Chapter 260 Song Jun's Doubts and Helplessness
More than ten miles outside Jingzhou City is a place called Shashi Town.

Because Shashi is located at the strategic point of the Yangtze River, it is also called Jiangjin. In the 1683nd year of Emperor Kangxi's reign (), a patrol inspection office was set up in Shashi, so it was called Shashi Office, which was under the jurisdiction of Jiangling County, Jingzhou Prefecture, Hubei Province.

In the first year of Yongzheng's reign (1723), the Qing government decided to move the Tongpan of Jingzhou Prefecture to Sha and set up the Tongpan Office on Qingshi Street, commonly known as the "Three Prefectures".

After the first year of Yongzheng's reign (1723), Shashi was administratively part of Jiangling County, but its administrative structure was equivalent to that of a county and was directly under the jurisdiction of Jingzhou Prefecture. In the seventh year of Yongzheng's reign (1729), the Grain and Salt Administration Office of Jingzhou Prefecture was moved to Shashi.

Since Shashi had no city walls, Yunhua withdrew his troops back to Jingzhou. Now the imperial army has moved into Shashi.

The two armies were in a standoff.

After the imperial army entered Shasi, they first installed cannons to block the Yangtze River to ensure the safety of their own waterway, and then prepared to attack the city.

Although Song Jun compared Chen Gu to Nurhaci and the Qing court to the Ming Dynasty in his memorial, which made Jiaqing very unhappy, Song Jun finally served as the commander-in-chief of the vanguard army in this bandit suppression campaign.

It was true that Jiaqing did not have many capable fighters under his command. Because of the White Lotus Rebellion in recent years, the capable fighters of the court were all in Sichuan. As a result, people like Lebao, Delentang, and Fuca Mingliang were killed one after another by Chen Jue, which made the leading figures of the court feel like there was a lack of successors.

Song Jun served successively as Deputy Director of the Treasury, Academician of the Cabinet and Deputy Governor-General, Vice Minister of the Ministry of Revenue, Imperial Guard, Minister of the Imperial Household Department, General of Jilin, Minister of the Ministry of Revenue, Governor-General of Shaanxi and Gansu, etc. He was considered to be quite capable, and Song Jun was only fifty years old, in the prime of his life.

So when choosing a leader, although Jiaqing disliked him, all the civil and military officials in the court unanimously pushed Song Jun out.

However, in the end, Jiaqing only gave Song Jun the position of commander-in-chief of the vanguard army. As for the person who really commanded the overall situation, it was Zhang Jiaqinggui.

Zhangjia Qinggui was 65 years old. He was the fourth son of former Grand Secretary Yin Jishen. He had served in the Cabinet as a scholar, deputy governor-general, counselor, general, governor-general, and was promoted to the Ministry of Works. He was transferred to the Ministry of War and served as acting governor-general of Gansu.

In the fifty-seventh year of Qianlong's reign, he defeated the invasion of Gurkhas and was awarded the title of Fifteen Meritorious Officials. In the same year, he went to Zhejiang to handle a case. In the fourth year of Jiaqing's reign (1799), he was transferred to the position of Minister of the Ministry of Justice, Assistant Grand Secretary, and Military Affairs. Soon after, he was appointed as the Minister of the Interior, Grand Secretary of Wenyuan Pavilion, and Prime Minister of the Ministry of Justice.

The young and strong Song Jun led the troops in the front line, while the experienced Qing Gui planned and coordinated supplies and manpower in Wuhan in the rear, determined to recapture the entire Sichuan in one fell swoop.

Before leaving Wuhan, Songjun and Qinggui had a long talk.

At that time, the vassal army of Jingzhou was still looting the prefectures and counties in Hubei, but after the imperial court mobilized troops to Wuhan, the vassal army retreated.

This made Song Jun very confused, because in Song Jun's opinion, the rebel army had enough strength to capture the important city of Wuhan, and it would be easy to develop in any direction afterwards.

Of course, if the rebel army was stationed in Wuhan, it would be much easier for the imperial court to attack.

Although Wuhan is only 500 miles away from Jingzhou, it takes more than ten days to march this distance. If you transport baggage and food by water or land, it will take another half a month.

Moreover, it would take boatmen to pull the boats from Wuhan to Jingzhou by water. In comparison, if the rebel army was stationed in Wuhan, the imperial court's transportation would be much more convenient, whether it was transported from the upper reaches of the Han River or from the upper reaches of the Xiang River in Hunan to Wuhan. Even transporting from the lower reaches of the Yangtze River to Wuhan would not be so difficult.

After hearing Song Jun's question, Qing Gui smiled helplessly and said, "The bandit army is very cunning. At first, Yun Hua, one of the bandit chieftains, led only 5,000 soldiers to Yichang. Although the army is at its peak, I am not completely powerless to fight.

However, I had just arrived in Hubei at that time and was unable to rescue Yichang. So I simply exposed a flaw to him and withdrew the troops from all over the upstream to Wuhan, hoping that the enemy would be able to advance deep into the city alone, and I could then capture him in one fell swoop.

However, this bandit Yunhua actually stopped in Yichang. I don’t know whether this bandit was cunning and saw through my plan, or the bandit leader Chen Gu had ordered Yunhua to stay in Yichang.

Unfortunately, when I sent troops back to recapture Jingzhou Prefecture and other places, the villain Yunhua actually captured Jingzhou and formed a vassal army.

Just when I thought Yunhua would continue to attack cities and territories, I didn't expect that he would settle down in Jingzhou again, and just let his vassal army plunder everywhere until now."

"Grand Secretary, what do you think the rebel army's intention is?" Song Jun asked.

Qinggui smiled bitterly and shook his head, saying, "I don't know either. I still can't understand why the rebel army would leave the fertile lands like the two lakes, Jiangsu and Zhejiang, and choose to attack the poor and mountainous areas like Guizhou, Yunnan and Guangxi.

The tax revenue of the entire Guizhou province is not even as much as that of Jingzhou Prefecture. Yunnan and Guangxi are slightly better, but not much better. The three provinces combined are not even half the size of Hubei. What's the point of conquering them?"

Song Jun thought for a moment and asked, "General, do you think we have overestimated the enemy army? In fact, they are not as strong as we thought?"

"I think you should know the strength of the rebel army better than I do. Didn't you feel it clearly when we were in Shaanxi?" Qing Gui sneered.

Song Jun couldn't help but choke, and smiled bitterly: "The enemy army is indeed strong, especially their various armaments, which are far superior to ours. I have fought with the enemy army countless times in Hanzhong, and I lost more than I won, and I was just struggling to hold on.

But it is true that they do not have many troops.”

"Not many soldiers?" Qinggui laughed at himself and said, "It's true that there aren't many elite soldiers, but speaking of elite soldiers, the court doesn't have many elite soldiers. The Eight Banners in the capital are no longer able to be used. The Eight Banners in the local areas can fight. The remaining Green Camps are not small in number, but how many of them can be called elite soldiers?

Your Majesty and all the officials in the court want to recover the lost territory immediately, thinking that with weaponry such as submachine guns, they can narrow the gap in strength with the enemy army. It's just a good idea, but if a real fight breaks out, I'm afraid it won't be that easy.

Song Jun, even though the enemy only has 20,000 main forces and 30,000 retainers, which is half the number of your vanguard troops, this battle is not easy to fight. You'd better act cautiously and avoid mistakes instead of seeking merit."

Song Jun couldn't help but smile bitterly and said, "I would like to proceed step by step, but I'm afraid I won't be able to report to Your Majesty."

"It's up to you. Anyway, I will do my best to support you from the rear. As for how to fight this battle, it's up to you. Win or lose, I can get away with it, but you~!" Qinggui smiled and didn't say anything else.

(End of this chapter)