Chapter 477: New Strategy Hears of Old Haunts

Just as Jia Xu had judged, after Cao Cao retrieved Xiahou Yuan's corpse, regardless of what he truly felt inside, he appeared utterly indifferent on the surface. Moreover, he immediately issued orders to the three armies, denouncing Xiahou Yuan as inherently inept at military command, long nicknamed in the army the 'Baitian General' — meaning the Idiot General — so as to dismiss the loss at Pubei and Xiahou Yuan's death as unworthy of mention.

On the other side, after Gongsun Xun established his camp by the Pu River, he too immediately issued a clear written military order, proclaimed to the three armies — but it was a "Self-Admonition Proclamation"!

The reason it was a proclamation and not an edict was that edicts were the sole prerogative of the Son of Heaven... In the proclamation, Duke Yan frankly admitted that due to his own arrogance and complacency, he had underestimated the enemy and lost his composure, thus falling for Cao Cao's scheme and being deceived by the latter's desperate gambit. This had squandered all the temporal and spatial advantages gained by the earlier Hebei army's surprise attack, wasting dozens of days of decisive battle opportunity for the sake of five thousand cavalry, allowing Cao's army to complete the construction of its defensive depth.

A battle so bizarre it was utterly asymmetrical — from a tactical result standpoint, it was undoubtedly an absolute major victory for the Yan army. They used overwhelming local troop superiority to annihilate an entire enemy force and slay an enemy grand general. But from a deeper strategic perspective, it was undoubtedly a success for Cao's army, because they had barely stabilized their footing under Gongsun Xun's surprise assault and established a defense in depth.

Yet, in the face of this battle, the commanders of both sides were each claiming the other had won and they themselves had lost, then frantically engaging in criticism and self-criticism... For warfare to become this strange could only mean that both sides had previously harbored unrealistic expectations about the war, and had now simply come to their senses.

In fact, after Cao Cao's "Baitian General Edict" and Gongsun Xun's "Self-Admonition Proclamation" were issued, the greatest shock was felt by the senior generals below the two commanders-in-chief.

The generals of Cao's army who hailed from Pei and Liang naturally began to stir with a shared sense of enmity. Men like Lu Su and Liu Ye, who had come to Chenliu as reinforcements, understood Cao Cao's predicament even more and were shaken by it. On the other side, the Yan army's generals also fell one after another into a state of fearful shock. Even Zhang Liao, who had reaped a huge advantage, and Zhang He, who had just been promoted, submitted letters pleading guilt, confessing their own faults.

The former deflected credit, saying Xiahou Yuan's death was truly the combined effort of all the generals; the latter self-criticized, saying a commander should not personally brave arrows and blades, disregarding the greater army.

To these, Gongsun Xun merely held onto them without issuing a response, only ordering the entire army to establish defensive lines on the north bank of the Pu River, then perfect the main camp, and simply confront Cao Cao across the river in the Suanzao and Pingqiu area upstream on the Pu River.

Though called a standoff, in reality it was a simultaneous process of massing troops and probing each other.

In just a few days, to be precise by early June, the number of troops in the two camps at Suanzao and Pingqiu, separated by the Pu River, had both reached an unimaginable scale — north of the Pu were the sixty-five thousand troops who had participated in the encirclement and hunt of Xiahou Yuan, plus twenty thousand auxiliary troops sent as reinforcements and five thousand permanently assigned laborers, reaching a total of ninety thousand; south of the Pu were the original fifty thousand combat troops sent to support Xiahou Yuan (twenty thousand Cao Cao brought from Chen Commandery, thirty thousand brought by Lu Zijing), and after the subsequent arrival of Liu Biao's reinforcements led by generals Liu Pan, Huang Zhong, and Wen Ping, there were a full seventy thousand field elite, plus tens of thousands of local laborers hastily gathered for home-ground operations, totaling no less than one hundred thousand!

Beyond this, downstream along the Pu River, all the way to Puyang and Baima, both sides had troops confronting each other along the route.

Xu Huang and Zhang He led fifteen thousand troops stationed in the four cities north of the Pu, while opposite them Li Tong and Wen Ping led troops stationed in cities like Kuangcheng, Pucheng, and Changyuan. Then Gao Shun was stationed at Baima, and Yue Jin at Puyang.

With a standoff of this scale, both sides were somewhat tense, and the probing never ceased from start to finish. Small elite units constantly crossed the river to probe, yet consistently failed to gain a foothold... The main armies, moreover, were hindered by the summer floodwaters, making it extremely difficult to maneuver directly across in force.

On this day, however, with the Governor of Sizhou, Lou Gui, arriving from west of the Yingou River, and the Deputy Director of the Jing'an Bureau, Guo Jia, also reaching the Pu River from the direction of Baima, the various generals of the main camp north of the Pu, predominantly the former Yecheng commanders, instantly understood that the second phase of the campaign was about to arrive.

"Setting aside the generals for now, the quality of the rebel army's soldiers was inherently inferior to our own, and after Xiahou Yuan's unit was encircled and annihilated, their disadvantage in cavalry has become even more pronounced..."

That morning, the second day after Guo Jia had just entered the Pu River main camp during the standoff, a large-scale high-level military council formally began. However, after the generals were summoned to the central army tent by Gongsun Xun, it was Guo Jia who first explained the latest intelligence obtained by the Jing'an Bureau to the assembled commanders.

"Approximately how many cavalry do they still have?" Just as Guo Fengxiao was standing in the tent speaking eloquently, Gongsun Xun, seated at the head, suddenly interjected to ask.

"They should still have over ten thousand..." Guo Jia immediately responded in explanation.

"How can there be so many? Haven't we cut off the horse trade for several years now?" someone curiously pressed — it was Cheng Lian. "The horse-producing regions are all in our hands, aren't they?"

"That is indeed true, but although the Central Plains and Jianghuai do not produce horses, before the realm fell into chaos, horse-raising was universally practiced," Guo Jia also earnestly explained. "After the realm descended into turmoil, the horse population in the Central Plains declined sharply. The lords of the Central Plains are no fools; naturally, they would search out warhorses to concentrate, breed, and raise them... Both the Cao and Liu clans, and before them Tao Qian, all established special horse supervisors in their military agricultural colonies. It's just that after six or seven years, the locally raised warhorses are somewhat lacking in quality, but that doesn't mean they are so short of horses as to be helpless. And now, with the three major lords allied, it's still no problem for the three families to scrape together twenty thousand cavalry in total."

The crowd nodded in agreement one after another.

"However, it's worth mentioning," Guo Fengxiao paused briefly at this point, "that Cao Mengde, being furthest north, used his position as alliance chief over the past few years to repeatedly demand fine horses from Xuzhou and Huainan. He has thus managed to assemble an elite personal guard cavalry unit, about three thousand strong, called the Tiger and Leopard Cavalry, personally led by his younger cousin Cao Chun."

The words "Tiger and Leopard Cavalry" drew a wave of obvious scoffing and derisive laughter, but upon hearing the name Cao Chun, quite a few in the tent couldn't help showing slight changes in expression. The combination of the two reactions stirred a brief commotion.

It turned out that Cao Chun was prominently listed among the names on the wanted animal cards — as a Winter Rooster. Alongside him were the three generals Chen Wu, Xu Sheng, and Dong Xi. According to the description, these four roosters were all young and impetuous, yet fierce and pugnacious assault commanders!

Among them, Cao Chun went without saying. He was Cao Ren's younger brother and Cao Cao's close paternal cousin, twenty-seven years old this year. Because of his family's prominence, during the period when Cao Song served as Grand Commandant, Cao Chun, before even undergoing his capping ceremony, had already served a term as a Gentleman Attendant at the Yellow Gate. By the year Dong Zhuo usurped the government, he had just been capped and had been following Cao Cao in his campaigns ever since, enjoying considerable renown throughout the Central Plains and even Hebei.

As for Chen Wu, his family had long been a major clan in Lujiang. His father had earlier served as a subordinate general under Liu Bei, holding the post of Commandant of Danyang, but had died two years prior at the hands of the Shanyue in Danyang Commandery. At that time, Chen Wu was only sixteen and happened to be with the army. Seeing his father fall in battle, he simply took up his blade and led his father's old troops in a counterattack, and actually managed to slay his father's killer with his own hands!

After this incident, Liu Bei, impressed by his heroic valor, actually permitted him to command troops at the age of sixteen, and kept him by his side as if he were an adopted son. Now, he was even allowed to accompany Lu Su on this campaign. His unit of three thousand men, all recruited from Lujiang in the Huainan heartland, was fully equipped with iron armor — all so-called 'Armored Troops.' They had always been the elite force beside Liu Bei, and because their armor was lacquered black, they were long known as the 'Lujiang Black Armor'!

Standing in direct counterpart to them was none other than Xu Sheng.

Xu Sheng was a man of Langya. In his early years, his family migrated south to escape the chaos of the Taishan Yellow Turbans. When they reached Guangling, they happened to hear people say that Liu Bei governed Huainan with clarity and integrity, and that many from Xuzhou had gone to join him. So they did not cross the river but instead turned toward Huainan, and had lived in Shouchun in Jiujiang ever since. It was then that Xu Sheng, renowned for his fierce bravery, joined Liu Bei. He followed in the sweeping pacification of Huainan, earning much merit. Moreover, being young and heroic, fond of riding a white horse and wearing white armor, he was greatly favored by Liu Bei and also used in his personal retinue.

His unit of three thousand men, all recruited from Jiujiang, was also fully equipped with iron armor, but mostly lacquered plain white, and thus was called the 'Jiujiang Plain Armor.' The two units of Xu and Chen combined formed the elite core of Liu Bei's Shouchun headquarters — apart from the three thousand Danyang veterans who had followed him since south of Pei — the very lifeblood of his forces, famously known as the 'Huainan Upper Armor'!

And Xu Sheng, naturally, had accompanied Lu Su on this campaign as well!

As for Dong Xi, he belonged to Sun Ce's forces. He was originally a man of Kuaiji, yet he had always looked down on the Zhu father and son, instead admiring the heroic valor of the Sun father and son. When Sun Ce advanced his army into Kuaiji, Dong Xi simply led the young men of his home region to kneel and welcome him before the Gaoqian Pavilion on the commandery border. For this, Sun Ce, overjoyed and seeing how exceptionally fierce and brave the man was, directly appointed him to lead three thousand Kuaiji youths, together with another general, Ling Cao, who led three thousand Wu Commandery youths, to serve as the permanent vanguard.

It is said that this arrangement was itself modeled after Liu Bei's Huainan Upper Armor from the two commanderies.

Only, on this occasion of Sun Ce's northward campaign, because Ling Cao was older and more steady, he was specifically left behind to watch over the rear, which allowed Dong Xi to stand out and be ranked alongside the other three as one of the Four Roosters!

"The animal cards are limited. Aside from the Four Seasons cards, there are merely fifty in total," Gongsun Xun, leaning sideways and narrowing his eyes as he sat in the Grand Commandant's chair at the head of the tent, waited for the tent to quiet down before offering a slight reminder. "Those listed are naturally the heroes among the enemy, but it is also influenced by their status and duties. For instance, these Four Roosters are listed largely because the troops they lead are all famous armored units or famous cavalry... And many heroic figures, omitted due to limited space, must likewise not be underestimated. Take the earlier case of Ding Fei — forty to fifty thousand field troops, infantry and cavalry complete, several famous Hebei generals, yet they were temporarily blocked in battle by a single county magistrate. Is that lesson not enough? You must not put the cart before the horse."

At these words, how could the generals seated in two rows within the tent dare to be remiss? They hurriedly rose in unison to acknowledge the order, the clashing of their armor ringing out incessantly for a time.

"All be seated. Fengxiao, continue!" Gongsun Xun gestured with his hand.

"Aye!" Guo Jia likewise dared not be remiss. "Regardless, the enemy's cavalry is merely thus, insufficient in both quantity and quality to compare with our own cavalry... However, the enemy also has an advantage, which is that the cities and towns everywhere in the Central Plains are simply too densely packed! For example, in Chenliu Commandery alone, apart from Suanzao on the north bank of the Pu River which is under our control, there are still a full twenty-one cities all in Cao's army's hands! Our army is the attacker, the enemy the defender, and the advantage of defending a city needs no elaboration. Even auxiliary troops and laborers, once holding a strong city with a steady and capable official, are enough to trade with our field elites, and the enemy's greatest disadvantage would thereby be erased! For instance, in this campaign, Liu Xuande has dispatched a grand total of one hundred twenty thousand troops to aid Cao Cao. Among them, the fully equipped and combat-experienced field elites number no more than thirty thousand; those with some training and armed are another thirty thousand auxiliary troops; the remaining forty thousand are merely laborers... Yet now, his forces are divided into three. The elites follow Cao Cao to the camp on the opposite bank, the auxiliary troops are separately garrisoned in various cities alongside Cao Cao's local officials, and the laborers transport grain to and from the Huai River. They can absolutely no longer be dismissed as merely thirty thousand combat-capable."

The tent fell silent for a moment, for this was precisely the serious issue Gongsun Xun had spoken of in his earlier "Self-Admonition Proclamation" — Cao Cao had successfully accomplished this very thing using the time won for him by Xiahou Yuan.

"Total troop strength!" In the midst of the silence, Gongsun Xun, chin propped on his hand, continued to ask while leaning sideways.

"Yes!" Guo Jia responded with a bow, then raised his head to answer. "According to the Jing'an Bureau's compilation of intelligence from various sources, the general picture is as follows... Cao's army originally had preparations to mobilize one hundred thousand troops. Having lost over ten thousand in this engagement, they should still have eighty to ninety thousand. However, with their forces within their home base, the replenishment of laborers should be limited to logistical preparations. Liu Bei's power is somewhat greater, enabling him to dispatch one hundred twenty thousand troops this time. Liu Biao has sent thirty thousand combat troops and thirty thousand auxiliary troops, totaling sixty thousand, and since he is responsible for transporting grain to Nanyang, the number of laborers is also hard to calculate. Only Sun Ce is the simplest — his twenty thousand troops are practically his entire force deployed, and with Jiangdong seeing frequent warfare in recent years, they should all be considered combat troops... Summing it all up, it is still roughly three hundred thousand! And while our army has achieved minor victories and annihilated enemy forces earlier, it is not enough to shake the overall situation."

"General distribution and disposition," Gongsun Xun continued to press, his hand on his forehead.

"The enemy's disposition can be roughly divided into five sectors! From west to east, they are: Nanyang, with Lü Bu and Cai Mao, roughly twenty to thirty thousand troops, of which over ten thousand are combat troops; Yingchuan, with Sun Ce, twenty thousand combat troops and ten thousand auxiliary troops, totaling thirty thousand; Chenliu, Jiyin, and Dong Commandery — or rather, from right before us all the way to west of Leize — personally commanded by Cao Cao, with Lu Zijing as his deputy, approximately sixty thousand combat troops, sixty thousand auxiliary troops, and countless laborers; from Leize and Dayeze to Taishan, commanded by Xiahou Dun, five thousand combat troops and over twenty thousand auxiliary troops; further east is the Donghai and Langya area of Xuzhou, overseen by Zhou Yu, with roughly five thousand combat troops originally stationed in Donghai from the Cao and Liu forces, ten thousand naval troops, and later reinforced by Liu Bei with an additional ten thousand auxiliary troops..."

"Do you understand?" Gongsun Xun suddenly interrupted Guo Jia's narration, then frowned and asked the generals in the tent.

"I understand the general idea," the most senior general below the two military advisors, Colonel Protector of the Wuhuan, Tian Chou, quickly rose and spoke. "Fengxiao must be trying to emphasize... that with Cao Cao now fighting on his home ground and having dense cities as cover, the figure of one hundred thousand laborers cannot be rigidly applied as before, because they can be replenished easily... The key to this battle still lies in eliminating their remaining ninety thousand combat troops and ninety thousand auxiliary troops, correct?"

"General Tian's words hit the bullseye," Guo Jia slightly bowed in acknowledgment. "But it is more than that... In fact, before I came here, the Jing'an Bureau had discussions in Yecheng, and we all felt that this battle is unlike any before, because both sides have foundations and both can replenish!"

"I understand what Fengxiao means," another general, Tian Yu of Yuyang, suddenly realized. "You in the Jing'an Bureau are trying to say that if this battle becomes a protracted stalemate, the war will likely form a state of steady circulation, just like the business of the Anli Company... I mean, because both sides have productive capacity, once a stable stalemate forms, laborers can be replenished into auxiliary troops at any time, and auxiliary troops, with more training, can also take to the field. The so-called numbers of combat troops, auxiliary troops, and laborers are only limited by the scale of logistics, not fixed and unchanging!"

"What does that mean?" Some were still bewildered, such as Yuwen Heita.

"It means," in the presence of Gongsun Xun, there would naturally be someone to explain earnestly — Zhang Liao, for instance, immediately spoke up, "that if we were to eliminate twenty thousand of their elites in one battle, but failed to breach their main camp, then after their original ninety thousand combat troops are reduced by twenty thousand, they wouldn't become seventy thousand. Instead, they would immediately make slight replenishments and become eighty thousand, and after a few more dozen days, with weapons and armor all ready, they'd be back to ninety thousand... Just like this time, after annihilating Xiahou Yuan's five thousand cavalry and over ten thousand auxiliary troops north of the Pu, if we cannot quickly breach their main camp, the enemy's three hundred thousand troops will very soon still recover to three hundred thousand. They'll only be short five thousand horses."

Yuwen Heita remained utterly bewildered.

"The Central Plains has a huge population, unlike the limited population of the grasslands," Tian Yu couldn't help but interject to explain. "You can think of it like your tribe having ample able-bodied men, but only able to support ten horses. So as long as the horses aren't dead, even if one rider dies, your tribe still fields ten riders!"

Only then did Yuwen Heita suddenly see the light.

"The lad can be taught," Gongsun Xun suddenly spoke, though it was unclear whether he was praising Tian Yu or Yuwen Heita.

And with his words, the previously slightly restless tent fell silent for a moment, but then Gongsun Xun himself fell silent again.

"Then how should this war be concluded?" After a long while, it was still Zhang Liao who couldn't help but direct a question toward the two military advisors sitting motionless.

He did not dare ask Gongsun Xun.

"To conclude this war, there are essentially only three methods," Xun You, when the question was directed at him, did not evade it, but instead chuckled lightly and spoke directly. "One is to continue the stalemate, pitting logistics against each other, and quietly wait for one side to be unable to sustain it. Another is to press forward, forcing the elite field main forces of both sides into a direct frontal clash, and in one battle shatter enough of the enemy's elite troops. And the third is..."

"Is to punch through their chain of cities and strike at the enemy's core," Gongsun Xun interjected. "Punch through Chenliu, reach Chen Commandery, and Cao Mengde will surely perish! Because then he won't be able to support one hundred thousand troops! Strike further to Shouchun, and my younger brother Xuande will also be unable to sustain his one hundred twenty thousand-strong army. At that point, he'll either surrender or have no choice but to eke out an existence in Jiangnan... It's just that, judging by the current situation, Cao Cao will inevitably rely on layer upon layer of cities, resisting at every step, and do his utmost to avoid battle! In that case, forcing a frontal decisive battle may not be possible; attempting to punch through Chenliu will inevitably result in grievous losses."

"Then what is to be done?" Tian Yu asked cautiously.

"Naturally, we advance while seeking a decisive battle — what else can we do?" Gongsun Xun sneered. "Are we supposed to drag this out? If it drags on for three or five years, believe me, the entire realm will wither! Even if it only drags on for a single year, should a famine strike then, with Hebei and the Central Plains both drained of reserves, the dead would number far more than a hundred thousand!"

The assembled generals all looked solemn.

"Of course, advancing and forcing a decisive battle requires method." Gongsun Xun suddenly smiled again, but rose and paced into the center of the tent, drawing the tension of the entire tent. "Cao Mengde has seventy thousand battle troops and seventy thousand auxiliary troops. The battle troops are concentrated at the Pu River main camp, while the auxiliaries are distributed among the surrounding cities for support. And we currently have nearly ninety thousand troops north of the Pu... If I attack him and he holds firm, it would be like facing a force of a hundred and twenty thousand. Victory would not be certain, and he might even find a gap behind us to cut our supply lines. But conversely, if he comes to attack me, he can only bring seventy thousand. With fifty thousand infantry plus twenty thousand auxiliaries, I can hold the city and the river securely! So... Zibo!"

Lou Gui, who had remained silent, immediately rose.

"I have already discussed this roughly with the two military advisors, and have prepared to leave all the infantry to you... to guard the main camp here in my stead, and to command Xu Huang, Zhang He, and Gao Shun in holding the Pu River!" Gongsun Xun turned and gave the order from the center of the great tent. "Then I will personally lead forty thousand cavalry, circle through Sizhou territory, and strike Cao Mengde's rear! What do you think?"

The men all roused themselves — yes, at this moment, Sizhou on the flank could still serve as a support!

"Our army's advantage lies in cavalry; circling to the rear through Sizhou is naturally feasible," Lou Gui replied in a deep voice. "But how far does my lord intend to circle?"

"Not too far. Enter Sizhou, pass through Zhongmu, and strike straight at Chenliu!" Gongsun Xun answered casually. "What do you think?"

This Chenliu certainly referred to Chenliu City, where the seat of Chenliu Commandery was located, not Chenliu Commandery itself.

Lou Gui was a man of Nanyang and fairly familiar with the geography here. After a moment's thought, he suddenly understood: "Does my lord intend to emerge at Guandu?"

Gongsun Xun was uncharacteristically taken aback: "Guandu?"

"To emerge from Zhongmu and strike Chenliu... one must pass through Guandu," Lou Gui replied gravely. "The Pu and Ji Rivers converge upstream, and west of that confluence lies a marsh called Wuchao. When the waters rise in summer, if my lord wishes to avoid Cao's main force by going through Zhongmu — whether he later intends to strike east at Chenliu or south at Yingchuan — he can only bypass Wuchao Marsh and the Pu-Ji confluence, cross the river further upstream, and then emerge past Honggou onto Guandu... In truth, I have been thinking: had my lord not launched a preemptive raid and disrupted the enemy's design, Cao Cao would certainly have first established his position at Guandu to contain Commander Cheng of Sizhou. For that place is the critical junction between Sizhou and Yanzhou, the most vital point beyond Hulao Pass."

Gongsun Xun looked thoughtful.

————I am a thoughtful dividing line————

"When the Grand Ancestor personally commanded the realm and eradicated the foul rebels, his deployment of armies and use of troops largely followed the methods of Sun and Wu, yet he devised stratagems according to circumstance, deceiving the enemy to seize victory, transforming like a spirit. When facing a matter, he personally issued orders; those who followed his commands triumphed, those who defied his teachings suffered defeat. When arrayed against the foe, his manner was calm and unhurried, as though he had no desire to fight. Yet when the moment came to seize the decisive advantage, his momentum overflowed. Thus every battle was won; the army knew no lucky victories. In a lifetime of wielding force, he was utterly without equal — only Cao Cao could barely match him." — Old Book of Yan, Volume 2, Annals of the Grand Ancestor, the Martial Emperor

(End of Chapter)