Although Xu Da, Li Wenzhong, and others captured Beijing, the northern Yuan forces could not be underestimated, especially the presence of Wang Baobao. Perhaps because of the light enemy, in the long war, Xu Da was not defeated by Wang Baobao. As a result, the war of 1372 was too aggressive, resulting in the death and wounding of tens of thousands of horses and horses by 150,000 elite troops. Mongolia has since confronted the Ming Dynasty for more than 200 years.
Xu Da's interaction with Wang Baobao was often won by the general Xu Da
As the first military general under Zhu Yuanzhang, Xu Da's first confrontation with Wang Baobao was in the twenty-sixth year of Zhizheng (1366), when Xu Da led an army to attack Zhang Shicheng's base camp Gaoyou, Wang Baobao led his troops south to attack Zhu Yuanzhang, because Zhu Yuanzhang correctly asked Xu Da to make preparations, so Wang Baobao retreated without fighting With Xu Da.
Subsequently, in the Battle of Xuzhou, Wang Baobao was defeated by Xu Da and lost more than 10,000 troops. Before Xu Da's Northern Expedition captured Dadu, the two maintained friendly relations. Wang Baobao did not engage Xu Da in order to preserve his strength, and Xu Da did not attack Shanxi.
After capturing Dadu, on August 15 of the first year of Hongwu (1368), Zhu Yuanzhang ordered Xu Da to capture Shanxi. This is the Western Expedition. The main purpose of the Western Expedition was to make Wang Baobao give up the recovery of Dadu and take Shanxi and other places.
At the Battle of Taiyuan, Wang Baobao was defeated by Xu Da, Chang Yuchun, and Fu Youde, mainly because wang Baobao's general Huo Yinma secretly surrendered, and Wang Baobao lost more than 40,000 people. In the first month of 1369, all of Shanxi was liberated, and Wang Baobao fled to Gansu. Later, Chang Yuchun and Li Wenzhong attacked shaanxi.
Subsequently, Xu Da's army attacked present-day Gansu and Ningxia, and launched a tug-of-war around Qingyang. In September, Xu Da was ordered to return to Nanjing (Ying Tian). Wang Baobao led his army south continuously, and in this case, Xu Da went north again.
On the third day of the first lunar month in 1370, Xu Da, the "Great General of Conquest", led the Western Route Army to attack Wang Baobao, and the left deputy general Li Wenzhong attacked Yingchang (southwest of the Abahanar Banner in Inner Mongolia).
In 1370, a great victory caused Xu Da to be lightly opposed
On the thirteenth day of the first month of the third year of Hongwu (1370), Wang Baobao attacked the surrounding areas in order to capture Dingxi Prefecture. On March 29, Xu Da and his troops arrived. Wang Baobao led an army of 100,000 to seize the favorable terrain lane Da Nang (Tong present). Xu Da settled down and settled into Shen Eryu, camping opposite a deep ditch near Wang Baobao's camp village.
On the eighth day of April, after Wang Baobao sent more than a thousand elite soldiers to detour Xu Da, he attacked the southeast battalion with a surprise army, and Xu Da hurriedly led his troops to kill the enemy soldiers. In anger, Xu Da beheaded General Zhao, the commander of the southeast battalion, and several others. The next day, the two sides fought a decisive battle, and Wang Baobao only led a few wives and children to escape. Xu Da won a great victory, capturing two princes and a duke alive, capturing more than 86,000 Northern Yuan soldiers and more than 15,000 warhorses. Guo Ying was ordered to pursue Wang Baobao to Ningxia, while Wang Baobao fled to Helin (Har and Lin, Mongolia). On May 16, Li Wenzhong attacked Yingchang and captured Emperor Yuanshun's grandson and concubines and palace people alive.
After this war, Beiyuan was in a precarious state. Emperor Yuanshun's son Zhaozong and Wang Baobao completely abandoned their former suspicions and prepared to protect the existence of northern Yuan. Emperor Yuan Shun refused to go to the western Mongol tribes (western provinces) to join the army, and also rejected the proposal to go to the eastern Mongolian tribes (eastern provinces) to join the troops. However, Emperor Yuanshun's son Zhaozong did not heed the advice and continued north to Helin. Thus, the historical tragedy of the Tianyuan Emperor being killed by the Tartars was laid.
In 1372, the army was defeated in Lingbei, and Xu Da was defeated
Where is Lingbei? Lingbei, also known as Lingbei province, was a vast area from Outer Mongolia to the Arctic Ocean administered by the Mongol Empire. The core of its rule is the place where Genghis Khan rose, and the first auxiliary is in Helin.
On the twenty-second day of the first month of the fifth year of Hongwu (1372), Zhu Yuanzhang summoned the Minister of Culture and Military Affairs to discuss the Northern Yuan issue. Xu Da took the initiative to ask Miao to carry out the Northern Expedition. Zhu Yuanzhang was silent for a long time and agreed to this suggestion.
Zhu Yuanzhang sent 150,000 troops, with Xu Da as the main general, and divided his troops into three ways to attack Northern Yuan. The purpose of Xu Da's army was to induce the main force of the Northern Yuan to fight a decisive battle with the Ming army, at that time, the Northern Yuan shang controlled the four places of Lingbei, Liaoyang, Gansu, and Yunnan, and Lingbei was the base of the Northern Yuan, so Xu Da was the main force.
The left vice admiral Li Wenzhong led the Eastern Route Army similar to the sneak attack on Yingchang in 1370, which was also a long-distance attack on Helin. The commander of the Western Route Army, General Zhengxi, was responsible for containing the Mongol kings of the Yuan Dynasty in the area west of Gansu.
Blue Jade led his troops as a forward, and Blue Jade fought the Mongols at the Mustang River (south of Ulaanbaatar, Mongolia) in February. On March 20, Xu Da engaged Wang Baobao and suffered a major defeat, mainly due to the light enemy's death and wounding of more than 10,000 people (some say tens of thousands). Xu Da retreated to the stronghold for a month and a half before he could get a respite and finally withdrew.
At the same time, Feng Sheng led the Western Route Army to a complete victory. At the end of June, Li Wenzhong's troops lost their way, and most of the soldiers died of hunger and thirst. Li Wenzhong's front-line battle killed Cao Liangchen, Zhou Xian, Chang Rong, Zhang Yao, and several other generals, and even Li Wenzhong was shot by stray arrows.
Only Feng Sheng, the third-way army, achieved great success, but because of its weak strategic position, the Ming Dynasty did not pay much attention to it. The result eventually led to Feng Sheng being ordered to withdraw his troops by Zhu Yuanzhang after this battle. In order to be troublesome, Feng Sheng found a reason to completely withdraw from the Gansu region.
Why didn't the Northern Yuan contact other Mongol regimes
After Xu Da's army occupied Beijing, the Yuan Shun Emperor still had a million men, and by the fifth year of Hongwu (1372), when the Ming Dynasty began to formally implement the Weishou system, the regular army had a strength of 1.2 million, and the two sides were not much apart. The Northern Yuan forces were mainly divided into three routes, with More than 200,000 hana in Liaodong, Wang Baobao on the right, and Emperor Yuanshun in the center.
However, the problem was that in the great peasant uprising at the end of the Yuan Dynasty, due to the struggle for power between the Prince of Yuan Shun and the Yuan Shun Emperor, coupled with the psychology of self-preservation of strength, the coordination between the various ministries of the Northern Yuan Dynasty was not good. In addition, the contradictions between the eastern kings of the Yuan Shun Emperor, the western kings and the central government led to the eventual decline of the "Golden Family", and the Northern Yuan collapsed less than 34 years after its establishment.
Although Wang Baobao was reused for this war, and Emperor Yuanshun's son Zhaozong was also striving to become stronger, because of the above reasons, the Northern Yuan had no way to pose a fatal threat to the Ming Dynasty.
In the twentieth year of Hongwu (1387), Zhu Yuanzhang finally avenged this great defeat and sent Lan Yu to attack the Northern Yuan. As a result, Emperor Tianyuan of the Northern Yuan Dynasty (said to be the grandson of Emperor Yuanshun and the younger brother of Emperor Zhaozong) was killed by the descendants of Kublai Khan's younger brother Ali Buge. The Northern Yuan perished.
The only advantage of this war for the Northern Yuan was to delay the time of destruction, after this war, Zhu Yuanzhang mainly adopted the policy of cultivation and recuperation, and has been politically co-opting the Northern Yuan, and the strategy of moving north on a large scale and trying to eliminate the Northern Yuan in one fell swoop was temporarily shelved.