later, at Hefei parade ground.

Zhao Yun and Gan Ning each led their officers and tens of thousands of soldiers, formed a square formation of one hundred by one hundred men, and stood on the left and right, waiting for Liu Bei's oath-taking and inspection.

The army was in neat order, with flags flying. The 10,000 men in Zhao Yun's formation all wore red outer robes, while Gan Ning's 10,000 men all wore black outer robes. The colors were all brand new, and from a distance it looked like the battle was in full swing.

The origin of the idiom "Ruhuo Rudu" originally comes from a military parade. It was an allusion to the military parade held at Huangchi, when King Fuchai of Wu went north to attack Qi over 700 years ago. Fuchai led 30,000 troops and arranged them into three 100-by-100 square formations of 10,000 people, and each square was pure white, pure red, and pure black.

"Ruhuo" describes the pure red square formation, and "Rutu" describes the pure white square formation. However, the Han Dynasty did not favor white, and Liu Bei did not use the cheap white square formation since it was not a mourning period.

Fuchai could afford such a big deal in his past, so it would be easy for Liu Bei, who is much richer than Fuchai, to gather 20,000 men, dress them in new clothes and go to war.

Of course, there are a total of 60,000 to 70,000 troops stationed in the Hefei War Zone. At that time, more than 50,000 troops will be sent out, and the rest will be responsible for defending the territory. Selecting 20,000 people from 60,000 to 70,000 people to wear brand new clothes means that the people selected are at least the top 30% of the elite in the army.

The armor-wearing rate of these troops was also very high. Zhao Yun and Gan Ning's phalanxes each had 3,000 front-row soldiers wearing iron armor. Among them, 1,000 soldiers each wore the newly-made one-piece forged breastplates that had been manufactured over the past year or so.

Another two thousand men were wearing the relatively old-style steel-filled armor, which was gradually equipped to the troops more than a year before the Battle of Guandu, and it has been four years since then.

These steel-filled armors are not all exactly the same in shape. Some later models have been adjusted based on years of battlefield experience, such as adding one-piece forged curved shoulder guards to protect the shoulders and upper arms.

The traditional steel armor of the Eastern Han Dynasty was mainly "Liangdang armor", which had no shoulder protection, similar to an "iron vest". It was not until 20 years later, when Zhuge Liang was in power in Shu, that the "Liangdang armor" was upgraded to "Tongxiu armor" to strengthen the protection of the shoulders and arms. Now it can be considered to be discovered and deployed in advance.

All these soldiers wearing metal armor are equipped with horse-slashing swords or one-piece forged steel-filled long spears. The swords and spears are so numerous that it is a spectacular sight.

Only the troops in the back row without armor would use old-fashioned spears or serve as sword and shield soldiers or archers.

……

Although these troops all belonged to Liu Bei, Liu Bei himself had not seen such a neat and majestic military appearance for several years.

After all, holding a military parade is very expensive. The soldiers have to be rewarded with a few days of good food, and then they have to do some extra training and training, and they have to give out some small rewards to boost morale. No one would deliberately ask the army to line up in such an orderly manner for no reason.

Liu Bei suppressed his inner excitement and watched the army's routine formations, marching, and assassination drills with a solemn expression, then waved his hand calmly.

There was a military judge nearby who helped wave the military flag and convey Liu Bei's order. When the soldiers in the distance saw the flag, they returned to silence within a dozen seconds.

Although the discipline was still worse than that of modern armies, the reaction was slower, and they could not be completely quiet, but at least no one was talking to each other, which was very disciplined for the ancient army.

Liu Bei cleared his throat, took a wooden megaphone, and shouted a few short oaths with full energy, which were nothing more than "The treacherous ministers stole my life, the lord was deceived, the thief Cao was unjust and cruel to the people."
Then, he ordered people to slaughter the black bull. Liu Bei personally cut off the bull's ears with a knife. He collected some of the blood spurting out from the broken ears, smeared it on his nose and beard, and announced that he would go on a Northern Expedition.

The long speeches were meant for the generals, as I had just said in the lobby of the General of Chariots and Cavalry's Mansion. Now, when facing the soldiers being reviewed, the speech must be brief and clear, and the content must be popular.

Ordinary soldiers could not understand the flowery oaths, and now without better loudspeakers, every word of the oath had to be shouted out with all their might, and Liu Bei's throat could not sustain too many words.

After the ceremony, all the soldiers shouted like thunder and waves: "Northern Expedition Cao thief! Support the Han Dynasty! Northern Expedition Cao thief! Support the Han Dynasty!"

Liu Bei raised his hands, and the flag officer next to him waved the military flag vigorously to calm the army down again.

Afterwards, Liu Bei issued a military order on the spot: "Zhao Yun, listen to my orders!"

Zhao Yun took a few steps forward and stood out from the crowd: "I am here!"

Liu Bei raised his sleeves and said with emotion: "I have found out that the commander of Cao's army defending Xu Huai is Cao Ren. He is stationed in Fuli with tens of thousands of mercenaries. Fuli is located between Shouchun and Xiapi. Now is the perfect time to gather a large army and attack from two directions. First, kill Cao Ren and cut off one of Cao's arms! After that, Xu Huai can be conquered by issuing an order.

"Zilong, I order you to lead 30,000 elite troops to advance northward along Yicheng and Longkang along the Woshui River, and then attack Fuli directly! In Xiapi, Yunchang will also lead the troops from Xuzhou to attack Cao Ren southwest along the Suishui River and through Suiling, and make sure to encircle and annihilate the main forces of Cao's army in Xuhuai!"

After hearing the order, Zhao Yun's face changed slightly, and he subconsciously wanted to persuade: "My lord, Cao Ren is good at defending. If we hold on, it may take several months..."

Liu Bei's expression changed slightly, without further explanation, he just deliberately repeated: "Zhao Yun, listen to my orders!"

The subtext is already very clear. He came to announce the order, not to discuss with the generals who were to execute the order. How could he take back the order in such a situation?
Zhao Yun was startled and wanted to grit his teeth and persuade him again, but when he saw Zhuge Liang glaring at him, he suddenly realized that there might be another reason. Zhao Yun only explained a few words and then gave up, pretending to be unwilling to accept the order.

"I will obey your orders!"

Not to mention, this is very consistent with Zhao Yun's character, and others would not suspect that he is acting.

In history, after Cao Cao's death and Cao Pi's usurpation of the Han Dynasty, Liu Bei also proclaimed himself emperor and immediately announced his intention to avenge Guan Yu. At that oath-taking ceremony, only Zhao Yun dared to argue in public on such a grand occasion.

Although Zhao Yun's protest also led to Zhao Yun's career becoming increasingly unsuccessful. After all, in real history, such objections in a grand oath-taking ceremony would be more or less ignored. After all, governing a country is not equal to brotherhood, it still depends on the occasion. After Zhao Yun received the order, the rest of the process was easy.

Liu Bei called Gan Ning again, and Gan Ning quickly responded: "I am here!"

Liu Bei: "I order you to lead the Huaihe River navy north to the Woshui River, attack along Longkang and Chengfu, threaten Cao Cao's lair Qiao County, protect Zilong, and block Cao Cao's army south of the Woshui River from returning to defend Fuli!"

Gan Ning: "I obey your command!"

Afterwards, Liu Bei focused on the major tasks and let the minor ones go, roughly assigning tasks to several generals above the rank of General of the Central Army and Colonel. He would not personally take care of the lower levels, and let Zhao Yun and Gan Ning make the arrangements on their own.

Finally, Liu Bei announced a generous reward for the soldiers, and the military parade and oath-taking were considered over. There is no need to elaborate on the remaining formalities.

……

That night, the soldiers returned to the camp and enjoyed themselves with wine and meat. After tonight, when the army officially set out, ordinary soldiers were not allowed to drink.

But after Zhao Yun and Gan Ning returned to the camp, they felt a sense of worry.

Fortunately, Zhao Yun didn't have to wait long before Zhuge Liang arrived at Zhao Yun's camp, and Zhao Yun immediately asked someone to prepare wine to entertain him.

After the guards had laid out the wine and food, Zhao Yun became alert and signaled everyone to leave the central army tent. Then he sincerely asked for advice: "Just now in the afternoon when we swore to march north, you tried to stop me with your eyes. There must be a reason. Could it be that the lord's public announcement that he wanted to fight a decisive battle with Cao Ren's main force and seek to annihilate it was just a false move?"

Zhuge Liang smiled calmly: "Of course it was a feint - this was also the strategy that my elder brother and I had discussed in advance. How could we make such a mistake? Cao Ren is good at defending to the death. Although his military strength is not as good as ours, if he defends Fuli with 50,000 or 60,000 people without fighting, it will be very difficult.

Although our army has slightly more people, it is not twice as many as the enemy. The military strategy says that if there are ten of them, surround them; if there are five, attack them. Even if our army has better weapons and armor and more sophisticated siege equipment, at most we can make up for the difference in strength by one, and we still cannot break the city by force within three to five months.

Moreover, Fuli is located on the Sui River, which is not low in terrain and has insufficient water volume, so it is impossible to imitate Cao Cao's actions in breaking through the Zhang River in Hebei and destroying Yecheng.

If the situation gets delayed for too long, Cao's army will first break Yecheng in Hebei and then return to rescue. At the same time, Cao's army on the left and right wings of Fuli, that is, the garrisons in Pengcheng and Huaixi, can also threaten our flanks, which will be bad at that time.

Therefore, my elder brother and I had discussed this before the war and decided on a goal: As for the Xuhuai Defense Zone, time is limited and we must temporarily lure the enemy troops away from the dangerous areas, then seize the land and clip their wings.

Because there must be a trade-off between destroying the enemy and seizing territory. If a defense zone is difficult to deploy a large army, it is very time-consuming and laborious to attack one place after another. In contrast, the most reliable method is to pretend to attack a key node on the plain, lure out the enemy troops in the dangerous places on the left and right, go to rescue that key point, then cut off the enemy's way back, and then seize those empty and dangerous places.

The area of Runan and Huaixi is close to the northern foothills of the Tongbai Mountains and faces the Huai River. Compared with the vast plains of Huaibei, Runan is such a dangerous place.

Although the geographical location of Pengcheng City is not strategic, there is a big lake in the north, Si River in the south, and Mangdang Mountain in the east after passing Xiao and Pei.

These two strategic locations on both wings of Fuli are our real targets.

I didn't tell you this before, because it wasn't time to start the war, and I was afraid that we might not be able to keep it secret. I didn't expect you to take the initiative to argue with the lord during the oath-taking review today. It's a good thing. When the oath-taking is under the spotlight, there may not be traitors, but there are many people and many mouths, so leaks are inevitable.

After a few days, this news reached Cao Ren's ears. If we could make Cao Ren also feel that we are sincerely looking for his main force for a decisive battle, and thus concentrate the troops of Runan and Pengcheng to the center of Fuli, it would be most beneficial to our army.

However, we still have to practice the attack on Fuli for at least ten days or half a month, so that Cao's army can have enough time to mobilize reinforcements."

After listening to Zhuge Liang's comprehensive analysis, Zhao Yun finally felt relieved.

It turned out that this time they pretended to break through the center and forced the enemy troops on the left and right wings to come to the rescue, but in fact they were cutting off the return routes of the reinforcements on the left and right wings, and then taking the dangerous territories on the enemy's left and right wings.

But Zhao Yun had served under Liu Bei for many years and had accumulated some bad experiences. He thought for a moment and frowned, "This central breakthrough is another feint... I won't be forced to fake defeat again in the end, will I?"

Zhuge Liang quickly patted his chest with his feather fan and assured, "Absolutely not! If Cao Ren dares to come out to fight in the field, you can just go all out! Win as much as you can!
However, if Cao Ren does not dare to fight, or is frightened after fighting and chooses to retreat and defend the city, then you should not try too hard to attack the city.

You should be more considerate of your soldiers. If Cao Ren still refuses to fight after besieging the city for ten days or half a month, then you should withdraw your troops and turn back."

Zhao Yun nodded, finally feeling relieved.

Just let him stop his troops at the fortified city. If he can't break in, don't force it and change the target.

This is fundamentally different from faking defeat.

(End of this chapter)