The winter pasture of the Zasaktu Khan tribe is on the back of Lake Su, Ubud, under the mountains.
The mountains here block the Siberian cold current. The densely injected rivers around the huge lake bring abundant water resources. The surrounding grasslands are full of dense hay.
Because it can shelter from wind in winter and there is a large amount of hay, it is suitable for winter overwintering pastures.
Because of the barriers of mountains, there is less snow here. In this way, the shallow layer of snow will make it easier for cattle and sheep to dig out the snow with their hooves and find the hay and grass roots below to eat. If the snow is too thick, the cattle and sheep will consume more energy than the nutrition brought by the hay, which will make the loss more and more thinner, and eventually lose the warm fat layer and freeze to death.
This is the meaning of winter pastures. Not all pastures can be used as winter pastures. There are very few treasure lands like this. You must shelter from wind, less snow, and more hay.
Although the nutritional value of hay is much lower than that of forage, this season without food is the only valuable resources that can help livestock not die of freezing and starvation.
The lake can break ice and fish as a supplement to food. There are many forks in the river, so it is relatively easy to break ice and water.
Throughout the winter, the population of 150,000 and 30,000 cavalry of the entire Zasaktu Khan tribe were all hiding in this pasture between the lakes.
There are three lakes in this area, the largest one is Ubud Su Lake.
The other two are not far away, namely Harwusu Lake and Kyrgyz Lake.
There is also a relatively large river that flows through the plains surrounded by three large lakes.
This place is a rare and good place in the Outer Mongolia region, which is spread all over the Gobi. Although the area is less than one-forty of that of Outer Mongolia, the water and grass here are abundant and can support the entire Zasaktu Khan tribe.
Ansanxi, a month ago, at the coldest time of winter, all the 50,000 cavalry horses were replaced with fiery red camels. The 300,000 dromedary camels teleported by Yang Fan from the Horn of Africa became an important supplement to the cavalry army in addition to one man and five war horses.
In this climate, war horses will freeze to death if they can't go far.
Only these thick-haired camels can move forward in the severe cold of minus forty degrees Celsius. Although they walk very slowly, they are very reliable and safe.
The carrying capacity is far greater than that of war horses. It can carry enough weapons, ammunition and supplies.
Fifty thousand cavalrymen spread a large net in battalions and surrounded the Great Lakes area. They drove all the Khalkhas at various wintering sites along the way toward the royal courtyard in the middle of the three Great Lakes.
After a month of network-style search, the Khalkha region, except for Chechen Khan who had joined Yang Fan's system, the Tushetu Khan tribe was annexed the year before yesterday, and now all the hostile Khalkhas have been compressed onto the grassland between the three great lakes.
There is an unbuilt city there - Ulya Sutai City.
It is now called "Zabharant" and is located on the Bogdo River, a tributary of the Zabhan River. It is located on the important trade routes of ancient times. The famous Ulya Sutai in later generations was the hub of the Tangnu Ulianghai and the entire Khalkha in the Qing Dynasty. The ancient city was built in 1735. There is no trace yet.
Now the golden tent of the Zasaktu Khan tribe is located here. Because Qianlong built the city, it is now full of yurts and cattle and sheep that have been overwintering.
In fact, after using a large number of camel cavalry from Ansanxi to raid Tushetu Khan's tribe, it aroused the alertness of the Tuva people in the Tanuwulianghai and the Zasaktu Khan's tribe in the Great Lakes area.
They suddenly realized that the cold and snowstorms in winter were not worthy of.
They were preparing for war all winter and were always on guard against sneak attacks.
After all, they used to come from the south of the desert to attack them, and the journey was very long. Now, the entire Komodo region and the Altai Mountains are filled with those annoying Ming troops. There are a total of 100,000 people. This is not the case with the migrant workers and militias who were recruited.
Ten days after the Ansanxi army was dispatched, it fought with scouts from the Zasaktu Khan tribe.
The Zasaktu Khan tribe took out all the camels and equipped them to the scouts. They were sent from afar to various places to monitor the Ming army.
An Sanxi understood that this time, the last opposition force of Khalkha would be completely eliminated.
So, he was very patient.
He dispersed the cavalry army, except for the 8,000 troops in the military headquarters, the others were searching and suppressing each other from all directions. It took a month to drive them all to this place now.
Fifty thousand cavalry officers and soldiers, 500 in groups, surrounded the Khalkha people on the opposite side in an arc.
Zasaktu Khan Laihul stood in front of the queue with a gloomy face. On his left hand was his son Subadi. He was the great-grandson of Dayan Khan of Mongolia, the great-grandson of Gessen Zhazal Lai (the ancestor of the Khalkha tribe). The son of Bayandala (some say that Laihul is Bayandala's younger brother).
He has been worried about going north of Ansanxi for the past two years because he is isolated and helpless.
Khalkha had fallen apart. But Tuhan went away from Qinghai. Tushetuhan defected to Huang Taiji. Chechen Khan is now fighting fiercely with Yang Fan and has made a fortune through trade. I heard that Yang Fan's people discovered silver mines in his territory. Now he is living an extremely free life.
Even the Buryat behind him was subdued by Yang Fan.
Now, except for being adjacent to the Tuva people in the northeast, he is surrounded by Yang Fan's sphere of influence on the other sides.
Strategically surrounded, isolated, and insufficient strength to resist, it is a matter of time before he is annexed.
"Abu, we have been here for two years, and these damn Han people still refuse to let us go. Let's fight them today." Subadi clenched his fists angrily and said to Laihul.
Laihul's narrow eyes were full of anxiety.
He originally thought that when he was warmer, he would lead his troops to move westward and learn from the Turkut tribe to leave here. Because this place had become a place for four battles.
Compared with the four Mongolian tribes in Moxi, they are soft persimmons. They are easily beaten to weak enemies first. Isn’t this the most popular strategy in the art of war in Han people?
Because he was greedy for the comfort of the wintering pasture, he could not make up his mind and led 150,000 people into the blizzard. In a doomed marche of suffering, a large number of people and livestock would be frozen to death on the road along the way. He always thought that he would leave later and warm up a little less.
Unexpectedly, An Sanxi took action so quickly, and did not solve the problem of the hundreds of thousands of Mongolian troops in the desert and western part of the world, and they dared to attack him first.
Now there was no time to retreat, so he could only place his troops, the elderly, young, women, children, cattle, sheep and livestock at the foot of the mountain. He brought all the strong men who could fight to the lake to confront the Ming army.
They did not ride horses. In this season when the north wind was howling, they drove out the war horses and could only freeze to death. Each of them wore thick leather robes, carried large bows and spears in hand, lined up on the ice, preparing to fight with the Ming army.
Bows and arrows have harsh operating temperatures, and the wet bow strings become soft, so they are not suitable for use in Southeast Asia. They are too cold and the elasticity of the bow arm is reduced, so the bow force is greatly reduced in this climate of more than minus 30 degrees Celsius.
Chapter completed!