Just as the three-masted sailboat "Antarctic Wolf" left Southern Chile, in the Liaodong Reclamation Area under its final destination, the Denglai Development Team, the officers and soldiers of the 10th Mixed Battalion drove into an abandoned Qing army camp more than 20 kilometers southwest of Dandong County.

This camp was abandoned a day ago. It was originally stationed with more than 2,000 Han army green camps, rattan players and musketeers recruited from Henan. This place in Henan has been a famous place of production of salt and lead since the Ming Dynasty. Now, in the 30th year of Chengping, the population has skyrocketed, and has increased from seven or eight million in the late Ming and early Qing dynasties to more than 13 million. Although it still has not caught up with the peak of the population during the Wanli period, the difference is not very far.

As the population increased, the nitrate manufacturing industry, which was originally famous in the Ming Dynasty, gradually recovered and developed. This advantage allowed the Qing court to set up a large-scale sauna and gun bureau in Henan to transport ammunition to more than 200,000 troops on the Xiangyang front line. The person in charge of this matter was Prince Xin, Ezha, who was only nominal. In fact, all major and small matters were managed by the governor of Henan Yao Qisheng. Otherwise, what vision and ability would you expect a 20-year-old prince to have? Speaking of which, the Qing court is too dependent on Han ministers now, but he can't bear to face it, so he created a model of the name of the Han ministers and the Han ministers doing things.

If this model is not particularly common in the officialdom, then in the army, especially in the last 5-10 years, the proportion of Han army and Han generals is getting higher and higher. In the era when muskets and cannons are popular, the intensity of war began to gradually increase, and casualties of officers and soldiers also increased sharply. The population base of the Manchu, Mongolian and Han Eight Banners is not enough to support long-term and high-intensity wars, because they cannot afford to die, it will take a long time to replenish them. Therefore, they have to recruit Han army on a large scale, and Han generals will enter the so-called new army.

Although the Eight Banners still firmly control the positions of middle and senior officers, as the war continues to deepen, many Han people have been promoted for merit and then slowly eroded the positions of the Manchus. And this trend seems irreversible, which undoubtedly makes the upper class of the Qing court even more frightened. If this war is fought for decades, the military system will not be controlled by the Han people in the future, right? So, they are even a little afraid of fighting now, but in this situation, they have no good way, as if they are trapped in a vicious cycle, unless they can put down their figure and completely merge with the Han landlords and gentry class, and are completely sinicized like the Jin Kingdom that entered the Central Plains in history.

The commander who now commands more than 20,000 new troops in Henan was transferred from Gansu. Zhang Yong, a Han general who was nearly 60 years old. He once fought with the Shun Army on the Xiangyang front line, and guarded the northwest for many years. He had many confrontations with Hui cavalry (these people dispatched tens of thousands of people to advance east in 1644 and were repelled by Li Zicheng's old camp). He has made outstanding achievements. Now he is transferred to Henan, using his rich experience in leading troops and practicing this new army with complete infantry, cavalry, cannons, and baggage. In the future, if the situation in Xiangyang changes, of course, in the view of the Qing army, the possibility of Henan can be very small. In Henan, their new army can be used as the core, and then gather other local green camps, form a strategic reserve team, and rush to the front line.

There are many examples similar to Zhang Yong, such as Zhao Liangdong, who was training the new army in Hanzhong (a scale of about 15,000), Sun Sic, who was training the new army in Jinzhou, etc. Of course, the largest new army in the Qing Dynasty was the new army stationed in Jinzhou, trained by Tuhai, with a scale of more than 40,000. Unlike other troops using domestic artillery and bird guns, the weapons of this army were mostly from England and the Netherlands, and more than 80 European mercenary officers and soldiers who were carefully teaching new tactics. Although the army has not yet formed an army, once the training is complete in the future, it will be a powerful brigade, and maybe it can fight with the Silver Gun Xiaojie Army of Emperor Dashun Li Laiheng.

Now the Qing army stationed in this abandoned camp is actually a man from Zhang Yong. He is led by a general. He is also a bit awesome and dares to compete with the men and horses of the First Division of the Liaodong New Army. As a result, a few days ago, he was defeated by more than 1,000 officers and soldiers of the 10th Mixed Battalion of the Army that came from Dandong in one battle, killing and wounding more than 1,500 people, and the rest fled in a hurry, losing the ability to continue fighting.

After winning the field battle of the Tenth Mixed Camp, he did not immediately advance lightly. Instead, he sent people to search, clean up the surrounding relatively complex terrain, and contacted nearby friendly troops. Then he raised his troops to enter the abandoned camp and occupied it.

The Liaodong War, which lasted for a long time, finally came to an end in the middle of this year. The people on the east coast held the situation stubbornly defended the situation while food, troops and other supplies were tight, and they were not pushed into the Yalu River and pushed down the sea. To this day, the three strongholds of Dandong, Jiuliancheng and Kuandian are still standing on the right bank of the Yalu River, silently mocking the Qing army's huge scale and lasting three years of offensive.

Of course, it was said that it was three years, but in fact, it was only a few months to fight a year, and the rest was just a small-scale harassment. Even in the last year, even a large-scale offensive was gone. The commander of the Qing army, Prince Kang Jieshu, even returned to Shengjing, leaving only the front-line generals to carry out some regional and limited-scale offensives.

The people of the East Coast naturally took this offensive more easily, but they were unable to counterattack: after three years of siege, not only did the Qing army suffer a lot of casualties, but the people of the East Coast also killed a large number of experienced veterans. In addition, the outbreak of the epidemic caused by long-term shrinkage in the fortress, the number of deaths became even more considerable, so in the later stage, they had to select strong people from the people who had retreated to North Korea to replenish the troops, but the overall combat effectiveness inevitably decreased. Therefore, when the main force of the Qing army returned because of its incompetence, the people of the East Coast were unable to pursue, they might be more afraid that it was a trap of the Qing army until the arrival of a new force such as the 10th Mixed Battalion.

Although the 10th mixed battalion of the Army was not an old-fashioned force, but a newly formed battalion in recent years, its weapons, equipment and training level were far superior to the Qing army, even though they really didn't have much war experience. Therefore, within the past two months after landing, they took the initiative to attack regardless of the fatigue and discomfort brought by long-distance voyages, defeating many small Qing troops left behind with the autumn wind sweeping the fallen leaves, aggravating the panic of the Qing army, causing these cannon fodder troops that were already thrown behind to escape, and failed to carry out greater damage to the local area, causing many key facilities to be retained, such as houses, cannons, warehouses, farmland, bridges, outposts, camps, etc.

The only regrettable thing is probably that the 10th Mixed Battalion set off too late, and too many days were delayed on the way, which made them arrive in Shandong and then land in Dandong. The war had already come to an end: the main forces of both sides had broken off contact, and only a few small groups of people were left to live in the wild.

These small groups of people are responsible for monitoring and cutting off the rear, and also for destroying some undamaged infrastructure, such as houses, wells (the Qing army also needed accommodation and drinking water before) and even roads. As for those grain stations and fortresses, they have basically been demolished by large troops that were withdrawn in advance, and the construction efforts of the East Coast people for many years have been destroyed.

The time for the landing of the 10th Mixed Battalion was stuck at this time. With the cooperation of some Shandan cavalry, they maneuvered around Dandong and Jiuliancheng, launching a fierce offensive against the enemy's small troops, killing, wounding and capturing nearly a thousand people. Then, under the guidance of the scouts, they took several "Yaksa"-class armed transport ships of the navy. Before the Qing army reacted, they landed near the Dadonggou, and attacked the largest Qing army's broken rear troops stationed here: two thousand new troops from Henan.

Now that the battle has long ended, the main force of the 10th Mixed Battalion has successfully entered a Qing army fort near the Later Donggang City. This fortress is not big or small in size, and it can accommodate more than 2,000 people, just enough for the entire 10th Mixed Battalion to settle down. The fortress is very close to the sea, and there is a very small river port dock leading to the sea. At this time, there are three or four small wooden boats parked in a mess, and the cabin is also filled with some jerky meat and food. I don’t know where it was transported.

However, in combination with the recent incident of the naval light cruiser intercepting a Qing Dynasty hard sailboat on the Dadonggou Ocean, the answer is about to come out: The Qing army is really brave. Even though they know that the East Coast people have the advantage of sea control, they still dare to play this trick of smuggling transportation. It seems that they are accurate to have the limited number of ships in the East Coast people and cannot achieve a long-term and comprehensive maritime blockade. If you think about the Qing army did not have such courage and "wisdom" in the past, then the East Coast people have sufficient reason to suspect that it was the "bad water" indoctrinated by the British, Portuguese or the Dutch. It is really unreasonable!

Li Ziqian is the acting battalion commander of the 10th Mixed Battalion, with a captain rank. He has served as a lecturer in the tactics of the Corps, a temporary assembly of the combat staff of the First Regiment, and a deputy director of the Tactics Research Office of the Army Department. This time, he was able to become a hot position such as the acting battalion commander of the 10th Mixed Battalion, and relied on the help of his elder brother Guo Handong. Otherwise, even if he was capable, he would have to waste his life in the army department. Therefore, he was still grateful to Guo Handong and regarded him as his benefactor.

After leading his troops to Denglai this time, Liao Xiaoyao, the captain of the pioneer team, was overjoyed and immediately dispatched the ships and deployed them to the Liaodong Reclamation Area, which was most urgently needed to deal with the Qing army. They did not disappoint everyone's expectations. Although the main force of the Qing army had retreated, their more than a thousand people cleaned up the Qing guards who had not yet been able to completely withdraw so neatly, which was enough to show their ability. Although the soldiers were more or less panicked due to lack of experience, it can be seen that the training on weekdays is still very solid, and what they should practice is basically done. The following is to accumulate experience.

After defeating the two thousand Qing New Army in Donggou Fort (the name of this abandoned Qing army camp), the war was basically over. The people on the east coast killed and injured a large number of officers and soldiers, consumed hundreds of thousands of yuan in war expenses, owed the Koreans hundreds of thousands of stones of food, wasted three years of time before the Qing army retreated this time, the loss was indeed extraordinary.

Of course, the Qing army was also injured in this offensive. They mobilized many soldiers and horses in the Eight Banners of the Capital, the Eight Banners outside the Pass, the Mongolian horse team, Zhili, Shanxi, Henan and other places. They were led by Prince Kang and fought for three years. They were unable to push the East Coast people into the sea. This was a great setback. What's more, in order to supply this group of soldiers, war horses, and livestock that were nearly 20,000 at the peak, the people of the Yongping Prefectures were also recruited on a large scale to transport supplies. The people were full of complaints and exhausted. After all, they had to stop and take a breath. After all, they did not have the "Korean ATM" in the hands of the East Coast people.

Therefore, after the Qing army retreated, officials from all over the Liaodong side optimistically predicted that the Qing army would probably not be able to make a comeback within five years, and could only continue the previous half-dead ranger harassing war, which was not very destructive. Therefore, at this time, they had even sent people across the river to many towns, including Hamkyung Road, Ping'an Road, Huanghai Road, etc., which housed 70,000 to 80,000 "refugees" on the east coast, and contacted local North Korean officials and officials to discuss when to set off to return to the right bank of the Yalu River. It would be too late to farm and sow. However, it is also necessary to restore agricultural facilities in the winter and spring to lay a solid foundation for sowing in the next spring. Unless you continue to give up next year's reclamation, that is exactly what the Qing army hopes to see.

The next task of the 10th Mixed Battalion is to bring enough supplies, and then carry out activities on the periphery of an arc-shaped area such as Donggou, Phoenix City, and Kuandian to find Qing army rangers, mule and horse teams, transportation teams, messengers, etc. If they encounter enemy villages, they will also be destroyed. On the one hand, they will deter them and retaliate against the Qing army, and on the other hand, they will also reduce the ability of Qing army to obtain supplies in the wild.

This mission was issued by Major Liao Degong, who is now in charge of Liaodong's defense. He believed that this kind of action of attack instead of defense could probably ensure the smooth progress of the agricultural recovery operation in the rear. At the same time, it could also conduct a "firepower investigation" on the Qing Dynasty to see what their reaction was, whether there were any large troops stationed nearby, and what was the counterattack ability. He believed very much that the combat effectiveness of the 10th Mixed Battalion equipped with Minnie guns and light field artillery, so he sent out the only mobile force at hand to give the Qing army eye drops, so that they knew that the tiger's butt was incomprehensible.
Chapter completed!