"Another piece of bad news." Li Guoying received a report from his subordinates that Deng Ming, Li Laiheng and Liu Tichun issued an announcement, which was the third bad news since Gaoyou Lake.

The last one was the will of the imperial court, which stated that it would continue to provide supplies and supplies to the governor of Sichuan and Shaanxi, and even transfer the green battalion from Shanxi to reinforce Chongqing.

Originally, after the Battle of Gaoyou Lake, Li Guoying and his civil and military officials judged that the imperial court would shift from strategic offensive to defensive in order to tide over the unstable period of the people in recent years. At that time, Li Guoying was even ready to withdraw his troops, planning to abandon Chongqing and retreat back to Boryeong in one go.

After learning that the imperial court would not only not weaken the material supply of Sichuan, but would continue to strengthen it in order to avenge Shunzhi, the officials under the Yamen of the Governor of Sichuan and Shaanxi, except for Li Guoying, cheered and thought that this was excellent news—for the Yamen of the Governor of Sichuan and Shaanxi. Only the Governor himself decided that this was too stupid to be an idea, because the Qing court needed to come up with a huge gamble to make such a risky gamble.

"If the imperial court takes the initiative to switch to defense, then it is up to the imperial court to decide when it will turn to the offensive again, but if it has to switch to defense after a fiasco, then it is difficult to say when it will be able to counterattack." Li Guoying obviously did not look at the problem from the perspective of his governor's yamen. In addition to being heartbroken, he even cited the examples of Xiong Tingbi and Wang Zaijin, comparing their strategies with those of today's Qing court: "Xiong Tingbi and Wang Zaijin in the previous dynasty both believed that they must first have the ability to restore the whole of western Liaoxi before they can try to restore Jinzhou; It is necessary to have the strength to restore the whole Liao in order to consider the restoration of Quang Ninh, which is very right. The problems encountered by the imperial court today are very similar to the problems of Liaodong encountered by the previous dynasty. Of course, the Mandate of Heaven is in this dynasty, and Deng Thief does not, but there are still some similarities in the form of shì. Now our army is stationed in Chongqing, choking the throat of Deng thief, although his transportation is inconvenient, and his mobilization again and again consumes his strength, but sooner or later he will change this mistake, and in the end the only use of Chongqing is to consume the strength of Sichuan and Shaanxi, and we have to spend a huge price to transport grain thousands of miles, delaying the time for the Ganshan green battalion to recover its vitality. Chongqing was only important when the imperial court had the strength to pacify the whole of Sichuan. Now Deng Ming only has 200,000 men under him, so what if this Chongqing is given to him? If the Deng thief sent troops to garrison him, then he would have to settle the fields or transport grain, and give us the opportunity to raid him along the Jialing River; And if he doesn't want Chongqing, when the imperial court wants to pacify Sichuan, we will send troops to occupy it, so why do we have to stay here? ”

Although the imperial court had some savings over the years, it would undoubtedly cost a staggering amount of military expenditure to transfer troops from Shanxi to Sichuan, so that the troops could attack Chengdu in several ways; Li Guoying could not imagine that if the attack failed, it might be a defeat that was far more severe than the Ming army's Battle of Sarhu, and the Qing court would lose a large amount of savings, troops, and prestige, lose the right to attack indefinitely, and even lead the court to lose its strategic reserves and a large part of its mobilization capacity. In the unlikely event that the Mongols, the Japanese or Zheng Chenggong and Li Dingguo took the opportunity to attack, the imperial court would not be able to support other places, but could only hope that each place would rely on its own strength to withstand it.

Everyone in the governor's yamen rejoiced and shouted the wisdom of the court, but Li Guoying was worried. Of course, he can't openly oppose the policies and appropriations of the imperial court, after all, his subordinates are waiting for this money and food, even if Li Guoying is the governor of the governor, he does not dare to offend the anger of the public, he does not want to be a governor who does not command the army under his hands.

Therefore, Li Guoying could only vaguely suggest that the imperial court should not rush to launch a large-scale attack on Chengdu, and should consider Hong Chengchou's countermeasures back then, that is, to stabilize the defense and wait and see the internal strife of the Ming army. The reason for not launching an offensive at the moment is not because there is no strength, but because there may be a better time to wait, and if the hasty action leads to a fiasco, then no matter how good the opportunity arises in the future, the Qing court will not be able to take advantage of it.

In the letter to the Qing court, Li Guoying carefully analyzed the current situation of the Southern Ming Dynasty, and he believed that the current situation of the Southern Ming Dynasty is very similar to that of Li Dingguo, the two famous queens, the original order within the Ming army is being disrupted, and the strength of the various factions of the Ming army has begun to swell, but there is no leader with absolute authority. The appeal of the Yongli Emperor to the various departments of the Ming army is even worse than before the internal strife of the three kings, and the loss of authority leads the generals of all factions of the Ming army to have the opportunity to compete for leadership.

Li Guoying believed that as long as the Qing court stabilized its position, the Ming army would definitely have another internal conflict for leadership, and Li Guoying believed that most of the infighting provoked this time was Deng Ming, whose strength was rapidly expanding. Now that Deng Ming has great prestige and military power, and Yan Zhan has broken the previous balance, when Deng Ming launches a war of internal unification, his reputation and support will decline as rapidly as Li Dingguo did. Once a large number of Ming allies had become Deng Ming's enemies, and their forces had been defeated but had not yet been digested, that was what Li Guoying thought was the best time to eliminate Deng Ming.

Moreover, Li Guoying also believes that the Qing court did not have to wait long to see the infighting launched by Deng Ming, on the one hand, because Deng Ming's strength and prestige had already clashed with other Ming armies; In addition, Shunzhi had just died, and the situation of the Qing court's suspicion of the young state might make Deng Ming misjudge, thinking that this was a good time for him to launch infighting, and he could take advantage of the Qing court's internal stability to unify the Ming army.

Once Deng Ming launched a war of unification, then the Qing army could get disgruntled defectors, and could be satisfied to see Deng Ming lose troops and supplies in the internal strife, and eliminate the allies he could have counted on; When the Qing army launches another all-out attack, it can drive Deng Ming to the Tibetan area, so that he will never want to gain a foothold in western Sichuan.

Until receiving Deng Ming's announcement, Li Guoying was still full of confidence in his strategic concept.

"Deng Ming is not unifying the Ming army's decree is to wait for death, he should be very clear about this, and he is by no means a person who is willing to wait to be killed, so I always thought that he would take advantage of his high prestige and take a risk when the court is in chaos." Li Guoying put down the document and sighed to the staff on the left and right: "I didn't expect him to be so open-minded, and would rather be on an equal footing with people whose strength is far inferior to him, it seems that they will not have infighting in the short term." ”

"Your Excellency the Governor need not be so disappointed," one of his aides advised, "perhaps Deng Ming is just trying to paralyze his comrades, maybe tomorrow there will be new news: Deng Ming has slaughtered Liu Tichun and is meeting Li Laiheng in battle." ”

"No, since Deng Ming made a declaration, it shows that he understands very well in his heart that the unification of government decrees is a dead end, but the unification of force is still a dead end; Since he knew so well in his heart, he would never give us a chance. Li Guoying smiled bitterly and shook his head: "Do you know who Deng Ming reminds the official of?" ”

Without waiting for the staff to ask, Li Guoying took the initiative to say the answer: "It's Emperor Taizong." ”

"Ahh Many of the staff members exclaimed.

"Yes, it's Emperor Taizong. After the death of Emperor Taizu (Nurhachi), our dynasty only had Liao and Shen projectiles, and the former dynasty gathered heavy troops in the western Liaoning corridor, and Mao Wenlong behind him attacked day and night, and the surrounding Mongolia and North Korea were also friends and enemies, and there were endless internal disputes, no matter how you look at it, it was a certain death. Emperor Taizong also understood at that time that if the Eight Banners could not be united, then Sheji would definitely be destroyed; And if the Eight Banners are unified by force, even if they win, they will suffer heavy casualties, and most of the defeated side will defect to the previous dynasty, which is almost exactly the same as Deng Ming's current shape. And Emperor Taizong chose to discuss the politics of the eight kings, the four Baylors sat on an equal footing, and everything was implemented after the discussion of the Eight Banners, and Emperor Taizong would never make his own decisions. ”

Hearing that there were staff members here, he asked, "What does the Governor mean, is Deng Thief learning from Emperor Taizong?" ”

"That's right," Li Guoying nodded, he pointed to the declaration and said: "Emperor Taizong put forward any ideas when the kings were discussing politics, and everyone agreed to do it, although this made Emperor Taizong unable to control the Eight Banners like an arm, but first of all, the Eight Banners were united; Second, Emperor Taizong did not need to use force to unify the decrees. Deng Ming's committee was obviously learning from Emperor Taizong, and he didn't want the Ming army to become a mess, but he would never use force. ”

"They still want Fengjie to be the judge!" Another staff member said.

"This?" Li Guoying said without thinking: "This is just to give Wen Anzhi a face." ”

After a deep sigh, Li Guoying said again: "Deng Mingxiong is strategic, when he is destroyed quickly, maybe it makes sense for the imperial court to attack Sichuan in a hurry." ”

"Deng Thief is just learning from Emperor Taizong of my dynasty, and the Governor thinks too highly of this fang, right?" The staff felt that since Deng Ming was learning Huang Taiji, it was nothing remarkable.

"Otherwise, it is human nature to cut off dissidents, and how many heroes and heroes have fallen at this level. Didn't the previous dynasty do enough things to kill each other? Only this Deng Ming, whose military strength is stronger than that of the thieves in Yudong, and his reputation is unparalleled for a while, he is still so young, but he can learn the heart of Emperor Taizong, isn't this a big trouble for the imperial court? Thinking of Deng Ming's age, Li Guoying felt a chill: "It's not terrible to have martial arts alone, it's a big deal to be Xiang Yu." But Deng Thief is only in his early twenties, and this patience has the demeanor of Liu Bang, is this worth it? ”

……

"Ahead is the Kuimen."

Deng Ming returned to Sichuan this time, the Ming army brought a lot of recruits who entered Sichuan for the first time, and when the Xiongguan appeared in front of them, the veterans introduced the recruits one after another: "After Kuimen, it is the White Emperor City and Fengjie, we are home!" ”

When the fleet of the Ming army slowly passed through the cracks in the mountains of Guò Gate, the beacon fire rose in the White Emperor City.

"Admiral's fleet!" The guards of White Emperor City shouted excitedly: "Such a large fleet can only be the Admiral's, quickly inform Fengjie!" ”