"Taobao, I'm not satisfied." Zhang Kai said. Negotiating peace was definitely impossible, so Wang Ju left the capital very early, not going to Shaanxi Road, but to Hedong. In the future, Hedong will be the top priority, not the expedition against Xia. After many cannibalistic conquests by Wang Ju, Xixia is no longer the stubborn Xixia of Li Yuanhao. But there is still a strong neighbor in the north. The Liao Kingdom can go south from Fulin Road to encircle Wei and rescue Zhao, support Xixia, cross the desert, directly increase the thickness of Xixia, and go south from the Daizhou gap that was moved from the Song Dynasty. Undoubtedly, in the future, Hedong Road may be undergoing a huge test. And at the critical moment, Hedong Road also needed to support the expedition to Xia, including soldiers, civilians, supplies, and a large number of livestock and vehicles. At the same time, Wang Ju also had to negotiate with Zhang Kai on how to capture Xixia as quickly as possible at the minimum cost. But they were talking about something else. Chen Tang, the famous Han general who went to Central Asia and defeated the Northern Xiongnu Zhizhi Chanyu and the Roman army, wrote to Emperor Yuan of the Han Dynasty that when he wrote to Emperor Yuan of the Han Dynasty, he said that among the barbarian mansions in Touchang Street, Yi County, he was thousands of miles away. Zhu should hang the severed heads on the streets where the barbarians live, to let them know that those who dare to violate the dignity of Dazhi must be killed even if they live thousands of miles away. Many people know this allusion. However, when Wang Ju was looking through the Han Dynasty, he also saw a passage from him: In the past, the five barbarians were the only soldiers of the Han Dynasty. Without them, their armor was strong and their weapons were sharp. Today, the moon is a little bit off, and the Hu people also understand the methods of the Central Plains. One soldier can also act as three Husbands. In the past, the combat effectiveness of five Hu soldiers was equivalent to that of one Han soldier. Without them, the weapons and armor were strong. Today, with the exchange of ethnic groups, the enemy also knows some of the methods of the Central Plains, and the weapons and armor follow. But that's it, a Han soldier. Still equivalent to three Hu soldiers. Wang Ju felt confused. He still remembered a saying that one Tatar warrior was equivalent to the fighting strength of five Ming soldiers, but he couldn't remember what the minister of the Ming Dynasty said. Of course, these two evaluations cannot be completely believed. Just like the soldiers of the Song Dynasty, to be fair, if you look at individuals, one-on-one is indeed not as good as Xixia soldiers or Liao soldiers, but when combined, it is hard to say, so the competition is often about the commander's command and planning ability and logistics supply ability. , and some other factors. And the soldiers of the Ming Dynasty were not as weak as imagined. For example, Emperor Yongle entered the desert five times to sweep up and almost wiped out the entire grassland. Could the Song Dynasty do it? But the soldiers of the Han Dynasty were indeed very fierce. Some people say that Sima Qian and other historians exaggerated the results of the Han army. For example, the 400,000 Xiongnu army besieged Liu Bang in Baideng, and the 400,000 Xiongnu troops came from the Huns. This is definitely a wrong statement. Just like in the upper reaches of the Shiyang River, there used to be two large lakes. One was called Zunye Ze, covering an area of ??16,000 square kilometers. There was also a larger lake to the west of it, called Zunye Ze. Xiu Tuze, think about the area of ??Poyang Lake in later generations, three to four thousand square kilometers! Even though the water and soil began to deteriorate in the Song Dynasty, the two lakes still covered thousands of square kilometers. The two lakes in the upper reaches of the weak water are called the West Sea, and their area is even more terrifying. Another example is the Badain Jaran Desert. In later generations, there was almost no human habitation in the desert, but now there are still many oases, so Xixia had to build three military forts to maintain order. There is also the west of Riyue Ridge. There are so many people in later generations. How many people are there? But in the Tang Dynasty, Tuyuhun could easily mobilize hundreds of thousands of troops. Think about how many people lived at that time. Therefore, although the north was bitter and cold during the Han Dynasty, it was far stronger than that of later generations. It is not surprising that the Xiongnu sent out hundreds of thousands of troops. Even now, if Bei Zu Bu is determined to start a war, he can still gather 100,000 troops. Moreover, the territory of the Xiongnu It is much larger than the current territory of Bei Zubu. Therefore, the number of casualties recorded in the history books in the Han-Hungarian war is credible. Moreover, Sima Qian¡¯s hatred of Emperor Wu of the Han Dynasty, his disgust for war, and his yearning for ¡°Huang Lao¡¯s inaction¡± made it impossible to beautify the results of the Han army. With these premises, Chen Tang¡¯s passage can indeed be used as a reference. Is it true that one Han soldier is equivalent to the combat effectiveness of five Hu soldiers? It has nothing to do with stirrups. Even if there are no stirrups, it is still all cavalry. Although the Han army also has cavalry, it is the same as the army in the early Song Dynasty. It is a combination of infantry as the main force and a small amount of cavalry as a supplement. So with this question in mind, Wang Ju wrote to Zhang Kai. The two discussed it for a long time and finally came to some conclusions. First of all, the Han Dynasty did not put serious constraints on the generals. Just like Li Guang's end was a bit miserable, but after careful analysis, we cannot blame the Han Dynasty. That is the system. When the war comes, you will be given free space to express yourself. If you have made meritorious service, you will be rewarded. Promotion, failure, and mistakes must be punished. Not only the two famous generals Wei and Huo, but also Chen Tang, Zhao Chongguo, Feng Fengshi,?I don't know that these people's performance in foreign wars is also not weak. Therefore, this little constraint is very important. Just like Pan Mei going south, if Zhao Kuangyin sent eunuchs or scholar-bureaucrats to constrain Pan Mei, I am afraid Pan Mei may not be able to successfully pacify the Southern Han Dynasty. Also, if Wang Ju comes to the northwest this time, if the court imposes restrictions, or even if there is no need to impose restrictions, as long as he does not cooperate, the consequences will be worrying. It is precisely because of this that the general is given room to display his talents. Secondly, the armor is excellent. By the Song Dynasty, due to the development of communication, the excellent armor was even less obvious. Just like Xixia has Xia Guojian, cold forged armor, and Xixia crossbow, but overall the technology is relatively backward and lacks resources. Xixia is relatively far behind. But the bad thing lies in two points. The first point is that the quality of many weapons and armors of Song Dynasty officials was seriously substandard. Even after Wang Ju went to the Ordnance Supervision and carried out systematic reforms, the court also dealt with many corrupt officials and craftsmen, but It cannot be eliminated yet. The Han Dynasty also had it, but the problem is that their system was a system of generals and soldiers. Armor is directly related to whether you can win on the battlefield and whether you can get an official title and make a fortune. If the court issues a large number of unqualified weapons and armor, each person will Will the military leader agree? This effectively prevented some substandard weapons from being circulated into the army. The Song Dynasty changed from the "flowing general system" to the art of war, which seemed to be a system of generals and soldiers. However, the fact was that it was still controlled by civil servants, and each military general continued to be a puppet. Therefore, the nature of the two was different, and many inferior weapons were destined to be produced. Why is it that the Han Dynasty, where one is equal to five, has been borrowed from the Song Dynasty? In fact, it is borrowed from. Wang Ju later reported the results of these discussions to Zhao Xu and the various prime ministers, and then said that it was impossible to completely copy the Han system. The Han system also had serious flaws, but it was possible to copy some parts, such as this general The art of war is also about generals, but in the Song Dynasty, a general officer only had a few battalions, and at most four thousand people could ascend to the sky. What harm would it cause, so it is better to further liberalize the rights of each general. There is also the problem of smuggling. Just like the original northwest, northwest merchants bought green salt from Xixia and sold pig iron to Xixia. The former relieved the economic pressure of Xixia, and the latter allowed Xixia to arm more weapons. There is a similar phenomenon on the Song-Liao border. For example, Hebei has been unable to implement the salt ban system due to the flooding of Liao salt. According to Zhang Kai, as long as the relevant behavior is found, both the parties involved and the people behind the scenes must be executed. But this is impossible. The best example is the Shanxi merchants. The army of the Later Jin Dynasty broke into the towns of the Ming Dynasty and stole a large amount of gold and silver. However, the gold and silver could not be eaten and drank. On the contrary, it caused inflation. So Fan Yongdou, Wang Dayu, Eight Shanxi merchants headed by Wang Dengku and Tian Shenglan violated the imperial ban and smuggled 80% of grain, gunpowder, 60% of metals, salt and other materials to Houjin. They even provided relevant technology to Houjin, so that Houjin's gunpowder technology was no less than During the Ming Dynasty, they also provided Hou Jin with information about the Ming Dynasty, down to the details of the names of the generals guarding each pass, the number of soldiers, and equipment details, all of which were revealed to Hou Jin. There are also. The richer these few businessmen are, the more greedy they are, and the greedier they are, the less patriotic they are. The problem is that the relationship circle behind these people is complicated. It is okay to use a few people to kill chickens and monkeys. If you want to prevent it, it will definitely cause an uproar. If you dare to warn Yan Junqi, do you dare to warn rural teachers? Even if the country has the ambition to clean up, it still can't put an end to it. Life is precious and love is more valuable. If it's for money, both can be thrown away! However, in the Han Dynasty, due to the barbarism of the Xiongnu, the situation was much better, which resulted in a huge gap in armor between the two, which was large enough to ignore the role of war horses. The third is to be well-trained. The principle is the same as the previous one. In the Song Dynasty, it was impossible to achieve it due to system problems. Let's look at the instructions of each battalion, eat empty pay, deduct military pay and logistics, and use soldiers to do private work. So Wen Tianwu played, Low combat effectiveness. But even so, the military discipline is much better than that of Xixia's stragglers. The fourth is actual combat, the confidence brought by repeated victories, and the strong support from the court and the rear. As for the most critical thing, neither Wang Ju nor Zhang Kai believed whether one Han soldier could defeat five Hu soldiers, because the soldiers of the Han Dynasty were also vegetarian troops, mainly eating beans and millet. "Just because of the combination of the above reasons, one Han soldier may not be able to defeat one Hu soldier, but a group of Han soldiers can defeat five groups of Hu soldiers." For this reason, even though the population of the Three Kingdoms was small, when the Wu Kingdom fell, the number of households in the country was 1,473,423 and the population was 7,672,881. The actual population was estimated to not exceed 16 million. Therefore, Cao Cao wrote a poem, Guandong There is a righteous man who raises troops to fight against the evil. In the early days of Huimengjin, his heart was in Xianyang. The combined strength of the army was uneven, and the geese were hesitant and flying. Power causes people to fight, and people fight against each other. The title of Huainan brother is carved in the north. The armor is infested with lice, and thousands of people die from it. White bones are exposed in the wild, and there is no rooster crow for thousands of miles. There are hundreds of things left by the people, but the thought of them will kill people.?. After beatings and beatings, only one person out of a hundred people was left! , but even so, Cao Wei still suppressed the northern nomads. Then came the Eastern Jin Dynasty. In fact, the Eastern Jin Dynasty was not weak in fighting power against the Sixteen Kingdoms. Not to mention the Battle of Feishui, Huan Wen and Liu Yu went to the north twice and almost took back their homeland. Unfortunately, both of them were ambitious masters and unintentionally defeated the enemy. , captured Guanzhong and withdrew their troops respectively. After Liu Yu, Song Qi, Liang and Chen Zheng were ruined, so don¡¯t mention them. ??????? Back to the Sui and Tang Dynasties, the overall performance against the nomads was not weak. However, in the Song Dynasty, the combat effectiveness of the Han people immediately changed! ?In fact, it is a problem of the system. Of course, it is impossible for Wang Ju or Zhang Kai to bring the Song Dynasty back to the system of the Han and Tang Dynasties. Moreover, that system may form a powerful army, but it does not impose any restrictions on generals, delegates power unlimitedly, and has too many The military strength is very powerful externally, but fatal tumors have also appeared internally. This is helpless. ¡°But for this one to be equal to five, both of them are envious. Think about it, with the financial resources of the Song Dynasty, if it could train an army of 200,000 "one against five", there would be no need to worry about the Liao Kingdom, just fight it! But this is impossible. So Zhang Kai mentioned the powerful army that Wang Ju used his sufficient financial resources to train in Huachi County. Wang Ju is also interested, because in the future, the West does not need to consider taking Xixia People may engage in some looting, but because their population base is too small, they will not shake the rule of the Song Dynasty at all. Therefore, the focus immediately shifted to the north, and Xixia's territory changed from the entire Shaanxi Road to the north and south Hetao, Helan Mountain, and possibly Juyanhai. But the real focus is on the line from Fulin Road in Hedong to Daizhou, extending eastward to the front line of Hebei Road. But it's impossible to play like Wang Ju. It's not because Zhang Kai is weak, but because there are more than 100,000 regular soldiers, rural soldiers, and archers on the entire Hedong Road. Not to mention how much money the equipment requires. If you buy a large number of pigs and sheep like Wang Ju did, and forcibly improve the physical fitness of the soldiers, it will also cause the entire price to lose control. Besides, if Hedong Road does this, what will happen to the more than 300,000 forbidden Tibetan soldiers on Shaanxi Road, which is the main battle area? So at Wang Ju's suggestion, the imperial court slightly increased the funds for the officers and soldiers brought by Yao Lin. This is what the two of them are talking about now. There have been some results, but they are not very ideal, and it is impossible to achieve the so-called one against five. "The Taibao, the main reason is the lack of actual expedition-style combat." "Expedition-style?" "The reason why the armies of the Han and Tang Dynasties were strong was not only because they fought many battles and the soldiers were familiar with the battle, but also because they often traveled long distances to thousands of miles away. Fighting in the rivers outside and deep in the desert will not only increase the coordination of the soldiers, but also improve the resilience of the soldiers. Although we mobilized many soldiers to fight in Yinxia last year, the distance is not far, and because of the advance arrangements, our army will not be able to fight. It defeated the Xia people with an overwhelming advantage, and it lacked a cruel battle, so the combat effectiveness of the soldiers was limited. " "In addition, unlike the soldiers from the Shaanxi Road, although our government occasionally dispatched soldiers from the Hedong Road to reinforce the Shaanxi Road, However, the number of troops was finally limited. The Song and Liao Dynasties were in peace for a long time, and Hedong Road became the second line. They were born in sorrow and died in happiness. The soldiers on Hedong Road were far from the strong army in the Northern Han Dynasty. " Wang Ju sighed slightly, regarding this. He knows one thing better than Zhang Kai. "Taobao, in my opinion, it is best to mobilize a group of capable soldiers to Hebei Road to change the defense." The soldiers on Hedong Road have experienced some wars. Zhang Kai came here and trained for more than a year, but what about Hebei Road? , wouldn't it be worse. This is just in case. If the Liao army goes south from Hebei Road and the soldiers on Hebei Road are defeated, the Song Dynasty may not be able to destroy Xixia. But it is impossible to transfer the Shaanxi and Tibetan troops to Hebei. They are also equivalent to rural soldiers. How can they be transferred to Hebei? Moreover, the Shaanxi Road battlefield still expected them to be the main force. I have to choose the taller among the dwarfs. Although the forbidden soldiers stationed on Shaanxi Road are not good, they have experienced many battles over the years and are much better than the soldiers on Hebei Road. The number of defense changes will be over. In addition, the soldiers originally stationed in Wang Although the group of border troops trained under Ju's suggestion cannot be said to be one against five, or even one against one, it is still much better than nothing. Then in case of an emergency, Hebei Road will be safe and sound, and at least it can Hold on for several months. But in just a few months, Xixia would be captured, and by then the troops would be released. Moreover, under Wang Ju¡¯s suggestion, last year the imperial court deliberatelyA large sum of money was spent to widen several mountain roads in Luliang Mountain and Taihang Mountain. Although it cannot be called a flat road, it can allow thousands of cavalry to rush to Hebei Road several months in advance. ????????????? But it¡¯s not that easy. If you mobilize those generals and soldiers, those who can fight are unwilling to go to Hebei and are still expecting to receive awards for meritorious service. For those who can¡¯t fight, it will not work to mobilize troops and mobilize large numbers of troops to move to Hebei. When spring officially arrives, we have to rush from Shaanxi Road to the Hebei front line, and we have to ask the court for permission in advance, so time is very tight. If part of the troops are transferred to Hebei, then some troops must be transferred from the capital to support it. However, the sky is covered with soil, and the troops in the capital cannot be left empty, so some troops must be transferred from Hebei Road back to the capital. "In order to "Preventing" Wang Ju covered the sky. This becomes complicated. Wang Ju pondered. "Taibao, I heard there are some rumors in the capital." "Brother Zhifu, have you heard it too?" "Well, this rumor is not good. Why does the court ignore it?" To be continued.