Han’s Son is Not a Slave

Chapter 327: Trouble with new enlisted soldiers

Zhou Shixiang eloquently claimed that in the future, the Taiping Army would change the previous rogue approach and use it to build bases for war needs. However, when attacking Zengcheng, Panyu, Shunde and other counties, the Taiping Army still used rogue tactics. Free Fiction Portal

The most typical manifestation is that the Taiping army raided the "strategic materials" in the occupied area on a large scale, and moved a large number of young and strong people to Xiangshan in the name of "voluntary". "No murder, no arson", but the plundering of grain, salt and iron still caused huge losses to the local people. During this process, many villagers spontaneously organized regiments to resist the Taiping Army, which resulted in a certain degree of casualties.

During the Second Battle of Lutouhe, the Tayinbu Department was completely wiped out, and Zhou Shixiang changed some radical policies slightly, allowing people who were unwilling to move south to Xiangshan with the Taiping Army to leave a certain amount of rations, and no longer forcibly attacked villages with strong resistance. to avoid unnecessary casualties of the common people, and vigorously publicized that if the common people did not move south with the Taiping army, they would be retaliated by the Qing army. However, these remedial measures came too late. By the time the Taiping army withdrew, the common people in Zengcheng, Panyu, Shunde and some areas of Xin'an were killed or injured. There are more than 1,000 people, and more than ten villages have been burnt down.

With the complete victory of the two Lutouhe battles and the disintegration of the Qing army's rule in Zengcheng, Panyu, Shunde and other rural areas, more and more green battalions, bandits and robbers joined the Taiping Army, making the new battalion head of the Taiping Army continue to grow. It increased to more than a dozen, and the number of new enlisted soldiers rose from more than 1,000 at the beginning to more than 6,000.

The military discipline of these new recruits has been corrupted to the extreme. Just take Yu Tianen's army of Zengcheng Volunteer Camp as an example. After capturing Zengcheng and surrendering to the Taiping Army, Yu Tianen sent his subordinates to loot everywhere, killing no less than one or two places in the town and village. The name is to pay food and taxes to the Taiping army commander Zhou. If they do not obey, they will be regarded as the Tartars in their hearts and will be killed.

The destructive looting of the new recruits in various places made the Taiping army's reputation in these places bad. Zhou Shixiang did not want to restrain these soldiers, but the sources of these soldiers were complicated, and each had a territory. They were also very separated from each other, so that the Taiping Army, which was eager to return to Xiangshan, could not draw out its troops, nor did they have time to use troops against them. Later, Zhou Shixiang simply ignored them. Let them fend for themselves.

Qin Zhisheng strongly opposes letting these new enlisted soldiers be left alone, saying that these bandits surrendered their troops under the banner of the Taiping Army to take advantage of the benefits, but the bad thing was the reputation of the Taiping Army. When the army is the enemy. It's too late to make up for it. Now, even if the Taiping Army is temporarily unable to incorporate these new recruits into the Taiping Army system, officials should be dispatched to take over the territories controlled by these new recruits, try their best to maintain local law and order, restrict the military discipline of the new recruits, and prevent them from fighting against the new recruits. The scourge of the people, rather than let it go.

Zhou Shixiang ignored Qin Zhisheng's request to send personnel to purge and surrender the troops. First, he really did not have such personnel to send out. Second, the Taiping Army had already expanded a lot in the two northward marches, and he had not yet had time to digest it, so there was still room for reorganization. Those new recruits. Thirdly, he privately thought that these soldiers were unbearable. But there are thousands of them anyway, and it is a force that is neither small nor small.

At present, the Qing army in Guangzhou was wiped out by the Taiping army before and after seven or eight thousand people. In a short period of time, the Qing army in Guangzhou was no longer able to use troops on Xiangshan. After Tayinbu was annihilated, the Qing army in front of the Qing army, Kalai Daoka, shrunk. Back to Guangzhou can be seen.

He made two northward marches. The first time Zhou Shixiang wanted to get food from the areas occupied by the Qing army, and the second time was to eliminate a certain force of the Qing army and completely destroy the ability of the prefectures and counties around Guangzhou to supply food and grass to the Qing army. As a result, the Qing army in Guangzhou could only adjust food from the Chaoshan area, but could not solve the source of food and grass nearby. This will inevitably increase the burden on the Qing army in Guangzhou, and will also affect their ability to use troops.

It can be said. The strategic goals of the two northward marches envisaged by Zhou Shixiang have been basically completed. Now, what he has to do is to digest the results of the two northward marches and place the people who moved south with the Taiping army in various places in Xiangshan. After the summer grains were harvested, they would launch a northward war, cut the Qing army's flesh little by little and let their blood, until the Taiping army was able to attack Guangzhou City.

During this period, Xiangshan needed absolute security and stability, and the Taiping Army's focus was no longer on offense. It's defense, then there are thousands of new soldiers scattered around Guangzhou, which is undoubtedly for the Taiping army to stand in the front and attract the attention of the Qing army. This is a good thing for the Taiping army, but the price paid is reputation. Damaged.

In chaotic times, human life is like a mustard. What Zhou Shixiang can do is to settle the people who moved south with the Taiping army, so that they will not starve to death or be killed. I can only feel guilty. As for the reputation, if the handle of the knife is strong enough, the reputation will be good; if the handle of the knife is not hard enough, no matter how good the reputation is, it is not as good as a pig or a dog.

People, there is no perfect person, things, there must be no perfect things.

The good thing that everything is perfect can only be said to be an extravagant hope in the current era.

After returning to Xiangshan, Zhou Shixiang convened a military meeting of more than 100 households. At this military meeting, Zhou Shixiang formally proposed the concept of five districts.

The five areas refer to the core area, the edge area, the occupied area, the friendly area, and the neutral area.

The so-called core area is the main site of the Taiping army dominated by Xiangshan; the peripheral area is the area around Xiangshan; the occupied area is the area occupied by the Qing army; the friendly area is naturally the area controlled by the Ming army, and the neutral area refers to those It was a turf that was neither attached to the Manchu Qing nor to the Nanming.

The first task of the Taiping Army is to ensure that the core area is not threatened by the Qing army, and the people in the core area must not be invaded by the Taiping Army. The forces in the marginal area must accept the command of the Taiping Army (mainly new soldiers). The Taiping Army can default to the marginal area to collect grain and tax independently, use the banner of the Taiping Army, and provide protection when the Qing army invades. The premise is that the marginal area The forces in the district had to pay a certain amount of money to the Taiping Army. At the same time, the Taiping Army will also constrain the forces in the marginal areas to protect the local people, instead of killing and looting.

The Taiping Army must immediately establish contact with the friendly military area, and at the same time reach a certain degree of intention with the forces in the neutral area. As long as the forces in the neutral area do not clearly fall to the Qing Dynasty, the Taiping Army will not use troops on the other side. As for the occupied areas, it is the main direction of the Taiping Army's future use of troops. For the civilians in the occupied areas, the Taiping Army will not kill in principle.

Zhou Shixiang was vague about how to deal with the people in the occupied area. After he was going to deal with Wang Yinghua's affairs, he would discuss with Song Xianggong and the others about the precautions for using troops in the occupied area in the future.

Zhou Shixiang was eager to obtain the surrender of the captives and scholars because he urgently needed these people to help him manage Xiangshan and build a civilian system of the Taiping Army.

Zhou Shixiang never believed that warriors could only conquer the world, but not rule the world. In his view, a perfect regime should pay equal attention to both civil and military affairs. The difference between civil and military should not only be based on whether he is in charge of the people or the military, but should be distinguished by whether he can read or not, whether he can read official documents, whether he can handle affairs according to the system, and whether he can express his own opinions on the matter.

In one sentence, the warrior in Zhou Shixiang's eyes is nothing but an illiterate knife-handling man. As long as a literate knife-handling man can be called a literati, not what kind of official this person is, even if he is just a general, as long as he is literate, If he can understand the official documents under his hair, then he is a civil servant, not a military officer.

The civil servants are the commanders, and the military officers are the prime ministers; the civil servants can ride horses and draw bows, and the military officers can compose poems. This may seem absurd, but in fact it is the core of Confucian teaching. The six arts are the foundation of this concept. Phase is the essence of Confucianism.

However, the reality is that most of the warriors of this era are illiterate, and those who know how to read, even if they are from an officer to a general soldier or a noble to a prince, are still military officers in the eyes of the world, not a member of the civil service. The concept of Confucianism, which has been distorted by Wengui and Wujian, has been popular for hundreds of years. If it is not in troubled times, the status of warriors is so low that it makes people speechless.

Zhou Shixiang wanted to break this deformed view of civil and military affairs, and to establish a civil and military merger regime of the Taiping Army, he must have a large number of people capable of civil and military affairs to help him build this regime and serve as officials at all levels. But the problem is that there is no such person in his pocket, or that such person is pitiful.

Cultivating civil and military officials of the Taiping Army is the key to the future development of the Taiping Army. King Li Dingguo of Jin, King Liu Wenxiu and Sun Kewang of Shu, and Ai Nengqi of that year are the new generation cultivated by Zhang Xianzhong in the Daxi Army. The burden of the Great Western Army became the last pillar of the Ming Dynasty. If Sun Kewang has no dissent, Zhou Shixiang believes that the co-owner of the Great Western Army Alliance must have achieved no less than Li Dingguo in the history books. After all, Sun Kewang is the true successor of Zhang Xianzhong and the true leader of the Great Western Army!

Zhou Shixiang often felt that his subordinates were lacking in talent. Everything about Erjin Xiangshan and the Taiping Army was driven by him. Although Song Xianggong and Liao Ruixiang spared no effort to help~www.NovelMTL.com~, there are still many difficulties. Among them, there are still many difficulties. The reason is that there is no effective grass-roots officials to assist.

Only relying on a structure of power going to the countryside is not enough to support the development of the Taiping Army in Xiangshan. There must be enough officials to maintain this structure and continue to enrich and expand, so that the Taiping Army can obtain a steady stream of money, food, manpower and stability. Only in the rear of the Qing army can we hold on to the end in the constant battle with the Qing army.

Zhou Shixiang is already working on education and training, but just as there are only a few talented people in Xinhui County who are helping Liao Ruixiang to maintain the operation of the county, education is also a step by step, and it is difficult for the students to be taught to reach the level of Zhou Shixiang. Satisfied, let alone the shortage of teachers and textbooks. Moreover, education in Xiangshan County only started at the beginning of the year. It will take at least a few years until the children in the school can really grow up. In these few years, Zhou Shixiang must obtain the help of those ready-made literati.

The captives and scholars are treasures on Zhou Shixiang's lips. He can't kill people because of the other party's unwillingness to submit. He must let these people serve him, even if they are reluctant, he has to temporarily lower them. Head for your own use.

Zhou Shixiang asked Xu Yingyuan to bring Wang Yinghua over.

(To be continued.)

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