The thickest defensive war in ancient China.
From 1235 to 1279, the Song and Mongolian (Yuan) Wars broke out in an all-round way, and the Song Dynasty was destroyed in the Battle of Yashan, which lasted nearly half a century. This is the longest, hardest and most intractable war that the Mongolian army has encountered since its rise. The battle of fishing city in Hezhou, Sichuan province, which took place in 1259, is one of the most influential wars.
1234 After the Song Dynasty and Mongolia jointly destroyed the gold, the Southern Song Dynasty sent troops to recover the lost land in Henan, and was ambushed by the Mongolian army and failed. 1235, the Mongolian army launched an attack on the Southern Song Dynasty on thousands of miles of fronts from Sichuan and Shaanxi in the west to the lower reaches of the Huaihe River in the east, and the Song-Mongolian war broke out in an all-round way. By 124 1, the Mongols had ravaged a large area of land in the Southern Song Dynasty, and Sichuan was the most severely damaged area among the three battlefields (the other two were Jinghu Battlefield-now Henan, Hubei Province, and Huaibei Battlefield-now Huaihe River Basin).
This year, Mongolia Wokuotai Khan passed away, and internal political struggles continued, weakening the offensive against the Southern Song Dynasty. The Southern Song Dynasty gained a respite from this and adjusted and enriched the defenses of various battlefields. 1242, in order to reverse the decline of Sichuan and consolidate the upper class, Song Lizong sent Yu Jie, who had an outstanding record in the war against Mongolia between Huai and Huai, to take charge of Sichuan. Yu Jie took a series of political, economic and military measures in Sichuan, the most important of which was to establish a mountain city defense system.
In other words, along the main rivers and traffic arteries in Sichuan, steep mountain passes are chosen to build cities and villages, which are dotted with each other and support each other to form a complete strategic defense system. Fishing City is the core of this mountain city's defense system and the strongest fortress.
Fishing Town is located on the fishing hill 5 kilometers east of Hechuan County, Sichuan Province. The mountain is abrupt and the relative height is about 300 meters. Jialing River, Qujiang River and Fujiang River meet at the foot of the mountain, surrounded by water on three sides, and the terrain is very dangerous. There are mountains and rivers and convenient transportation. All parts of Sichuan can be reached by land and water. Peng Daya was appointed as the deputy envoy of Sichuan (1239— 1240) and ordered Gan Runchu to build a fishing city. 1243, Yu Jie adopted the advice of the brothers Ran Jin and Ran Pu, the sages of Bozhou (now Zunyi), and sent the brothers Ran Pu to rebuild the fishing city and adjust the state and Xingyuan. Fishing city is divided into inner city and outer city. The outer city is built on a cliff, and the city wall is made of stone. There are vast fields and abundant water sources in the city all year round, and there are also many arable land in the surrounding foothills. All these make the fishing city have the necessary geographical conditions for a long time and the characteristics of relying on natural disasters and being easy to defend but difficult to attack. 1254, Wang Jian, commander of Hezhou, further improved the tower. People in the border areas of Sichuan have avoided the chaos of war, and the fishing city has become a solid fortress for soldiers to eat and drink.
125 1 year, Mongolia ascended the throne of Khan, which stabilized Mongolia's political situation and actively planned the war to destroy the Song Dynasty. Meng Ge, the eldest son of Tuo Lei, the youngest son of Genghis Khan, once traveled to many countries in Europe and Asia with Ba Dou and others, and was famous for his bravery. 1252, Mongolian Khan ordered his brother Kublai Khan to lead his troops to pacify Dali, which formed a siege and attack on the Southern Song Dynasty.
1257, Mongo Khan decided to launch a large-scale war to destroy the Song Dynasty. Meng Ge ordered Kublai Khan to lead an army to attack Ezhou (now Wuchang), while Taghachar and Li Chao attacked the Huaihe River and divided the forces of the Song Dynasty. He also ordered Uriyangqatai to send troops from Yunnan to the north via Guangxi; Mengge attacked Sichuan from the main force of Mengjun. Mengge took Sichuan as the strategic main attack direction, aiming to give full play to the characteristics of Mongolian cavalry, which is longer than land warfare and shorter than water warfare, to seize Sichuan with its main force, and then to unite with various roads east of the Yangtze River to reach Lin 'an (now Hangzhou), the capital of the Song Dynasty.
/kloc-in the autumn of 258, Meng Ge led 40,000 troops into Shu. Together with the Mongols in Shu and the troops recruited from all over the country, the total number of Mongols greatly exceeded 40 thousand. Mongolian troops successively occupied Jianmen Kuzhuguan, Changning Mountain City, Pengzhou Yunshan City, Langzhou Dazhao City and Guang 'an Daliang City. , near Hezhou. Meng sent a man named Jin from the Song Dynasty to the Fishing City to surrender, and was killed by Wang Jian, the commander-in-chief of Song Hezhou.
On February 2nd, the first year of Song Kaiqing (1259), Mongo Khan led an army across the canal from Jizhaotan and camped in Lion Mountain. On the third day, Mongo personally supervised the army to fight in Fishing City. On the 7th, the Mongols attacked the wall. The word "wall", also called "transverse wall", is used to stop the enemy from moving outside the city. At the same time, the defenders in the city can move to the position of "wall" through the outer wall to repel the enemy and form an angle crossing attack point with the outer wall. There is a wall in the north and south of Fishing Town. On the 9th, the Mongols captured the west gate of the town. On this day, the Mongolian army stone came to Fishing City to participate in the war.
In March, the Mongols attacked Dongxinmen, Qishengmen and Zhenximenbao, all of which were defeated. From April 3rd, the thunderstorm lasted for twenty days. After the rain stopped, the Mongols captured the country on the 22nd of the Gregorian calendar. On the 24th night, Meng Jun boarded the outer city and fought fiercely with Song Jun who was guarding the city. "History of the Yuan Dynasty, Xian Zongji" said that "a lot of Song soldiers were killed", but the Mongolian army's offensive was finally defeated by Song Jun. In May, the Mongolian army attacked Fishing City many times. Since Mongolian Khan led the army into Shu, most of the mountain cities and fortresses he passed were easily surrendered by the garrison commander of the Southern Song Dynasty, and no real hard battles have been encountered. Therefore, after fishing mountain, Mongo wanted to take advantage of pandering to attack and pull his city. Although he stayed in this solid city for a long time, he didn't want to give it up. Although the siege equipment of the Mongolian army was well prepared, the fishing city was too steep to play its role. Under the joint command of general commander Wang Jian and deputy commander Zhang Jue, the defenders of Fishing City repelled many attacks of Mongolian army. Dong, a thousand families, was ordered by Meng Ge Khan to attack Dengzhou. Dong encouraged the soldiers to climb the ladder and fly stones, and arrived in the city to fight hard with Song Jun. Because of the heavy casualties in the headquarters, he was forced to retreat. His nephew Dong Shiyuan invited his uncle Dong to attack the city and lead his troops into the city. He fought Song Jun for a long time, but he was forced to quit for lack of backup.
The fishing city could not be captured for a long time, and Meng Ge Khan ordered the generals to "discuss the enterprising plan." The speed of operation suddenly felt unfavorable to siege. It is better to leave a small number of troops to worry about and join hands with Kublai Khan and other armies along the river to destroy the Southern Song Dynasty in one fell swoop.
Arrogant generals, on the other hand, advocate storming the city, but regard speed and speed as pedantry. Mongo Khan did not take the advice of quick action and decided to continue to attack the city. However, in the face of fishing, Mongolian cavalry, which is famous for its agility and ferocity, can't do its best.
In June, the Mongolian warrior (formerly known as Chen) led his troops to attack the outer city horse at night, and Wang Jian led his troops to refuse to fight. At dawn, it began to rain, and the Mongolian siege ladder was broken and forced to retreat. The Mongols besieged the city for five months and could not get off the city. Wang Dechen rode alone to the foot of Fishing Town, trying to surrender the defenders in the city. He was almost hit by a stone flying from the city, so Wang Dechen fell ill and soon died in the temple in Jinyun Mountain. When Mungo heard the news of his death, he was heartbroken and lost his right hand. The death of Wang Dechen dealt a great blow to Meng's spirit, and the fishing city could not be captured for a long time, which made Meng furious.
After the Mongolian army attacked Sichuan on a large scale, the Southern Song Dynasty took a large-scale rescue operation to Sichuan, but Song Jun, who reinforced the fishing city, was blocked by the Mongolian army and never reached the fishing city. Despite this, the fishing city, which has been besieged for several months, is still rich in materials and the defenders are full of fighting spirit. One day, the defenders of the Southern Song Dynasty threw two fresh fish tails weighing 15 kg and more than 100 steamed noodle cakes to the Mongols outside the city, saying that even if they kept 10 years, the Mongols would not be able to capture the fishing city. In contrast, the situation of Mongolians outside the city is very bad. The Mongolian army stayed under the fortified city for a long time, also in the hot summer season. Mongolians were originally afraid of summer heat and humidity, and their acclimatization led to the epidemic of diseases such as summer heat, malaria and cholera in the army, and the situation was quite serious. According to the records of the Yuan Dynasty, Mongo Khan also fell ill in June, and the history of Raster's collection more clearly stated that he had dysentery. Another book, Travel Notes of Marco Polo and Annals of Rivers in Wanli of Ming Dynasty, claimed that Mongo Khan was injured. In any case, Mongo Khan can no longer insist on attacking the city. In July, he retired from fishing town to Wentang Gorge in Jinjianshan (now Chongqing North Hot Spring), and Meng died. According to Biography of the History of the Yuan Dynasty and Biography of Monuments in the Yuan Dynasty, many generals who went out with Meng died at the foot of Fishing City, from which we can imagine the tragic battle of Fishing City and the serious losses of Mongolian troops.
The downfall of Mongo Khan under the fishing city had a great impact. First of all, it led to the complete disintegration of Mongolia's war to destroy the Song Dynasty, which lasted for 20 years. The Mongols who attacked Sichuan were forced to retreat, escorting Mong Gehan's coffin back to the north. He led the East Route Army to break through the natural barrier of the Yangtze River and surrounded Kublai Khan in Ezhou. He had to withdraw his troops and return to the north to compete with his younger brother Ali for Khan's position. Uriyangqatai army went north from Yunnan via Guangxi, and arrived at the gate of Tanzhou (now Changsha). Because of the death of Mongo, the army also crossed the Yangtze River and returned with the help of a unit sent by Kublai Khan. The northern and southern armies of Mongolia basically marched as scheduled, but fell short because of the defeat of the main battlefield in the west.
Secondly, it stopped the third expedition of the Mongolian army and eased the threat of Mongolian forces to Europe, Asia and Africa. 1252, the Mongolian Khan sent his brother Xu Liewu to launch the third Western Expedition, and successively captured large areas of land in the Arabian Peninsula such as Iran, Iraq and Syria. Just as Xu Liewu was preparing to March into Egypt, he learned of Mongo's death, so Xu Liewu left a small amount of troops to continue his campaign and returned to the East with his troops. As a result, the Mongolian army was defeated by the Egyptian army because it was outnumbered. The Mongolian army never entered Africa again. Mongolia's large-scale expansion has since fallen into a trough. Therefore, the influence of the Battle of Fishing City has gone far beyond the scope of China, and it also occupies an important page in world history.
Thirdly, it provided an opportunity for Kublai Khan to take charge of the Mongolian regime, which had a great impact on the historical development of China. Meng Han Ge is a Mongolian conservative, and his policy is still traditional. This policy, which has a strong color of Mongolian tribes and western regions, has been extremely unsuitable for the needs of ruling the vast Central Plains and Han areas. Kublai Khan, on the other hand, is one of the few enlightened people in the Mongolian ruling group who admire China culture. After Meng Ge became Khan, Kublai Khan was ordered to take charge of the desert in southern China. He made great efforts to recruit talents and talents, and vigorously promoted the policy of sinicization, and achieved great results. However, it aroused the suspicion of Mongolia and its conservative officials, Kublai Khan was dismissed, and the sinicization policy was forced to cancel. After Kublai Khan ascended the throne of Khan, he continued to carry out the sinicization policy, gradually changed the indiscriminate killing policy of the Mongolian army, and saved the economy and culture in southern China from further destruction. Meng left his last words that he would seize the fishing city in the future and kill all the people in it. Later, the fishing city returned to Yuan, but Kublai Khan pardoned its soldiers and civilians. It was because of Kublai Khan's governance that the frontier regime of the Mongolian khanate was transformed into the feudal dynasty-Yuan Dynasty, which unified China, which made great contributions in the history of China.
As a typical representative of mountain city defense system, fishing town fully demonstrated its defense function in the cold weapon era and became a fortress that Mongolian army could not conquer. After the fall of Mongolian Khan, Fishing City resisted numerous attacks by Mongols, and it was not until 1279 garrison commander Wang Licheng surrendered that Fishing City fell into Mongolia's hands. The ancient war hall of China People's Revolutionary Military Museum specially made a sand table model of the ancient battlefield of Fishing Town to show its important position in the history of ancient war in China.