What is history: it is the echo of the past to the future, the reflection of the future on the past. - Hugo
Zheng Chenggong did not understand his father's choice, but he wanted to be a loyal and filial son, although his father surrendered to the Qing Dynasty, he also had to do his best to save his father's life, and to be a loyal subject of the Ming Dynasty, he must have enough power to resist the Qing army. So in 1646, the same year that his father Zheng Zhilong went north to surrender to the Qing, Zheng Chenggong erected the banner of anti-Qing in Fujian and gathered Zheng Zhilong's old department, becoming one of the main forces in the south to resist the Qing.
From the beginning of the anti-Qing campaign in 1646 to the recovery of Taiwan in 1661, Zheng Chenggong's 15-year anti-Qing struggle can be divided into three stages.
The first phase: 1646-1650
Zheng successfully gathered the old part of the Zheng family and captured Kinmen and Xiamen as bases for the anti-Qing resistance. The development of maritime transport, port trade, economic strength enhanced. After the fall of the Longwu regime, Zheng Chenggong took the Yongli regime as Zhengshuo.
The second phase: 1651-1656
Zheng Chenggong's troops grew to more than 100,000 people, and the strategy of resisting the Qing during this period was to cultivate peace with war and use war and peace at the same time. Zheng Chenggong's troops and the Qing army had many small-scale battles in Fujian, and Zheng Chenggong defeated the Qing army in several fierce battles, and his prestige was greatly enhanced, echoing the anti-Qing forces in the southwest, Sun Kewang and Li Dingguo, and planned to unite against the Qing army.
At the same time as resisting the Qing Dynasty, Zheng Chenggong also had many peace talks with the Qing Dynasty, and the Shunzhi Emperor of the Qing Dynasty personally issued an edict, making Zheng Chenggong the Duke of Haicheng, and giving Zheng Chenggong the four capitals of Quanzhou, Zhangzhou, Chaozhou and Huizhou.
Zheng Chenggong's condition was that the Qing Dynasty cede the land of Fujian, Zhejiang and Guangdong provinces, emulate the Korean system, and not shave its hair and not be dispatched by the Qing Dynasty, just like an independent kingdom.
Such harsh conditions, the Qing Dynasty naturally will not accept, the two sides are like this and fight and stalemate.
Map of the situation in 1655
The third stage: 1657-1661
At this stage, Zheng Chenggong sent troops to the Northern Expedition three times, along the Yangtze River, advancing on land and water in an attempt to capture Nanjing. At this time, the general trend of the Qing Dynasty's unification of the whole country had been determined, and the military pressure on Zheng Chenggong was also increasing. With the failure of Zheng Chenggong's three Northern Expeditions, the situation he faced became more and more difficult.
In the more than ten years since he rebelled against the Qing Dynasty, Zheng Chenggong has not had a single day of not being exhausted, like walking on thin ice, only having two strongholds in Kinmen and Xiamen, and at any time there is a danger of being annexed by the Qing army. In order to be loyal to the Ming Dynasty and to save the life of his father who was far away in Beijing, he had to persist in resisting.
Where is the way out?
In order to have a long-term confrontation with the Qing army, it is necessary to find a base area outside the two islands of Jinxia, and Zheng Chenggong set his sights on Taiwan on the other side of the strait, which is separated from the mainland by a strait, just to give play to the advantages of Zheng Chenggong's water army, and it is difficult for the Qing army to attack.
A map of Taiwan drawn by the Dutch
By this time, Taiwan had been occupied by the Dutch for thirty-eight years and had become an important Dutch maritime trading port in East Asia. In March 1661, Zheng Chenggong led 30,000 soldiers and more than 100 warships to attack the Dutch stationed in Taiwan.
Zheng Chenggong's warships were compared to the number of Dutch warships
15:1, with absolute superiority, after eight months of hard fighting, in February 1662, the Dutch finally surrendered, and Zheng Chenggong led his army to occupy the island of Taiwan.
Zheng successfully recaptured Taiwan
Zheng's successful recovery of Taiwan was one of the few victories in Chinese history against the Western powers, and this battle played a Chinese spirit, and in the eyes of the Dutch, the Chinese soldiers were thin and dry, timid and cowardly, and when they heard the cannon, they lay on the ground like a flock of sheep and tied their hands. The soldiers under Zheng Chenggong were tall and mighty, fighting bravely, and completely subverted the image of Chinese soldiers in the eyes of foreigners.
Zheng Chenggong leapt from an ordinary anti-Qing general to a great national hero, and his personal prestige and the power of the Zheng clique reached their peak.
Yet a drastic change is coming.
Throughout Zheng Chenggong's 15-year history of resistance against the Qing Dynasty, it has always been aimed at developing its own power and expanding its control of territory, and has not launched a large-scale life-and-death decisive battle against the Qing Dynasty. Zheng Chenggong and the Qing Dynasty were always in a state of resistance and peace talks on the one hand, and the two sides maintained a delicate tacit relationship.
Just two months after Zheng successfully recovered Taiwan, this tacit relationship was broken by one person.
This person is Wu Sangui.
In April 1662, Wu Sangui executed the Yongli Emperor in Kunming, Yunnan, and the Southern Ming regime collapsed. At this time, although Zheng Chenggong occupied the islands of Taiwan and Jinxia, he had lost the object of his allegiance, and it was no longer possible to revive the Ming Dynasty, and there was no point in resisting the Qing.
At the same time, Zheng Chenggong's years of resistance finally made the Qing Dynasty lose patience, Zheng Zhilong was killed by the Qing Dynasty, the news of his father's death came from Beijing, and he could no longer perform filial piety for his father. From a loyal and filial son to a lonely rebel, this huge change was like a thunderbolt on a sunny day that completely crushed Zheng Chenggong's psychological defense line.
He fell ill, and on his deathbed, Zheng Chenggong said:
"Since the country drifted to zero, Pillow Ge wept blood for seven years, there was no basis for retreat, loyalty and filial piety were lost, and death was not blind, why make the lonely subjects as far as this pole, what face do I see the emperor in the underground."
In June 1662, at the age of 39, Zheng Chenggong died in Taiwan with a grudge.
Throughout his life, Zheng Chenggong "was in a situation where there was no way to do it, and he had never had a situation that had never been, and with the momentum of his mantis arm, he crisscrossed the enemy, chased the red and destroyed the sea, and opened up thousands of miles of land, and was the only one who had bright fruits."
Zheng Chenggong's "failure" was at his personal level, rongma's life, only bao erdao, three northern expeditions, all of which became illusory. Trying to turn the tide of the tide from the fall, helping the building to fall, but becoming a lonely rebel son, died young, tragic life.
The "greatness" of Zheng Chenggong lies in the fact that he injected a magnificent heroic spirit into the character of the Chinese nation. Chinese experienced more than two thousand years of feudal dynasty rule, accustomed to the rise and fall of dynasties, most of the people are "time-conscious people for Junjie", pursue practical self-interest, have a small family and no everyone, which is particularly evident in the Chongzhen Dynasty at the end of the Ming Dynasty, a large number of civilian and military generals surrendered to the Qing Dynasty, directly promoting the demise of the Ming Dynasty.
Zheng Chenggong had an idealistic personality that knew that he could not do anything, he was in the chaotic world at the end of the Ming Dynasty, he insisted on loyalty and filial piety throughout his life, was a loyal and filial piety, bowed down to the revival of the Ming Dynasty, and then died, recovered Taiwan, and safeguarded the interests of the Chinese nation.
Zheng Chenggong is different from the traditional heroic image, he was born in Japan, died in Taiwan, across the sea, drifting all his life, the rough waves on the sea did not extinguish his enthusiasm for the country and the people.
In 1699, 38 years after his death, Zheng Chenggong's remains were moved back to his hometown in Fujian for burial, and the Kangxi Emperor personally inscribed an inscription for Zheng Chenggong:
Four towns with more than two hearts, two islands tun division, dare to fight to the southeast for half of the wall;
The kings have no land, a corner of resistance, and know that there are orphans and loyal overseas.
A mighty heroic spirit runs through Zheng Chenggong's thirty-nine years of burning life with hot blood, and it still reverberates on both sides of the taiwan strait.