lcionline Chapter 566 Coastal Pursuit
Chapter 566 Coastal Pursuit
The brutal flogging shocked all the officers and soldiers present. They watched as dozens of soldiers were whipped until they were bloodied and mangled. The resentment in their hearts disappeared, replaced by a feeling of shared sorrow, and at the same time, they felt fortunate that it was not they who had violated discipline and disobeyed orders.
Liang Xiaoming sighed softly, "Does governing an army have to be like this? It's a little heartbreaking to watch. They're just unwilling to hurt their own families."
“Womanly compassion.” Liu Ye glanced at him. “Soldiers are duty-bound to obey orders. No matter the era, the best army is a mindless killing machine. It’s just a pity we don’t have the brainwashing methods of the CCP. There’s no revolutionary ideology in this time and space, so we can’t use the ‘Party branch in the company’ approach. We can only use the carrot and stick approach. If we act according to your pity, with generous pay but no strict military discipline, we will sooner or later degenerate into the Eight Banners Army of the late Qing Dynasty.”
After the execution, the wounded soldiers were carried inside to receive medical treatment, while the soldiers who had watched the execution returned to their posts according to their unit's regulations. This "killing the chicken to scare the monkey" incident left a deep impression on the soldiers of the Independent Regiment, and thereafter, in battles across the country, the Independent Regiment never again violated military discipline.
Liu Ye and Liang Xiaoming walked side by side toward the officers' quarters—the so-called officers' quarters were actually similar to the bungalows where the soldiers lived, except that instead of a large communal room, they had double or single rooms. Liu Ye planned to stay in the barracks tonight, and he had some ideas to discuss with Liang Xiaoming.
Liang Xiaoming asked, "When did the Tartars retreat? How many cavalrymen did they have? Did they conscript any men?"
"Almost every Tartar soldier is on horseback... The retreat began this morning. They captured many civilians, and their baggage looks heavy. With so much baggage, even if everyone were on horseback, they probably wouldn't be able to run very fast..."
"They've only been gone a day, still dragging their tails, can't they run fast?" Liu Ye rested his chin on his hand and pondered.
Liang Xiaoming, who had partnered with him for several years and knew him very well, knew he was up to something as soon as he saw him. He asked in surprise, "You're not planning to chase after him, are you?"
Liu Ye chuckled: "If I were in Lingao right now, I wouldn't have come all this way to fight the Tartars. But I was worried you'd die, so I came anyway. Now that I'm here, and Abatai is just a detachment, I feel uneasy if I don't chase after them and fight them, like I missed out on a five million dollar lottery prize..."
Liang Xiaoming said helplessly, "He's a Beile of the Later Jin, and I heard he's a very senior general, not a greenhorn. Do you think he's here to deliver your head? You missed out on five million."
"Hehe, it's not like I'm just throwing my life away. Abatai is quite famous in history, but that's precisely why I want to catch up with him when he's alone. Once he joins up with Ajige, it will be much harder to fight him. The Later Jin population is small. Whether it's soldiers or generals, every death is one less. If the Jurchens are almost all dead, all that's left are the Han Chinese and Mongols. They'll scatter like monkeys when the tree falls. No matter how much Huang Taiji tries to cause trouble, he won't be able to make a fuss anymore."
“You make it sound so easy, but the Tartars aren’t so easy to kill!” Liang Xiaoming shook his head. “With my Independent Regiment, we can only hold our own against them by relying on the bastions. It’s hard to say what will happen in open field battles.”
“You don’t need to overestimate the Tartars,” Liu Ye said. “They had their own advantages, but not as exaggerated as history portrays. The late Ming Dynasty was an era of competition for the worst. The reason the Later Jin were able to take over the Central Plains was because the Ming Dynasty itself had problems: political corruption, a decadent army, famine caused by the Little Ice Age, and peasant uprisings triggered by land annexation. This allowed the Later Jin to take advantage of the situation. Any army with decent training and morale could have fought against the so-called ‘invincible’ Tartars. In the Battle of Hunhe, the Zhejiang and Sichuan White-Spear Soldiers left by Qi Jiguang totaled only about 7000 men, yet they fought a fierce battle against tens of thousands of Tartars. If reinforcements hadn’t been delayed, the outcome would have been very different.”
Liang Xiaoming frowned and said, "What you said makes sense. But even if I don't understand military affairs, I know the importance of mobility. The Tartars are almost all cavalry. Even if they are slowed down by their baggage, they are still much faster than us on foot. They have been on the move for a day now. Even if you set off tomorrow morning, can you catch up if you are a day late? Even if you catch up after exhausting yourself, how can you fight them when you are exhausted? Moreover, when cavalry fights infantry, even if they can't win, they can just abandon their baggage and run away. The initiative is in their hands. Do you really want to fight this kind of battle?"
Liu Ye gave a thumbs up: "You said you didn't understand military affairs? What you said makes a lot of sense! Your experience on the battlefield has really impressed me."
The two had already returned to Liang Xiaoming's dormitory. Liu Ye said, "Take out paper and pen. You're from Shandong, so you should be familiar with the terrain. Draw a map of the northeastern coast of Shandong and analyze it."
Liang Xiaoming, unaware of his true intentions, took out paper and pen and sketched a partial map of the Shandong coastline.
Liu Ye pointed to the depression in the Shandong Peninsula on the map and asked, "What area does this location roughly belong to?"
After recalling for a moment, Liang Xiaoming replied, "It should be near Changyi. According to the administrative divisions of this time and space, it is roughly at the border between Laizhou and Qingzhou."
Liu Ye called out to the door, "Someone, bring Ma Wei here."
A moment later, Ma Wei entered the room. Liu Ye beckoned him over to look at the map and asked, "Tell me, how far can cavalry travel in a day at most? And how far can the Tartars travel with their baggage?"
Ma Wei silently estimated for a moment and replied, "General, based on my experience, if it were light cavalry like the Mongols, and the terrain were flat, they could probably travel 200 li a day, and 300 li if they didn't spare the horsepower; most of the Tartars wear heavy armor, and 200 li a day is their limit. If we take into account the burden of baggage, they can only travel a maximum of 80 li a day, otherwise, those people will be exhausted to death, and the Tartars will have captured people for nothing."
Hearing this, Liu Ye understood the situation and pointed to the location of Changyi, asking again, "I heard that you chased the bandits all the way from Laizhou to Qingzhou to suppress them. So, how far is this place, where the two prefectures meet, from Dengzhou?"
Ma Wei recalled for a moment and answered confidently, "About 300 li."
Looking at the map, Liang Xiaoming asked in confusion, "Why are you repeatedly asking about Changyi?"
Liu Ye replied, "Because the Tartars were heading towards the capital, unless they wanted to take a detour and not travel in a straight line, they had to follow the coastline until they reached a depression in the coastline, which is Changyi. After that point, the terrain changed, and the Tartars got further and further away from the coastline."
Liang Xiaoming suddenly realized: "You want to take advantage of our position on the water?"
“That’s right, two legs can’t outrun four legs, but a ship on the sea is faster than four legs.” Liu Ye slammed his hand on the map. “I’m going to pursue the Tartars along the coast!”