Chapter 658: Grand Regional Commander of Henan of the Great Ming

The killing of the Prince of Wan'an and the siege of the Fu fief have stirred a huge uproar at court.

The impact even surpasses the earlier rumors of the Tong Pass massacre.

Just as Prince Han over at the Marshal's headquarters saw it, the court officials' view was the same — the Prince of Wan'an's death was of no consequence.

After all, like most princes in the realm, the Prince of Wan'an was very distantly related to the Chongzhen Emperor by blood; they were both descendants of Zhu Di.

Nominally, the Prince of Wan'an was actually an imperial uncle — he was Zhu Di's ninth-generation descendant, while Chongzhen was Zhu Di's tenth-generation descendant.

Their connection went no further than that. When Chongzhen heard the news of the Prince of Wan'an's murder, his reaction was the same as the ministers': this prince was truly unlucky.

The Prince of Fu is different.

He is Chongzhen's own uncle. If anything happens to the Prince of Fu, it would not be an overstatement to say it touches the very foundation of the state.

The mere news that the Fu fief was besieged reached the capital, and at court the next day, the entire assembly of civil and military officials was as silent as cicadas in winter, too terrified to speak.

Chongzhen already had a nameless rage burning inside him with nowhere to vent; seeing the hundred officials in this state only made him angrier.

Liu Chengzong led his troops eastward in invasion, and a single decisive battle in Shaanxi nearly produced the Ming dynasty's greatest military disaster since Tumu. The court officials now dared not utter half a word on western affairs — and how did Chongzhen feel about that?

He felt nothing.

The Emperor had grown numb.

Even now, his mind still hadn't turned the corner; he could not fathom how Liu Chengzong had fought so cleanly.

Normally speaking, take Sarhū for example: eighty-eight thousand five hundred fifty men marched beyond the pass, over forty-eight thousand troops and more than three hundred officers were lost — an unprecedented major defeat. For a year or half a year after the campaign, Liaodong was still gathering scattered remnants and broken troops.

That is a normal campaign — after it ended, over forty-two thousand three hundred sixty-some personnel still returned.

Where the hell do you see a battle that wipes out your entire family fortune clean in one go?

Liu Chengzong, on the other hand — the Ming mobilized over a hundred thousand officers and men from the five provinces of Shaanxi, Sichuan, Ningxia, Huguang, and Yunnan, launched a grand campaign in Shaanxi, and it ended abruptly.

Fragmentary field reports trickled in — the men he wanted dead were nowhere to be heard from, while those who could send field reports all appeared exceptionally loyal.

Lu Xiangsheng was nearly worked to death in Huguang, chasing down every manner of roving bandit and local brigand to the point of exhaustion.

Sichuan Regional Commander Hou Liangzhu sent field reports to the court most eagerly. On the southern front, he was the only one who could still speak, and whatever he said, the court had to believe.

In his field reports, he was clashing and brawling, fighting with fiery intensity, repeatedly defending against rebel and bandit attacks on Sichuan, even extending the battle lines into the Hanzhong area, sparing no effort to keep Sichuan from falling — the Southern Heaven Pillar of the Ming.

And truth be told, there was not a single lie in Hou Liangzhu's field reports.

He did indeed command twenty thousand Sichuan troops in successive major battles at the Sichuan-Shaanxi border. After all, Gao Yingxiang in Shaanxi and Yao Tiandong in northern Sichuan — which of them was not a rebel? And the field reports never said he was fighting Liu Chengzong specifically, right?

As for the lack of significant results, that was because Hanzhong suffered a great flood. My forces were stationed south of the Han River, the bandit forces north of it, separated by water and unable to reach each other — a fault of Heaven.

In short, against the backdrop of all four routes suffering defeat, Grand General Hou seized the rebels by the throat, not allowing a single soldier to invade the Land of Abundance!

Of course, Chongzhen could not be said to be completely deceived — he still had eunuch army supervisors — but the supervisors also praised Hou Liangzhu.

Given the situation at the time, Liu Chengzong fought like a ghost. One day the northern route army was still sending word that all was well; the next day, four armies had switched banners and the military situation collapsed. On the southern route, by day the momentum was still ours; that very night, it was devoured clean, down to the last man.

With morale shaken, the Sichuan army nearly scattered in panic back to their homeland. It was entirely thanks to Hou Liangzhu's immense prestige, and his deference to the troops' mood, that the situation was stabilized.

To say he spared no effort to keep Sichuan from falling is no empty claim. Without him, Gao Yingxiang, even split in two by the floodwaters, would certainly have been able to enter Sichuan.

The sole surviving great general — Chongzhen's hand on his sword hilt twitched uncontrollably, yet he truly could not kill him, and grew even angrier.

As for Brigade General Zu Dale, he was even craftier than a monkey.

His battalion was originally a Liaodong cavalry battalion, a model unit in Liaodong. Half of them had followed Zu Kuan to their reincarnation.

The remaining half — Zu Dale, scared out of his wits, bolted from the battlefield, then gathered surrendered troops along the way, so that his troop strength was greater than before the battle, approaching six thousand.

He first went to link up with Hou Liangzhu in Sichuan, then fled further east, not daring to let out a single fart to the court until he was out of Shaanxi territory.

By the time the court received word from him, he had already led his subordinate officers and men on the run to Huguang to help Lu Xiangsheng fight.

And truth be told, although when facing Liu Chengzong, Zu Dale was scared out of his wits by the manner of Zu Kuan's death and had no idea himself how he had fled —

In Huguang, facing ordinary roving bandits, General Dale returned to his true self and struck with heavy fists.

Li Zicheng had barely entered Huguang and hadn't enjoyed his swagger for long before Zu Dale's Liaodong troops bowled him over. And the miner rebels rising in places like Yunyang were chased all over the place by Zu Dale.

After the Shaanxi defeat, Zu Dale was extremely zealous in suppressing the Huguang rebellion.

Even his old aversion to pursuing bandits into the mountains was gone. He could be described as striking wherever pointed — told to enter the mountains, he entered; told to cross the river, he crossed. With full firepower, he drove his two battalions of officers and men to fight desperately, to the death.

He was not even afraid to die.

Zu Dale truly was not afraid.

Liaodong troops have always relied on sturdy armor and four hooves, fighting and grappling in close combat, killing banner slaves and battling white-armored soldiers — all just one head and two hands. If you die, it means you lacked skill and deserved it.

What he feared was the way Zu Kuan died: long arrows and three-eyed guns never even fired, never even touched the enemy's body. A few gusts of gunsmoke, and an entire company of men — gone, just like that.

Even those damned lowliest of the low Later Jin banner slaves, when they saw a wagon fort, would crouch far off and wait for the shielded carts to come up, then hide behind them to press forward.

Zu Dale could not accept that kind of death.

So much so that the army supervisor in Huguang kept speaking well of Zu Dale — it was a time when men were needed, after all.

Chongzhen was filled with pent-up fury and nowhere to direct it. He couldn't even find a few ministers to execute — he didn't know who to kill!

However, recently, not everything the court faced was bad news.

At least in the east, there was good news.

For instance, the Chongzhen Emperor, in a fit of rage, nearly had someone arrest Yang Sichang and throw him in prison.

Ever since the Later Jin invaded Xuan-Da earlier this year, court officials had never stopped impeaching Yang Sichang.

This was mainly because of Yang Qi.

Just as they had impeached Wang Huazhen years ago for supporting the Chahar's Khutugtu, everyone said Yang Sichang's support of Yang Qi was a complete waste of funds and provisions.

Of course, many local officials in Shanxi and Xuan-Da were also impeaching him, saying Yang Qi was a fraud — that he had been besieged by twenty thousand Later Jin troops in Guihua City, trapped like a grandson, and that there were no hundred thousand Mongol troops at all.

The Chongzhen Emperor also thought Yang Qi was as timid as a mouse, holding a large army in vain yet trapped in Guihua City by Dorgon, crying for his parents — truly a useless general within the walls.

This, by extension, made him think Liu Chengzong's ability to employ men was very poor.

If he were Liu Chengzong, the inspecting officials sent by the Grand Marshal's headquarters would have already reached Guihua City by now. Never mind publicly executing Yang Qi, they would at least have thrown this useless general who disgraced the Marshal's headquarters into prison.

They would never let him remain in the position of Mo Nan Commander, deceiving the world and stealing renown.

But Yang Sichang was no fool. Facing the Emperor's rebuke, he naturally had to defend himself.

He wrote several memorials, explaining in sequence what Yang Qi had done beyond the border and the threat he posed to Dorgon, which finally calmed Chongzhen's anger.

The most miserable one was Yang Sichang himself. He actually knew very well why so many officials were impeaching him — it was not personal grudges, but rather — Yang Qi's method of dealing with the Later Jin army was genuinely effective.

Yet this effective method violated the political correctness of the Great Ming.

No one was a fool.

Yang Qi fortified the walls and cleared the fields, avoided battle at every turn, refused decisive engagements, and relied on stalling for time to counter the Later Jin's logistical problem of lacking supplies.

Did it work? Of course it worked.

But this tactic was one the Great Ming dared not use, was unwilling to use, and could not use.

It was a strategy unacceptable from top to bottom.

No one wanted this year's eastern slave incursion, with Yang Qi as the example, to become the model — next year the eastern slaves invade Shanxi, the Ming army in Shanxi fortifies and clears the fields locally, burning everything to scorched earth, leaving the Later Jin nothing to plunder, forcing them to withdraw on their own.

That was just goddamn unrealistic.

First, the family properties of officials, gentry, and commanders — in short, all the ruling class of the Great Ming — were outside the city walls. You say fortify and clear the fields, and they'll just let you?

Second, given the Ming army's current state of military funding and discipline, if those roughneck soldiers got the order, would they fortify and clear the fields first and then burn it to scorched earth, or burn it to scorched earth first and then fortify and clear the fields? Could anyone say for sure?

Third, fortifying and clearing the fields in Shanxi — fine. But what if the Later Jin broke through the border wall at Ji Garrison and came in that way, and you had to fortify and clear the fields in Northern Zhili, even outside the walls of Beijing?

Whose fields would you be clearing then, and could you even clear them?

Even looking at it optimistically, assuming everything went without a hitch, fortifying and clearing the fields once a year might, in the grand scheme, wear the Later Jin to death. But for the Great Ming itself, production would grind to a halt, and the losses to local military, civilians, officials, and gentry would be even greater than a Later Jin raid.

This method of defending the cities simply would not do.

What were soldiers and commanders raised for? There must be a decisive battle!

This was the real reason Yang Sichang was being impeached.

Yet he had no way to vent his frustration. Even if he was so angry his teeth itched, these things lying beneath political correctness were things he could not explain to Chongzhen.

After all, who knew — Chongzhen absolutely could not afford to lose face. From the first year of Chongzhen's reign until now, the Ming army had won or drawn countless local engagements against the Later Jin army. Unless the commanding general died, those whom the Emperor had praised for fighting well could be counted on one's fingers.

He was never satisfied. A defeat was a disgrace; a victory was merely the strong bullying the weak — you were supposed to win.

But in reality, no matter how vast the Great Ming was, its territory was so far-flung that strength could not be brought to bear at such distances. In that local theater of Liaodong, to fight to a draw was already the weak overcoming the strong.

From Yang Sichang's perspective, this campaign had instead made him look at Yang Qi beyond the border with new eyes; his impression had greatly improved.

Although Dorgon had led his troops on a jaunt through the Southern Desert, militarily bottling Yang Qi up in the city in a very showy manner, and his incursion into Xuan and Da had not suffered too great a loss, on the political level, it was a complete and utter failure.

All because of that meddlesome fellow Yang Qi, who had changed the nature of Dorgon's western expedition.

Dorgon's western expedition originally had one primary objective and one secondary objective.

The secondary objective was to swing by the Southern Desert to find a meal.

The primary objective was, in the process of finding that meal, to demonstrate the Later Jin's presence to the various Mongol tribes of the Southern Desert, to pull back the Mongol tribes that had submitted to the Marshal's Manor, with the intent of contesting the Marshal's Manor for dominion over the Southern Desert.

In the end, because of Yang Qi... actually, you couldn't blame Yang Qi. The Yang Qi at the Marshal's Manor was just the scapegoat.

The main factor was still the will of the true masters of the Southern Desert — the Mongols.

Sechen Taiji of the Ordos tribe, in order to preserve a measure of independence for the Southern Desert Mongols, offered counsel to his lord Jinong Erinchen.

He suggested that Erinchen raise the banner, and while their immediate superior Yang Qi was a Han who still did not understand the Mongol ways, take advantage of the bloodline superiority of the old nobility who had ruled the steppe for generations to lead the Marshal's Manor's new nobility in team-building.

The whole affair was that simple.

The team-building was a great success. By plundering the Kharchin tribe, the old nobility demonstrated brilliant strategic deployment, the new nobility displayed seasoned tactical skills, everyone melded into one, and the team's centripetal force and cohesion were strengthened.

But this meant that Dorgon's objective for the western expedition had already failed before he even reached the Southern Desert steppe.

The Kharchin were gone. The Later Jin's registered Mongol soldiers, over nine thousand strong, had been slashed to just over a thousand. The various Mongol tribes of the Southern Desert that had taken part in plundering the Kharchin had all become enemies of the Later Jin, and all had fled deep into the Mu Us Desert, near the Great Ming border wall.

Even if Dorgon seized back the wealth, people, and livestock, it would only be recovering part of the loss. The objective was still a failure.

So things like besieging Guihua City, kicking Yang Qi around while he was bottled up, and raiding Xuan and Da — these were all just impotent rage after the objective had failed.

Many people, including Yang Sichang, understood this situation. Only Chongzhen could not understand.

Long after the Southern Desert campaign ended, the border defense reports all along the route were sent to the Ministry of War. From Xuan and Yun, through Ji Garrison to Liaodong, the watchtower troops all along the border wall were reporting: deserters and herders were rebelling from the Later Jin in droves, fleeing into Han territory by the hundreds and thousands, requesting to submit and be incorporated into the army.

This kind of situation happened every year.

After all, times were hard everywhere. Within the Great Ming, the border troops went hungry, while beyond the border, it had long reached the point where if you didn't risk your life to plunder, you starved.

But never had there been so many as this year. Moreover, when border defense officials compiled the reports from every watchtower and fort and sent them to the Ministry of War, one piece of intelligence was easily analyzed: all those rebelling from the Later Jin and submitting were Mongol soldiers and Mongol herders.

Once the various border commands sent the interrogation reports of the deserters and herders to the Ministry of War, the situation became even clearer — the Great Ming's national foundation had been shaking for decades, and now it was finally the Later Jin's turn to have their national foundation shaken a bit.

It was only at this point that Chongzhen realized Dorgon's western expedition this time was a complete and utter failure.

The Later Jin Eight Banners' Mongol Left and Right Camps had no men left.

These two camps were both Mongol soldiers who had not yet been incorporated into the Manchu Eight Banners. The sudden loss of their men caused such turmoil that rather than being assigned to the various banners as banner slaves, it was better to flee inside the border wall to beg for a meal.

But in fact, fleeing inside the border wall was only what some of the Mongol herders who had attached themselves to the Later Jin did.

The greatest impact of this Southern Desert campaign, which took place in the summer of the eighth year of Chongzhen's reign, was that it made the small tribes living in the eastern Southern Desert realize that the Later Jin could not gain sufficient advantage on the Southern Desert steppe.

Then when the next conflict began, they would be the first stepping stones to bear the brunt — the Kharchin had been so powerful, yet they were slaughtered and plundered to nothing. What chance did they have?

Therefore, more small tribes whose nobility still survived simply drove their livestock northwest to seek refuge with Sechen Khan Sholoi.

Meanwhile, at court, because Zhang Yichuan had captured Yongning and besieged Luoyang, they were discussing ways to lift the siege.

It was at this moment that Zhang Renxue, a presented scholar serving as the Censor Inspecting Henan and Army Supervisor, submitted a memorial to the court.

He said that not shirking difficulty was the duty of a subject, and with the bandit situation as it was, should men like us simply sit in command with composed ease?

He proposed to the Emperor, requesting that the court change his post. He wished to serve as a military officer and personally command troops to confront the rebel army.

Chongzhen absolutely loved this kind of spirit!

He immediately sent the matter to the Ministry of War, the Ministry of Personnel, and the Chief Surveillance Bureau for deliberation. In the end, the grand ministers all thought this was absurd and suggested that the Emperor simply give Zhang Renxue an additional concurrent assignment overseeing military affairs — there was no need to change his appointment to a military post.

Could Chongzhen possibly agree to that?

If a thing was to be done, it must be done thoroughly, and done well!

He immediately overruled all objections, reassigned Zhang Renxue as Henan Regional Commander, and ordered him to raise troops and summon officers as quickly as possible, then lead the army to break the siege of Luoyang, the seat of Henan Prefecture.