Red Mansion: I am Jia Lian

Chapter 509: Reform Frustrated
"Boom, boom, boom!" There were continuous roars, and the target ship in the distance was riddled with holes from the dense artillery fire.

A formation of ten warships skillfully changed direction, changed side, and continued shooting.

The cost of shooting alone in this live-fire exercise was 100,000 yuan.

It can be seen how much money the navy spends. Jia Lian on the deck, holding the railing, watched the target ship in the distance gradually sinking. His mood became much better, as he finally saw the results of the battle.

"Good practice!" Jia Lian praised, and Jim couldn't help but straighten his chest slightly.

"According to intelligence, the Dutch have deployed twenty third-class battleships in Java, and the Spanish are of similar strength in Borneo. Our army currently has a total of thirty-three third-class battleships, which is enough to defeat any one of them. The difficulty lies in the worry that they will unite."

"The Dutch-Spanish Mutual Assistance Treaty? That is indeed a problem. I hope they will not be able to achieve true unity by then."

The expansion speed of the Nanyang Fleet was already very fast in Jia Lian's opinion. In two years, from the initial ten third-class battleships (lacking guns) ordered by Wang Ziteng to the current thirty-three (including five purchased from abroad), money was spent like water. In terms of personnel, more than a thousand people were hired from Europe and distributed on various warships as coaches. The Tanka youths were hardworking, smart and capable, which was well reflected in the training.

As a British, Jim spoke highly of the Tanka youths, believing them to be the best source of soldiers. At the same time, the students of the Naval Academy had already gone to India to intern in the Royal Navy's Indian Fleet. The British government was quite welcoming of the admission of students from the Zhou Empire, and the Royal Navy did not stop it. It was not that they were not worried about the strength of the Zhou Empire's navy, but they could not take care of it now.

The North American War of Independence, from the beginning when the British army was unstoppable to the present when it became increasingly difficult, was due to the interference of the French as well as the tactical success of the North American colonies.

In fact, the number of casualties in the American Revolutionary War was not high, and the scenes in the movie starring Mel Gibson were exaggerated. To be frank, the organizational strength of the North American militia was not enough to fight the British army head-on. It would be better to say that the British army was worn down rather than defeated.

Jia Lian was not satisfied with the current naval guns. The upper limit of the power of black powder was too low. Even if a stabilizer was found and smokeless gunpowder was developed, the problem of processing accuracy could not be solved. Another problem was production capacity. The current artillery improved from the British army could not keep up with the speed of shipbuilding. This was due to the lack of enough skilled workers. This was not a problem that could be solved by simply piling up people. It took time to train workers. Fortunately, Jia Lian was not in a hurry and should be able to basically complete the war preparations this year.

The Nanyang Fleet is currently composed of a main fleet and three squadrons. The main fleet includes twenty third-level battleships, three purchased second-level battleships, and three squadrons, totaling thirteen third-level battleships.

In order to improve the defense, Jia Lian also made a metal outer skin, that is, a layer of copper on the outside of the warship. The reason why it is copper instead of iron is naturally due to corrosion.

At present, the defensive effect has indeed been improved a lot, but the disadvantage is that it affects the speed. Therefore, the three squadrons mainly engaged in guerrilla warfare did not apply the skin, but only the main fleet did this.

"It will be three years next spring. At the end of the year, the officers who have been interning in India will come back and get on board to adapt for a while, and then we can start working." Jia Lian said to himself. Although he was very anxious in Guangdong and Guangxi in the past few years, Emperor Chenghui, who was far away in the capital, seemed even more anxious. The specific reason was that Emperor Chenghui chose Henan as a pilot to implement the land tax system. After a year of hard work, there were few results.

It can be said that the Henan pilot project failed miserably for many reasons, the main one being the lack of cooperation from the grassroots government and gentry. Not only did they not cooperate, they also dragged their feet in various ways, and they also used the wrong people.

Chenghui's 14-year reform can basically be considered a failure. Now, there is a countercurrent in the court. The outbreak point was the Henan pilot project launched at the beginning of the year. In the process of clearing the land, a gentry was "forced to death". Generally speaking, the governor Song Ke was ordered to implement the land tax distribution, and the first step was to clear the land. As a result, this first step was initially delayed by government agencies from top to bottom. After several months of delay, it was almost time for the summer harvest, but there was still no progress. Song Ke was forced into a corner and took tough measures to force government agencies at all levels to speed up the process.

Unexpectedly, under this pressure, a major event occurred in Kaifeng. A gentry named Bao hanged himself at home and left a suicide note, all because of the pressure from Qingtian.

Three days after the gentleman committed suicide, his wife and two concubines also committed suicide.

After the incident, it quickly fermented across the country. Although the cabinet had responded and sent Fang Song to investigate the case, things still developed rapidly in an unfavorable direction and against reform.

The first wave was directed at the governor Song Ke. Officials at all levels in Henan submitted memorials one after another, impeaching Song Ke as a cruel official, a contemporary Zhou Xinglai Junchen.

You know, cruel officials are not a good word. Zhou Xing and Lai Junchen were cruel officials during the reign of Wu Zetian. Well, the phrase "walk into a urn" comes from a torture method invented by Lai Junchen.

After Song Ke was impeached, he had no choice but to submit a memorial to defend himself. It was more of an accusation than a self-defense, an accusation against bureaucrats at all levels for delaying the clearing of land, which led to the delay in the implementation of the entire reform.

After the self-defense memorial was submitted, a second wave of protests soon broke out in the capital. This time, officials in the capital filed memorials one after another to impeach Song Ke, and hinted that he had a backer behind him. He did something wrong and not only refused to admit his mistakes, but also insisted on biting back and taking the blame from his subordinates. This was no longer a cruel official, but a villain without moral integrity.

Well, the bottom line is that there are bad people in the cabinet who have deceived Your Majesty.

This wave of opposition was not too loud, indicating that the emperor and the cabinet had relatively good control over the officials in Beijing. Only a hundred or so officials submitted impeachment memorials.

But before this wave was over, the third wave came right after. This time, officials across the country were impeaching Song Ke. Or in other words, they seemed to be impeaching Song Ke, but in fact they were opposing the land-based tax system.

After all, one thing is clear: after the tax was distributed among all the gentry, they all had to pay taxes together.

Let me ask you, which official in the world is not a member of the gentry group?

Although the provincial governors were suppressing impeachment memorials, they still could not stop the officials below from submitting impeachment memorials. Of course, some provincial governors were just pretending, while others were really suppressing.

Among them, the officials in Liangjiang and Guangdong and Guangxi were suppressed very honestly, and each of them only submitted three or five memorials to the emperor. Guangdong did not even submit a single memorial, while five officials in Guangxi submitted memorials to impeach Song Ke.

The incident lasted from the end of May to the end of October in the 40th year of Chenghui. Instead of being settled, it became more and more serious.

Even though Fang Song released the results of his investigation at the end of October, concluding that the death of the gentry surnamed Bao was not caused by the land clearing, but because he was addicted to gambling and lost all his property, officials and gentry all over the country still strongly questioned it, and even scolded Fang Song. They said that he was the backer behind Song Ke and a traitor who brought disaster to the country and the people. Against this background, Emperor Chenghui did not make any concessions after consulting with the cabinet. Instead, he issued an edict, clearly stating that the land tax should be distributed according to the amount of land, which opponents regarded as deceiving the emperor.

Immediately afterwards, the case in Henan was characterized and Fang Song’s investigation results were upheld, but Song Ke did not get any good results either. He was dismissed from his post and sent back to Beijing on the charge of dereliction of duty, awaiting punishment.

Relying on the emperor's great personal prestige, the matter was suppressed, but the pilot project in Henan also failed and was delayed for a year. If they wanted to restart it, they could only wait for the re-appointment of a minister as governor.

The fact that the voices of opposition were suppressed did not mean that the opponents gave up. It can only be said that the opposition took advantage of the death of the gentry surnamed Bao to make a fuss and delayed the trial for a year, which in fact affected Emperor Chenghui's reforms and caused damage to his personal prestige.

Under such circumstances, Emperor Chenghui sent a secret decree through the channel of Long Jinwei, hoping that Jia Lian would take action.

After all, Jia Lian had told Emperor Chenghui that when one thing cannot be suppressed, one can use another thing to divert attention.

In the secret decree, Emperor Chenghui also expressed his concerns about the continued implementation of the land tax system in the future, because after this incident, the gentry in the world would definitely find various means and reasons to resist its implementation.

Fang Song, who was implicated, also wrote to Jia Lian, complaining that Song Ke was a boastful person, but in fact he was an incompetent person with high aspirations and low skills. As a governor, he could not control the subordinates of a province. He also said that he was taking the blame for Li Qing and sent Song Ke to Henan to be the governor to conduct a pilot project. Song Ke was strongly recommended by Li Qing, and Song Ke was also a star figure in the Qingyun faction. Well, Fang Song tacitly agreed that Jia Lian was not a Qingyun faction.

The letter also detailed the conclusion of the investigation into Bao Shishen's case. He was definitely not forced to death by the land clearing. Bao Shishen's family used to have more than 10,000 acres of land, but lost more than half of it because of gambling. Before the incident, he had completely lost all his land and even his wife. Moreover, Fang Song speculated that it was not him who committed suicide first, but his wife and concubine who died first.

The problem is that when Fang Song arrived in Kaifeng, all the evidence had been tampered with, and even at the critical moment of the investigation, the Kaifeng prefect died suddenly. The cause of death was a stroke.

Fang Song had already traced the case back to the Kaifeng prefect, but he was dead, and all clues were gone. He could only close the casino, put the escaped casino owner on the wanted list, and close the case.

What’s even more depressing is that the results of the investigation are not recognized, or rather, people don’t care about the truth at all and are just opposing for the sake of opposing.

When Fang Song returned to Beijing to report on the death of the Kaifeng prefect, he was severely scolded by Emperor Chenghui, who said that he should have controlled the officials of Kaifeng Prefecture from the beginning. Before he left, he was repeatedly told to be vigilant against collusion between officials and gentry and to oppose the pilot program of equalizing the land tax, but he did not take it seriously.

It can be said that the situation was a mess and has not yet been completely settled, but has only been suppressed temporarily.

Jia Lian fully believed that once the pilot project was launched again, there would still be a more violent counterattack waiting.

Jia Lian sent a secret memorial to Emperor Chenghui, stating his own views.

Well, the tone is very implicit. He did not directly say that Emperor Chenghui ignored the fact that the suppressed resistance had accumulated to a very strong level because the previous reforms were too smooth.

Previous reforms only affected officials, so the resistance was limited. This time, the reform affected the interests of officials and gentry all over the world, so the resistance was naturally all-round.

Jia Lian's wording is [The Henan Bao case is a concentrated outburst of backlash after your majesty's many years of reform.]

Although Jia Lian did not oppose the reform of the land tax system, he actually thought that the reform was too hasty. The reform of the land tax system was very different from the previous reforms.

At the same time, he also put forward some opinions on the selection of executive officials, believing that ministers with long-term grassroots work experience and strong personalities should be selected. He did not criticize Song Ke openly for being anxious at first, panicking and defending himself after the incident, and hiding in the governor's office to "reflect on his mistakes behind closed doors." Indirectly evaluating Song Ke, he did not have the ability. At the end of the secret report, Jia Lian suggested that the subsequent personnel should be carefully selected, and the power of Longjinwei in Henan should be strengthened to obtain more comprehensive intelligence as a preliminary preparation for the reform of the land tax, and at the same time, be prepared to suppress it with violent means.

Jia Lian also saw some clues of the power struggle in the cabinet from this incident. Why did Li Qing strongly recommend Song Ke? Why was the candidate not decided by Lin Ruhai and Zhang Tingen? Even if they did not recommend a candidate, did they not have the ability to stop it? Obviously, the emperor and Li Qing discussed this matter first and then made the final decision. This is in line with the emperor's personality and governing philosophy. Even if he trusted Zhang Tingen and Lin Ruhai, he would not allow them to be too strong in the cabinet.

Looking back at the matter of Ning Ke being sent away, Jia Lian even suspected that Emperor Chenghui felt embarrassed about Ning Ke's matter and was worried that his personal prestige in the cabinet would be affected.

On the other hand, in order to show his positive performance, secure his position in the cabinet and pave the way for promotion, Li Qing, with the emperor's deliberate indulgence, recommended his favorite student Song Ke to be the governor of Henan.

Jia Lian judged that Zhang Tingen had the ability to tolerate others for the sake of the overall situation, while Lin Ruhai was beginning to restrain his edge.

In short, this matter is very complicated. Jia Lian did not get much relevant information. He only got the information from the court newspaper and Fang Song's private letter. It is difficult to make a clear judgment. Jia Lian even suspected that Zhang Tingen and Lin Ruhai had advised the emperor not to be anxious and wait a little longer. Emperor Chenghui was a little arrogant, so he couldn't wait. This gave Li Qing an opportunity.

Many things cannot be said in letters. After all, if written down, it may be a handle for political enemies to attack in the future. Lin Ruhai and Zhang Tingen's letters did not mention this matter, and Jia Lian did not dare to ask about it.

Since the emperor had issued a secret decree, Jia Lian had no choice but to carry it out. So, after synthesizing all the information and coming to a basic conclusion that was not too vague, Jia Lian submitted a secret memorial while also submitting a public memorial.

"Memorial to the Emperor on the Restoration of the Nanyang Xuanwei Office."

The general meaning is that since he became the governor of Guangdong, Jia Lian has been preparing for the military. Now the Nanyang fleet has begun to take shape and the army is well-trained. As long as His Majesty and the Cabinet allow, he can send troops to Nanyang next year to expel the Dutch and Spanish forces in Nanyang and restore the Nanyang Xuanwei Office.

In the memorial, Jia Lian also mentioned some of the cruel acts committed by the colonists against the local Chinese, and threatened that the time had come to settle the accounts.

(End of this chapter)