Chapter 1379: The Final Eastward Advance

Once the situation was broken, it was like spilled water that could not be recovered, and pulling one hair moved the whole body—the entire Western Regions were thrown into turmoil. For the Kara-Khanids, perhaps their upper echelons did not wish to break the balance, but compelled by the times, they had no choice but to commit troops and participate in this final battle between the Han and Liao in the Western Regions.

After all, if the remnants of the Liao army were annihilated by the Han army, then the Han army's next target would absolutely be them. If it were merely to deal with the remaining Khitan bandits at Luntai and Beiting, there would be no need to mobilize so many troops westward.

Although that Liao remnant force was weak in strength and on the verge of collapse, as long as it existed for even one more day, it served as an effective aid to the Kara-Khanids, buying them more time to digest newly seized lands, strengthen military armament, deepen public security construction, and reinforce urban defenses.

In fact, over the past decade, after successively clashing with both the Liao army and the Han army, the Kara-Khanids had already learned their lesson somewhat. While continuing to maintain an expansionist posture, in secret they had long since regretted making enemies of these powers.

Nearly ten years of eastward advance, launching several eastern expeditions, fighting over a dozen cruel and fierce battles of varying scale against the eastern powers, ultimately claiming to have seized half of Qocho Uyghur territory—which in reality was only Kucha and Karashahr, both places utterly desolate, their lifeblood of wealth drained dry.

And the price paid was enough to make the entire Kara-Khanid state tremble with fear—over fifty thousand wounded, over thirty thousand killed in action. Even if half of those were conscripted holy warriors, the remaining half was still a devastating and unacceptable loss for the Kara-Khanids.

Though after several generations of monarchs' development and construction, the Kara-Khanids had become a minor hegemon of the Western Regions, gradually gaining renown in Central Asia, in terms of actual strength they were not much stronger than the former Xizhou Uyghurs. Casualties of tens of thousands could well be described as breaking bones and damaging sinews.

After so many years, the expansionist desires of a newly risen power had long since been drained away by the harsh reality of hitting walls. Now that they had calmed down, they knew their own bitterness well.

The reason they had pushed east was that the Samanid Empire to the west was at its peak, completely blocking their path of expansion, leaving them no choice but to suppress their ambitions and seek another outlet. At that time, the two great empires of Han and Liao were wrestling, pulling all directions into their struggle. Reflected in the Western Regions, this meant the Liao army's western campaign and the collapse of the Uyghur kingdom, which showed the Kara-Khanids an opportunity and gave them a channel to vent their expansionist desires.

Yet by now, whether Kara-Khanid monarchs or ministers, generals or officials, soldiers or commoners, all had come to realize that those countries from the East, which styled themselves the center of the world, the Celestial Dynasty of the Central Plains, were truly difficult to deal with, difficult to defeat. Whether it was the Liao army or the Han army.

In the past, the Liao army had contended with them for supremacy, suffering countless casualties before finally capturing Kucha. And that enemy which had once been so formidable as to be nearly undefeatable had now fallen, completely losing its rule over the Western Regions. They had thereby continued their eastward expansion by several hundred li, seizing the core region of Karashahr.

Yet this was nothing to celebrate, because an even more formidable and even more terrifying opponent had already appeared before them. That name which over a thousand years ago had once displayed its might in the Western Regions, causing all states to submit and dare not look askance, was once again spread abroad by that band of bold and spirited knights. They used their blades to display the Great Han's dominance, and their battle formations to enact the empire's majesty.

In response, the Kara-Khanids had already grown timid. There was no shame in this—after suffering losses, one inevitably gains some memory. Therefore, under the threat of the powerful Han army, they had little confidence in whether they could hold onto their seized territories.

Short on national strength, adequate for defense but insufficient for offense—this was the true portrait the Kara-Khanids had displayed over these ten years. The holy warriors from the Central Asian world were not truly inexhaustible, and even if they were, this was not a resource the Kara-Khanids of this era could draw upon at will.

Moreover, the timing of their expansion had truly been poorly chosen—or rather, the timing was too early. Their opponent was not the long-dead Xizhou Uyghurs; they first encountered the still-formidable Liao Empire, and then an even fiercer Han Empire began baring its claws. Such fortune, such results—for the Kara-Khanids, this was truly somewhat tragic.

Yet no matter how anxious they felt, they could not possibly fear battle because of it, nor abandon this vast stretch of land soaked in the blood of their soldiers and people. The grievous price paid over ten years of eastward advance had already put the Kara-Khanids in a position where they could not easily dismount from the tiger.

After occupying Karashahr, during the half-year stalemate with the Great Han, although the two sides had engaged in numerous battles, they were all low-intensity skirmishes, with no large-scale fierce war erupting.

The Kara-Khanid army's operations had grown increasingly conservative day by day. The grievous casualties, the excessive cost, the stretched supply lines, and the powerful enemy all made the Kara-Khanids daunted at the very sight.

After repeated blows from the great eastern empire, their former arrogant expansionist ambitions had been extinguished. If the Han army would simply hold its position as it had over the past few months, they would be willing to remain at peace, maintain the status quo, and even look forward to peace negotiations.

But the Great Han side had never had any such intention from start to finish. They had never even deigned to regard these Western Regions overlords in their eyes, remaining as aggressively dominant as ever, without the slightest change.

When Guo Jin made a great show of force and led his troops north, the Kara-Khanid army at Karashahr was forced to dispatch troops as well, and even transferred forces from the rear to advance east, putting on a posture of a major eastward push, displaying a threat toward Qocho, hoping thereby to intimidate the Han army, lure Guo Jin back to reinforce, and thereby aid the Liao army.

In the past, this situation had occurred three times, and the Kara-Khanid army had succeeded each time. But now, times had changed. With the great army from He-Long arriving in the west, the situation in the Western Regions had transformed drastically. The Han army's shortcomings of insufficient strength and unstable foundations had been remedied, and the balance of power between the two sides had undergone a fundamental shift.

But the Kara-Khanid army had not changed much, still employing the same tactics as before—how could they achieve their past results? And how could the Han army possibly comply with their wishes?

The Kara-Khanid army advancing east from Karashahr, plus some poorly equipped and weakly combat-effective subject tribesmen, numbered less than ten thousand cavalry and infantry. The four hundred li of open road from Karashahr to Qocho, with no resistance and no interception, still took them a full ten days to traverse, and they still had not arrived.

The Kara-Khanid army's hesitation and indecision were fully exposed. Behind all the grand posturing, the essential truth of their weakness and inability to sustain the effort was completely revealed.

The Han army's chief commander remaining at Qocho was Cui Han, a rare general in the Great Han army who excelled in both civil and military affairs, possessing both courage and strategy. Moreover, he came from a distinguished family with impressive pedigree—a member of the Boling Cui clan. Though the great house had long since declined, no longer wielding its former prestige and renown, merely bringing out that name was enough to make most people envious, especially now that the Great Han's grass-roots-born meritorious nobles were beginning to gravitate toward the aristocracy, making his status all the more special.

Though Cui Han had only recently arrived at Qocho, he had done his preparatory work well, gaining a detailed and thorough understanding of the Western Regions situation and the enemy's circumstances. The strength Wang Yansheng had left him was also sufficient to cope.

And the hesitant posture and feeble reality that the Kara-Khanid army had exposed were keenly seized upon by Cui Han. Therefore, he readied his troops and prepared for battle, waiting at ease for the exhausted enemy. When the Kara-Khanid army slowly approached Qocho, Cui Han did not hesitate in the slightest and led his troops out to attack.

The two sides clashed at the foot of the Tianshan Mountains southwest of Jiaohe Prefecture. This was the first time the two sides had committed over twenty thousand troops combined to a war. Compared to the grand, spectacular Han-Liao wars that routinely involved one to two hundred thousand men, this was truly insignificant. But for the Western Regions, long ravaged by the flames of war, its people suffering, and utterly ruined, this was already counted as a major battle.

And judging from the course and outcome of the engagement, this battle was also somewhat lackluster—the Han army won easily, and the Kara-Khanid army withdrew cleanly.

In the past, when the Kara-Khanid army approached, the Han army had merely defended behind city walls and mountain passes. This time, however, they took the initiative to attack, boldly advancing. From the very start, under Cui Han's command, the Han army displayed resolute determination and formidable combat power.

It was fortunate that the Kara-Khanid army had marched without haste, cautious and not rash, so they had not lost too much combat effectiveness. Even so, they were at a disadvantage from the very beginning. Though they did not collapse at the first clash, under Cui Han's composed deployment and strikes, they were pushed back step by step.

The Kara-Khanid commander was also a decisive man. From the Han army's aggressive assault, he sensed their powerful will, and knew that their scheme of empty intimidation had failed—the Han army had completely stopped being frightened by threats.

Therefore, less than one shichen after the engagement began, before the two sides' soldiers had even fully become entangled, he ordered a retreat. Not having sunk too deep into the fight, and aided by the Tianshan terrain and cavalry cover, they finally shook off the Han army's pursuit. Nearly two thousand casualties became the price of the Kara-Khanid army's renewed eastward push.

And with the Kara-Khanid army's voluntary withdrawal, the remnants of the Liao army to the north completely lost all hope—indeed, they never even had the chance to receive news of the battle situation in the south.

And this time was also the Kara-Khanid army's final eastward advance. This failure once again thoroughly extinguished their ambition to expand eastward.