When Guo Shao's troops crossed the Hutuo River, they saw that the military camps, fences, arrow towers, toilets and trenches had been built, and a large amount of firewood and coal were stored outside each camp. They immediately rewarded the governor of Qizhou and did not care about not being able to enter the city.
After entering October, the weather became increasingly cold as the north wind blew. Fortunately, there was plenty of fuel. The generals provided firewood and coal to each unit, and charcoal was burned day and night in the felt tent. No one wanted to go out. Before going to bed, Guo Shao filled his iron bowl with water and placed it outside the tent. When he woke up the next morning, he saw that a thick layer of ice had frozen overnight.
Hebei is so cold, but the court has sent troops here to spend the winter. Two days later, Guo Shao summoned several generals to discuss: The purpose of the Privy Council's mobilization of troops may be to start deploying troops in advance, and to prepare for the siege early. We need to send some scouts to Waqiaoguan to find out the strength of the fortifications.
The left wing was stationed at the current location, and was mainly composed of infantry. Guo Shao thought that the battle might start with the attack on Waqiao Pass to the north, so he thought of using gunpowder to smash the wall. He first asked the generals how to prepare, wanting to hear their opinions first.
No need to tackle the problem. Unexpectedly, Li Chuyun said directly.
Guo Shao hurriedly asked why.
Li Chuyun looked around and said: "Zhou Duan is not here today. A few days ago, he talked about the Liao Kingdom. I noticed that his words were fierce, so I didn't argue with him, but I really disagreed in my heart."
When the generals heard this, they all agreed and cursed again. It seems that Zhou Duan is really unpleasant, and it is normal for the generals to dislike him. Zhou Duan's words are indeed often exaggerated and unreliable. For example, if he wants to say that the color of something is white, he will definitely do his best to say that it is whiter than snow. But Guo Shao didn't care. He just listened to what Zhou Duan said, just as the ancients said that listening to both sides will lead to enlightenment, while believing in one side will lead to ignorance.
Li Chuyun added: "In my opinion, the Liao Kingdom has so many tribes and the ruler is unpopular. The weakness is that it is very fragmented. Especially in Youyun, most of the people are Han people. It is easier to persuade them to surrender than to attack the city. Youzhou has not been ceded for a long time. The Khitans do not trust the Han people. The Han people in Youyun want to return home. The generals guarding Waqiaoguan and other places are all Han generals. They will not be willing to defend to the death. Once the Northern Expedition begins, the lord will take the lead to persuade them to surrender."
That makes sense. Guo Shao nodded, but he had to prepare for both situations. He wrote a letter to get some raw materials for storage; if the enemy army refused to surrender, he would use gunpowder to blow up the city. Even if it was not used to attack Waqiao Pass and other places, if he could reach Youzhou City at that time, he would use gunpowder to blow up the city wall and attack the city, which would be his best effort to recover Youyun.
Li Chuyun said: "My Lord, you are right. We can prepare. But I want to tell you, brothers, when the imperial army arrives, there will be no fierce battles in Youzhou. We can recruit surrenders and rebellions along the way. The victory or failure of the Northern Expedition depends on the Liao reinforcements. The current situation of the Liao depends on whether they can send a large army to rescue and whether the reinforcements can work together to protect Youzhou. Otherwise, most of Youyun is Han people, and it will be easy to recapture it once the imperial army arrives.
Li Chuyun looked around and said: "Come and see tomorrow when spring comes. If I am not right, you can laugh at me in person, I will definitely bear the ridicule."
At this time, Zuo You said: I agree with General Li. And if you accept the surrender, you should treat the Youzhou people equally. I have heard that the people of this place are tough and there have been many heroic men in Yan and Zhao since ancient times. If you can win the hearts of the people of Youzhou, your success will last a long time.
Guo Shao dug up his previous command system idea. In Tokyo, he was restricted and couldn't do anything. Now that he led the troops out, as long as he didn't leave the station too far, he could do whatever he wanted with the commander's word.
Regardless of the cold weather, he couldn't wait to put it into practice.
The left wing had a total of six armies and thirty-nine commanders, including the cavalry directly under Dong Zunxun's unit. Guo Shao ordered the six armies and thirty-nine commanders to have a total of forty-five military officers, each of whom selected six familiar personal soldiers to form a messenger force of about 270 people; below the commander, there were three captains, twelve generals, ten generals and forty-five fire chiefs.
Luo Mengzi was also in charge of the messenger soldiers, and he transferred 15 soldiers from the personal guards to serve as generals with more than 10 ranks. In this way, Luo Mengzi and the generals were able to gradually get to know these messengers. In the future, there would be no need for so many procedures for passing orders, just recognize the person; general simple military orders were spoken, and important military orders were in written form.
After entering the battlefield, these 270 men were divided into two groups, one half stayed in the central army, and the other half were dispersed around their respective commanders to share what they had.
Guo Shao added another measure to the system. He, Zuo You and Zhou Duan issued their signatures to the generals. The written military orders had to be signed by one of the three to be valid. There were also multiple anti-counterfeiting measures such as the seal of the commander of the flag. These things only needed to be stamped, so they were not complicated.
Zuo You and Zhou Duan were no longer as idle as before, so they set up a staff office and selected some literate soldiers in the army as helpers. First, they built a staff structure similar to the General Staff.
After Guo Shao had organized the staff and the messenger army, he could not wait to begin drills.
He felt that the operation of the confrontation exercise was too complicated and the conditions were insufficient, so he only asked the troops to conduct simulated mobilization and marching. It was agreed that the exercise would begin around November 1st. Beforehand, he and the generals made some adjustments and preparations for military law.
Zhao Kuangyin implemented an elimination system in selecting soldiers in the Palace Front Division, and Guo Shao was also tinkering with it, but he did not eliminate the soldiers, he just conducted organizational exercises.
On November 1, it snowed heavily, but on the 2nd, the weather cleared up and the wind blew away. All the troops gathered in an open space by the river as ordered.
The sky and the earth were covered in white, and the river had frozen. When Guo Shao came out of the tent, he exhaled white steam, and the weather was very cold. A group of people came to the front of the battle array, and saw that nearly 20,000 people had gathered in formation. The white snow made the people and horses look like a black mass. The left and right wings were more than a mile apart, and the formation was relatively dense.
Each unit counted its troops, and then the generals came up to report, just like usual. Then Guo Shao just said: "According to your orders."
At that moment, the drums in the central army camp were beating. Guo Shao took out a booklet with messy writing and gave an order: Order the cavalry of the Third Army, Dong Zunxun's unit, to move north. The straw man targets are the enemy. Search for the enemy and fight.
The messenger quickly took the military order and rode up with the flag. Soon, the cavalry on the left wing began to move, and thousands of cavalrymen were dispatched with the roar of horses' hooves. Guo Shao was very happy to see this, and soon ordered the fifth commander of Yang Biao's army to follow up and reinforce the cavalry; Deng Fei's cavalry came from the right wing to attack from the back.
After arriving at the battlefield, the various troops sent messengers back to report the situation.
Guo Shao then began to issue one or two false military orders, which were not sent out by messengers and were not stamped with the central army's seal and signature.
Later, the orders became more and more complicated; the military orders elaborated on the intentions of the central army and ordered each unit to temporarily judge the situation and move on its own. However, the situation was not optimistic, and before noon, the various units began to run around, because some ambiguous military orders made the generals feel very confused; there were other reasons, the simple conditions limited the preparation for drills, and the generals could not imagine what the situation was.
But the overall effect is still good, and the messaging system is very fast, but everyone is not yet fully adapted to it.
Guo Shao then gathered the army for drills every now and then, and often called together the fifty or sixty generals to discuss and summarize the combat intentions. Each imaginary battle was based on a familiar battle, such as the several major battles in the attack on Shu and the battles in Huainan, for simulated mobilization.
When Guo Shao summoned all the generals in the Central Army, he said: "In the future, military orders may only describe intentions, because the situation on the battlefield is ever-changing, and the Central Army Headquarters cannot understand the situation in time. For example, if we want to ambush the enemy somewhere, I ask you, Luo Yanhuan, to ambush on the road; but you find that the enemy does not take that road, do you still have to lie there and wait foolishly
All the generals seemed to understand what was said and burst into laughter.
Guo Shaodao: So I will only send someone to pass on the order. Luo Yanhuan, you send someone to set up an ambush somewhere. Our intention is to ambush, and how to ambush depends on General Luo's temporary decision according to the situation. Then you send scouts to discover the enemy's movements. As long as you find a way to achieve the intention of ambush, it will be considered as a meritorious service in accordance with the military order.
Guo Shao added: "In the future, when we reward soldiers in the left wing, in addition to their achievements, we will mainly look at whether they have completed the combat purpose. The purpose of all the troops is to win a battle; otherwise, no matter how much a certain unit has gained, if the whole army is defeated, what is the use of it?"
The Hujie Army was stationed outside the city of Qizhou. In a short period of time, Guo Shao did a lot of things and changed most of the military rules and regulations of the left wing.
He expanded the rules of the original small circles to the six armies. After receiving rewards from the court after the war, the benefits and money were distributed to cover the dead and wounded soldiers, and a portion of the military pay and rewards was calculated from the army to provide pensions to their families. The original rules of the imperial army were that if you died on the battlefield, you were dead, unless those who died for meritorious service, the emperor and the Privy Council would give additional posthumous pensions.
Guo Shao's approach diluted the benefits that everyone could get, but few people objected. After all, everyone could die in battle. He felt that doing so would be more humane and strengthen the cohesion of the organization. Everything was changed by trial and error and discussion with everyone. Guo Shao felt that there was no need to stick to the rules. If there was a better way, just change the rules.
There was also a guest envoy named Zan Jurun in the army, who probably reported everything to the emperor, but no one in the court paid any attention to Guo Shao. Guo Shao wrote again to the emperor asking for raw materials, such as saltpeter, sulfur, and charcoal, to make preparations.
He actually didn't want to attack a city, especially a city like Youzhou, but if the siege failed for a long time, he probably wouldn't be able to hide away; besides, if Youzhou could be recovered, he also wanted to do his best to help Chai Rong.
Whenever he had time, Guo Shao wrote to Fu Ermei. He had written three letters in a row, telling her about the situation in Qizhou, the cold weather, the many military affairs, etc. He also told her about his longing for her and some private words, such as that since there were no women in the army, he would occasionally dream of being with her. Anyway, it was just a private letter, so Guo Shao didn't pay much attention to it.