More than 200 lieutenants were summoned at this meeting, and officers in both the combat and auxiliary units were ordered to attend the meeting. Although Deng Ming gave the auxiliaries the same respect as the soldiers, and also established an establishment for the auxiliaries and arranged special officers to lead the team, rather than being driven by the personnel of the combat units like other armies, it was possible to go to Deng Ming and never call two officers at the same time. If Deng Ming had any training or work needs for the auxiliaries, he would summon the officer in charge, but there would be no need for the officers of the combat unit to attend.

"Sit." With Deng Ming's order, more than 200 officers sat on their horses one by one, straightening their waists and looking at the commander at the front desk.

The officers present all knew about the recent military situation, so Deng Ming did not exaggerate the difficulties of the Ming army, and simply said two sentences, and immediately went straight to the point: "In the past few days, I have heard that both the soldiers and the auxiliary troops have begun to have a voice, that is, to throw down the 10,000 captives in Guizhou and let them help us drag the Qing army for a few days. First of all, once we abandon these Guizhou people, the officers and men of our army will also know that we have nothing to do with the stubborn Qing army, and neither I nor the gentlemen here have the confidence to get out of the predicament; If you can give up the people of Guizhou today, will you be able to give up Huguang recruits tomorrow? The day after tomorrow, will the less important auxiliaries be abandoned? No, I'm not going to make this head! We want to convince the soldiers that we, as officers, have a way and will not abandon the soldiers. ”

Seeing that many people in front of him nodded slightly, Deng Ming continued: "In addition to military issues, this is also about conscience, we are like a group of travelers who are chased by evil wolves, we still have sticks in our hands, and we still have strength, why should we throw down our companions who can't walk, and don't turn around to fight wolves?" I don't know what you guys think, but I'd rather kill the wolf than leave my companions and escape alone. ”

Deng Ming's words aroused the enthusiasm of many officers, and they all shouted that the reason why they participated in Zhang Huangyan's Volunteer Army was to fight the Qing army to the end.

"If we let the Qing army linger behind us like this, we may pay a heavy price for every mistake, which we cannot tolerate; Fighting a battle with the Qing army, defeating them, and running away, I think will be the least loss. And we have the strength to defeat them, these days, our officers and soldiers have been chased by the Qing army, and everyone is holding back their strength, but Li Guoying has no courage to fight, and his soldiers must have also noticed this, and they are all thinking about winning by tricks, and they have lost the sharpness of pursuit. ”

Probably none of the officers present objected to fighting a battle with the Qing army, and even if they knew that the Qing army behind them was strong, many people felt that it was better to decide the battle than to be afraid of each other—as Yuan Zongdi said, when they were first entangled, the morale of the pursued people would rise, but if they could not fight for a long time, they would begin to decline.

Therefore, most of the officers are now most concerned about whether the Qing army is willing to fight with the Ming army, and some people with flexible minds feel even more strange - today's topic sounds like how to fight the Qing army, which is mainly the work of the soldiers; Even if he needed the cooperation of the auxiliaries, according to Deng Ming's habit in the past, he would call another meeting, instead of having a large number of officers of the auxiliary forces sit here and waste time listening to their irrelevant tasks.

"Twenty miles ahead, there are several large valleys, with rolling hills, where they come into play." Deng Ming ordered a huge map to be hung, which he asked the striker to explore carefully. After seeing this map, many officers also felt that this was a good place to fight, but they were very cautious in pursuing the Qing army's advance, and Li Guoying's standard battalion cavalry never approached the Ming army's brigade infantry; Although the strength of the Governor's Battalion exceeded that of the Ming army's cavalry by a lot, in order to avoid being sticky, they had also been cautious to distance themselves from the Ming army; As for the large number of infantry of the Qing army, they marched behind the standard battalion, not giving the Ming army a chance to form an encounter.

Shut down

In the past few days, the main force of the Ming army has moved very slowly, so Deng Ming has enough time to collect geographical information, and when listening to Deng Ming's careful introduction to the terrain, many officers have new doubts: "Could it be that the Admiral wants to set up an ambush here?" But the Admiral asked Hu Shuai and General Yuan's subordinates to teach us all kinds of reconnaissance methods, could the enemy not understand this? ”

Especially now that the Qing army knows that the Ming army is in front of them, they will not march recklessly, and many officers recall the reconnaissance training they have received, and feel that the possibility of an ambush not being seen through is very small.

"In order to lure the Qing army into the army, I plan to carry out an unprecedented deception operation, because there is no precedent, so I not only need the cooperation of all the monarchs here, but also the efforts of the whole army."

Defeat is a very common tactic, for example, He Zhen's method against Li Shixun is a typical trick, but this also requires the opponent to be careless, because experienced commanders have many ways to judge whether the enemy is really fleeing or feintting. The simplest thing is to observe the flag, if the flag is not discarded in large quantities, it means that the officers of the other side at all levels may still be able to restore control over the army, so be careful; The second is to observe whether the other side still has large-scale formed troops, and if the other side can still control a large number of troops, then it is far from a failure.

With Li Guoying's prudence, this kind of deception will not succeed, and now the Qing army does not even plan to engage the Ming army, even if it wants to, there is no chance of defeat. However, no one asked questions at this time, and it was obvious that Deng Ming had not finished speaking.

"I plan to carry out a long-distance rout, and our army will be routed for twenty miles, from here until the predetermined battlefield." Deng Ming pointed to the map, when he first proposed this plan, Zhao Tianba and they all thought that the Admiral was crazy, because such a rout could not be disguised, if it was really a fraud for twenty miles, it would definitely become a real collapse of the whole army.

But the officers in the audience seemed to have more confidence in Deng Ming than the guards, and they did not scream as soon as they heard Deng Ming's beginning, as the guards did, and most of them listened attentively to Deng Ming's words.

"No one has ever been able to carry out such a long-distance rout, because if you can't run ten miles, the formation will begin to be chaotic, the soldiers will not find the officers, the officers will not find the soldiers, and the auxiliaries will scurry like headless flies." If you want to avoid chaos in the formation, you must march in an orderly manner, but then the other party can see at a glance that this is not a rout: "Even if a flag is erected twenty miles away to gather the stragglers, the panicked soldiers will not obey the command, and they will not be able to collect the stragglers at all in a day or two, and the pursuers will have already been killed before this, and the soldiers who are already frightened birds will scatter and flee." ”

If an army is defeated for twenty miles, no commander will suspect that it is a deceit, and even if the enemy's commander has the intention of deceitful at first, he will completely lose control of the army at this time.

"In thousands of years of war, no army has been able to lure the enemy by a rout twenty miles in front of the enemy, because no army has done it. But unlike all armies of the ages, we can do it. First, our army did not have strong men who were forcibly pulled, except for many Huguang volunteers, both soldiers and auxiliaries were volunteers who joined the army in Zhoushan. ”

Most of the soldiers recruited by Huguang have also gone to Chengdu, and very few remain in the army now.

"We also have a military rank system, whether it is a soldier or an auxiliary, there are officers, we can do without a banner, and the officers will lead the scattered march, and it looks like a rout. Organizational chaos is inevitable on the road, so I need the officer to take every lost soldier he encounters, whether he is your subordinate or not; If a soldier falls behind, he must act in concert with the officer he encounters and obey the command of the highest-ranking officer. This is the second reason why we were able to carry out this deception, our army is not an army with the hierarchy of generals, family members, personal soldiers, soldiers and auxiliaries. ”

When Deng Ming presented this reason to Zhou Kaihuang and Li Xinghan, his guards also thought that it seemed that they could give it a try, but despite this, even if there was a military rank system that could help the Ming army reduce the confusion and shorten the time it took to gather troops, this long-distance deception was still extremely dangerous.

"Thirdly, in the past, only the commander himself, and a few henchmen, knew about the deception, and the bait soldiers sent to lure the enemy were either very small in number, or they were abandoned to the enemy as outcasts. But this time is different, and I need everyone here to participate, not only in this project, but also in your sergeants, to be as familiar with geography as possible before the battle. Because of secrecy, I could not inform the whole army too early, but in the end every soldier and auxiliary soldier had to understand our army's plan and how our army was going to win the victory. ”

In the past, this kind of deception was generally not notified to each soldier, but Deng Ming believed that if the soldiers understood the commander's strategic determination, it would be very beneficial to dispel their panic, and also help to maintain the structure and morale during the deception. Deng Ming announced that the Ming army would stop advancing from today, and from tomorrow onwards, the officers would disguise themselves as reconnaissance troops in batches, and take the sergeants to familiarize themselves with the terrain and further formulate a more rigorous plan for deception.

"In the end, we need the cooperation of the Qing army." Deng Ming told the officers present that in the next few days, in order to cover the true intentions of the Ming army, Deng Ming would repeatedly challenge the Qing army: "Li Guoying will definitely not agree, and when we are ready, let the sailors evacuate first, and at the same time let out the news that we have abandoned the army and absconded, and the whole army will be led by the officer, and the small formation will disperse and march to the assembly site twenty miles away according to the predetermined route and plan." Li Guoying abandoned the army and absconded twice, and Zhao Liangdong just escaped once a few days ago, since they have all done this, then most of them think that everyone in the world will make similar moves in an unfavorable situation. So I think they will cooperate with me, thinking that this is a repetition of the Battle of Songshan, and the army will be exhausted to outflank and intercept our army. ”