Jiajing Chengming

Chapter 235: Create threat theory and shape imaginary enemy!

Zhu Houcong used a large amount of gold and brass mined and smelted from the Donglai gold mine to promote the new policy, allowing the reform, which mainly focused on increasing the number of local patrol officers and soldiers, to proceed smoothly.

Simultaneously.

Zhu Houcong also used this wealth to continue to train tax talents in Xingming Academy in preparation for the establishment of a national tax office in the future.

Many of the half-grown orphans he had adopted are now fifteen, sixteen, or seventeen years old, and many of them have married, mostly orphan girls he adopted.

These people can be sent to other places as national tax talents at any time.

Besides.

Zhu Houcong also allocated a special sum of money to spread the word about the crimes of the Portuguese and create the theory of the threat from the Western barbarians.

"The country has been peaceful for too long. We need a strong external enemy that can motivate us to eliminate corruption and keep the people of the country motivated to make progress!"

"Even if this foreign enemy is not as powerful as imagined, we must portray him as a very powerful foreign enemy and create an atmosphere that he poses a threat to the long-term stability of the country!"

"I have issued an order to Lord Fei and Wang Hong, asking them to collect more evidence of the Portuguese crimes along the coast. The more heinous the evidence, the better!"

"Those of you who are in charge of the Yumin Newspaper and the Wenbao Newspaper should also follow up on this matter and make these evidences public in easy-to-understand words. Let the people of the world know about the threat posed by the Portuguese Empire and lay a foundation for public opinion for the court to declare war on the Portuguese Empire in the future!"

For this purpose, Zhu Houcong made special instructions to Yi Hui, the Left Minister of Justice, and Yang Tingyi, the Right Censor-in-Chief, who were in charge of the newspaper industry.

Yi Hui and Yang Tingyi nodded in agreement.

Yi Hui was an old servant of the royal palace, so he naturally obeyed the emperor's orders.

The same goes for Yang Tingyi. Although he is Yang Tinghe's younger brother, his duty in the Yang family is to be a jester who pleases the emperor. Naturally, he also follows the emperor's orders seriously. As long as the emperor hates someone, he will follow suit and hate that person. Even if the emperor hates his brother Yang Tinghe, he will hate him openly.

Therefore, the scholars and people of the Ming Dynasty discovered that the Yumin Daily and Wenbao newspapers began to report in length on the Portuguese invasion of the east, elaborating in detail the Portuguese conspiracy to collude with the Fujian gentry to plunder the coastal areas, and made appropriate adjustments, that is, the planners of the conspiracy became the Portuguese, and the Fujian gentry were only passive participants because of greed.

In addition, these two newspapers also exposed the bloody and cruel side of the Portuguese colonial activities in various parts of Southeast Asia, and even imitated the victims of Malacca to make an interview record similar to the "Youwei Hongyi" in the Wanli period of history, and published it in newspapers.

Simultaneously.

Zhu Houcong was in a good mood in this life because he was employed by the emperor as a Hanlin official, so he did not have Tang Yin, who died of illness in the second year of Jiajing as in the original history, and the newly-crowned Jinshi Wen Zhengming. Based on the evidence of Portuguese crimes provided by Fei Hong and Wang Hong, he portrayed the cruel scenes of the Portuguese burning, killing and raping along the coast, and also attached them to the newspapers.

Tang Yin and Wen Zhengming were both top painters and top writers of this era.

Therefore, both their paintings and the poems and verses that satirize the Portuguese in the paintings are very contagious and infectious.

This naturally had a strong impact on the people of the Ming Dynasty, who had enjoyed peace for a long time.

"No way!"

"How could such a vicious barbarian come to our neighborhood and enslave us and take away our property?"

"It should be true. I heard someone in the south say that the Portuguese coming from the sea are indeed very barbaric. They rob any ship they see and kill any person they see!"

"Damn it! These Portuguese coming from the west cannot be underestimated. Judging from their behavior in Goa and Malacca, they are going to erode our Ming Dynasty step by step!"

"We can no longer argue endlessly about whether the court should set up an envoy to observe customs and rectify social practices, whether it is too harsh to strip the gentry of their titles for failing to pay autumn grain, and whether Wang Qiong should be reinstated! We should focus on guarding against the Portuguese and strengthen our maritime defenses!"

"Yes! According to the newspaper, the Portuguese have powerful guns and cannons, their warships are extremely fast, their awareness of maritime expansion is stronger than ours, and their ambitions of aggression are also very great!"

"We have neglected our military preparations for many years, our ships are broken and our people are lazy. If this continues, there will be chaos in the southeast! But the southeast is an important source of revenue for our dynasty. If there is chaos in the southeast, the nine borders will be unable to resist the Tatars. By then, there will be chaos in both the north and the south, and the peaceful days of our Ming Dynasty will be over!"

"I understand!"

"I understand why the imperial court is implementing new policies, setting up inspection offices, observing social practices, and demanding the payment of autumn grain. This is all to prevent disasters before they happen!"

"My emperor is wise! You have read the words of the Portuguese when they sent me to meet your majesty in the newspaper. They actually threatened your majesty that Donglai belonged to them because we discovered the Donglai gold mine. If the emperor insults you, your subjects will die. We cannot tolerate such disrespectful bandits! These barbaric Portuguese are extremely arrogant!"

Many scholars and civilians were discussing this matter.

The people of the Ming Dynasty, who had never felt that there were any external enemies to fear and had always been content with a peaceful and peaceful world, naturally felt uneasy about the sudden emergence of threats to their peaceful times.

What's more, you have to know that the Han people nowadays actually lack a sense of security.

After all, they have a long history and know many times of war.

Although many of them were not eyewitnesses, they knew about the humiliation of the marriage alliance in the early Han Dynasty, the Five Barbarians' Invasion of China, the An-Shi Rebellion, the Jingkang Shame and the Yuan Dynasty's conquest of the Southern Song Dynasty through the detailed historical materials and various literary works that have been passed down for thousands of years, as well as word of mouth from their ancestors.

In fact, most of them are conservative, seek stability and are afraid of turmoil, precisely because they are worried that chaos will come again.

And now, the sudden emergence of a "French" threat naturally makes them uneasy.

The key is that most of them don’t understand “France”, and the less they understand and the more unfamiliar it is, the more uneasy they feel, and the more likely they are to believe the words of exaggerators.

Therefore, if the imperial court promoted the Mongol threat theory, they might not take it seriously because they were well aware of the Mongol's current strength.

On the contrary, this little-known "Falangji" makes them uneasy.

Many people therefore began to take the initiative to learn about this "Flangji." After all, the military thought of "know yourself and know your enemy, and you will win every battle" has become one of the main factors of Chinese civilization. In the Ming Dynasty, from the nobles to the merchants, everyone believed that this was a necessary means to fight for power and profit!

Therefore, even Xu Jie, who was in charge of compiling classics in the Hanlin Academy, could not help but look for documentary materials about the Portuguese in the Hanlin Academy.

Because Xu Jie was really worried that the southeast would be in chaos because of the Portuguese.

After all, his family still has a lot of cotton fields!

Moreover, in recent years, his family received a large amount of cotton fields as donations because he won the third place in the imperial examination.

He was naturally worried that the chaos in the southeast would affect his family's cotton industry.

Furthermore, his cousin Xu Lin was still serving his sentence in Donglai, and he was also worried that the Portuguese were really too ambitious and would occupy Donglai by force, and then his cousin Xu Lin would fall into the hands of the Portuguese.

Others may not know, but Xu Jie knew that although his cousin was not as successful as him in the imperial examinations, he was very good at growing cotton and managing cotton fields. He also knew that it was at the suggestion of his cousin that his family used the acquired fields for growing cotton, which greatly increased the Xu family's wealth, thereby ensuring that he and many of his sons in the family could pass the imperial examinations with ease, and could hire famous scholars to teach them at a large price.

Therefore, Xu Jie was worried that the Portuguese would occupy Donglai and use threats and bribes to force his cousin to develop the cotton industry for them, which would only affect the interests of his family and the entire southeastern gentry.

"There are so few records about the French!"

"There are even few records about the Western Barbarians!"

But after Xu Jie read through all the books and documents in the Hanlin Academy, he was very disappointed.

Yao Lai, a fellow Hanlin editor who was studying with him, saw that he looked disappointed. He came over and bowed to Xu Jie, then asked, "Zisheng, why are you sighing?"

"I sigh because there are few records of the Western Barbarians in the national classics."

"How can we know ourselves and our enemies in this way?"

Xu Jie returned the greeting and then began to answer.

Yao Lai said, "You might as well go to the Ministry of War and look for the maritime maps and documents of Zheng He's voyages to the West during Emperor Taizong's reign. There may be some records about the Western Barbarians in them."

"No need. I asked a friend to look for it at the Ministry of War. The blueprints and documents for the voyage to the West have been lost."

At this time, the detective from the previous department, Fei Maozhong, came over. He was Fei Hong's cousin, and all officials would give him face, so it was easy for him to get the archival materials of the Ministry of War.

That's why Fei Maozhong interrupted when he happened to hear Yao Lai and Xu Jie say this.

Yao Lai was not satisfied with Fei Hong's behavior in investigating the case in Fujian, so he also had no good impression of Fei Maozhong. In addition, Fei Maozhong had always been suspected of being the emperor's spy, so he left after Fei Maozhong spoke.

Fei Maozhong couldn't help but frown when he saw Yao Lai leave directly.

Xu Jie did not leave, because Wang Ao, Wu Yipeng and other people from Nanzhi had told him to try his best to repair his relationship with the emperor and the people around him.

Xu Jie bowed to Fei Maozhong and said, "It seems like a pity!"

“What a pity!”

"However, His Majesty has already asked the Royal Guards to force the Portuguese to reveal their own details."

"So there are new articles about the French in the newspapers nowadays. Zisheng can read more of them."

Fei Maozhong replied.

Xu Jie smiled and said, "I'm already watching, but I want to ask Brother Minshou, if we don't take precautions, will these Portuguese really cause chaos in the southeast?"

"It's hard to tell!"

Fei Maozhong also replied with a smile, and then he left.

Xu Jie and Fei Maozhong, sons of large southern landowners, were actually very conflicted about whether or not to strengthen military preparedness to guard against the Portuguese.

Because, on the one hand, their families made huge profits by relying on the magnates in their hometown to do smuggling trade with these Portuguese. On the other hand, they were also afraid that the Portuguese would really become ambitious after realizing the wealth of the Southeast, and in turn collude with the magnates along the coast to plunder the Southeast.

This also meant that they didn't know whether to support the court's propaganda of the Portuguese threat theory or not.

Therefore, Xu Jie decided to ask Fei Maozhong for his opinion after seriously understanding the French. After all, Fei Maozhong's opinion would definitely represent Fei Hong's opinion.

In any case, Emperor Zhu Houcong was determined to promote the Portuguese threat theory because it would be beneficial to his rule.

Firstly, he could use this as a reason to promote the New Deal and achieve the goal of strengthening the imperial power's control over the local areas.

Secondly, he can divert the attention of many people who oppose reform.

Thirdly, he could take the opportunity to strengthen his military, especially to build new warships and establish a strong navy, in preparation for opening up the sea and developing more new resources in the future.

to this end.

Zhu Houcong also summoned the cabinet ministers and nine officials to say when many coastal censors began to submit petitions to strengthen maritime defenses because of the growing threat of the Portuguese.
"I want to build more warships and establish a stronger navy to defend against the sea barbarians. What do you think?"

(End of this chapter)