Chapter 330: Starvation, Burning Camps, Wheels Laid Flat: The Triple Gate Slaughter in Liaodong

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It is well known that the Jin state was founded by the Jurchens, and Liaodong was one of their ancestral homelands and the core region of their early activities. Wanyan Aguda laid the foundation of the Jin state only after seizing Liaodong.

Thus, it is not an exaggeration to call Liaodong the cradle of the Jin state.

Losing Liaodong would weaken the Jurchen tribes’ sense of allegiance to the Jin state and might even spark internal dissent, undermining the regime’s cohesion.

Liaodong’s geography is strategically vital: it borders the Korean Peninsula to the east, the Mongolian steppe to the west, and the Central Plains to the south, serving as the Jin state’s natural barrier against external threats. It blocks the southern advance of Mongol tribes and harassment from other forces in Liaodong, such as Goryeo, safeguarding the security of the Jin’s core ruling territories.

If Liaodong’s geographic barrier were lost, the Jin state would be directly exposed to threats from the Great Song, the Liao remnants, Mongol steppe tribes, and Goryeo, plunging it into a passive multi-front war.

Liaodong also serves as the Jin state’s springboard for southern expansion. From Liaodong, the Jin can strike directly at the Liao heartland (the Yan-Yun region) and then advance southward against the Great Song, making it the strategic pivot for dominating northern territories.

The Jin has always advanced southward from Liaodong as its base, ultimately destroying the Liao and pressuring the Song. If Liaodong is lost, the Jin loses its strategic rear and expansion springboard—it can no longer push south and may even face counterattacks from Liao remnants, losing already occupied territories and becoming a regional minor power.

Liaodong’s agriculture, animal husbandry, and hunting/fishing industries are highly developed, producing abundant grain, horses, furs, and minerals (such as iron), providing vital material support for Jin military expansion and daily governance.

Especially horses and iron tools are critical to the Jin army, which relies primarily on cavalry. One could say Liaodong’s resource supply directly determines the Jin army’s combat effectiveness.

Losing this region would leave the Jin facing severe shortages, unable to sustain its governing machinery, and possibly triggering internal unrest due to economic collapse.

The area around Liaoyang Prefecture in Dongjing Road is a key Jurchen population center, with four counties—Liaoyang, Heye, Yifeng, Shicheng—and Changyi Town housing over forty thousand households. At five people per household, this amounts to over two hundred thousand people.

Including the Meng’an-Mouke households and Han, Khitan, and Bohai populations in Dongjing Road’s prefectures and counties, the total reaches roughly one million four hundred thousand.

This is unquestionably one of the Jin’s core settlement zones; by controlling Liaodong, the Jin stabilizes its ethnic population base and ensures a steady supply of recruits.

Without Liaodong, the Jin army will face depleted manpower, interrupted equipment, and severed logistical supply lines, making it impossible to sustain prolonged warfare against the Liao and Song.

Thus, Liaodong is the very foundation of the Jin state—indispensable to its origin, military security, and economic support—and a vital guarantee for its rule. Losing Liaodong would completely halt the Jin’s rise and likely cause its rapid decline in confrontation with the Liao and Song, preventing it from becoming a dominant northern power.

In short, Liaodong is a region the Jin cannot afford to lose under any circumstances.

The alliance between the Great Song and the Liao remnants plotting to seize Liaodong is, for the Jin, a war of survival.

Even in dire circumstances where manpower and equipment appear inferior, the Jin will fight to the death—Wanyan Aguda and others have no choice.

Guerrilla tactics are precisely the strategy that offsets the Song army’s cannon advantage and wears down the Song-Liao coalition.

The Jin army, having already suffered heavy losses, fully understands the destructive power of Li Lin’s cannons.

Wanyan Aguda and other outstanding Jin commanders, through these battles with the Song, have concluded that these heavy artillery pieces capable of breaching city walls, though dominant on open battlefields, suffer two fatal flaws: first, their immense weight requires dozens of men or draft animals to haul them; in Liaodong’s mountainous, forested, and marshy terrain, they move at a crawl—traveling hundreds of miles from the Liaoxi Corridor to Liaoyang’s interior, crossing the mountains of former Goryeo territory and the muddy wetlands of the lower Liao River, they advance no more than ten li per day; second, their logistical demands are enormous—each cannon consumes vast quantities of gunpowder and cannonballs daily, and the transport teams must also carry food, tools, and supplies, often leaving them in the predicament of “cannons at the front, ammunition still en route.”

In response to Li Lin’s cannons’ weaknesses, the Jin army adopted a guerrilla strategy: “harass as the main tactic, avoid strength, strike weakness.”

That is, the Jurchen cavalry divided into small units, using their intimate knowledge of the mountains and forests to hide during the day and strike at night, targeting Song supply lines. They avoided direct confrontation with cannon units, instead focusing on the auxiliary troops transporting gunpowder and grain—setting traps in the woods, setting fire to grain carts with flaming arrows, or launching night raids on isolated escort squads, leaving the Song’s Li Lin cannons perpetually in the awkward state of “cannons without ammunition, ammunition without cannons.”

Once, when a Song cannon column passed through the Sarhū Valley, the Jin first sent small forces to feign harassment, luring the escort troops to split and pursue, then launched a main force attack on the rear gunpowder wagons—a massive explosion rendered over a dozen cannons useless scrap metal.

Moreover, Liaodong is dotted with old Liao fortresses. Though less sturdy than prefectural cities, these hillside strongholds block key passes. The Jin hides its main forces inside, letting Song cannons bombard the outer earthen walls—after all, the fortresses store ample grain, and soldiers know every tunnel and hidden bunker. When the Song’s Li Lin cannons retreat due to depleted ammunition or broken supply lines, the Jin sallies forth to reclaim lost ground.

Not long ago, in the battle for Shicheng Fortress outside Liaoyang, Song cannons breached half the wall—only to find a deep moat and sharpened stakes behind it. Jin archers on both hills suppressed the Song advance; when Song soldiers climbed ladders to scale the walls, Jin troops emerged from underground tunnels to harass their rear, dragging out the fight until the Song ran out of ammunition and provisions and withdrew, never capturing Shicheng Fortress.

Meanwhile, the Jin used resources and women plundered from Goryeo to lure the Liao remnants into defection.

The Liao remnants are now destitute—they cannot even pay their soldiers, and their food is supplied entirely by the Great Song, with no victories to seize spoils.

In the short term, soldiers cling to patriotic ideals—to restore the state, to avenge, to wash away humiliation—and endure hardship without reward.

But as time passes, the rumble of empty stomachs drowns out the slogans of restoration; frozen fingers can no longer grip weapons of vengeance; patriotic fervor, worn down by day after day of hunger and cold, thins to a mere whisper.

Meanwhile, they watch Song soldiers receive heavy monthly pay, wear thick cotton coats that withstand minus thirty or forty degrees, sleep in fine tents with warm quilts, burn coal and charcoal for heat inside their tents, and enjoy wine and canned meat during festivals and after victories; wounded soldiers receive medical care, and fallen soldiers’ families receive pensions sufficient to feed them.

The Liao soldiers’ sense of justice tilts steadily.

Both sides fight for their country—why do Song soldiers eat well and stay warm, while they starve, gnawing on frozen beans? And even those beans are provided by the Great Song to the Liao.

Both sides abandon homes and families—yet Song soldiers have the imperial court to care for them in life, death, sickness, and old age; the Song court even grants land, houses, and women to meritorious soldiers. But if a Liao soldier dies, he becomes nothing but a mound of forgotten earth in the wilderness.

The once thunderous cries of “restore the state, wash away humiliation” gradually, in nights of starvation-induced delirium, shrink to a simple longing: “one full meal.”

Liao soldiers often secretly borrow grain from Song troops.

The Great Song responds generously—no matter who comes, a supervisor meets them, courteously giving extra food to Liao soldiers, and helping them when needed, such as treating wounded Liao troops.

In casual conversation, Song soldiers say: “War is won by national strength, not individual bravery. Look at us—our cannons line up, blasting the Jin dogs into confusion, then we charge and cut them down; battle merits are as easy to collect as fallen fruit. Look at you—your armor and weapons are incomplete; you must trade your lives for every inch. And worse—you’re hungry, cold. How can you win? You’re just throwing your lives away.”

Hearing this, Liao soldiers feel profound resentment, profound injustice.

One Liao soldier killed two Jin troops at the cost of his own life—his reward: half a sack of moldy grain. In the Song army, such a feat would earn him two mu of good land, two guan in bounty, a wife, and a victory feast with endless wine and canned meat.

A Liao junior officer stared at his boots, worn thin at the toes, stuffed with wula grass to keep his toes from freezing, then looked at the thick felt boots worn by Song privates. That last shred of “Liao men must die fighting” pride, like firewood soaked in snowmelt, could no longer spark a flame.