The time has come, support your troops and stand on your own feet!
This is the advice Zhou Wusui gave to Li Kuo last night.
Although Li Kuo had more or less thought about this idea before, this was the first time he really thought about the possibility of doing so.
Now is the time of trouble, and it is the best time to support the army and stand on its own feet. At present, the court and the rebels are fighting fiercely, and they will not have the extra energy to worry about this little fish and shrimp of their own. But if the rebellion is put down and the court's vitality is restored,
, if you think about being independent again, you will be like a moth flying into the flame, with absolutely no chance of winning.
Rebellious ministers and traitors!
Li Kuo never thought that one day he would be so close to such a word. Even if he had no choice but to raise the flag of rebellion, he would probably be written down in the history books as a heinous national traitor.
Previously, I always thought that An Lushan would ignore the emperor's favor and support the troops to stand on his own. Now it seems that he may have had no choice but to do so.
After all, rebellions have existed in ancient times and today. Throughout history, the so-called rebellious officials and traitors who rebelled were often forced to rebel.
Do you really want to take this path?
Even if it was just to protect himself, this choice seemed to go against Li Kuo's original intention.
However, if he does not stand on his own feet, what will happen to the brothers under his command? The current emperor is not a magnanimous person. If he is really held accountable afterwards, these brothers who followed him will inevitably be jealous of the court.
If you are not self-reliant, how can you stand up to them?
This is a very difficult question to face and a very difficult question to answer.
It's not that Li Kuo can't face it, but he doesn't dare to face it.
People who sit in higher positions tend to be more cautious when making choices. Because they have too many things and bear too many things, if they are not careful, they will fall into the abyss and harm a team of followers.
Li Kuo is not in a hurry to make a choice now. At least for now, there is a more important thing waiting for him to do.
Sun Xiaozhe mobilized 30,000 troops to besiege Tangzhou City for half a month, but there has been no progress.
This is no wonder. After all, the city defense of Tangzhou City has been far better than before after Li Kuo's construction. Not to mention 30,000 people, but 50,000 or 100,000 people want to break through Tangzhou City without large-scale siege equipment.
It's definitely not an easy task.
What's more, Li Kuo left more than 10,000 garrison troops in Tangzhou, and together with the 5,000 young men in the city, it was more than enough to resist Sun Xiaozhe's 30,000 cavalry.
As the art of war goes, besiege a city only when the force is ten times the number.
Sun Xiaozhe's current military strength is at most three times that of Tangzhou, so it is understandable that he cannot conquer Tangzhou.
"In other words, Sun Xiaozhe had no intention of conquering Tangzhou from the beginning to the end!" As soon as he returned to Tangzhou, Li Kuo summoned the generals who defended the city. After learning about Sun Xiaozhe's actions in the past few days, Li Kuo came to this conclusion
A conclusion that makes people laugh or cry.
Sun Xiaozhe is also considered a famous general and he knows that attacking a city requires an overwhelming force advantage. The troops in his hands are part of the garrison in Chang'an, Xijing. Although they are extraordinary, they are by no means elite. Such a force cannot be considered elite.
An elite army will never be able to conquer a city with ample food and forage and strong defenses.
"Captain, what is Sun Xiaozhe's plan?" Dou Qing was puzzled and asked in a deep voice. If Sun Xiaozhe didn't want to conquer Tangzhou City, how could he drag 30,000 cavalry out of Tongguan for a walk? This is not eating.
Are you full?
After my group came back from Ningling, they saw Sun Xiaozhe's rebels outside Tangzhou City. This guy fled ten miles to the west without even daring to fire an arrow. It was really confusing.
"Perhaps they are just trying to contain our troops." Li Kuo sighed and said, "If I guessed correctly, An Qingxu has made up his mind to conquer Suiyang this year!"
Li Kuo walked to the wall chart, drew a circle on the location of Suiyang City with a charcoal pen, and said: "Yin Ziqi, Yang Chaozong and other troops stationed nearly 100,000 people outside Suiyang City, almost blocking all the roads for reinforcements to arrive.
, now Suiyang has become an isolated city. An Qingxu has spent so much effort, naturally he does not want anything to go wrong, so they want to drive our army out of the Ningling line."
Li Sheng sighed: "The governor is right. Now even Tian Chengsi, who is stationed in Xingyang, has pushed his army to the north of Ningling. It seems that the rebels are determined to open the Jianghuai gate and intercept rice grains."
"So, they pretended to attack Tangzhou and tricked us back?" After Dou Qing heard this, he roughly understood the vicious intentions of the rebels, and was furious for a moment.
"That's probably the case, but we really don't dare to take risks in this situation. After all, most of the veterans were taken out by me, and most of the people defending the city were recruits from the Jianghuai Army. Although Sun Xiaozhe didn't have many soldiers and horses,
But they all went through a big battle. If the brothers are overwhelmed by the momentum of the rebels and make a mistake, there may be an accident."
Li Kuo moved the charcoal more than two hundred miles below Tangzhou City and clicked: "Behind Tangzhou is a plain. As long as they cross Tongbai Mountain, they can also enter the Jianghuai River, but it will be a bit more troublesome."
Li Sheng nodded and said: "So the rebels made two-pronged preparations. On the one hand, they transferred the main force to Suiyang, hoping to conquer this important town in one fell swoop. On the other hand, they sent Sun Xiaozhe to go outside Tangzhou City. If we return to defend,
They will attack Suiyang with all their strength. If we rush to help Suiyang, they will launch an attack on Tangzhou at the same time. No matter where the city is broken, the Jianghuai Road will be in the pocket of the rebels."
"If this is the case, won't Xiao Zhang Tanhua be in danger when we come back?" Dou Qing immediately thought of Zhang Xun's safety. Xiao Zhang Tanhua had been on good terms with his general when he was in Chang'an City. This time in Ningling
Wai, even more
The general risked his life to help and saved Xiao Zhang Tanhua's life. Unfortunately, Xiao Zhang Tanhua insisted on going to Suiyang. The general was worried about his safety and stayed in Ningling. It was not until the news that Tangzhou was besieged came that he hurried to Suiyang.
Come back.
"Brother Zhang, the situation is indeed not good." Li Kuo frowned and said, "But now the Suiyang Canal is blocked and the rebels' grain and grass cannot be transported in time. This is good news for Brother Zhang. However, seeing that
It will be May soon. By then, if the rebels seize the wheat outside Suiyang City, it will be difficult."
ps: It was actually a feint, Shichiro was deceived.
It needs to be mentioned here that when Suiyang was besieged in history, the first thing the Tang Dynasty thought of was not to rush to rescue, but to seize the opportunity to seize Chang'an. If the imperial court could allocate half of its troops to rescue Suiyang at that time, I believe Suiyang would not