Chapter 397 The difference between inside and outside
For a commander who leads tens of thousands of troops in combat, the most terrifying situation is not how powerful the enemy is, but the lack of external information that prevents him from clearly seeing the trend of the battle, making timely and reasonable judgments and taking effective responses. measure. After Zheng Bai led his army south to the outside of Hue City, he faced this situation that made him very depressed.
Although the battle plan agreed upon with Hai Han at the end of last year was for "the two armies to join forces in Hue to attack Hue City together," the current actual situation seems to be slightly different from the agreement at the time - this "reunion" "It has already arrived, but "joint attack" seems to be still open to question.
For the North Vietnamese court, the significance of conquering Hue was not only to realize the political unification of Annan, but also the wealth in Hue city was an important means to save its fiscal deficit. Before Zheng Bai sent his troops south, King Zheng Zhi of the Qing Dynasty issued a secret order to Zheng Bai, asking him to collect as much gold and silver treasures in the city as possible after conquering Hue and transport them to the north. After the end of the Civil War, the military expenses that the northern court had to pay to the Haihan militia were bound to be a considerable amount. At this time, the national treasury had already been exhausted. Whether it could avoid owing Haihan a huge debt again would depend to a certain extent. Let’s see how much oil and water the Southern Expedition army can scrape from the South Vietnam-controlled areas.
But it was obvious that North Vietnam was not the only one eyeing Hue City. After Zheng Bai led his army southward, he discovered that his allies had the same thoughts. The Hai Han people asked North Vietnam to deploy their troops in the area west of Hue City, saying that it was to prevent the remaining soldiers from escaping into the mountains, but they couldn't wait to launch an offensive on Hue City alone. Zheng Bai believed that this was exactly what the Hai Han militia wanted to do. Performance. The information returned by the military observation team sent to carry out surveillance missions in the Haihan Army was basically relayed by the liaison officer on the Haihan side. It was often just a few numbers, only "Today's battle situation was very fierce, and the two armies were attacking and defending each other." Or descriptions such as "our army killed more than a thousand enemies in front of the formation" did not mention the specific progress of the siege at all.
Of course, Zheng Bai was not a fool. He knew that the observation team he sent there probably would not have a chance to watch the battle on the front line, so he sent many spies to the areas surrounding the area controlled by the Haihan Militia to inquire for information. However, the information fed back from various channels is varied and inconsistent, and it is difficult to judge whether it is true or false. There is news that the Hai Han militia is attacking the northeast corner of Hue City for days, but no substantial progress has been made; there is also news that the Hai Han militia has breached the city wall. After entering the city, they even secretly occupied the imperial city; there was even more exaggerated news that Haihan had accepted the peace terms proposed by the South Vietnamese court, and the two sides had secretly reached an alliance under the city, and might counterattack at any time.
For these completely different statements, it was difficult for Zheng Bai to judge whether they were true or false. According to his own judgment, all of this information was incomplete and untrue. The fierce artillery fire of the Haihan people attacking Hue City in consecutive days was heard for miles. This offensive could not be faked, and it was unlikely that there would be no progress at all. But if the Haihan people have occupied Hue City, they have not seen a large number of defenders fleeing from Hue City. In recent days, a small number of stragglers have quietly sneaked out of Hue City and tried to escape, but were captured by the North Vietnamese Army patrol. After interrogation, it was confirmed that the Hai Han people had indeed invaded the city, but the war situation seemed to be still in a stalemate.
Judging from the frequency of deserters, it seems that the Haihan people have not captured the core area of the city, and the defenders have not completely given up resistance, which made Zheng Bai feel a little relieved. If this situation can continue for a while, Zheng Bai is actually happy to see it happen - the strength of the Hai Han militia is too strong, and it will actually be good for North Vietnam to let them lose more in Hue City. Moreover, Hue City is so big that Zheng Bai does not believe that with the existing strength of the Hai Han Militia, they can completely control the city defense after capturing Hue.
As for the rumors that the Haihan people were negotiating peace with the South Vietnamese court, Zheng Bai didn't believe it at all. He knew that the Haihan people were not a good person. They spent so much effort destroying various seaports in South Vietnam and driving away the Portuguese. Now, With troops already at the gates and victory in sight, how could South Vietnam be tempted by some conditions? Besides, could North Vietnam not be able to meet the conditions that South Vietnam can offer? Comparing the two, the Haihan people will definitely choose allies with strong relationships instead of opponents who have been fighting for more than a year.
According to Zheng Bai's estimation, after the Haihan people invaded the city, they were bound to encounter a crazy counterattack by the defenders who were forced to a desperate end. As long as they fought for a few more days, the Haihan militia would suffer more casualties, and Yan Chujie would naturally have to take the initiative to invite them. Send troops to assist. But what he didn't expect was that an organized leading party actually appeared in the city, and took the initiative to seek cooperation from the Haihan people, allowing the Haihan militia to easily control a small part of the city, and relatively smoothly set up their forward positions in the imperial city. An area only one mile away.
When the situation developed to this point, the final outcome had basically been decided. The defenders did not know the actual strength of the Haihan Militia. They only knew that the enemy had advanced half of the city after breaking through the outer city and arrived outside the imperial city. . As soon as the news spread, it was quickly interpreted by some of the defenders as "our dynasty is about to end", which led to large-scale rebellion in the city and the loss of organized resistance. This also reduced the pressure on the Haihan militia in disguise. Otherwise, if the tens of thousands of defenders in the city really pressed forward and fought the militia army, not to mention that they would not be able to fight, but the militia would suffer more casualties and ammunition as a result. The consumption of materials is definitely unavoidable, and it will also delay their attack on the imperial city.
When Zheng Bai received the news that the Haihan Militia was about to launch a formal attack on the Imperial City today, his first thought was to send troops to attack Xicheng. Since the defenders in the city have to resist the Hai Han Militia's offensive against the Imperial City, they will not be able to allocate too many troops to defend the outer city. If this opportunity is seized well, then the North Vietnamese Army should still be able to defeat the Imperial City with the Hai Han Militia. We had entered Hue City before, and with our superior strength, at least half of the fat meat of Hue could be squeezed into our bowl.
Zheng Bai immediately raised his account and mobilized his troops to prepare for the attack. But the North Vietnamese army had just finished assembling the team, and before they had time to pull the team out of the camp, the gate of Hue West City suddenly opened wide, and thousands of South Vietnamese troops poured out and rushed towards the North Vietnamese camp.
At first, the North Vietnamese thought it was the defenders taking the initiative to attack, but they soon discovered that something was wrong - the South Vietnamese army did not march in the proper military formations, and was almost a chaotic swarm, and this was obviously not their normal behavior. combat level. Zheng Bai made a judgment after personally confirming that the South Vietnamese army was not launching an attack, but running for their lives!
The emergence of this situation probably means one thing, that is, the Haihan Militia has breached the Imperial City!
The anxious Zheng Bai wanted to immediately let his tens of thousands of troops fly into Hue City with wings, but his reason told him that he could not let go of these rebel soldiers who had abandoned the city and fled, because the big shots of the Ruan family were likely to Mixed in among these rebels. If they escape, it will be equivalent to leaving behind troubles. Maybe they will organize a new resistance army further south in a month or two. Moreover, among the tasks assigned to him by Zheng Jie, the first priority was to capture the core members of the Ruan family, and the second was to control the wealth in Hue City.
"Form up! Stop these rebels. No one can escape! But if there are any resisters, kill them!" Zheng Bai did not hesitate for too long before making his decision. No matter what the situation in the city is, he must first capture the people he must capture. The blame for not grabbing the money can be passed on to the unkind Haihan people, but if the city is destroyed but no one is arrested, then Zheng Bai, as the commander-in-chief, will have to bear the blame.
For these deserters, the several-mile-wide defense line on the plain was simply an insurmountable chasm. After the hundreds of rebels at the front were knocked down by the intensive musket fire of the North Vietnamese Army, the march of the rebels behind immediately slowed down. A South Vietnamese officer on horseback began to yell and organize the surrounding soldiers to form a military formation. However, in such a chaotic situation, it was really difficult to maintain military discipline in the chaotic army. Except for a small number of imperial guardsmen who protected the nobles from withdrawing from the imperial city, most of the other South Vietnamese troops had actually lost their original organization at this time, and there was no effective command at all.
Zheng Bai didn't have the patience to wait for these rebels to slowly reorganize on the plains. Entering the city now a moment later may mean that there is less oil and water that can be scraped out of Hue. For the North Vietnamese court, the life and death of the Nguyen people in power was not important, as long as they were kept, so Zheng Bai decisively ordered the artillery to aim at several places in the enemy's formation where military flags were held and start bombarding them.
The sharp artillery fire quickly dispersed the few organized troops among the South Vietnamese deserters, and the rebels who fled in panic did not have any heavy weapons that could compete with them - when they were fleeing for their lives, who could care about those Cannons weighing hundreds of kilograms were brought out.
"Pass my order, the cavalry battalion will attack and drive the enemy southward!" Seeing that his own army had gained an advantage with long-range weapons, Zheng Bai issued a new combat order. The size of the cavalry battalion of the North Vietnamese Army was not large, with less than 500 horses, and the horses were all of the relatively short Yunnan horse breed. They were very suitable for carrying loads, but they were not very useful as charge horses. In terms of horse breed alone, it is actually not as good as the Haihan Cavalry which currently has less than fifty horses. However, this unit has the advantage in the current situation and the battlefield terrain is relatively flat. It can play a very significant role on the battlefield. Hundreds of cavalry were ordered to attack, killing the South Vietnamese soldiers who tried to flee to the north one by one, and drove the South Vietnamese deserters to the south bank of the Xiong River like sheep.
But although this process was relatively smooth, the battle to eliminate the deserters did not end in a short time, because deserters continued to pour out of the city, and later even the North Vietnamese cavalry units that rushed too far south were killed. Caught in the middle. By the time the North Vietnamese Army's infantry and cavalry cooperated and forced most of the deserters to the banks of the Xiangjiang River, it was already noon, and by this time, almost three hours had passed since the Haihan militia had entered the Imperial City from the Peace Arch.
"What a good thing! Put it away and be careful not to get hurt!" Yan Chujie praised while carefully handing a blue and white porcelain vase to the militiaman next to him.
"Is this bottle valuable?" Qiao Zhiya asked Yan Chujie with a blank expression as he watched the militiamen take out the bottle as if it were a treasure.
"Well, it's very valuable." Yan Chujie nodded and said, "That's the blue and white lotus-shaped vase from the Xuande period. They were all supplied as tribute to the palace and are not available on the market. Look at this, it's blue and white, sea water and white dragon. The patterned flat pot is also from the official kiln...and this seawater banana leaf patterned bowl, this dragon pattern bowl...tsk tsk, I really found a treasure this time! Move them all, move them all!"
"I didn't realize that Mr. Yan was still an expert on porcelain!" Qiao Zhiya couldn't help but admire him when he saw that he spoke eloquently.
"Experts can't say for sure. In fact, I have made up for it recently." Yan Chujie said with a smile: "Since the attack on Hue was decided at the end of last year, this guy Ning Qi has grabbed me and forced me to make up for my lessons and made up for my cultural relics. Knowledge. He said that there are many valuable things in Hue, and he is afraid that if we don’t know the goods, it will be a pity to smash them as ordinary jars. ”
In addition to being supplied to the palace, the fine porcelain produced by the official kilns of the Ming Dynasty also had another important destination: as gifts to some servant countries. During Zheng He's Seventh Voyage to the West in the early 15th century, Annam and Champa were areas visited by Zheng He's fleet many times. At that time, these two countries each received a lot of exquisite porcelain from the official kilns of the Ming Dynasty. These collections in Hue City are all genuine goods with well-documented origins. Ning Qi had greeted Yan Chujie early and asked him to collect as many of these good things as possible and transport them back to Victory Port.
Although these porcelains are not as valuable at this time as they were in later generations, and can often fetch tens of millions or hundreds of millions at auctions, they are still rare and rare objects among the people, even if they are used to display in some external places. Exhibitions at venues, such as the Guangdong Office in Guangzhou, Haihan Bank, etc., will still have a significant effect on improving your personality.
In addition to these porcelains, there are also many exquisite handicrafts from the Ming Dynasty in the palace, as well as calligraphy and painting works by famous people. Although this is just a small court in a quiet corner, it is still a powerful party. In addition, the maritime trade with the Ming Dynasty has always been close, and it has also collected a lot of good things. Although Yan Chujie had been studying cultural relics for two months, he could only identify objects by looking at pictures. Those who had seen the pictures and information could roughly tell, but those who had not seen them could only rely on imagination. It was difficult for him to identify things like calligraphy and paintings. Although there was the author's seal on the back, most of them were letters, numbers, etc. Yan Chujie didn't recognize a few of them at all, so he could only let the soldiers ignore these things. Collect them all and transport them away.
Cultural wealth is important, but to the Haihan militia, the most important thing is more practical things like gold, silver and jewelry. After all, when the dividends were distributed after the war, they couldn't bring vases, plates, banners and the like. Dispatch the militia. Although they are issued with negotiable bonds, they still require real money to be used as bank reserves. Several big guys from the Military Commission had already calculated it before the war. If they couldn't get over a million taels of silver from Hue City during this trip, it would really be considered a failure.
However, when they were clearing out the Treasury of the Ministry of Finance the day before, the scene almost made Yan Chujie and others feel heartbroken. The official treasury of the South Vietnamese imperial court contained less than 50,000 taels of silver and only more than 3,000 taels of gold. Such a small amount of money Even the exchange center of Haihan Bank in Victory Port cannot be compared. Looking at the empty warehouse, several senior officers at that time were a little suspicious that the expected gains from this cross-sea operation before the war were a bit too high.
It is not surprising that such a situation occurs. At the beginning of last year, the Hai Han militia destroyed Dong Hai Port north of Hue. In the second half of the year, it turned Hoi An south of Hue into ruins, and successively destroyed the two largest ports in South Vietnam. After the seaport, the Portuguese chose to withdraw from South Vietnam, and the Haihan militia blocked the waterway from Hainan to South Vietnam. Various factors caused the maritime trade business under the South Vietnamese court to be greatly affected, and the trade volume shrank to only one or two percent of the original. At the same time, the huge military expenditures have not decreased at all. In order to maintain the military confrontation with North Vietnam, the South Vietnamese court could only squeeze out military expenditures as much as possible from fiscal expenditures. This led to the rapid emptiness of the national treasury, even if the Haihan Militia If we don't attack Hue at this time, as long as this situation continues for a few more months, the South Vietnamese court will also fall into bankruptcy.
Fortunately, the raids on the homes of powerful families in the city did not disappoint the military brass. Only at the home of Ruan Tong, who was in charge of the commercial power in South Vietnam, the militiamen confiscated 130,000 taels of silver and more than 7,000 taels of gold from the underground bank. Two, hundreds of kilograms of various kinds of jewelry and jade, and hundreds of handicrafts. The valuable goods copied by this family alone were enough to load more than twenty large carts. Yan Chujie couldn't help but sigh, this South Vietnam is in the same vein as the Ming Dynasty, and it has also managed to "hide wealth among the people". The national treasury is empty, but the powerful and powerful are all very fat. Seeing that the country's political power is about to collapse, these people are still reluctant to spend money on military operations. They deserve it now that they have been plundered by the invaders.
With such an example in front of them, the militiamen became more enthusiastic about raiding homes. On the day before they attacked the imperial city, the Haihan militia seized property from the homes of wealthy families in the city. The value of gold and silver alone exceeded one million taels. This also gave Yan Chujie plenty of time to slowly appraise the various art collections in the Nanyue Palace after entering the imperial city, so as to show off his humanistic and artistic accomplishments.
(End of chapter)