Since the Accounting: A Chronicle of the Roman Khanate

Chapter 837 The Era of the Most Adventurous and Pioneering Spirit—The Great Yuan Dynasty

In the early days of the Javanese Yuan dynasty, there was no such thing as a "regular army." At that time, the army consisted of the private armies of various families who had fled south. There was no direct command between them, and they even fought each other frequently in the struggle for power.

As far as Guo Kang knew, the main difference between this world and the one he had been in was that the Yuan Dynasty had actually won its expedition against Java. Although, given the Yuan Dynasty's limited administrative capabilities, it would have been difficult to maintain effective control after conquering Java, a large number of merchants, attracted by the high profits, began to venture south to explore new markets.

Sun Shiwan once remarked to Guo Kang and others that, throughout history, only the Yuan Dynasty possessed the most pioneering spirit and the greatest support for overseas adventures. Unlike previous dynasties, the Yuan Dynasty's management approach was benevolent and lenient, entrusting everything to professionals without arbitrary interference. The atmosphere in economics and trade was also remarkably free and open. This sparked a surge of maritime enthusiasm among the people, with many breaking free from traditional local barriers and venturing into a larger and more exciting new world. This stood in stark contrast to the repressive atmosphere of the past.

Based on this, Sun Shiwan even criticized Europeans, saying they were incompetent. According to their experience, it was best for the monarch to interfere as little as possible; in fact, if order could be maintained, it was acceptable to abolish the monarch and follow the precedent of the Western Zhou Dynasty to implement a republican system.

However, the situation in Europe is now reversed.

All the major countries were strengthening the authority of their monarchs, and some even actively sent envoys to the East to learn from them. Some even went as far as the Ming Dynasty, stating that they wanted to learn how the Ming Dynasty consolidated its monarchical power.

Sun Shiwan was utterly perplexed by this, lamenting, "No wonder everyone says that barbarians don't understand political ideals and morality. Instead of learning from such a good example as the Yuan Dynasty, they choose to take the wrong path; it's truly incomprehensible. In this light, the future of Europeans seems bleak."

Of course, while he said that, Guo Kang and the others didn't really believe him.

Normally speaking, people from the Central Plains didn't have much of an adventurous spirit when it came to the ocean. The reason for this is that whether they were from the Central Plains or Europeans, any normal person would consider the expected benefits. Without potential advantages, people simply don't have the spirit to take risks…

Even the early Crusaders, known for their fanaticism, went with clear objectives. Most were after the wealth of the Holy Land; otherwise, the Pope wouldn't have emphasized that it was a land of plenty—why bring that up if people didn't care? Even devout believers needed the Church's guarantee of religious rewards for participating in the Crusades to reclaim the Holy Land before they would act. So, even if it's for religious gain, there has to be some benefit; otherwise, why would so many people have nothing better to do than risk their lives in such dangerous places…

For most people in the Central Plains during traditional dynasties, engaging in production in their hometown was the most beneficial thing in the world. Of course, there were also those who genuinely needed to travel far—for example, when a copper mine was discovered in a certain place. In those cases, the local tribes would truly experience what a vigorous spirit of adventure meant…

Therefore, the desire for adventure isn't really about "spirit," but rather a very pragmatic pursuit of profit. Commerce in the Central Plains wasn't stagnant, but going overseas was still extremely dangerous given the technology at the time. Not to mention, caravans in those days were essentially small armies. If your men weren't skilled enough, the locals probably wouldn't be willing to do business with you.

Therefore, the benefits of traveling overseas are limited, while the risks are significant. Unless absolutely necessary, there's really no need to go abroad. Furthermore, historically, the vast majority of products have only been produced in Han-dominated areas. It's the "barbarians" who have demand from the Han people, not the other way around. If they need something, why don't they just buy it themselves?

However, the situation was different in the Yuan Dynasty.

Originally in the Central Plains, the cost of leaving one's hometown was very high, so the willingness to do so was not strong. But under the rule of the Yuan Dynasty, the threshold for " settling down and living in peace" suddenly rose considerably. Like Zhu Wenkui's great-grandfather, whose entire family had very few relatives left. Now, even if people wanted to stay and move to their ancestral lands, they had neither land nor relatives to rely on...

According to Guo Kang's understanding, the most important driving force behind the Age of Exploration was the extremely cheap labor. One reason why the British fleet could easily seize people from ports and board their ships was that, even though life at sea was harsh, it wasn't worse than life on land. For the lower classes in the ports, boarding a ship was also a gamble with their lives, but the living conditions might even be better. With this background, people were willing to board ships and go to sea.

Under the Yuan Dynasty, a large number of cheap human resources could also be obtained directly from port areas. For example, in Quanzhou, an important port for those heading to Southeast Asia, a large number of Mongol slaves gathered and distributed in the trading port. The large merchants along the coast could obtain Mongol slaves continuously without spending much money, thus enabling them to develop rapidly.

Thus began the Age of Exploration for the people of the Central Plains—including the Mongols, of course.

Unfortunately, people didn't seem to like this era. Not long after the Yuan Dynasty unified China, various rebellions broke out one after another.

At the end of the Yuan Dynasty, with the outbreak of the Red Turban Rebellion in the Central Plains, Mongols in various regions also responded enthusiastically, launching an armed resistance against the Yuan Dynasty. Although almost all the wealthy merchants along the coast sided with the court and organized "righteous armies" to fight against the rebels, they ultimately lost. The Age of Exploration, which had only flourished for a few decades, ended so abruptly.

The wealthy merchants who founded the Javanese Yuan dynasty felt this was a great pity. Some of the Confucian scholars they employed also conducted extensive research. In the end, they concluded that the Yuan dynasty's system was not flawed; it was only that a group of powerful figures, led by Mongol nobles and prominent Han Chinese families from Hebei, quickly became corrupt after unification, engaging in vicious infighting, which led to the loss of control of the court and caused serious consequences.

This chaos was exploited by ambitious figures from the lower classes, led by Zhu Chongba. These people, born of humble origins and possessing immense ambition, were psychologically twisted and ruthless. The Mongols in power were of extremely questionable character and were no match for bandits like Zhu Chongba and Chen Youliang. Ultimately, this led to the rapid collapse of the Yuan Dynasty.

These words sounded quite familiar to Guo Kang. Generally, criticisms of Zhu Yuanzhang followed a similar pattern. However, many people, including himself, criticized Zhu Yuanzhang not for his own sake, but because it had become a habit. Founders with similar accusations of coming from humble backgrounds, disrespecting intellectuals, and using political maneuvering to persecute veterans tend to have similar images—like Liu Bang, even many anecdotes about him are the same. Zhu Yuanzhang himself was implicated in this perception, thus being criticized along with the others—of course, for them, this wasn't entirely unfair. Those who liked this rhetoric of "lower-class people having low morals" would certainly not like him. However, another explanation was rather unusual. Guo Kang had heard more often that Europeans possessed an adventurous spirit, while the Seres lacked it. Therefore, learning only technology and military prowess wasn't enough; they also needed to learn the pioneering spirit and democratic values ​​of Europeans. Now, the Yuan people's explanation was the complete opposite, which sounded very strange at first. But upon closer examination, what they said did indeed make sense.

If this argument is not accepted, it means that the factors contributing to the rise of Europeans are nothing new; the Yuan Dynasty also possessed them. The rise of Europeans, like previous barbarian invasions, is nothing new. But this implies that all that's needed is to learn the technology of these "high-tech barbarians"—even their military experience is only suitable for barbarian societies and doesn't need to be learned. Therefore, a whole host of subsequent arguments demanding continued learning of European culture become untenable. Many of these arguments directly negate the truths held by people in Guo Kang's time, and even if people don't find them unacceptable, they will certainly feel uncomfortable.

Conversely, if we accept this view and believe these elements are indeed important, then learning from the Yuan Dynasty is better than learning from the Europeans. After all, the Yuan Federation was more radical than the Europeans in many ways, and it started earlier as well. Moreover, the Yuan Dynasty has already done a great deal of the crucial localization work for everyone. Rather than learning from a bunch of unfamiliar outsiders from such a distance, it would be better to announce the restart of the Yuan Dynasty, and from now on, everyone would be Yuan friends…

Of course, Java also acknowledges that even the best Yuan Dynasty still had many areas for improvement. The early Javanese Yuan Dynasty had many major internal and external initiatives, representing old problems left over from the Yuan Dynasty.

Initially, people were not optimistic about the future of the Yuan Dynasty. If conditions allowed, many might have chosen to surrender directly to the Ming Dynasty. However, several major incidents that occurred later dispelled this notion.

The Ming army initially had no interest in distant Java. Therefore, by leveraging the plantations they had established there in earlier years, these people successfully settled in Java and even had the leisure to compete with each other.

Before the fall of the Yuan Dynasty, the region was already in a state of chaos. After the Red Turban Rebellion spread far and wide, the Yuan Dynasty was already struggling to maintain its military presence on its homeland, and was even more powerless to do so here. Like in other places, they didn't even bother with the pretense of military action, and simply handed over military power to local powerful clans.

In Java, wealthy merchants from the southeastern coast of the Yuan Dynasty held an absolute dominant position of power. When the Yuan army attacked Java, the local chieftains were able to lead their people in resistance. By the end of the Yuan Dynasty, although there was no official army in name, the private armies of these merchants were even more ruthless than the regular Yuan army.

Compared to the officials sent by the capital, these wealthy merchants were much more difficult to deal with. They had basically been operating in the area for two generations or more, cultivating their businesses deeply over many years, and their influence was already widespread.

Although the overall environment of Southeast Asia is harsh, and at first glance it may not even seem suitable for human habitation, over the past few centuries, with technological advancements, some fertile lands have become exploitable. Merchants occupied these areas and began cultivating cash crops, which they sold to the Central Plains—essentially replacing the role of tributary states like Srivijaya and Chola. In a sense, they were essentially "outer vassal states" composed of Han Chinese.

Like the major powers in the region, they also formed their own "mandala" tributary network. Their trading ports were their capitals, and their plantations and guards were the estates and vassal armies they had granted to their people. On one hand, they maintained connections with many local kings and chieftains, using their Han Chinese identity and hometown networks to facilitate more profitable trade with the Central Plains. On the other hand, through their directly controlled armed forces, they could also suppress the local population, making an example of them when necessary.

For the native inhabitants of Southeast Asia, these merchant groups, more localized and integrated into the local ruling order, were far more difficult to manage than the officials and troops sent by the Yuan Dynasty. Due to the Yuan Dynasty's laissez-faire policy, these merchants could easily obtain weapons and supplies from the Central Plains, making them no weaker than regular armies and capable of overwhelming the natives. On the other hand, they possessed a deep understanding of the region's geography, ethnic distribution and conflicts, and the situations of various princely states, making them adept at handling the situation. Therefore, in just fifty years, before the Yuan Dynasty even ended, they had occupied all the important ports of Southeast Asia.

Another fatal weakness of the indigenous peoples of Southeast Asia was revealed here: similar to the situation in Bengal, the larger nations among them with some capacity for resistance heavily relied on seafaring and ports. A good port was generally also a central city, and the surrounding land was also of good quality. Places like Java were actually very suitable for rice cultivation, with high yields. Thus, through trade and surrounding agriculture, these nations began to emerge as powerful entities. From here, the rulers would conquer various small and medium-sized cities, establishing a system of governance.

However, these regions were also the favorite haunts of the Yuan Dynasty's wealthy merchants. They would arrive by ship with their armies, and their first target would be these core cities. A defeat in battle could easily cause the collapse of a powerful indigenous nation. Even if the king and nobles managed to escape, they would lose vital sources of revenue and population, making it even more difficult for them to contend with the Yuan merchants.

Under these awkward circumstances, the Yuan Dynasty merchants' colonization efforts were remarkably successful, surprising even Guo Kang. The Yuan government, however, ignored or even encouraged this.

After the collapse of the Yuan Dynasty, the first thing local merchants did was to engage in a round of mergers and acquisitions. After a short but intense three-year war, only a dozen or so large merchant guilds remained. The number of powerful clans capable of waging sufficient military force dwindled to single digits. However, their size had grown unprecedentedly, spanning continents and connecting islands, further enhancing their strength.

After the Ming army conquered Yunnan, the merchants quickly learned of the news and began to worry. Finally, the wealthy merchant Chen Wenkang proposed that the civil war should be stopped, and that they should unite against the enemy, responding to the imperial court's call to resist the rebels. Through his efforts, the prominent families of Southeast Asia formed their first alliance.

By this time, most of them had already been lost. They tried to get official recognition from the imperial court but couldn't find anyone, so they simply declared several provinces for themselves and defined their spheres of influence. The name of the regular army that they assembled was also decided at this time.

According to Sun Shiwan, the true value of a Han Chinese army wasn't measured by how many cities it defended or how many water conservancy projects and engineering works it constructed, but rather by how far it advanced. Although the Eight Guards Han Army's period of prosperity was brief, it achieved the pinnacle of Han Chinese military achievement: "Sealing the Wolf's Lair." Few throughout history have been able to accomplish this. Therefore, it is truly worthy of commemoration.

With this beautiful wish of "victory in the Northern Expedition" in mind, they chose this name from that time.

(End of this chapter)