Pingyuan County, Gaotang City. Pen @ fun @ pavilion wWw. ｂｉｑUｇE。 ｉｎｆｏ

Gongsun Chan looked at the letter in his hand in disbelief, and then looked up at Guan Jing.

Guan Jing asked strangely, "Lord, what's wrong?" What happened? ”

Gongsun Zhan handed the letter to Guan Jing and said, "Pingyuan City is empty. ”

"Plains City is empty?" Guan Jing's face changed, and he hurriedly read the letter.

"Wang Men and Zou Jing crossed the river smoothly, and then marched forty miles to reach Pingyuan City, and now they found that Pingyuan City was an empty city." Gongsun Zhan frowned tightly and looked down at the map on the desk, "Could it be that Yuan Shao and Cao Cao attacked successfully, and Li Yi transferred Gao Shun and Gao Changgong's men and horses to the two battlefields in the middle and west?" Li Yi gave up the eastern battlefield? How is this possible? ”

Gongsun Chan said to himself with a wry smile: "What does Li Yi want to do? Lure the enemy deeper? ”

"Advanced Plains City." Guan Jing put down the letter, "At present, Yuan Shao, Cao Cao, Liu Biao, and Liu Bei have no news to deliver, and we don't know the development of the entire battle situation, so there is no way to speculate about Hebei's true intention to abandon Pingyuan City." ”

"However, if we are successful, Plains City may be surrounded by the Northern Frontier Army overnight." Gongsun Zhan was very hesitant, "According to our information, there are Gao Shun's 32,000 men and horses on the opposite side, as well as Gao Changgong's 18,000 iron cavalry, and the strength of 50,000 people can completely block us under the Plains City, and there is no need for them to abandon the Plains City." ”

Guan Jing nodded again and again, and said: "Indeed, according to the predetermined attack strategy we formulated, the main direction of attack of the Northern Expeditionary Army is Yuan Shao's west road and Cao Cao's middle road, and our attack on the east road is only to contain the 50,000 horses of the Northern Xinjiang Army, and not let these 50,000 horses support the two battlefields of the central and western regions." If this intent is to be revealed, it should also be within five to ten days of the start of the attack, not now. Now that Liu Bei's army has just crossed the river, it is impossible for Li Yi to know that Liu Bei's Xuzhou army participated in the middle attack, that is to say, these 50,000 horses must still be in Pingyuan County. ”

"However, I think it's better to take the opportunity to take Plains City. No matter what tricks Hebei plays, after ten days, the direction of our attack will be completely exposed, and Li Yi will definitely draw troops from the eastern battlefield. At this time, we can attack and retreat, and we can completely contain the 50,000 northern Xinjiang troops. ”

Gongsun Chan thought for a long time, but still didn't agree, he said, "Don't take risks. If Li Yi's goal is to eat us, then after we are besieged in the plain city, the Northern Xinjiang Army may put more troops in the eastern battlefield. Once he eats us, and then turns around to fight Yuan Shao and Cao Cao, it will be much easier. ”

Guan Jing did not insist. The Northern Frontier Army is not an army that can be defeated in a fight, not to mention that the opponent's combat strength is stronger than their own side, and they must have their intentions to abandon Plains City.

"Tell Yuan Shao, Cao Cao, Liu Biao, and Liu Bei, please rest assured that we are attacking Pingyuan City." Gongsun Chan said, "Please tell us about the battle as soon as possible." ”

………………

At the end of May, Yecheng, the general marched.

Sima Xu Shu of the General's Mansion is making a detailed report on the battle situation in the past ten days.

On the battlefield of the West Road, the First Cavalry Corps of General Zhao Yun, the Fourth Cavalry Corps of General Lu Bu of Anxi, the Third Infantry Corps of General Zhang Fei of Zhengnan, the Fifth Infantry Corps of Chang Yuchun and the Sixth Infantry Corps of Li Jing were gathered, totaling 36,000 iron cavalry and 96,000 infantry troops, to block Yuan Shao's Henan Army, Liu Biao's Jingzhou Army, Ma Teng's Xiliang Army, Zhang Yang's Hanoi Army and Yuan Wei's Yuzhou Army.

Yuan Shao's generals Han Qiong, Zhang Nan, and Tao Sheng led an army of 20,000 to attack Liyang, and they are currently pinned down by the 5,000 army of Captain Yu Poison under Liyang City, and they have not advanced an inch.

Yuan Shaoqin led the generals Yan Liang, Wen Chou, Gao Lan, Gao Gan and others, together with Ma Teng, Yuan Wei, Yuan Zhong and others, to raise an army of 100,000 to attack and cross the river from Changshoujin and Puyangjin in the direction of Puyang, and the general Zhang Fei of Zhengnan led 32,000 infantry soldiers of his headquarters, as well as 12,000 iron cavalry of Wei Xu and Cheng Lian, a total of 44,000 troops to block it. Yuan Shao is still in Puyang, and the army has not been able to gain a foothold on the north bank of the Yellow River.

Liu Biao's 50,000 Jingzhou troops crossed the river from the direction of Muniudu and entered Hemu City, and Xu Huang and Li Xin led 16,000 foot soldiers and Yue Yun's 6,000 iron cavalry to block them in the direction of Dunqiu and Weiguo City.

Due to the successful raid at Pengting led by Yue Yun with 6,000 iron cavalry, the Jingzhou army lost more than 5,000 people and hastily withdrew to Hemu City, and there is no sign of attacking the north again.

Han Hao of the Hanoi Army led 10,000 horses to attack Neihuang City.

General Zhang Fei originally planned to have infantry captain Sima Ju and Hu cavalry captain Yan Rou ambush Han Hao in the Yellow River, but because General Lü Bu failed to contain Zhang Yang, Zhang Yang quickly retreated, resulting in the failure of the ambush. However, Sima Ju still killed 1,300 people on the south bank of the Yellow River.

With the efforts of General Lü Bu, Hanoi Taishou Zhang Yang led an army of 20,000 to stop at Feng Ting on the Huanshui River, and finally met with General Lü Bu.

Although Zhang Yang did not make any promises, he obviously could not refuse General Lu Bu's request, so Zhang Yang would not take the initiative to attack us in the near future.

Of course, if Yuan Shao's army reached the Neihuang and Fanyang areas, Zhang Yang would have no excuse, and his army would immediately participate in the attack.

On the battlefield in the middle of the road, the 32,000 army of Guan Yu, the general of Zhengdong, together with Zhang He's 18,000 iron cavalry, faced Cao Cao's Yanzhou army and Liu Bei's Xuzhou army.

Cao Cao's 100,000-strong army crossed the river from the direction of Cangting, and is currently fighting fierce battles with the 30,000-strong army of Guan Yu, Mu Shun, Li Zhong and others in the area of Dongwuyang and Yangping. Cao Cao's army was blocked under the cities of Dongwuyang and Yangping, and has not been able to break through so far.

Liu Bei's 20,000 troops crossed the river from Chipingjin and killed Liaocheng, and Zhang He relied on the Luoshui River to lead the army to block, and the two sides are still fighting fiercely.

On the battlefield of the East Road, Gao Shun and Gao Changgong led an army of 50,000 to meet Gongsun Zhan's army of 50,000.

At present, there has been no fighting on the battlefield of the Eastern Road.

Judging from the ten-day battle, the rebels mobilized a total of 370,000 troops from seven states, and if we add the Yuan Shu army of Yangzhou, which was in charge of transporting grain and grass in the Central Plains, the total strength of the rebels was about 400,000 troops. Our troops are 232,000. In terms of the ratio of forces, we are at an absolute disadvantage.

The rebels attacked on three fronts in seven directions, which was quite different from our previous expectations.

We originally thought that the rebels would concentrate their main forces on the two flanks and adopt the strategy of attacking on several fronts to attract us to invest our forces on both flanks, so as to cover Cao Cao in the middle to enter the Qinghe Kingdom as quickly as possible and destroy our overall defense. Therefore, we put the main forces on the battlefield on both flanks, intending to attack Yuan Shao on the west road, lure the enemy deep on the east road and inflict heavy losses on Gongsun Zan and Liu Bei, forcing Cao Cao's attack in the middle to be uncovered and had to give up halfway.

But now the rebels are focusing on the middle of the battlefield, and they are the first to attack, which is very surprising to us.

In addition, their practice of deploying heavy troops on the west road and releasing only one army of Gongsun Chan on the east road also contained our troops very well.

At present, on the battlefield in the middle, we have an army of 50,000, while Cao Cao and Liu Bei have an army of 120,000, which is more than twice the size of our army, and the difference in strength is quite large. Although the large army on the battlefield in the middle is now relying on the strong city to hold on, there is no point in fighting like this, first, our losses are too great, and second, we will not be able to achieve the goal of annihilating the enemy.

On the battlefield on the west road, we arranged an army of 132,000, although they were all elite divisions of the Northern Xinjiang Army, but in the face of the crazy attack of Yuan Shao and Liu Biao's 200,000 troops, the losses were also amazing after a long time.

Moreover, if the loss of more than 130,000 troops is too great, it will have too much impact on the imperial court's plan to pacify the world in the future, so we must also choose to retreat at the appropriate time.

We also have 50,000 people on the battlefield on the east road, and took the initiative to give up Pingyuan City, originally planned to lead Gongsun Chan and Liu Bei's army to Nanpi City to be surrounded and annihilated, but now it seems that it cannot be realized, Liu Bei joined the attack on the middle battlefield, and Gongsun Chan's troops are thin, he not only does not go north, but even Pingyuan City does not enter, which is really helpless.

Because there were many mistakes in our early estimates, there were also many mistakes in the deployment of troops. We put the strongest forces against the strongest forces of the rebels, and put the weakest forces in the middle of the rebels' strength, so now there is a very passive situation on the three battlefields.

Listening to Xu Shu's report on the battle situation, Li Yi's heart was agitated. In this big battle, the total number of troops used by both sides exceeded 600,000, which was definitely a shocking battle. Throughout Chinese history, wars of this magnitude are absolutely rare.

From another point of view, this will also be a big battle that will determine the fate of Li Yi and many princes in the Central Plains.

Li Yi saw that Xu Shu had finished speaking, and turned his gaze to a few military advisors and asked, "How many military advisors have an opinion on the situation in front of them?" ”

Li Yi originally thought that it would be Xu Maogong or Liu Bowen who spoke first, but he didn't expect Jia Xu, who had been very low-key before, to stand up first.

Jia Xu arched his hand and said: "My lord, before the war, we had a three-step strategy, the first step was to block, the second step was to drag, and the third step was to annihilate the enemy with a camera. At present, although the battle situation is not as smooth as we expected, it is basically still within the controllable range, and this small passivity in front of us does not have much impact on the overall situation. ”

"Compared with the rebels, they are more passive, because Cao Cao on the middle battlefield has not yet taken Dongwuyang and Yangping, and they are still far, far away from their goal."

"The key now is how to change from passive to active, in addition to the appropriate adjustment of troop deployment, there is also a very important point is to preserve strength. It is not worth it for us to devote our limited forces to such unnecessary attrition. ”

"Mr. Wenhe means to let them in now?" Li Yi shook his head and said, "It's too early to put it in." ”

"For the people of Jizhou, the fact that the rebels have reached the front line of the Qinghe River so quickly shows that the rebels are very strong, and it is easy to cause them to panic, and it is difficult for me to guarantee that there will be no problems in the rear."

"From the perspective of the imperial court, I would rather sacrifice the lives of some soldiers than let innocent people be frightened and even cause a wave of flight. I have to make the people feel that Jizhou is safe. (To be continued.) )