The Great Arcanist Who Traveled Through the World of American Variety Shows.

Chapter 428: Zhou's hodgepodge system
Zhu Yuanzhang's military household system was a very clever trick. Not only did they have to pay taxes, they also had to do labor service, and more importantly, they had no food or salary, and they had to go to war. What's more, there was no room for advancement for military households. They were military households for their entire lives, and they would be military households for generations.

All the benefits were taken away by the imperial court, and the military households live worse than farmers. So you shouldn't blame the military households for fleeing and giving up.

Richard was going to reform the Fubing system. Fubing would be allocated 200 mu of farmland, and they would not have to pay taxes or perform labor service, and they would not be under the jurisdiction of the local prefecture or county, but under the jurisdiction of the Zhechongfu.

The farmland allocated to the soldiers was not allowed to be traded or sold. Soldiers were required to serve in the military, and the age requirement was between 20 and 45. If they were over , they had to retire and their sons would take their place and continue to serve.

Richard specially designated some areas to house the palace soldiers.

If a soldier dies in battle, his son or brother will also serve in the army.

Richard set up the soldiers to own 200 mu of good farmland. In addition to the good farmland, they would also be allocated 10 mu of mulberry forest or pasture according to the area they were in, so that they could graze horses, raise cattle or weave cloth.

In addition, the soldiers did not have to perform labor or pay taxes, so their annual income was enough for the family to live a good life, and they also had enough time to hone their martial arts.

Under this system of fubing, each fubing household could support two soldiers to hone their martial arts. Although fubing had no military pay, they would receive rewards after going to war. And there was no upper limit on fubing. If they made contributions, they could obtain official positions and be promoted.

Jinyang and Xinzhou are located in the basin, with a lot of land for farming and war horses. Richard set up Zhechongfu here. Jinyang and Xinzhou each set up four Zhechongfu, each with a thousand households, adding up to 8,000 households of soldiers.

All of these palace soldiers are experienced soldiers, and each of them has weapons and armor. According to the farmland allocated to them by Richard, they can basically raise horses.

Such well-trained soldiers are stronger than many regular troops.

You should know that the armor rate in ancient wars was not high. In regular armies, the armor rate directly affected the combat effectiveness of an army.

The armor-wearing rate in the Tang Dynasty was only 60%, while the armor-wearing rate of the government soldiers needed to be at least 80% to 90%, and there were even a large number of cavalry. The combat effectiveness of these troops was completely incomparable to that of the Liao army.

Eight thousand soldiers were enough to make this place feel at ease. Then Richard also established the military system in Youzhou. Among the sixteen states of Yanyun, there was more arable land here. At the same time, because of the problem of Khitan, Richard set up sixteen Zhechongfu in Youzhou.

The sixteen Zhechongfu added up to 16,000 soldiers, and then sixteen Zhechongfu were set up in Hebei. Then sixteen Zhechongfu were set up in Guanzhong and Hedong respectively.

Next, Zhechoufu will be set up in Longxi and Hexi as well.

In the military system of the Zhou Dynasty, Richard planned to use both the recruiting system and the government soldiers system. The recruiting system was for the imperial guards, while the government soldiers system was mostly for the frontier troops. Every battle was fought by drawing a part of the imperial guards and adding some government soldiers.

Too many fubing systems would affect the court's tax revenue, so Richard did not set up five or six hundred Zhechongfu like the Tang Dynasty. Richard expected to set up three to four hundred Zhechongfu.

The number of government soldiers will be between 300,000 and 400,000. At the same time, the central government will train 300,000 imperial guards. 200,000 of these imperial guards will guard various places, and 100,000 will guard Luoyang. These imperial guards will be rotated every year. The government soldier system and the recruitment system are combined to ensure the military strength of the Zhou Dynasty. At the same time, Richard and Guo Rong agreed to establish the Privy Council to manage the army of the world.

Moreover, the Privy Council and the civil officials are separate, and the civil officials will not be used to manage the army. Richard is too aware of the disadvantages of civil officials managing military generals. As long as the civil officials are allowed to intervene in the army, it will not take decades for the entire army to be completely destroyed.

The civil officials did not want the military commanders to have too much power, and they did not want the emperor to have a strong army. In the eyes of the civil officials, maintaining such a strong army would allow the emperor to truly have the power of the emperor.

Just like in the Ming Dynasty, why were Zhu Yuanzhang and Zhu Di able to possess enormous power? The four major cases initiated by Zhu Yuanzhang implicated tens of thousands of people and killed countless people, but no one dared to resist his will.

In addition to Zhu Yuanzhang being the founding emperor and having great prestige, he also controlled a powerful army, and the same was true for Zhu Di. After the Ming Baozong, the powerful army of the Ming Dynasty was abolished, and the power of the emperor began to be compressed step by step.

This was the case during the Ming Dynasty, not to mention the Five Dynasties and Ten Kingdoms period which is still in progress today.

Although the saying "The emperor has the strongest army and the most powerful horses" sounds extremely treasonous, it actually reveals the emperor's true power.

Guo Rong did not want the imperial power of his descendants to be continuously weakened.

The Privy Council was established as the management and decision-making level of the army, and the officials in it could only be military personnel. In addition to the Privy Council, the court also set up a Political Affairs Council.

The Council of State Affairs had seven ministers, who were equivalent to prime ministers. All the prime ministers held the same official title as the Minister of State Affairs and the Minister of State Affairs. Among the seven prime ministers, one was the first prime minister, and the other six were second prime ministers.

Richard and Guo Rong designed this to weaken the power of the prime minister and divide it. Each of the seven prime ministers would take turns to serve for one day. If there were any major events, the seven would need to discuss and submit them to the emperor for approval.

It is equivalent to the emperor holding the decision-making power.
At the same time, the Ministry of Works, Ministry of Personnel, Ministry of Rites, Ministry of Punishment, Taifu Ling, Shaofu Ling, Supervisory Council, Metropolitan Censorate and Tongzhengsi were established.

The Ministry of Works was in charge of local projects and water conservancy facilities, the Ministry of Personnel was in charge of the promotion of officials below the fifth rank, and officials above the fifth rank were decided by the emperor. The Ministry of Rites was responsible for the imperial examinations and sacrifices, the Ministry of Punishments was in charge of criminal law, the Minister of the Imperial Household was in charge of taxation, and the Minister of the Imperial Household was in charge of the emperor's inner treasury.

The Privy Council was responsible for the deployment of the army, and together with the Ministry of Works, was responsible for the manufacture of weapons. The Censorate was responsible for monitoring the law and discipline of officials throughout the country, and also had the duty to impeach officials. The Inspectorate was also responsible for monitoring officials and was also responsible for inspecting the Inspectorate, which was equivalent to the Embroidered Uniform Guard and was directly responsible to the emperor.

Richard also created a secret memorial system, whereby officials above the seventh rank could submit secret memorials to the emperor if they discovered any major incidents. Secret memorials would not go through the Council of State Affairs but directly through the Ministry of Public Administration, which would then deliver them to the emperor's inner study.

In fact, the entire system is a hodgepodge that combines the advantages of several dynasties. We will have to wait and see how this system performs.

If there are any problems, they can make adjustments in time. Anyway, it is the early days of the founding of the country, and the system is not perfect, so we just need to keep improving it. Richard and Guo Rong now have enough time to try and make mistakes.

(End of this chapter)