Tiger Guards

Chapter 323 The New Policies of the Military Fields
In the middle of the twelfth lunar month, the north wind blows.

Taiyuan's high humidity likely made Zhao Ji feel that the temperature was lower.

However, when the sun is shining brightly and there is no wind at midday, it doesn't have much of an impact.

He took some time to inspect the nine counties in the Zhongdu area south of Taiyuan, accompanied by more than 30 carriages and over 200 riders.

Sun Zi, who was in charge of the administration, was leading the way by car. Sun Zi was under a lot of pressure.

The influx of people from Shangdang and Changshan put immense pressure on him and the old inhabitants of Taiyuan.

Previously, there were two groups of immigrants in Taiyuan. One group consisted of immigrants from the four northern counties of the border region who were stationed there for self-defense and were incompatible with the county government and the local people.

The second force was the Xiongnu, who spread from the direction of Xihe, but fortunately, Zhao Ji suppressed them.

The old powerful clans and gentry were uprooted. In this process, the emperor's majesty only played a superficial role. The real influence came from the immigrants from the north of the prefecture, the Xiongnu and the people from Hedong, and even the people from Henan.

It was the intervention of these forces from other prefectures that dismantled the local bandit forces in Taiyuan.

It only dismantles the structure of the clan bandits, rather than wiping out all the clan members and able-bodied men.

As time goes by, they still have the opportunity to gradually build up their strength and form a new local power by banding together.

This transition period may be long or short, but their resurgence is only a matter of time.

However, people from Shangdang and Changshan migrated here.

Fortunately, Zhao Ji's judgment was fairly fair. Those who made military contributions were granted household land, household land, and military land along with the Tiger Step Army. If their families had many members, they could also rent government land.

All other new immigrants who had neither merits nor military service became government tenants.

Even the government-owned tenants were renting prime land that had been confiscated from the homes of powerful and wealthy families; if they were to develop in the future, they could still squeeze the living space of the old residents of Taiyuan.

Therefore, the people of Taiyuan could not make mistakes. They had to actively respond to the policies and arrangements of the Grand Marshal's office in order to make meritorious contributions and be allocated land for their households and households.

Military land is a type of government land; it is only available during military service and is reclaimed upon retirement.

If a person is unable to cultivate the land during their military service, the government can hire tenants on their behalf, and the profits will be split 50/50 with the government, ultimately allowing them to receive 25% of the land.

The specific amount of military land granted was linked to the soldier's rank; enlistment meant receiving fifty acres of military land.

When one is promoted to the rank of Jie Cong Hu Ben, with one bar and one star, the military farmland is 800 mu. All of it is rented out, and the harvest is divided annually, yielding approximately 600 shi (a unit of dry measure).

The yield of three shi per mu is an average. The military land allocated to soldiers was divided according to their rank, resulting in fertile and infertile land, thus maintaining a basic balance.

The annual income from the military farmland was equal to three-quarters of the area of ​​the military farmland.

Jie Conghu Ben did not send his family members to cultivate the military fields; he merely recruited tenants, who could earn 600 shi of grain annually.

A Qin stone was twice the amount of a Han stone. Under the Qin military merit system, a sixth-rank official could receive an annual salary of 600 Han stones.

In Zhao Ji's case, the official title of "Guan Dafu" corresponds to "Bai Ren Du"; in reality, the one receiving this salary is a junior officer of the "Jie Cong Hu Ben" rank.

A centurion is usually a three-star officer with one bar, while a senior officer has two bars and one star, and is appointed as a Tiger-like Imperial Physician. He is granted 1,700 mu of military farmland and 2,200 mu of land.

If there were no military lands to rent out, Jie Conghu Ben would have received a salary of 200 shi per year; in comparison, he could receive 600 shi from Zhao Ji.

In years of plenty, the share is greater; of course, in years of famine, the share is less.

Zhao Ji increased the allocation of military farmland to the Tiger Warriors and Tiger Warrior Physicians to increase their income; the next level of military farmland was reduced to 200 mu.

Mid- to high-ranking military officers don't lack this kind of income.

Even the high-ranking Tiger Step soldiers below the Tiger Warrior rank, with three slanted stripes, only had three hundred mu of military farmland, with an annual rent income of over two hundred shi; this was far higher than the grain-eating officials of the Han army garrison commanders and village officials with a hundred shi of grain.

With an annual income of 200 shi (a unit of dry measure), one can take a break from work to support oneself, one's wife, and two children.

The new recruits at Tiger Step were granted military land ranging from fifty shi, seventy-five shi, to one hundred shi, which was enough for the couple to eat their fill.

As new recruits, they would be issued farmland and land for their families; if they were single soldiers, they could rent out these fields themselves and receive 30% of the rent, which was enough to support their off-the-job life.

Therefore, the granting of land grants only provides the quota, not the actual operating rights.

The amount of military land allocated determines the share of profits for that year.

The household land is fixed at only fifty mu; as long as the family line continues, the lineage can be passed down indefinitely.

Koudai were temporarily allocated, with either sloping or thin fields being selected.

Upon retirement, the farmland is reclaimed, and only the household land is retained; if a son takes over the military, it is retained; if the son is killed in action or disabled, it is retained for ten years.

These two types of land are the ones that can truly be cultivated and managed by oneself; if one does not wish to manage them, one can also rent them out independently.

When officials and commoners rent out their private land, the annual rent cannot exceed 30%.

The entire military land allocation system is like a spindle, thin at both ends and thick in the middle.

Mid- to high-ranking military officers did not rely on military farmland or annual salaries for their livelihood; the majority of their income came from the spoils of war.

In order to strengthen control over the counties, the land plots and fields were distributed in clusters, so that more than a hundred soldiers could live together in one place and form a small military stronghold.

To avoid other problems, soldiers from the same stronghold would be assigned to different units. Zhao Ji called such strongholds "zhuang" (庄), while larger, more important locations with over three hundred households were called "zhen" (镇).

The military land allocated to them nominally belonged to the county; the number of official lands in a county could accommodate a corresponding proportion of military households.

The more prosperous a county is, the more military households it resettles, and the pressure on towns increases proportionally.

These military households also live in clusters within the county... which allows them to monitor the county, and can basically prevent false reports of disasters and reductions in land rent.

In short, Zhao Ji's design created a network of military households' strongholds that would control each county and extract revenue from them to support the army.

However, this will take time to implement, and Zhao Ji does not plan to mobilize a large army for the campaign against Guanzhong next year.

While he was away on campaign, Jia Xu had already completed the land survey in Taiyuan.

Within the present-day Taiyuan area, apart from the pastures and cultivated lands of the Xiongnu people, there is a significant surplus of land, sufficient for allocation and use.

This is precisely why Sun Zi and other remaining officials were particularly worried.

Both they and the subsequent immigrants are waiting for a new conscription order.

However, the Tiger Step Army suffered limited losses in the Battle of Shangdang; the subsequent battles of Changshan and Chenliu, on the contrary, brought back many subordinate armed forces.

With limited Tiger Warriors, Zhao Ji was still thinking about reducing the size of the Tiger Infantry Army, so he had no intention of continuing to expand it.
Therefore, in addition to the Tiger Step Army and the prefectural and county troops, the Grand Marshal's Five Battalions were also established.

The main force of the Fifth Battalion came from the recruits who had fought in Shangdang, Changshan and Chenliu, and also included some elite Tiger Step Army soldiers.

The Five Battalions have not yet been fully reorganized and are operating smoothly, but they are still within the scope of land allocation.

As for the prefectural and county soldiers... unfortunately, being selected as a prefectural or county soldier only qualified them for selection into the Tiger Step or the Five Battalions.

Therefore, soldiers from prefectures and counties were not granted military land, but only household land and household land, which guaranteed each family at least 100 mu of land.

Ordinary people still own the same amount of land they owned previously.

The servants and slaves who were liberated previously had no land, and still do not have land now.

These people could only rent government land. If they wanted to acquire land, they had to join the county soldiers, prefecture soldiers, and state soldiers. After being selected through various levels, they could be added to the Tiger Infantry and the Five Battalions. In this way, they could acquire military land and have the opportunity to enter officialdom through military merit.

For an ordinary person, as long as they could rise to the rank of Jie Cong Hu Ben, their annual income of 600 shi (a unit of dry measure) was enough to support three to five horses, two or three cows, and even send their children to school.

An annual income of 600 shi (a unit of dry measure) is equivalent to that of a mid-level county magistrate, and even higher than the income of a small county magistrate of 400 shi.

This also means that every military officer who followed Zhao Ji and received a rank of Tiger General or higher would have a stable annual income.

Given enough time, everyone can grow and expand their own small family or clan.

Those Tiger Warriors who were killed in action or wounded and retired earlier will be replaced by their sons, whose sons will be given official ranks; if they have no heirs, they will be entitled to military land for ten years.

As for the prisoners captured several times, it was naturally impossible to directly promote them to official positions.

Young and able-bodied prisoners are a valuable source of low-cost manpower. Zhao Ji was reluctant to elevate their status, nor was he willing to let them be wasted or consumed at will.

These people have been sent to the Daling and Pingyang smelting plants and coal yards to mine coal, dig ore, cut down trees, and burn charcoal.

Only high-ranking prisoners like Gao Gan, Yuan Xi, and Qian Zhao were spared from heavy physical labor and were placed under house arrest in Jinyang, where they were given simple physical tasks.

Want to freeload? It's not that simple.
Maintaining a tight and transparent internal upward mobility channel is essential to maximizing cohesion.

If there is a shortage of personnel in the field troops in the future, they can be selected from the state soldiers and county soldiers... but the county soldiers are not enough.

This also prevents commanding officers and generals from arbitrarily recruiting soldiers and expanding the army.

Soldiers recruited arbitrarily from outside were naturally not well-regarded by veteran soldiers.

Zhao Ji's inspection tour of the nine counties of Zhongdu was to check on the implementation of policies in each county.

Nowadays, the magistrates, assistant magistrates, and county constables in various counties are generally retired Tiger Guards, and their sons and brothers take over the vacant Tiger Guard positions.

Therefore, they are highly integrated with the Hu Ben group and will naturally take the initiative to implement these things.

As for the future, these rules have already been established, so there is no fear that subsequent officials will disrupt them.

Besides, barring any unforeseen circumstances, future senior officials can only come from retired military officers.

These people are naturally inclined to protect the military land system, since after their term as officials ends, they still need to return to their respective villages and towns to live out their retirement.

Even if you are from an ordinary family, from the day you join the army, after being granted household land and military land, you will be assigned to a certain village or town, and then belong to that place for a long time, where you will live out your old age.

If someone embezzled or did other things during that time, the surrounding neighbors were also military households... which could serve as a form of oversight.

As for things further into the future, that's beyond Zhao Ji's comprehension.

The only hope is that this system can function properly in the short term and that no obvious errors occur.

In this way, Zhao Ji stayed in each county for two or three days. By the time he had finished inspecting the nine counties of Zhongdu, it was already the second year of Jian'an.

Liu Biao's envoys, Wang Can, Pei Qian, and Fu Xun, traveled north and encountered the last cold wave of the winter.

(End of this chapter)