The Chongzhen Emperor was the last emperor of the Ming Dynasty, and the Ming Dynasty lasted for three hundred years and was finally buried in his hands. However, the Chongzhen Emperor lost Jiangshan not because he was incompetent, on the contrary, among the successive emperors of the Ming Dynasty, Chongzhen's attitude or ability to handle state affairs was the best choice. Chongzhen did not have any bad habits of sound and color dogs and horses, and poured his whole heart into saving the Daming River and Mountains, and the reason why he finally failed was, in the words of the ancients, "It is too urgent to seek treatment, too wide to listen to, and too sharp to enter people" is the fundamental reason.
In other words, Chongzhen faced the dangerous mess of the Ming Dynasty, rushed to attack the heart, rushed to achieve results, and failed to grasp the scale and scale of many things. In ancient times, whenever a general went out on a campaign or inspected abroad, in order to show the authority of the emperor, improve the prestige of the main general, and achieve the effect of doing what he said and forbade him, he would sometimes give the general Shang Fang the sword and grant him the right to make an arbitrary decision and cut first and play later. The Shangfang Sword seems to be an ordinary weapon, but it symbolizes the power of life and death of "such as the arrival of the emperor", so the emperors of the past will never easily grant people.
But when this matter came into Chongzhen's hands, it completely changed its taste. Chongzhen reigned for seventeen years, prompted by the mentality of rushing for success, he awarded the general Shang Fang Sword at every turn, not counting more than a dozen, all the generals who led the army to go out on the expedition, regardless of the green and red, almost everyone had one, Sun Chengzong, Yuan Chonghuan, Lu Xiangsheng, Sun Chuanting, Yang Sichang, Ding Qirui, Fu Zonglong, Wang Zhichen, Man Gui, Li Jiantai and other generals, all of whom chongzhen gave the Shang Fang sword, and the heavy weapons of the country in the past had reached the point of flooding in Chongzhen's hands.
Shangfang Sword, as an extension and embodiment of imperial power, strictly manages and rationally applies, and has many benefits such as strengthening the prestige and sense of responsibility of the general, unifying the power of affairs, prohibiting orders, and improving the efficiency of work. However, if you do not restrict the arbitrary issuance of applications, it will inevitably bring many drawbacks. In the first year of Chongzhen, Yuan Chonghuan served as the governor of Jiliao and presided over the war against the Qing Dynasty. Chongzhen had high hopes for him, and before leaving, he specially gave Yuan Chonghuan a Shangfang sword to show his trust and dependence on Yuan Chonghuan.
Who would have thought that this sword that Chongzhen gave to Yuan Chonghuan would cause great chaos, and could even be said to have destroyed the Ming Dynasty. After Yuan Chonghuan arrived in office, he had a conflict with Mao Wenlong, the commander-in-chief of Dongjiang Town in the Ming Dynasty. Mao Wenlong was a typical representative of the military generals in the last years of the Ming Dynasty, relying on the base of Phi Island for the imperial court town, arrogant, disobeying the general's orders, and greedy for money and profits, and was a personal thorn in the face of annoyance. Yuan Chonghuan is also a violent temper, and he cannot tolerate his misdeeds, and the contradictions between the two have become more and more intense.
In the second year of Chongzhen, Yuan Chonghuan, who could not bear it, used the Shang Fang sword in his hand and brazenly killed Mao Wenlong. It is reasonable to say that Mao Wenlong was a high-level military attaché at the level of chief soldier, and Yuan Chonghuan had no right to kill him at all, and if he wanted to move, he must go to the imperial court and obtain the emperor's permission. However, at the critical moment, Yuan Chonghuan cleverly used the Shang Fang Sword given by Chongzhen, and involuntarily cut first and then played, killing Mao Wenlong. The appearance of this Shang Fang sword triggered a series of extremely serious evil consequences, which eventually destroyed the Ming Dynasty and sent the Ming Dynasty to the road of no return.
The first evil consequence is that after Mao Wenlong's death, the Phi Dao base operated by the Ming Dynasty for many years collapsed. Although Mao Wenlong was of humble character, he was loyal to the Ming Dynasty and had outstanding military talent. Phi Dao is isolated overseas, near the old lair of the Qing Dynasty, and can play an irreplaceable lead role in the Liaodong War. With the Phi Dao base, which posed a great threat to the rear of the Qing Dynasty, the Emperor Taiji always had worries about the rear, and repeatedly tried to eradicate the Phi Dao base, but was thwarted by Mao Wenlong. As the founder of the Phi Dao base, Mao Wenlong has been operating Phi Dao for many years and can be said to be the soul of the Ming Army on Phi Dao. After Mao Wenlong's death, the garrison on Phi Dao became a scattered sand, divided and contradictory, and was soon conquered by the Qing army. As a result, the Ming Dynasty lost an extremely critical strategic fulcrum.
The second evil consequence is that with mao Wenlong's killing, the garrison on Phi Dao is Mao Wenlong's old subordinates for many years, and he is extremely dissatisfied with the Ming Dynasty. Within a few years after Mao Wenlong's death, the original Mao Wenlong troops, Shang Kexi, Geng Zhongming, Kong Youde, and others, successively led their troops to surrender to the Qing Dynasty, not only taking away tens of thousands of elite troops, but even more regrettably, Kong Youde also packed and took away the Ming Dynasty's extremely valuable artillery and firearms. As a result, the Eight Banners Army, which was small and widowed, added tens of thousands of fresh troops and heavy weapons, and correspondingly, the Ming Army's military strength was broken and heavy losses. These warriors were enfeoffed by the Qing Dynasty as the King of Sanshun, and they all played a major role in the future key battles such as the Battle of Songxing, the Battle of Shanhaiguan, and the entry into the Central Plains, and almost half of the Qing Dynasty was laid.
The third evil consequence was that Yuan Chonghuan had violated the taboo by killing the general without the emperor's approval. In addition, the situation outside Guanwai did not improve, and Emperor Taiji even broke through the Great Wall into the Central Plains, so Chongzhen held a grudge against him, which eventually contributed to the tragic murder of Yuan Chonghuan. Killing Mao Wenlong was already a big mistake, and killing Yuan Chonghuan was even more wrong. Since then, the Ming Dynasty has "benefited no one from the side", and the defeat of the Ming Dynasty's destruction has now been decided and can no longer be reversed. If Chongzhen had not given Yuan Chonghuan that sword, Yuan Chonghuan would not have been able to kill Mao Wenlong at all, all these evil consequences would not have appeared, the Ming Dynasty would not have faced the defeat of destruction, and the historical development trend of the late Ming Dynasty was likely to undergo a major change.