Su Jin's strategy was both unexpected and reasonable. The lush trees on Longshan Mountain were the culprit. Whether it was the raw materials Su Jin needed to build Weizhou City or the current Xixia Army's on-site attack.
The wood needed for the city's equipment was, without exception, collected from Longshan.
Of course, the entire Longshan Mountain has several towering peaks and an area of dozens of square kilometers. It would be impractical to destroy all the trees on the mountains. However, Su Jin wanted to burn only the trees on the easternmost slope of Longshan Mountain.
If you want to cut down trees inside, you need to climb the towering east slope. Even if Xia Jun has the perseverance to go in and cut down trees, how to get the cut trees out of the mountain will be a big problem, or it may be impossible at all.
As soon as Su Jin came up with this plan, Jingtai, Li Chong, Pan Jiang and others were stunned. None of them had thought of this idea. This was indeed a plan to drain money from the bottom of the cauldron. It could be completely eliminated without confronting Xia Jun.
Xia Jun stopped thinking about cutting down trees to build ladders. When there was no way to cut wood on Longshan Mountain, what would Xia Jun do to build those thousands of ladders?
The city wall of Weizhou City is more than three feet high. It originally requires two ordinary ladders to be connected to the edge of the city wall. The higher and longer the ladder is, the thicker the wood required is. This is not random.
It can be made by cutting down some miscellaneous trees on the roadside and willows by the river. Besides, the quantity required is too much. Except for the trees on Longshan Mountain, the flat land is almost barren. At a glance, there are not a few standing tall trees.
trees, so Xia Jun had no other choice but to go up the mountain to cut down trees.
"Mr. Su, what a good plan. I am sincerely convinced by it."
"Yes, the subordinates also accepted it. Why didn't we think of this?"
Pan Jiang and Jingtai complimented each other, but it didn't seem like they were just flattering, they were sincere admirers.
"Master, leave this errand to me." Wang Chao volunteered.
Su Jin smiled and said, "What are you going to do?"
Chao Chao said: "What else can I do? Just light a fire and burn it. Am I not good at setting fire?"
Su Jin shook his head and said: "Then you are wrong. It is midsummer and the trees on the mountain are lush and lush. How can you light them? Even if they are lit, it will not form a prairie fire. If you want to set a fire, there will be a huge fire, all at once.
We will burn the east slope of Longshan Mountain to the point where not even a blade of grass grows, and we will not allow the Western thieves any opportunity to take advantage of it."
The dynasty understood that Su Jin was worried that if it was half burned and extinguished, it would expose the Song army's strategic intentions. The Xia army would send troops to guard the mountain pass, and then it would be impossible to burn the mountain again.
"Tonight you lead five hundred soldiers, load five hundred bundles of hay on camels in the city, and bring a dozen barrels of kerosene. Taking advantage of the strong southeast wind, pour the hay with kerosene and spread it in densely wooded areas.
You can only evacuate after the pine wood has burned. The pine wood is greasy and difficult to extinguish when burned. The key is that the fire must be strong enough to spread." Su Jin said with a smile.
Pan Jiang said anxiously: "Mr. Su, do you need kerosene? There isn't much of that stuff anymore. Didn't you say you still need to rely on kerosene to defend against the enemy? It's a bit wasteful."
Li Chong smiled and said: "General Pan, in fact, there is no waste at all. If this plan fails and the city is destroyed, what else can we talk about?"
Pan Jiang nodded and said: "I understand, I just feel a little reluctant to let go."
Su Jin said: "Yes, I feel sad too, but what can I do? I heard that this thing is produced in Sichuan and Shaanxi. Doesn't our Jingyuan Road belong to Shaanxi? Why haven't I heard of this somewhere?"
Jingtai said: "Yes, there are many of them. The Yanyan Road under the jurisdiction of Fan Shuai produces this product. It is said that it was born on the waterside. In the caves where sand and rocks are mixed with spring water, black oil comes out in confusion. The local soil
People picked it up with the pheasant's tail and put it into a fou."
Su Jin slapped his thigh and said, "Why didn't you tell me earlier? If you had told me earlier, I could ask for more from Fan Shuai and get one that can be stabbed a thousand times. Are we still afraid of his Western thieves coming to attack the city?"
Jingtai said in astonishment: "A thousand barrels of eight hundred barrels? Are you kidding me? The collected black oil is called 'petroleum' by the locals. It is extremely difficult to burn. When it burns, black smoke will billow, making people choke, and the black oil that comes out will
The smoke is like wisps of black lint, which is difficult to remove even if it stains clothes and curtains; however, it does have the advantage that the black smoke can be used as ink after it is collected and melted with water, which is not much worse than pine ink."
Su Jin widened his eyes and said: "Such a precious strategic material is only used to make ink? Why does the kerosene we use ignite when touched by fire? Are you talking about this thing we use?"
Jingtai smiled and said: "My lord, I don't know. Kerosene is indeed petroleum. However, it needs to be refined through many processes after being picked. It costs a lot of money, so it is rarely refined. However, it is very easy to make ink, so most of them are
It’s used to make ink rather than refine it.”
Su Jin was very interested and said: "But I don't know how to refine it?"
Jingtai said: "I don't know for sure, but it is said that the oil is collected and boiled in a large cauldron. After several twists and turns, one barrel of kerosene can be obtained for every 100 barrels. Think about how much manpower and firewood this costs."
Salary? If this thing cannot be used for military purposes, who will refine it?"
Su Jin carefully recalled the knowledge he learned in later generations, and seemed to have an impression that the traditional method of refining petroleum is distillation and decomposition. It seems that depending on the temperature, it can be decomposed into liquefied gas, gasoline, diesel, etc., and the final residue is used to pave the road.
Asphalt oil; Su Jin was suddenly very excited. Although he could not extract a large number of weird things from oil like later generations, at least he could find a way to produce important strategic materials such as kerosene, whether for military or civilian use.
will have a huge impact.
Su Jin raised his head and muttered, and heard the loud beating of drums from the city tower. At some point, the Xia army's trebuchets had stopped bombarding the city wall. The sound of the drums was a signal to the remaining troops on the city tower who were monitoring the enemy to warn them to be on guard against the enemy's attack.
Pan Jiang quickly ran towards the soldiers who were sitting on the school field to rest after eating, and shouted: "Everyone go to the city wall! In case the Western thieves attack again."
The soldiers quickly stood up and climbed to their respective positions on the city wall. Su Jin and others also returned to the city tower. Looking from a distance, they saw a huge crowd in the Xixia camp. It seemed that the troops stationed behind were moving forward, but it was not.
No sign of attack.
…
The atmosphere in the tall and tall Chinese army tent of the snow-white Li Yuanhao was depressing. Although the aroma of wine and meat in the tent was fragrant, the faces of everyone present were gloomy and gloomy, and they could not swallow the delicious food and wine.
Li Yuanhao sat at the top, holding a wine glass in his hand and thinking deeply. Although his expression seemed calm, the suppressed anger in his eyes revealed his innermost feelings.
The first battle of the siege in the morning was thwarted, with tens of thousands of casualties. Although thousands of them were newly recruited cannon fodder recruits, Li Yuanhao, who had planned to make a contribution in the first battle, was still furious. Yeli Yuqi and Yeli Wangrong had vowed before the battle.
Completely ignoring Li Yuanhao's advice, he adopted extremely simple and crude siege methods, hoping to break through the defenses of Weizhou City in one fell swoop, but the result was a huge disappointment.
Although he was extremely angry, Li Yuanhao still gave face to the two wild kings and did not blame them. On the contrary, he specially held a banquet to reward the two. Of course, there was some humiliation in it. The more important reason was that Li Yuanhao wanted to withdraw the decision of this battle.
Quan, let the Yeli brothers listen to your suggestions instead of going your own way.
"Generals." In the silence, Li Yuanhao spoke.
Everyone was obviously shaken. Due to self-blame and fear, the generals did not know what kind of punishment was coming. The emperor was famous for his tyranny. In the last battle with the Song Dynasty that he personally supervised,
With a force that was several times the enemy's but was beaten into disgrace, he would definitely kill a few scapegoats to satisfy his hatred, but he didn't know which one or two of the scapegoats were present here.
"Generals, thank you for your hard work." Li Yuanhao felt proud as he looked at the silent crowd. Even Brother Yeli's face was full of shame and horror, which made Li Yuanhao very many.
"Your Majesty...I am incompetent...please forgive me, Your Majesty." Yeli Yuqi stood up and left his seat and knelt down in front of Li Yuanhao's case. He and Yeli Wangrong had originally agreed to hold on, but when facing Li Yuanhao, he still
Some can't stand it.
Yeli Yuqiu surrendered, but Yeli Wangrong no longer had the courage to persist, so he quickly stood up and knelt down, and the whole tent was filled with people knelt down.
"What are you doing? I don't mean to blame you. I sincerely invite you to come and drink to relieve your fatigue. Get up quickly." Li Yuanhao said lightly.
"I am incompetent and lost the first battle. Please ask the emperor to punish us, otherwise I will feel uneasy." Ye Liyuqi said in a hoarse voice.
Li Yuanhao stood up with a smile, came to Ye Li Yuqi, stretched out his hand to help him up, and said quietly: "Victory or defeat is a common thing for soldiers. This battle has just begun. How can we say the outcome? Although we lost the first battle today, our army only suffered a few casualties.
Why do you need to be so sad? Besides, this battle also revealed the true identity of the Song people and gained something. Everyone, please get up, I won’t blame you."
Everyone was relieved. It was rare to see Li Yuanhao be so magnanimous. Today's luck was really good.
"However... the cause of the defeat in this battle is worthy of our careful analysis. Who can tell me why we lost today? What is the cause of the defeat?" Li Yuanhao changed the topic, making everyone feel relieved again.
Everyone looked at me, and I looked at you, but no one wanted to speak first, and the tent fell into dead silence again.