After the Tianjing Incident, the vitality of the Taiping Heavenly Kingdom was greatly damaged, but the British king Chen Yucheng and the loyal king Li Xiucheng were able to defeat the Eight Banners, the Green Battalion, and the Hunan army many times, and even completely annihilated the main force of Li Xubin's Hunan army, as well as the cavalry corps of Shengbao, and once reversed the crisis.
Behind the victory of Chen Yucheng and Li Xiucheng was the temporary solution of the issue of military command, and all units worked together. At the first Zongyang Conference, Tongcheng won a great victory, recovered northern Anhui, and absorbed the Twist Army. At the second Zongyang Conference, the Pukou victory was achieved and the transportation line of the Beijing division was opened; Troops were dispatched to Sanhe, and Li Xubin was completely annihilated, and the momentum of the Hunan army's eastward expedition was frustrated.
At the Jianping Conference, the leaders of the Taiping Army from all walks of life came one after another, and the princes and kings discussed countermeasures together and cooperated with each other. Next, Li Xiucheng destroyed the Jiangnan camp for the second time, and took advantage of the victory to capture Jiangsu and Zhejiang, and continued the life of the Taiping Heavenly Kingdom for several years.
It can be said that after the Tianjing Incident, the Taiping Army won because of the temporary settlement of military command. After a series of failures, Chen Yucheng and Li Xiucheng were not cooperating, and the princes and kings fought separately, and they were finally broken by each.
The key to the victory of the peasant uprisings in successive generations lies in whether or not the command is unified. Why did Zhu Yuanzhang win? Hu Dahai went on an expedition to the east and fought with Zhang Shicheng, and his son Hu Sanshe violated the military order and sold wine without permission, and Zhu Yuanzhang executed him.
Liquor sales, things can be big or small, but Zhu Yuanzhang tried his best to disregard the public's pleas, regardless of the generals' pleas, and killed Hu Sanshe, why is this? Very simply, Zhu Yuanzhang wants to tell everyone: he has absolute command, and the army must be absolutely obedient.
Kill Hu Sanshe, what can Hu Dahai do, dare to resist Zhu Yuanzhang, or surrender to Zhang Shicheng? The answer is that Hu Dahai has to continue to fight hard, turn his grief into strength, and storm Huzhou without complaint.
Looking at Li Zicheng again, after attacking Yanjing, Liu Zongmin connived at the soldiers to loot and rob Wu Sangui's concubine Chen Yuanyuan, but Li Zicheng couldn't stop it. Li Zicheng asked Liu Zongmin to lead troops to recruit Wu Sangui, but he was also refused, and publicly said: "Everyone is a thief, why let me go." ”
From the performance of Hu Dahai and Liu Zongmin, it can be seen why Zhu Yuanzhang was able to establish the Ming Dynasty, and Li Zicheng could only end up being killed by a farmer in Jiugongshan.
Why did the Taiping Heavenly Kingdom fail? Li Xiucheng put an end to the "ten major mistakes", and the confusion of command power is the key. Because, after the Tianjing Incident, the Taiping Heavenly Kingdom could no longer talk about unified command, and could only rely on the cooperation of the generals themselves, rather than the strong center.
Yang Xiuqing, the only prince of the Taiping Heavenly Kingdom who had the right to rule and command, but his comprehensive ability was average, and he did not tolerate people, and brought the Taiping Heavenly Kingdom to the abyss.
Speaking of Yang Xiuqing, whether it is the Qing Army or the Taiping Army, they have a very high evaluation of him. Because many major victories in the early stage of the Taiping Heavenly Kingdom were achieved under the planning of Yang Xiuqing, he had a certain command talent.
So, why do you still say that Yang Xiuqing's comprehensive strength is average? Very simply, behind these brilliant victories, it is not how far-sighted and far-sighted Yang Xiuqing is, but that he has unified command and a high fault tolerance rate.
Let's look at the Northern Expedition first, 20,000 elite soldiers went north alone, what is this concept? These 20,000 people are all elite troops of the Taiping Army, the generals are mainly the "old brothers" of Liangguang, and the soldiers are the people of Lianghu, all of whom are divisions of a hundred battles.
Lin Fengxiang, Li Kaifang, Ji Wenyuan, in the early days of the Taiping Heavenly Kingdom, were absolute forward generals. Such an elite force, but Yang Xiuqing took it to the north to adventure, resulting in the annihilation of the entire army.
After the Northern Expedition encountered setbacks, several batches of Northern Expedition reinforcements such as Zhu Xikun, Zeng Lichang, and Qin Rigang were sent one after another, and the number was only a few thousand. As a result, Zhu Xikun was led to ** medicine by the Qing army when he was eating, and except for Lin Shaozhang, who was well preserved, the rest were defeated.
Zeng Lichang arrived in Linqing, but was surrounded and intercepted by the Qing army, and Li Kaifang had to go to the rescue. As a result, before Li Kaifang arrived at the battlefield, Zeng Lichang was annihilated, and he jumped into the Yellow River.
Qin Rigang was even more violent, and as soon as he arrived at Yangjiadian in Shucheng, he complained: "There are too many demon troops on the North Road, and there is no way out." The Qing army was heavily defended, and Qin Rigang did not try to attack, and the lack of troops was the main reason.
Among Li Xiucheng's "Ten Mistakes", the Northern Expedition accounted for "three", which shows that Yang Xiuqing's layout was bad. If you add the "Tianjing Incident" mentioned later, as well as Lin Shaozhang's "Xiangtan Fiasco", and the "Ten Mistakes" related to Yang Xiuqing, Dongwang accounts for 5, that is, half.
The Northern Expedition failed miserably, and the Taiping Heavenly Kingdom lost a large number of elite veterans. Imagine, if the Northern Expeditionary Army was put into the Western Expedition and acted as the main force of the Western Expedition, how could the Hunan army of Zeng Guofan have a chance to rise. Lin Fengxiang threw himself into the Northern Expedition, Nanchang was bound to win, and Jiangxi had long been the territory of the Taiping Heavenly Kingdom.
The reason why the Northern Expedition ended was that Yang Xiuqing was mainly responsible. However, considering that the Northern Expeditionary Corps were all subordinates of Xiao Chaogui, the king of the West, it was not ruled out that Yang Xiuqing wanted to use the hands of the Qing Dynasty to weaken Xiao Chaogui's power.
You must know that Xiao Chaogui once surpassed Yang Xiuqing in the early period of the Taiping Heavenly Kingdom and actually presided over military affairs. Xiao Chaogui not only has many soldiers and horses, but also enjoys the qualification of "Brother Tianxia", and his physical fitness is very good. Although Yang Xiuqing said that he could "descend from heaven", his health was very poor and he was unable to do so.
At the same time as the Northern Expedition, the Taiping Army also carried out the Western Expedition, and Yang Xiuqing's command level and the amount of people he accommodated can be clearly seen. The victory of the Western Expedition is not because Yang Xiuqing is clever, but because he has a high fault tolerance rate, and everyone temporarily tolerates "Heavenly Father descending to earth" and does not tear his face.
In Li Xiucheng's self-report, he scolded Lin Shaozhang's "Xiangtan fiasco", saying that it was a major mistake. Why? The Xiangtan fiasco wiped out the achievements of the Jinggang victory, Zeng Guofan survived in a desperate situation, and the Hunan army also gained a firm foothold.
The defeat of Jinggang gave the imperial court and the Hunan bureaucracy and gentry, who were already dissatisfied with Zeng Guofan, a reason to deal with the Hunan army. If Xiangtan still fails, Changsha will be lost, and Zeng Guofan will not only be unable to continue to establish the Hunan army, but whether he can survive is a question.
So, why Xiangtan failed, mainly because Lin Shaozhang was incompetent. Lin Shaozhang, Yang Xiuqing's person. The Western Expedition was originally in charge of Wei's Guozong and Shi's Guozong, Wei Jun and Shi Xiangzhen were both famous generals, Zeng Tianyang was also ruthless, Yang Xiuqing just let Lin Shaozhang go into battle, and he also acted as the main force, and he was also drunk.
Before taking command of the Western Expedition, Lin Shaozhang's military exploit was "the Northern Expedition with Zhu Xikun, the Liuhe Battalion was burned, and he himself preserved the troops", nothing more. It can be said that Lin Shaozhang almost did not fight with the Qing army and had little military experience. Later, in the Battle of Anqing, Lin Shaozhang's poor performance made Chen Yucheng fall into despair.
Talent is mediocre, prestige is insufficient, why is Lin Shaozhang in charge? Very simply, Yang Xiuqing didn't want the power of Wei's Guozong and Shi's Guozong to be too strong, so he wanted to train his own people and let other "Guozong" be his deputies.
Xiangtan was defeated, and the Hunan army took advantage of the victory to expand the results and arrived in Tianjia Town. At this time, Yang Xiuqing was not willing to send famous generals such as Wei Changhui or Shi Dakai to attack, but let Qin Rigang be in charge and control the battlefield remotely. In this way, the battle of Tianjiazhen was defeated again, thousands of warships were burned, and the naval forces of the Taiping Heavenly Kingdom were almost wiped out.
Tianjiazhen was defeated, the Hunan army was killed under Jiujiang City, and the results of Wei's and Shi's westward expeditions were almost wiped out. Zeng Guofan even shouted that before the Chinese New Year, he captured Anqing and Nanjing, captured Hong Xiuquan and Yang Xiuqing alive, and then celebrated the New Year.
The Northern Expedition failed miserably, and the Western Expedition was also anticlimactic, and Yang Xiuqing was the main responsible person. Judging from the Western Expedition, Yang Xiuqing has made too many mistakes, not only because of his lack of ability, but also because of his lack of tolerance.
Of course, after every major defeat, Yang Xiuqing was able to sum up lessons and lessons, adjust his deployment in a timely manner, and mobilize the forces of all parties to win a new victory. For example, after the fiasco of Tianjiazhen, Shi Dakai went into battle and won great victories in Jiujiang and Hukou.
After losing the war, he can still enjoy such a high prestige and command all the soldiers and horses in a unified manner, which is Yang Xiuqing's advantage, and his fault tolerance rate is much higher than that of others. The reason why this is so is because Yang Xiuqing enjoys the qualification of "Heavenly Father's Rumors", and the powerful faction temporarily tolerates it and does not dare to tear his face.
However, before the world was won, Yang Xiuqing began to lay out, wanting to weaken the powerful faction and enhance his own strength, how could Wei Changhui, Shi Dakai and other powerful factions obey? You must know that Yang Xiuqing has no family background, the so-called "Heavenly Father descends to earth" does not exist, how can Wei Changhui and Shi Dakai, who are powerful in hardware, let Dongwang Hu come.
Yang Xiuqing also knew the strength of Wei Changhui and Shi Dakai, and knew that their hardware was strong, so if they had to fight head-on and overturn the table, he would not be able to deal with the North King and the Wing King. In this way, Yang Xiuqing often punished Wei Changhui and Shi Dakai with "Heavenly Father descended to earth", and even publicly reprimanded him, so that the princes and kings could not get off the stage.
The rod scolded the princes, in the name of "Heavenly Father", not the East King, which in itself showed that Yang Xiuqing lacked confidence, but he had the aura of "Heavenly Father". Later, Yang Xiuqing wanted to take over the base laid by Wei Changhui and Shi Dakai's family, and the North King and the Wing King finally stood on the side of the Heavenly King, and Yang Xiuqing died in the Tianjing Incident.
Before the Tianjing Incident, everyone considered the "Heavenly Father" factor, in order to maintain the bond of faith, they were not allowed to temporarily accept the unified command of Yang Xiuqing, even if the princes and kings were dissatisfied in their hearts, they had to obey the arrangement. After the Tianjing Incident, the so-called "Heavenly Father" was a joke, and the pavilion built on the beach collapsed when touched, and the myth was shattered.
The unified command system was an extravagant hope for the Taiping Heavenly Kingdom after the Tianjing Incident. Chen Yucheng and Li Xiucheng have always wanted to solve this problem, and have held military meetings many times to coordinate the actions of soldiers from all walks of life. However, relying on local military leaders to hold meetings to achieve temporary unified command was not destined to last long, and the Taiping Heavenly Kingdom eventually failed in its own affairs.