Chapter 608: Regional Commander of Shanhai Pass, Oboi

"Angbang Zhangjing" is Manchu; translated into Chinese it means Regional Commander. So the Angbang Zhangjing Defending Shanhai Pass, rendered in Chinese, is the Regional Commander Defending Shanhai Pass!

And this term's Regional Commander of Shanhai Pass is none other than the foremost warrior of the Manchus, Gūwalgiya Oboi.

At this moment he was riding along the official road inside Shanhai Pass, leading a Hongyi cannon niru that had no cannon (the great cannons on Shanhai Pass were passed down from the Ming dynasty, and historically could still be used as late as the time of the Eight-Nation Alliance), accompanying the Prince Regent of Yu, the Great General Who Pacifies the Nation, Dodo.

In the distance, the tall, thick, solid walls of Shanhai Pass were already visible, exuding a vigorous, imposing air under the sunlight.

Yet a preposterous thought welled up in Oboi's heart.

He, Oboi, the foremost warrior of the Manchus, had now actually become the Regional Commander of Shanhai Pass — and his chief mission at Shanhai Pass was to prevent the Ming army from entering the pass!

Had this happened a few years earlier, you could have beaten him to death and he would never have believed it. The Ming army attacking from outside Shanhai Pass, while the Great Qing's celestial troops defended desperately on the pass — had things been turned upside down?

But the problem was, this utterly absurd situation had indeed come about between Ming and Qing!

Just last night, while he and Dodo and the others were preparing to spend the night at Funing, an urgent dispatch sent by six-hundred-li express relay horse arrived from the Regional Commander of Shengjing, Ebilun — Jinzhou's Central-Left Garrison City and Jinzhou Guard City had fallen on the same day.

More than twenty thousand (in fact not that many) Ming bandits had crossed the sea and seized an extremely critical stronghold in Liaodong.

And the ever-victorious celestial troops of the Great Qing could do nothing about them!

At present there were only ten thousand old Eight Banners soldiers outside the pass, and guarding such a vast territory with them was like scattering pepper — a little here, a little there, impossible to concentrate.

The Green Standard troops were somewhat more numerous, but still under twenty thousand (originally twenty thousand, though some had by now been killed), and they were likewise very dispersed.

Moreover, all eight of the Qing army's small Hongyi cannon niru were inside the pass; outside the pass there was not a single small Hongyi cannon — Dorgon also knew that artillery had to be concentrated, so he had placed all the small Hongyi cannons inside the pass.

And without small Hongyi cannons, the Qing forces outside the pass had no way to fight a set-piece battle against the invading Ming army. After the Battle of Blood-Flow Creek, the Manchu generals all knew that the great cannon was the master of the battlefield!

If the artillery disparity was too great, then a set-piece battle could not be fought — under the bombardment of the enemy's cannons, which could move quickly and open fire quickly, you could not even form ranks, so what the hell was the point of fighting!

So last night, Dodo and Oboi had agreed upon a tactical combination of holding the strategic points and harassing the enemy's rear.

The north gate of Jinzhou Guard City, which happened to block the vital route in and out of the Jinzhou isthmus, Little Black Mountain, and Shanhai Pass, where Oboi served as the Angbang Zhangjing in charge of defense, were both strategic points that had to be held!

If Little Black Mountain was not held, the Ming army might sweep across the entire Liaodong Peninsula and then threaten Shengjing, Shenyang.

And if Shanhai Pass fell, the passage by which the Great Qing entered the Liaoxi Corridor would be cut off, and thereafter they could only go the long way around. Moreover, from Shanhai Pass to Beijing was no more than seven hundred li, and along the way there were many farmland estates of the old Eight Banners.

Then it would be the Ming army's turn to enter the pass every year to plunder.

But in Oboi's view, Little Black Mountain was easy to defend, while Shanhai Pass was hard to hold!

Little Black Mountain leaned against the great Fen Shui Lin mountain; the surrounding forests were dense and the mountains high. Even if the Ming army landed on the flank or rear of Little Black Mountain, they would be blocked by the mountain forests — those old-growth woods were no place to fight a set-piece battle. Ming troops unfamiliar with the terrain and unaccustomed to living in mountain forests would easily fall prey to Qing ambushes.

Shanhai Pass lay beside the sea; both inside and outside the pass it ran along the sea, and there were fine bays and beaches everywhere, with the wind and waves at sea not too rough, so landing was not difficult — one could say it was impossible to guard against every possibility.

And the pass city of Shanhai Pass had been built to face an enemy coming from the east, so its defenses facing west were very weak; the walls were low and thin, and could not withstand bombardment by Hongyi cannons at all.

At the thought of how hard Shanhai Pass would be to hold, Oboi could not help but sigh. Dodo, riding beside him, seemed to hear his sigh and turned his head to glance at him: "What is it? Is the foremost warrior of the Manchus worried he cannot hold Shanhai Pass?"

"Of course not. With this slave here, I guarantee the southern court's troops will not advance a single step past the mighty pass of Shanhai!"

Those words truly were awkward!

Oboi suddenly felt as though he had turned into Wu Sangui.

Dodo nodded and laughed: "With you, Oboi, guarding Shanhai Pass, this Prince can rest easy. But not letting the southern army advance a single step past Shanhai Pass is impossible! They are not like we were back then — they can not only fight their way through the Liaoxi Corridor, but can also go by water and circle around to the west of Shanhai Pass. So this Shanhai Pass is extremely difficult to hold; only you, Oboi, have the means. Oboi, what means do you have? Tell this Prince!"

Oboi smiled bitterly: "My Prince, you flatter this slave. This slave has only a bit of brute courage, good enough for charging into battle, but as for plans... ah, they are only foolish plans."

"What sort of foolish plan?" Dodo asked.

"To build beacon towers along the coast of Yongping Prefecture," Oboi said. "The coast of Yongping Prefecture is about three hundred li; building one beacon tower every ten li makes thirty beacon towers, no great trouble. Once the beacon towers are built, when the southern army comes again, we will know at once."

"And after you know?" Dodo asked again.

"Then of course we immediately muster our troops and rush over to engage the southern army!" Oboi said thoughtfully. "The southern army always needs some time to disembark from their ships, and after landing they must still reorganize. If we can strike them with elite troops while they have not yet gained a firm footing, perhaps we can rout them in one blow."

"And if that fails?" Dodo asked again.

"Then..." Oboi shook his head. "Then we can only strengthen the defenses and clear the countryside, and hold Shanhai Pass to the death! But the walls on the west side of Shanhai Pass are low and thin, and the moat is narrow and shallow, so it will take considerable effort to repair them."

Dodo said: "This Prince has already issued orders to the estates of our old Eight Banners in Yongping, directing them to send booi bondservants and tenant farmers to Shanhai Pass. After you take office, use these booi bondservants to reinforce the pass city and build the beacon towers!"

Oboi relaxed slightly, and saluted from horseback: "This slave thanks the Prince."

It turned out that almost all the land around Yongping had been enclosed and seized by the Eight Banners' regimental command offices and the princes, dukes, and high officials after they entered the pass — before the Eight Banners entered the pass, land had been distributed to each household; after entering the pass, it became the princes, dukes, and high officials enclosing land for their households, and the Eight Banners' regimental command offices enclosing land for their banners. Ordinary Eight Banners soldiers were not allotted land, but could receive grain stipends from the command office of the banner to which they belonged. Each regimental command office, in turn, had the land it received cultivated by booi bondservants or rented out to tenant farmers.

Therefore, around Yongping there were large tracts of farmland estates belonging to the princes, dukes, and high officials of each banner and to each banner's regimental command office. Using the title of Great General Who Pacifies the Nation, Dodo could draw men and grain from these estates for the defense of Shanhai Pass.

"Shanhai Pass — do you all think we should go and have a go at it now?" In the government office inside Jinzhou's Central-Left Garrison City, the newly arrived Wu Guoyong was presiding over a council of war, attended by Gao Jie, Shen Tingyang, Liu Chongru (Musket Liu), Liu Xinyu, Zhang Huangyan, and others.

Apart from Gao Jie and Liu Xinyu, the others had all crossed the sea after the recapture of Jinzhou's Central-Left Garrison City.

Jinzhou's Central-Left Garrison, that is, the strategic value of the area around Port Arthur, could not be overestimated no matter how highly one rated it. Historically, Port Arthur was known as the foremost military port in the Far East!

Of course, as a port itself, it could never have ranked first in the Far East. But for a military group that had crossed the sea, controlling Port Arthur meant gaining a base from which to contend for the Liaodong Peninsula, and the Liaodong Peninsula was in turn a springboard for advancing into the fertile, vast lands of the northeast.

Judging purely by geographical position, the consequences of the Ming dynasty's loss of Port Arthur in the seventh month of the sixth year of Chongzhen were probably more severe than the collapse of the Dongjiang Garrison — the Qing army had paid no small price to capture Port Arthur; among officers whose names were recorded alone, several had fallen, including Naha, son of Fiongdon; the jala ejen Yueleshun; the guards' school commandant Ede; the Battalion Commander Cheng Guofu; and others. And the Ming's Regional Commander of Southern Liaoning, Huang Long, who defended Port Arthur, along with his subordinate officers Li Weiluan, Xiang Zuolin, Fan Hualong, Zhang Dalu, Shang Keyi, and others, had all died heroically in that battle.

Port Arthur had been fought over so bitterly back then, yet now it had been easily retaken by the Ming army — from this one could see how the balance of strength between Ming and Qing had shifted.

(End of Chapter)