On February 15th, more than 30,000 soldiers and horses gathered outside Yuxiang County.
The main force was the Wuwei Army's 15,000 infantrymen on the left wing. They were units that had been reorganized earlier and were already very familiar with each other.
Chishui Army envoy Fan He also arrived at the east of the city with his main force of 5,000 people, and more than 7,000 Tutuan countrymen who had been recruited.
A total of 20,000 government troops and nearly 18,000 local warriors surrounded the east, north, and west directions of the city, leaving only one area in the south of the city to lure the thieves to escape.
Lu Huaizhong is already in his forties and has been fighting for almost thirty years, but he is still an "honest man".
Because of his early experiences, he hated generals who drank the blood of their soldiers and treated them harshly.
His temper was originally very irritable, and he had a temper that was easy to live with. But starting from the Tielindu era, he forced himself to read more and study more. Over time, not only did his level improve a lot, but his temper also became much gentler.
In his place, there are no distinctions between aliases and direct lineages. Forbidden troops like the Wuwei Army also want to attack the city, so there is no need to negotiate.
The Wuwei Army has a tradition of attacking cities. From the first time it broke Kang Yuancheng's camp in Lingzhou, it was basically out of control.
During the Battle of Heqing, he led his troops to attack Heqing County, Baiyacang and other key points, resulting in heavy casualties. However, he captured these strongholds before Pang Shigu's main force arrived for reinforcements, laying the foundation for ousting the Liang soldiers.
It has been more than a month since the Pu soldiers rebelled, and the attack on Yuxiang County has also continued for nearly a month. Starting from the end of the first year, through continuous field battles, they have completely restricted the thieves to Yuxiang County. Half a month has passed so far.
Long.
Encircling three ques and one is a classic siege tactic, aiming to make the enemy abandon the city and flee. Encircling the city along the entire line and digging trenches is another siege method. It is more tragic and neither the attacker nor the defender will end well.
The tactic of surrounding three towers and one tower was effective. If the thieves gathered with advantage, they would inevitably disperse with advantage, especially those weak-willed village warriors who fled at night in an endless stream.
Of course, most of them were captured and killed during the pursuit, and very few escaped.
Lu Huaizhong personally came outside the city and witnessed the end of an offensive battle.
Li Zhong was waiting in the capital, and Han Xun, the military envoy in the left wing, was on the left and right, silent.
It was the Wuwei Army that collapsed, killing and wounding hundreds of people - it can be basically considered that hundreds of people were killed, because the wounded were badly bruised and obviously would not survive.
Du Youyi's envoy An Xiuxiu rushed over with a group of prisoners.
"Kneel down." The cavalry sergeant dismounted and said angrily.
The more than 20 prisoners were obedient and knelt down directly.
"How is the situation in the city?" Lu Huaizhong walked to the prisoners and asked.
The soldiers have raised their whips.
A military officer who surrendered the troops immediately replied: "Due to several unfavorable battles out of the city and low morale, some generals, including Wang Shiyou, made noise and abandoned the city and ran eastward to Zelu. They were killed by Li Diancheng. From then on, the soldiers all complained, and Li Diancheng was appointed an official.
A lot of people made wishes, including governors, defense envoys, regiment training envoys, and suppressive envoys, and everyone felt at ease. As your army accelerated its attack on the city in the past few days, some people couldn't stand it anymore and began to make noises. Li Diancheng became suspicious and hunted and killed
A lot of people came.”
Lu Huaizhong nodded, roughly understanding the situation in the city. In his opinion, Li Diancheng's fate was not much better.
Since the difficult times, sergeants who commit rebellion generally have four consequences.
One is the appeasement from above, pretending that nothing happened, and recognizing the fait accompli posthumously. For example, in the first year of Yongtai, Guo Yingyi, the Jiedushi envoy of Jiannan and Xichuan, was killed by Cui Yi, the Xishan military envoy who inspected the school. Cui Yi was posthumously recognized by the imperial court as the Jiedu envoy.
The second is resolute suppression. For example, in the eleventh year of the Dali calendar, there was an army rebellion in Heyang. The eunuch and supervisor Ran Tinglan was expelled from the city and looted for three days. Ran reorganized his troops, entered the city again, killed the leaders of the rebellion, and pacified it.
The third is to use both suppression and appeasement to achieve appropriate control and appeasement. In the first year of Baoying, Deng Jingshan, the governor of Hedong Province, was killed because he embezzled military pay and led to military chaos. The Hedong soldiers stationed in Jiangzhou also took the opportunity to cause chaos and killed the Beiting soldiers stationed in Yicheng.
Jiedu envoy Li Fei Yuanli followed suit, and finally relied on Guo Ziyi's prestige to frighten the armies, kill the leaders of the rebellion, and the court allocated funds and rewards to quell the rebellion.
The fourth is internal collapse. A typical example is the rebellion with the Chinese soldiers in the first year of the Dali calendar. As a result, they became afraid and one after another surrendered. In the end, the rebels simply killed the Jiedu envoy Zhou Zhiguang and all surrendered.
"Take all the captured soldiers to the city walls and let them persuade them to surrender." Lu Huaizhong ordered: "By the way, how many captured soldiers are there now?"
Li Zhong, the Marquis of Du Yu, immediately replied: "The military envoys have captured more than 4,300 soldiers. The Tutuan countrymen have dismissed them, and there are still more than 2,500 people."
"Beheading geometry?"
"Behead one thousand and four hundred levels, and divide them equally between the Yamen soldiers and the local warriors."
There must have been more than this number of people killed in the siege, but there were only so many that could be counted, so there was nothing we could do.
Lu Huaizhong made a mental calculation. If we exclude the fish that escaped, there should be only more than 3,000 government officers left in the city. Xiang Yong estimated that there were slightly more, but not much more. The total defenders were only 8,000.
People go up and down.
The best way to deal with these panic-stricken people is to use both suppression and appeasement. The price paid for forced suppression is too high.
More than two thousand prisoners were originally building trenches, but they were quickly gathered and taken to the city walls one by one.
Under the coercion of the mighty soldiers, the prisoners had no choice but to shout in turn.
"Brothers, surrender. Just dig trenches. We won't settle old scores."
"Six biscuits a day, but they don't treat us too harshly."
"Give up, the Jin soldiers on Wuling Road will just go down the mountain and plunder, like thieves, they can't save you."
"The old man, King Xia, has given us a way to survive. We can join the army and continue to be warriors."
"The Wei people on the left wing of the Xiejie Army are all dead-set. What are you waiting for?"
"If you don't surrender, we will have to dig ditches day and night. It will be hard."
…
The shouts outside the city continued, and the garrison at the top of the city listened for a long time, and they probably all understood.
After hearing this, Zhao Lie, the tenth general in charge of the defense of this section of Xicheng, immediately called for a few of his close men and said, "Everyone, if you stay behind and plunder military supplies and property in the city, your gains will be limited. Yuxiang City cannot be defended for long.
By mid-March at the latest, we will run out of military supplies and we will not be able to hold on any longer."
After Li Diancheng rebelled, he called himself the Liu Hou of the National Protector Army, so the rebels were called Liu Hou.
Everyone was sensible and nodded when they heard this.
"I don't know what the Xiaojie Army is. It's probably the new army formed by King Xia. Generally speaking, you shouldn't surrender to this new army. If you surrender, you will die. What's more, you have to move home. I was unwilling to do so before.
." Zhao Lie said: "But in this current situation, I don't want to say anything. How about trying your luck?"
"General, if we surrender, shouldn't we give you a reward?" someone suddenly said.
"Enemies." Someone else echoed: "After Li Liu, he raided the whole city. I think it won't be a problem for each person to get a piece of money. Shouldn't we give money to the Xia people when they want to surrender?"
"Take the reward from Li Liuhou first, and then surrender to the Xia people, and get even more." Someone laughed.
Zhao Lie always knew that the sergeant was greedy for money, but he did not expect to be so greedy. For a while, he was manipulated by his subordinates and became a bit confused.
Could you give me more points? Can this still be done?
He has some sense and feels that the Xia people are not stupid. Once such a dangerous precedent is set, how will they manage the army in the future?
The sergeant rebelled, and the crowd elected a leader, who gave him a reward. The army came to suppress it, and the rebels asked for a reward. After taking the money, they killed the leader and surrendered collectively. Both sides benefited, but only the general lost.
If you have money, will the army that came to suppress it be unhappy? Will they also take the opportunity to cause chaos and seek rewards?
Anyone with any sense would not please a sergeant without any bottom line. Once many precedents are set, the trend will drop to a lower level, and it will be difficult to pull it back in the future.
"This matter..." Zhao Lie hesitated for a moment and said: "Let's see what Liu Hou has to say first. Furthermore, it seems that we alone can't make it happen. We need to connect more people to act together to make it effective.
.”
"It makes sense. General, don't worry, I know a few fellow villagers, so I'll go find someone to discuss it."
"I also know a few military academies, so I'll go and walk around."
"It's best to take action after dark. It's not pretty if you leave your post without permission and are caught with your head on the ground."
"Too."
Everyone was chattering and looking excited.
Zhao Lie felt a chill in his heart when he saw it, and thought about running away after dark. These people were all greedy and bargaining with each other, so it would be bad to follow them.
******
After Li Hang established his power in Hedong, he handed over his troops to Feng Zangzhi, who continued to organize them.
Afterwards, he went all the way north to Jiangzhou, where he gathered the scattered river soldiers with great fanfare.
On February 13, more than a thousand surrender troops were gathered in Wanquan, Jishan and other places.
On the 15th, we arrived at Longmen and recruited hundreds more.
On the 17th, he went to the countryside of Zhengping County and collected 300 people.
As usual, these less than 2,000 soldiers were all organized into the right wing of the Houtiao Army.
Yang Yi, the deputy envoy of the Economic Strategy Army, also came to join him with 3,000 people.
While Li Hang was reorganizing and surrendering people, he also promptly handled an incident and killed dozens of the rebel leaders, which was regarded as an escort.
"General Yang, Xizhou only has more than a thousand state soldiers. It suffered a defeat a while ago. I guess I won't be able to hold on for a few more days. Since your troops have received the order, go north quickly." Li Hang said: "Jiangzhou,
There should be about two thousand rebel soldiers in Hezhong Mansion, but they are not here to join forces, but they are determined to cause chaos, and there is no need to recruit them. When the regiment recruited by Wang Yao gathers, Feng Zangzhi will lead his troops northward
, the situation in Jiangzhou will be stable."
"The generals are worried about the instability of the newly surrendered people, so they ordered our troops to temporarily station in Jiangzhou." Yang Yi replied: "Actually, it doesn't matter, so what if Cixi is taken over by others? The weather is cold, the mountain roads are not easy to walk, and thieves are coming.
Not that fast."
"That's alright." Li Hang said, "Then please trouble the officers and soldiers of the strategic army."
In fact, he has no idea of his attitude towards the newly surrendered people. What if someone makes trouble again and kills him? Wouldn't it be an unjust death?
It would also be good to have more time to reorganize the troops. For the people in the right wing of the Xiejie Army, they still need time to settle down if they want to actually fight in battle.
In addition, this time he was good at making decisions, and the general's forehead was doubled. I don't know what King Xia thinks.
Often by Shao Shude's side, he knew that King Xia had been working hard to control the total number of troops under his rule, trying every means to reduce expenses and consume miscellaneous soldiers. This time he was given five thousand more, and Li Hang was helpless.
And just when he was feeling uneasy, the messenger had already rushed five hundred miles to Luoyang and delivered his handwritten letter to Shao Shude's desk.