Chapter 124: The Extinction Strategy

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Although the Song and Xia had made peace, the warfare in the northwest had not ceased.

This was because the Zhao Song dynasty was still waging a war of annihilation against Qingtang Tubo.

Qingtang Tubo appeared small on the map, far smaller than Western Xia, yet it controlled the densely populated regions of Longyou and Hexi, possessing sufficient national strength and depth to be called a major power of the northwest.

Qingtang Tubo was founded by the descendants of the Tibetan Empire's emperor, Gusuoluo, and was also known in many places as the "Zongka Dynasty."

Although this state could not restore the former glory of the Tibetan Empire, it once dominated the western frontier, standing on equal footing with Western Xia and the Uyghur states.

Its capital was Qingtangcheng, formerly the seat of the Tang dynasty's Longyou Protectorate, Shanzhou (modern-day Xining, capital of Qinghai Province).

After the An Lushan Rebellion in the Tang dynasty, Shanzhou was occupied by the Tibetans; although nominally restored to Tang authority during the Guiyi Army period, it was in fact continuously controlled by barbarian forces.

By the time of Zhao Xu, it had been independent from central Chinese dynastic rule for over three hundred years.

The core region of Qingtang Tubo was Shanzhou, Huangzhou, and Guozhou; at its peak, its rule extended to Lan, Hui, Xi, He, Min, Tao, Dang, and Die, with a total population of one million five hundred thousand to two million. Relying on such manpower and wealth, Qingtang Tubo not only expanded its army to over two hundred thousand, but also built countless fortresses and strongholds within its borders.

Qingtangcheng sat at a crucial transit point along the Silk Road, connected to the Qinghai route in the west, bordered by Longyou in the east, backed by the Qilian Mountains to the north, and fronted by the Yellow River to the south; most Central Asian merchants traveling to trade with the Zhao Song dynasty passed through this city.

This made Qingtangcheng not only politically, religiously, and militarily significant, but also economically occupy an irreplaceable ecological niche in East Asia.

Although the Tangut Li clan rose to become the strongest power in Hexi by the end of the Tang dynasty, they could never seize Qingtangcheng; even the formidable Li Yuanhao suffered defeats at the hands of Gusuoluo in multiple wars.

But after Gusuoluo's death—even before his death—Qingtang Tubo was wracked by constant internal strife; Gusuoluo's descendants and local chieftains each seized control of their own cities, standing in opposition to one another.

Over these years, Western Xia had been steadily dividing Qingtang Tubo, seeking multiple allies to strategically encircle the Zhao Song dynasty.

Yet Qingtang Tubo controlled the vital Silk Road route; merely collecting transit tolls had already filled its coffers, so it had no desire to launch a full-scale attack on Song.

During the reign of Emperor Shenzong, Qingtang Tubo had even assisted the Zhao Song dynasty in attacking Western Xia.

But at the same time, multiple powerful chieftain factions within Qingtang Tubo had long been close to Western Xia.

Later, even the second emperor, Dongzhi, secretly colluded with Western Xia; his son even married a Western Xia princess, and the two states established a marriage alliance, appearing to be forming a coalition.

Meanwhile, the Zhao Song dynasty also recognized Qingtang Tubo as a latent threat and understood the strategic value of the Hehuang region.

Wang Shao, the warrior-general of Emperor Shenzong's reign, advised the court: rather than sit idly while Qingtang Tubo was wooed by Western Xia, it was better to strike first and expand into the Xihe region to counter Western Xia.

This aligned perfectly with the ambitions of Emperor Shenzong and Wang Anshi, who sought to make bold moves.

Thus, with the support of Emperor Shenzong and Wang Anshi, Wang Shao personally led a large army into campaign, formally launching the Song-Tubo War.

After fierce battles, the Song army expanded its borders by over two thousand li, seized Xi, He, and other prefectures, and brought nearly one million barbarians under its control, establishing the Xihe Road as a key frontier stronghold of the Zhao Song dynasty.

Later, Dongzhi attempted to retake the Xihe region but was defeated by Wang Shao, Li Xian, and others, forcing him to once again submit to the Zhao Song dynasty; the two states then entered a period of peaceful coexistence.

Later, Dongzhi was assassinated by his adopted son, Ali Gu, who became the third emperor.

But at that time, Gao Taotao and the old faction held power; they were unwilling to launch foreign wars and even considered giving Xihe Road back to Western Xia.

This amounted to allowing Ali Gu to unify Qingtang Tubo.

As a result, Ali Gu used his formidable skill to unify Qingtang Tubo; the Qingtang region once again slipped from Zhao Song control and became a major threat to the dynasty.

When Ali Gu's son, Xiazhen, ascended as the fourth emperor, he lacked both prestige and ability, knowing only slaughter; nearly half the local aristocratic clans rebelled against Qingtangcheng, plunging the entire Qingtang region into chaos, with factions fighting each other.

Meanwhile, the Zhao Song dynasty had entered the period of Zhao Yu's personal rule.

At that time, many Qingtang Tubo chieftains came to submit to the Zhao Song dynasty.

Later, the chieftain Bian Sibojie even brought with him the four key frontier towns of Qingtang—Jiangzhu City, Yigong City, Cuozao City, and Dangbiao City—along with his entire clan, to surrender to the Zhao Song dynasty.

The situation in Qingtang Tubo was clear to any observer: this was an opportunity too good to pass up.

Thus, Zhao Yu approved the war against Qingtang Tubo.

This campaign was led by Sun Lu, with the generals Wang Shan and Wang Min as vanguards.

As soon as the war began, countless barbarian tribes were eager to surrender to the Zhao Song dynasty.

The soldiers of Xihe Road all felt the destruction of Qingtang Tubo was certain; requests to attack grew daily.

Wang Shan even launched a surprise attack, crossing the Yellow River and killing the Tubo chieftain Mijian, who held the mountain pass, seizing the key Qingtang city of Mochuan (Huangzhou).

A month later, the chieftain Sheqinjiao, who guarded Zongge City, a major western stronghold of Qingtangcheng, also surrendered to the Zhao Song dynasty and sent envoys to offer the city to Wang Shan.

Zongge City had long been known as the gateway to Qingtangcheng; with its fall, Qingtangcheng was now in imminent danger.

Then, the Song army steadily advanced outside Qingtangcheng, capturing surrounding minor cities one after another, cutting off Qingtangcheng's links to the outside world.

Seeing the dire situation, the Qingtangcheng chieftain Xinmou Qinzhan imprisoned the puppet emperor Longza and sent envoys to surrender to the Song army.

Wang Shan accepted Xinmou Qinzhan's request and led his troops to Qingtangcheng.

Xinmou Qinzhan, accompanied by Longza, the Khitan princess (wife of the second emperor Dongzhi), the Western Xia princess (wife of the third emperor Ali Gu), and the Uyghur princess, all came out of the city to surrender.

—Later, Wang Shan captured the former emperor Xiazhen.

Thus, Qingtang Tubo, which had stood for nearly a century, was extinguished.

Zhao Yu's personal achievement reached the peak of his life.

This war of annihilation proceeded with extraordinary ease, taking only slightly over two months for the Song army to capture Qingtangcheng, the capital of Qingtang Tubo.

Yet, barely a month later, rebellions erupted across Qingtang, one after another.

The Song army, once reveling in a favorable situation, suddenly found itself surrounded by enemies everywhere.

Not only were Song troops stationed in Qingtangcheng and Mochuan besieged and cut off from their rear, but even newly surrendered strongholds near the heartland of Xihe Road—such as Yigong City and Dangbiao City—were all under siege.

The reason for this sudden reversal was that Zhao Yu and his ministers sought to impose the central dynasty's prefecture-county system to fully control Qingtang, directly threatening the interests of the slaveholding tribal chieftains.

Thus, just one month after the Song army occupied Qingtangcheng, the entire Qingtang region "rose up in a chorus of shouts, day and night without pause, uniting over one hundred thousand men to attack from all sides."

Western Xia also took the opportunity to send tens of thousands of troops to support Qingtang Tubo.

Suddenly, the Song army deep in Qingtang territory became a lone isolated force.

This was primarily because the Zhao Song dynasty had underestimated the strength of the tribal chieftains within Qingtang Tubo; for this loosely structured tribal confederation, crushing a central authority did not mean weakening all the chieftains.

Therefore, after Wang Shan entered Qingtangcheng, he was passively trapped in an endless guerrilla war.

As a result, Qingtang Tubo became a massive mess.

By the time Zhao Yu ascended the throne, one of the major problems facing the Zhao Song dynasty was whether to abandon or hold onto Qingtang Tubo.

Throughout his career, Zhang Dun had always been fervently devoted to expanding borders, using military force to resolve the border threats facing the Zhao Song dynasty and helping it extend its territory.

As early as the reign of Emperor Shenzong, he personally directed a series of campaigns to open up Jinghu.

During Zhao Xu's reign, he played the most crucial role in restarting the Song-Xia war.

Yet Western Xia was not an ordinary nomadic tribe; as early as the Five Dynasties and early Song period, it had already transformed into a feudal state combining agriculture and pastoralism.

After Zhao Xu assumed personal rule, the Zhao Song dynasty and Western Xia fought back and forth for four years, during which nearly a hundred fortresses and garrisons were built, nearly a million troops were mobilized, and countless human and financial resources were consumed.

If Shaanxi's economy was not promptly restored, a major crisis might ensue.

At this point, the Zhao Song dynasty had finally penetrated the Hengshan region and fully seized Western Xia's key stronghold, Mount Tiandou—it was time to cease hostilities and withdraw.

Before Zhao Yu ascended the throne, Zhao Xu had already joined forces with Ceng Bu and Zhang Jie to reject Zhang Dun and Sun Lu, the commander of Xihé Road, and firmly refused to launch troops against Qingtang, resolved to restore border peace and reconcile the economy.

Later, due to the dire internal situation in Qingtang Tubo, and motivated by the desire to seize an opportunity, Zhao Xu and his ministers launched a campaign into Qingtang.

Unexpectedly, in the end, the Song army found itself caught between advance and retreat.

The war to destroy Qingtang Tubo was naturally led by Zhang Dun.

This became the entry point for his political enemies to attack him.

The leader of the Old Party, Han Zhongyan, impeached Zhang Dun, seeking to make him bear responsibility for the campaign's arrogance and reckless advance.

The Old Party's censors further argued from the perspective of people's livelihood, claiming that the exhaustion of the populace under the Shaosheng era should be blamed entirely on Zhang Dun's militaristic excesses, and they hoped the Zhao Song dynasty would completely abandon Qingtang.

To be honest, the Old Party's concerns regarding finance and livelihood were indeed valid; censor Ren Boyu believed that at this very moment, the salt ponds of Shaanxi's Jieyan were damaged, causing annual fiscal losses exceeding three million, while Guanzhong had suffered consecutive years of drought, with grain prices soaring and people starving, causing masses to flee Shaanxi—population had declined by sixty to seventy percent; even though this year's harvest was bountiful, prices remained five times higher than normal.

Seen this way, Shaanxi truly needed several years of rest and recovery.

Yet Zhang Dun believed that harsh suppression policies must be imposed on rebellious Tubo chieftains; he even proposed killing every male member of rebellious chieftain clans and conscripting their women into the Imperial Music Bureau, solely to preserve as much as possible the military gains from the destruction of Qingtang Tubo.

Undoubtedly, this difficult choice now rested on Zhao Yu's shoulders.

After learning of this, Zhang Chun told Zhao Yu: "Qingtang will eventually be reclaimed anyway; and if we withdraw from Qingtangcheng back to Huangzhou, the cost of constructing cooperative fortresses will be even higher than if we had not withdrawn at all—it will not save money."

Zhao Yu had some recollection of this, as Song dynasty ministers had later calculated this very account in history.

Zhao Yu also knew that if they chose to withdraw, General Wang Shan would commit suicide out of unbearable humiliation, and the future general Wang Hou, who would reclaim Qingtang for the Zhao Song dynasty, would be demoted.

Thus, Zhao Yu chose to withstand the pressure from the Old Party and delay Zhang Dun's withdrawal from Qingtang.

To support Zhang Dun, Zhao Yu tightened his belt and allocated five million strings of coins and silk to relieve border civilians and reward meritorious soldiers.

Zhang Dun perceived Zhao Yu's intent and fully cooperated with him to seize power from Empress Xiang as quickly as possible.

This led to the later situation where Zhang Dun fully supported Zhao Yu, Zhao Yu consistently protected Zhang Dun, and Zhang Dun, to demonstrate his loyalty to Zhao Yu, even gave him his own granddaughter, Zhang Nan.

Now, Zhao Yu had reclaimed all his imperial authority from Empress Xiang.

The question of whether to abandon or hold Qingtang Tubo could no longer remain unresolved, for continuing this indecision would be highly detrimental to the Zhao Song dynasty and would undermine the morale of frontline troops.

At this moment, although the Song army controlled the battlefield, Zhao Yu was fully aware of the poor discipline of the Western Army; without asking, he knew they had committed countless acts of burning, killing, and looting in Qingtang.

Moreover, not long ago, Yao Xiong not only impeached Wang Shan for seeking glory through reckless advancement and delaying state affairs, but also accused Wang Shan and Wang Hou of plundering the treasuries of Tubo nobles during the conquest of Qingtang, displaying grotesque greed.

Others also impeached Yao Xiong for, while rescuing Wang Shan, plundering the Xilan Zong fortress and burning its tribal encampments before returning.

With such conduct by the Song army, it was clearly impossible to expect any goodwill from the Qingtang populace.

The original policy of establishing prefectures and counties had already proven ill-suited.

Now the Song army, blinded by bloodlust, was looting everywhere.

At this point, invoking Fan Zhongyan's principle of governing borders with benevolence would be absurdly pretentious.

Meanwhile, court ministers—especially conservative ones—advocated withdrawing the Song army from Qingtang and implementing a tributary system of indirect rule.

But when only Zhao Yu and Zhang Dun were alone, Zhang Dun presented Zhao Yu with a devastating strategy: to arrest all clan members of rebellious chieftains in Qingtang and subject each member, from infants to the highest chieftains, to the horrific punishment of slow slicing.

Zhang Dun analyzed for Zhao Yu: compared to Qingtang Tubo's rigid three-tiered social structure of nobles, commoners, and slaves, Zhao Song society was undoubtedly more favorable to the lower-class Fan people. Although opportunities for Fan people in Zhao Song were still fewer than for ordinary Han, their life experience here was vastly superior to returning to Tubo as lowly outcasts or slaves—let alone the near-total absence of social mobility in Qingtang Tubo. In Zhao Song, however, many Fan people who gained imperial favor had risen to become seasoned frontier generals. Thus, the lower-class Fan people would certainly accept Zhao Song rule. Now, if the noble class of Qingtang Tubo were eliminated, the prefecture-county system could be implemented, and Qingtang could be fully occupied.

Zhang Dun also said that once the Zhao Song dynasty fully controlled Qingtangcheng, Shaanxi's economy would quickly recover through the Silk Road's lifeline.

Admittedly, Zhang Dun's plan was even harsher than the Mongols' policy of total annihilation in history.

Yet the Zhao Song dynasty's civilization stood in the way—court deliberations would inevitably oppose such indiscriminate slaughter.

But on the other hand, it was now impossible to restrain the Western Army from committing even the slightest atrocity.

Crucially, this half-measure could never control Qingtang.

Moreover, frontline grain supplies could no longer sustain the Song army's presence.

Zhang Dun's suggestion was that frontline troops adopt the Hu Ren practice of foraging for provisions locally.

In short, Zhang Dun sought to preserve the military gains of conquering Qingtang Tubo by any means necessary, to restore the prestige he had lost due to the failure of his campaign to destroy Qingtang.

After listening, Zhao Yu fell into deep thought for a long time, then said: "Free all slaves; leave commoners and below untouched."

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(End of Chapter)