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The Kangxi Emperor realized from the lessons of the failure of many peace talks with taiwan's Zheng clique and Zheng Jing's threat of invading the mainland by force that the possibility of settling the Taiwan issue by purely peaceful means did not exist, and that to achieve reunification, it was necessary to resort to force. In the eighteenth year of the Kangxi Dynasty (1679), the war to quell the Rebellion of the San Francisco was still in progress, and the Kangxi Emperor had already made up his mind to unify Taiwan by force. The Records of the Qing Dynasty contains:
"If the Lord wants to take advantage of the victory and the reversal of the sea, he is a boat master who collects Xiamen and Kinmen and takes the two islands of Xiamen and Kinmen in order to try to conquer Penghu and Taiwan."
After the Qing army recaptured the coastal islands such as Jin and Xiamen, and zheng jing led the remnants to flee to Taiwan, Yao Qisheng, the governor of Fujian, wrote a note on Chen's eight paragraphs on "The Aftermath of Pinghai", one of which was "Taiwan is attacked in a second order, and the waves of the sea will never be carried out."
In the first month of the twentieth year of the Kangxi Dynasty, Zheng Jing died of illness in Taiwan, and the Internal Contradictions of the Zheng clique intensified due to the power struggle, and the powerful figures Feng Xifan and Liu Guoxuan joined forces to kill Zheng Jing's eldest son Zheng Ke (Zang Tu) and supportEd Feng Xifan's son-in-law and Zheng Jing's second son, Zheng Ketuan. Zheng Ketuan was only 12 years old, and the actual power of the Zheng clique fell into the hands of Feng and Liu.
In May of that year, Yao Qisheng reported the death of Zheng Jing and the infighting of the Zheng clique to the imperial court, and requested that "the officers and soldiers of the land and water meet, and the trial plane will directly pound the nest." The Kangxi Emperor believed that the time had come to reunify Taiwan by force, so he made the strategic decision to reunify Taiwan by force.
On the seventh day of the first month of June, he issued an edict after meeting with university scholars:
"Since Zheng Jin (Jing) is lying in the shadows, the thieves will be obedient and disturbed, and it is advisable to take the opportunity to stipulate Penghu and Taiwan." Governor Yao Qisheng, Inspector Wu Xingzuo, Admiral Nomai, Wan Zhengse, etc., together with the generals Lahada and the attendant Wu Nuchun, united their aspirations to lead the Green Flag Boat Division forward, and to suppress and use them simultaneously, to determine the sea frontier at the bottom, and not to miss the opportunity."
This decision provoked a strong reaction among senior Qing officials.
At that time, those who opposed the reunification of Taiwan by force actually occupied the mainstream in the imperial court, and they all believed that "the sea is dangerous and far away, the wind and waves are unpredictable, and it is difficult to win with a long drive, and it is difficult to calculate everything." Among the generals at the front, there were also many who disagreed with the unification of force. The Admiral of the Fujian Marine Division, Wan Zhengse, said that "Taiwan is difficult to attack, and there is no need to attack," and even the supreme military commander of Fujian at this time, Ninghai General Lahada, also raised objections. Cabinet ministers Li Guangdi, Shi Lang, Yao Qisheng, and others supported the use of force against Taiwan.
Judging from the situation at that time, the Qing government's reunification of Taiwan by force was not only necessary, but also the conditions for all aspects were already in place, and the trend of reunification was irreversible.
After the Kangxi Emperor made up his mind to unify Taiwan by force, he began to consider the selection of the main admiral of the water division. At that time, although Wan Zhengse, the admiral of the Fujian Water Division, was good at water warfare, had a good military command, and had outstanding military achievements, he was a resolute opponent of the reunification of Taiwan by force, and the Kangxi Emperor decisively transferred him away from the water division and became the admiral of Fujian Land.
At this time, Yao Qisheng and Wu Xingzuo jointly signed Shi Lang, and the cabinet scholar Li Guangdi also recommended Shi Lang to the Kangxi Emperor. Li Guangdi also put forward four reasons for Shi Lang to be the admiral of the water division:
First, Shi Lang's entire family was killed by the Zheng clan, and the Zheng clan was a feud and could be trusted; second, among the generals, only Shi Lang knew the situation inside the Zheng clique the most, "there was no one who had surpassed it"; the third was that Shi Langzhi was both courageous and "not a brave husband"; fourth, the Zheng clique was "feared, but this one person, with his anger, took advantage of it first".
Through the protection of Yao Qisheng, Li Guangdi and others, the Kangxi Emperor had a basic understanding and trust in Shi Lang, but he also had to examine Shi Lang's talents in person, so he prepared a banquet in the inner court and summoned Shi Lang to ask for a strategy for attacking Taiwan. Shi Lang calmly analyzed the situation between the Qing and Zheng sides and stated his strategy for using troops. The Kangxi Emperor was very satisfied after hearing this, so in July of the twentieth year of Kangxi, he made a major personnel decision to appoint Shi Lang as the admiral of Fujian.
In October of the same year, Shi Lang went to Fujian to take up his post. However, he and Yao Qisheng, the governor of Fujian, soon had differences of opinion on a series of issues such as the time of the expedition, the route of the march, and the use of troops, which led to repeated delays in the offensive against Taiwan. In order to change the situation in which Shi and Yao were at loggerheads and mutually constrained, and to ensure the smooth implementation of the attack on Taiwan, the Kangxi Emperor made a decision in October 21 to grant Shi Lang the right to "special conquest", with one of them having full authority to command the Qing army's attack on Taiwan, while Yao Qisheng sat in Fujian and was responsible for the logistics support work of the Qing army. In this way, the coordination of the Qing army's command system for attacking Taiwan was ensured, and Shi Lang was able to give full play to his military and political talents and implement his established strategy for attacking Taiwan without interference.
Whether or not the strategic guidance for the offensive against Taiwan is correct or not has a direct bearing on the success or failure of the great cause of reunification.
Shi Lang was the most resolute warrior faction among the Qing dynasty ministers and always advocated the reunification of Taiwan by force.
He pondered and deliberately planned for many years, and formulated the strategic guiding principle of "suppressing and suppressing the people", the core of which was to force peace by war, that is, to promote the political settlement of the Taiwan issue by military means, and to avoid triggering war on the main island of Taiwan as much as possible.
The focus of the "suppression of the enemy" is the "suppression", the dominance of military offensive, while at the same time trying to find the possibility of a political solution. The relationship between the two is to suppress first and then to promote the care, that is, to take military action and use strong military pressure to force Taiwan's Cheng clique to accept the terms of peace talks and realize the reunification of Taiwan with the mainland.
Its specific implementation plan is divided into three steps:
In the first stage, penghu was captured by amphibious forces and the living forces of the Zheng army were eliminated. Penghu was Taiwan's maritime barrier, controlling Taiwan's main sea lanes of communication with the outside world at that time. The occupation of Penghu and the suppression of the territory by large troops have opened the door to Taiwan and hindered trade, which can form an imminent deterrent that threatens its survival.
In the second stage, after occupying Penghu, it was not triggered, and preparations were made for attacking Taiwan. At the same time, he sent emissaries to Taiwan to negotiate peace with the Cheng clique, forcing them to surrender to the Qing government and realize the peaceful reunification of the main island of Taiwan. If the peace talks failed and the Cheng clique stubbornly resisted, it took the third step and marched into the main island of Taiwan.
The main fleet of the Qing army reached the port of Anping west of Chengtianfu (present-day Tainan City), the political center of Taiwan, to implement a frontal containment; at the same time, two elite rapid fleets were dispatched, one to the south to blockade Dagou Harbor (present-day Kaohsiung City), the other to the north to blockade Mosquito Harbor (that is, QiaoGang, in present-day Chiayi County) and Haiweng cave port (present-day Da'an Port), so that they could not take care of each other. After controlling the main ports and waterways of Taiwan's entry and exit, it besieged Taiwan and sent people to further surrender the Cheng clique, or promote internal turmoil and self-defeat without a fight. If the goal is still not achieved, it will carry out a landing operation against Taiwan, first sweeping away the Zheng army outside the city and between the villages, then capturing the isolated city where the Zheng army is trapped, and finally seizing the entire island of Taiwan by force and completely eliminating the Zheng clique.
On the basis of fully understanding the enemy's situation, Shi Lang drew up a plan for attacking Taiwan, the most important of which was to choose the correct timing and offensive route for crossing the sea in light of the climatic characteristics of the Taiwan Strait. The monsoon is the most obvious climatic feature of the Taiwan Strait.
In the winter of each year, the wind direction is northward, the wind is strong, and the sea wind is high; in the summer, the wind direction is southerly, the wind is smaller, and the sea surface is relatively gentle, but the summer is a period of highly destructive typhoons. For the Qing fleet, which was mainly powered by the sea breeze at that time, if the climate and wind direction were properly utilized, they could use the wind to create favorable conditions for victory; improper use and misjudgment could be attacked by the sea breeze, repeating the mistakes of Kangxi's three- and four-year defeat in attacking Taiwan.
Therefore, choosing the correct timing and offensive route according to the law of the monsoon climate of the Strait is crucial to the success or failure of the Qing army's attack on Taiwan Shi Lang, relying on the rich experience accumulated over many years of sea frontier activities and his mastery of the law of the monsoon in the Strait, decided to choose the time for the sea crossing operation in June in the summer. Shi Lang believes that the north wind is hard and strong in winter, which is not conducive to the navigation and mooring of the fleet. The Battle of Penghu may not be won in one battle, and once the ships are scattered by the sea breeze, it is difficult to quickly assemble and launch a second attack. The southwest monsoon in summer is relatively soft, the sea breeze is light and the waves are flat, the Qing fleet can sail in formation, officers and men can avoid the pain of dizziness, and it is also conducive to the concentration of the fleet to anchor and carry out the next combat operation.
At the same time, due to the many typhoons in the summer, it is not customary to cross the sea in this season, so the enemy's defenses are bound to be lax. Launching an attack at this time can catch the enemy off guard and achieve the miraculous effect of "surprise and unpreparedness" in the art of war. In order to avoid the attack of the typhoon, Shi Lang chose more than 20 days before and after the summer solstice as the best time to cross the sea and fight, and he judged based on his previous sailing experience that the wind and waves were the most peaceful during this time, and the possibility of typhoons was small.
In the choice of offensive route, Shi Lang decided to set sail from Tongshan on the basis of the direction of the wind and the known enemy defenses, ride the southwest monsoon in June to cross the Taiwan Strait eastward, and first seize the area of BayuYu (present-day Wang'an Township, Penghu) south of the main island of Penghu and where the Zheng army was weakly defended. In this way, the anchorage and attack point of the fleet could be obtained, and the vantage point of the upper wind could be taken to launch an attack on Penghu. By capturing Penghu, strangling the enemy's throat, and then pointing directly at Taiwan, the strategic principle of "suppressing Yufu" can be smoothly implemented.
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