More than eight hundred years ago, the Central Plains Dynasty was corrupt and weak, and the European continent was now shrouded in a black fog of religion, and also in this era, a tribal alliance in the northern steppes that had always been subordinate to the Central Plains Dynasty rose up, they aimed at the end of the world, all the way to the east and west to conquer the invincible, after more than seventy years of war, their iron horses advanced all the way from East Asia to West Asia and Central Europe, establishing an empire with the largest land area in human history and, in some ways, the greatest impact on human civilization - the Mongol Empire.
The Mongol Empire during the time of Genghis Khan
In East Asia, they first destroyed the Great Jin dynasty and then went down to the Western Xia, then annexed Tubo and took Dali in a roundabout way; in West Asia, they destroyed the Arab Empire with a destructive force and trampled the caliph with the horseshoe; in Europe, they effortlessly defeated the thirteen-nation alliance of Western Europe, pointing directly at Venice, which was called "God's Whip" by Europeans, meaning that God sent them to punish their civilized army.
But it was such an invincible army that their dream of conquering the world was shattered in 1259 in a small city in southwest China.
<h1 class="pgc-h-decimal" data-index="01" > little-known sweat</h1>
In 1227, after the death of Genghis Khan, who founded the Great Mongol Empire, Wokoutai succeeded the position of Great Khan, but Wokoutai could not convince the public. After the death of the Great Khan of Wokoutai, the Mongol Empire fell into civil strife for many years, until 1251, when Möngke, with the support of his good brother Batu, became the Great Khan, ending many years of civil strife.
Mungo
Möngke Khan is not very well-known now, but this is not because of his ability and no merit, on the contrary, after Möngke ascended the throne, he did not covet pleasure like other Mongols, but worked hard to expand the territory of the Mongol Empire again, and the above-mentioned southern destruction of Dali and the expedition to West Asia were his achievements during his reign. There is only one reason why he is not well known today, and that is the story we want to tell today, in 1259, the Battle of Diaoyu City, which made God fold.
Territory of the Mongol Empire in the later years of Möngke's reign
In 1256, Möngke set his sights on the surviving Southern Song Dynasty and drew up a plan to destroy the Southern Song Dynasty: Möngke himself personally led the main force to attack Sichuan, his brother Kublai Khan attacked Wuhan, and another army led by the general Wuliang Hetai to attack Shonan, the three-way army would converge along the Yangtze River after completing their respective goals, and then follow the Yangtze River to lin'an, the capital of the Southern Song Dynasty, to destroy the Song in one fell swoop.
Möngke's plan to attack the Song Dynasty
For the upcoming invasion, the Southern Song Dynasty was not unprepared, after all, it had suffered losses and increased its memory. As early as more than a decade ago, the Southern Song Dynasty sent the general Yu Jiu to Sichuan to operate precautions.
Yu Jie deeply understood the strength of the Mongol army, if there was a large army on the plain, no army in the world was the opponent of the Mongol Iron Horse. Therefore, Yu Jiu spent more than ten years to build dozens of cities in the mountains of Sichuan, and connected them according to the trend of the mountains, trying to avoid a frontal battle with the Mongolian army, intending to rely on the fortifications of the city to eliminate the enemy's living forces in defensive warfare, thus disintegrating the Mongol offensive.
Yu Jiu's strategy was undoubtedly correct, but unfortunately he took an incompetent court. At a time of national crisis, Yu Jiu, who was trying his best to run Sichuan in preparation for war, was still jealous of Song Lizong because of the rumors of his courtiers, and he was killed by a violent illness before the battle began (there are also rumors that he committed suicide by taking poison). After Yu Jie's death, "the Shu people are like parents."
Shortly after Yu Jie's death, in 1258, Möngke Khan's campaign to destroy the Southern Song Dynasty began, and according to the plan, the Mongol army was divided into three routes, and Meng Ge personally led the main force all the way, all the way to Sichuan.
At this time, the defenders of Sichuan were facing the same situation as Yu Jiu, there were strong enemies invading from the outside, but there were still traitors in the DPRK and China, in the face of such a situation, how could the defenders still have the will to fight. Therefore, after the Mongol army broke through the Yunding Mountain City in Chengdu, the defenders of other cities surrendered one after another after a slight resistance, and the Mongol army was full of momentum. By the autumn of 1258, the defensive line that Yu Jiu had painstakingly managed for decades had collapsed, and north of Chongqing, the Target of the Mongol Army, only the last city still held, Diaoyu City, remained.
<h1 class="pgc-h-decimal" data-index="01" > lesser-known savior</h1>
If the popularity of Möngke Khan is not very high, then the Diaoyu City defender Wang Jian, who saved the world, can be said to be completely unknown, there is not even a portrait of him on the Internet, I only found an overview map in the encyclopedia, but even this can not change the fact that he saved the world in Diaoyu City in 1259.
Wang Jian overview diagram
Diaoyu City is located on the Diaoyu Mountain, 5 kilometers east of the city in hechuan District, Chongqing, surrounded by water on three sides, and the terrain is dangerous. In 1254, Wang Jian was promoted to the capital of Xingyuan Province and Zhihe Prefecture. In order to prepare for the great war a few years later, he mobilized tens of thousands of soldiers and civilians from the five counties under his jurisdiction to consolidate the defense of Diaoyu City, and in order to deal with the possible situation of defending the isolated city alone, Wang Jian ordered the excavation of large and small "Tianchi" in Diaoyu City to store water and raise fish, control 92 wells, and also build a city wall from the city to the north and south riverside docks directly across the river called Yizi City, preventing the enemy from bypassing the Diaoyu City by water and taking Chongqing directly, vowing to use the strength of a city to firmly block the enemy from going south and coexisting with the city.
Fishing City
At the end of 1258, Möngke Khan led 40,000 vanguard troops to the Diaoyu City, looking at the Diaoyu City in front of him, Möngke did not have any waves, because in his eyes, in front of him, it was just a small city that was about to be taken by him like dozens of previous cities.
Meng Ge first sent jin guobao into Diaoyu City to surrender, but as soon as Jin guobao entered the city to explain his intentions, he was pulled by Wang Jian to the city wall and beheaded to show the public, leaving the head of the person off the city wall. Seeing this scene, Möngke Khan was furious, ordered a large army to attack the city, and issued an order that after the city was destroyed, the city would be slaughtered and left behind.
Diaoyu City has a total of eight gates, large and small, and it seems that there are attack points everywhere, which can be easily breached. But it wasn't long after the siege began that the Mongols realized they were wrong.
Diaoyu City built on the mountain and the terrain is dangerous, although there are many city gates, but the road to the city gate is very narrow, the Siege Equipment of the Mongol Army can not come at all, can only rely on simple ladders to climb and attack the city tower, also because of the terrain, Möngke's forty thousand troops can not be opened at all, the pressure of the defenders in diaoyu City is greatly reduced, and even can take turns to rest, but the Mongolian army's offensive did not stop because of the unfavorable terrain.
On February 2, 1259, the main force of the Mongol army arrived at Diaoyu City and stationed at Shizi Mountain in the east of the city.
On 3 February, Möngke personally oversaw the siege of the city, Buke;
On February 7, the Mongolian army attacked Jiangzhong YiziCheng, Buke;
On February 9, the Mongol army stormed the west gate of the town, Buke;
In March, the Mongol army, which had collapsed in mentality, simultaneously attacked the gates of Dongxinmen, Qishengmen, and Zhenximen, but under the command of the defender Wang Jian, the defenders stubbornly resisted the enemy, and all attacks were defeated;
In April, it rained heavily for 20 days;
On April 22, the rain stopped, and the Mongol army sneaked into the gate of the country, Buke;
Late on the night of April 23, the Mongol army sneaked in and attacked the north of the city, Qimen and Jiangzhong Yizi City, but was quickly recaptured by Wang Jian's personal and dead soldiers.
Schematic of the Battle of Diaoyu City
The battle was fought from the end of 1258 to the end of April 1259, and the Mongol army, known to Europeans as the Whip of God, wasted almost half a year in front of a small city without making any progress.
<h1 class="pgc-h-decimal" data-index="01" > "where God breaks the whip"</h1>
The time into May, the summer of the mountain city of Chongqing is known to everyone, from the north of the grass original Mongol army soon could not hold on, the army began to epidemic disease, the Mongolian army was forced to suspend the siege. But if you don't move, it's our turn.
Throughout May, Wang Jian began to lead his troops to sneak attacks on the Mongolian camp by night, which made the Mongol army, which was almost unable to bear the disease and climate torture, even more exhausted and sharply reduced its combat effectiveness.
At this time, the Southern Song Dynasty finally reacted to support the Diaoyu City, Song Lizong strictly ordered The Deputy Envoy of Sichuan to support the Diaoyu City, at the end of May, the Song and Mongolian water armies fought fiercely on the Yangtze River, although there was no victory or defeat, but the clear-eyed people could see that with the passage of time, the situation would become more and more unfavorable to the Mongol army, so Möngke's general Shu Suoli proposed to Möngke that a small number of troops should be trapped in the Diaoyu City, don't let Wang Jian come out, and we will take the main force to detour along the Yangtze River to the east, and Kublai Khan in the east will meet with their two large armies. First break the Lin'an City and then turn around and slowly clean up this Fishing City.
This proposal is undoubtedly correct, but at this time, Möngke Khan has already been caught up in diaoyu City, thinking that my Möngke has been fighting horses all his life, from north to south, from east to west, when did he be so depressed? Möngke decided to fight Diaoyu City to the death.
Meng Ge thought that he had besieged Diaoyu City for almost half a year, as long as he besieged it for half a year, even if he could not attack it, he could starve the people in the city to death, so the Mongol army slowly reduced the frequency of sieges, from the original several times a day to a few days, ready to surround and kill the soldiers and civilians of Diaoyu City. However, Wang Jian in the fishing city had already calculated this trick, as mentioned above, Wang Jian dug more than a dozen ponds and dozens of wells in the city before the war began.
On a certain day in June, Wang Jian ordered the defenders of Diaoyu City to throw two 30-pound large fish and hundreds of large cakes under the city wall like garbage in front of the hundreds of thousands of Mongolian troops under the city (wasting grain, children should not learn [dog heads]), and also wrote a letter to Möngke: "Er attack for another ten years, the city will not be obtained." (Look I'm angry that I can't kill you)
At this point, Möngke was completely on the top, and the irrational Möngke ordered his men to build a tower outside the Dongxin Gate, and he had to personally watch the arrangements in the Diaoyu City to prepare for the armageddon. Or how can it be said that Möngke has completely lost his mind, building a high platform outside the city gate, when the defenders in the city are blind and invisible?
Wang Jian discovered that after Meng Ge built the high platform, he did not take the night to send troops to block it, but quietly ordered various trebuchets and cannons in the city to aim at the high platform.
On July 21, the high platform was completed, and The head of the meng ge did not wonder why the Song army allowed itself to build a high platform, he excitedly pulled a cadre of generals to the high platform, ready to observe the deployment of diaoyu city from a high place while formulating decisive tactics with his men. Wang Jian, who had long been prepared, saw Meng Ge ascend to the high platform, and immediately ordered the cannon stones that had been aimed long ago to be fired in unison, and the rain-like cannon stones smashed on the high platform, and Meng Ge was also hit and fell.
On July 27, 1259, the Mongol Emperor Boerjin Möngke Khan died of his wounds in the army at the age of fifty (it is said that on August 11, he died of illness).
The death of Möngke has always been regarded by historians as a major historical event that changed the direction of world history, and Diaoyu City has been called "the place where God breaks the whip" by Western historians.
"The Land of the Gods' Whips"
So what exactly did Mungo's death change?
First, Hulagu, who had captured almost the entire Arabian Peninsula and was preparing to march to Egypt, immediately led a large army back to fight for the Khan's position after hearing the news of Möngke's death, leaving only fifteen thousand people stationed in Syria, and finally this group of people was surrounded by the Egyptian army because they were outnumbered, and the entire army was destroyed, resulting in the expansion of the Mongol Empire to Africa;
Second, kublai khan's two armies, which set out at the same time as Möngke to carry out the plan to destroy the Song, originally proceeded very smoothly, but after the news of Möngke's death came, he immediately stopped the invasion of the Southern Song Dynasty and led his troops back to compete for the Khan's throne, which enabled the Southern Song regime to last for more than twenty years.
<h1 class="pgc-h-decimal" data-index="01" > however history has no ifs</h1>
We might as well imagine that if there was no Wang Jian, no Diaoyu City, if we were defeated in 1259, after Möngke and the other two large armies met, the Southern Song Dynasty would perish in the morning for more than ten years, and the Central Plains civilization would be ruled by Möngke into a logistics base for the expansion of the Mongol Empire; hulagu who conquered Egypt in the west would not retreat, and the entire African continent would also be included in the territory of the Mongol Empire, and Möngke, who had completed all this, was only in his fifties at this time, and after he had such a huge logistics and resource support base, Where will the Mongol Empire's war machine go?
finish.
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Link to the previous issue: Son of the Face, Xiu'er Benxiu - Liu Xiu
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