Jingnan Strategy

Chapter 284 Everything is complicated

"Congratulations!"

"Long live Long live Long live……"

"Pingshen——"

On July 15th, the 33rd year of Hongwu, after a month of renovation, the atmosphere in the temple became much better.

But the officials' eyes always stayed on Jin Cha, the head of the Taxation Department, who was in the sixth grade.

Their eyes revealed coldness, which was naturally seen by Zhu Di on the golden platform of Fengtian Palace.

Zhu Di glanced sideways at Zhu Gaoxu, who was standing next to him, and his eyes seemed to say: "You burned them badly with this fire."

But Zhu Gaoxu didn't bother to pay attention to the looks of Zhu Di and other ministers.

Since Zhu Di came to the throne, he has not been anti-human, like Zhu Yuanzhang, who held court three times a day. Instead, at Zhu Gaoxu's suggestion, he changed the morning court time to Chen hour, once a day.

No one feels bad about this approach. After all, the policies of Zhu Yuanzhang's period were really anti-human.

Not everyone can work more than eight hours a day for 365 days like Zhu Yuanzhang, and live to be seventy-one in one breath.

Not to mention the ministers, even Zhu Gaoxu didn't think he could maintain the high-intensity work like Lao Zhu and live to his age.

"Today's meeting at court is about the salaries of hundreds of officials."

Zhu Di was sitting on the golden platform. After the sound came out, the officials looked back and listened carefully to the holy sound.

"During the previous dynasty, many people had to fold money into their salaries. Although I..."

"Ahem!" Upon hearing Zhu Di's words, Zhu Gaoxu coughed softly to remind him that this was a court meeting.

"Ahem, even though I announced that I will return to the old Hongwu system, I still have to give up on the idea of ​​folding banknotes."

"Your Majesty!" Upon hearing that the salary would be paid in real terms, the ministers immediately shouted long live.

Seeing this, Zhu Di continued to speak: "Recently, the Huangpu River in Gongsheng Ye Zongxing's Shangshu River has flooded, causing the coastal paddy fields to be repeatedly invaded by the river water."

"When I heard about this, I felt uneasy. I have sent Huang Fu, Minister of the Ministry of Industry, to Susong to control the water. The Ministry of Household Affairs will provide all the money and food needed."

"Your Majesty is wise!" Upon hearing that Zhu Di was about to take action against the Huangpu River, officials from the six prefectures in the east of the Yangtze River also bowed and sang loudly.

There were three rivers in the lower reaches of Taihu Lake that drained water into the sea in ancient times. Among them, the Dongjiang River was blocked due to the construction of sea-protecting weirs in the late Tang Dynasty.

Nowadays, Suzhou and Songjiang Prefecture areas often suffer from floods due to blockage of the Huangpu River and Wusong River waterways.

A few days ago, a scholar named Ye Zongxing came to the court and suggested that the upper reaches of the Wusong River be driven from Kaipu to Liujiagang to divert the flow of water and abandon the old downstream route.

Then open Fanjiabang in the northeast of Junxian County, connect it to Huangpu, and merge with Wusong River. To enhance the water potential, it rushes into the sea.

This suggestion was adopted by Zhu Di, and now it has been moved to the temple. It can not only ease the relationship between Zhu Gaoxu and the officials of the six Jiangdong prefectures, but also take the opportunity to publicize his achievements as emperor, which can be said to kill two birds with one stone.

As for what he was thinking, after he blurted out these words, the officials all understood.

During this period, the civil servants of the Six Prefectures of Jiangdong were severely tortured by the East Palace. As Zhu Gaoxu said, few of them had clean butts.

During the Hongwu period, they did not dare to go too far, but during the Jianwen period, they did too many things.

They just took advantage of Zhu Di's steps to avoid further trouble.

Seeing this, Zhu Gaoxu also turned his attention to Jin Cha, and one hand vaguely touched the wrist of the other hand.

"Your Majesty, Jin Cha, the head of the Taxation Department of the Ministry of Household Affairs, has something to report!"

Jincha watched Zhu Gaoxu's actions every day when he went to court. When Zhu Gaoxu signaled, he also walked out holding the wat board.

This move made the ministers' hearts immediately rise. Zhu Di also nodded when he saw this: "Come forward to make a statement!"

Hearing this, Jin Cha came forward, bowed and said:

"The Taxation Department has been conducting tax inspections for two and a half months. Now the tax inspections of land and acres in six prefectures including Yingtian, Yangzhou, Zhenjiang, Changzhou, Suzhou, and Songjiang have been completed. Among them, 394 officials were involved, including the head of the district and the head of grain. One thousand, four hundred and twenty-seven people deceived the court, and four thousand six hundred and twenty-seven households were in debt."

Zhu Gaoxu was never prepared to offend the officials of the six Jiangdong prefectures to death in one breath, so what Jin Cha did when he returned to the Taxation Department every day was to count the number of people found by the Taxation Department every day.

The reason for doing this is to wait for Zhu Gaoxu's signal and be ready to end the inventory of the six Jiangdong mansions at any time.

The reason why Zhu Gaoxu was not prepared to take over the six Jiangdong mansions in one go was because he did not have enough officials in his hands.

Now he has more than 7,600 grassroots officials in his hands, but they were all recommended by him using the "recommendation system" during the Jianwen period. If this group of people took part in the imperial examination, they would not be able to pass the Jiangnan scholar.

Because of this, these 7,600 people are all ninth-grade officials and can only serve in Shandong, Liaodong, Bohai, Daning and other places and in the taxation department.

Relying on the three thousand officials of the Taxation Department, he has already attacked the six Jiangdong prefectures once, but with only three thousand officials and thirty thousand Bohai soldiers, he could not measure the entire land of the six prefectures, so he used the method of "reporting" .

Now that the people in Jiangdong Six Prefectures have relented, he has also obtained the cultivated land, criminals and official vacancies in Jiangdong Six Prefectures that he wanted. This is enough.

"How much tax debt do these people owe? How many acres of land are they hiding?"

Zhu Di watched Jin Cha speak and immediately expressed his curiosity.

To this, Jin Cha responded without thinking: "The accumulated tax debt is 765,427 stone, three buckets and four kilograms, and the hidden land area is 471,979 acres and three cents."

"The total number of people involved in this case is 6,648. According to the "Great Ming Law", 53,627 people in our clan including parents, wives, etc. should be implicated. Please make your decision..."

Hiding one's land and abusing one's power would definitely lead to exile according to the "Laws of the Ming Dynasty". There is no doubt about this.

Faced with such punishment, Zhu Di glanced at Zhu Gaoxu: "Prince, what do you think?"

With his words, the officials from the Sixth Jiangdong Prefecture above the temple looked at Zhu Gaoxu in secret.

In response, Zhu Gaoxu took a deep breath and said: "Your Majesty, I think that the new dynasty has just been established, so we should not start a big war."

"Therefore, these more than 50,000 people can be moved to Xingdusi, Sichuan, and Changwei can be renamed Jianchangfu, Sichuan, so that they can educate the Guihua Luoluo and Xifan people who have come down the mountain."

Zhu Gaoxu did not send these 50,000 people to Yunnan and Guangxi, but he still sent them to Sichuan.

Sichuan now includes Guizhou and Chongqing in later generations, but its population is less than 1.5 million.

The relocation of more than 50,000 people this time is a big help to Sichuan, not to mention that the place where these 50,000 people moved is a place like Jianchang.

Thanks to the influence of Zhu Gaoxu, Zhu Yuanzhang and Zhu Yunwen have been working in Jianchang for five or six years. Otherwise, based on the past reputation of this place, it might not be as good as Yunnan.

Precisely because Zhu Yuanzhang and Zhu Yunwen have been here for five or six years, plus there are gold, silver and copper mines in the area, and Qu Neng is in charge, its current security is pretty good. Although the faces of the officials in the six Jiangdong prefectures are still livid, deep down in their hearts. But he breathed a sigh of relief.

What they were most worried about was that Dong Gong would send them to the frontier with the intention of killing this group of people, and then this group of people would really be finished.

Now that he is assigned to Jianchang, the worst thing he can do is give him more support after he settles down, establish culture and education in the local area, and take the imperial examination. Once the imperial examination is successful, he can find a way to exonerate his relatives.

Their ideas were exactly what Zhu Gaoxu needed.

"Ministry of Punishments, how about the immigration of Jianwen Chengchen's relatives?"

Zhu Di thought of the more than 300,000 Jianwen ministers and couldn't help but ask.

Hearing this, Luo Qian, the Minister of Punishment, came out and bowed: "Your Majesty, 360,000 Jianwen ministers and their relatives have been handed over to the Sixth Army Governor's Mansion."

"Return to your majesty!" Wang Yi, the former governor of the military governor's office and Duke Shen, heard this and walked out to bow.

"Three hundred and sixty thousand Jianwen ministers have been escorted to Yunnan by 5,000 elite cavalry from Bohai and Peking and 30,000 official troops from Shangzhi who are listening in Beijing. They have now arrived in Nanchang Prefecture, Jiangxi."

In more than a month, they walked more than 600 miles, which was relatively slow for the wandering team, but this was also what Zhu Gaoxu had told them.

For these more than 367,000 people, Zhu Gaoxu was very precious and wanted to send them all safely to Yunnan one by one.

With their participation, the progress of Yunnan's sinicization can be advanced by hundreds of years.

"Your Majesty, Li Zhigang, Minister of Rites, has something to report."

Just after discussing Jianwen's ministers, Li Zhigang, the Minister of Rites, came out to bow, and his voice echoed on the high platform of Fengtian Hall.

Zhu Di, who was on the golden platform, saw this and nodded immediately: "Play!"

"At the beginning of this year, there was civil strife among the princes of North Korea. Li Fangguo, who was informed of state affairs, came forward to ask for the throne..."

Li Zhigang said the reason why he left was nothing more than civil strife in North Korea in the east.

Zhu Gaoxu didn't know the details about the civil strife among the princes in North Korea, but he knew one thing, that is, there is no king in North Korea now.

Because Zhu Yuanzhang didn't like to see Li Chenggui, he called Li Chenggui "King of Korea" instead of "King of Korea".

According to the original history, in order to seek diplomatic stability at the end of this year, Zhu Yunwen officially gave North Korea the title of "King". His rank was that of a county king, but he could override the title of prince.

However, because Zhu Yunwen was forced to die early by himself, North Korea still bears the unjustified title of 'the right to know state affairs'.

They are eager for Ming Dynasty to admit that it is not just a day or two. If it were Zhu Yunwen, he might admit it now, but the people now are Zhu Di and Zhu Gaoxu.

"Father." Zhu Gaoxu turned sideways and bowed to Zhu Di on the golden stage:

"I believe that there is no etiquette in North Korea and civil strife continues. Father, son, uncle, and nephew are vying for the throne, which disrupts the ethical principles and should not be conferred the throne."

"..." Listening to Zhu Gaoxu's words, Zhu Di thought he was ridiculing him without knowing it.

Fortunately, Zhu Di didn't have a good attitude toward North Korea, so after Zhu Gaoxu expressed his stance, Zhu Di also refused: "North Korea has no ethics, how dare it dare to ask for the throne, this matter is dismissed, and there is no need to discuss it further."

"Your Majesty..." Li Zhigang agreed with a very calm expression. Apparently he was not surprised by the attitudes of Zhu Di and Zhu Gaoxu.

After all, it is the early Ming Dynasty, not the late Ming Dynasty. The relationship between North Korea and the Ming Dynasty is not a simple father-son relationship, but a master-wolf relationship.

Tieling in the Yuan Dynasty is still under the control of North Korea, and the Ming Dynasty has always claimed this place as its own territory.

Zhu Di and Zhu Gaoxu will naturally not give up what Lao Zhu did not give up.

But it is not easy to get North Korea to spit out this place. Therefore, the father and son have their own ideas on how to rectify North Korea.

"Some eunuchs have escaped from the inner court recently. The Ministry of Rites sent people to send news to North Korea and asked them to send five hundred eunuchs into the inner court."

As soon as Zhu Di opened his mouth, all the ministers looked at him. Even Zhu Gaoxu looked at Zhu Di in surprise. Regardless of whether it is Goryeo or North Korea, their specialties are mainly beautiful women and eunuchs. During the Hongwu period, the Ming Dynasty often asked Goryeo and North Korea for eunuchs. Nowadays, the inner court is indeed short of many people, and five hundred eunuchs is not too much.

"I accept the decree..."

Li Zhigang bowed respectfully and took over the errand. After hearing this, Zhu Gaoxu waited quietly. Seeing that no one among the ministers came forward, he turned his attention to Zhu Di.

When Zhu Di saw this, he also looked at the minister of Honglu Temple. Upon seeing this, the minister of Honglu Temple immediately sang a salute: "San——"

As the court dispersed, the ministers pushed Zhu Di away respectfully, and upon seeing this, Zhu Gaoxu returned to his East Palace.

After the normal morning dynasty, he and Zhu Di would definitely go to Wuying Hall to manage politics.

Although the Sixth Army Governor's Mansion and the Ministry of Civil Affairs, Ministry of Household Affairs, and Ministry of Industry are currently under his control, Zhu Di is not the kind of emperor who will be ignored.

For these state affairs memorials, Zhu Gaoxu would read them again after processing them, and then personally approve them.

However, Zhu Gaoxu cannot go to Wuying Palace normally today because his East Palace will welcome a group of guests.

Just like now, when he took the carriage and stopped at the entrance of Chunhe Hall, there were already many people waiting in the hall.

"Your Highness Chitose..."

The sound of singing came, and Zhu Gaoxu got out of the carriage and walked into the palace.

Amidst the singing of the ministers, familiar faces appeared in front of him.

Fu Rang, Yang Wen, Lin Su, Zhang Chun, Wang Yi, Meng Zhang, Cui Jun, Xu Sheng, Ta Shi, Nimacha, Talachi, who had also been summoned and had obtained the title of Duke and Count, etc. Dole and Qi, Chen Chang, Chen Xuan, Yang Qiu, Yang Zhan and others...

It can be said that the people in Chunhe Hall at this moment basically control more than 40% of the military power of the Ming Dynasty.

If you include Li Jinglong, Wu Gao, Ping'an, Yu Tongyuan and others who were transferred to the southwest by Zhu Gaoxu, then 70% of the Ming Dynasty's troops were actually in the hands of Zhu Gaoxu.

He must tighten his grip on military power and not relax for a moment.

"I haven't seen you, old friends. Please take your seats."

Zhu Gaoxu chuckled and ordered everyone to sit down, and then watched the generals take their seats.

His eyes rested on Fu Rang. Fu Rang's experience in Southwest China had enriched him and made him appear more mature and calm.

Not only him, but also Zhang Chun and Lin Su. It's a pity that they didn't make any contribution during the Jingnan period, so it was difficult for them to be knighted.

"Have you all gone to report on your duties and take over?"

"Already in office."

Zhu Gaoxu looked directly at Fu Rang, Yang Wen, Lin Su and others. Fu Rang and Lin Su answered without thinking, while Yang Wen paused for a moment.

The succession in their words was to take over the vacancy left by the withdrawal of Yang Zhan and others from the Rear Army Governor's Mansion.

Yang Wen was appointed as the Right Commander-in-Chief of the Rear Army Governor's Mansion, while Yang Zhan became the Right Commander-in-Chief of the Navy Commander's Mansion.

At present, in the Sixth Army Governor's Mansion, the rear army, the left army, the right army, and the navy undoubtedly belong to the East Palace faction. The front army is completely controlled by the Yan Mansion, and the central army is managed half-and-half by the Yan Mansion and the East Palace.

The more things you know, the more things you need to pay attention to.

Therefore, Zhu Gaoxu summoned Yang Wen, Fu Rang and others to Beijing to report on their work, also to examine which of them was suitable to guard the border and who was suitable to stay in the center.

In fact, he already had the answer in his mind, but he still wanted to investigate it in detail.

"In my opinion, the situation of Guangxi chieftains' conversion to native land is that you have converted more than half of the 342 chieftain families to native land. This is a good thing, but the local population structure has not changed, and there is still the risk of rebellion."

"Back to Your Highness, it is indeed true."

Zhu Gaoxu said his thoughts, feeling very helpless about the lack of people in the world.

There is a huge shortage of people in the world. Compared with the situation in the three southwestern provinces, even the north is considered densely populated.

Among the three southwest provinces, Yunnan has a controllable population of about 1.2 million, of which more than 400,000 are Han people.

There are less than 1.5 million people in Sichuan, and more than 300,000 of them are naturalized Lala and Fan people living in the Xichuan area.

The situation in Guangxi is that it controls more than 1.6 million people, but there are only less than 600,000 Han people.

On paper, the population of the three southwestern provinces that the imperial court could control reached more than 4.4 million. If you include the 360,000 of Jianwen and his ministers, it would be close to 4.8 million.

However, the actual situation is that there are no less than three million people in the southwest who are under the jurisdiction of the chieftains, and the Han people only account for less than 30% of the actual total population in the southwest.

Except for Shaanxi Xingdusi, the population structure of few provinces is as bad as that of Southwest China.

If there are enough resources, Zhu Gaoxu would like to separate 20 million people from the 30 million people in Jiangnan and move them to the southwest and northwest respectively.

Just thinking about this kind of thing is enough. The resources consumed by migrating the population and distributing prisoners are not a small amount.

The 360,000 Jianwen and ministers migrated for more than a month and consumed nearly 300,000 dan of grain along the way. It would take at least six months for them to arrive in Yunnan, and the entire migration process cost more than 2 million dan of grain.

In addition, after they arrived in Yunnan, they would also need to consume food for farming and reclamation. In total, distributing these 360,000 people would cost the Ming Dynasty no less than 5 million shi of food.

Without Lao Zhu to build up a family fortune, it would have been very difficult to maintain the migration of 300,000 people every year with the normal national strength of the Ming Dynasty, let alone more.

So what Zhu Gaoxu has to do now is to increase revenue and reduce expenditure, and this is also the reason why he invites everyone to come.

He glanced at everyone, his thoughts constantly jumping in his mind.

"I have called you here this time to ask you, based on the situation in each place, how many soldiers and horses do you think each place needs?"

Zhu Gaoxu spoke slowly, and everyone looked at each other in shock after hearing the words.

At Zhu Gaoxu's signal, they quickly started discussing.

Among them, Meng Zhang, who mastered cannons and matchlocks, had much lower demand for soldiers and horses in the world than others.

"Your Highness, I believe that in important border areas, two to thirty thousand troops and horses can be stationed depending on the situation, while only ten thousand troops in the interior are enough."

As soon as Meng Zhang opened his mouth, everyone started talking. Yang Wencai joined the East Palace and didn't say anything. But after all, Fu Rang was the veteran leader of the generals present, so he retorted:

"If this is the case, the maximum number of soldiers and horses in the world will not exceed 500,000, which is a bit too few."

Fu Rang traveled all over the country and saw the situation from the northeast to the southwest. Although he didn't know how powerful Bohai's firearms were, he still gave his own opinion based on his experience.

"The eight northern capitals of Bohai, Liaodong, Daning, Peiping, and Shanxi must maintain at least about 400,000 troops. The three southern regions of Sichuan, Yunnan, and Guangxi must have at least about 200,000 troops."

"As for the interior, each province will have 20,000 troops, and Zhili will have 40,000 troops. The total is 200,000."

"Therefore, the number of soldiers and horses in the world can be kept at around 800,000."

Fu Rang's answer was based on what he knew about the situation, so there was no problem.

However, when faced with his answer, Meng Zhang and others said: "Dudu Fu doesn't know. Our army's matchlock guns, field artillery, and siege artillery are extremely powerful. They can often fight ten thousand people against twenty thousand people, but they can't fight against Hu soldiers." Needless to say.”

"If we could equip the entire army with matchlocks and field artillery, then 400,000 people in the north would be too many."

"Indeed." Xu Sheng, Chen Chang and others also agreed, which made Fu Rang frown.

He really didn't know to what extent the power of Bohai's firearms had developed, but based on what Meng Zhang and others said, he still made an estimate of their combat strength.

"Even so, the number in the north cannot be less than 300,000, the southwest must maintain 200,000, and the mainland can reduce it as appropriate, but it needs to be kept at around 150,000."

Fu Rang took a step back and only asked the entire Ming army to maintain 650,000 troops.

This number is already quite large. You must know that when the Tang Dynasty had a population of 70 million, the number of soldiers in the country was only 570,000.

The Ming Dynasty had a smaller population than the prosperous Tang Dynasty, but more soldiers and horses than the prosperous Tang Dynasty. This is already an incredible ratio.

We must know that the number of military households in the Ming Dynasty is nearly two million, and the number of combat soldiers is normally maintained at around one million, but the quality is difficult to say.

Judging from the reactions of the armies in the Battle of Jingnan, except for the 90,000 elites in the Jiangnan area, the remaining combat strength was very worrying.

Rather than maintaining such a large but unusable army, Zhu Gaoxu would rather dismantle it and let them engage in agricultural production honestly.

"Zhili has 60,000 troops, Beiping, Daning, Bohai, Liaodong, and Shanxi each have 30,000 troops, Shaanxi and Xingdu have 50,000 troops, Sichuan has 50,000 troops, Yunnan has 100,000 troops, and Guangxi has 40,000 troops."

"The rest of the interior provinces have 15,000 each. The navy currently has 25,000, and the total army totals 610,000."

After listening to the suggestions of the generals, Zhu Gaoxu set the number of soldiers in the world at 610,000, but he also added:

"This number of troops and horses has to be achieved bit by bit, bit by bit with equipment, and bit by bit by dismantling the inland guard posts."

"For now, we will start with Bohai, Daning, Liaodong, and Shandong."

"The number of soldiers and horses in the four provinces shall not exceed one hundred and five thousand. The extra 45,000 shall be carefully screened and the unqualified ones shall be returned to work as farmers. However, the recruitment of Jurchens in the Bohai Sea shall not be stopped. The recruited soldiers and horses shall be sent to the capital and charged with Straight up.”

After Zhu Gaoxu finished speaking, Yishiha, who was sitting in the hall, bowed and said: "According to the situation in Liaodong and Bohai, it will take at most one year to redress these 105,000 men, and it will take almost six years to redress the 610,000 troops in the world." ."

"Why doesn't Your Highness set up an ordnance bureau in the mainland?" Zheng He said, but Zhu Gaoxu frowned.

He is also planning to improve the Northeast's economy and status with handicraft and smelting industries. At this time, moving the Ordnance Bureau into the inland is not just to make him feel uncomfortable.

What's more, the Northeast is his base, and he is not afraid of trouble in the Northeast.

"We will discuss this matter later. At present, the strength outside the customs is enough to slowly replace the entire army's equipment. The firearms equipment rate of the entire army must be strictly in accordance with the old Bohai system. Firearms equipment needs to reach 60%, and the remaining 40% of spears and horse shooting skills cannot be Throw it away.”

After Zhu Gaoxu said this, he continued to discuss with everyone some unreasonable aspects of the health center, such as the annexation of farmland in the health stations in Mainland China, Jiangnan and other places, and the situation of insufficient use of farmland.

Zhu Gaoxu did not plan to dismantle these guard posts, but planned to move them to the southwest and north in the future.

If the military households in the guard station are unwilling, then the civil registration will be restored and the land in the guard station will be divided equally among them.

Guard posts need to be retained, but in densely populated areas they seem to encroach on local resources, so they must be abolished.

Zhu Gaoxu was happy for what he had done, but many generals standing in the hall felt that he was a little strange at this moment...

(End of this chapter)