Luoyang City is a very strange place, it seems to be a horse Flat River, easy to attack and difficult to defend. However, under the situation of highly frequent wars in the Southern and Northern Dynasties and the Sui Dynasty, this city has always been an extremely difficult city to fight.
It maintained an undefeated golden body for 80 years, that is to say, from the last year of the Northern Dynasty to the beginning of the Tang Dynasty.
It was not until the Tang Dynasty unified the world that Li Shimin personally went out on horseback that he took Luoyang. Although Wang Shichong had an elite army of 40,000 or 50,000, and even had the blessing of Shan Xiongxin, Qin Shubao, Cheng Zhijie and other famous generals of the Wagang Army, he was still defeated in the end. What the hell is going on?
First, Luoyang, which has not been lost once in 80 years
This point in time should be calculated from the split of the Northern Wei Dynasty in the Northern Dynasty.
In 534, the Northern Wei Split into Eastern wei and Western Wei, and the border between the two countries ran in a north-south direction, bounded by the Yellow River and the western part of Henan.
The Yellow River runs through the city of Luoyang, with the kunshan mountain to the west and the bears ears mountain funiu mountain to the south.
There are certain defensive conditions according to it. Therefore, after the split, the Eastern Wei abandoned the overly large old city of Luoyang and renovated and reinforced the small city of Jin Yongcheng in the northeast corner of Luoyang as a defensive focus.
Later, the successive battles for Luoyang were basically centered around Jin Yongcheng.
What is surprising is that although luoyang only has the ruined Jin Yong City left, it has never lost its hand in the offensive and defensive battles.
From that year on, the east and west countries repeatedly tugged around Luoyang, from 535 until the fall of Northern Qi in 577, the two sides fought seven times, Luoyang was either unable to capture, or chose to surrender after all the surrounding cities fell, note that it surrendered directly without fighting.
Therefore, it can still be counted as a golden body that is not broken.
After the Northern Zhou Unified the North, including the later Sui Dynasty, the city of Luoyang was expanded, and the city of Jin Yong was no longer the focus of the city's defense.
Such an unprecedentedly strong Great Luoyang, due to the large investment of the unified dynasty's strength and the large population in the city, was even more difficult to attack.
In 613, Yang Xuan rebelled against the Sui, and the army besieged Luoyang Buke, but instead fell under the siege of the Sui army.
In 618, the Wagang army swept the Invincible Hands of the Central Plains with the power of thunder, and as a result, it fought under the city of Luoyang for many years, and finally ended up in a rout. This record was held until 621 AD, for a total of more than 87 years.
I really don't know, I said I was shocked!
It turned out that Luoyang was actually a fortress.
So, how did Li Shimin fight Luoyang?
Second, Li Shimin did not attack the city hard, but first uprooted the small cities around Luoyang
On the surface, Luoyang is a city, but in fact, Luoyang is backed by mountains and water, and there are many supporting small cities and strongholds around it.
Near the Yanshi and Baiguwu passes, far away there are heavy and dangerous tiger prisons for remote help.
To the east of Luoyang is Luokou, which is the confluence of the Yellow River and Luoshui.
The tributaries of Luoyang, such as Yingshui, Ci, and Gu, can be defended in echelons, and key points such as Yiyang, Xin'an, Gucheng, Jiuqu, and Duliu can also provide peripheral defense, supply, and support for Luoyang.
The terrain in the north is the most complex, the main stream of the Yellow River in the north of Luobei, the three mouths of the river in the south of the river are Heyin, Dengjin and Mengjin for the crossing of the river, and the north of the river has the control channels of Heyang, Dengxiang, Yesaka and North Zhongcheng, and far Away has Hanoi County as a support.
North of Luoyang City, although the terrain is not very high, but the tactical significance is rich enough to explode, both sides can use this as a basis to carry out large corps movements. The southern side is mainly Yishui and Yiquekou, and the tactical significance lies mainly in guarding the Luonan Main Road.
Such a complex situation makes Luoyang City have a double meaning: it is not only a separate and strong small city, but also a hub for the defense of the region around western Henan. Therefore, in attacking Luoyang, the campaign and tactical arrangements must not only focus on Luoyang's one city and one pool, but should focus on the overall situation of regional operations, take the overall destruction as the essence, and strip Luoyang from the system on which it relies.
Li Shimin attacked Luoyang, and before the official attack began, He sent Shi Wanbao from Yiyang south to Longmen, Liu Dewei from Taihang to the east to besiege Hanoi, Wang Junkuo from Luokou to cut off grain, and Huang Junhan attacked back to Luocheng from Xiaoshui into the river (Mengjin Ferry Pass), leaving only the west for the main army to attack. From the layout point of view, the east, west, south, and north sides have been choked on the key points, the tentacles extending from Luoyang to the four sides have been cut off, and the large area defense has been compressed to the periphery of Luoyang City.
Third, dou jiande: while besieging the city, he came to the aid
Siege and reinforcement have always been complementary to each other, indispensable, only the siege of the city without obstruction is easy to suffer from the enemy, heavy attack and light siege, is in vain to consume troops more than worth the loss.
The reason why Luoyang has repeatedly defended successfully is that it is in all directions, and it is extremely easy for reinforcements from all sides to come to the aid, which has caused great trouble to the attacking side.
Li Shimin's attack on Luoyang also encountered the difficult problem of fortifying the city and strengthening the enemy to come to the rescue.
Dou Jiande divided Hebei and wanted to take the opportunity to rescue Wang Shichong and fight with the Tang army.
The tang dynasty's military strength was not enough to deal with Wang Dou's two departments at the same time, so there was confusion within the Tang court, some people advocated retreating to Guzhou to observe the situation, both withdrawing from the siege and not providing assistance, which seemed to be very stable but very negative; and some people advocated withdrawing the siege and defending the dangerous land around Luoyang, which seemed to be Dou Jiande's plan to deal with dou Jiande with all his might.
The baseline of Li Shimin's decision-making is that Wang Shichong, who has already been beaten, continues to besiege with half the effort, and if the siege is withdrawn and the previous achievements are abandoned, Wang Shichong will soon be resurrected with full blood. Although the Tang Army had great pressure in two-front combat, it was up to him to see who could persist to the end.
Fortunately, Li Shimin relied on his outstanding tactical performance and Dou Jiande's pig-like stupidity to exhaust his sharp qi outside the Tiger Prison Pass, and as a result, the battle was broken, and Dou himself became a prisoner.
The defeat of the Dou army was equivalent to cutting off the last breath of Luoyang City.
Sieges are sometimes more effective than onslaughts
The fortresses of major towns and cities are relatively completely repaired, which can effectively kill and injure the attacking troops and reduce the advantages of the attackers. Therefore, to attack the fortified city and seize the fortress, although it is a necessary means, the method of attack is exquisite. If you do not charge casualties and attack and beat at any cost, if you don't get it right, you will lose the battle.
Li Mi of the Wagang Army attacked Luoyang, and from beginning to end it was one word: fight. Chai Xiaohe persuaded Li Mi to take the two key points of Luokou and Mengjin, lock Wang Shichong's lifeline from the east to the north, and then surprise the army to enter Guanzhong in the west, and the world was determined.
To tell the truth, this is also a simplified version of the siege tactics, Wang Shichong can't penetrate Luokou and Mengjin, the most important grain and grass problem cannot be solved, and Luoyang's super stomach will definitely digest itself.
Entering Guanzhong in the west is a clever move to behead Luoyang politically, which will inevitably lead to the disintegration of the people's hearts in Luoyang, and then there will be no war in the city, not only will Wang Shichong collapse himself, but the Henan states will also look forward to the wind.
Helplessly, Li Mi had honey confidence in his Wagang army, and he resolutely stayed under Luoyang City and repeatedly launched fierce attacks. If the strong attack and hard push can work in a short time, it is also a fierce move to quickly cut the mess.
However, what is speechless is that Li Mi sits on tens of thousands of elite soldiers and the super large granary of Huiluocang, and some of them are manpower and time to grind Wang Shichong to death, but he chooses to fight against Wang Shichong. Neither digging trenches to block the passage of Luoyang City, nor did he force the enemy to trap the enemy in the city, but openly let Wang Shichong out to fight a decisive battle.
Wang Shichong went left and right, and when he won, he chased and defeated and entered the city, and the Countless losses of the Wagang Army were unable to destroy the main force of the enemy army.
In comparison, Li Shimin's tactics are much more flexible. He dared to fight hard battles, such as the great victory of Cijian.
After approaching the city wall, he cautiously gathered his troops and did not allow the city to be attacked hard to reduce the loss of troops. And "sent the armies to dig up the trenches, and to encircle them for a long time." "The lack of grain in the city is a major death pit in Luoyang since the end of the Sui Dynasty. It was precisely because Li Shimin saw this that he decided to besiege him for a long time.
Wang Shichong had no resistance to Li Shimin's various tactics.
He could only shrink into the city and did not dare to fight hard.
He had many famous generals of the Wagang Army under his account. For example, Cheng Zhijie, Qin Shubao, Pei Xingyu, Luo Shixin, and Shan Xiongxin, but they would not use people at all.
Neither dare to go out of the city to attack, nor will it be affected by the enemy.
Coupled with his treachery and unpopularity, cheng Zhijie, Qin Shubao, and Luo Shixin abandoned the dark and surrendered to the Tang army. Only one Shan Xiongxin chose to be martyred for Wang Shichong. Sigh.
Soldiers are impermanent, water is impermanent. Any fixed provision in military law is not a golden rule that is difficult to overcome. Li Shimin's breaking of Luoyang is an excellent practice of making full use of laws and tactics. This is also the highest realm pursued by successive generations of soldiers, with the law in the chest as the balance, and the use of techniques in the hands as easy. Between the balance and the easy, not a grid of mud, the famous will be out.