The leader of the Jin army in Datong Prefecture was Wanyan Helisa. He was released by the Song Dynasty and returned to the Jin Kingdom, and was re-employed. Wanyanchang recommended him as the commander-in-chief of the West Route Army, controlling the 50,000-strong army in the northern part of the Hedong Road.
Wanyan drank with Lisa riding on a majestic horse to patrol the soldiers to arrest Han and Mongol people. This was Wanyanchang's order. Wanyanchang sent two orders. One was to cancel the Jin soldiers from Datong Prefecture who went north to encircle and suppress the Mongols.
The second is to arrest the Han and Mongol people in the city. There must be spies here.
Wanyan drank from Lisha and asked his staff Song Yingdao worriedly: "To the south, Chen Qing's army is gathering, and to the north, there are Mongol people who are eyeing them. Sir, how should I deal with it?"
Song Ying was a Han nationality in the Liao Kingdom and one of Wan Yanchang's staff. His ideas were quite clear, so Wan Yanchang assigned him to Wanyan Helisa as his staff. In the past few months, Wanyan Helisa was very fond of Song Ying.
Reliance.
Song Ying pondered for a moment and said: "It's mid-September now, and the first snow will fall on the grassland in more than a month. At this time, the Mengwu tribe will no longer go south to harass, and besides, they still have to deal with Nianhan's 100,000-strong army.
So there is no need to consider the threat from the Mongol tribe for the time being, but the Song army is likely to attack Chitang Pass in the near future, so the governor had better strengthen the defense in the south."
Wanyan Jiulisha doesn't need anyone's guidance on how to fight specifically, but he does need advice on the general direction.
Song Ying's reminder was very timely, and Wan Yanhe dispersed immediately thought of the weather, yes! It's going to snow soon, how could the prairie people still come out?
It is understandable that the Han people do not understand the situation of the grassland nomads, but Wanyan Helisa knows very well that the Jurchen fishing and hunting people, like the grassland nomads, are tribal systems and are not professional armies. First, the herdsmen must gather from various tribes to the king's tent.
It would take ten days and a half to gather troops around.
After offering sacrifices, they then head south in large numbers. The distance to the target is often thousands of miles, and it takes more than a month to reach the target place. During this period, if there is heavy snow, the army will be trapped in the vast snow, unable to go north or south, and the entire army will eventually be destroyed.
Therefore, seasons are extremely important for nomads to wage war. Nomads never start wars in autumn and winter. They usually enter the war season after the lambs give birth in spring.
Wanyan drank from Lisa and wanted to slap herself in the face. She actually forgot this most basic common sense.
"Thank you sir for the reminder. Let me ask you again, sir, should I lead the army south? Or send 10,000 troops south?"
Song Ying shook his head and said: "The reason why Marshal Tarlan Du ordered to abandon the Northern Expedition to the Grassland is because he was afraid that the Song Army would take advantage of the empty space in Datong Mansion to attack by surprise. This sneak attack army did not come from the south, but from the west. The Governor must be careful of Chen Qing's faction.
The cavalry came from the Hetao. Our 20,000 troops are not large in the first place. If we divide our troops further, it will be easy for the Song army to defeat them one by one."
"I finally understand!"
Wanyan drank from Lisa and let out a long sigh, "Sir, if you didn't tell me, I really wouldn't have thought that the Song army would come from the west."
Song Ying added: "There is one more thing I want to remind the governor. These Mengwu and Kelie tribes are different from the Han people. The Han people will be obedient and patient, but they will not. They have violent personalities, so they are locked up in the camp.
Inside, riots are very likely to occur at night.”
"What do you think, sir?"
"Let them go home to get some food, and then drive them all out of the city. They will have no choice but to return to the grassland. This saves a lot of trouble. The governor can also make a considerable fortune from the property they leave behind."
The last sentence was Song Ying's true intention. He took this opportunity to confiscate the wealth of the Mongol merchants. Of course, the bulk of it would go to the Jurchen generals. Even if he himself couldn't eat meat, he would always have some soup.
Wanyan drank from Lisa and narrowed her eyes and laughed. This suggestion was really good.
Wanyan immediately ordered twenty kilograms of grain to be distributed to each person and expelled more than 10,000 merchants from the Mengwu and Kele tribes from Datong Prefecture.
Of course he would not give them another chance to go home and collect their gold and silver.
Hedong Road is basically covered by vast mountains, especially the two mountain ranges running from north to south, the Taihang Mountains to the east and the Luliang Mountains to the west. However, there are many small and medium-sized mountain ranges distributed between these large mountain ranges, such as
Zhongtiao Mountain and Taiyue Mountain in the south, Yunzhong Mountain and Xiezhoushan Mountain in the middle, Wutai Mountain, Hengshan Mountain, Wuzhou Mountain and so on in the north.
Six basins are formed in these large and small mountain ranges: Yuncheng Basin, Linfen Basin, Shangdang Basin in the south, Taiyuan Basin in the middle, Xinzhou Basin and Datong Basin in the north. Millions of people live in these six basins.
In the middle, Hedong Road is formed.
The Taiyuan Basin and the Xinzhou Basin are blocked by Yunzhong Mountain and Xizhou Mountain, but two rivers flow through the mountains, forming two river valleys that become the main thoroughfares running through the north and south. One is the Fenshui River Valley in the northwest, connecting Taiyuan.
Fu and Lanzhou, the other is the Lanshui River Valley, which runs right through the junction of Yunzhong Mountain and Xizhoushan, connecting Taiyuan Prefecture and Xinzhou.
Two famous passes were built on these two river valleys. To the west is Loufan Pass, which is currently controlled by the Song Army. The Northern Song Army went from here to Lanzhou, Linzhou, Fuzhou and other places to fight against Xixia.
cutting edge.
The pass to the east is Chitang Pass, which was built at the entrance of the Lanshui River Valley. The exchange of hostages between Chen Qing and the Jin Kingdom took place at Chitang Pass.
That morning, several teams of cavalry came out of Chitang Pass. Each team had about ten people. They were wearing leather armor and bronze helmets. They had bows and arrows on their backs and spears in their hands. They rushed out of the pass along several lines.
Heading towards the south.
This cavalry was the spies sent by the garrison army. They were all Han Chinese Xie Congjun. On Wanyan Wushu's side, the name had been changed to the Signing Army, but on Wanyanchang's side it had not changed yet and was still called the Xie Congjun.
The chief general of Chitang Pass was Zhang Zhongfu, the commander of the capital, who was also responsible for the affairs of Xinzhou. He could be called a general with both civil and military skills. When Zheng Ping was undercover in Wanyan Wushu Camp, this Zhang Zhongfu was his immediate boss.
Zhang Zhongfu received an order from Wanyan Helisa, ordering him to determine the location of the main force of the Song army within two days, and at the same time, the defenders entered first-level combat readiness.
The so-called first-level combat readiness means that war can be launched at any time, and no one can enter or leave the pass, except for the spies sent out.
Not long after several spies and cavalry rushed out of Chitang Pass, one of the spies was stared at by a Song army scout.
This Song army scout seemed to be waiting for the enemy's spies outside the pass. They had been waiting for five days, and they finally arrived.
The Song Army had about fifty cavalry scouts, led by a deputy commander of the scout battalion. The deputy commander was named Li Sanghuai, who was from Chengji County. He was twenty-six or seven years old. He had participated in the Battle of Ganquan Fort and had grown up step by step from a small soldier.
Gong was promoted to deputy commander.
Fifty scouts rode on two horses and followed the enemy spies all the way. After entering a forest, Li Sanghuai was very familiar with the terrain. He immediately divided his troops into two groups and ordered a captain to lead 20 scout cavalry to continue following, while he led 30 scouts.
The cavalrymen took the path around to the front to intercept the enemy spies.
The ten auxiliary army spies were not familiar with the road conditions. They walked along the official road for more than ten miles and came out of the woods. There was a creek in front of them and another forest on the opposite side of the creek.
"Du Tou, there is someone following us!"
They were all spies and relatively keen, and suddenly they noticed a cavalry figure moving not far behind them.
The spies were shocked and took off their bows and arrows one after another. At this moment, a dense burst of arrows was shot from behind them. The arrows were powerful and all targeted their horses.
The horses of the ten spies were hit by arrows in the legs and fell to the ground. At least five soldiers fell from their horses.
"Kill!"
Li Sanghuai shouted and led thirty cavalry scouts to fight out, while twenty cavalry also came out of the woods opposite and surrounded the ten spies.
The three spies tried to break out of the encirclement, but there was no chance. The Song army scouts rushed forward, stabbed them with spears, and killed the three spies on their horses.
"We surrender! Surrender!"
The remaining seven spies shouted in fright and raised their hands.
Li Sanghuai ordered sternly: "Throw away all weapons and dismount!"
When the last two cavalrymen dismounted, everyone was so frightened that they immediately threw away all their weapons and took off their armor.
Without armor and weapons, they were like porcupines with all their thorns pulled out, and could only be slaughtered by the Song army.
Li Sanghuai ordered his men to tie up seven Confederate Army spies behind their backs, mount them on horses, and lead them towards the south military camp.
