Dong Zhuo was overjoyed to learn that the Hanoi Army had not been harmed, but he also fell into trouble later. In less than ten days, all the land in Hanoi County was lost, which was the land that his subordinates had just captured after two bloody months.
, now not only was it completely occupied by Chen Chong, but even Mengjinguan was easily breached by him. This was all due to his excessive fear of the enemy.
With 50,000 mobile troops and horses in his hands again, Dong Zhuo became bolder again. He gave up the idea of returning to Hangu Pass and took the time to observe Chen Chong's movements on the north bank. After all, he was also quite curious: Now Yuan Shao and Yuan Shu are each
With an army of nearly 200,000 people, they all stood still, but Chen Chong dared to march across the river to confront him at Mang Mountain. What did he rely on? Or did he have unknown foreign aid?
Of course Chen Chong would not think so, even though most of the Central Route Army had gathered in Heyang one after another. After Wang Fang withdrew from Hanoi, he took over the two cities of Yewang and Wenxian, and re-adjusted the defenses of Yecheng, Yewang and Wenxian.
, about 12,000 people were left in Zhi County to guard Heyang in a square shape, and 3,000 people were used to transport baggage from Tianjingguan to Hanoi. Only 40,000 people could be used to confront the river.<
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This is much lower than Dong Zhuo's expectation of 70,000 people. However, Chen Chong's plan was to use the Central Army to contain the enemy. He never expected 40,000 people to be able to defeat Dong Zhuo. To contain the enemy, he had to take risks.
It cannot be said that it is not dangerous because Dong Zhuo did not know the details of Chen Chong, so he did not dare to act rashly. What Chen Chong wanted to do was to take advantage of this situation.
At this opportunity, they stabilized Mengjin's defense line and nailed Dong Zhuo's army to Luoyang.
Now Chen Chong has conquered Mengjin Pass and is facing off with Dong Zhuo's army in Beimang Mountain. Mengjin Nanguan is isolated on the south bank, forming an extremely delicate situation. Dong Zhuo may not be able to conquer Nanguan, but Chen Chong cannot cross the river to fight and must station troops.
Because of holding on to Nanguan, Chen Chong could not easily move his army. Dong Zhuo only needed to leave a small number of troops to guard Mang Mountain, and then he could use the remaining main force to find fighters. If he crossed the river to attack Chen Chong's flank, Chen Chong could still hold on. If he attacked Yuan Shu and Sun Jian first,
, the Central Army was completely defeated.
Therefore, he planned to build a floating bridge on the Yellow River in Mengjin.
The Floating Bridge on the Yellow River has existed since ancient times. In the fiftieth year of King Zhaoxiang of Qin, due to winning the Battle of Changping, the Qin State expanded rapidly in the three Jin areas. In order to ensure the convenience of travel between Qin and Jin, King Zhaoxiang built it at Pubanjin in the east of the river.
River Bridge. It is a pity that after Wang Mang's rebellion, the Red Eyebrow Army entered Chang'an, and Guanzhong was in chaos. No one repaired the Puban River Bridge, so it was damaged and has not been rebuilt to this day.
A river bridge can be built at Mengjin, but it is different from Pubanjin. The water surface of the river in the north of Luoyang is complex, and the river banks are sometimes wide and sometimes narrow. Especially the section of the river from Heyang to Gongxian forms a thin and round shape, like a
The snake that swallows an elephant. This means that the river suddenly converges at both ends, with a width of only about two hundred feet, but suddenly widens in the middle of the river, reaching a width of nearly seven hundred feet. It stands to reason that the river surface is wide, and the water flow will be accordingly.
It slowed down, but the river water was full of sediment from the upper reaches. After the water flow slowed down, the sediment from the upper reaches settled here. Over thousands of years, two sandbars, one large and one small, were piled up in the middle of the river. The large sandbar is about five miles long.
, the small sandbar is about three miles long, which in turn causes the river to branch from the sandbar into two narrower channels, making the water flow more rapid.
It is said that when Dayu divided the Kyushu, he decided to build a bridge here to connect the north and south of the river. However, he built the bridge three times, and each time half way through, the bridge piles were washed away by the river. He sighed: "I
The success of flood control has always been to go with the flow, because I clearly understand the principle that those who follow the heavens will prosper and those who go against the heavens will perish. Now that I have failed to build the bridge three times, it can be seen that it is a warning from the gods not to allow the bridge to be built." So he gave up the construction.
Bridge. After three generations, there were not many people who made Luoyang their capital, but they all believed that they were not as good as Dayu in controlling water and building bridges, so no one built a river bridge in the north of Luoyang.
But once the river bridge is completed, the geopolitical impact will be earth-shaking. The natural dangers of the Yellow River will become a smooth road, and Luoyang's danger to Hebei will no longer exist. If Chen Chong's army is at Mengjin Beiguan and sets out from the river bridge in one day,
You can reach the north of Luoyang City directly within. There is only Beimang Mountain between the two armies as the only barrier to Luoyang. Unless Dong Zhuo abandons Luoyang, he will never dare and cannot move his army and let Chen Chong cross Beimang Mountain.
Therefore, Chen Chong summoned all the generals accompanying the army in Beiguan and told them his plan. The generals were shocked by Chen Chong's bold idea. Tao Qiuhong questioned this and said: "The river has flowed eastward for thousands of years, and it is impossible to build a river bridge.
, but I have never heard of it being built in Mengjin. What’s more, there are many capable and wise people in the past dynasties, and no one has ever proposed to build a river bridge here. It can be seen that building a river bridge here is as difficult as climbing to the sky. What Longshou did
, isn’t it unwise?”
Tao Qiuhong was as famous as Hua Xin in Beihai. He had not been an official since he was elected as Xiaolian, so he had a reputation for being noble. Chen Ji became the Prime Minister of Pingyuan and visited him repeatedly to ask him to be the chief secretary of the government. Soon he heard that Chen Chong was participating in the challenge against Dong.
, and sent him to help, and everyone in the army respected him very much.
After listening to his speech, Chen Chong did not answer immediately. Instead, he looked at the eastward flow of the river. After everyone was calm and breathless, he said: "Brother Tao Qiu's words are biased. The so-called unwise is because he doesn't know that he can't do it.
, and we still have to force ourselves to do it. The so-called worrying about the sky and carving a boat for a sword is nothing better than this. The ancients knew that they were beyond their capabilities, so they did not build river bridges. This is indeed wise, but how can ancient and modern people be the same? What the ancients couldn't do is not what people today can't do.
, I know how to build river bridges, so I just came up with this proposal, how can I call it unwise?"
Chen Chong also took the example of going out to Taixing and said: "The generals who went out to Taixing before were just opening up a new path that has never been seen in ancient times. The world is different and the people today are better than the ancients. Do we need to talk more about it?" Previously, Chen Chong sent Tao Qiu.
Hong arranged to go down the mountain with the cavalry at Tianjing Pass, so he couldn't understand it. The other generals who followed Chen Chong down the mountain thought of the scene of climbing up the mountain and going down to the clouds, and they all agreed with what Chen Chong said was reasonable.
Then came the question from Taishan Colonel Chang Xi, who directly focused on military issues and said: "Not to mention how to build the river bridge, will the Liang people on the south bank sit back and watch us build it? The pontoon bridge is difficult to build, but easy to destroy. If they cross the river to harass
, and a large army besieged Nanguan. We have no foothold, so how can we build a bridge?"
This hit the point directly. Chen Chong admired Chang Xi greatly. He patted Chang Xi on the shoulder and said with a smile: "Mr. Chang's words hit the mark, so we can't build the river bridge now." He paused slightly and pointed his finger at the crowd.
He looked towards the small sandbar in the river and said, "Let's build a city here first."
On July 16, the sky was still between turbid and bright. The Liang people scouts in Beimang Mountain vaguely saw a noise on the other side, but they couldn't see it clearly. They could only vaguely see black masses on the small yellow and black sandbar.
Shadow. So they waited for another half an hour, and when the sky turned into a dark blue color, the scouts saw clearly: People were landing one after another on the small sandbank three miles long. They lined up on the sand and gravel, and Chang Ge and
The flags stand like a forest, and the north side of the sandbar is full of small boats, as densely packed as the hair of the sandbar, swaying back and forth with the white waves in the river.
The scouts hurried to report to the Prime Minister. Dong Xiangguo was greatly surprised when he learned about it, and personally led his staff to Beimang Mountain to watch. When he arrived, he saw that people were still being transported to the sandbank on the north bank. Looking from a distance, there were as many people as the corner of the city.
Dong Zhuo roughly estimated that there were no less than ten thousand ants on the island. He did not embarrass Cai Yong, and instead asked Zong Zhengjia's minister and prime minister Liu Ai for his opinion: "Liu Changshi, what do you think?"
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Liu Ai speculated for a long time, and finally frowned and said: "Could it be that you plan to build a fortification here?"
Dong Zhuo shook his head and said with a smile: "If he were an ordinary general, I would think so. But with Chen Chong's strategy, I would not be ignorant. With the strength of the two passes in the north and south of Mengjin, as long as there are enough defenders, even if I lead my troops to attack by force, it will be difficult for a while.
Why bother building another city on the sandbank? It's a waste of the strength of the soldiers."
"He must be building a city as a cover." After saying this, Dong Zhuo paused for a moment, put his forehead on his forehead to sort out his thoughts, and then said more firmly: "Chen Chong's battles are very deceitful. He is now leading thousands of people to cross the sandbank. The sandbank is only two miles away from the south bank.
Baizhang, a soldier can cross the Yellow River in two quarters of an hour by boating. When we believed it and relaxed our vigilance, thinking that he really wanted to hold on to Mengjin, he repeated his old tricks and led his army across the river to rush to Nanguan. Our army had no time to react.
It can be seen that he calmly crossed the river, but missed the opportunity to attack halfway across the river."
This speculation was quite reasonable and was full of various games among the generals. Liu Ai felt his eyes widened after hearing this and admired Dong Zhuo greatly. He also asked: "The Prime Minister's wise strategy can see through Chen Chong's plan, but he doesn't know that we are waiting for him."
How to deal with the enemy?"
Hearing this, Lu Bu, the general of the Tiger Guard, stepped forward to ask for a fight: "I saw the two thieves Liu and Chen in Bingzhou. One was a scholar who could not fight, and the other was a prodigal son who was conceited and took risks. Only his subordinates Guan Yu and Zhang Fei returned.
Even if they have some skills, the rest are just little people with little money. They are now trapped on the sandbank. Once there is a fight, there will be no way to escape. Why not let my generals go ashore in boats and kill them all like sheep.
Absolutely,"
Dong Zhuo didn't want to agree at first, but then he thought about it, he had never fought against Chen Chong head-on. Now that Chen Chong was leading the army, how could he not fight for more than ten days? When he thought of this, he felt itchy, so he agreed immediately
Lu Bu, let him take two thousand soldiers first and go to the sandbank to fight for a while to test the depth of the enemy.
Lü Bu picked two thousand of his old troops and went down the mountain to Xiaopingjin in a big way. Jia Xu of Xiaopingjin heard that Lü Bu wanted to fight and wanted to go to the sandbank to fight. He was worried and said: "I see that there are many boatmen under Chen Chong. You have to be careful.
." Lu Bu replied nonchalantly: "How big of a difference can it make? It's just a hundred feet of river surface."
He picked eighty small boats in Xiaopingjin. Each boat was manned by two boatmen and carried ten soldiers. The ropes were loosened on the side of the boat, and the bow rose and fell with the waves. Lu Bu faced the river wind and stood at the front without hesitation.
, he was wearing chain mail, carrying a long bow with horns on his back, and a silver tiger's gauntlet on his head. He waved a halberd in the wind with both hands. He couldn't help but feel high-spirited and smiled at the generals behind him: "I will test my bravery for you today."