Xiang Xiaoqiang drove to the Supreme Command in the Purple Mountain Fortress. On the way, he sat in the car and eagerly browsed the major newspapers of the past ten days.
As expected, all major newspapers on August 9th, the day of the signing, published the full text of the "Treaty of Port Arthur" on the front page. The full text of the treaty was not long, only the first half of the page was used, and the second half of the page was dedicated to the political moderators of each newspaper.
The pen's verbal criticism and the bold "Editor's Note" in the headline
, the writings of these main writers reveal a strong smell of gunpowder, and several other pages are filled with related articles. No matter which faction is pouring out their anger, the calmer ones are also sarcastic, and the finger points are basically pointed at them.
Beiqing, which confuses right and wrong.
Xiang Xiaoqiang read a few more newspapers and found that there were some left-wing views. He directed his doubts at the Ming Dynasty negotiation team, accusing them of being unprincipled and not just to take back prisoners of war. They could blame the entire Ming Empire for anything.
.An individual never has the right to disregard the interests of the country for his own interests. The reason why these officers and soldiers were captured was to defend the country. Now because they want to come back, they have to trade for the honor of the entire country. Isn't it putting the cart before the horse?
In short, there is such a question between the lines in their words: What is more important, personal self-interest or national honor?
Then, he looked through the newspaper of the next day, which was August 10th. Sure enough, there were many articles tit for tat at this time, criticizing those few articles and criticizing them all. Xiang Xiaoqiang also saw the present from it.
The mainstream thinking of the Ming Dynasty people is that the country is composed of families and individuals. If the abstract "
If "national honor" is placed above the happiness of each family and individual, then this so-called "national honor" is hypocritical. A country that cannot protect even its most specific citizens is the greatest shame. Damn it.
The "national honor" obtained at the expense of the specific interests of the citizens does not belong to all citizens, but only to the rulers themselves.
…
Then he read through the newspapers for the past ten days. This matter has always been the focus. Most of the articles contained three emotions: indignation, humiliation, and expectation.
What are you looking forward to? I hope the Ming Dynasty’s thousands of prisoners of war can return safely. In addition, there is a common sentiment that you can’t swallow this breath and hope that the empire can do something.
A small number of radical views "claimed" that the Ming Dynasty should take tough measures against the Northern Qing Dynasty, such as immediately increasing its efforts to airdrop the Taihang Mountain column, expanding the southward escape agitation behind the Northern Qing Dynasty, intensifying the instigation of rebellion and subversion... etc., in short, to
After bringing back thousands of prisoners of war, they completely tore up the Treaty of Port Arthur. Some were even more radical and even called for the Ming Dynasty to go to war with the Northern Qing Dynasty to show them how powerful they were. Of course, most of these writers who clamored for war did not stop.
along the Yangtze River.
When Xiang Xiaoqiang saw these titles, his first thought was: Are there so many patriotic and angry young people who dare to love the Ming Dynasty?
But he read the article carefully and immediately saw that the articles written by these "angry youths" were still very high-quality. After all, there was no Internet, no forums, and no blogs at this time. No one wanted to talk, and they would be immediately criticized by thousands of people if they posted it.
Thousands of people can see it. At this time, the relationship between the author and the readers still has to go through the editing process. Moreover, the newspaper space is limited, and what can be printed are the most high-level articles. Things that are purely venting and clamoring are directly deleted.
Reject the manuscript or throw it in the trash.
Therefore, according to the standards of later generations, the "angry youth articles" Xiang Xiaoqiang saw in the newspaper cannot be called "angry youth", but should be called "angry scholars."
And the views of "going to war" advocated by these "angry scholars", analyzed one by one, are very similar to the arguments of the "Northern Expedition" at the Supreme Military and Political Council of the Empire! But after all, they are not professional in military matters and cannot see the same as Xiang Xiaoqiang.
Air superiority and deep maneuvers
Most of them analyze the power of war from a political perspective. The words they say the most and are also the most powerful argument are the four words "the will of the people on both sides of the Taiwan Strait." Nothing can most directly express the will of the people on both sides of the Taiwan Strait than what happens every day.
They risked their lives and fled south. They wrote directly in the article:
"'To live in the Ming Dynasty' is the dream of every low-level people in the Northern Qing Dynasty. The bottom of the army is no exception. Let me ask, if the Qing army soldiers were given a chance to live in the Ming Dynasty, how many people would give up? How many people would give up?
Still holding the gun in hand, shooting at our Ming soldiers? No, they won’t! They will only regard the Ming army as liberators!”
Xiang Xiaoqiang lay on the leather backrest of the back seat, flicked the newspaper hard, and secretly praised:
"Okay! This sentence is the most thorough!"
Zheng Yucong has been taken to attend the press conference. Xiang Xiaoqiang did not attend because he was summoned by the headquarters. What is certain is that Princess Zheng’s clever mouth spoke vividly, coupled with the pear blossoms’ rainy words
Grief and indignation expressed, happening
Everything about the Chifeng prisoner-of-war camp is about to be exposed. Now the outside world only sees an urn held during the medal ceremony. They only know that it is a brother who died in the prisoner-of-war camp. They don’t know how he died! Still only
I feel like such a brother died in a prisoner of war camp!
Before tonight, the second round of anger against the Northern Qing Dynasty will sweep across the Ming Dynasty, and rush out of Asia and into the world... Of course, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of the Northern Qing Dynasty will definitely refute the rumors as soon as possible and sternly refute the "vicious slander" of the Southern Ming Dynasty.
"Yes.
…
Entering the headquarters conference room in the Purple Mountain Fortress, a regular military meeting was taking place, chaired by Tang Yunsheng. Since the Ming Dynasty secretly set the national policy of the Northern Expedition, such regular military meetings have been held every day in the headquarters, and the army and navy staff officers have been holding such meetings every day.
The latest progress of the Qing operation plan must be discussed and improved at the meeting.
Xiang Xiaoqiang and Zhang Zhao first came after attending the medal ceremony for returning officers and soldiers, and almost walked into the conference room. When they saw Zhang Shuai coming in, all the generals stood at attention and paid tribute. Zhang Zhao waved his hands first and asked everyone to continue.
But everyone's attention was focused more on Xiang Xiaoqiang. Xiang Xiaoqiang and Zheng Yucong were on the mission to Beiqing these days, and they have always been the focus of the Ming Dynasty. Later, the mission came back first, but the two did not come back. It is said that they were
Went there to escape the summer heat
The villa met the Emperor of the Northern Qing Dynasty and had no contact with them for so many days, which cast a veil of mystery over them. And it was precisely because of their "lonely man and widowed" trip that many tabloids provided information
A perfect source of material for fabricating scandals.
Xiang Xiaoqiang smiled humbly at everyone, said hello, pulled up a chair, found an empty space and sat down.
As soon as he heard this sentence, he understood why he had been called to this meeting. Because this time he had to make a more important decision, and he had to invite all the relevant generals. If everyone thinks about it, he will make a decision if it works.
Tang Yunsheng continued:
"...So, there are currently two factors that determine why we set the 'attack day' on October 4th. First, in the previous military meeting, we have decided to set the attack time in October. This is based on
Our preparations, the farming season in Beiqing, and
It is determined by factors such as the geographical environment of North China in autumn and winter. The reason why it is recommended to be on the 4th is because the 4th is the first Sunday in October. Like us, many departments of the Qing army have holidays every weekend, and many stations
Officers who are close to home will take this opportunity to return home.
"Although the holiday only started on Sunday, many officers would buy tickets and leave on Saturday night. This situation happened to us and the Qing army. But the Qing army's military discipline was much laxer than ours, and this was much more serious than ours.
Except for a small number of elite ace troops with better military discipline, the officers of most of the troops will definitely not be found on Saturday night, whether they go home or not. They basically go back to the cities and counties where they are stationed to have fun, and
I won't go back to the army until noon on Monday. This is a common phenomenon.
"Therefore, if an attack is launched on Sunday, and it is a lightning-like sudden attack, the Qing army's command system, which is in a semi-paralyzed state, will definitely be unable to withstand it. For this, I would like to thank Commander Xiang Xiaoqiang for first proposing the concept of 'blitzkrieg'
, and allowed me to personally experience its power during the fortress exercise."
When he said this, everyone turned to look at Xiaoqiang. Xiang Xiaoqiang was startled, looked at Tang Yunsheng who was smiling slightly, and felt that he should be kind, so he acted like a junior, scratched the back of his head, and smiled in embarrassment.
:
"Tang Gong was so complimentary."
Tang Yunsheng laughed and then said:
"The second reason is that some information about Emperor Guangwu's 'Century Exercise' has been transmitted in recent days. The information is relatively reliable and concerns the length of the exercise. Now Guangwu has set the length of this exercise at about three months, and the scope of the exercise
It will start from the Jingjintang area in North China, then go all the way south, across the three provinces of Zhili, Shanxi, and Henan, and finally focus on the north of Xiangfan, which is the north of the middle section of our Yangtze River defense line. The scale is unprecedented.
"Beiqing has been preparing for this exercise for two and a half months. As an exercise, two and a half months is already a long time. Since the total length of the exercise is three months, our analysis shows that it will definitely start in September and end around November.
, it is unlikely to be delayed until October. Otherwise, this exercise will have to be carried out in the cold weather of December and January in North China, and the effectiveness of the exercise will be greatly reduced.
"Because it is such a situation, it also provides us with the best opportunity to hide the reasons for deploying troops. We are attacking in October. If the large-scale exercises in Beiqing begin in September, we will have sufficient reasons to launch the attack in September."
In the second half of the year, a large number of troops will be transferred to the Yangtze River defense line. When we are about to
Gather in the offensive area. In this way, both the Beiqing and the outside world will understand this as our fear of the Beiqing exercise, fear that the Beiqing will invade the south under the guise of the exercise, and we have to take defensive measures. In this case, we suddenly