Standalone Northern and Southern Dynasties

Chapter 343 The advantage is mine
Upon hearing that Gao Huan was willing to go to the southern front where no one was willing to go, Ge Rong was overjoyed. He not only allocated a thousand armored soldiers to Gao Huan, but also appointed him as the general of the southern front.

After Gao Huan returned from the meeting, he conveyed the appointment to his subordinates. Sima Ziru was very excited, but Wei Jing and Dou Tai looked at Gao Huan in confusion.

Especially Dou Tai, he asked:
"He Liuhun, why don't you follow the king to fight? If we win this battle, it will be a great achievement for Dingding."

Sima Ziru coughed and said:
"Atai, I've told you so many times that you should address the general when you are discussing matters."

"Don't you also call me A'tai?" Dou Tai muttered, and then changed his words to call Gao Huan "General".

Gao Huan sighed in his heart. This is the difference between the rebel army and the government army.

When Su Ze was appointed as the captain, Gao Huan respected him from the bottom of his heart and did not dare to call him brother anymore, and no one found it strange.

However, there was no clear official system among the rebel army. Everyone was brothers who had fled together, and there were factions within the army. There was no strict hierarchy at all.

Even the general Gao Huan was appointed by Xianyu Xiuli at random, and no one knew who had a higher position.

The result of this is a clear lack of respect in the military. Except for the old subordinates who already have a superior-subordinate relationship, people usually address each other without regard for seniority.

If Sima Ziru had not been reminding others to respect Gao Huan's authority, with Dou Tai's simple-minded character, he would probably have put his arm around Gao Huan's shoulders during the meeting.

Gao Huan changed the subject and said:

"Everyone go to the northern front. Our relationship with the king is not as close as those old subordinates. The battles we are given will definitely be difficult to fight and will not earn us military merit. Are you willing to fight to the death?"

Sima Ziru thought about the time when he was in the Six Garrisons and Gao Huan became the military leader and followed the Heba brothers to fight in the war. He risked his life to get the position of military leader.

But at that time he fought for a position in the imperial court. Now, do I have to lead my brothers to fight for a position in the rebel army?

This is the problem with a makeshift team. Since there are no long-term benefits, everyone only sees short-term interests.

It's useless if you promise me to be a general or a king. As long as you have strength in your hands, you are a real king. If all your soldiers are killed, even if you are a king, you are no better than a dog.

The best example is that Xianyu Xiuli, the true king, was killed by Ge Rong, the King of Wei.

After Gao Huan said this, Dou Tai remained silent.

At this time, Wei Jing said:
"But why go to the southern front? I heard that Yuan Yanming is also very good at fighting. The Yanzhou soldiers he led have defeated attacks from various southern tribes many times. If we go to fight him with such a small number of people, isn't it dangerous?"

Gao Huan smiled and said:

"No! Yuan Yanming looks powerful, but he is actually a man without strategy."

"The reason why Yuan Yanming was able to stop our army in Yanzhou was because the nobles in Yanzhou did not want to end up like the people in Hedong, so they fought desperately, and they also had the danger of the Yellow River."

"But now Yuan Yanming has taken the initiative to leave Yanzhou and fight with us. The nobles in Yanzhou will have to provide troops and food. They will definitely not support it."

"Transporting grain across the Yellow River will cause huge losses. There was also a war in Yanzhou last year, so the grain supply must not be abundant."

"So we go to Jizhou. As long as we lure the enemy deep into our territory and use up all of Yuan Yanming's food supplies, we can chase them and we will surely win this battle!"

After hearing Gao Huan's analysis, Sima Ziru also nodded.

In troubled times, a leader who can fight is always more convincing. Gao Huan knows how to preserve his strength, so it will never be a disadvantage to follow him.

Just as Gao Huan was reorganizing his troops, Yuwen Luosheng, who had rushed back from Wulu to attend the military meeting, saw his younger brother Yuwen Tai sighing.

"Black Otter, the war is about to start, why are you sighing?"

Yuwen Tai said to his only remaining brother:
"Brother, I was thinking that if grandfather and brother were still alive, we could ask for permission to go to the south to fight."

Yuwen Luosheng felt sad at first.

Too many people have died in the Yuwen family over the years.

First, the eldest brother Yuwen Hao died in Liuzhen while protecting his father, and then his father and second brother Yuwen Lian died in Wulu.

The Yuwen family, which was once on par with the Heba family, now only has two brothers left.

However, Yuwen Tai was not yet an adult, and Ge Rong could not allow him to lead the army independently.

Therefore, although the Yuwen family gained Ge Rong's trust, due to the lack of manpower, it could only be supported by Yuwen Luosheng alone.

This is why ancient society attached great importance to male offspring. Many interests were linked to the family. If the family had many people, more things could be done and the family would have more tolerance. If the family had few people, many things could not be done.

Yuwen Luosheng comforted his brother and said:

"Yuan Yanming is also a famous general of the Pseudo-Wei. It is not certain that Gao Huan will be able to achieve merit in his trip to the southern front this time."

Yuwen Tai shook his head and told his brother Gao Huan's reasons. After listening, Yuwen Luosheng frowned and asked:

"So Gao Huan volunteered because he had thought of these things?"

Yuwen Tai nodded and said:
"I'm afraid so. Gao Huan is a man who knows a lot about military tactics. There aren't many people in the Six Garrisons who can match him in military tactics."

"Heita, do you think so highly of Gao Huan?" Yuwen Tai nodded. In fact, Yuwen Tai looked down upon most of the famous generals in the Six Garrisons.

These people are only brave individually, but have no strategic vision at all.

But only Gao Huan, who was able to consider the battlefield from a global perspective, could be considered a person who had comprehended the art of war.

It seemed incredible to Yuwen Tai that, with so many generations of generals in his family, how could Gao Huan, a mere son-in-law and messenger, have such a vicious strategic vision?

Was it because he had dated Su Ze before? Was it because he had broadened his horizons by being around Su Ze?
Yuwen Tai recalled the figure who once dominated the six prefectures. After so many years, the only general Yuwen Tai admired was Su Ze.

This man really used the art of war to the extreme, far beyond the reach of those people in Hedong.

It’s a pity that Su Ze is in the northwest, tens of thousands of miles away from here, and his grandfather has chosen to join Ge Rong, so Yuwen Tai has no way to join Su Ze.

In the following days, Ge Rong began to reorganize the army and personally led the army towards Lingqiu.
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The Northern Wei army set out, but the journey was very difficult.

First of all, food and fodder.

Looking at the map, the distance from Pingcheng to Lingqiu is actually not far. This road is one of the Eight Passes of Taihang Mountains. The road is rugged and difficult to travel. In order to transport food to the front line, a large number of civilian laborers must be conscripted.

This is also the reason why Yuan Shen did not dare to make a decision, as the government troops really had very little food and fodder.

Last year's locust plague, coupled with the expenses of suppressing the First Six Garrisons Rebellion, had brought the Northern Wei court close to bankruptcy.

However, after Empress Dowager Hu regained power, she began to build large-scale projects. In order to thank the Buddha for helping her regain power, Empress Dowager Hu built a large Buddha statue in Yongning Temple and rebuilt the wooden pagoda and golden vase.

The expenses of the nobles in Luoyang were still extravagant, but when the court had to raise military funds, they all cried poor.

Yuan Shen conscripted a large number of civilians and finally transported food and armor to Lingqiu. He was then urged by the military supervisor to advance.

Yuan Shen had no choice but to order an attack on several nearby cities amid the soldiers' complaints, in order to temporarily silence the military supervisor.

When the military supervisor saw that he had won the battle, he immediately reported the victory to the court.

But Yuan Shen was not happy with these achievements.

For an opponent like the rebels, the loss of a few cities was not a major defeat at all.

On the contrary, for the government troops, they had to appease the powerful families in the occupied cities, appoint officials, and even send troops to garrison.

This brought great burden to the government troops.

But the military supervisor did not know this. He was praising himself crazily for Yuan Shen's small victory and even wanted to say that he was the one who commanded the battle.

Ge Rong stopped when he was nearly a hundred miles away from the government army's front line, and then began to set up camp in a mess. After hearing the news, the military supervisor personally rushed to check Ge Rong's camp.

The young military supervisor had new ideas because of the previous victories:

I didn't know that the enemy army's combat effectiveness was so poor before. It seems that Yuan Shen's unwillingness to advance is really intended to keep the enemy at bay for his own benefit.

As a close confidant of Empress Dowager Hu, the young military supervisor was determined in his decision. His surging sense of responsibility overshadowed his desire to return to the court as soon as possible after making merit, and he began to urge Yuan Shen to advance even more frantically.

At the same time, Yang Yu of Wulu showed his power again and defeated Yuwen Gong's son Yuwen Luosheng again, and recaptured Wulu City. Yang Yu also passed the message to Yuan Shen, asking him to immediately send troops to attack Ge Rong.

When things got to this point, Yuan Shen had no choice but to send troops. He assembled a large army to attack the rebel camp. Just three days later, Ge Rong was defeated, leaving behind an empty camp.

Ge Rong was defeated and the military supervisor urged Yuan Shen to pursue him, but Yuan Shen had no food left.

Normal soldiers would only carry three days' worth of dry food when going into battle.

Therefore, battles in most periods of history were actually fought in a very cumbersome manner, even cavalry battles.

The only two periods in history when wars were fought in an extremely dynamic manner, with battles often fought over thousands of miles and on long-distance raids, were the end of the Qin Dynasty and the end of the Sui Dynasty.

Xiang Yu often rushed to fight with his back to the river, but Li Shimin was even more fierce and would often attack from behind.

The reason is that both dynasties liked to build super-large granaries, which created a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity for later generations to advance into combat.

However, the Northern Wei did not have such conditions for fighting. In the second year of Xiaochang, the three states of Ji, Ding and Ying had all been eaten up by Xianyu Xiuli and Ge Rong. Even if Yuan Shen ordered his troops to rob nearby, they could not rob any food.

Yuan Shen had no choice but to grit his teeth and distribute the last of the food to the soldiers. He also ordered the grain supervisor to transport the food back and forth, making it look like the army had sufficient food, and then let the soldiers take the food and continue to pursue Ge Rong.

The fight had come to this point, and Yuan Shen had no choice but to take a gamble.

If Ge Rong fights a decisive battle with him, then food will not be a problem. If Ge Rong drags his feet and does not fight a decisive battle with him, as long as he can be scared off, he can withdraw his troops and return to Lingqiu.

But the only option of losing is that Ge Rong does not fight with him and pesters him and prevents him from returning to Lingqiu.

Choose one among three, win two and lose one, the advantage is in my hands.

(End of this chapter)