The Ming army did not gather from Chengdu to Xuzhou, mainly because of production issues. Many farmers in Chengdu now own twenty acres of land. They have worked hard to plant such a large area of ​​arable land. If they leave at this time, they may suffer a lot of losses. Even organizing personnel to harvest for the applicants is also costly, and Chengdu is not willing to pay such a cost. Deng Ming also has to weigh whether it is worth paying a large amount of wages.

The place in Xuzhou is slightly better. Because the fellow scholars who immigrated here this year missed the farming season, many of them worked for salt merchants. These people are easy to recruit and only pay military salaries. However, it will damage the development of the salt industry. Therefore, Deng Ming also had to consider the economic losses caused to the government by premature mobilization; in addition, the number of immigrants in Xuzhou is relatively limited and it is impossible to mobilize so many troops at once.

As for the handicraftsmen in Chengdu, although they also participated in military training, if they had other choices, Deng Ming was not willing to recruit them into the army. Wars had to be calculated, because Chengdu lacked manpower extremely, so the manpower cost was very high for Deng Ming, which affected his strategic determination.

Until the end of June, in addition to the two thousand infantry and 300 cavalry of the standing army, there were more than 4,000 recruits. As for the auxiliary soldiers, only 5,000 were concentrated. The sailors gathered some of them. After all, the navy in Chongqing did not have much pressure on shipping. Moreover, according to the reconnaissance report, Li Guoying had blocked the Jialing River, which further reduced the pressure of the Ming army's escort and patrol.

"We'd better wait until the last moment to recruit troops." Because Chongqing's troops were estimated to be weak, Deng Ming was reluctant to leave farming and the profit of salt dragged the time of assembly again and again: "Walking down the river, we can reach Chongqing in five days. Including the way to encircle Chongqing, we have time to move in mid-July. Li Guoying had no navy, couldn't find our actions, and couldn't catch up on the harvest."

Although such a stingy time may leave the Qing army with the opportunity to seize the harvest, it is not entirely a disadvantage for the Ming army, because once the harvest is completed, Chengdu can make a large mobilization, so that the attack gap between the first and second waves will be shortened, which means a shorter reaction time for the Qing army, and for the Ming army, it means that there is less prone to accidents and the army is safer.

Unlike Deng Ming, who was undecided in Xuzhou, Li Guoying had already sent many advance troops to march towards Zhong County with food and grass on his back. In order to avoid being discovered by passing Ming ships, these advance troops did not advance along the river bank, but marched inland. Without the ability to control the Yangtze River waterway, the Qing army had to endure greater losses of physical strength and military rations.

Compared with the slow assembly of the Ming army, the Qing army's movements were slightly faster, but it was not very fast. Li Guoying's order to order Zhao Liangdong to go south for a long time, but Zhao Liangdong and Wang Jinbao have not arrived in Baoning yet. This matter was not beyond Li Guoying's expectations, because the Qing army's limited transportation capacity needed to ensure the transportation of grain and fodder into Chongqing. Li Guoying insisted on hoarding enough food and fodder in Chongqing for three months. As for the military rations that attacked Wanxian, it cannot be counted.

"Governor General," Sun Sike couldn't help but feel even more anxious when he saw that the Qing army's slow movements were just harassing Wanxian, which was so simple that he could not even launch immediately: "Deng Ming has already gone to Kunming, we don't need to reserve so much food in Chongqing, right?"

"I hope the enemy will be lenient, maybe Deng Ming will come back suddenly. With him in Chengdu, the speed of the thieves sending troops can reach ten days or even more than half a month. From Chengdu, you can go to Chongqing in seven or eight days. How can you be careless?" If Deng Ming suddenly sends troops, then Chongqing can leave enough military rations to respond to various emergencies. Li Guoying doesn't know what accidents will happen, but it is always right to ensure a stable base and sufficient reserves: "Not only may there be various accidents here, but the same is true for Wanxian. As long as Chongqing has military rations, General Zhao, General Wang and General Wang will be stationed with elite troops, this governor will have no worries; if Yuan Zongdi responds abnormally, this governor can attack Wanxian or chase and defeat the fleeing thieves at his discretion. If there is a good opportunity, but he has to give up because of the unstable retreat, wouldn't it be a pity?"

If Chongqing becomes a fortress that the Ming army could never conquer, and there is another opportunity in Wanxian that is beneficial to the Qing army, Li Guoying could even consider temporarily giving up the transportation line and concentrating all the troops along the way to Wanxian. The tiger's teeth were pulled out to take down Yuan Zongdi first. The Qing army gathered more than 100,000 troops on the front line of Wanxian in Chongqing, Zhongxian, and Wanxian. Li Guoying estimated that the reinforcements of the Ming army in Chengdu would not exceed half of the Qing army at most, so he would not be afraid even if they were temporarily divided by the Ming army.

"If Deng Ming dares to stay on the north bank after conquering Wanxian, we will attack him from all over the world. The army is embraced in a group, and Chongqing has food and reinforcements, and he can do nothing to do if he has the advantage of the navy." Li Guoying patiently explained to Sun Sick. After all, this person was a military supervisor sent by the court, and the court used it to observe Li Guoying's eyes and ears; even if Li Guoying has the right to be arbitrary, Sun Sick must understand his ideas and strategies: "In addition, Deng Ming may also take a risky blow and go straight to Shunqing."

Shunqing is located between Chongqing and Baoning, on the west bank of the Jialing River, and is an important place connecting Baoning and Chongqing. If Deng Ming lands in the west of Chongqing and bypasses Chongqing and goes directly into the Jialing River channel, it can threaten Shunqing.

"The Deng thief is not so arrogant, right?" Sun Sike was shocked. Behind him was the Qing army stationed in Jiancheng in Chongqing. The Ming army's food route was not smooth. Deng Ming rushed straight in and committed suicide no matter how he saw it.

"Realistically, no, but often you can't guess whether the thief will suddenly go crazy." Li Guoying also thought that Deng Ming was unlikely to put more than 100,000 Qing troops in disregarding him and rushing Shunqing regardless of the consequences. If it were Zhang Yong, Zhao Liangdong, and Wang Jinbao, they would probably not consider this possibility. But Li Guoying was unwilling to leave a clear flaw behind him, so even such seemingly impossible things must be taken care of: "If Chongqing has food and Deng Ming dares to insert into Shunqing, we will slowly withdraw the entire army and then attack him. If there is enough food and grass, there is no need to rush to catch the fighter planes slowly. But this requires Chongqing to really have reserves, otherwise once the food channel is cut off, we will have to be forced to open the food channel."

Since Li Guoying is unwilling to leave any flaws, his speed of action will inevitably be dragged down.

Seeing the Qing army struggling to transport grain into the city, Sun Sike couldn't help but sigh: "Why don't the Governor farm around Chongqing? Even if it can reduce the grain transportation a little."

Originally, Li Guoying had some military farming in Chongqing, but after the last battle in Chongqing, he even gave up this military farming, and the reclaimed soldiers also withdrew from Baoning's military farming.

After looking at Sun Sike, Li Guoying thought about it and decided to openly announce it to the imperial military supervisor: "A year ago, when I was in Chongqing, I thought western Sichuan would soon be taken, and Wanxian might be in the bag soon. For a long-term plan, some military camps were opened in Chongqing to fill the army. But now Chongqing may become a battlefield at any time, and opening up military camps will tie up your hands and feet."

In Li Guoying's view, we need to know priorities when defending, and we need to make trade-offs: "If there are a large number of military camps outside the city, when the thieves attack, we may have to weaken the city defense and defend the enemy in the field because we are reluctant to give up our food. Although transporting tens of thousands of stones of food is hard, it can prevent our officials from being disturbed by the small profits in front of us and use our troops in a really important position."

Sun Sick kept nodding, saying that he was taught.

But Li Guoying didn't finish his words, and it also involved the selfishness of the generals. These military camps are likely to be handed over to the generals to operate or to distribute the output to them. When the harvest is related to the interests of the generals, they will affect the overall strategy in order to protect their property. Li Guoying would rather be a little troublesome than to act in an emergency to protect their property.

And there is a more critical point, that is, Li Guoying still believes that Chongqing can give up. If a large number of military camps are built around Chongqing, evacuation from Chongqing will encounter greater resistance. Generals are unwilling to suffer damage to their own interests, and most of them will insist on persevering here.

Compared with the expenses of a 100,000 army, the harvest of the military camp is really a drop in the bucket. It is like the Ming Dynasty's military farming in Guanning in order to fight against the Later Jin Dynasty, there were a large number of military camps in Jinzhou from Shanhaiguan to Ningyuan. In the early years of Chongzhen, Zu Dashou's family alone had tens of thousands of auxiliary soldiers farming for the Zu family; in the late Chongzhen period, the Wu Sangui family even expanded to control two or three thousand Liao people, and they had to cultivate a large amount of food and salary for themselves. However, the imperial court still needed to import a large amount of land. The Wu family and Zu family all opposed the evacuation from those already very dangerous areas, forcing the imperial court to invest more reinforcements and supplies again and again.

"Whether Chongqing has the meaning of retaining it depends on the result of this attack on Wanxian." Li Guoying thought silently in his heart that more than 100,000 troops were stationed in Chongqing. It would be best if the Yangtze River shipping could be cut off. If not, as long as Deng Ming and Yuan Zongdi were exhausted, it would be worth the money. Even more, as long as Deng Ming was dragged in Sichuan and could no longer attack Jiangnan, the expenses would not be considered waste. But if the huge Qing army could not threaten Wanxian at all and could only struggle for his own survival, Li Guoying felt that it would be better for Chongqing to fall off quickly. Li Guoying had no military camp here. If he really insisted on withdrawing troops, the generals would just complain a few times and would not stop him.

In early July, Li Guoying received a report from the advance team that they had arrived in Zhong County safely and met with the local Qing army. After receiving the news, the eager governor of Sichuan and Shaanxi immediately swore a oath to set off.
Chapter completed!