Chapter 1083 1174 Journey to the West

Chapter 1083 1174 Journey to the West

"Master, the Ministry of War has sent an urgent report."

Wei Guangde was reading a memorial in the duty room. Lu Bu hurried in, stood beside him, bowed and said something, and handed over a document with both hands.

Wei Guangde slowly put down the memorial in his hand, stretched out his hand to take it, unfolded it and took a look.

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"News from Jiugang."

Just looking up, Wei Guangde couldn't help but murmured.

Yes, this urgent report sent by the Ministry of War was sent by Yu Dayou a few days before leaving Jiugang, reporting the departure time and the estimated time of arrival in Myanmar.

This is a very important node, because after the Ming Navy arrives in the waters near Myanmar, it will look for a landing point and start a military attack on Myanmar from the south.

And after the war in the south started, at most ten days, the Burmese King Mang Yinglong will definitely receive the news.

Yu Dayou didn't know about Li Chengliang's plan in Yunnan, but he knew that the Ming Dynasty had already fought with the Burmese army in Yunnan.

Yes, after the war broke out, the war report was transmitted to Guangdong, and the South China Sea Navy centipede ship delivered the war report to Jiugang.

Since the war had already started in the north, the South China Sea Navy naturally didn't have to stay in Jiugang for a long time. After sorting out the situation here, Yu Dayou led the fleet to set off and sailed to Myanmar.

During his stay in Jiugang, he had learned some information about Myanmar from the merchants here. He knew that the main ports of Myanmar at this time were Pegu and Maduba, and the Portuguese had built a small dock near Thanlian for their merchant ships to rest and replenish.

However, although Thanlian is close to the Yangon River, the water transportation resources of the Yangon River are not developed, so it is not an important port in Myanmar. Instead, Pegu has been targeted by Yu Dayou because it is closer to the capital Toungoo City.

Speaking of Myanmar, people in China generally think that the capital of Myanmar should be in Yangon. After all, it is the largest city in Myanmar and a seaport city with a long history and strong influence in China.

However, this was only true before 2005, because in that year, the Myanmar government made a decision to move the capital.

Yes, Myanmar moved its capital from Yangon to Naypyidaw, a city surrounded by mountains in central Myanmar.

Less than 100 kilometers away from Naypyidaw is the city of Toungoo, which is surrounded by flat terrain.

I don’t know whether this capital relocation is similar to the idea of ​​the king of the Toungoo Dynasty. Choosing to establish the capital in central Myanmar seems to be more conducive to the rule of the kingdom.

In fact, Myanmar has always been a multi-ethnic country. Influenced by history, the chieftains were rampant in ancient times, and the central government had limited control over the local areas.

In modern times, Myanmar is still prevalent in local armed forces, which is also related to multi-ethnic groups.

There are as many as 135 ethnic groups of all sizes in Myanmar. In fact, they are the slightly larger tribes, or the leaders of their tribes are the chieftains of the year.

Among these tribes, the Burmese are the largest ethnic group.

During the feudal dynasty, many violent conflicts broke out among ethnic groups and tribes in order to fight for power and profit, and they also constituted the new force of local armed forces later.

In modern times, the hostility between ethnic groups in Myanmar is strong, especially the resentment of ethnic minorities against the Burmese.

The Burmese have long been the main ruling group of the country and live in coastal areas.

Most ethnic minorities live in remote mountains and have extremely poor economic and social conditions.

Such contradictions do not exist now, because the ethnic conflicts in its country are largely provoked by the British as colonizers. They need the obedient and docile Burmese under their control to manage other Burmese on their behalf.

At this time, Yu Dayou had to face the situation of landing in Pegu, and then heading north to attack Toungoo City, threatening the foundation of the Burmese king's rule.

In his view, this was conducive to Li Chengliang's battle with the Burmese army in Yunnan.

If his own nest is threatened, any normal ruler will know what to do.

Moreover, they were facing a powerful country, the Ming Dynasty. It would be a pipe dream to defeat the Ming army in a short time and then return to support.

However, at this time, his judgment was obviously not suitable for launching now because he did not know Li Chengliang's plan, which would cause loopholes in the huge encirclement prepared by Li Chengliang.

That is, after knowing that the Ming army landed in the south of Myanmar to attack Toungoo City, Mang Yinglong led the main force to return to support Toungoo City, first defeated the Ming army navy that came from afar, and then returned to continue fighting with Li Chengliang.

Don't think that the Burmese army can't do it. You must know that northern Myanmar is full of mountains and steep mountains.

As long as Mang Yinglong led his troops to the south, he used the mountain terrain to arrange defense along the way, and it would be difficult for Li Chengliang's troops to quickly break through the Burmese army's obstruction and realize the opportunity to attack the Burmese army from the north and south.

Such tactics are almost impossible to accomplish in this era, because without fast means of communication, the two Ming armies in the south and north cannot echo each other.

Once such a battle situation is entered, the consequences are self-evident, and there is a high probability that they will be defeated by the Burmese army one by one.

Well, Wei Guangde, a half-baked military civil servant, could have imagined such a trend, not to mention the people in the Ministry of War.

So, Yu Dayou's military intelligence was urgently sent to the cabinet and handed over to Wei Guangde to see how to deal with it.

After reading the military intelligence, Wei Guangde was silent for a moment and knew that the final decision-making power of this matter was not in the capital, but in Yunnan.

First, Li Chengliang must be informed of the movements of the Ming Dynasty's South China Sea Navy, so that he can launch the encirclement tactics at the right time.

If the Burmese army could be surrounded after they knew that the Ming army had landed on the southern coast of Myanmar, the tactical influence would be at its best, which would not only hit the morale of the Burmese army, but also make them panic.

The terrain of Myanmar is mountainous in the north, while the terrain in the south is relatively flat. Except for a few rivers, there are almost no natural barriers to stop the Ming army from advancing.

If the southern plains of Myanmar are lost, the Burmese army will be surrounded by the Ming army in the northern mountains. With so many troops gathered, the supplies can drag them down.

Encirclement warfare is not necessarily an encirclement and annihilation war. Arranging defenses on the periphery means encircling them. Without using knives or guns, the enemy can either take the initiative to fight or starve to death in the encirclement.

When the Burmese army was eager to go south to rescue the capital, it was an excellent opportunity to eliminate the main force of the Burmese army.

The Ming army did not need to take the initiative to attack. As long as they blocked the Burmese army's way back, they could make the enemy lose their order and fight against the Ming army passively.

These were just what Wei Guangde considered at this time, because the specific implementation depended on Li Chengliang to operate, and he could not directly command the Ming army thousands of miles away.

Moreover, with his half-baked military ability, it is absolutely impossible for him to surpass real generals like Li Chengliang and Yu Dayou.

His only advantage is that he has more experience and vision, and his vision is a little higher than these famous generals.

For example, if there is no Wei Guangde's plan for the war against Myanmar this time, no one in the Ming court would think of sending the navy from Nanyang to southern Myanmar.

People of this era simply don't have such thinking.

Of course, this is not all. In fact, the navy of the Ming Dynasty has always existed, but most of the people who have such thinking are officials in the navy, with little power and low position, and no one cares about what they say.

As for the civil officials, they know that it is very close to Liaodong by sea from Shandong, which is easier than taking the Liaoxi Corridor, but they still don't realize the importance of the sea route.

After all, China has been a continental country since ancient times, and its thinking is also limited to it.

Thinking of this, Wei Guangde did not slow down, and immediately took out a note and started writing.

The content is very simple, copying a copy of the military information of the South China Sea Navy and sending it to Li Chengliang in Yunnan in an expedited manner for 800 miles.

Yes, Wei Guangde did not write anything else. It was the generals' business to know the intelligence and how to respond. He and the Ministry of War had no need to interfere.

If Li Chengliang still didn't know what to do after seeing the military situation, then he would have done his job as a governor.

After writing the note, Wei Guangde took it and blew it to let the ink on it dry quickly.

After a while, he handed it to Lu Bu and ordered: "You go in person and send it to the Ministry of War immediately, and let them send the news to Governor Li in Yunnan as quickly as possible."

The ink on the note was not dry yet, so Lu Bu naturally did not dare to fold it. He could only take it with both hands and ran out.

Wei Guangde wanted to send the message as quickly as possible. He understood it, so he didn't dare to delay for a moment.

"Today is the eighth day of the first lunar month. It will take about ten days for the navy to reach the Burmese waters. It should be in time."

Wei Guangde was still mumbling after Lu Bu left.

It would take at least half a month to send 800 miles from the capital to Yunnan in an emergency.

By this calculation, when Li Chengliang received the military intelligence document, Yu Dayou's navy might have been close to Pegu, or had landed for one or two days.

It took about ten days for the news to be transmitted from Pegu to Toungoo City, and then to Yunnan and handed over to Mang Yinglong, and these few days were the time window for the Ming army to send troops from Mengding Prefecture.

Li Chengliang's original encirclement tactics may have been too late to implement, but from Mengding to Mubang, and then to Mengmi, it can still block the Burmese army's retreat route to the south.

If the encirclement war cannot be fought, taking advantage of the Burmese army's eagerness to go south to set up defense lines along the way to block them, there is still a chance to cause huge casualties to the main force of the Burmese army.

Moreover, the Ming army in Baoshan and Shidian would not just watch the Burmese army retreat. They would take advantage of the situation to kill and follow, and also restrain the Burmese army's retreat speed.

Thinking of this, Wei Guangde had a toothache. He didn't know how Li Chengliang was able to command mobile warfare. If he fought like this, it would probably be a mess, and it would all depend on the front-line generals' ability to command on the battlefield.

Of course, Yu Dayou, who was already on the ocean, didn't know about this.

At this time, the South China Sea Navy led by him was safely passing through the Strait of Malacca. Of course, the Ming Dynasty still called this place Malacca.

The arrival of the Ming Dynasty Navy again this time still scared the Portuguese in Malacca.

Although they had received documents from the Ming Dynasty and knew that the Ming Dynasty Navy came here to recover a piece of land they had lost before, that is, the old port.

But the Ming Dynasty Navy came here again, which still deeply stimulated the Portuguese.

Yes, they would not launch an offensive for the first time when they took a fancy to a piece of land or a town. They would often go back and forth many times to confirm the importance of this place before they would have the idea of ​​occupying it.

The Ming Dynasty Navy did not come to Nanyang very often before, so naturally they would not be interested in this place.

But if they come here often in the future, they may not have any ideas about this place over time.

At least occupying Malacca, the fleet can dock here, and the soldiers and ships can be repaired and maintained.

As for the Old Port, it is some distance from the entrance and exit of the Strait of Malacca, and cannot control this important waterway.

Fortunately, the Ming navy did not have any idea about this place. The fleet went directly there and headed towards the Indian Ocean. They just watched the departure of the Ming fleet silently from the top of the castle.

"We must build new forts as soon as possible and strengthen city defense."

The Governor of Malacca gave an order to the city defense commander Sikwila.

After seeing the Ming Dynasty fleet appear for the first time, the Portuguese felt as if they were facing a formidable enemy. They selected several places around the city of Malacca and prepared to build more forts to strengthen the city's defense.

"Yes, Your Excellency."

Lopez Siqueira naturally agreed.

He wanted to build it before, but the government didn't give him money and asked him to build it how he wanted.

Well now, the Ming Dynasty fleet passed by twice, and the governor started to hurry up.

Just as the Portuguese were paying attention to the Ming fleet, some princes and ministers from the Kingdom of Aceh on Sumatra rushed to the beach to watch after learning that the Ming navy had entered the strait again.

When the Nanhai Navy of the Ming Dynasty entered the Strait of Malacca for the first time, they only chose to return halfway after walking half way. Therefore, although they entered the sphere of influence of the Kingdom of Aceh, there was no preparation on the side of the Kingdom of Aceh. From the king to the ministers, they just listened. The soldiers stationed at the seaside reported this and found out what happened.

However, when the soldiers said that there were hundreds of warships on such a large scale, everyone in the Aceh Kingdom was shocked.

There are also rumors in the Kingdom of Aceh about Zheng He's fleet's grand voyage to the West, so there is no doubt about the situation described by the soldiers.

In their eyes, Daming has this strength.

It could be done more than a hundred years ago, let alone today.

After receiving the documents from the Old Port, the top leaders of the Aceh Kingdom knew that there was little hope of continuing to penetrate southward and seeking the Old Port.

The original owners of the old port are back, and with the tiger Ming by their side, what they are now considering is no longer how to live in peace, but how to carefully deal with behemoths like Ming to avoid them finding excuses to completely seize Sumatra through war.

You know, the so-called Strait of Malacca is actually a waterway between Sumatra Island and the Malay Peninsula.

Controlling the Malay Peninsula is somewhat difficult, but targeting only Sumatra becomes much easier.

Moreover, controlling Sumatra can effectively send troops to intercept ships bypassing the Strait of Malacca from the south.

In peacetime, ships will of course not stay close to them, but in wartime this may not be the case.

In fact, Yu Dayou was also very surprised by the Portuguese's choice. They chose the city of Malacca instead of the north of Sumatra.

Blocking the strait can actually be done either in the middle or at both ends. In Yu Dayou's opinion, the effect in the north of Sumatra seems to be better.

This is also the reason why Yu Dayou has set his sights on the Kingdom of Aceh at this time. He intends to monopolize Sumatra, so that Malacca's strategic advantageous position will no longer exist.

Moreover, for this, the Ming Dynasty could completely build a city in Temasek and completely surround the city of Malacca.

The people on the shore looked at the Ming Navy, and the people on the boat also looked at them.