Han’s Son is Not a Slave

The use of troops in Guizhou, or the use of troops in the two lakes of Undetermined County, indeed greatly expanded the Taiping army's short-term territory, and could even occupy the two lakes alone. In this way, the Taiping Army alone owns four provinces of Guangdong, Guangxi, Hunan, and Hubei. In terms of area alone, it is the second largest force after the Qing court. The problem is that it is not difficult to seize territory, but how to hold it and how to manage it is difficult.

Zhou Shixiang did not have enough troops to guard Hunan and Hubei, nor did he have enough qualified officials to govern the two provinces. Therefore, even if he won the two lakes, he would not be able to digest the fruits of this victory within a few years. And at that time, what he will face is not to block the Qing army in Yunnan, Guizhou, and Guizhou alone, but to face the pressure of the Qing army in four directions: Hunan, Guizhou, Guizhou, Hubei, and Hunan at the same time.

Enemies on all sides at the same time, in terms of the current strength and strength of the Taiping Army, it is impossible to sustain it no matter what. When one shot moves the whole body, as long as one of the four sides fails, the other three sides will all be affected. Therefore, Zhou Shixiang needed a friendly army to share the pressure on both sides or at least one direction for him, and it was undoubtedly a good choice to break into the rest of the army in Kuidong.

The agreement between Zhou Shixiang and the Kuidong soldiers was that the Taiping army would only take Jingzhou, Baojingzhou, Yuanzhou, Chenzhou, and Changde in Hunan, and the Kuidong soldiers would be responsible for capturing and occupying the rest of the prefectures. Among them, Wuchang, an important town in Hubei, and Changsha, an important town in Hunan, will be taken by the two armies. On the Hunan side, in addition to the above-mentioned prefectures and counties occupied by the Taiping Army, the four prefectures of Quanzhou, Yongzhou, Hengzhou, and Baoqing in southern Hunan also belonged to the Taiping Army, and the remaining prefectures belonged to the Kuidong Army.

In this way, on the premise of ensuring the border between Hunan and Guizhou, the slightly richer money and grain of the four provinces in Hunan can be obtained to support the Taiping army on the front line of Hunan and Guizhou. On the one hand, the Kuidong soldiers can get a chance to breathe and grow stronger by virtue of the territory of one and a half provinces. On the one hand, they can support the northern front for the Taiping Army and attract the attention of the Qing army in the north; blockade.

Zhou Shixiang promised that the Taiping army would independently respond to the pressure of the Qing army in Guizhou before the troops from Kuidong entered the two lakes. Therefore, Zhou Shixiang had to clear the Tusi forces on the border between Hunan and Guizhou to ensure that the border between Hunan and Guizhou was firmly blocked by the Taiping army. Otherwise, allowing these chieftain armed forces to exist will always be an unstable factor. Furthermore, Zhou Shixiang also urgently needed the young and strong population under the control of these chieftains to supplement the Taiping army, and also needed manpower to restore the destroyed and exhausted production in western Hunan.

In the negotiation with the Kuidong Group, Zhou Shixiang paid the greatest sincerity. To a certain extent, the territory he sought for the Taiping Army was determined on the basis of Sun Kewang's operation of the Hunan defense line. He also tried his best to suppress the desire of his subordinates to expand the territory. In my heart, I feel that the Taiping Army owns the four provinces alone.

You can't chew too much, how much rice is in a big bowl, and if you eat too much, your stomach won't be able to support it.

Just as the central and peripheral areas were established for the pacifying bandits in Western Hunan, Guangdong was also the core area of ​​the Taiping Army, while Guangxi and the newly occupied Hunan counties and prefectures were the fringes. The purpose of occupying these fringe areas is only to ensure the security of the core area and to ensure that there is a buffer area large enough to relieve the pressure on the core area.

Only by thoroughly digesting the core area, establishing an unshakable regime in the core area, thoroughly mobilizing the manpower and material resources in the core area, and cultivating military and political talents belonging to the Taiping Army, can Zhou Shixiang consider digesting the marginal area, thereby transforming the marginal area into a core area and then developing it The new border area is expected to establish a stable base that can continuously provide money, troops, and equipment.

This has the same effect as the rogue approach adopted by the Taiping Army at the beginning, but it is also a snowball. The former is likely to be shattered in a real crisis, while the latter can withstand failure and will quickly replenish losses and repair through its own mechanism. The wound gave the Taiping army the ability to fight again, instead of collapsing, becoming a passing cloud of history and the last lament of the Han family.

The formation of the Xiangxi Bandit Suppression Army is based on an extension of this strategy. It can obtain money, grain and population resources by suppressing the armed forces of the chieftains, so as to ensure the stability of the border between Hunan and Guizhou. Army, exercise the combat effectiveness of the bandit army.

The most important thing is that the newly compiled Six Towns of Bandit Suppression Army is the largest reserve corps prepared by Zhou Shixiang to deal with the madness of the Qing army in Yunnan, Guizhou, and the largest mobile force in his hands.

Originally, Zhou Shixiang wanted the soldiers from Kuidong to help block the border between Hunan and Guizhou immediately after they got out of trouble. However, the news from Kuidong was not optimistic. Thirteen soldiers and horses were betrayed by Ertan in Chongqing and suffered heavy losses. The strength of the so-called Li Laiheng and Hao Yaoqi was not damaged, but the other ten families suffered huge losses. Even the soldiers' weapons were difficult to get together, and the army did not have a decent armor. Although Li Laiheng and Hao Yaoqi's troops did not suffer losses in Chongqing, they were not much better than Yuan Zongdi and Liu Tichun.

Kuidong was really poor. According to Yu Dahai, Wang Guangxing and others who came to negotiate on behalf of Kuidong, their soldiers could only have one meal for two days in the most difficult days, and their clothes were torn and mended. After repairing the rotten, then repairing the rotten clothes. Later, there was no material to repair the clothes, just like a man named Fanhuazi. The weapons were also tattered and tattered, and they couldn't be worse than the Qing soldiers. The family members continued to eat three meals a day, and many were starving as if they were skin and bones. But even so, they have been insisting on fighting, unwilling to submit to the Tartars. If it wasn't for Er Tan's mutiny this time, they would probably have taken Chongqing.

Wang Guangxing said that the little tigers Li Laiheng and Yuan Zongdi were very grateful when they learned that the Taiping Army opened up the Qing army for them, and the supervisor Wen Anzhi was also moved to tears. Originally, Superintendent Wen planned to come to Changde in person to meet with Zhou Shixiang to discuss the matter of the two coalition forces, but due to the wind and cold on the way to Chongqing, they could not make the trip, and Li Laiheng and the others were busy arranging the defeated soldiers who had withdrawn from Chongqing. Come and meet.

At the same time, Wang Guangxing told frankly that even though the Taiping Army had released the entrance of Kuidong troops into Hunan, there would not be many troops and horses that could enter Hunan in the short term, and it was impossible to block Yungui as Zhou Shixiang thought. In the war of the Qing army, they could only develop to Hubei first to occupy enough territory, obtain enough food and equipment to support the rest of the troops and horses left in Kuidong, and only after they have the ability to send troops can they enter Hunan and Taiping. joint military operations.

Zhou Shixiang knew that the soldiers in Kuidong had been living miserably in recent years. In Kuidong, even if a strong dragon comes, you have to lie down, because this place is in the future and is also an extremely poor area, let alone now. It is not easy for Li Laiheng and the others to have a foothold in this barren land. Out of admiration for these Han heroes, Zhou Shixiang continued to make concessions and showed the greatest sincerity, agreeing that the Kuidong troops would temporarily leave the Hunan-Guizhou border, and the Taiping Army would independently deal with the Qing army in Guizhou.

In this way, the importance of suppressing the bandit army has become more and more prominent. In order to let the bandit suppression army break in as soon as possible, Zhou Shixiang gave the most power to the bandit suppression yamen. Even if the border between Hunan and Guizhou was tense, he would not draw troops from the bandit suppression army, as long as the bandits were completely pacified and the bandit suppression army could adapt to the battlefield. until needed.

In this way, the important task of blocking the border between Hunan and Guizhou fell on Tie Yi's second town, Suna's sixth town, Guo Dengdi's ninth town, and Qi Hao's artillery town.

After the second town of Tieyi sent a brigade to Xiangxi to form a bandit suppression army, the remaining two brigades also sent some officers and veterans to expand the two brigades on the basis of Changde Green Camp, with a strength of more than 9,700 people. Compared to before, the combat effectiveness of the second town has decreased.

When the sixth town of Suna was in Jingzhou, the third brigade was expanded based on the third brigade, so that the township actually governed five brigade soldiers. When the Xiangxi Bandit Suppression Army was formed, the Second Brigade in the sixth town was transferred, and now there are actually four brigade soldiers in the Suna Department, and the number of troops is less than ten thousand. Among them, the A Brigade is the original system and has the strongest combat power. The third brigade, the new first brigade, and the new second brigade are all newly formed brigades, and their soldiers are mostly subordinate soldiers and civilians, and their combat effectiveness is relatively weak. The military's evaluation of the three new brigades is slightly stronger than that of the green battalion.

The ninth town of Guo Dengdi, Marquis of Weiyuan, reorganized a brigade of soldiers when stationed in Yuanzhou, and then transferred two brigades to participate in the formation of the bandit suppression army. Now the town has only two brigades and less than 5,000 soldiers. .

Qi Hao's gun town has also been expanded, and there are 8,000 soldiers in reality. One of Paozhen was stationed in Jingzhou, the other in Yuanzhou, and the other two battalions remained in Liuzhou and Guilin. The army suggested that the artillery towns be allocated to each town by battalion, so that each town could have its own attached artillery battalion, which would facilitate command and strengthen the firepower of each town. The concentrated use of artillery as it is now makes it difficult to move, and secondly, it is inconvenient to command.

Qi Hao also raised this issue with Zhou Shixiang, believing that his gun towns were used separately in various battles and never concentrated. Regardless of the scale of the battle with the Qing army~www.wuxiaspot.com~ it is not necessary to focus on the artillery town alone. Instead, the army's opinion is adopted and the artillery town is allocated to each town for use.

Zhou Shitong agreed with the military department and Qi Hao, and ordered artillerymen from all over the country to return to the first-level command of the town where they were located. For example, the artillery of Yuanzhou will be commanded in the ninth town of Yuanzhou, and the artillery of Jingzhou will be commanded in the sixth town of Jingzhou.

Shao Chengguo's cavalry brigade did not expand much, mainly because the Qing troops in Hunan were all green battalions, with no cavalry and not many captured.

On November 17, Zhou Shixiang ordered Tie Yi to lead two brigades from the second town to Changde to monitor the movements of the Qing army in Hubei, and to respond to the troops from Kuidong. After the Kuidong soldiers came out, Tie Yi gave up Changde and led the two brigades to Yuanzhou immediately.

At the same time, a brigade was transferred from the Suna Department, together with Shao Chengguo's cavalry brigade to form the Eastward Detachment, which was led by Qi Hao and was responsible for attacking Baoqing, Yongzhou, Quanzhou and Hengzhou.

Zhou Shixiang's order to Qi Hao was to grab food at all costs.

When capturing the prefectures and counties of Hunan and Guizhou, the Taiping Army seized a lot of grain for the Qing army from Changsha to Guiyang, but these grains were obviously not enough for the long-term needs of the war, so Zhou Shixiang needed a lot of grain. (To be continued.)