Guangzong Yaoming

Chapter 173: Standpoint is more important than right and wrong

Zhu Changluo now has guns, but it is not good enough, as there are still many external enemies to target.

"We have an additional important task of pacifying and suppressing the local garrisons. If the Grand Marshal has any other difficulties, please let us know."

After the court meeting the next day, Zhu Changluo kept Tian Le again.

After being the first to stand up at the court meeting that day, Tian Le tore off his disguise of reconciling the relationship between the emperor and the cabinet ministers during the period when "the emperor was worried about the instability of imperial power". He was a member of the New Party who supported the emperor in implementing new policies.

Tian Le thought for a moment and said, "Ninglubo is in Liaodong. If there is a border threat, Your Majesty should be patient for now."

Zhu Changluo originally wanted to first gain control of Liaodong and suppress border threats to stabilize the military power and the north, and then use his power to implement new policies. However, Tian Le dissuaded him from this idea.

There is no other reason. The money in the treasury is simply not enough to accomplish these things.

If the South is not touched first, the imperial court will always be in financial difficulties. If the South is touched, it must be completely suppressed first, not giving them the opportunity to hinder and threaten the imperial court in solving the northern threat in the future.

It was the actual border defense status introduced by Tian Le outside the information that made Zhu Changluo change his mind.

Among the nine borders of the Ming Dynasty, the main enemies from west to east are still Mongolia and Jurchen.

The Mongolian tribes that were close to the Ming Dynasty were roughly divided into Tumed and Chahar. Altan swallowed the Ordos tribe among the 30,000 households of the right wing of Mongolia, but now his descendants have divided the Tumed tribe into three: the Tatar Tumed in Qinghai, the Western Tumed in Tumochuan, and the Eastern Tumed, which had submitted to the Chahar Khanate and merged into the Kharchin Ten Thousand Households after moving east.

After the Battle of Xiaosongshan and Dasongshan, the connection between the Tatar Tumed in Qinghai and the Western Tumed was greatly weakened.

The Ming Dynasty had long ago granted tribute to the Western Tumed and had border trade with them, but this did not mean that the Western Tumed were safe. On the contrary, as recently as the 25th year of the Wanli reign, a group of 100,000 northern barbarians invaded and plundered. In the 27th year of the Wanli reign, northern barbarians invaded Yansui as well.

What made Zhu Changluo speechless the most was that these two large-scale invasions were only revealed during later investigations, and the border generals and governors in charge at the time did not report the matter truthfully.

In Tian Le's words: The problems with border troops and border defense are actually bigger than those with local garrisons.

He was able to achieve the feat of conquering the Songshan Mountains in Gansu because he spent a long time trying to be self-sufficient and gather a small force. Li Chengliang was able to achieve the feat in Liaodong because of the special situation in Liaodong.

As the central Wanhu, Chahar Wanhu moved eastward to Kulun, which was further south and closer to the Ming Dynasty, after the 25th year of Jiajing, and subjugated the three guards of Duoyan, Funing and Fuyu. The Kalaqin Wanhu, located to the north and east of Xuanfu, also submitted to the Khan's court and incorporated some small tribes of the three guards of Duoyan.

At present, the Ming Dynasty and the Mongolian Khanate are still in a hostile relationship and there is no tribute trade.

In other words, Liaodong is currently facing threats from the Khanate in the west, the Haixi Jurchens in the north, and the Jianzhou Jurchens in the east.

When Li Chengliang was making achievements in Liaodong, the Khanate moved eastward and there was internal annexation; there were great survival conflicts between the Jianzhou Jurchens and the Haixi Jurchens, and between the Mongols and the Haixi Jurchens.

He supported the Jianzhou Jurchens, took advantage of the internal and external disputes among the three, and with his own skills, he was able to achieve success and be granted the title of Earl.

After hearing what Tian Le said, Zhu Changluo couldn't help but feel helpless: "Do I have to endure it?"

"At least we have to endure it for now. If the Beijing camp is successful, then the Earl of Pinglu and the Earl of Zhangyong will each lead at least 10,000 elite soldiers from the Beijing camp to suppress it. Only then will we have hope of reorganizing the border troops in the three western borders and Xuanda. Once they are reorganized and there is no worry about money and food, we can plan for the big things in the future." Tian Le said.

Zhu Changluo had already heard Tian Le's suggestions for the north. In Mongolia, the Tumed should be pacified first, and the Khan's leader should be destroyed before pacification. In the Jurchens, the situation has changed, and now we need to support the Haixi Jurchens. In the west, they can help the Ming Dynasty destroy the Khan's leader, and in the east, they can prevent the Jianzhou Jurchens from continuing to grow.

But all this requires the Ming Dynasty to have stronger military forces and more money and food.

"Then let's talk about today's business." Zhu Changluo calmed down. "In addition to the training of the Beijing Camp, I have also been paying attention to the military preparations. Now I have cleaned up the Jinyiwei and the eunuchs. I plan to let He Shengrui take charge of the military craftsmen managed by the Southern Pacification Office, the Armory Bureau managed by the eunuchs, and the Military Equipment Bureau of the Ministry of Works after he builds the Huangji Gate. In addition, one of the purposes of my setting up the Baijia Academy is to improve military preparations..."

From before he ascended the throne to now, it took a year to initially open a crack in financial and domestic affairs, and to set up the military power for his personal guards and the Beijing camp. Naturally, Zhu Changluo had to start promoting equipment innovation.

After ascending the throne, he ordered Matteo Ricci to offer more benefits first. It took him a long time to send the message out and wait for the first batch of things to arrive.

It’s not that their weapons technology and many ideas are ahead now, but communication is what is needed for progress and inspiration.

Xu Guangqi is currently in charge of this matter at the Baijia Academy, researching weapons and military preparations.

Tian Le was left behind specifically for this meeting.

"Zunhua has a good foundation. There are already 72 blast furnaces of various sizes. We will concentrate them there."

This is what Zhu Changluo had thought of long ago, the concentration of industries. Zunhua is in Shuntian Prefecture, on the way to Liaodong.

Whether it is cold weapons or hot weapons, steel is needed.

The gunpowder needed for hot weapons should not be stored in Wanggongchang in Beijing.

Now that Zhu Changluo is going to do this, he doesn't want to cause a big explosion in Taichang.

There is only one special problem: even if the military base is placed a little further away, it is still necessary to prepare for defense. "I have thought about this as well." Zhu Changluo agreed with Tian Le's opinion. "The Beijing camp has 55,000 soldiers, and I have always wanted to select the best from the best. After the Beijing camp's competition this time, I plan to gradually select the most skilled people to form a Tianshu camp. I plan to let Jingyi Hou lead the Tianshu camp. He has been practicing martial arts and studying Yu Dayou's military books. The Tianshu camp only needs 5,000 people to go anywhere. The factories in Zunhua will be garrisoned and trained by the Tianshu camp first."

"Tianshuying..." Tian Le nodded, "Not far from Malanyu, Da'ankou and Xifengkou..."

"There is no need for them to help defend. But if there are new and improved weapons, they can be the first to try them out and use them." Zhu Changluo's eyes lit up. "A few hundred or thousands of elite soldiers can attack and launch surprise attacks, which is equivalent to tens of thousands. If the locals think that as long as there is any trouble, the court will have to mobilize tens of thousands of troops to solve it at the cost of manpower and money, then they are wrong. Breaking through the enemy lines, beheading, suppressing and appeasing are used at the same time. This way of using troops will only make money and not lose."

Of course, the Jinyiwei's "making money" from Jiangnan this time cannot be used as an example to illustrate the same point, but if there are really unusual movements in the local area, then these elite troops with special warfare characteristics can mobilize at the fastest speed.

Moreover, there is no need to spend too much food and money, the silver you carry with you can meet your consumption for a long time.

In this era, when faced with internal rebellion, beheading is actually the most efficient method.

Bozhou had a solid foundation because it had been operating for who knows how many years; but those who were most likely to cause some trouble were all in the hinterland that had been cultivated by the Ming Dynasty for so many years, and they were all Han Chinese, so the possibility of infiltrating was much greater.

Zhu Changluo pushed forward according to the planned ideas, and the previous batch of news in the capital had spread throughout the core provincial governments of the Ming Dynasty.

The emperor mentioned at the court meeting that the moral integrity of officials and gentry in inheriting the teachings of the sages was too much. He mentioned sincerity, uprightness, investigation of things, knowledge, self-cultivation and family harmony, and the four sentences of Hengqu...

The most important thing was that he stripped several people of their official titles at court meetings and castrated several outspoken scholars.

Cruelty is nothing more than this!

Jiangnan didn't know that after the emperor met with Zhang Yi, Geng Dingli and Hao Jie yesterday, he was thinking of demoting and exempting all officials and gentry in the country. He didn't know that there would be a window period for "surrendering" next year. He didn't know that if he was convicted of harming the people, his county and even the entire Ming Dynasty would be implicated and the officials and gentry would be demoted and exempted.

Jiangnan just felt suffocated.

In the golden autumn of October, the Beijing troops were competing in skills, while the people in the south of the Yangtze River were bickering and arguing with each other.

Although the emperor also said at the court: The rights and wrongs of this matter are clear, there is still controversy. Doesn't it mean that they can't tell right from wrong?

But of course there will be controversy, and stance is much more important than right and wrong.

There is now a special "Beijing official" in Huating County, Songjiang Prefecture.

Dong Qichang was a Jinshi in the 17th year of the Wanli reign. After he was selected as a scholar, his teacher in the Hanlin Academy died. After Dong Qichang attended the funeral, he took sick leave and returned home. Now he is an editor in the Hanlin Academy, but stays at home.

Now he is 47 years old and still in good health. He is extremely embarrassed when facing the orders from the capital, and he has a large group of gentry and celebrities at home who he is on good terms with.

"Mr. Xiangguang is an excellent calligrapher and painter. What's wrong with him writing books and copying scrolls in his hometown? Now in the court, His Majesty has even issued an order to castrate scholars. Brother Xuanzai, don't you fear that serving the emperor is like serving a tiger?"

"It's time to resign! When scholars hear about this tragedy, they are all shocked! If you can't protect your family members when they make mistakes, what's the point of being an official?"

"I see resignations flooding in before the New Year. What a pity! It's so ridiculous! We finally filled vacancies in various places, but now there are countless more vacancies!"

Dong Qichang felt a little embarrassed: he had not done anything for so many years, but his official position was still there.

Although he was on sick leave at home and could not receive his salary due to the vacancy, he still had the noble status of an editor in the Hanlin Academy and was highly respected in the local area.

Now that the Hanlin Academy has been reorganized into four academies, the Hanlin Academy has been ordered that he should either recover from his illness and return to Beijing to take up his post, or formally resign.

Listening to the visiting scholars talking, Dong Qichang remained silent.

One person sneered and said, "Resign? Don't you see that every family is in trouble now, and no one is in the government. Given the situation, is it really better to resign?"

Dong Qichang blushed a little.

This is sarcastic. Do you still hope that he will join the team of resigning?
After finally dealing with them, Dong Qichang felt terrible.

I want to write something to calm myself, but my handwriting is terrible today!
"Father..." His seventeen-year-old son was terrified.

Dong Qichang looked at his eldest son, who was now studying at Shanghai County School on government stipend, and then at his second son, who was studying at Huating County School on government stipend, and he couldn't help feeling anxious.

It was only because of his identity as an editor in the Hanlin Academy that he was able to enter the county school as a student on government stipend so easily.

If he really resigns, will he be able to deal with the storm that has already begun?

He took sick leave and stayed at home because the dispute over the country's foundation in the court was too dangerous.

The court now seems even more sinister. The new emperor is young, hot-tempered and "brutal and inhumane", which is indeed terrifying.

Moreover, since he did not contribute to the court, but retained his official position and enjoyed courtesy in the local area, he was probably an official who was selfish in the eyes of the emperor!
(End of this chapter)