The Ming Dynasty did not revolutionize

Chapter 143 Sending a Fleet to Talk to the Shogun

The talks between the State of Wu and the Duke of Min were suspended for one day, and they met again two days later to discuss the specific plan of cooperation.

The three representatives of the Min Kingdom Mansion headed by Zheng Ruian first introduced the situation in Japan.

During the Wanli Korean War, Ming officials actually already knew that there was a nominal emperor in Japan and that the Japanese king previously enthroned by the Ming Dynasty was a powerful minister.

But at that time, the Ming Dynasty was not familiar with the specific situation of the feudal states in Japan, and most ordinary people are not very familiar with it now.

However, because the Min family often dealt with Japan, Zheng Ruian was more familiar with Japan's current situation and could give a rough introduction:
“The Japanese archipelago is narrow and mountainous, with small and scattered flat areas.

"This kind of terrain naturally lends itself to local separatism. In fact, the intensity of separatism in Japan is even worse than that of the Ming Dynasty.

"In the entire archipelago, the monarch who claimed to be the emperor had no authority at all, and was completely marginalized by the Edo shogunate of the Shogun. The so-called emperor was even worse than Emperor Xian of Han.

"The shogunate itself was able to directly control only a quarter of the entire Japanese archipelago.

"Other feudal domains outside the shogunate are called daimyo in Japan.

"In fact, the highest-ranking officials are the daimyo, the relatives of the shogun, who rule the local vassal states.

"Then there are the hereditary daimyo, the feudal lords who followed the first shogun of the Edo shogunate before the Battle of Sekigahara, which determined the position of the Edo shogunate in Japan.

"The lands ruled by the relatives and hereditary daimyo account for a little more than a quarter of the entire archipelago.

“Finally, there are the outer daimyo, which are the other daimyo who existed before the Battle of Sekigahara and the other daimyo who surrendered to the Edo shogun after the war.

"These outer domains ruled about half of Japan.

"The total area of ​​the entire Japanese archipelago is over 100,000 square kilometers, which is only the size of one province of the Ming Dynasty, but there are two or three hundred vassal towns of various types.

"On this basis, most daimyo would often continue to grant fiefs to their subordinates within their own domains.

"Most of the daimyo's retainers also had fiefs, and positions within the domain were almost hereditary.

"Even the lowest-ranking samurai, as long as they hold an official position under a daimyo, most of them have their own small fiefdoms.

"A samurai without land and office would become a ronin.

“So although Japan was also a country of feudal separatism, the actual situation was very different from that of the Ming Dynasty. Instead, it was more like the situation in inland Europe.

“They’ve never really been unified.”

Most of the separatist regimes in the Ming Dynasty were only one level high, and were actually small kingdoms with centralized power.

The monarchs of each feudal domain were the rulers of all the land within their domains, and most of them would not continue to grant land to their subordinates.

Most of the officials in the court of the vassal states were not hereditary, but were selected through various traditional means.

After Zheng Ruian finished his introduction, Chen Yuyang proposed a battle plan:

"So to achieve our goal, we don't need to defeat the most powerful Edo Shogunate directly, we only need to defeat a few coastal outer daimyo.

“After defeating these daimyo, we can ask them to pledge allegiance to the Ming Emperor and continue to maintain their local ruling status. They should not be particularly resistant.

"In the future, we only need to provide protection to prevent them from being directly punished by the shogun, and these places will become vassal towns of the Ming Dynasty."

Many other officials at the scene could not help but nod their heads. If it was just to open a window in Japan, a small and closed country, this approach would indeed be the simplest.

"It makes sense."

"If you don't plan to conquer the Japanese archipelago, this is indeed the most convenient way."

"It can also prevent the Qing Dynasty from interfering."

But many officials could not help but frown, and some felt that Japan should be conquered and that a conflict should occur with the Qing Dynasty.

"What if there is a conflict with the Qing Dynasty?"

"The Japanese monarch usurped the title of emperor, and the Japanese shogun committed treason. They should be punished by sending troops."

"Japan is such a treacherous country that it should not continue to exist."

Some people simply think that this plan is unreasonable.

After a while of discussion, Fei Chun, the secretary of the Wu State Secretariat, spoke up: "If we actually control a few so-called daimyo, and the Edo Shogunate feels that they are unable to fight the Ming army, what if we isolate these vassal states?

"It was equivalent to making these feudal lords independent, isolating them from the rest of Japan, and prohibiting them from interacting with other Japanese.

"We want to open a window to Japan, not to open windows to these feudal lords."

Chen Yuyang said subconsciously:

"We can continue to do the same thing, continue to attack the remaining coastal vassal states, and gradually turn the Edo Shogunate's outer vassal states into Ming vassal states.

“Although multiple operations may be necessary, the scale of each operation will not be too large.

"Until we directly occupy the territories directly under the Edo Shogunate and the territories directly under the Edo Shogunate, the Edo Shogunate will probably not have much determination to fight us."

Zhu Jianxuan couldn't help but wave his hands when he heard this:
"Cutting the meat slowly, piece by piece, is really too inefficient.

"The Ming Dynasty had never directly intervened in Japanese affairs before, firstly because it had no interest in the mountainous, narrow, crowded and poor Japanese archipelago.

"Another important reason was the interference of the Qing Dynasty in the past. After conquering Korea, the Qing Dynasty colluded with the Japanese, and the Japanese also began to play both sides of the Ming Dynasty and the Qing Dynasty.

"The Ming Dynasty wanted to conquer Japan several decades ago. Not only did it have to defeat the local daimyo and samurai in Japan, but it also had to eliminate the interference of the Qing Dynasty. Of course, this was difficult.

“But now the situation is different. What we want now is not Japan’s land, but their surplus bankrupt samurai.

"These ronin are destabilizing factors in Japan. It may not be a bad thing for the Japanese generals and daimyo to hand over these samurai to us.

“At the same time, the Qing invaders no longer have the courage or the strength to continue interfering in the affairs of our Ming Dynasty.

"Since we have the support of the two governorates of the Ming Dynasty, why don't we first move our fleet into Edo Bay and have a good talk with the general of Edo.

"This general and his ministers should be able to understand and should be willing to have friendly exchanges with the Ming Dynasty.

“Even if this general refuses, it’s just a fight.

“The strength of the Edo Shogun may be comparable to that of the Duke of Min, but it is far from that of the Ming Dynasty.

"For the Ming Dynasty, there is no essential difference between fighting an ordinary feudal lord in Japan and fighting the Shogun, the largest feudal lord.

“When we fight against the feudal lords, the Edo Shogunate may not have time to intervene, or it may not fully support us.

"But if we directly attack the shogunate itself, the largest feudal domain in Japan, will the foreign feudal domains in the local areas of Japan fully support the shogunate?
"I think it's good enough that these local vassal states don't take advantage of the opportunity to cause chaos."

When the power of the two hostile parties is not much different, or when there is strong external interference, the party that is slightly stronger overall can adopt the salami-slicing tactic of taking inch by inch.

But the Ming Dynasty is not just slightly stronger than Japan, and the Qing Dynasty is no longer able to interfere, so there is no need to deal with it slowly.

Zhu Jianxuan also remembers that in the original history, after the Qing Dynasty was opened to the world by the Opium War, Japan basically did not put up much resistance to the European and American colonists.

During the Black Ship Incident, the Americans only brought four ships to Edo the first time, and only seven ships the second time.

The largest of these warships was a 2,500-ton steam paddle steamer.

The Edo Shogunate at that time could not withstand the pressure and was willing to trade directly with the Americans.

It directly gave up most-favored-nation treatment, consular jurisdiction, the right to negotiate tariffs, and even opened concessions.

After the Americans successfully signed the treaty, other powers heard the news and signed similar trade treaties with Japan one after another.

The current Japanese shogunate may be more heroic than in the late period, but the Ming Dynasty, which is closer to Japan, can also send several times more warships!
Dozens of battleships of more than 2,000 tons entered Edo Bay, simply demanding that Japan open up trade and foreign immigration.

Will the shogun and retainers of the Edo shogunate choose to accept it, or fight to the death?
Zhu Jianxuan feels that this is not a multiple-choice question.

As the saying goes, the county magistrate is not as good as the current manager. No matter how powerful the European and American powers are, their homelands are still far away from Japan.

The Ming Dynasty’s homeland is just around the corner.

After the Qing Dynasty was unable to intervene, the Ming Dynasty, with its powerful navy, attacked Japan alone, and Japan had no power to fight back.

In the original history, after the Edo Shogunate signed the treaty with European and American powers, the local feudal lords did start to stir up trouble and rebelled in the name of respecting the emperor and expelling the barbarians.

Zhu Jianxuan is now curious about what the local samurai and daimyo of Japan will do when the Ming Dynasty, as the Celestial Empire, knocks on the door of Japan.

They can neither respect the emperor nor repel the barbarians, so how should they shout this slogan?
(End of this chapter)