Chapter 280 The Sword Points at Japan () Kurodas Surprise Attack
Quite coincidentally, when Zhang Wanbang and Li Shanhai reached a cooperation agreement, it happened to be a time when the military situation in southern and central North Korea was undergoing new changes.
On this day, four forces were intensifying their mobilization on the land in southern Korea. These four forces were the main force of the Japanese troops going south, Gao Pingshi's direct headquarters, Liu Wei's department, and Li Rumei's department. In fact, there were also troop mobilizations at sea on this day, but this time
I’ll leave it out for now and will explain it later.
In central Korea, the main changes also occurred in the four forces. The four forces here are the Ming Army Dong Yiyuan's Department, the Ming Jurchen Allied Army Nurhachi's Department, the Japanese Army Nabeshima Katsushige's Department, and the Japanese Army Shimazu Yoshihiroki.
The remnants of Kato Kiyomasa.
Due to different war zones, these eight forces on land can still be divided into two parts: the southern part and the central part for explanation.
Let’s talk about the south first. The changes in the south started when Gao Jingshi guessed that Kuroda Rushui would make a desperate move to launch a sneak attack on Sichuan where he was. At that time, Gao Jingshi quickly sent his servant Ding Shaoqi as a messenger to inform Liu Wei and treat him
He gave some instructions, and contacted Li Rumei as soon as possible, and also gave some instructions.
At this time, the Japanese army did two things: First, they held a meeting at the corps commander level. Kuroda used hard and soft tactics to persuade the participating generals, win their support, and decided to take advantage of the fact that Li Rumei had been temporarily dumped.
They followed him and launched an all-out sneak attack on Sichuan as quickly as possible.
Second, send people to contact Busan to try to allow the Japanese navy stationed in Busan to sneak out of the port and block the Sacheon port.
There is nothing to say about this first point. It is entirely within Gao Pragmatic's expectations. If there is something that even Gao Pragmatic cannot completely guarantee, it may be the specific marching route of the Japanese army. There may actually be three routes on this route.
, but the last section would all converge on the same road, so Gao Pragmatic didn't pay much attention to it. After all, he himself had no intention of leading his army to meet the enemy.
The second point is very critical. The Japanese army hopes that the Japanese navy stationed in Busan will sneak out of the port and block the channel to the sea in Sichuan. Is this operation likely to succeed?
There really is.
This needs to be explained. We are still in the age of sails. First of all, the sea self-sustainability of this ship is far from being comparable to that of later generations. After all, you don’t have any seawater desalination equipment. Maybe you can still persist without other things, but if you don’t have
It really won't work if it's fresh water.
The several methods that Gao Pragmatic "came up with" in his early years can only be said to be more or less extended for a certain period of time, and it is impossible to strengthen them to the point where they can stay at sea permanently and never go ashore, just like cheating.
Therefore, the blockade of Busan Port by the Japanese-Japanese Fleet these days is not to pull the entire fleet outside Busan Port like a chain of iron chains, but to rely on the nearest base to dispatch multiple routes and batches of faster ships to the outer sea.
Pull the net shuttle patrol.
In other words, when the Japanese navy looks outside the Busan Port, there is not a wall there, but one or several steel knives that are twisting above and below you in turn - so theoretically, if they can figure out
According to the regular patrols of the Japanese and Japanese fleets, opportunities can still be found to sneak out.
There is another problem here, that is, the Ping-Japanese Fleet's shuttle patrol has a focus. There is no doubt that the Ping-Japanese Fleet's focus is to prevent the Japanese navy from escaping southward back to Japan (regardless of whether it carries a Japanese land division)
delusion, and this means that this shuttle patrol mainly targets the coastal waters of the port and the southern waters of this sea area.
During this period of time, the Japanese navy was not just sitting in the Busan Port eating free of charge. They also sent several speedboats out to sea to deliberately hit the wall, and basically tested this situation. Therefore, after receiving the news from Kuroda Rusu,
Kuuki Yoshitaka agreed to this dangerous plan and personally drew up a battle plan. [Note: Historically, Kuuki Yoshitaka had been officially dismissed at this time, but in this book due to changes in circumstances, this did not happen.]
Jiugui Jialong believes that although 70% to 80% of the trap set against the Ming Navy has been discovered, after all, the enemy is extremely powerful and there may still be some untouched situations. Therefore, it must not be like the land navy.
Just like a desperate move, all the troops are concentrated together for action.
It is definitely not possible for the entire navy to act together in this battle. In that case, the best result is that the Ming army does not notice it at first, but soon after it is discovered, it can rely on the advantages of ship size and speed to surround it.
, in the end, the Japanese navy was overtaken before it reached Sichuan Port, and had to fight a decisive battle at sea with the Ming navy - it was a sure defeat, and there was no need to take any chances.
Therefore, navy generals such as Todo Takatora, Kato Yoshiaki and Wakisaka Yasuji all made suggestions, and finally it was Kuuki Yoshitaka who made the final decision: to send nearly 30% of the main warships of the Japanese navy in Busan Port to sea to break out, pretending to use the main combat power
The posture of withdrawing to the Japanese mainland attracts the attention of the Japanese and Japanese fleets, and strives to attract the main force of the Japanese and Japanese fleets.
Then, after the Ping-Japanese fleet left the coast of Busan Port, the remaining navy ships were quietly sent out of the port and rushed westward almost along the coastline to Sacheon.
There are two troublesome or very dangerous aspects of this plan. One is that the main warships of the Japanese navy used as bait must be the real main force. Otherwise, the Ping-Japanese fleet has been exploring the Pusan Port for so long, and it seems that it is not a real battle.
The main force will definitely not be fooled. This task of luring the enemy is 100% impossible to complete.
But here comes the problem. If the real main force dispatched, which accounts for 30% of the total number of warships, is really swallowed up by the Taira-Japanese fleet, then the pot will be too big. Kuki Yoshiro asks himself that he cannot bear such a big responsibility - not only is this
There is the Nippon Maru and those of His Majesty Taikaku's favorites in the new fleet.
The second danger lies in how the real large fleet that goes to sea later can escape the inspection of the Japanese fleet - although there is a main fleet acting as a decoy, the size of the Japanese fleet is so large that no one can guarantee that they will destroy all the ships.
They are all mobilized to contain this bait, right? Even if they leave a few ships around and discover the Japanese fleet leaving the port, the subsequent operations will basically be in vain.
Due to the obvious strength gap between the two sides, there was not much room for adjustment in the combat plan itself. Therefore, several Japanese navy generals discussed and decided to set the time for the decoy fleet to go to sea in the afternoon, and the time for the large fleet to go to sea in the evening.
The Ming army also had to eat in the evening, and the Japanese navy went out to sea in the evening, and it happened to be night when they left the port. At that time, the Ming army sailors had just eaten and drank enough, and their vigilance was at their worst, and it was just after nightfall when their vision was extremely poor.
, even if there are still some ships responsible for monitoring Busan Port, the chance of discovery is very slim.
Another advantage of doing this is that according to their arrangement, after the bait fleet attacks for a while, it will pretend to be invincible - well, there is no need to pretend - and then retreat to Busan with all its strength. If everything goes well, from evening to night
This time period happens to be when the bait fleet returns to port. If this is successful, then this plan will almost complete the plan of vacating the cage and replacing the birds.
This is where Kuroda Ruishui contacted the Japanese Navy and the Japanese Navy's arrangements. He will continue to talk about the actions of the main force of the Japanese army. As mentioned before, Gao pragmatically judged that the main force of the Japanese army had three options for a sneak attack on Sichuan, and these three options will eventually go.
To the same section of road, why?
Because since the Japanese army will not go west of the Nakdong River where Liu Wei has set up a posture, they can only cross the Nakdong River south of Changning. It is difficult to determine where the Japanese army will cross the river, but after crossing the river, depending on the situation,
As they crossed the river, there were three towns in front of them that they could enter and settle in. These three places were Jinhai, Xiongchuan, and Mashan from east to west.
The situations in these three places are not the same at this time. Jinhae is located in the east, so it is closest to Busan and is still under the control of the Japanese army. Xiongchuan and Mashan were areas that Liu Wei had previously sent troops to recover, but no troops were stationed there.
——This is actually not accurate, because although there were no Ming troops stationed there, Liu Wei's generals appointed the leaders of the local militia as temporary defenders after they recovered the two places.
It is actually enough to have these militia groups to maintain law and order in normal times. As for whether they will be useful after the Japanese army arrives, that is of course two questions. Gao Pragmatism actually tends to believe that once the Japanese army arrives, these militia groups may even kill him or Liu Wei.
Their reporting skills are not very good, so it is better not to have too high expectations for these people.
Instead of going to Gimhae, which was still under Japan's control, Kuroda Yoshizu finally chose to attack Xiongchuan immediately after crossing the river. Xiongchuan was probably located in Changwon in later generations of Korea, and was very close to Masan further to the west.
They are only twenty miles apart.
The terrain of Mashan is low, and the terrain of Xiongchuan is higher. Therefore, when the Japanese army attacked Xiongchuan, if Xiongchuan could light a beacon fire or something, it would be visible to the naked eye from the side of Mashan.
Unfortunately, this did not happen. The Japanese army originally marched quickly while hiding their whereabouts as much as possible. When they reached Xiongchuan, the local area was defenseless. When the Korean militia in Xiongchuan discovered that tens of thousands of Japanese troops were approaching, they marched without saying a word.
The white flag was hoisted to welcome the Japanese troops into the city. Their behavior could be described as extremely bachelorful and without any thought at all.
Kumagawa's surrender was completely expected by Kuroda Rusui. This is actually not surprising. This is just a small town, so small that it is impossible for tens of thousands of Japanese troops to squeeze in. In fact, Kuroda Rusui only sent 300 people to conquer it.
The Korean militia took control, and then the occupation of Xiongchuan was completed.
Not only did the remaining Japanese troops not enter the city, they even continued to advance westward without rest, and arrived at Mashan that evening.
Mashan is also a small town, but it is much larger than Kumagawa. At least if the Japanese army is willing, they can squeeze tens of thousands of people into the city while driving the Koreans out of the city. However, Kuroda
The water is not so dry.
It's not that Kuroda Rusui loves the Korean people like his own son, but what he fears most now is that the news will leak out. If the Koreans in Mashan City are driven out, and they run to inform the Ming army in Sichuan that the Japanese army has captured Mashan, then
Wouldn't it be a big deal?
But the problem is that the Japanese army was marching like crazy and it was time to rest. So Kuroda Yoshizu, a Japanese monk who has become a monk, did a very professional thing: to save North Korea in the city.
people.
Although tens of thousands of Japanese troops could be squeezed into this small city, the reason why we say "squeezed in" is because the city is indeed not big, and there are not too many Koreans in the city - this place has been attacked twice by the Japanese army.
, the population has been much smaller to begin with. Currently, there are only more than 4,000 people in the city, including a militia group of more than 200 people.
The performance of the Mashan militia was the same as that of Xiongchuan. They also surrendered on the spot with a white flag and let the Japanese army enter the city. However, their fate was far inferior to that of Xiongchuan. The Japanese army immediately sent 3,000 troops into the city and slaughtered the militia and the Korean people. The remaining
The Japanese army set up a dragnet outside the city and cleaned up any fish that slipped through the net one by one.
The bloody city of Mashan could not stop the Japanese army. Kuroda Rushui and other Japanese generals seemed to be accustomed to massacres - even those generals who were not accustomed to it would not show it, because they were all "the pillars of the military family"
", they are unwilling to admit that they have any compassion. In their concept, "compassion" is considered weak and can be bullied.
Now let’s talk about the terrain issue. The straight-line distance from Mashan to Sichuan is about a hundred miles, but the problem is that this straight-line distance is not very meaningful because there is a mountain between the two places. This mountain is called Lotus
The mountain is one of the southern branches of Taebaeksan Mountain in North Korea.
The most coincidental thing is that the middle of the straight line distance from Mashan to Sichuan is exactly where the main peak of Lianhua Mountain is. In other words, even though this place can be walked, normally it is definitely not suitable for large armies to pass through.
Where is the road? There is a road from Mashan to Jinzhou. Whether the Japanese army attacked Jinzhou twice from Busan when they swept across the Eighth Route Army of Korea, or when Liu Wei sent troops from Jinzhou to recapture Masan, both sides took this road.
This chapter is not over yet, please click on the next page to continue reading! However, although the road is ready-made and completely suitable for the army to march, Kuroda Ruishui firmly disagrees with taking this road to attack Jinzhou.
It’s a joke, how could Gao Pingshi not get the news about Sichuan when he attacked Jinju? Even if Liu Wei’s main force is still stupidly waiting near Sanjia to the west of the Nakdong River, he will definitely not leave any troops in Jinju.
.
The Ming people are not Koreans, and the Ming army is not a Korean militia. The Korean militia will surrender directly when they see the Japanese army coming, but the Ming army will only light beacons and send cavalry messengers when they see them. Neither of these two methods of communication can stop the Japanese army.
, that would be bad, so I definitely can’t go to Jinzhou, at least not now.
Kuroda Rushui asked the entire army to cross the mountains and ridges, cross the Lotus Mountain, and go straight to Sichuan City!
In fact, this order was not without objections among the Japanese generals, but it was just that the matter had come to this, and objections did not mean much anymore. After all, there was no turning back when the bow was fired. Ninety-nine bows had been made, and the last one could not be trembled.
superior.
Therefore, regardless of whether they were happy or not, the Japanese generals had no choice but to go out in person to cheer up their subordinates. After being very encouraging, they promised various benefits, especially based on the military exploits of "capturing Tang Xiang". The morale of the entire army soared.
.
After mobilization was completed, the Japanese army marched towards Lianhua Mountain.
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PS: The delay in publishing this chapter is not because I fell asleep in the middle of the night, but because I hesitated a bit in my writing. Mainly because I hesitated whether to write according to the timeline like most of the time before or to finish writing the Hanyang side first. Later,
Think about it, just follow the timeline in your usual style.
