Episode 12 From the Great Reckoning to the Massacre
Unexpectedly, Zhu Yourong was not surprised at all. Instead, he still smiled and nodded and said:
"The cabinet has already told me this."
Xiang Xiaoqiang and Zhang Zhao first looked at each other and sighed: Shen Rongxuan's information is quite good.
Zhu Yourong frowned again and said in deep thought:
"This incident will have a certain impact on our rear. However, it is limited to the shallow depth of our offensive area, that is, within one or two hundred kilometers. Within a range of more than one hundred kilometers, the local people can compare It is easy to walk to the south, but it is not so easy to go north. Of course, it cannot be compared with the previous escape to the south. Escape south and escape from death and not care, let alone walk. I mean, as we advance farther and farther, the local area When the people see that we can actually attack here, they won't think that we just fight and leave. In addition, it is a long way to the south, so it will be easy to persuade the local people to stay."
"Your Majesty," Xiang Xiaoqiang said anxiously, "The flow of refugees on the north bank of the Yangtze River is now out of control, and our army is about to shoot into the air. Now the traffic on our north bank is a mess, and the refugees and our tanks and artillery They are all mixed together, and there is no way to advance! We are attacking Yangzhou and Chuzhou now, and it is the time when heavy weapons support is needed... The entire Jianghuai plain in front is waiting for our mechanized troops to advance. Now that the north bank is in such chaos, do we still need to Provide transportation for the refugee flow and help them come over?"
Zhu Yourong nodded and said:
"Oh, the flow of refugees from the war zone on the right will definitely not work. The military can declare the implementation of military control of war and prohibit civilians from crossing the river south. But for the refugees on the left, it is better for us not to interfere."
"But……"
"Xiang Qing, Zhang Qing," Zhu Yourong stood up, paced gently, and said slowly, "the local people are right. Since that place is already the Ming Dynasty, and the Ming Dynasty does not prohibit citizens from moving freely, then they will naturally Can go anywhere they want."
She stood still, looked at the two of them and said:
"You must also know how our representatives to the League of Nations debated with the pseudo-Qing representatives. In the League of Nations, the pseudo-Qing representatives often accused us of how bad Ming Dynasty was and why it was illegal. And our representative's most powerful response was, They often say: 'Although our Ming Dynasty, which is a constitutional monarchy, has many shortcomings and problems of one kind or another, we have never used a barbed wire to shut the people in like you did.'
"My dear friends, you must understand that a country that has said this can never prohibit anyone except prisoners from going wherever they want. We encouraged them to flee south before the Northern Expedition, and we encouraged them to flee south after the Northern Expedition. Isn’t it ironic to ban them from escaping south? This does not require the Puppet Qing Dynasty to slap us in the face. Our own citizens and our own media will slap us first... So, even if our attack speed will be affected There will be some delays, or there will be more pressure on our logistics, and we have to do the same. These are the prices we have to pay.
"Our Northern Expedition is not for territory, resources, geopolitics, or to remove military threats... These are not our purposes. Our Northern Expedition is so that all Chinese people will never have to flee south. Two My dear, you must remember that this is the purpose of our Northern Expedition. It is the real and only purpose...We cannot do anything that goes against this purpose."
After Zhu Yourong finished speaking, he stood quietly and looked at the two of them.
Zhang Zhaoxian and Xiang Xiaoqiang slowly looked at each other again, feeling that there was no need to say anything more.
Then, the two resigned.
…
When they came out, neither of them spoke. Zhang Zhao sighed first, and he didn't know whether he was lamenting Zhu Yourong's simplicity or regretting the inconvenience caused to the military.
Xiang Xiaoqiang was also sighing. This girl went too far this time. Please, you have to have a certain restraint when it comes to childishness.
To be fair, although this may cause trouble militarily, it is very beneficial politically. This is also the result of Shen Rongxuan's persuasion. This decision is not naive, but Zhu Yourong's words are naive.
"Anyone except prisoners must not be prohibited from going anywhere they want to go." Haha, is that right? I remember clearly how I, a non-prisoner, almost ended up in jail last time. By the way, why? What's going on?
"Not for territory, not for resources, not for geopolitics, not for the removal of military threats," waging war only for an ideal and values. This kind of thing may happen after the end of the Cold War, such as the United Nations peacekeeping war, and other It doesn't matter if there are several wars that are completely public welfare. But now, before World War II, when the world is still following the "law of the jungle", it is completely impossible.
"Our Northern Expedition is so that all Chinese people will never have to flee south."
This sentence is also very touching. It is good to use it to sensationalize when giving a speech, but it is boring when facing one's own trusted generals.
Alas, this girl Zhu Yourong was probably born in the wrong era. If she had been born in the 21st century, she might have been able to become a United Nations Peace Ambassador, a United Nations Children's Ambassador, or win a Nobel Peace Prize or something.
The two returned to their command posts and immediately began arranging the troops in the East Road War Zone to completely prohibit refugees along the Yangtze River from crossing the river and prohibit local Beiqing people from migrating south in groups.
It makes sense at home and abroad to do this in the East Route War Zone - a large number of refugees will seriously affect the troops crossing the river, which is due to military needs. But the refugees on the West Route...that is a headache for the cabinet government. Let's see how they can prepare. How many temporary shelters are there.
…
At seven o'clock in the evening, it was completely dark. There was already a different atmosphere in Nanyang City.
Several places in the city were already on fire. People were shouting and running everywhere, especially in the government offices and wealthy areas in the south of the city, where smoke was billowing. People in the city, mainly young people, were shouting feverishly, People are constantly flocking to this area. The atmosphere in the entire Nanyang City is weird and crazy.
The first one to be besieged was the police station in Nanyang City.
It used to be several stories high, and it was a very majestic blue brick building with overhanging eaves. Now every window is filled with smoke, and at least half of the windows have flames jumping out, licking the walls outside. There is a sea of people below, and they are constantly Someone was carrying things like stools and tables and smashing them against the windows. Every time they hit the windows, the crowd would burst into cheers of "Okay!!!"
However, there were actually people in the building. There were several windows without fire, and from time to time a person would stick out from inside. He was wearing a Peking police uniform, his head was blackened by smoke, his face was covered with blisters, and he was breathing in the fresh air. . From the windows behind these people, billowing smoke kept coming out. It was obvious that the fire was going to reach here soon. They looked at the dark crowd below and made desperate begging.
What responded to them below were the loud shouts and curses from the crowd. These usually gentle people seemed to have become bloodthirsty thugs, with hatred spouting from everyone's eyes.
"Don't let them jump!"
"Burn them!"
"Burn! Burn!"
"Burn these beasts!"
"Eat people without spitting out bones!"
"You have today too!"
"If you don't want to be burned to death, just throw it to death! I'll give you an advantage!"
The two tall and majestic stone lions at the entrance of the police station are usually so condescending and spotless, demonstrating the absolute authority of the ruling machine. But their current appearance is even more terrifying than the bull-headed and horse-faced ones in hell.
Two stone lions, each with a person tied to its granite base. Not only were their police uniforms ripped off, but their chests were also pulled out. One person's chest was cut open, and his black heart and liver were filled with blood.
They all rolled to the ground, their heads tilted to one side, and they were already dead. The man on the other stone lion had his stomach cut open, and his white intestines flowed all over the floor. But he was not dead yet, with his head lowered, and his complexion had turned
Blue and white, he looked at his intestines with his eyes open and his mouth opened and closed.
A big man squeezed out of the crowd, holding a big kitchen knife in his hand. He stood next to the dead man first, grabbed his hair, and chopped off his head with one knife.
With a "boom", everyone stepped back, and then there was a burst of applause. Then the big man came to the second Beiqing policeman, not caring that he was still alive, or that many people in the crowd were shouting "Don't chop him."
"Cut it, it will hurt him to death." He raised the knife and chopped off his head.
The big man lifted the two heads and swung them twice, then opened his bow and threw them out. The two heads drew an arc in the air and accurately flew into the windows of the building one after another, and were swallowed up by the fire.
Screams began to come from the windows of the building, and then people kept jumping out of the windows on fire. Those who jumped from the third or fourth floor fell to their death. Those who jumped from the second floor did not fall to death and were still rolling in pain.
Crowds of people holding various things swarmed forward, and in a blink of an eye, only a pile of bloody flesh and blood was left.
…
The same situation also happened in many places in the same block. There were many government offices in this block. Almost the entire street was smashed to pieces. Several tall buildings were in flames. Tens of thousands of people were also gathered under these buildings.
The citizens who had not left were shouting and whistling, and they all went into a state of madness, venting their anger that had been suppressed for many years.
There were corpses everywhere on the streets, some had their heads chopped off, some had been doused with gasoline and had been burned to coke.
The atmosphere in Nanyang City was almost the same as the atmosphere on the streets of Batavia in the Dutch East India a few months ago. Even though the city was full of fireworks and blood, the poor people were not afraid at all when walking on the street, but felt proud and proud.
In the past, I only dared to be cautious and obedient, but now I am completely sideways.
On the contrary, the people who died tragically on the street, those headless corpses with bloody flesh, were either officials or rich. Before yesterday, they were still 100% "cool people", walking sideways on the street, covering the sky with one hand, and looking down upon human life.
The "great people" who bully men and women, monopolize all wealth and social resources, and can make any untouchable live or die with a flick of his finger are now lying on the streets, dead.
Those who are not dead have also become the prey of the common people. They hide in fear and hide in Tibet. In order to escape, they can get into any place: trash cans, cesspools... Some even escape into the coffin shop, lie down in the coffin and pull it up.
Lid, hide yourself inside...
Those who have been captured by the crowd have to kneel down in front of the untouchables, give up all self-respect and cry bitterly to survive. But even so, it is still difficult to escape bad luck.
When the riots first began, the beliefs that filled the minds of the people were very simple: to avenge those who had a grudge, to vent their long-suppressed anger, and to seek just revenge. Those who had their families destroyed by the powerful were
, now without exception, they all took up weapons and prepared to hunt down and kill all the officials and rich people in Nanyang City before defecting to the Ming Dynasty.
But just over an hour later, the taste completely changed. The people who were stimulated by the bloody scenes, especially those who had tasted the pleasure of killing the enemy with their own hands, became even crazier and more blind. Their
The bloodthirsty became uncontrollable, and the original belief in justice became filled with more and more evil things.
When they discovered that they could drag the old men out of their mansions without any scruples, kill them, smash them, and set fire to their mansions, they felt that their power was extremely powerful, and it seemed that they had nothing left.
Things can prevent them from doing more things. Even if they do whatever they want, they are not restricted by anything.
When the previous things in those mansions were displayed in front of them, when the corrupt officials, the beautiful concubines and young daughters in the inner houses of wealthy businessmen were exposed in front of them in horror, they could no longer control their hearts.
It became evil. At this time, the people turned into a mob.
More and more doors were broken into on the streets. The mobs screamed excitedly, dragging out screaming women from every house in the wealthy district and committing violence on the streets. The mansions were smashed to pieces and then burned to the ground.
.Scattered banknotes, silver coins, and silk can be seen everywhere.
Satin, and even jewelry. Because not many people recognized the more valuable calligraphy and paintings, they were torn from the walls and burned along with the house. Those priceless porcelain vases, porcelain plates, porcelain bowls, etc. were also torn from the walls.
It was smashed during the robbery, and the debris was stomped all over the floor.
You can constantly see groups of mobs raping the female family members of the owner of the house in the lobby and back garden of a certain mansion. And the owner of the house, a certain local official, has already died outside.
.
The riot soon expanded. When the houses of officials and wealthy businessmen were looted one after another, and the subsequent mobs repeatedly found that there was nothing to rob, they retreated to the next best thing and began to attack those whose families were only slightly wealthy. These families
Originally, they were still watching from the other side, watching the poor looting the officials and wealthy businessmen, but now they suddenly discovered that after the officials and their families were destroyed, it was their turn.
These families are neither officials, nor are they the kind of wealthy businessmen who collude with officials and businessmen. They are just small families who open a small shop and do small business. They are basically the same class as the mob outside.
They are the kind of lower-class people who are usually oppressed by the government and squeezed out and monopolized by government and businessmen. But now the mob outside has changed from righteous "insurrectionists" to robbers who only want money.
More ordinary people in the city had their doors broken into, were looted and killed, and their female relatives were raped.
The riots had started again, with "common people killing and plundering the upper class", evolving into a full-scale "common people killing and plundering the people". The entire Nanyang City fell into total terror.
…
The Ming army was stationed outside the city, and they were aware of the situation in the city. However, the People's Guard, the most powerful force, had already moved forward to mop up the troops, and several army divisions stationed near Nanyang City had strict orders: no When entering the city and garrisoning troops, they are not allowed to fire a single shot at the local people.
Under the current situation, the Ming army only had a small number of military police in the city, but due to these two death orders, they could not even march into the city to quell the riots.
In the first hour of the riot, the Ming troops outside Nanyang sent urgent reports to Nanjing one after another, asking for instructions on how to deal with it. Nanjing had no expectation of this situation, and it can be said that it was completely confused.
The headquarters immediately realized that this was a major political issue, a political issue more serious than the refugee flow. They immediately approached Shen Rongxuan and demanded a decision as soon as possible:
Should we drive into the city immediately to quell the riot? How to quell it? What are the limits of the means? Can we shoot at the mob?
…
To be honest, neither Shen Rongxuan, Zhu Yourong nor Xiang Xiaoqiang thought at this moment how the docile and kind-hearted Chinese people could become bloodthirsty beasts like the natives of Nanyang?