Chapter 280: 278 Torment

Lu Xiangsheng was exhausted, body and mind worn thin.

Whether in the original history or in this timeline, this year saw a great debate over whether to seek peace.

But the dispute between war and peace was effectively over the moment the Qing army reached Beijing.

With the enemy at the city gates, what damned peace talks could there be?

No matter how foolish the sovereign and his ministers might be, none would fantasize about negotiating peace once the Manchu Qing had struck at Beijing.

Historically, the core conflict between Lu Xiangsheng, Yang Sichang, and Gao Qiqian was not the pro-war versus pro-peace stance recorded in the History of Ming, but a complete divergence in strategic approach!

Lu Xiangsheng belonged to the "pro-war faction" — take the initiative in battle, seek opportunities to annihilate the enemy.

Gao Qiqian belonged to the "evade-battle faction" — hoard massed troops and adopt passive defense.

Yang Sichang belonged to the "steady-war faction" — divide forces to hold the cities, and by all means avoid reckless battle.

Both Yang Sichang and Gao Qiqian counted on the Manchu Qing to finish looting and leave on their own. The only difference was that Gao Qiqian dared not fight at all, while Yang Sichang was willing to fight when he had absolute certainty.

To stop Lu Xiangsheng from charging ahead into reckless battle, Yang Sichang even deliberately delayed the supply of grain and fodder.

"Supreme Commander, the grain and fodder are nearly gone!"

"Send someone back again to request provisions."

Lu Xiangsheng was fighting not only the Manchu Qing, but also the civil officials and military officers around him.

Even after Yang Sichang was transferred away from Beijing, the situation remained unchanged.

Because Gao Qiqian was unwilling to fight in the field, and the commanders under Lu Xiangsheng were also unwilling to fight in the field. Thus, the former withheld grain and fodder, while the latter gave outward compliance but inward defiance, all to force Lu Xiangsheng not to go charging about.

A commander like Wang Pu, leading eight thousand troops, would very likely retreat without a fight at the critical moment.

For the frontier garrison commanders, even if the entire Northern Zhili was stripped bare, it mattered not so long as the Manchu Qing did not take Beijing. The common folk being burned, killed, and plundered was no concern of theirs; they only wanted to preserve their own forces.

If they preserved their forces, even after a crushing defeat, the Emperor would not dare punish them severely.

If they lost their forces, even after a total victory, they might inexplicably lose their posts and be thrown into prison.

That being so, why take the initiative to seek field battle?

Was it not better to follow at a distance of two or three hundred li, and after the Manchu Qing finished looting and left, "recover" the lost territory?

Lu Xiangsheng was inspecting the army camp when suddenly a commotion broke out somewhere. He promptly rode over, and halfway there met a messenger. He asked at once, "What has happened?"

"Supreme Commander, Li Zhongzhen's unit is making a clamor over pay, saying they haven't been paid for two months. Lately their rations have been cut too, and they're all complaining they don't get enough to eat," the messenger said.

Lu Xiangsheng sighed helplessly and rode over to pacify the soldiers clamoring for pay.

He bore the Imperial Sword and held supreme command over all the relief armies of the realm. Yet Gao Qiqian was the Supervisor-in-Chief, overseeing all the realm's troops. With Yang Sichang gone from Beijing, grain and fodder were entirely under Gao Qiqian's control.

If Lu Xiangsheng were truly done to death, it could never be the work of just one or two men framing him.

Rather, all the civil and military officers in charge of the troops wanted him dead. Only with Lu Xiangsheng dead would they not have to fight a bitter battle. Only with Lu Xiangsheng dead could they peacefully hold the cities and wait for the Manchu Qing to leave on their own!

"Report!!!!!"

Lu Xiangsheng had just pacified the soldiers clamoring for pay when suddenly a scout came to report: "Supreme Commander, the Tartar slaves have besieged Julu. The County Magistrate of Julu has sent a man to beg for relief!"

"Scout again!"

Lu Xiangsheng summoned his commanders to council and said, "The slave army is outside the city of Julu. Tomorrow we break camp and march south! Supervisor Gao's (Gao Qiqian's) grand army is at Linqing. I have already sent word asking him to join forces and strike the enemy!"

"This must be a baiting tactic by the Tartar slaves, besieging the city to strike the relief force. We must not act rashly," Wang Pu said.

Li Zhongzhen said, "Even the Emperor does not send out hungry soldiers. The men lack grain and pay, their morale is low. Without full grain and pay, how can they fight?"

Li Guozhu sighed, "Let us wait until Supervisor Gao's troops join forces, then speak further."

Hu Dawei and the other commanders kept their heads down in silence, clearly also opposed to relieving Julu.

Lu Xiangsheng held the Imperial Sword in his hand, yet he was utterly helpless against these commanders.

Because what the military men said was all correct: the Manchu Qing were certainly besieging the city to strike the relief force. Moreover, the Emperor does not send out hungry soldiers; without full grain and pay, the troops were very likely to erupt in mutiny.

If he forcibly ordered an attack, or killed someone to assert authority, a mutiny would break out at once!

Lu Xiangsheng could only let the matter drop, waiting on one hand for grain and fodder, and on the other for Gao Qiqian to come and join forces.

As for the shortage of grain and fodder, it was not entirely Gao Qiqian deliberately making trouble.

The Manchu Qing had wreaked massive destruction along their path, so the government troops could not requisition grain locally and had to have it transported from Beijing. As they pursued the Manchu Qing southward, the supply line stretched longer and longer, and they were nearly at the Shandong border.

What little grain and fodder there was, Gao Qiqian naturally supplied his own forces first, tossing the leftover scraps to Lu Xiangsheng.

Lu Xiangsheng just kept waiting. He at least managed to get a little grain and fodder, but Gao Qiqian advanced at a tortoise's pace. Linqing and Julu were only a hundred-odd li apart, and the terrain along the way was fairly flat, yet Gao Qiqian's forty-thousand-strong army took a full ten days to cover the distance.

The two sides communicated by courier and agreed on a pincer attack from north and south against the Qing army.

Gao Qiqian entrenched his camp and refused to move, wanting Lu Xiangsheng to fight a battle first. If Lu Xiangsheng won, he would pursue the victory; if Lu Xiangsheng lost, he would fall back and hold Linqing.

Lu Xiangsheng, full of confidence, prepared for the joint strike, only to find that all the commanders under him refused to move.

Those fellows had once again stirred up the soldiers to clamor for pay, and this time all the units from Xuan-Da did so together. Until full grain and pay were provided, they adamantly refused to advance.

Lu Xiangsheng flew into a rage, brought out the Imperial Sword, and beheaded over twenty of the rioting officers in succession.

He dared not kill the high-ranking commanders, but low-ranking officers were another matter.

At last, after two days of reorganization, the entire army set out.

How many troops the Qing army that had breached the passes this time actually had, the Great Ming still had not figured out. All they knew was that apart from the artillery, the rest were all cavalry, and they had split into three columns to plunder southward.

Here at Julu, there were probably around ten thousand Manchu Qing cavalry.

Lu Xiangsheng led his troops to attack. A few li from the county seat of Julu, two thousand enemy horsemen came charging toward them.

"Just drive them off. Do not pursue too far." Lu Xiangsheng dispatched cavalry to give chase. He had seven thousand cavalry in all under his command.

Those two thousand Manchu Qing cavalry seemed to have no intention of engaging. The moment they saw the Great Ming cavalry emerge, they immediately wheeled around and fled. And they fled by making all sorts of detours, their sole purpose being to slow Lu Xiangsheng's advance.

The scouts had already located the Qing army's main camp, but dared not approach too closely.

Lu Xiangsheng led the main army and advanced with extreme caution. Another half day was lost before he finally realized something was wrong. The Manchu Qing's main camp outside Julu was actually empty, with only a few thousand head of plundered draft livestock, and not even any captured men or women!

This year's breach of the passes by the Tartars was different from every previous incursion.

In the first two or three months of the war, they did nothing but wreak destruction, without carrying out large-scale looting.

The operational intent was obvious: the Manchu Qing had suffered a defeat around Beijing, so they split their forces to drag the Ming army south. The longer the Ming supply lines stretched, the more friction arose among the various commands, the more exhausted the troops became — and the Manchu Qing would then seize the chance to destroy their effective strength.

Historically, Lu Xiangsheng was left with only five thousand men, and the Manchu Qing went straight for him.

But now, Lu Xiangsheng had twenty-four thousand men, and Gao Qiqian had forty thousand. Having already tasted defeat at Lu Xiangsheng's hands, the Manchu Qing bypassed him and struck directly at Gao Qiqian, leaving behind an empty camp to deceive Lu Xiangsheng.

"Superintendent Gao is in grave danger — we must go to his aid at once!" Lu Xiangsheng stood inside the empty camp, horrified.

The frontier garrison generals, however, were one and all secretly delighted.

They had relieved Julu County seat and recaptured several thousand head of livestock, along with the great quantities of fodder and provisions the livestock had been carrying.

All of it counted as battle merit!

……

Let us turn to Gao Qiqian. He had brought his troops over and gone straight to Jize County to encamp. At that time, Jize County seat lay wedged between the Fuyang River and the Luo River, naturally quite secure with two rivers shielding it.

The man had never intended to fight a battle; otherwise, he would never have stationed his army in terrain so favorable for defense and so unfavorable for attack.

What one fears most is exactly what comes.

Gao Qiqian and a handful of trusted confidants lodged inside the town, while the main army camped outside the walls — Julu County seat was not large, forty thousand soldiers could not possibly all be crammed inside, and there were also endless supplies of grain, fodder, and baggage; only when defending a city would one bring the whole army inside.

That noon, he drank himself into a stupor and was snoring through his midday nap inside the town.

A eunuch came running in panic: "Disaster! The slave troops have crossed the river and are bearing down on Jize!"

"How many?" Gao Qiqian asked in alarm.

"Unknown — I fear it is twenty or thirty thousand cavalry!" the junior eunuch answered.

Twenty or thirty thousand, his foot — this column of Qing troops could have no more than ten thousand-odd cavalry at most.

"Quickly, have the army enter the town and hold the defenses!"

The gates of Jize County seat swung open at once, and the cavalry were the first to enter. Gradually, the rumble of hoofbeats became audible, and the forty-thousand-strong army instantly panicked, throwing away all regard for their lives as they surged into the town.

"Shut the gates!"

"Loose arrows! Loose arrows!"

The arrows were not aimed at the Manchu Qing, but at the Ming soldiers outside the walls; at the gate, men began butchering one another.

The hoofbeats drew nearer and nearer. Seeing there was no way into the town, the remaining soldiers immediately broke and fled south.

Of the forty-thousand-strong army, only a little over twelve thousand picked troops made it inside the town.

The remaining twenty-eight thousand men, more than half of whom were civilian laborers and support troops, were left exposed to the Manchu Qing butcher's blade.

The Qing soldiers pursued and slaughtered all the way, and after scattering the Ming troops outside the town, they headed straight for Guangping Prefecture seat without a backward glance. They meant to continue plundering grain and fodder, continue luring the Ming army south, and continue stretching the Ming supply lines.

Gao Qiqian stood atop the gate tower, watching the Qing army head south, and at once breathed a sigh of relief: "Thank heaven, thank heaven — the Tartar slaves did not lay siege to Jize."

Another day passed. Lu Xiangsheng arrived with his troops to relieve him, only to be furiously denounced by Gao Qiqian for cowardice and failing to advance.

An impeachment memorial was already on its way to the capital.

As for its contents: the two men had jointly attacked the Manchu Qing western army; Gao Qiqian had fought valiantly, while Lu Xiangsheng had cowered and refused to advance. This made it impossible to form a combined assault, squandering a prime opportunity to annihilate the enemy, and resulting in a severe defeat for Gao Qiqian.

Several days later, Gao Qiqian colluded with the military officers under Lu Xiangsheng, and before long a mutiny over pay arrears was stirred up.

Gao Qiqian sent off a second impeachment memorial, accusing Lu Xiangsheng of embezzling army provisions and favoring only his own elite corps, thereby driving the troops of the Xuan-Da frontier army to mutiny.

It came down to the same old truth: apart from Lu Xiangsheng, no one wanted to fight this war.

Whether Lu Xiangsheng ended up dead or thrown into prison, none of them cared. All they wanted was for Lu Xiangsheng to stop being the supreme commander; if the fighting went on like this, every column of troops would be wiped out by the Qing army.

To be honest, if one sets aside self-interest, it is hard to say who is right and who is wrong.

Lu Xiangsheng's strategic decisions were certainly correct in the early phase. But now, dragged into the late phase, the battle lines have been stretched far too long — there is simply no way to keep fighting. Any further field operations will only see the Qing army destroy them piecemeal.

Lu Xiangsheng's Tianxiong Army could take it, but how could the other units withstand this kind of long-distance pursuit battle?

As the commander of the entire army, faced with such a situation, one cannot act recklessly.

Yet one cannot simply refuse to fight — can we just let the Manchu Qing burn, kill, and plunder as they please?

Whoever sat in this position would be torn just as Lu Xiangsheng was. To fight is wrong; not to fight is also wrong.

The Great Ming is beyond saving.

(End of chapter)