Chapter 2164: Shizong Chronicles 32: The Sixth Year of Jianlong · Dominating Central Asia

At Gaozhou, Mahmud made three main deployments against Ghazni: first, he set up camp, built interlocking fortifications, kept a death grip on Gaozhou City while gazing toward the cities of Transoxiana, awaiting further reaction from the Anxi army.

Second, he sent troops to clear out Anxi towns and scattered soldiers missed along the advance route, especially along the Jihun River valley, opening and consolidating a grain road straight back to his own country, making a show of preparing for a long campaign—and indeed, a steady stream of military supplies would follow, transshipped through the Balkh plain north of Ghazni, moving by both water and land to stock the front lines.

Third, while the main army held still, Mahmud dispatched several elite cavalry forces of varying sizes east across the Jihun River to strike directly into the heart of Anxi. The mission Mahmud gave them was, of course, not to attack the great cities of Transoxiana, but to kill—to kill Han, to kill those traitors who had turned their backs on Allah and willingly served as slaves to the Han, while also rescuing those believers unwilling to endure Han servitude and inciting them to join in vengeance against the Han. This strategy was clearly meant to disrupt Anxi's normal war preparations and sap its strength.

Fourth, he converted the feinting forces in the Khorasan and Mingcheng directions into active operations, joining with the tens of thousands of holy warriors already arrived from the east, throwing full effort into recovering lost territory, capturing Mingcheng, securing the sea-eastern flank of Anxi, and thoroughly consolidating the rear of the great army at Gaozhou.

Fifth, Mahmud also sent envoys north to contact the Oghuz Yabgu state, the Kimek, the Karluks, and other powers on the grasslands north of Anxi, inviting them to march south, join in attacking Anxi, and share in the spoils—goods, land, and people.

With this combination of blows, Mahmud did indeed create within a short time a sense of crisis on all sides, of internal strife and external threat, for Anxi—so much so that even the King of Anxi, Liu Wenze, could not help but panic.

However, at this stage the Anxi dynasty still had no shortage of capable men. At Gaozhou, the veteran general Kang Jirong held the defense, shielding Transoxiana while firmly pinning down Mahmud's main army so it dared not rashly cross east; in Transoxiana, when the dynasty faced an unprecedented crisis, the energy of the military merit nobility was forced out—one could say they were united in heart, with all wills set as one.

First was Director of the Chancellery Yang Yi, who carefully analyzed the military and intelligence situation for Liu Wenze, calming his mind somewhat and offering him strategies. In Yang Yi's view, the enemy had come with ferocious momentum, shaking heaven and earth, but the only force posing a truly fatal threat to the state was Mahmud's main army—and even that was pinned on the far bank of the Amu Darya by the nail that was Gaozhou.

Though the situation was momentarily grim, it was far from irretrievable. The enemy was showing a moment's ferocity, but Yang Yi believed that with a campaign mobilizing an army of this scale, the national strength of Ghazni could never sustain it for long; once their momentum weakened, breaking them would be like snapping dry twigs.

Meanwhile, troops from all over Anxi were being mobilized and had completed a certain degree of assembly. Forces were sent to strengthen the Amu Darya defense line, the entire country was placed under martial law, and priority was given to striking the enemy cavalry that had invaded Transoxiana to burn, kill, and plunder—first pacify the interior, then repel the foreign invader.

As for the nomadic powers to the north, the Oghuz Yabgu state had long since declined and fragmented; the Kimek and Karluks were farther away and had for years faced expansionary pressure from the Northern Court—they were not worth worrying about. Sending a single senior general with a detached force would suffice to overawe them.

Beyond offering advice and strategies, Yang Yi also recommended a military commander to Liu Wenze: Guo Ju, Deputy Commander of Sa City. After learning of Guo Ju's background and record, Liu Wenze appointed him Defense Commissioner of Sa City, tasking him with leading troops to wipe out the enemy cavalry raiding from the east.

Yang Yi came from the Yang clan of Ganzhou, and the Ganzhou Yang clan shared ancestry with Yang Tingzhang, the Baron of Changwu—and Yang Tingzhang was the brother-in-law of the late Duke of Xing, Guo Wei... In short, though Yang Yi's origins were not top-tier among the Anxi upper class, they were still deep and well-connected, and his talent and insight fully made up for any deficiency in birth, making him a trusted pillar of Liu Wenze and earning him a place in Anxi's decision-making circle.

As for Guo Ju, he was just thirty years old, also from a distinguished family—the great-grandson of Guo Jin, Marquis of Bowang. Though short on political acumen, he had strategy in his breast and outstanding talent for commanding troops. Guo Ju, along with Yang Yi and Kang Jirong holding Gaozhou, became the three most important meritorious officials in this campaign to repel the Arab invasion and counterattack.

By late April, Guo Ju, employing tactics of hard assault, surprise attack, and ambush, personally led troops to wipe out the bulk of the Ghazni cavalry that had invaded eastward, killing over 7,000 enemies; the rest fled in rout. Though he had not completely pulled out the thorn Mahmud had wedged into Anxi's heartland to cause chaos, he had basically eliminated its threat to Anxi's ruling order.

In the course of driving out the raiders, Guo Ju also pacified several believer rebellions along the way. Toward the rebels, Guo Ju displayed exceptionally ruthless methods—regardless of identity, gender, or age, all were executed without exception, with no mercy shown. While this greatly intimidated those restless elements with ulterior motives within the country, it also inevitably made people sigh at how formidable the Arabs' powers of seduction were—even after Anxi had gone to such absolute lengths, the poison still had not been fully cleansed...

Under Guo Ju's blows, Mahmud's intention to disrupt Anxi came to nothing—though not entirely to nothing. At the cost of over ten thousand casualties, he had still caused major chaos, destruction, and loss of life in the Transoxiana region. The other tribes and vassals could be set aside, but the key point was the heavy Han casualties, which made the Anxi upper class especially pained and furious—these were their own people!

Indeed, one enemy cavalry force even crossed past the major Anxi strongholds of Samarkand, Ju Prefecture, and Da Prefecture, burning, killing, and looting all the way, and was only completely annihilated after fleeing into the territory of Taraz.

This matter also made all of Anxi feel deeply ashamed. Since the late king Liu Min, it had always been Anxi that went into enemy territory to stir up trouble, burn, kill, and plunder—never had enemy raiders been allowed to run so rampant, driving deep in and slaughtering at will.

The Ghazni army's havoc in the Transoxiana region thoroughly woke Anxi up, and the awakened Anxi completed its full and thorough mobilization in mid-April. On the twenty-second day of the fourth month, a 130,000-strong army, personally led by the King of Anxi, Liu Wenze, marched to the banks of the Jihun River, facing Mahmud's main army across the water.

This 130,000-strong army was nearly all the strength Anxi could bring to bear on the Jihun River front. Though it still did not empty the country, Liu Wenze had laid out the entire family fortune that Liu Min had painstakingly accumulated over decades, including nearly all of Anxi's elite forces—even the loyal and elite Han main forces from old regions like Suyab and Taraz were thrown into the fight against the Ghazni army.

From late April all the way to mid-July, the two sides launched landings at the Jihun River crossings and beaches from Gaozhou northward, fighting dozens of bitter battles, each trying to find a flaw in the other—yet both also harbored caution, strengthening their river patrols and not daring to rashly launch a full-scale crossing attack. The battlefield pattern remained in a state of stalemate.

The stalemate actually reflected their differing strategic intentions. Using Gaozhou as bait to draw Anxi's main army forward, seeking an opportunity for a decisive battle to break the enemy in one stroke—toward Liu Wenze, Mahmud did not feel the same dread as toward Liu Min, harboring a measure of contempt.

After drawing the Anxi main army to the Jihun River, Mahmud had to adopt a defensive posture. With the strength in his hands, he was actually at a numerical disadvantage, so for nearly three months, the Ghazni army mostly relied on the fortresses they had built earlier for defense, while striving to hold the river defenses and the grain road.

What Mahmud was steadily waiting for was the Arab allied army from the sea-eastern direction—there were nearly 100,000 troops there. This great war cannot be discussed without covering the sea-eastern front, yet in Yang Yi's planning for the King of Anxi, Liu Wenze, the defense of Mingcheng was clearly neglected—even deliberately avoided in discussion.

There were two reasons for this. First, the man holding Mingcheng was none other than Liu Wenze's second elder brother, the Marquis of Gan, Liu Wenli—who had originally been squeezed out of Transoxiana by Liu Wenze himself, then transferred away from his fief of Gan City, which he had managed for years, and sent to the unfamiliar land of Mingcheng to resist the Arabs.

The second point was that with Leizhou lost and the enemy at Gaozhou, communications were basically severed. To re-establish contact, one would either have to defeat Mahmud's main army head-on, or go around the entire Karakum Desert and make a huge detour from the eastern shore of the Caspian Sea—which was clearly unrealistic under current transportation conditions.

And for isolated, unsupported Mingcheng, facing the encirclement of the Arab army, the outcome was hard to view optimistically. Thus, even though Mingcheng was a strategic stronghold, in the great chess game of the "Six Great Wars," it sadly became a sacrificed piece.

And judging from the results, that was indeed the case. Facing the Arab allied army's massive offensive, Anxi was first driven out of Khorasan—it simply could not be held—and immediately after came the combined northward march of Ghazni and the holy warriors to besiege Mingcheng.

The Arab allied army numbered nearly 100,000, while Mingcheng's defenders—even counting the defeated troops from Khorasan and the temporarily conscripted Han private militias—numbered only 17,000, of which fewer than 8,000 could be relied upon as elite. The disparity in strength was enormous, and the situation of enemy strong and self weak was stark.

And this Second Battle of Mingcheng was longer and more brutal than the one twenty years earlier. Last time, Liu Wentao, son of Liu Fang, Prince of Zhao of the Northern Court royal house, had died; this time, it was Liu Wenli.

Speaking of the Marquis of Gan, Liu Wenli—he was politically shortsighted, hot-tempered by nature, and lacking in tolerance for others. Especially after his failure in the succession struggle, his flaws were further magnified. One could say he had many detestable shortcomings.

But the single battle of Mingcheng was enough to vindicate his name. He was worthy of the blood of the Great Han imperial house flowing in his veins, and he did not disgrace his father's aspirations. Even though he had been politically suppressed, when facing the Arab army's attack, he showed not a trace of weakness or hesitation, not a hint of cowardice or fear. He composed himself and led the defenders in fighting the allied army with all their strength.

From the third day of the fifth month, when the Arab army besieged the city, to the twenty-seventh day of the sixth month, when Mingcheng fell, Liu Wenli led the Anxi Han army in bitter defense for nearly sixty days. On the battlefield, he was a fearless warrior, a comrade who could be trusted. By leading from the front and sharing hardships with his men, he transformed himself from a "banished" prince into a commander embraced by the defending officers and soldiers, who followed him in fighting to the death.

In the end, with no support coming, Mingcheng was still breached by the Arab army. Over ten thousand Han defenders were annihilated to the last man. At the moment the city fell, Liu Wenli embraced a barrel of gunpowder and perished together with several dozen holy warriors, leaving not even bones behind—a death of extreme heroism.

In the Battle of Mingcheng twenty years earlier, though victory and defeat had not been decided by the siege of Mingcheng itself, the "Battle of Mingcheng" had become a wound for the entire Arab world. The name "Mingcheng" had spread far and wide, making countless loyal Arab believers gnash their teeth, desperate to take it and wash away the shame.

Judging from the results of the Second Battle of Mingcheng, they had succeeded—they planted the Arab banner on the walls of Mingcheng, which had been reduced to smoke and ruin. But the price paid was equally heavy. Even with rotating attacks and driving large numbers of cannon fodder against the walls, the eastern expedition allied army's direct combat losses exceeded 20,000 men.

In the later stages of the siege, Liu Wenli had already resolved to die. He gathered his subordinate officers and stated plainly that they were all doomed to die—but before dying, each of them must take at least two enemy lives in exchange. Needless to say, in the later stages, the Han army at Mingcheng was no less fanatical than the holy warriors, and many of the allied army's deaths occurred precisely in that late phase of the siege.

Because of the heavy losses, Mahmud was forced to conscript more troops from home to make up the shortfall. By mid-July, combining the eastern expedition allied army from Mingcheng with reinforcements from the Balkh direction, the Arab allied forces on the Jihun River front had exceeded 250,000.

However, though the numbers had grown, combat effectiveness had not actually increased much. The Mingcheng allied troops had never received adequate rest or replenishment, so their fighting power was already greatly diminished; as for the troops subsequently conscripted from home, many were in fact forcibly drafted able-bodied men—farmers who had just picked up weapons with little to no military training.

As for the Anxi side, upon learning the news of Mingcheng's fall, Liu Wenli's death in battle, and the Arabs' mass slaughter of the local Han population, they were filled with righteous indignation and burning rage.

The emotion of "revenge," stirred up by Liu Wenze, ran exceptionally high and quickly overshadowed the shock of "Mingcheng's fall" and the mood of "defeat." At the same time, over the two-plus months of stalemate and bitter fighting against Mahmud, the Anxi side had not been idle or negligent in the slightest.

More manpower and resources were organized under Anxi's military system and thrown into this "war of national defense." Military supplies flowed in an unending stream to the camps the Anxi army had set up along the Jihun River. By mid-July, counting the defenders of Gaozhou City, Anxi had mobilized 200,000 troops into the war—and their quality was far brighter than that of the Arab allied army.

One should know that even the vassal troops, trained under the Han, had far stronger combat effectiveness than the private armies of those Ghazni nobles. And nearly four months after the war began, the two sides had seen a tremendous reversal in both strength and morale. In the eyes of the Anxi high command centered on Liu Wenze, offense and defense had swapped positions—it was time to counterattack.

In fact, the Ghazni side was not without capable men. Some did sense the danger and advised Sultan Mahmud that a long-distance expedition had worn out the troops, that the army was weary from prolonged campaigning, and that lingering too long at Gaozhou was extremely dangerous.

This great campaign had already dealt a major blow to Anxi, seized a large swath of territory on the west bank of the Jihun River including Leizhou, and also captured Mingcheng, that thorn in the eyes of the faithful—it was time to stop.

Such advice was fair and objective. Had Mahmud been able to heed it and quit while ahead, even if he could not fully hold all the fruits of victory, this great Han-Arab war could, on the whole, have been declared an Arab victory.

But Mahmud, like many monarchs of outstanding ability, committed the cardinal sin of underestimating the enemy. Though he took the Anxi army seriously tactically, toward their commander Liu Wenze, he had never truly taken him seriously from the depths of his being. If Mingcheng had not fallen, perhaps it would have been one thing—but with Mingcheng taken, he was all the more confident of achieving an even greater victory.

For Mahmud, if he could defeat the main Anxi army across the river, then the bountiful lands of Transoxiana—that civilized realm he dreamed of—would be his for the taking, elevating his dynasty to a new height.

Only, the more beautiful the hope, the more dismal the result. Having already lost strategic initiative, Mahmud also made errors tactically. Without a clear numerical advantage, he ordered a ferocious assault on Gaozhou City.

Gaozhou was a must-take objective for both sides. Mahmud had seen this clearly, and his purpose in attacking Gaozhou City was to draw the Anxi army across the river to its relief, so he could strike them mid-crossing.

In planning this matter, Mahmud had only thought of half, and only succeeded in half. That half was that Gaozhou City was difficult to take—after all, its defenses were solid, its troops elite, and its provisions ample—and indeed, five days after the fierce attack on Gaozhou erupted, the Anxi army did take the initiative to launch a river-crossing battle on the Jihun.

As for the other half beyond Mahmud's expectations—that was the formidable combat power of the Han army and the iron resolve of their will to fight. Under the cover of thundering cannon fire from the east bank, over ten thousand elite Han soldiers crossed westward on boats from five beachheads and launched their attack.

Striking mid-crossing did indeed inflict heavy casualties on the Anxi army, but the blood was not shed in vain. After paying nearly half their number in casualties, they successfully seized two beachheads on the west bank, established defenses, and bought time for the main army's subsequent crossing.

The bloody battle on the west bank was a contest of hard against hard—close combat, relying on courage and organization. And in these two aspects, the only force that could match the committed Anxi main army was Mahmud's personal guard.

The fighting lasted a full three days and nights. The front line shifted steadily westward, blood permeating the air and staining the riverbank red. The Ghazni defensive line was breached in numerous places. Though the fortresses built earlier did play a role—facing the Han army's tide-like attacks, many Ghazni troops chose to hole up in their forts for self-preservation—the tide of battle had already turned unfavorable.

The attack on Gaozhou City had long since stopped. The assault troops, save for a portion left to keep watch, were all redeployed by Mahmud to the west bank to deal with the attacking Anxi army. In three days, the tactical vocabulary had shifted from "annihilate" to "respond to."

Meanwhile, the defenders inside Gaozhou City, under the command of the veteran general Kang Jirong, also sallied out to attack, fighting bitterly against the several tens of thousands of allied troops keeping watch, not sparing casualties, helping relieve pressure on the main army.

What decided the course of the battlefield was a force of 10,000 elite cavalry led by Guo Ju. Liu Wenze gave him Anxi's finest cavalry, including the royal court's mounted guard, and Guo Ju led them across the river at a shallow ford, rode around more than 300 li, and struck the Arab army from behind.

First they coordinated with Kang Jirong's forces to rout the enemy before Gaozhou City, then joined forces and launched a fierce assault on the Ghazni main army. There are not many armies in this world that can withstand being attacked from two sides in open battle—and for the Ghazni army, vast in scale and complex in composition, it was all the more difficult.

Thus, twenty years later, the Arab eastern expedition failed once again. Mahmud tasted bitter fruit once more after the Battle of Ming City, and this bitter fruit was clearly even more bitter, for what had brought it to him was the "unknown" Liu Wenze.

The outcome of this great battle likewise profoundly influenced the course of history in Central and Western Asia.

Mahmud's late years were tarnished; the halo of hero and victor upon him was utterly dimmed, with nothing left to wash clean. Not only did he lose his lifetime of renown, but he also stripped away the resplendent exterior of an Arab dynasty.

Though Mahmud managed to flee the battlefield and eventually return to his capital Ghazni, his troops and horses were nearly all lost. Of his army of over two hundred thousand, fewer than thirty thousand survived to escape back to Ghazni, mostly cavalry. The rest were either killed, captured, drowned in the surging Jihun River, or lost somewhere in the vast Central Desert...

For the Arab world, this battle was undoubtedly another major setback. Even the most fanatical believers were nearly driven to psychological trauma by the Han. Lei Prefecture and other areas west of the Jihun River were swiftly recovered, and the battered Ming City once again raised high the Han banner of Anxi. The memorial ceremony for the fallen defenders used the heads of over ten thousand Arabs as sacrificial offerings. Even the Ziyarid dynasty entrenched on the southern shore of the Caspian Sea was destroyed in passing when Guo Ju recovered the city of Gorgan with his troops.

This battle shattered the courage the Arabs had accumulated over twenty years. The fury and clamor that had been so loud in Baghdad came to an abrupt halt...

And as the pillar of the Abbasid Caliphate, the Ghaznavid state likewise slid toward the abyss. In the north it lost vast territories—the fertile Balkh Plain was taken by Kang Jirong leading troops across the Jihun River. In the northeast, it was exploited by the state of Kangju; the perilous passes and strategic defiles at the northern foot of the Hindu Kush that had once made the Kang army hesitate were easily breached. Not only was the Badakhshan region lost, but Kunduz, the core of the northeastern defense, was also taken by troops sent by King Liu Wenqian of Kang.

Within Ghaznavid territory, Mahmud's prestige plummeted and the central government's strength was severely weakened, causing local powers to rapidly rise—especially the separatist forces in Persia and India, which quickly grew and formed a situation of divided rule.

As for Mahmud, though he did not completely sink into despair, he spent the rest of his life toiling to suppress internal rebellions and maintain the rule of the Ghaznavid dynasty. As for the three states of Anxi, he could no longer muster the strength or will, and could only adopt a completely defensive and contracting posture.

It was only through Mahmud's desperate efforts that the Ghaznavid dynasty's reign was extended to a certain degree, but its decline was inevitable. By the time Mahmud died, the dynasty's rule was already very fragile, and its control over Persia and India was merely nominal...

Compared to the miserable Ghaznavids, Anxi, as the victor, naturally fared much better—after all, it had captured countless spoils, expanded its territory, and had no more rivals in Central and Western Asia. However, the price paid was also considerable. Casualties numbering in the tens of thousands were enough to make the Anxi army lick its wounds for years, and the severe destruction of population and production across the vast lands from the Caspian Sea to Sa City would require even longer to recover.

Nominally, the state of Anxi had become the strongest power in Central and Western Asia, but in the short term, it had actually lost its capacity for expansion. Under the consumption of the great war, its national strength was in fact declining.

At the same time, the performance of the two brother states, Beiting and Kangju, in the great war also aroused suspicion in Anxi—especially Kangju, with its wolf-like ambition and unprincipled conduct. On the other hand, the Seljuk people, a rebellious tribe of the Oghuz Yabgu state roaming the lower Syr Darya, took advantage of the situation to attack the delta region of the lower Jihun River, gradually growing stronger and becoming a major threat to the state of Anxi.

The glorious victory draped Anxi in a bright coat, but the dynasty's future was not so secure. Regardless, after the Battle of Gao Prefecture, the Anxi dynasty truly stood at the pinnacle of the Central and Western Asian world, and the roots of Han civilization in this land grew ever deeper.

The fame of Liu Wenze, King of Anxi, like that of his father Liu Min, spread far and wide to Europe...