Zeng Guofan fought a stupid battle to kill the Taiping Heavenly Kingdom, but it also caused great losses

In the late Qing Dynasty, the Taiping Heavenly Kingdom broke out, and in an instant, the flames of war burned throughout half of China, but the Qing government could do nothing about it, so it called for group exercises to be held everywhere, and the four generals of Zhongxing also stepped onto the stage of history. The first of these is Zeng Guofan, but Zeng Guofan's way of fighting is often called a dumb battle. However, in the end, it was Zeng Guofan who attacked the Tianjing City by relying on his own stupidity. What are the advantages and disadvantages of this approach?

The Taiping army was like a broken bamboo, and the Xiang army was invincible

At the beginning of the war, although Zeng Guofan used the most advanced munitions and trained a tiger and wolf division, the Xiang Army, in the fourth year of Xianfeng (1854) in March Yuezhou was defeated, april Jinggang Water Station was defeated, the following year the Xiang army was fired by Shi Da and burned more than 100 warships, Zeng Guofan himself was besieged in Nanchang City, Zeng Guofan himself was forced to jump into the river, so several times zeng guofan wanted to jump into the river to commit suicide was dissuaded by others. It can be seen that the combat effectiveness of the Taiping Heavenly Kingdom is not under the Xiang Army at all, and at the beginning of the war, it is absolutely to press the Xiang Jun to the ground and rub it. However, when Shi Dakai attacked Jiangxi, there were differences within the Taiping Heavenly Kingdom, and Hong Xiuquan and Yang Xiuqing had infighting, which was called the "Tianjing Incident" in history!

Strategic stalemate, protracted war

Although Hong Xiuquan retained the fruits of his victory, it was also a depletion of strength within the Taiping Heavenly Kingdom, which also exposed the chaotic situation within the Taiping Heavenly Kingdom's rule and could not establish a solid base area. Zeng Guofan immediately realized that this war could be fought in a different way, that is, a protracted war. Because the foundation of the Taiping Heavenly Kingdom was not solid, and because of the short period of its establishment, there was no strategic material resource support. This led Zeng Guofan to prepare to try a new method, that is, to "form a hard village and fight a stupid battle." "It can be said that this is the most stable way of fighting in the Qing Dynasty or the Xiang Army.

Zeng Guofan

In fact, this method of warfare is extremely cruel for both armies, and at the same time, the Xiang army uses its superior strength to besiege the enemy, which is huge in terms of attrition. Even if there is a financial master Hu Linyi as a helper of the Xiang Army, it usually leads to the surrounding towns and ten rooms and nine empty, completely squeezed dry. And the long confrontation is definitely a test of the warriors' psychology, even if they can defeat each other, they are absolutely killing the enemy and losing 8,000. Of course, Zeng Guofan's younger brother Zeng Guoquan also used this method to take advantage of the weakness of the Taiping Army's insufficient logistical supplies with 20,000 enemies and 200,000 enemies, and then dug deep ditches to lure the other side to attack, and at the same time use superior firearms to strike at the Taiping Army.

The drawbacks of this approach

This method of warfare can be said to be terrible, but the most important thing is food, and the mental and physical exertion of both sides in the war of attrition is extremely great, and the will of both sides is close to collapse, and there is no surplus food. Therefore, after the destruction of the city, it will usually be vented through massacre due to psychological pressure or the limitation of material resources. Even Zeng Guofan could not prevent such a thing from happening, resulting in Zeng Guofan's reputation not being very good and his younger brother being called "Zeng shaved his head".

During the Taiping Heavenly Kingdom Movement, few major wars broke out, but they led to the direct death of nearly 70 million people and the indirect death of 100 million people, so we can see how much this method of warfare has lost and how long it stays. Although the rule of the Qing Dynasty was maintained, the price was indeed too great. There is nothing clever about it, and this is the disadvantage of the student fighting.

To sum up: The hardened villages adopted by the Xiang Army and the fighting of the stupid battle really consumed the Taiping Army alive. To a certain extent, the unity of the country was maintained, but the consequences of this method were unforeseeable and uncontrollable to Zeng Guofan. It is not necessarily how clever it is to say that he is smart, but from the final result, Zeng Guofan fulfilled his obligations, fulfilled his responsibilities, and suppressed the taiping movement. It also fully corresponds to Chen Gongdu's evaluation: "Guo Fan su is rigid, his talent is not as good as Hu Zuo, and his merit is doubled, and it is his specialty to know people well." ”