Chapter 30 5. Guandu vs.

The front line of Guandu, the main battlefield where the two sides confront each other. Facing Yuan Shao's powerful offensive, Cao Cao fell into a hard fight. Judging from the territory controlled by both parties, the difference between them is actually not that big.At this time, Yuan Shao occupied all of Jizhou, most of Youzhou, Bingzhou, and a part of Qingzhou. In addition, there was the area of ​​Yanzhou East County north of the Yellow River. According to statistics, there were more than 30 counties and more than 300 states. county.Cao Cao actually controlled the Sili Xiaowei Department, most of Xuzhou, Yuzhou, and Yanzhou, and a small part each of Qingzhou, Yangzhou, and Jingzhou. The number of counties was equal to or even slightly larger than that of Yuan Shao.

But Cao Cao's control over these areas is not as good as Yuan Shao's. Although the territory is large, there are not many old base areas, and a considerable part of them are newly occupied areas. Runan County, Guanzhong area, Xuzhou, etc. are still very unstable.The scattered and large area of ​​the territory is Cao Cao's disadvantage. He has to divide his troops to guard and further disperse the limited troops, which obviously has the disadvantage in the main frontal battlefield. Yuan Shao's trip to the south was carefully prepared after a period of time. He reorganized and trained troops from various places in the "Yuan Tong District" and formed a powerful southward army with a total strength of about 110,000 to 20,000 troops, including 100,000 infantry. , more than 10,000 cavalry, and about 8,000 or 9,000 northern minority mercenaries.

Yuan Shao was organized according to the seven-level organization of the regular army of the Eastern Han Dynasty, "Ministry-Qu-Tun-Zu-Sh-Wu-Bing".Further up, several divisions of different arms are mixed into an army, led by a general. From the point of view of arms, in addition to infantry and cavalry, there is also the Archer Battalion of Shesheng Xiaowei Battalion.The cavalry is divided into two types: Tuen cavalry and Yue cavalry. Tuen cavalry is heavy cavalry, men wear armor and horses wear heavy armor.Yueqi is light cavalry. Soldiers wear thin armor and are equipped with bows and arrows. They undertake the tasks of long-distance raids, pursuits, searches, and vigilance.

There is also Colonel Changshui, the soldiers under his command are responsible for water combat tasks. In addition, they are also responsible for erecting bridges, opening roads, and civil engineering operations related to siege, similar to a mixed force of naval forces and engineers. It can be found from historical materials that the first-level senior generals who served as "teacher commander" (college) under Yuan Shao are: Ma Yan (infantry captain), Han Ding (Yueqi captain), Wang Mo (Yueqi captain) , Mu Yuanjin (Captain of Infantry), Han Ju (Captain of Tunqi), Zhao (Captain of Yueqi), Jiang Qi (Captain of Infantry), Xun Chen (Captain of Changshui), Gao Lan (Captain of Infantry ), Zhang (Captain of Tunqi), Han Xun (Captain of Yueqi), Lu Kuang (Captain of Shesheng), and Zhang Ke (Captain of Infantry).Jushou, Guo Tu, Feng Ji, Yan Liang, Wen Chou, Chun Yuqiong, Jiang Yiqu and others were appointed as army supervisors or generals, similar to corps commanders or army commanders.Xin Ping, Xu You, Su You and others are the senior staff of the headquarters.

Cao Jun's formation method is roughly similar to Yuan Jun's, but due to insufficient preparation time and geographical dispersion, the degree of regularization of the army is not as good as Yuan Jun's.The main force of Cao's army includes about three infantry armies, one army each for Tunqi and Yueqi, and less than one army each for Changshui and Shesheng.The internal establishment of each army is also not enough. It is generally believed that the total strength of the troops devoted to the frontal battlefield at Guandu is less than half of Yuan's army. After Liu Pi and others rebelled in Runan County and Yuan Shao successively sent Liu Bei, Han Xun and others to outflank Xu County, Cao Cao had to reconsider strengthening the military deployment in the rear. Cao Hong, Cao Ren, Le Jin, Li Dian and others successively was drawn to the rear.At present, Cao Jun's overall deployment of troops on the front line of Guandu and various places is as follows:

1. Henan Yin and Jianwu General Xiahou led 5,000 infantry to guard Aocang, and sent some of them to guard Mengjin, a ferry on the Yellow River; 2. Colonel Yujin Pinglu led 4,000 infantry to guard Yuanwu, and sent some of them to guard Huojia and Yanjin, another crossing on the Yellow River; 3. Liu Yan, the prefect of Dongjun, led more than a thousand infantry to guard the white horse, and has now retreated to Guandu; 4. Cheng Yu, Prime Minister of the Dongping Kingdom, led 700 infantry to guard Juancheng, the current seat of the Inspectorate of Yanzhou; 5. Cao Cao personally led General Xu Huang, General Zhang Liao, and Guard Commander Xu Chu to lead a mixed infantry and cavalry force of more than 10,000 people to guard Guandu. The main staff members of the base camp were Guo Jia, Xun You, Jia Xu, and Dong Zhao , wool, etc.;

6. General Zhang Xiu of Yangwu moved to Yanzhou Governor's Department and led more than 5,000 people to guard Jiwu County and Chenliu County; 7. Langya Prime Minister Zang Ba and others defend Xuzhou and Qingzhou and cover the right wing. There are about 10,000 troops, but they are not Cao Cao's direct descendants; 8. General Li Feng Cao Hong led about 10,000 people to garrison Wan County in Nanyang County to guard against Liu Biao's attack; 9. In order to ensure the safety of the left wing, Cao Ren, the Yueqi general and the prefect of Guangyang County, was transferred to the area of ​​Yingchuan County to guard the front line of Guandu, and there were about thousands of people;

10. Shangshu ordered Xun Zong to take over the affairs of Xu County, and additionally sent Wei Lejin, the school of captives, and Li Dian, a general of Zhonglang, to guard Xu County with thousands of people on foot; 11. Zhong Yao, Lieutenant of Sili, sits in Guanzhong and is responsible for supervising the transportation of grain and grass in Guanzhong; 12. Xia Houyuan, the prefect of Yingchuan County, was responsible for supervising the transportation of grain and grass in Xuzhou, Yanzhou, and Yuzhou; Thirteenth, Diannong Zhonglang General Ren Jun is responsible for supervising the manufacture of weapons and responsible for the transportation of various military supplies.

What should be emphasized here is the logistics support part.The battle at Guandu took several months. The two sides mobilized about hundreds of thousands of troops directly, and hundreds of thousands of people indirectly. , Such complex and heavy logistical support is a problem that neither side has encountered before. Yuan Shao, who is strong and strong, also has weaknesses in logistics support. As the war dragged on, this problem was gradually exposed. Although he also put in a lot of effort, it eventually became the main reason for his defeat.Cao Cao invested more manpower in logistics, and Xun, Zhong Yao, Xia Houyuan, Ren Jun and others were dedicated to their duties, ensuring the needs of the frontline under extremely difficult circumstances.

Zhong Yao not only transported the grain and grass in Guanzhong to the front line as much as possible, but also collected more than 2,000 horses to send them, which was no less effective than sending hundreds of tanks to the Huaihai front line. With grain and grass, transportation is also difficult. Robbing the enemy's grain roads is often one of the means of winning by surprise. Ju Shou suggested that Yuan Shao specifically rob Cao's grain roads, so that the enemy's lack of food supply will shake the morale of the army and win without fighting.In addition to the enemy troops, the rogue bandits who are prevalent everywhere also often rob the army rations.

When Ren Jun was in charge of grain and grass transportation, he was deeply troubled by the raids of bandits. Finally, he summed up his experience. When transporting grain, thousands of transport vehicles must be gathered to make it happen, and additional troops should be sent to protect it.