Although Chongzhen himself is not the king of the fallen country, history proves that he is indeed the king of the fallen country. Although he worked hard, was as diligent as Zhu Yuanzhang, and wanted ZTE Daming wholeheartedly, he had a very fatal flaw - to die for face.
Because of the death for face, the Chongzhen Emperor missed three strategic opportunities to reverse the decline of the Ming Dynasty.
First, the best opportunity to negotiate peace with the Manchu Qing outside Guanwai was missed.
During the chongzhen emperor's term of office, the Ming Dynasty was worried about internal and external troubles, there were more and more peasant rebels inside, and there were Manchu Qing iron horses with high combat effectiveness on the outside, and for the Ming Empire, which was corrupt in history and empty in the treasury, it was the best strategy to take care of the outside world first.
Therefore, Chongzhen deliberately wanted to negotiate peace with the Manchu Qing and free his hands to clean up the internal rebel forces. Therefore, he instructed the military department Shangshu Chen Xinjia to secretly negotiate peace with the Qing court, but the matter leaked out, he was particularly afraid that the idea of negotiating peace was his own, and it was easy to lose the face of an emperor who never surrendered and negotiated peace, so he shifted all the responsibility to Chen Xinjia and brutally executed Chen Xinjia.
As a leader, when encountering things, the idea is not how to solve the problem, but for the sake of face, but to blame the subordinates, punish the subordinates, and for a long time, the ministers and Chongzhen will only deviate from morality and dare not do things sincerely.
Second, the opportunity to make a comeback was missed.
When Li Zicheng's army was about to attack outside the Forbidden City in Beijing, the ministers suggested that the imperial court move south, at least to Nanjing, the capital of Zhu Yuanzhang's capital, to follow the example of the Southern Song Dynasty court. As a result, this very good proposal was immediately rejected by Chongzhen, because in Chongzhen's heart, the emperor could not easily admit defeat, even if the rebels attacked the foot of the city gate, they would have to fight desperately to the end.
Moreover, as the Son of Heaven, he should have guarded the gate of the kingdom, not discarded it. Chongzhen's arrogance of not accepting defeat was extraordinary, but in the long run, there were still many places in the Ming Dynasty that had not been captured by the rebel army, and there was still a chance to breathe, and it was possible to counterattack the rebel army in the end. However, Chongzhen did not have this idea, and since the capital was breached, the country was destroyed.
In fact, after Chongzhen's death, several emperors appeared in the late Ming Dynasty, all of whom were stubbornly resisting, proving that at that time, the people who supported Daming were still there, but Chongzhen would not take advantage of it.
Third, we have missed a good opportunity to straighten out the administration of officials. At the beginning of Chongzhen's presidency, he used thunderous means to eliminate Wei Zhongxian's many castrated parties, and the atmosphere of the imperial court seemed to be new, and the relationship between kings and subjects seemed to be better. However, later developments were less than satisfactory.
In the seventeen years of the Chongzhen Dynasty, the cabinet changed fifty phases, the reason is that the Chongzhen Emperor's personality is suspicious, easy to produce doubts about the ministers, moreover, at that time, it is the time when the party struggle is getting more and more intense, as the king of a country, if you can't see the ministers' intrigue, gangs and factions, and let it develop, then, in the end, the Donglin Party, which is becoming more and more powerful, will mistakenly destroy the country, and the facts have proved so.
For example, Wen Tiren, in the Apocalypse Dynasty, so many ministers were castrated by the party, only he had a frank career, therefore, many Donglin party people hated him, because Wen Tiren lived well, others could not see it, especially the small-minded Donglin party members who only had no world, plus Wen Tiren rejected dissidents and used poisonous means, so he mistakenly believed wen Tiren's Chongzhen, because he did not see the situation clearly, did not stop the internal war of this partisan struggle in time, and missed a great opportunity to have the ambition to rise and thrive.