Battle of Sarhu.
In April 1618, Nurhachi, who declared himself an enemy of the Ming Dynasty, attacked the forts in Liaodong, and Li Weihan, the governor of Liaodong, ordered Zhang Chengyin to lead an army of 10,000 to suppress it, but the whole army was annihilated. In July, the Houjin army invaded Qinghebao (now Benxi, Liaoning) and other places, captured 300,000 people and animals, captured 9,000 horses and 7,000 pairs of armor, and finally alarmed the Ming court, which decided to completely eliminate the Houjin. At this time, the Ming Dynasty garrisoned 60,000 troops in Liaodong, excluding the defenders of various castle post stations, there were more than 20,000 people who could fight in the field.
In December 1618, Yang Hao, the former governor of Liaodong, was appointed as the economic strategy of Liaodong, recruited soldiers from various defense areas across the country to aid Liao, and sent a message to Joseon and Yehe to jointly recruit. Cobbled together a field army of 80,000 men and a garrison of 60,000 troops, which was an army that overwhelmed Houjin in terms of numbers and equipment. At that time, the total strength of Houjin was about 80,000, and 60,000 people could be dispatched to field battles.
Originally scheduled to go out on March 21, 1619, due to the poor financial situation of the Ming Dynasty, the salary of the Liaodong army increased sharply by three million taels of silver, and did not dare to delay the war. The imperial court ** continued to urge Yang Hao to send troops, Yang Hao decided to go out on February 21 in advance, but was questioned by the generals of the army, and finally decided to leave the division on February 25, and the four Ming armies were divided from the Liaoyang Jiaochang at the same time. Lack of money! Forced to set off more than 20 days early, many soldiers from the south had to endure the cold in the northeast, which was slightly detrimental to the combat effectiveness of the Ming army.
On February 28, Juniper led the 290,000 people of the West Route Army went to Fushun Pass for a short rest, and traveled more than 100 miles in the snow in one day, and arrived at the bank of the Hunhe River on February 29, when Juniper learned that the Houjin soldiers were about 150,000 men were building defenses at Jiefan City on Tiebei Mountain, trying to stop the advance of the Ming army. The position of Jiefan is extremely important, Jun Song will divide the army into two places, divided into 20,000 people to camp at the foot of Salhu Mountain (now Fushun Dahuofang Reservoir), on the first day of the first month of March, Jun Song personally led 10,000 people to cross the Hunhe River lightly, attacking Jilin Cliff north of Jiefan City. When crossing the river, Houjin destroyed the dam and released water, drowning many Ming troops, and the baggage did not cross the river, which significantly weakened the combat effectiveness of the Ming army crossing the river, and as a result, Juniper did not capture Jilin Cliff. The Western Route Army, which was already weak, was divided into two parts, and this time the loophole was fully utilized by the Houjin, and the fiasco of the Ming Army on the Western Route was inevitable.
Houjin 370,000 cavalry, the 20,000 Ming army attacking Salhu, and the Ming army, which was mainly equipped with firearms, failed to withstand the impact of the tactical cavalry of the Houjin Renhai, and the large camp was broken and almost all the troops were annihilated. This was the largest camp of the Ming army in the Battle of Salhu, with 20,000 men, and it did not succeed in resisting the onslaught of superior cavalry. This shows that the firepower of the Ming army, which has entered the era of hot weapons, is not fierce, and it is difficult to resist the rapid impact of the superior cold weapon cavalry team. It may also be related to the lack of unified command, and Juniper, who led the Western Route Army, was fighting for Jilin Cliff at this time. Then, the Houjin army transferred the forces attacking Salhu to the Jilin Cliff area, and the troops deployed in the Jilin Cliff combined with the troops to attack the Ming army of Juniper, and fought until the night, the Ming army lit the torch, but allowed the Houjin army to attack the Ming from the dark, so that the Ming army suffered heavy casualties, and almost the whole army was annihilated.
Marin led 2The 20,000-strong Northern Route Army received the news of the defeat of Juniper's army on the second day of the third month, and Marin did not listen to the suggestion, divided the army into three, and turned the offensive into defense. Ma Lin's main battalion retreated to Shangjian Cliff in Fulha Mountain, more than 30 miles northwest of Salhu, and ordered Pan Zongyan and others to garrison Feifen Mountain, and surrounded it with chariots and dug trenches. The three armies formed a corner, and the camp held out, hoping to resist the attack of the Houjin soldiers and wait for the arrival of the Yehe army to help. In the early morning of the third day of the first month of March, the Houjin army attacked Malin with three times the strength of the Marin army, and saw that the Ming army was also divided into camps, so it was decided to break through each one, first attack Gong Niansui's camp, and besiege Pan Zongyan's camp, so that it could not be saved, and as a result, Gong Niansui's camp was broken through. Nurhachi turned to attack the Shangjian Yamarin camp, and then attacked the Pan Zongyan camp, but the Northern Route Army was destroyed. At this time, the leaders of the Yehe tribe, Jin Taiji and Buyangu, led 10,000 troops to Zhonggu City (now Zhonggu Village, Kaiyuan City, Liaoning Province), and the Ming army was defeated and retreated.
Marin's defensive decision was also incredible, although it was very necessary to switch from offensive to defensive, but it was divided into three places, which made the already weak Northern Route Army even weaker, which was the reason for the rapid collapse of the Northern Route Army. It is understandable that the remnants of the Western Route Army's baggage troops were very necessary to provide assistance or joint consideration, but the results of the decision were inappropriate. At least it should not be divided into three parts, at most two. The baggage troops of the Western Route Army, which were inconvenient to move, formed a camp with the reinforcements of the Northern Route Army, and the remaining troops of Marin formed a camp. If you have the courage of a strong man to break his wrist, he can give up his baggage and let the personnel of the baggage troops of the Western Route Army gather lightly in the Marin camp to form a defensive battalion of more than 20,000 Ming troops. Under the unified leadership of Marin, it should be able to resist for a period of time and give Houjin greater damage. If they can hold each other for a period of time and contain or kill a large number of enemy soldiers, the Yehebu and the Eastern or Southern Route Army will converge and will not be annihilated. Marin's Ming army did not act with Yehebu, but went first, which was also an obvious mistake, which was actually caused by the original underestimation of the enemy. Yehbe is supposed to be cavalry, why is it so slow?
Liu Wei led 1230,000 East Route Army will meet 130,000 Korean soldiers attacked Hetuara from the east of Kwandian Fort. This road Ming army has poor equipment, no cannon firearms, and is the weakest of the four roads. At this time, the Eastern Route Army was completely unaware of the news that the Juniper Army on the West Road and the Marin Army on the North Road had been defeated. Nurhachi first sent the Han people to disguise themselves as Juniper soldiers and lure Liu Ling's lone army into going deeper. Liu Wei ordered the soldiers and horses to march in a single column. In the early morning of the fourth day of the first month of March, more than 40,000 Houjin troops attacked the Ming army on the East Road, and the East Route Army was defeated. Later, the Jin army attacked the rest of Liu Wei, and then attacked the Korean army, the Korean army was defeated, and the remaining Korean army surrendered to Houjin. Liu Wei is a veteran who can fight well, the information is not good, the army he leads is not much, and defeat is inevitable. The Ming army and the Korean army did not cooperate very well, and they fought separately, which may have been caused by encounters during the march, and there was no time to unify the battle. The Korean army was the only army to surrender on a large scale in this battle of Sarhu.
Yehbu did not participate in the battle, and the Korean army surrendered after the rout. On the whole, in this battle of Sarhu, the Ming army did not take advantage of the value of the friendly army, and the friendly army did not play its due role. The 20,000 Southern Route Army set off late, and Yang Ho ordered it to return after learning of the failure of several other routes.
The Ming army was defeated by Nurhachi in the Battle of Salhu, ** 4More than 580,000 people, civil and military officials and 310 people died, and horses, mules, camels and other beasts were lost2More than 80,000 horses, more than 20,000 pieces of firearms, guns and guns, and great losses to the elite (many generals are military talents who have returned to their hometowns, and they have been reactivated in order to fight this war, and the veterans trained by the three major expeditions of Wanli have been consumed in this way).
In the Battle of Salhu, the fundamental reason for the Ming army's crushing defeat was that the strategic enemy was lightly defeated, and Yang Hao's stupid strategic decision buried tens of thousands of Ming troops. The author can't understand why the troops are divided into four routes, the author originally thought that these four armies set out from different places and went to the same place for a decisive battle. Who knows, it turned out to be from the same place (maybe not, it is normal to start and gather from multiple places, but it should not be directly on the battlefield, but to gather first, and then act together), the soldiers are divided into four ways to fight from different paths to the same place, this kind of decision is too incredible, this is obviously sending the Ming army to death. If Yang Ho wasn't a spy, then his stupidity was incredible or his underestimation was incredible. The Ming army has already had a process of 10,000 troops being completely annihilated by the Houjin, which shows that the Houjin army is still very strong, how can the strength of the Houjin not be properly estimated?
Yang Hao's division of troops into four routes can only be explained as a strategy of quickly sweeping and annihilating the enemy with a high degree of underestimation of the enemy, which is a military strategy caused by lack of money and the root cause of the defeat of the Ming army. In order to save money, it just makes you spend more money, and since then the Liaodong region has become a big wound in the Ming Dynasty that has been bleeding endlessly, and the huge amount of silver has become the main financial burden at the end of the Ming Dynasty, which has seriously aggravated the internal contradictions of the Ming Dynasty and become one of the reasons for the civil war in the Ming Dynasty or the intensification of the civil war in the Ming Dynasty. Of course, Nurhachi's spies may have played an important role, and Nurhachi may have clearly grasped the actions of the Ming army and made corresponding decisions.
At this time, the battle of Salhu, although the strategy was a mess, but the Ming army's war skills or tenacity were singable and weeping, the Ming army was helplessly defeated after complete resistance, and the real situation of being raided or ambushed did not exist, and it was helpless to be defeated in the case of strategic planning mistakes.
The war to pacify Yang Yinglong mobilized more than 200,000 Ming troops, which were divided into the Eighth Route Ming Army. This time, the Ming army and friendly troops only used 100,000 people to pacify the Nurhachi separatist forces, and this degree of attention was different, or due to the different financial resources of the Ming Dynasty. At the time of the crusade against Yang Yinglong, the Ming Dynasty still had the family background of Zhang Juzheng's era, and could organize large-scale military operations. By the time the Nurhachi separatist forces were pacified, the Ming Dynasty's finances had dried up, and the scale of military power at its disposal was much smaller.
If the Ming army also used more than 200,000 in the Battle of Salhu, it would be difficult to defeat even if the troops were divided into multiple routes. When the roads are close to each other, they can support each other, and it will be easier to destroy Nurhachi in one fell swoop. In fact, no matter how many troops there are, it is not appropriate to divide them into multiple routes. Moreover, Nurhachi's army was dominated by the most mobile lightly armed cavalry, which was different from Yang Yinglong's secession army in Sichuan, which required that military operations in the eastern Liaodong region should not be divided into multiple routes.
According to the situation of the Battle of Salhu, the Ming army of 100,000 people and the friendly army were actually divided into 9 routes (the West Route Army was divided into 2 routes, the Ming Army on the North Road was divided into 3 routes, plus the Yehe Division, a total of 4 routes, the East Route Army Ming Army all the way, the Korean Army all the way, and the South Route Army all the way), the forces were very scattered, and there was no reason to be invincible. In short, it was an incredible war, and it seemed that there was providence in the dark, the end of the good fortune of the Ming Dynasty.