Daming Yuanfu

Chapter 1547 A Game of Chess in the Far East ([-])
Since it was related to the garrison, Gao Wushi obviously attached great importance to it, and when he heard this, his expression became serious, and he asked, "What's the big deal?"

Huang Zhiting didn't say what was going on right away, but asked first: "The establishment of the garrison is determined by the master. I don't know if the master knows the specific strength of each army, for example, how many troops does each have?"

Gao Wushi was a little surprised, and said: "I naturally remember that the six garrison armies of Dingnan, Thanglong, Jingang, Vientiane, Phnom Penh, and Bago were organized in units of towns. Each town has a full staff of 12700, and each has two standard infantry Association, three independent artillery marks, one independent cavalry mark, and two engineer battalions.

The specific number of towns owned by each garrison varies. Among them, the Dingnan garrison has five towns with a total strength of 63500; the three garrison forces of Thang Long, Jingang, and Bagu each have four towns with a total strength of 50800. The Phnom Penh Garrison has three towns with a total strength of 38100; the Vientiane Garrison has two towns with a total strength of 25400. "

Huang Zhiting nodded and said: "Master remembers well, but Dingnan has more than just a garrison. In addition to the garrison, there are also 8000 Siamese royal guards, 9000 Siamese independent garrison, plus five The town garrison has a total of 80500 people."

She paused for a while, and frowned deeply with a worried face: "That is to say, the six major garrison forces in southern Xinjiang have a total of 22 towns, with a total strength of 279400 people, plus the royal palace guards and Siam independent garrison divisions. , the total strength of the entire southern border has reached 296400. My lord, this is an army of 30!"

"Are you... worried about the military salary?" Gao Wushi asked, looking into her eyes.

"Since I know that the master has no other intentions, I can only worry about the military salary." Huang Zhiting seemed to pay attention to the high-level pragmatic expression when she said this, and seeing his calm eyes, she continued: "The master is the number one in the world in terms of government and financial management. , You should know that the cost of raising soldiers is very expensive, although I have never asked about these things, I also know that the annual expenses of the 30 troops are astonishing."

The cost is staggering, that's for sure, and the high-spirited and dignified Minister of the Ministry of Household Affairs of the Ming Dynasty couldn't be more clear about the cost of raising soldiers.

Take Daming as an example, let’s not talk about the training of soldiers under the Weisuo system. Anyway, there are bad books everywhere now, and there is no exact standard. Everything is really carried out according to the standard. It is nothing more than crying for the top tricks and shouting for reductions, and for the bottom ones to drink soldiers' blood. It depends on which side's performance level is more exquisite and can make the court nod.

Due to the existence of military camps—at least in name, the expenses of the guards can be pretended not to see the problem and implemented according to the book—so there is always an approximate amount of serious expenses, which are directly "subsidized" from the center The amount of money that went down was not particularly amazing.

However, after the civil engineering change, because "the Beijing army was not exhausted", we had to "order the guards on all sides to order the recruitment of strong men", and began to recruit people everywhere on a large scale.

At the beginning, the recruitment was only 1 to [-] people, but later on, more and more people were recruited, and it actually became the mainstream in various places. Now many people in the Nine Sides are under the name of guards, but they are actually recruiting Those who came to "refill" - their combat power is naturally not a refill compared with the guards, but they are indeed "recorded".

Compared with guard soldiers, recruiting soldiers has improved combat effectiveness, but it also leads to a large increase in military expenditure. First of all, recruiting soldiers requires silver taels.From the civil engineering change to the early period of Jiajing, the cost of recruiting troops increased greatly. Taking Jiubian as an example: in the eighth year of Chenghua, when recruiting volunteers in the Northwest, "people were given three taels of silver, two pieces of cloth, and one stone per month of rice", which was about five taels of silver.

In the Hongzhi period, recruiting soldiers directly became "people give five taels of silver." Five taels of silver can be converted into seven stones to ten stones of rice, which is several times higher than the two horses of cloth given to the orthodox recruits at the beginning.

At the beginning of Zhengde, it was "those who recruit natives who are willing to serve, check their age, and they will give three taels of silver." Don't think that this is a drop in salary, but see clearly that the "natives" mentioned here, such as Cen Huang In the areas controlled by the family at the beginning, the children under the jurisdiction were called natives, so the three liang of silver given here is not the value of Han soldiers.

In the Jiajing period, there was an additional expenditure for recruiting soldiers from all sides, that is, "people pay three taels of silver for clothes." "Silver" is simply a one-time clothing fee.

So in the 29th year of Jiajing, the Nine Borders alone raised as much as 59 taels of silver. There is this factor.

If it hadn't been for the large amount of military expenses saved after the completion of the tribute ceremony (it will definitely cost more money during the war), even with Gao Gong, it is estimated that it can only maintain a balance of payments, but it will be extremely difficult to repay the debt.This is also one of the main reasons why the historians of later generations have a high evaluation of the significance of Alda's tribute.

Since the Nine Sides recruited the most soldiers, the recruitment fee was also the highest, but besides the Nine Sides, there were also recruits in other areas. The supply of the imperial court was also picked up by the court (but it was not enough, and Qi Jiguang had to find ways from other places, including making fake accounts to corrupt ink, and then smashed them into the army). Basically recruiting soldiers (of course, the relevant guards also provide some soldiers).

But please note that the recruiting silver here is one-time, and does not cover the monthly routine silver, that is to say, this money is just for buying recruits, and does not count as "monthly salary".

In terms of "monthly salary", the price of the north and the south is different. Generally speaking, the price of the north is lower than that of the south (the economy in the south is developed, and no one can apply for it). The monthly salary of the south is sometimes as high as three cents a day. ——It means nine taels a month. Of course, this is usually wartime, such as the most severe period of Yuwa.

So 18 years after arriving in Jiajing, in order to meet the needs of the war, "the frontier ministers asked for more troops every day, and the soldiers asked for daily pay, which increased from 59 to more than 280 million."

On the eve of granting the tribute, Zhang Shou, then Minister of the Ministry of Household Affairs, said bluntly: "The annual income of the national tribute is only 230 million yuan, and there are many accumulated disasters in the middle of the country who are exempted from playing. The one-year-old, the capital is more than one million and the side The salary reaches more than 280 million, and there are not many other beggars. In the second year (referring to the second year of Longqing), it is more than 440 million, and in three years (the same as above, it refers to the third year of Longqing), it is 370 million, which is the least. It is twice as good as entering.

The nearest ones moved to the four imperial envoys to expand the collections of the world's government, and all those accumulated in 200 years were returned to Taicang. However, there are only two million from the old treasury, which is less than one year's use of the nine sides. Everyone is chilling."

Although his statement at the time was based on the intention of Gao Gong, Zhang Juzheng and others, and to promote the tribute of Alta, but if the data cited in it are viewed separately, each piece is true.This is enough to show that the high cost of recruiting troops was already beyond the reach of the imperial court at that time-after all, there was no additional payment for Liao, training, and suppression at that time.

The Ming army recruited hundreds of thousands of soldiers, spending three to four million taels a year, and the six major garrison forces in southern Xinjiang totaled about 400. Could the cost be less?

Of course not less!
The price of recruiting silver (the one-time one) for the garrison was different. The earliest batch were all Han Chinese. Although they were mainly northerners, Gao Wushi paid quite high at that time, six taels per person.And because of Jinghua's rules, clothes are distributed free of charge on a regular basis, so there is no need to give "clothing silver".

Later, after Annan was pacified, Jinghua was able to recruit soldiers among the Annan people because of the naturalization household registration system as a whole. Then you still don't have to give it.

After that, southern Myanmar, Siam, Nanzhang, Cambodia and other places were successively pacified, and the naturalization household registration system was promoted at the same time, and the scope of recruiting soldiers became larger and larger.At that time, it was considered that the former kings in Myanmar and other places did not pay for recruiting soldiers at all, and almost canceled the recruiting silver, but Gao Wushi knew that there would be harm only if there was a comparison, so he maintained the standard of "giving three taels of silver".

But this amount of money is not as simple as multiplying 30 people by three or two. The losses caused by injuries and deaths in the war need to be supplemented.Supplementary money must not only be given to recruiting soldiers, but also pension money, and other compensations must be given according to some regulations of the naturalization household registration system.

However, this is still not all the expenses, it can only be called "personnel expenses".In addition, various daily expenses such as rations, barracks, horse feeding, and training for the 30 army are by no means small.

In addition, there is another big head, which is the equipment of weapons and equipment, as well as the repair or replacement after wear and tear.In terms of this series of expenses, the garrison army has a higher degree of weaponization, and those who are close to the water are always equipped with the most advanced weapons in Beijing, which makes them spend more than the Ming army recruiting troops.

In short, after offsetting the advantages of recruiting money brought about by the naturalized household registration system, the garrison has to spend a lot of money.

The final result is that even if there is no large-scale war, the 30 troops in southern Xinjiang will spend more than 320 million taels a year-this is the data after removing the previous recruitment silver, in other words, just to maintain this An army, Gao Wuzhen has to spend so much money every year now.

This amount of money is already close to the current general expenditure of the 90 troops on the Nine Sides of the Ming Dynasty (but not counting the additional expenditures for the war against Chahar in recent years).

From this perspective, it is very reasonable for Huang Zhiting to be worried about the cost of the garrison.After all, in the west courtyard of the "Siamese Palace", there is a "Military Command of the Southern Border Garrison", and this department is temporarily in charge of Huang Zhiting, who is the highest leadership of the six major security forces in Southern Xinjiang except Gao Yushi himself. .

Huang Zhiting has already learned that the cost of this army is astonishing. As the hostess of Jinghua, it is natural for her to have such worries.

Gao Yushi was silent for a moment, then asked: "Then what is your opinion? Is it disarmament, or cut military pay, reduce training intensity, barracks standards, and armed equipment?"

Huang Zhiting shook her head and said, "My lord, the first thing I want to know is what is the purpose of maintaining the 30 troops there. If the lord says that it is only to deter the countries in southern Xinjiang, then I suggest that the Dingnan garrison be removed." All the towns under the jurisdiction of the other five garrison armies were downgraded to the standard of the independent garrison division in southern Siam.

The garrison has a population of 12700 in a town, and the independent garrison division is not only in the early 9000s, but also has a lot of weapons, especially artillery. Artillery is really the biggest cost of ordnance, whether it is the price of artillery itself, or the cost of training or war. Both are the most expensive items. "

Gao Yushi didn't answer, and seemed to be calculating something.

Seeing this, Huang Zhiting said directly: "I have made a rough calculation, not counting the 'Dingnan Five Towns', if the remaining 63000 towns are downgraded to garrison divisions, then the number of personnel will be reduced by about 70. Nearly [-] doors have been reduced, and war horses, draft horses, etc. have been reduced by [-] to [-]... In total, it is estimated that the annual expenditure can be reduced by nearly [-] taels."

Of course, 70 taels is a huge sum of money, and Gao Yushi knows that Huang Zhiting's so-called "just maintain a deterrent to the countries in southern Xinjiang", the reduction of the garrison to the garrison does not have much impact.

Although the degree of firearms of the garrison division is lower than that of the garrison army, especially the artillery equipment has been reduced a lot, but in the face of possible opposition forces from various countries in southern Xinjiang-even including the rebellion of local nobles, the garrison division still has an overwhelming advantage. superiority of force.

It can be said that unless a large-scale armed uprising breaks out in all the countries in southern Xinjiang, and the number of insurgents in any country exceeds [-], otherwise, even if the garrison is downgraded to a garrison division, it is completely sure that it will be realized within two to three months. The main force was defeated and completely wiped out within half a year.

For this point, Gao Pragmatism can almost be said to have full confidence.

However, Huang Zhiting said this on the premise that "only maintain a deterrent to the countries in southern Xinjiang", but this premise itself is not valid, because Gao Yushi's expectations and requirements for the garrison are not limited to this.

For example, after the pacification of Luzon, it is likely that a new "Fubo Garrison" will be established (see above, Manila is going to change its name to Fubo), and this new garrison cannot all recruit local natives in Luzon—from the original From a historical point of view, the fighting power of the people of Luzon is far inferior to that of the countries in southern Xinjiang. Even if there is a strong BUFF bonus of the naturalization household registration system, high pragmatism is not very optimistic.

At any rate, Myanmar, Vietnam and other countries have had glorious moments in their original history when their combat power exploded. With the support of the Red Dynasty, the Vietnamese drove away Midi. Although they were reprimanded by Taizong for being too jumpy, the loss of the Red Dynasty was not very small.

However, the Luzon people have never had any glorious moments at all, and they have always been the ones who are hanged and beaten by others. It is really difficult for Gao Yushi to have much hope for their fighting spirit with such a performance.

Therefore, the expected "Fubo Garrison" will be a "multi-national mixed force", consisting of about 30% of immigrant Han Chinese, about 50% of naturalized Han people from various countries in southern Xinjiang, and about 20% of local Composed of naturalized Han people, the proportion of local naturalized Han people in the army is the lowest in the entire southern Xinjiang garrison system.

In addition, Taiwan's colonial expansion plan is progressing rapidly. Although the local area will be dominated by Han immigrants (the local native population is relatively limited), it is still uncertain whether it is necessary to recruit soldiers from southern Xinjiang—the reason It is Gao Pragmatism who does not want to use the immigrants as an army, but prefers to use the immigrant Han people in production and construction.

After all, the advantages of Han people in production and construction are obvious, and it must be the best choice to let them be in charge of production and construction.

In this case, it means that not only cannot disarmament, but even expand the army in the future.In the present situation, of course, the expansion of the army should not be a blank slate. Taking out a part of the original garrison as the core backbone of the new army to bring the old to the new is Jinghua's customary routine, and the effect and cost-effectiveness are obviously the highest.

In addition, when Malacca is in hand—whether it is through war or through an agreement with the Portuguese for a peaceful handover, in short, after getting it, it will definitely continue to promote the "Nanyang Project" and fully occupy the large and small islands of Indonesia in later generations , Established a complete "Jinghua Great Southern Border".

At that time, don't so many new territories need to be guarded and maintained by the army?At least on large islands such as Java, Kalimantan, and Sumatra, it is always necessary to put a town on each island, right?Even if there is no need for so many troops in the future, it will always be indispensable in the early days of the rule.

After all, Gao Pragmatism is not doing stronghold colonization like the Europeans. He wants to carry out comprehensive colonization and naturalization. It is impossible to just put a small elite army in key cities and fight wherever there is an accident.

The European colonial system, especially in the rule of Asian colonies, generally established a master-slave relationship with the original local chiefs, and indirectly ruled various places by relying on the chiefs of the natives.

But Gao Pragmatism is not like this. What he wants to do is to establish a comprehensive and thorough rule. Even if the structure of each kingdom is temporarily retained in name, in fact, Jinghua completely empties its power so that it can be deposed, revoked and timely ruled at any time. degree of replacement.

Comprehensive rule means that there is no need for the intervention of native leaders. Even if some of these people's forces are absorbed, it will only be carried out after they have been Sinicized through the requirements of the household registration naturalization system.

In this way, the force that Jinghua needs to maintain locally and the administrative system that needs to be established are naturally much larger than those of the European colonists in the original history.This also makes it impossible for Gao Wuzhen to carry out disarmament in southern Xinjiang, or to downgrade the garrison.

In addition, Gao Pragmatism also has plans for Japan.Although Huang Zhiting urgently made up some lessons this afternoon, after all, she didn't know Gao Yushi's plan for Japan. In fact, Gao Yushi set three goals with different difficulties for the Japanese plan. Which step he can achieve by then is up to him. I dare not guarantee it now, but obviously, Huang Zhiting did not think that the highly pragmatic Japanese plan required direct military support from southern Xinjiang.

It's not unreasonable to think so. Liu Xin briefly mentioned the climate in Japan this afternoon. After listening to it, Huang Zhiting thought it was probably similar to the northern and central plains.

In this way, even if a certain amount of force needs to be sent to Japan in the future, it seems that it is more suitable to draw from Jinghua's armed servants in Daming, such as the cavalry and guards of Jinghua Trading Company, and the factory guards and mine guards of major factories and mines. such as.

Although the names of these armed forces sound similar to the militias of the wealthy gentry in various parts of the Ming Dynasty, Huang Zhiting certainly knows that they are just the result of high pragmatism and prudence. These armed servants only need to be equipped with enough artillery, and they are no different from the garrison. Therefore, the artillery is listed separately because it is certainly not possible to equip it on a large scale at will in the country, but there are not many of them who have received artillery shooting training.

Of course, these armed servants are not full-time soldiers compared to the garrison, and their combat effectiveness will still be slightly inferior, but Huang Zhiting believes that if Gao Wushi really wants to be sent to Japan, he will definitely be sent to the Satsuma domain for formation and strengthening. The training was the same as it was during the crusade against Annan.

Gao Wushi wanted to understand this point, so he smiled, briefly talked about these considerations, and then said: "Although the Japanese side probably won't use troops directly within three to five years, when they need to use troops in the future, I am afraid that at least four or five towns will be needed, plus the entire Nanyang area, disarmament or downgrading is not appropriate."

Huang Zhiting couldn't help sighing after hearing this, and said: "If this is the case, it may affect the infrastructure construction in southern Xinjiang. Not only the subsequent construction of the outer city of Dingnan City may have to reduce investment and extend the construction period, but also another southern city that is scheduled to invest more I am afraid that the Xinjiang official road plan will also be affected...does the master have a plan?"

"Did elder brother (Gao Mengnan) mention these things to you?" Gao Wushi asked.

"Uncle's hair has been busy with graying a lot in the past two years. When the Portuguese visited last time, he sent someone to inform my concubine, and by the way, told me about these financial matters." Huang Zhiting paid attention to Gao's pragmatic expression, and said : "Is there something on the master's side that hasn't been notified to the uncle, so the uncle is worried about not having enough money?"

"Brother may be worried because of the offensive launched by the Maritime Trade Alliance against Luzon this year." Gao Yushi considered it carefully and said, "He has always been cautious, and he does not seek meritorious deeds before seeking faults. There was a sharp drop, which in turn caused Jinghua to lose a large amount of income, which affected its financial health."

After a pause, he continued: "However, I was prepared for this matter, and I don't think the Spaniards can give up this profitable exchange for both parties. In addition, regarding silver, copper coins, etc., there are actually differences with the Japanese. about the plan.”

Huang Zhiting frowned and said: "Is the master saying Ishijian Yinshan? But the master has not chosen to support the Maoli family now. I am afraid it will not be easy to get Shijian Yinshan."

Gao Wushi shook his head, and said: "Iwami Ginzan can't move now, although it is now the territory of Maori Ryogawa, but they have already reached a compromise with Toyotomi Hideyoshi, most of the output of Yinshan has to be handed over to Hideyoshi. If I support the Mori family for the sake of Yinshan, I will have to fight Hideyoshi in advance, but it is not worthwhile to make such a move now.

If... I mean, if our funds are really tight to the extent that my brother is worried, I will find a way to occupy Japan's Sado Island first. There is a huge gold mine there, but the Japanese don't know it yet.

In addition, after lunch today, I carefully considered the situation of the Hojo Clan in Kansas, and I planned to find a way to take advantage of the current critical situation of the Hojo Clan and sign a port lease contract with them to lease half of the Miura Peninsula. "
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(End of this chapter)