At the end of January in the sixth year of Zhongping of the Great Han Dynasty (189 AD), the Son of Heaven convened all the ministers to discuss the court.

Shang Shu ordered Lu Zhi to present the current domestic situation.

The situation on the battlefield of Xiliang is worrying, the rebel leader Wang Guoli has led the army to besiege Chencang for more than three months, although the lieutenants Huangfuhong and Hu Zhen have not retreated, but the small Chencang City has long been overwhelmed and precarious, and the left general Huangfu Song and the former general Dong Zhuo are still stranded in Huaili City because of grain, grass and weather and other reasons.

The Jizhou battlefield is currently progressing smoothly. The general led the army to attack all the way, defeated the strong enemy, and had already repelled the Yellow Turban of Montenegro. Now the general's army is advancing in the direction of Wei County, and it is estimated that the Jizhou rebellion can be quelled before the spring ploughing in April.

The Qingzhou and Xuzhou battlefields are currently difficult. Qingzhou Mu Liu Yu has retreated to Beihai after even being defeated, and almost all the northern counties of Qingzhou have been captured by the rebels of the ant thief Sima Ju and Guan Cheng. Xuzhou Mu Taoqian was defeated by Zhang Rao and Xu He's rebels, and had retreated to Pengcheng to hold on. However, this crisis on the Qingxu battlefield will be alleviated with heavy snow and the impending famine.

Last year, the floods in the seven counties of Qingxu and Xu Prefecture did not harvest the grains, and although the ant thieves plundered during the October riots, those grains were simply not enough to support millions of ant thieves through the long winter. Once the food is eaten, the next thing is famine, and if the ant thieves do not retreat, it is a dead end.

The war in Liaodong has ended, and the Liaodong alien races such as Goguryeo, Buyeo, and Sanhan have completely surrendered to the Han Dynasty, and all the areas to which they belong have been incorporated into the Han Dynasty. Li Yizuo, the general of the expedition to the north, asked the imperial court to set up a new Liaodong Protectorate in Liaodong to govern the Liaodong region.

Li Yi, the general of the expedition to the north, had already led his troops from Quanzhou City to Bingzhou.

Although the heavy snow in northern Xinjiang made the road difficult, the soldiers still overcame all difficulties and arrived at the predetermined forward base within the scheduled time.

According to His Majesty's will, from the beginning of the year. The armies of all walks of life in northern Xinjiang, with the exception of Zhang He's headquarters in Liaodong, had already begun to rest and recuperate, which ended at the end of February. In other words, from the end of March, the battle in northern Xinjiang can be launched at any time, and the army can go out to fight at any time.

Then Lu Zhi gave a detailed account of the preparations for the Great War in Northern Xinjiang.

He said, "...... After the efforts of the Northern General's Mansion. At present, all kinds of materials such as food, ordnance, and other materials needed for the war in northern Xinjiang have been basically prepared. The soldiers and civilians have also recruited about 200,000 people from among the victims who migrated to Youzhou and Bingzhou last winter. ”

"It's just that these 200,000 people are far from meeting the needs of fighting in the fortress, and another 300,000 to 400,000 people must be recruited. However, Li Yi, the general of the expedition to the north, said that the recruitment of these people would not be until the end of April and the beginning of May, that is, after the end of spring ploughing. This is absolutely not possible, and His Majesty will issue an order urging Li Yi to complete the recruitment of 600,000 people in early March. ”

The Son of Heaven said: "Li Yi is worried that the transfer of a large number of strong men will seriously affect the spring ploughing, and I feel that his worries are still very reasonable. The population of Youzhou and Bingzhou is now increasing, and if there is no food for them to eat, the rear will be unstable, and what kind of war will there be if the rear is unstable? I agreed to Li Yi's recital. First of all, spring ploughing is guaranteed, and as for the operation out of the fortress, it will be a little later, and it will not affect the overall situation. ”

There are also ministers who do not approve of sending troops in the DPRK and China, and the representative figures are Sikong Liu Hong and Guangluxun Liu Bo.

After listening to the words of Lu Zhi and the Son of Heaven, Sikong Liu Hong took the lead in standing up and said: "Your Majesty, now that the Qingxu ant thieves are raging, the Xiliang rebels are not pacified. The conditions for fighting out of the fortress are simply not in place. If you want to fight in Cyprus, you must first resolve the rebellion in the country. We cannot say that when you have money and food, you can go to war on three battlefields at the same time. This is purely misleading. Xianbei people first suffered heavy losses in a row, and then broke out a civil war for the royal power, at this time the Xianbei strength and the Xianbei strength of the Tanshi Huai period compared with the gap is huge, there is a world of difference between the two, it is easy to defeat them, why do we need to be so anxious? ”

Ma Riyan immediately retorted: "Liu Sikong only saw the weakening of Xianbei's strength. We did not see the great threat posed to us by the Hu Alliance. Once the heavy snow in northern Xinjiang melts away, spring comes, and everything recovers, the vitality of the Hu people will quickly recover, and we will move slowly. If the army is reluctant to leave the fortress, the army will lose the best opportunity to take advantage of the attack, and the difficulty of the government steppe will be greatly increased. ”

Guangluxun Liu Bo said: "Captain Ma Taiwei has not been to Biansai to fight, so I don't know the situation there. In the savannah, the winter is long, and the heavy snow covering the prairie does not melt until around March. In other words, we won't be able to get out until the end of April at the earliest. However, June is also the rainy season on the prairie, and if there is enough rain, there will be heavy rain throughout summer and autumn, in this case, the Hu people will have a great advantage. They can come and go as they please, but our footmen cannot. ”

After a pause, Liu Bo continued: "Therefore, the battle out of the fortress is not as simple as Captain Ma imagined, we must not only be well prepared, but also grasp the appropriate time. Half of the reason for the defeat of Xia Yu and others on the prairie was in the heavy snow. If the snow hadn't come early that year, we could have evacuated at least half of the people. We went out of the Fortress in August, when the rainy season had passed on the savannah, and it was the best time to attack. ”

Guanglu Doctor Yuan Feng sneered: "According to what Liu Guanglu said, the Northern Xinjiang War will not start until August? In August, when the water and grass were abundant, the cattle and sheep were fat, and the Hu people's power was greatly boosted, it was even more difficult for us to fight out of the fortress. If the Hu people can fight in winter, why can't we? Isn't there tens of thousands of iron horsemen under the command of the general Zhengbei? With these iron horsemen fighting in front of them, and the foot soldiers following suit, the army will be invincible. ”

Liu Bo said helplessly: "We are out of the fortress to recover the lost border counties, not to go on an expedition to the desert to kill the Hu people, please understand the difference between the two." There is a fundamental difference between a great war aimed at occupying land and cities and a great war aimed at driving away the Hu people and killing the Hu cavalry. In this battle, our purpose is to recover the border counties, to recapture the city, to rescue the enslaved people, and to make sure that everything goes out of the war, so full preparation is the top priority, and we must not be hasty. ”

Sikong Ding Gong said: "Liu Guanglu said that he was just worried that the rebellion in the country would affect the battle out of the fortress and lead to the defeat of the Northern Xinjiang War. However, judging from the current situation, it is more likely that the Xiliang rebellion will be put down as soon as possible. General Huangfu said in the recital that it is better to win a hundred battles than to win without a fight. Although Chencang is small, the city walls are strong and tightly guarded, and it is not easy to attack. Although the kingdom is strong, it cannot be attacked for a long time, and the rebels are bound to be tired. General Huangfu intended to attack while the rebels were tired, so that a battle would be decided, and he was absolutely sure that he would defeat the rebels before March. ”

"If the Xiliang rebellion is put down, the rest is nothing more than the Qingxu ant thief. Lu Shangshu had already said just now that the Qingxu ant thieves would soon fall into famine because of the lack of food, and it seemed inevitable to withdraw their troops and flee to Mount Tai. With both rebellions able to be quelled, is there any need to worry about launching a war in the north in time? ”

The debate among the ministers in the court became more and more intense, and when the Great War of Northern Xinjiang began became the top state event of the Great Han Kingdom in the New Year.

After Li Yi, the general of the expedition to the north, arrived in Bingzhou, the first thing he did was to convene all the generals under his command to discuss the reorganization of the army.

As early as after the imperial court established the overall strategy of the Northern Xinjiang War, Huangfu Song wrote to Li Yi several times to discuss with him the specific implementation methods of the Northern Xinjiang War, the most important of which was to ask him to reorganize the army immediately after arriving in the state. He hoped that Li Yi would take advantage of the successive victories on the battlefield in northern Xinjiang and the morale of the officers and men under his command to immediately rectify the army in northern Xinjiang, and strive to eliminate the estrangement among the officers and men of all departments, reduce contradictions, and work together to lay the most solid foundation for the war in northern Xinjiang.

Li Yi also had this idea, and when he was in Quanzhou, he often convened his advisers to discuss this matter, and the general plan for the whole army had already taken shape.

Li Yi planned to build eight armies and thirty armies, with 220,000 troops.

The cavalry army was built into three major armies and nine armies, with a total of 54,000 men. A legion consisted of three corps with a total of 18,000 men, one corps with 6,000 men, and each army had three divisions of 2,000 men each.

The A-shaped legion was commanded by Zhao Yun, the B-shaped legion was commanded by Zhang He, and the C-shaped legion was commanded by Gao Changgong.

The infantry army built five major armies, 20 armies, and 160,000 men. One legion is thirty-two thousand, and one army is eight thousand. Each army has three infantry and one chariot.

The T-shaped legion was commanded by Yue Fei, the E-shaped legion was commanded by Guan Yu, the Jizi legion was commanded by Zhang Fei, the Gengzi legion was commanded by Mu Guiying, and the Xinzi legion was commanded by Xu Da.

General Zhengbei directly supervised the 6,000 people of the Pro-Guard Iron Cavalry, and Tai Shici and Dian Wei served as the chief and deputy commanders of the Pro-Guard Army.

Li Yi sent this plan for the reorganization of the Northern Expedition to the imperial court. The Son of Heaven and the ministers deliberated carefully and unanimously approved. There is no controversy about such a big matter, and this is the first time in the court.

The Son of Heaven immediately issued an order approving the formation of the Eight Army Corps and the Thirty Armies of the Northern Expeditionary Army. At the same time, Li Yi was moved to be the general of the expedition to the north, holding the jieyue, supervising the military affairs of the three states in northern Xinjiang, and leading the army to prepare for the battle.

In fact, the Son of Heaven and the hundred officials had no objection to Li Yi's reorganization of the army, because they each had their own small calculations. In their opinion, after the end of the Northern Xinjiang War, the Son of Heaven could use this structure to quickly hand over all the troops of the Northern Army to the generals of the eight legions, thus completely depriving Li Yi of his military power.

Because the army is scattered into eight legions, and each legion has a commander, even if Li Yi is gone, the army will not fall into chaos. Even if one or two legions rebelled in the middle, there were other legions to suppress it.

When the northern Xinjiang is gradually stabilized, the Son of Heaven can slowly transfer the commanders of the eight major army corps back to Beijing one by one, and finally the armies under the command of the captain will be left in all parts of the northern Xinjiang. The armies are stationed in various passes and barracks in peacetime, and no one can be recruited without the soldiers of the Son of Heaven.

In this way, the threat of the entire Northern Xinjiang army to the Great Han State was completely removed. (To be continued.) )