In June of the second year of Shunzhi, Duoduo attacked the Hongguang regime of the Southern Ming Dynasty along the Yangtze River, and Dolgon thought that the world was at peace, so he couldn't wait to convene a meeting. At this celebration party, in front of Daishan, Jierharang and others, Dolgon boasted about the merit of the two white flags to unify the world, and then changed his words and criticized Huang Taiji's compromise policy of refusing to enter the Central Plains. Did Huang Taiji really compromise with the Ming Dynasty as Dolgon said? Was his eight years of iron-blooded reform really forgotten by the world?
Huang Tai Chi
The pioneer of the encirclement and reinforcement, Huang Taiji was the first person to eat crabs
In the first month of the eleventh year of the Mandate of Heaven (1626), after learning that Sun Chengzong was deposed by the Ming court, Nurhachi led the Eight Banners cavalry to cross the Liao River and attacked Ningyuan City on the first line of Shanhaiguan. However, in the process of capturing the city, he was unfortunately wounded by the red-clothed cannon placed by Yuan Chonghuan, and died suddenly due to the onset of his injuries soon after.
As Nurhachi's successor, Huang Taiji was always haunted by the defeat in the Battle of Ningyuan, after all, this was the first crushing defeat of the Later Jin in the face of the Ming army. After learning from the pain, Huang Taiji specially convened a political meeting to criticize the siege tactics of the Nurhachi period. First of all, the reason why the Eight Banners were omnipresent in the battle was that they relied on their strong field combat capabilities, that is, by luring the enemy out of the city to annihilate the opponent in the field battle, resulting in the emptiness of the city's troops and taking advantage of the situation to attack.
It's okay to use this routine occasionally, but once it's a fixed tactic, it quickly becomes flawed. Yuan Chonghuan obviously understood this, and in order to avoid a direct collision with the Eight Banners cavalry, he withdrew all the garrisons and Western cannons into the city, which allowed the soldiers to calmly operate firearms with the protection of the city wall and improve the killing effect.
Eight Banners Heavy Cavalry
In contrast, the bow and arrows that the Eight Banners were proud of could not be shot into the towering high walls, and the cavalry's melee charge and slashing advantage could not be brought into play, so they could only withstand the condescending artillery attacks of the Ming army, and finally suffered a crushing defeat.
After stating the operational disadvantages of the Eight Banners, Huang Taiji asked everyone for advice, and Dolgon and Zilharang agreed that if they wanted to capture the Ming army's city, they could first use artillery to bombard the city, and then build a cloud ladder to attack.
Although the use of a strong attack can break through the city in one go, it will hurt the enemy by 1,000 and lose 800, which is completely worth the loss for Houjin, which has a population of 2 million. For this reason, Huang Taiji tried his best to override public opinion and decided to subvert the existing military tactics and launch a macro strategy of encircling points and sending reinforcements.
In the fifth year of Tiancong (1631), Zu Dashou led 80,000 reinforcements into the Daling River, and Huang Taiji also drove his own expedition and raised the whole country's troops to fight, which will directly determine the national fortunes of the two dynasties. However, just when it was a matter of life and death, Huang Taiji dared to bet on the operation of the country to practice his encirclement tactics.
The siege of the city is afraid that the soldiers will be wounded, and it is better to dig trenches and build walls to trap them. If the other army comes out, I will fight, and if foreign aid comes, I will meet it. "Records of Emperor Taizong of the Qing Dynasty"
According to Huang Taiji's instructions, the soldiers of the Eight Banners dug four trenches around the city, and built a wall more than one zhang high, surrounded the city of Dalinghe, and then used the high-speed mobility of the Qing cavalry to go around the back of the opponent and cut off the supply line. In this way, the Ming army could not seek a breakthrough under the premise of losing the supply of grain and grass, and once it tried to break through, it would be quickly surrounded and annihilated by the Qing cavalry.
Dig trenches and besiege the city
At the same time, Huang Taiji took advantage of the starvation of the defenders in the city, and sent the Eight Banners of the Han Army to fire red-coated cannons and bombard the city of Dalinghe. Although this move could not completely destroy the city wall, it could mentally break the resistance of the other side.
Sure enough, under the double torture of material and spirit, there was a terrible scene of cannibalism and cannibalism within the Ming army, and the reinforcements sent by the Ming Dynasty could not break through the encirclement at all, and were confined to the trenches that were connected in a line. Faced with this dilemma, Zu Dashou was worried that the troops would mutiny, so he had to respond to the conditions of the peace talks of Huang Taiji and submit a surrender to the Qing Dynasty, which not only made the Ming Dynasty lose an important transportation hub, but also made Huang Taiji's encirclement and reinforcement tactics famous all over the world, and even the old opponent Wu Sangui exclaimed:
Wrapping grain and carrying cannons, collecting wood to build houses, and planning to live for a long time, these 20 years have never been seen. Collection of Archives of the Ming Dynasty of China
Thanks to Huang Taiji's wise military reform, the Eight Banners have grown from a ragtag army that only knows how to attack and not know how to defend to a division of kings with both offense and defense, which not only allowed Huang Taiji to establish absolute prestige in the Eight Banners, but also laid the foundation for the war for the Great Qing Dynasty to cleanse the Central Plains and unify the world.
Comprehensive sinicization, from the economic base to the superstructure
In 1615, the Later Jin took control of Liaodong from the Ming Dynasty by virtue of their victory in the Battle of Sarhu, and the Eight Banners army began to enter the region in large numbers. Nurhachi hoped to take advantage of the superior agricultural conditions in Liaodong to encourage Han production, and then provide reserves for the Later Jin conquest of the Central Plains.
Qing Taizu Nurhachi
But Baqi has long been accustomed to the predatory economy, how can they understand the benefits of agricultural production, so every place they go, not only swept away the land and livestock, but also forcibly robbed the Han people as slaves. This barbaric military plunder set off a fierce resistance of the Han people, and for a time countless people flocked to the Shanhai Pass, and the population of Liaodong region was sharply reduced.
In order to stop the exodus from intensifying, Nurhachi enacted draconian fugitive laws, inflicting brutal capital punishment on those who fled, causing social unrest. By the time Huang Taiji succeeded to the throne, the domestic rice grain had risen to 8 taels and one bucket, the people were hungry and captives, and the people were free from each other.
Huang Taiji was soberly aware that if he wanted to solve serious social problems, he had to abandon the remnants of Manchurian slavery and vigorously promote agricultural production in order to develop the feudal economy.
For this reason, Huang Taiji first deprived the nobles of the Eight Banners of the benefits of enclosure, and then ordered the Manchu and Han to live separately, unify the Han people into the household registration, and select Han officials from them to govern. At the same time, in order to make up for the lack of human resources in the Later Jin, the Manchu and Han integration policies were implemented in Liaodong, and all Han people surrendered to the unified distribution of land and houses, which made up for the population lost during the Nurhachi period.
You will have to ride all the horses you have, and you will have to use all the livestock, and your wives will be spared, and you will choose the land and plough it, and the grain will be self-sufficient. As for the people, they are all my own children, and when they return, they should be nurtured. "Records of Emperor Taizong of the Qing Dynasty"
It can be said that after Huang Taiji's reform of the law, the high-quality productive forces represented by agriculture replaced the backward productive forces such as fishing, hunting and gathering, and the Houjin entered a feudal social form.
The economic base determines the superstructure, and when Huang Taiji completes the agricultural reform, the state can distribute the collected grain in a unified manner, and there is no longer a need to distribute food through hunting, so there is no need for a council to protect the interests of the nobles of the Eight Banners.
Huang Taiji strategist Hong Chengchou
Under the advice of the Han strategist Ning Wan, Huang Taiji imitated the Central Plains system and carried out two Sinicization reforms.
1. Set up six ministries and the Metropolitan Procuratorate, divide the parliamentary power into six, evenly disperse among the ministries, in order to balance the Manchu and Han forces, but also deliberately install the Han officials who surrendered, such as Hong Chengchou, Fan Wencheng, etc. In this way, the Six Ministries became organizations directly subordinate to the imperial power, and the Qing Dynasty was only one step away from completing the centralization of power.
2. Vigorously advocate the study of Chinese classics, from which to absorb the Confucian concept of loyalty and patriotism, so as to improve the ideological and cultural deficiencies of Manchuria. It can be seen from this,Huang Taiji's ideology and strategy are far ahead,What he wants is not only as simple as conquering the Central Plains,More about how to govern after conquest,Homeopathic sinicization is the only answer。
The final step of feudalism was the abolition of the division of the eight families
The political situation of the division of the eight families of the Later Jin Dynasty was completely caused by Nurhachi, who was hit hard by the incident of his eldest son Chu Ying, and decided to no longer concentrate power in the hands of one beyler, but to be jointly governed by the eight beylers. Therefore, at the beginning of Huang Taiji's succession, although he was called the Khan of a country, he was no different from ordinary Baylor, not only to carefully obey the three Baylors as brothers, but also to consult with the other four little Baylors whenever there were major national events, as the so-called:
The eight kings discussed the Khan and managed the country's affairs together, and the Khan must not violate the will of the eight kings, and the eight kings can be more easily the Khan. "Manchu Old Files"
In this case, the kings were suspicious of each other, and each had his own way, and the yang was the courtier, and the yin was the khan. Any military and political measures proposed by Huang Taiji could not be implemented easily, and this was by no means a good thing for the central decision-making of the Houjin Dynasty.
Obviously, at a time when the world's heroes are competing for the Central Plains in a vain attempt to achieve hegemony for a thousand years, it is extremely difficult for Huang Taiji to even settle the internal level, so how can he talk about accomplishing a great cause? If he fails to complete the centralization of power and coordinate the strategic thinking at this critical moment, he will only be left with a corner of peace in the northeast.
So Huang Taiji decided to carry out drastic political reforms, and did not hesitate to abolish the Eight Kings at the cost of disobeying Nurhachi's will. In fact, the key to abolishing the system lies not in the system itself, but in the individuals who are attached to the system.
In the fourth year of Tiancong (1630), Erbeile Amin was caught for slaughtering the city in Yongping, and just as Amin was quibbling with the tradition left by Nurhachi, Huang Taiji counterattacked with the "integration of Manchu and Han", and finally completely collapsed the blue flag force it represented. In the second year after the Amin incident, Huang Taiji used the strategy of luring the snake out of the hole, forcing the third Bel Mang Gurtai to show his blade in front of the emperor, and removed his title of Baylor. With the fall of Amin and Mang Gultai one after another, Huang Taiji thought that the time was ripe, so he mobilized his collective forces and instructed Dolgon, Duoduo and others to discuss the crimes of the good people, and finally dismissed the Great Baylor from his position.
Dolgon
In the first year of Chongde (1636), that is, the eighth year after the iron-blooded reform, after clearing out all opposition forces, Huang Taiji worshiped the heavens in the suburbs of Shengjing, and then ascended the throne, and was honored as "Emperor Kuanwen Rensheng", and named the country Daqing. A minority regime that started as a safari officially stood on the land of China, and was about to replace the dying Ming Dynasty, and all of this began with Huang Taiji's iron-blooded reform.
Conclusion:
It took only eight years for Huang Taiji to complete the comprehensive sinicization from the economic base to the superstructure, and then built a tribal alliance into a centralized empire. However, at the historical moment when the Manchu Qing Dynasty entered the Central Plains, Dolgon came from behind with his outstanding military exploits, and he had the limelight to overshadow Huang Taiji. In fact, without the iron-blooded reform of Huang Taiji's eight years, it would have been impossible for the Qing Dynasty at this time to complete the centralization of power, and how could Dolgon talk about mobilizing thousands of troops and horses? Just as Emperor Kangxi said: Emperor Wenzong snare Junyan, create a group of famines, and open up the foundation of the Han Dynasty!