Fu Shanhe

Chapter 399: Annan New Deal
Thang Long City.

"My Lord, I just received news that the traitor Hu Xinbo led his people to the Xuanwei Division, our old lair."

After Zhang Ning finished speaking, a smile appeared on Li Mu's face.

Hu Xinbo ran away at the right time. He had just come over to take charge of the situation and presented this great gift.

To protect yourself by keeping the enemy in your care requires some skills.

Once you mess up, you will end up making things worse.

The Liaodong clique was not well received in the court. Apart from the fact that the Shi family's monopoly of power was tantamount to separatism, the main reason was that they messed up the situation by nurturing the enemy.

Both the emperor and the civil and military officials in the court believed that the Liaodong generals were the culprits that led to the growth of the Northern Tartars.

When the Northern Tartars were weak, they had many opportunities to wipe them out, but they gave up in the end for various reasons.

Once some mistakes are made, there is no way to wash them away.

Unfortunately, the Liaodong generals made the same mistake repeatedly.

This is a typical example of failure in keeping the enemy for your own benefit.

Having learned from the failures of his predecessors, Li Mu would definitely not give the King of Annan the opportunity to accumulate strength.

Now it is undoubtedly the best choice for him to lead his troops abroad.

Entering a foreign country, the King of Annan became an invader.

Having lost their base, if they want to feed their army, they can only compete with local chieftains for resources.

Not to mention growing and developing, even whether it can survive is an unknown.

It won't make much difference if you keep such a stray dog.

“Well done. In the name of the Protectorate, we commend the officers and soldiers who participated in the pursuit.

The Three Proclamations and Six Consolations are different from other places and must be handled with caution.

After clearing out the remaining enemies in Annan, all pursuit operations will be stopped.

I will report this to the court and ask Your Majesty to make a decision before deciding whether to continue the encirclement and suppression."

Li Mu immediately found an excuse and called off the military operation.

Theoretically, the Annan Protectorate had the authority to handle all affairs in southern Xinjiang, including the Three Xuans and Six Weis.

But as the Protector General, Li Mu had to report the decision to the emperor first, and no one could find fault with it.

From a political perspective, some powers can be had, but they do not have to be used.

Based on his understanding of Emperor Yongning, he knew that most important matters should be reported to him for instructions, and the emperor would not blame him even if it delayed the progress of the war.

Considering the distance between Annan and the capital, it would take at least several months to complete the task.

If there was a dispute in the court on this issue, it would normally drag on for a year or two.

With such a long buffer time, Hu Xinbo ran a long way.

It would be only logical to pursue him along his escape route and take over the land along the way under the jurisdiction of the Protectorate.

"My Lord, except for the northwest region, we have almost cleaned up Annan.

Now the soldiers are waiting to be divided into fields, what do you think? "

Li Sanqi asked eagerly.

The expedition to Annan went so smoothly, not only because of the power gap between the two sides, but also because the combat effectiveness of the Yu army suddenly exploded.

The promise of dividing up the land was too tempting for the grassroots officers and soldiers who came from poor backgrounds.

According to the reward standards set previously, officers and soldiers who participated in the war received at least dozens of acres of land, and at most hundreds of acres.

Under the temptation of the land, poisonous insects and miasma are no longer a problem.

The solution was trained before going out.

When encountering a place infested with poisonous insects or miasma, just set fire to the mountain.

When encountering swamps, they would directly recruit coolies from the locals to drain the water and turn the swamps into fertile fields.

……

There is no environmental protection law, so do it the quickest and easiest way.

Under the guiding ideology that man can conquer nature, many high-risk areas are undergoing changes.

"Ha ha……"

“This time, I came here to preside over the distribution of land among you.

The land that was promised at the beginning will not be lost even an acre.

This marquis divided Annan into several areas, numbered them from north to south, and drew lots for each thousand households.

The land allocated to the thousand-household officers and soldiers will be in the area where they are drawn.

Of course, everyone’s new residence will also be in the corresponding area of ​​​​the land.

In order to strengthen control, this marquis plans to establish two-level management agencies under the county, namely town and village.

In principle, one hundred households form a village, with one village chief and two deputy village chiefs, and one group leader for every ten households.

A town consists of 1,000 households and temporarily has a mayor and two deputy mayors to manage town affairs.

Ten thousand households make up a county...

In addition to local residents of Annan, Han immigrants were also attracted to move in to accelerate ethnic integration.

After the troops are dispatched to the local area, they will be stationed in villages and towns, and everyone's land will be divided among them.

In the short term, the dispatched officers and soldiers will also have to serve as local civilian positions.

In the future, local basic positions will be held by retired officers and soldiers.

......"

Li Mu briefly explained his plan.

The plan is not complete, mainly because there is a lack of sufficient officials, so military control can only be adopted as a substitute.

In the education system of the Dayu Dynasty, scholars had their eyes on the sky, and those who passed the imperial examinations started out as county magistrates.

Instead of asking these people to put down their airs and take up posts in towns and villages in a "hellhole" like Annan, it would be better to kill them directly.

If they just can't let go of their pride, they can slowly think of a way to solve it. The key is that most of these people don't eat grains.

They are all good at writing, each one better than the other.

When it comes to doing specific things, it can make people angry to death.

Moreover, the Annan region had just been stabilized, and the people did not know how many remnants who were loyal to the King of Annan were hiding among the people.

If you want to quickly control a place, you still have to rely on force.

A squad of soldiers controls a village, and a hundred households controls a town, spreading their influence directly to the grassroots level.

In order to obtain amnesty, the pirates and rebels killed people ruthlessly in the local area.

The population in Annan dropped drastically after the war.

According to preliminary statistics, there are only about two million people, most of whom are the elderly and the weak.

The local security was able to stabilize quickly, mainly because the killing was so brutal earlier that almost all the local young and strong people died.

The hundreds of thousands of troops that migrated south, plus their families, totaled over a million people.

If more immigrants are introduced, the local population structure will soon be reversed.

"My Lord, let us fight, and none of us brothers will complain.

But letting everyone govern the local area is like asking Zhang Fei to embroider flowers, isn't it? "

Li Sanqi said with a sad face.

We all have experience with martial law, but it is temporary.

The measures taken are basically a policy of non-intervention.

As long as there is no unrest among the people, they don't care about anything, not even collecting various taxes. Everyone only needs to maintain local public order.

Once you get to the Annan region, you definitely can’t play like this.

The Protectorate had many powers, but the price it paid was a reduction in funding from the imperial court, and it had to raise money and grain on its own.

The issue of military pay is easy to solve. Everyone is willing to work hard for the tax-free land that will be distributed.

But soldiers always need to eat, and maintaining weapons and equipment also has costs.

Money and grain cannot appear out of thin air, so taxes must be levied on the people.

Although it seems like a simple job, it is actually quite stressful for the soldiers when they are actually carrying it out.

The complicated accounts alone are enough to make people collapse.

"Don't worry, your main task is to maintain local stability and promote local sinicization. In order to reduce the pressure of administration, this marquis will simplify the tax types.

Abolish all the miscellaneous taxes, and ordinary people only need to pay: the poll tax and the agricultural tax.

When the army withdrew, many survivors were left in Annan. You are responsible for verifying them.

The assessment criteria are very simple. One must learn the language of Dayu, have ancestors from Dayu, and cut ties with the rebellious King of Annan.

All the people of Dayu will be given five mu of food-producing land each, and will be exempted from the capitation tax and agricultural tax.

In the future, the taxation model of Annan Protectorate will be changed from direct tax to indirect tax, and the taxpayers will no longer be farmers. "

Li Mu's explanation confused everyone. They only remembered the food-grain fields and the tax exemption for the Yu people.

"My Lord, you absolutely cannot do that!"

"If we continue doing this, in a few years, all of Annan will be our people.

By then, no one will pay taxes, and it will be difficult to maintain expenses relying solely on other income!"

Everyone hurriedly tried to dissuade him.

Tax exemption may seem like a good thing, but everything has its limits.

For a regime, the first thing to do is to survive, which requires money and food to maintain.

They were not clear about what direct taxes became indirect taxes, but they understood that agricultural tax and capitation tax would not be levied.

In fact, Li Mu didn't want to be so radical.

However, Annan’s situation is special, and the tax exemption for military merit land was promised in advance, and they will definitely not go back on their word.

The remaining Annan people are mostly the elderly, the weak, women and children, and the young and strong labor force is extremely limited.

If you want to assimilate them quickly, you can't rely on coercion alone, but mainly rely on inducement to make everyone see the benefits of surrendering to Dayu.

In this context, there will definitely be problems if a group of elderly, weak, women and children with limited productivity become taxpayers.

Immigrants introduced from the country are basically penniless and unable to bear the burden of paying taxes in a short period of time.

In this context, if taxes are levied on the lower-class people, the amount of taxes collected may not even cover the cost of taxation.

What's more, human nature cannot stand the test. If the soldiers stationed in the village are given the power to levy taxes, there will inevitably be people who abuse their power.

In the absence of supervision, it is easy for the current good situation to be ruined.

Let's just be straightforward. As long as everyone is willing to join Dayu, the farmers will be exempted from taxes.

The taxes originally collected from the land were all distributed into commercial taxes such as salt, iron, wine, tea, and grain transactions.

Although taxes are still being collected, the government does not ask for money directly from the people, so the conflict between the government and the people no longer exists.

"It would be better if they all became my citizens. This would solve the problem once and for all.

As for the issue of tax reform, it is actually something that has to be done.

According to the Dayu law, only households with land and tax payers were required to pay the Ding tax.

Land between 100 mu and 300 mu is considered as middle-class Ding and a Ding tax of 7 cents is levied.

Those with more than 300 mu of arable land are considered as upper-level adults and are subject to a Ding tax of 1 tael.

The Annan region had just been plowed, and you cleaned it again.

All the private land has been nationalized. Don’t tell me there are still some that have escaped the net.

Other taxes will be incorporated into the agricultural tax, with a maximum rate of no more than one-thirty.

The tax that could be collected from the more than two million old people in Annan was at most a few hundred thousand taels.

Mobilizing tens of thousands of tax collectors just to collect this little bit of tax revenue is totally not worth it.

I might as well give up this income and make up for it from other places.”

Li Mu immediately calculated the economic accounts.

Excluding various local levies, the official taxes of the Dayu Dynasty could be said to be the highest among all dynasties.

According to the laws of Dayu, trying to collect taxes in Annan would be a joke.

If the Protectorate wants to continue to operate, it must carry out tax reform.

Compared with the Dayu Dynasty, the biggest advantage of Annan is that there are no vested interest groups.

The meritorious group that followed Li Mu had not yet taken root in the local area, and no one was involved in business.

Without conflicts of interest, there will naturally be no opposition to tax reform.

Commercial taxes, customs duties, mining taxes, seigniorage, you name it, it doesn't matter what you collect, everyone's focus is on the land.

As long as you deliver the promised military merit land to everyone, you will be a good boss.

"My Lord, why are the taxes so low?

I remember that all male adults had to pay the Ding tax, and other taxes were far more than one-thirty.

If the imperial court’s taxes were so low, there wouldn’t be so many people rebelling!”

Kong Yutang's question represented the voice of all the generals.

Because they live at the bottom of society, they are very aware of how serious the exploitation by the government is.

Suddenly one day, someone told him that the tax revenue of the imperial court was actually very low, and the rest was added by local governments.

The normal reaction of people is disbelief.

"Taxes are already so high, and the extra money you pay is either to shoulder the tax obligations of others or to feed the local government.

You should know that most of the people in the three shifts and six offices in the yamen are not on the regular staff.

The servants and legal advisors in the county magistrate's mansion also require money, not to mention the money required to bribe their superiors.

These expenses cannot be created out of thin air, so the burden falls on you.

I would never do such a despicable act!"

After Li Mu finished his explanation, his image became more and more brilliant in everyone's mind.

"The Marquis is wise!"

After carefully calculating the economic accounts, the generals who had originally insisted suddenly lost interest.

Even hundreds of thousands of taels of tax may not be able to cover the cost of taxation. There is no point in wasting this little money.

At this moment, they suddenly understood why the Dayu court was often short of money.

According to this taxation model, it would be strange if remote provinces with backward economies did not suffer fiscal deficits.

Even in the wealthy Jiangnan region, not much tax could be collected.

Instead of collecting direct taxes with great difficulty, it would be more practical to deal with indirect taxes.

“Stop talking nonsense, the new policy cannot be accomplished overnight.

I have already lightened your workload. If you still can't do your job well in the future, you will be held accountable individually.

Whoever causes trouble is responsible for cleaning up the mess.

I want a stable and prosperous Annan so that I can receive more immigrants.

You have seen how fertile the land of Annan is.

If all of it were developed, it would be no problem to feed tens of millions of people.

And this is only a part of it. The Three Xuans and Six Weis in the west and the many small indigenous countries in the south are all our future targets.

The focus of the Annan Protectorate was to "stabilize the south" rather than just the tiny country of Annan.

The world is not at peace yet, and it is far from time to let the horses go to the mountains. I don't want anyone to fall behind!"

Li Mu made another promise.

The bureaucracy cannot be idle, and the military generals cannot lose their goals.

The institution of the Protectorate was established for the purpose of expansion.

Taking the Han and Tang dynasties as an example, the Protectorate has always been at the forefront of external expansion.

The government troops brought their own dry food to the battlefield and were still able to fight so effectively, mainly because the imperial court knew how to share the benefits.

Compared to today, the rewards for military merit in ancient times were really generous.

For beheading an enemy soldier, the imperial court would reward him with land in units of hectares.

Under this system, the Han and Tang dynasties were able to expand rapidly outward and conquer vast territories.

With the rise of the civil service group, the number of people sharing the cake continued to increase, and there was gradually not enough benefits to share.

The grassroots officers and soldiers who had no say became the biggest victims and were the first to be kicked off the table.

The benefits of soldiers participating in the war decreased, and their enthusiasm for fighting also declined.

(End of this chapter)