Ma Ying's words made the generals seem to have been poured with cold water, and they calmed down from the fanaticism of advocating for the rapid advance of the north. They all gradually grew up from the commander commander of the first battalion when they were in the commander of the general's mansion. After experiencing hunger, they certainly understood the importance of food and grass to the army. They also knew that although guns and cannons were sharp, they also needed ammunition to exert their power, and at the same time they were more dependent on logistics. Once the ammunition was lost, the guns and cannons in their hands would become burdens.

Let go of the impatient situation in my heart and calm down and understand Ma Ying's suffering. The imperial guards and local prefectures participating in the war now have reached 400,000, and more than ten newly formed brigades are also entering the war zone. Moreover, the consumption of war horses is several times that of soldiers, and the 200,000 soldiers who accompany the army also need to eat and drink. In this way, only daily consumption is a huge amount, and the pressure of the Ministry of Revenue responsible for material retrieval can be imagined.

In addition, with the rapid advance of the army northward, the territory occupied is becoming increasingly large, and the items need to be sent to farther and larger areas. At present, the north is cold, the rivers are frozen, and the waterways are cut off. Even in the south of the Yangtze River, the transportation capacity is greatly reduced and it needs to be transported by land. During the transportation, there are also faces the harassment of enemy troops and bandits, the fight between poor people, the loss of injuries and illnesses of husbands, etc.

The overlap of various factors has led to the speed of supply of materials being difficult to keep up with the army's offensive pace. Once the army has cut off food and ammunition supply, the consequences will be very serious, and it will even lead to the failure of the second Northern Expedition, repeating the mistakes of Emperor Taizong's failure in the two Northern Expeditions at the beginning of the founding of the Song Dynasty.

All the generals knew that the court, whether it was historical records or the claim that Taizong's failure in the Northern Expedition was caused by the generals' failure to comply with the orders, the greed for merit and the reckless advance, the mutual support, and the strong Khitan troops. They understood that this was just to cover up Taizong's incompetence, and it was precisely because of his distrust of the generals that they could only fight according to the formation map granted before the war; they also underestimated the enemy, lacked preparations, and were at a loss in the face of the battle; and lacked military talents, lack of flexibility, etc.

However, everyone also knows that these are actually only one of the reasons for the failure of the two Northern Expeditions, and they are actually related to insufficient food and grass...

In the first month of the third year of Yongxi, the Song army divided into three routes to make the first northern expedition: Cao Bin from the east led his troops out of Xiongzhou; Tian Chongjin from the middle route led his troops out of Feihu; Pan Mei and Yang Ye from the west route led his troops out of Yanmen. In March, the Eastern Army occupied Gu'an and Zhuozhou; after the Central Army defeated the Liao army in Feihu North, they set up suspicious troops to win, captured the Liao general Dapengyi alive, forcing Feihu and Lingqiu Liao army to surrender; the Western Army also won consecutive victories in Huanzhou, Shuozhou and Yingzhou.

When the Song army arrived at the city of Nanjing, Liao, the army was very strong. The Liao general Yelu Xizhen avoided the edge and retreated to the victorious mouth. Yelu Sha retreated to the north of the Qinghe River. Zhao Guangyi thought that the Liao army was afraid of fighting, so he sent a unit to confront Yelu Xizhen for surveillance, and he led the main force to attack Nanjing City. He also lured some of the defenders in the city to surrender. The people in Nanjing were panic. It was not until Yelu Xuegu entered the city to guard Han Derang together that the morale of the army stabilized.

The Song army continued to use night attacks, digging ground attacks and other methods to be repelled by the Liao army. It should be said that at this time, the Song army still had the advantage in the scene, and the victory and defeat were unpredictable. However, at this time, the Song army began to have a shortage of food and grass. In April, the Eastern Army occupied Zhuozhou, but it was less than a month. At night, the Liao army often attacked by the Liao army, and the food route was cut off by it.

The Liao lord Yelu Longxu and Empress Dowager Xiao led reinforcements to Zhuozhou. Seeing that the situation was not good, Cao Bin hurriedly retreated. Yelu Xiuge chased the Song army at Qigou Pass and took advantage of the night to cross the Jimahe River, causing countless Song army to drown. The remnants retreated to Shahe, but were intercepted by the Liao army, and more than half of the Song army died.

In May, Yelu Xiuge from the Liao Kingdom sent a large army to rescue Nanjing, and ordered Yelu Sha to march to Gaolianghe to fight the Song army. He and Yelu Xizhen attacked the Song army from the left and right wings. The Song army was unable to resist, and the besieged troops also came to support. Seeing that the big aid had arrived, the defenders in the city opened the door and rushed out. The Song army collapsed and was defeated under several attacks. Zhao Guangyi himself was also shot in the arrow and fled south.

After seven years of long-term preparation, Emperor Taizong Zhao Guangyi launched the "Yongxi Northern Expedition" again.

This time, Zhao Guangyi did not personally fight. The Song army still set out in three ways. The Eastern Army used Cao Bin and Mi Xin as the main commander as the main force, and advanced slowly to attract the main force of the Liao army to achieve the effect of allowing the Central and Western Army to advance directly. The Central Army used Tian Chongjin as the head commander, and the Western Army used Pan Mei-Yang Ye. The last three routes met to attack Nanjing.

The Liao army was not prepared for the war and responded hastily. The Song army conquered the prefectures and counties in three consecutive ways, and the progress was very smooth. The Liao army guarded Nanjing by Yelu Xiuge. He was short of troops and chose to stick to avoid war. He sent light cavalry to detour the food route of Cao Bin's army, and constantly sent cavalry to harass Cao Bin's army to delay his advance and gain time for the main rescue of the Liao army.

After Cao Bin's army occupied Zhuozhou, it was out of food in just ten days. Cao Bin gave up Zhuozhou and retreated to Xiongzhou to obtain food. Zhao Guangyi was shocked to receive the news, so that Cao Bin could not retreat, and should meet with Mi Xin's army, and then wait for the Central Army and the Western Army to meet. Because Zhao Guangyi's original strategy was to join forces with three armies and then attack Nanjing. If Cao Bin retreated on the east side, he would be isolated from the Central Army and the Western Army.

At this time, Cao Bin's army changed, and his generals were ashamed of hearing reports from the middle and west roads because their east roads were the main force, so they demanded a war, which was difficult for Cao Bin to control, so they joined the Mi Xin army and attacked Zhuozhou again. But at this time, the main reinforcements of Liao Kingdom had arrived in the northeast of Zhuozhou, waiting for labor.

Yelu Xiuge continued to send light cavalry to attack Cao Bin's army at night, which made Cao Bin's army exhausted when he arrived in Zhuozhou. He was exhausted again and was short of food. Cao Bin had to withdraw his troops again. The entire Liao army pursued him, and Yuqigou Pass besieged Cao Bin's army. Cao Bin and Mi Xin broke through at night and fled, and the Song Donglu Army was defeated.

The middle army Tian Chongjin received instructions to withdraw safely. Zhao Guangyi issued a task to the Western Army to relocate to Huan, Shuo, Yun, and the people of the four prefectures to retreat south. As a result, the Western Army was pursued by all the main forces of Liao. Deputy General Yang Ye and the main general Pan Mei and the military supervisor Wang Zhi had differences. They fought alone, were defeated and captured, and died of hunger strike. At this point, the Northern Expedition of Yongxi commanded by Zhao Guangyi was completely defeated, and the Liao army took advantage of the victory and advanced southward to the north of Daming.

The impact of this Northern Expedition of Yongxi was very far-reaching, and the Song Dynasty's national strength was greatly damaged. Since then, the Song army became afraid of Liao, so they completely gave up the recovery of Yanyun. The Song Dynasty's strategic offensive against Liao also became strategic defense...

The generals could not help but feel relieved when they figured out this point, and secretly came out of a cold sweat. The current situation was very similar to that in the beginning. Both Northern Expeditions were extremely smooth at the beginning, and they won consecutive victories and even pushed to the city of Nanjing. At that time, Nanjing was the capital of the current capital. At that time, from the emperor to ordinary soldiers, they all thought that the victory of the Northern Expedition was in sight, and they were inevitably blinded by victory, but they did not know that the seeds of failure had been planted at this time.

At that time, the Song army marched in three routes. The plan seemed reasonable, but in fact it violated the taboo of fighting on the outside. The three routes were far away and blocked by mountain roads, so they could not join forces to rescue. The Liao army repeatedly used the advantages of the inside line to mobilize superior forces, and the three routes to reinforce back and forth, and eventually defeated the East Route Army where Cao Bin was and Yang Yejun of the West Route.

Even if Cao Bin did not make any mistakes, the Song army was still easily isolated and defeated by the Liao army's superior forces one by one, while the failure of the first army would lead to a complete failure. Moreover, the advance of the three armies also increased the difficulty of logistics supply. Cao Bin's two defeats were all due to the rapid progress, which led to poor food and grass, and had to retreat and take food, so he was taken advantage of by the enemy, and even defeated the whole army, and all three armies were implicated.

The current second Northern Expedition of the New Dynasty was strategically advancing three routes. They set out from the Huai River and sent troops from Hebei at that time, and the corresponding logistics supply was more difficult. However, their progress speed was beyond the original plan. After two months of the war, they had already entered the "enemy's territory", which also exceeded the plan for logistics supply.

Fortunately, the emperor was not overwhelmed by victory in a row and the situation was very good. He was still awake when the generals unanimously requested a rapid advance northward, and ordered to move on the spot to rest and stop moving northward. If he was ignoring the reality, he would probably repeat the mistakes of Taizong. From this perspective, the young emperor would be much more skillful than him.

Next, the emperor named Zeng Kun, the head of the Ministry of War, to report the current casualties of each unit. Since the war started, the casualties of each unit were nearly 40,000, especially the most serious of the troops, which were the vanguard, which was nearly 20%. As the northwards, the weather became increasingly cold, and the number of soldiers with frostbite and illness increased, and the 12th and 13th armies even reached 30%.

According to the Military Medical Institute, the main reason for the military soldiers' inability to adapt to the severe cold in the north, and they have been camping in the wild for a long time, lack of cold-proof facilities, and frequent combat, resulting in a decline in physical strength, which is also one of the factors that lead to an increase in the number of patients. Therefore, it is urgent to switch to rest and allow military soldiers to rest and recover their physical strength. If they do not take time off, it will lead to more non-combat reductions and may cause the spread of epidemics.

Subsequently, the head of the logistics department also reported on the consumption and replenishment of weapons and ammunition. At present, due to frequent siege battles, there is a lot of gunpowder and artillery shells consumed, and several military workshops have been fully production and supplying. However, due to the long journey and transportation capacity, the produced equipment will take time to replenish them to various departments.

After each ministries emphasized the necessity of rest and recuperation, Lu Xiufu explained politically the need to strengthen military discipline and study the new issuance of the new edict during the rest and recuperation. This is not only a need to ease relations with the Han people in the northern region, but also a need for long-term stability. Not just because of the situation and measures, all ministries should do big things and not be perfunctory. Violators will be severely punished.
Chapter completed!