My younger brother Zhuge Liang

Chapter 674: The strategies used by the princes are not something you can imitate
When Cao Ren received the order from Cao Cao to "block the estuary between Baihe River and Han River and prevent Liu Bei's navy warships from entering Baihe River", he was still a little hesitant.

He knew what doing so meant, and he also knew that by doing so he might be used by Guan Yu.

However, when Cao Ren himself truly felt the threat of Lu Yi's infiltration, and when he heard with his own ears that Huyang County was forced to surrender due to intimidation from Gao Shun, he did not dare to hesitate any longer.

Block the river! Block the river now! Do it with swiftness and vigor!
After making up his mind, Cao Ren organized thousands of auxiliary soldiers in Fancheng that night, equipped them with shovels, shoulder poles, and earth baskets, and personally supervised the opening of the east gate. He asked the auxiliary soldiers to dig soil and stones and fill the Baihe River.

Of course, after many days of construction, Fancheng has already formed a solid fortress group. So when the city gates are opened at night, there is no need to worry about the enemy's infiltration and sneak attacks.

The South Gate of Fancheng was originally located on the banks of the Han River. It was a water gate through which warships could enter and exit. On the opposite bank was Yuliangzhou.

As for the east gate of Fancheng, although it is not a water gate, it is not far from Baihe River, a tributary of the northern bank of Han River. Originally, there was a buffer zone about one mile wide outside the city gate, where there was a dock town.

By now, Cao Ren had already ordered the construction of rammed earth walls, pointed wooden fences, and trenches to extend the southeast and northeast corners of the city wall all the way to the Baihe River, ensuring that the entire dock area was enclosed within the fortress.

In this way, even if the east gate of Fancheng was opened at will, Guan Yu would not be able to launch a surprise attack because there was actually an outer city outside the gate.

Under such tight protection, Cao's army worked hard on the construction. Loads of earth were transported to the far end of the original dock pier and then dumped into the deep-water berth.

Then, in some places where the water is very deep and difficult to completely block off, we use thick and long stone slabs and place them vertically.

Pour more soil around the stone and try to bury the roots of the stone tightly to ensure that the stone will not fall over in a short period of time.

In this way, these protruding rocks in the deep water form reefs.

There was no clue on the water surface, but if a warship really hit it, the bottom of the ship would be shattered.

In the end, when construction was really difficult at certain locations, they requisitioned some large and old warships under Cai Mao's command, drove them to designated locations on the waterway, and then sank them on the spot.

Before sinking, as much earth as possible was transported on board to ensure that the main body of the ship would remain solid enough after sinking to the bottom. Even if the enemy wanted to smash the wreckage and clear the waterway by head-on collision, they would not be able to do so.

In some very deep places, if sinking one boat is not enough to block the water, then sink another one, and stack them up like a pyramid!

Such measures certainly made Cai Mao, who was in charge of the navy, feel distressed.

He led the Jingzhou navy for many years, but never won a naval battle. After the war with Liu Bei's army, he was first defeated by Gao Shun and Chen Dao, and then by Lu Yi and Han Dang.

Now the remaining warships have to be picked and chosen by others to sink and block the road, which is really frustrating.

But how could a tool like Cai Mao have the right to object? He should feel honored to be able to use his broken ships to their full potential, at least that's what Cao Ren thought.

After such cost-insignificant landfilling, the waterway of the Baihe River was finally completely blocked just one night later.

……

Of course, Guan Yu, who was preparing to besiege Fancheng, could not immediately know about Cao Ren's little move.

After all, Cao Ren's actions were relatively secretive.

Guan Yu was unaware of anything the next day. He continued to expand the siege camp in Fancheng step by step and advance the war at his own pace.

Fancheng is located to the south by the Han River and to the east by the Bai River, and these two directions cannot be attacked. Therefore, Guan Yu's attack direction can only be the west and north.

When Guan Yu first landed in Hanbei, he landed west of Fancheng, then set up camp outside the west gate and advanced step by step steadily.

Now, a few days later, Guan Yu slowly extended the siege camp to the north gate of Fancheng. He also planned to continue building an earthen corridor to completely connect the encirclements on the west and north sides.

This project will definitely take some time, and it is unlikely to be completed in less than half a month. If further reinforcement is required, it will take even longer.

Guan Yu knew very well that a forced surrender was possible in Xiangyang, where Yu Jin was defending strongly. But in Fancheng, where Cao Ren was personally guarding, a forced surrender was out of the question and would require a tough battle.

This is Cao Ren! His last name is Cao! How can we solve the problem of Cao Cao's brother by attacking his mind?
The Battle of Fancheng may be the most brutal battle in the entire Jingbei Campaign. Liu Bei's army has no other choice but to bite this tough bone head-on, which will also be a battle to establish prestige.

Zhuge Jin and Xu Shu had used enough fancy tricks to lure the enemy, deceive the enemy and annihilate them, and flood the enemy. They had done everything they should and could do.

For this battle, even with Zhuge Jin's intelligence, he could not think of any strategy, and it could only test Guan Yu and Zhang Fei's hard power.

After a day of building the siege ramparts, as the sky darkened again, Guan Yu's camp fell silent again. Only the soldiers who took turns to watch the night were still there on guard.

However, the probing on the Han and Baihe rivers had only just begun to become active as the generals fell into darkness.

It has been a long time since Guan Yu sent Lu Yi to command the small boat navy to infiltrate Baihe River in the dark and cause sabotage. He had also made Cai Mao suffer a loss before.

Tonight was the day for action again, and Lu Yi had made sufficient arrangements in advance. He sent out a hundred small boats, divided into several groups, some to go deep into the enemy's territory, and some to provide support, to carry out the harassment mission as planned.

As soon as the hour of Chou arrived, the fleet set sail as planned.

Everything went smoothly at first, but at the end of midnight, when the fleet should have arrived near the Fancheng wharf, something unexpected happened.

There were a few unexpected muffled sounds in the darkness, and several of Lu Yi's light vanguard boats actually shook violently, mixed with the sound of wooden boards breaking and tearing, and the bottom of the boats soon flooded with rushing water.

"Oh no! We've hit a reef! Abandon ship!"

The sailors on the ship were quite elite and reacted very quickly. They quickly began to take off their armor and then jumped into the river to escape with light equipment.

Because they were sailing upstream when they marched, and they were floating downstream after jumping into the river, the soldiers swam back quickly, and most of them were quickly rescued by friendly warships that responded downstream.

However, the unusual movement in the darkness still alerted the Fancheng defenders. Torches were suddenly lit in the water forts along the shore, and many archers, under the command of their generals, fired crossbows in the direction of the commotion on the river.

Some soldiers under Lu Yi who fell into the water were inevitably shot by bows and crossbows while swimming. They didn't even have time to scream before they choked on the water and sank to the bottom.

Some of the smaller boats that were closer to the front were also covered by the rain of arrows, and screams were heard from the boats. In the panic, some boats made careless turns and hit reefs without knowing where to go, which made the situation even more chaotic and caused more losses.

Lu Yi took a lot of trouble to make the troops retreat in an orderly manner, leaving behind a hundred or so floating corpses and abandoning the harassment plan.

……

When all these changes happened, Cao Ren was sleeping in the county government office which had been used as a temporary shogunate and was unaware of all this.

Because the matter was relatively minor, the generals under Cao Ren's command did not disturb his sleep and did not choose to report it overnight.

It was not until the end of the fourth watch the next morning that Cao Ren woke up naturally from his anxious sleep. He asked his attendants, and only then did a personal guard officer quietly mention the matter.

Cao Ren was about to wash up, but when he heard the good news, he didn't even bother to wipe his face. He rolled over, wrapped himself in his battle robe, and ran straight out the door.

He rode his horse straight to the Baihe River to see with his own eyes the remains of last night's battle.

Cao Ren had just arrived at the battlefield when Cai Mao, who had finally shown off a little last night, was already waiting there with a smug and slightly flattering expression.

As soon as he saw Cao Ren, Cai Mao came over in high spirits to report last night's battle achievements.

Although no enemy ships were captured, and most of the enemy soldiers shot and killed drifted away, with few bodies recovered, this did not stop Cai Mao from bragging about his achievements.

Relying on the wreckage of the sunken enemy ships and the few dozen enemy corpses that were salvaged, he boasted that he had repelled several thousand of Lu Yi's navy last night, killing or wounding more than a thousand of them.

However, this kind of bragging ability is actually not surprising. In later generations, the naval forces of the Ming and Qing dynasties would brag about defeating the enemy fleet as long as they encountered the Red Barbarians/foreign naval forces.

In naval battles, even if "countless enemy soldiers were killed or wounded", in the end they could always explain it away with the sentence "unfortunately the enemy corpses were all dragged away by the enemy ships and their heads could not be captured."

Even if you exaggerate your victory ten or twenty times, it won't be exposed.

Cao Ren knew that Cai Mao's boasting was exaggerated, but his side had suffered a series of defeats and he needed a victory to boost morale.

So when faced with Cai Mao's attempt to take credit, he pretended not to see it and just turned a blind eye to it.

An unremarkable daily routine anti-harassment operation was thus promoted by Cai Mao as a great victory.

……

Even Cao Ren knew that Lu Yi's harassment had failed, and Guan Yu would certainly know it too.

So while Cao Ren and Cai Mao were celebrating their "great victory" last night, Guan Yu also determined that the Baihe waterway was blocked by reefs created by Cao's army.

After confirming this, Guan Yu immediately realized that this situation could be exploited.

But to be on the safe side, he did not make a decision directly. Instead, he immediately wrote a letter and had it sent back to Yicheng by a patrol boat to explain the situation to Zhuge Jin and to hear whether Zhuge Jin had any specific suggestions for action.

When Guan Yu's report arrived, Liu Bei was with Zhuge Jin and happened to see it. Out of curiosity, Liu Bei asked:

"Zi Yu, what do you think of the matter of Cao Ren blocking the Baihe waterway? How can we use it to maximize the benefits for our army?"

Zhuge Jin did not answer immediately, but instead carefully read every detail mentioned in Guan Yu's letter while waving his folding fan.

Finally, he said carefully: "For now, the most important thing is, of course, to convey this news to Yu Jin who is besieged in Xiangyang.

Yu Jin also knew that Cao Ren had been beaten into a coward by Yun Chang, and in order to prevent our navy from infiltrating into Baihe River, he did not hesitate to completely block the estuary of Baihe River and Han River.

For Yu Jin, this meant that unless Cao's army defeated Yunchang and Yide in Fancheng, Cao's army's reinforcements to Xiangyang would be completely cut off.

Once this news is confirmed, the morale of the Xiangyang defenders will inevitably collapse further. Even if they don't surrender immediately, when food and fodder become scarce in the future, the Xiangyang defenders will lose their will to hold on and will collapse at the first sign of trouble.

Zhuge Jin was still very realistic. He knew that this bad news would not allow Yu Jin to surrender directly.

There was no reinforcement, no food supply, and the Xiangyang defenders would not die suddenly. As long as there was food to eat, they could still delay the war.

However, once food began to run out, coupled with the negative news that friendly forces completely ignored the enemy and even blocked their own theoretical hope of rescue, the combined effect of the two made it entirely possible to expect the total collapse of Cao's army in Xiangyang.

Therefore, this message still needs to be used in conjunction with time and in a two-pronged approach.

Liu Bei agreed with this judgment. He also believed that Yu Jin had followed Cao Cao for twenty years and would not surrender just for a piece of information. He still had to wait and it was worth waiting.

However, there is still a problem at the moment, which is how to make Yu Jin believe that all this is true?

Liu Bei couldn't think of what to do. Zhuge Jin was right beside him, so he didn't bother to think about it and just asked:
"Then how can we break this news to Yu Jin and convince him that Cao Ren has completely given up on him? He's even cut off from any chance of reinforcements. No matter how we spread the word, Yu Jin will say it's a trick, a deception."

This was a very real problem. After all, Yu Jin was dozens of miles away from Cao Ren, separated by the Han River. Yu Jin couldn't see the latest battle developments downstream on the north bank.

If you rely solely on Liu Bei's army's propaganda, why would Yu Jin believe you? Fortunately, Zhuge Jin had already thought of this problem. He had already made up his mind and immediately analyzed it with confidence:

“There is a way to do this - during the previous naval attack on Yuliangzhou, Yunchang not only flooded Yu Jin’s camp, but also captured more than 10,000 Cao’s prisoners and forced thousands of them to surrender.

Among those captured enemy prisoners, there are still some who are very loyal and stubborn. Even if they are captured by our army and forced to do hard labor, they refuse to surrender and fight for our army. I think some of them must be very close to Yu Jin, and Yu Jin knows that they are reliable.

Therefore, our army can screen those prisoners who swear to die rather than surrender, isolate them for cross-examination, and secretly investigate to find out which ones are deeply trusted by Yu Jin.

In two days, when Boyan's navy goes to harass Baihekou again, they can take these captives with them on board, and then let them witness with their own eyes the Cao army sinking their warships to block the river.

After the meeting, our army can explain to them what all this means, and then release them back to Xiangyang City, allowing them to rejoin Yu Jin's old subordinates.

If Yu Jin refuses to accept our trusted prisoners of war, his army's morale will inevitably waver. If he does, the news that Cao Ren has completely abandoned him will sooner or later spread among the Xiangyang defenders."

Liu Bei listened quietly, his eyes became brighter the more he listened, and he felt that this operation was quite feasible.

The Cao army prisoners of war captured during the flooding of Yuliangzhou were actually placed in Yicheng and other places for custody.

Especially those who were more stubborn and refused to surrender should be placed in the rear, so as to prevent these prisoners from becoming unstable and escaping when something unexpected happened on the front line.

Therefore, Guan Yu was unable to handle this matter personally and could only let Liu Bei and Zhuge Jin handle it.

After Liu Bei understood, he nodded and asked Zhuge Jin to write a reply letter to Guan Yu, telling him not to worry about it.

After the reply was sent, Liu Bei authorized Zhuge Jin to select prisoners of war and implement the plan.

……

There is no need to rush to undermine the morale of the Xiangyang defenders. Many operations must be carried out step by step according to the procedures.

Since Zhuge Jin is determined to do this well, he must strive for perfection from the very beginning.

He first screened the prisoner of war accounts on hand and made a rough estimate.

It was learned that most of the prisoners left in Yicheng were not the most diehard ones. The more diehard ones had been taken back to Dangyang or even Jiangling in the rear, responsible for the hard labor of transporting food from Jiangling to the front line of Yicheng.

As we all know, transporting grain from Jiangling controlled by Liu Qi to Yicheng requires a lot of loading and unloading work by land and water in Jiangling and Dangyang.

To put it bluntly, a large number of dock workers are needed.

When in Jiangling, the grain was loaded onto ships and taken to the Zhangxiang Wharf in Dangyang County. After reaching the end of the Ju River waterway, the grain had to be unloaded from the ships and loaded onto trucks, and then transported overland to Yicheng.

Prisoners of war were not allowed to do hard labor such as escorting food along the way, because the team would have too many opportunities to escape while traveling all the way.

Prisoners of war could only play the role of dock workers. They were guarded at a dock and had to do heavy physical work of loading and unloading cargo every day. If they dared to run, they would be shot with arrows.

After finding out the accounts of the prisoners of war, Zhuge Jin took the trouble to personally spend two days traveling from Yicheng back to Dangyang County in the rear to inspect the work.

When Dangyang County heard that Situ was coming in person, they naturally made careful preparations, fearing that Situ would express dissatisfaction with the transportation and supervision of military rations.

After Zhuge Jin finished his routine inspection, he asked the military grain commander of Dangyang County to gather all the hard labor prisoners for screening.

The military rations captain didn't understand what was going on, but he didn't ask any more questions and immediately carried out Zhuge Jin's order.

Zhuge Jin instructed in advance how to identify and select the confidants who would accompany him on missions.

So everyone first screened the performance records of the prisoners, picked out the candidates, and then questioned them one by one. Finally, they selected a group of prisoners who "would definitely gain the trust of Yu Jin and other Xiangyang defenders as long as they were released."

A day later, Zhuge Jin ordered his men to mix these captives with Lu Yi's navy, and then take them to the Fancheng front line when the opportunity arose to carry out another harassment mission.

Of course, this time Lu Yi was not required to achieve any victory. He just wanted to put on a show and let the captives see with their own eyes how Cao Ren treated Jin.

Since these prisoners of war were stubborn and refused to surrender, they were of course unwilling to carry out the mission of "serving as sailors of Liu Bei's army and helping Lu Yi fight against their former comrades".

But it doesn’t matter. Lu Yi can use torture to intimidate anyone who doesn’t follow his orders.

At the same time, he also told them that they did not need to perform any combat missions on this trip, but only needed to serve as rowers and help Liu Bei's army row the boats.

And as long as they go, they can be rewarded with money, and ensure that they have enough food to eat and can have some meat.

With a combination of kindness and force, these stubborn captives were quickly dealt with and everything went smoothly.

The entire operation took four or five days, and ultimately achieved Zhuge Jin's requirements perfectly.

The vast majority of the selected prisoners were forced to serve as rowers and participated in another naval harassment mission. They returned with a small defeat and witnessed what Cao Ren did with their own eyes.

It is ironic that during the battle, Cai Mao's troops, who were responsible for blocking Lu Yi, even cooperated very well and made some noise.

"Lu Yi, you little brat! Haven't you learned your lesson from the disastrous defeat last time? You can't cross the Baihekou no matter how many times you come here! Why bother to die in vain!"

Cai Mao's subordinates shouted and cursed like this when they were repelling the enemy. Their original intention was of course to undermine the morale of Guan Yu's army, and they didn't think much about it.

During the seven or eight days that Zhuge Jin was operating in the rear, Guan Yu had not yet launched a formal attack on Fancheng. He was still continuing to strengthen the siege camp and sending auxiliary troops to destroy Fancheng's moat and outer defensive fortifications.

Therefore, Cao Ren's army also needed some good news to boost the morale of the defenders. It was human nature to scold the enemy when there was an opportunity to repel him. Who would have thought that such a thing could be used by Zhuge Jin?

Zhuge Jin got exactly what he wanted, and the next day he asked Lu Yi to bring all these stubborn captives back to the Xiangyang front line.

Then the captives were well fed and well cared for for three days. During this period, Huang Zhong sent people to shoot arrows into the city and negotiate with Yu Jin, indicating that Liu Bei's army was willing to release some of Yu Jin's former prisoners of war.

When Yu Jin heard this, he was worried that it was a trap and wanted to refuse to negotiate.

But this kind of thing is definitely not difficult for Zhuge Jin.

Zhuge Jin asked Huang Zhong to organize a feint attack on Xiangyang, and at the same time arranged a large number of scolding men to stand up and shout insults at close range, shouting out their goodwill in returning the prisoners.

In front of the two armies, countless defending soldiers heard about this, and Yu Jin was unable to block the news.

In order to avoid morale collapse and being misunderstood by his subordinates as abandoning his old subordinates, Yu Jin had no choice but to bite the bullet and negotiate with Huang Zhong from a distance on the city wall.

Of course, Yu Jin also knew that Huang Zhong was an excellent archer, so when they were fighting, he asked the shieldmen to hold long shields and stand in front.

At the beginning of the negotiation, Yu Jin cursed Huang Zhong for being shameless and said that he must have some conspiracy and was not really willing to release the captives. He might have wanted to take advantage of the opportunity when the Xiangyang defenders opened the gates to receive the captives and launch a surprise attack on the city.

Huang Zhong had received instructions from Zhuge Jin on this issue, so he certainly knew what to say.

He asked the scolds to shout according to the lines they had taught him in advance:
"Yu Jin! Don't judge a gentleman by your own standards! My lord simply respects men of integrity. Seeing that some of your men are steadfast and steadfast, swearing to die rather than surrender, he is releasing them!
As for a surprise attack to seize the city, since you don't want to open the gates, after we release the prisoners, you can just lower the hanging basket and pull the prisoners up! Besides, you and I both know that each gate in Xiangyang has a garrison. If you only open the garrison gates and not the inner city gates, how can you steal the city? Isn't that a lie?"

Yu Jin was speechless after being refuted. In addition, Huang Zhong suggested that the defenders could first identify the identities of the released prisoners. Yu Jin really couldn't find an excuse to refuse.

In order to prevent his own people from thinking that he had abandoned his allies, he had no choice but to accept it.

When making the decision, Yu Jin gritted his teeth and thought to himself, "At worst, I can just see what tricks Zhuge Jin has!
Anyway, my decision is also for the sake of military morale. Even if it is heard by the Prime Minister in the future, no one will find any fault with it.

If I really fall into a trap, I will just accept it. Zhuge Jin's schemes are beyond human control."

After figuring it out, the captives were quickly identified and handed over. Yu Jin opened the gate of one of the city gates, let the captives in, and slowly inspected and searched them before closing the gate.

During the entire process, Huang Zhong did not make any sneak attacks, which made Yu Jin feel relieved.

Then, he began to carefully question the officers among the released prisoners, wanting to know what Huang Zhong's plan was.

It doesn't matter.

After half a day's investigation, when Yu Jin heard the released officers say in unison that "Cao Ren has sunk his warships and completely blocked the Baihe waterway. Cao's warships in the Baihe River can no longer enter the Han River", Yu Jin felt dizzy.

It turns out that Zhuge Jin and Huang Zhong were waiting for him here!

"Quick! Order all released prisoners to keep silent about this incident! Anyone who disobeys will be subject to military law!"

Unfortunately, it's too late.

There were too many people who were released, and Yu Jin did not immediately discover the crux of the problem and silence them. Once the door was opened, it could not be stopped later.

What's more, although these captives were unwilling to surrender, some of them had been shaken in their hearts after Zhuge Jin's subtle reforms using both kindness and power over the past few days.

A considerable number of them felt deeply disgusted with Cao Ren's abandonment of his allies. Even if Yu Jin told them to keep quiet, they would still reveal the truth to their closest comrades in private.

They felt that if they returned to General Yu and told him what Cao Ren had done, they would be helping him, not betraying him.

The news that "Cao Ren and the Prime Minister both abandoned the Xiangyang defenders" quickly spread among the Xiangyang defenders and could no longer be completely blocked.

Yu Jin only felt his scalp tingling, but there was nothing he could do.

In the end, he could only do what he could to remedy the situation.

Regardless of the actual effect, at least he tried his best. Even if the final result doesn't live up to his expectations, he can still save face.

The next day, Yu Jin issued an order: "It is imperative to spread the word to the soldiers that Xiangyang has ample food reserves and there is absolutely no shortage of food! You must hold on with confidence!"
From today on, we will give soldiers extra meals. The daily ration for combat soldiers will be increased from three liters to five liters! The ration for auxiliary soldiers will also be increased from two liters and a half to four liters! "

All Yu Jin could think of was to give the demoralized troops more food, to swell their faces, to show off the sufficient military rations and to stabilize people's hearts.

This move is similar to what Zhuge Jin did when he sang and measured sand in Huaiyin City.

This is how Zhuge Jin stabilized the morale of Liu Bei's army in desperate situations.

But the problem with this tactic was obvious - when Liu Bei's old nest Xia Pi was robbed, there was only one month's worth of military rations left. Zhuge Jin helped him stabilize the morale of the army and let the soldiers eat as much as they wanted, but the price was that the same amount of military rations could only last for twenty days.

This move is to exchange the duration of military rations for temporary stability of people's hearts.

Yu Jin's painting of a tiger ended up looking like a dog, how close the final effect would be? Would the fat man not be installed properly and end up with a more swollen face? We can only leave it to fate.

Yu Jin felt that he had done everything he could and had done his best to serve as prime minister.

(End of this chapter)