Signed to Zhu Cihong, Prince of the Late Ming Dynasty

Chapter 45 45, Emperor Chongzhen was discouraged, Zhu Cihong gave advice
After listening to Zhu Cixiang's words, the Ming Dynasty monarchs and ministers present were stunned at the same time.

Originally, after hearing the news that Wu Sangui was unwilling to send troops, Chongzhen fell into an ice cave and almost couldn't breathe.

But after hearing Zhu Cixiang's words, Chongzhen suddenly had a little hope in his heart.

Chongzhen asked, "Lang'er, what do you mean by that?"

Li Guozhen looked at Zhu Cixiang, and the doubts in his heart were clearly shown on his face.

Even Wu Sangui didn't come here, it might be very difficult to defend the city of Beijing, yet the crown prince actually said he could repel Li Zicheng?
It's a bit outrageous.

Seeing the reactions of these guys, Zhu Cihong immediately smiled.

You people are still too young!

Zhu Cixiang was confident and said: "In fact, Li Zicheng seems to be powerful now, but since he has been unable to attack for a long time, there must have been complaints among the army.

As the saying goes, go all out, then decline, and exhaust three times.Li Zicheng's first wave of offensive has dissipated with Liu Zongmin's death.The second wave of offensive almost broke through the Desheng Gate, but it was also blocked by us.

Then, Li Zicheng actually only has one chance left. If he still can't break through Beijing City in the third chance, then his hope of really conquering Beijing City is very slim, it can be said that it basically does not exist. "

Listening to Zhu Cihong's analysis, everyone began to be a little convinced, as if it really was the case.

Li Guozhen was a little unconvinced, and asked: "Siege of the city may be really difficult for Li Zicheng, but what if he chooses to besiege Beijing for a long time?"

This is actually a very common means of siege, which is to surround the city but not attack. The purpose is to trap and starve the people in the city to death. Due to the lack of resources, a large number of people will be reduced, and eventually they will be unable to resist.

Zhu Cixiang smiled and said: "If this method is really used, then Li Zicheng does have a chance to conquer Beijing. But the problem is that if he really wants to use this method of warfare, then Li Zicheng must besiege the capital for at least half a year. To start, does the current Li Zicheng have that much time? Actually, he doesn’t.”

With that said, Zhu Cixi stood up and walked towards the wall of the imperial study room.

There, a map of the territory of the Ming Dynasty hangs, which also shows Liaodong, Annan, Korea and even Ryukyu and Japan beyond the East China Sea.

Zhu Cixiang reached out and placed his hand on the map: "Please see, Li Zicheng's Northern Expedition this time is actually somewhat imitating Taizu (Zhu Yuanzhang). He sent two partial divisions to attack Taiyuan and Lu'an, and the main force left Henan from Shaanxi and passed through Shandong went straight to the capital from the northeast.

In other words, Li Zicheng's current territory is Shaanxi, Shanxi, Shandong, Henan, and most of the northern Zhili area south of the capital.

These areas have a characteristic, what is it?That is, he has been severely poisoned by the Mongols such as Oala and Tatars and the Manchu Qing for so many years. Li Zi has become the people's heart in these places. Every time he conquers a place, he will "kill officials and release food", kill a group of officials, and open up the country. The government granary is for the common people.

If he does this, it is indeed beneficial, that is, the common people feel relieved that the former corrupt officials have been killed.Then he saw King Chuang releasing food, so he naturally followed King Chuang wholeheartedly, which was why Li Zicheng was able to conquer so many provinces in a short period of time. "

Listening to Zhu Cixi's explanation, the Ming Dynasty monarchs and ministers present could not help but breathe quickly.

They seemed to be able to see that after Li Zicheng broke through a place, he pulled out batches of Ming officials and beheaded them for public display. The corpses were hung on the city gate and fluttered in the wind.

I saw countless bony ordinary people cheering, taking bags of grain from Chuang Jun, shouting "Long live King Chuang, long live Dashun".

Watching the ruling order of the Ming Dynasty crumble on the vast land north of the Yellow River, watching the invading army swarming like a black tide, encircling the capital heavily!

Chongzhen swallowed a mouthful of saliva, and said with some difficulty: "Then what should we do?"

Li Guozhen also said: "If you follow the prince's statement, it will give people a feeling that the capital will be breached at any time."

When Zhu Cihong heard this, he laughed again.

at any time?

If this prince hadn't traveled through time, the corpses of your group would have rotted away!

Zhu Cihong coughed and said slowly: "However, behind Li Zicheng's strength, there are actually great hidden worries. This is because his regime has been established for too short a time, and the local foundation is seriously lacking.

Let’s take Li Zicheng’s favorite policy of killing officials and releasing grain as an example. Everyone knows that the officials and gentry in our Ming Dynasty are actually one. Gentlemen.

Therefore, Li Zicheng's killing of officials was tantamount to killing the children of these gentry and big families who were officials abroad, cutting off their hope of continuing to use official power to expand their family power.

If this is the case, then forget it, but Li Zicheng still has a policy of releasing grain.

After so many years of wars and natural and man-made disasters in the Central Plains, in fact, many cities did not want to rescue the victims, but really had no food.

Where is the food?In the homes of those wealthy gentry families.The gentry of the Ming Dynasty had the idea of ​​donating land, which caused the land in the families of the gentry families to expand at an alarming rate, allowing them to obtain huge amounts of food.

It is impossible for Li Zicheng not to know this, so when he can't find food in the city, how can he appease the people?You must know that the refugees are the biggest supporters of Chuangjun, and Li Zicheng must give them an explanation.

Therefore, Li Zicheng had no choice but to attack these gentry and use the food from their homes to provide relief to the refugees.

Now that food has become stronger, the money from the gentry's family must also be snatched away from the labor force, and the women from the gentry's family must also be snatched away for fun. This is a very natural thing.

Under such circumstances, the gentry in these five provinces hated the intruders extremely.They will continue to cause trouble for the invading army behind the scenes. The gentry often have intricate power and reputation in the local area. Even if their family wealth is gone, they can still recruit people to oppose the invading army through other methods.

Of course it doesn't matter if they invade the army in a short period of time, but as long as the main force of the army fails to return to the capital, big trouble will occur in the five provinces behind them. "

Hearing this, Chongzhen's eyes began to glow, and he couldn't help but said: "So, Xinger, you mean that some local righteous men will rise up to resist Li Zicheng?"

Zhu Cilang smiled, and said: "It's natural. If the emperor is willing to make a decree, saying that as long as the local righteous men actively participate in countering the rebellion, the emperor will reward them in the future, then their enthusiasm will be even higher."

Therefore, it is said that Chongzhen was incompetent. The intruders kept approaching. Chongzhen did not want to mobilize various forces to resist. Instead, he kept issuing "sinful edicts". If one failed, he would issue two more.

What is the prerequisite for the usefulness of the Edict of Guilt?It is you who must have an army when you are an emperor!In that case, everyone will apologize when they see the emperor, and we can't rebel even if we have an army, it's almost enough.

But in the current situation, when Chongzhen's culprit was punished, everyone felt: "Oh, your Majesty is timid, weak, and scared. King Chuang seems to be successful."

Therefore, every time Chongzhen issued an edict of guilt, a group of Ming officials surrendered to Li Zicheng, and when it was issued again, more people surrendered.

Only when you are strong enough can you have the capital to show weakness.When a country has become so weak as in the late Ming Dynasty, it would be too long to condemn itself to show its weakness—history has also proved this point.

After hearing Zhu Cihong's words, Chongzhen was happy: "Then do this!"

Zhu Cizhong glanced at Li Guozhen and knew that this guy was still unconvinced, so he continued: "If we rely solely on local gentry, it will indeed be unsustainable for a while. But don't forget, there are two other factors that are also very important."

Zhu Cixiang moved his hand to Tongzhou and said: "Wu Sangui's Guan Ning Army has arrived in Tongzhou. Even if Li Zicheng can know through Wu Sangui's behavior that Guan Ning Army is acting according to the wind, Guan Ning Army can stab Li Zicheng in the back at any time. A fact.

Therefore, Li Zicheng had to allocate part of his troops to defend against Wu Sangui.If I guessed correctly, he would most likely send someone to recruit Wu Sangui to surrender. "

Chongzhen was a little nervous when he heard this, and asked, "Will Wu Sangui surrender?"

Zhu Cixi's expression was calm: "Of course not, because Wu Sangui's whole family is now in the capital! Our court can continue to send people to contact Wu Sangui and give him and the many generals of the Guanning Army under his command official posts. Jin Jue.

In this way, Wu Sangui will definitely still want to have both ways, and he will not make a choice between the imperial court and Li Zicheng rashly.As long as he doesn't fall to Li Zicheng, even if he doesn't send troops, he can still share part of the pressure for the city of Beijing, which is enough. "

When Li Guozhen heard this, he was actually [-]% convinced.

It has to be said that these analyzes by Zhu Cihong are indeed very penetrating, analyzing the entire battle situation very thoroughly, giving people a feeling of clearing the clouds and seeing the fog.

Li Guozhen couldn't help but said: "Excuse me, Your Highness, are there any other aspects?"

Zhu Cixiang nodded: "Of course there is. In fact, there is another place that can also provide combat power to the Ming Dynasty. Please take a look."

Zhu Cihong's fingers moved slowly towards the bottom of the map, and finally stopped at the south of the Huaihe River.

Li Guozhen couldn't help but said: "Zuo Liangyu?"

Zhu Cilang laughed: "Zuo Liangyu? What's the use of that trash thing? This is what I want to talk about."

Zhu Cihong's hand continued to descend, and finally stopped south of the Yangtze River.

British justice: "Ying Tianfu?"

Yingtianfu is where Nanjing is located, and there is also a Sixth Division of the Ming Dynasty there, which can be regarded as a preparatory court.

Zhu Cihong shook his head: "It's small, the layout is small."

British Duke: "..."

Zhu Cihong tapped the map vigorously: "I'm not just talking about Yingtian Mansion, but the whole Jiangnan!"

"Jiangnan?"

After hearing Zhu Cihong's words, the expressions on the faces of the Ming emperors and ministers present were different.

Judging from the expressions alone, it was obvious that they were not very convinced by Zhu Cihong's words.

For a long time, although the north of the Ming Dynasty has been experiencing constant wars, the south of the Ming Dynasty has been relatively stable.

The Japanese pirates, who were once extremely rampant in the middle of the Ming Dynasty, began to recede rapidly with the official lifting of the sea ban in the first year of Longqing. By the late Ming Dynasty, the situation was basically calm.

The opening of maritime trade made Jiangnan take off rapidly, and the economy experienced unprecedented prosperity. When the Central Plains of the Chongzhen Dynasty was corrupted by Li Zicheng, and Liaodong and Shandong were ravaged by the Manchus, Jiangnan became the most important source of Ming's economy. .

The reason why Beijing City has not issued salaries for a long time is because the water transportation route from Jiangnan was completely cut off after Li Zicheng occupied Shandong, and no money or food could be transported to Beijing City.

Li Guozhen wondered: "But, Jiangnan doesn't have enough soldiers and horses."

Among the soldiers and horses in the south of the Yangtze River, only the Qi family army can be considered excellent, but due to the internal struggle of the Ming Dynasty, the Qi family army had already been betrayed in Liaodong and died cleanly.

Zhu Cilang laughed: "Although Jiangnan doesn't have enough soldiers and horses, there are people in Jiangnan who are loyal enough to Daming!"

Jiangnan is very loyal to Daming?

Yes.

Just look it up in the history books.

What to check?
Investigate the massacre after the Qing army entered the pass.

Yangzhou Ten Days, Jiading Three Massacres, Suzhou Massacre, Nanchang Massacre, Ganzhou Massacre, Jiangyin Massacre, Kunshan Massacre, Jiaxing Massacre, Haining Massacre...

These are just some of them, but it can be easily found that these cities are all from Jiangnan.

It is not to say that there were no resistance and massacres in other places. For example, 70 people were massacred in Guangzhou, and at least 30 people died in Jinan. The army's resistance is undoubtedly the most intense among all regions.

Why are you resisting the Qing Dynasty?Of course we are all loyal to Ming Dynasty.

The policies of the Ming Dynasty were very beneficial to the officials and gentry, and the officials and gentry as local backbones naturally reciprocated the favor and responded to the Ming Dynasty by using their family's prestige to mobilize local people to resist the Manchus.

This is the so-called Ming Dynasty's 300 years of raising scholars.

Zhu Cixiang said calmly: "The people of Jiangnan will not sit back and watch Beijing city besieged for so long. I can conclude that in as little as half a month and as long as a month, we will hear the news of Jiangnan troops heading north.

By that time, Li Zicheng wanted to conquer Beijing but was unable to do so. Wu Sangui was at his side to contain him. In his territory, there were gentry from the north who were making trouble, and behind him were the troops of King Qin who were marching from the south to the north. At that time, Li Zicheng was again What can we do to continue to surround the city of Beijing? "

After listening to Zhu Cihong's words, the Ming emperors and ministers present suddenly had a feeling of clearing the clouds and seeing the fog.

Duke Ying couldn't help getting excited, and said with a smile: "At first, I thought that there was no hope, and I was trying to count it all. But I didn't expect to give His Highness such an analysis now, so it turns out that Daming can still be saved."

Zhu Cihong laughed, and said seriously: "Of course Daming can still be saved, there is no doubt about it!"

We must know that after the collapse of Beijing, facing the Qing army entering the customs, the fragmented Nanming can rely on half of the country to persist for more than 20 years, let alone the real Ming Dynasty that represents the world's righteousness?
Chongzhen breathed a sigh of relief and said, "So, now we just need to hold on, right?"

In Chongzhen's mind, since there is still so much help from the outside world, it should be enough for the capital to stick to it and wait for help.

Zhu Cihong smiled: "Of course it's okay to hold on, but in this situation, it's more appropriate to take the initiative and catch Li Zicheng by surprise!"

　This chapter is 4300 words, which is equivalent to two usual chapters, so there is only this chapter today.As for why not take it apart, that sentence still affects the reading experience. .

　　
　
(End of this chapter)