Daming Crazy Emperor

Chapter 339 The True Strength of the Japanese Pirates

The top floor of the Aegis ship, in the meeting hall.

Yuan Keli, Shen Yourong, Zhang Yuanfang, Qi Jin, Cao Wenzhao and other navy and infantry generals gathered together.

A huge map of Japan and a few books in Japanese were already placed on the long table between them.

Zheng Zhilong has already made annotations on these books, that is, translations, and everyone can roughly understand them.

Taichang took a look at the book that recorded the Guan Yuan battle, and couldn't help but nodded slightly: "Well, these books are very good."

He didn't expect that Zheng Zhilong not only bought a bunch of maps, but also bought a bunch of Japanese books.

These books are the records or biographies of some wars by the people of Dongying themselves, such as the change of Honnoji Temple, the battle of Toyotomi Hideyoshi's unification of Dongying, the so-called Battle of Wenlu Qingchang when Dongying invaded North Korea, and the Sekihara Hero who seized power by Tokugawa Ieyasu. fight and so on.

In fact, these books are more useful than most intelligence.

Because these books are recorded by the Dongying people themselves, they certainly have a good understanding of their own strength, and the records are also quite detailed.

This is quite useful for them to understand the real strength of Japanese pirates.

Taichang roughly flipped through other books, and then said to Zheng Zhilong: "Okay, you can use these battle examples to introduce the situation in Dongpu to the map."

How about this?

Zheng Zhilong thought for a while, then stood up and pointed to the left end of the map: "Your Majesty, this is Kyushu Island, this is the Hizen Kingdom, and this is the Hirado Castle. The country is a relatively large feudal lord in Kyushu, and my ministers landed from Hirado Castle to buy maps and news."

Hearing this, Taichang couldn't help but slightly nodded.

Dongpu has a total of four big islands, and Kyushu Island is the closest big island to Daming, which he still knows.

However, he was not very clear about the Hizen Kingdom and the Hirado Domain before.

Now he looked at the map, and he understood.

It turns out that the Hizen Kingdom is in the north of Kyushu Island, and Hirado Castle is in the northwest corner of Kyushu Island.

Zheng Zhilong then pointed to the map and introduced: "Originally, the most powerful subordinate of Toyotomi Hideyoshi in Dongying Guanbai was the Mori family of the Changzhou Domain. Ju, there are at least more than 120 young and strong men who can be recruited, and he has recruited 7 horses to join the war in the two Japanese invasions of North Korea."

This Mori is amazing!
7 horses is not a small number.

Question, what is Shi Gao?

Taichang couldn't help asking: "Feihong, what is Shi Gao referring to?"

Zheng Zhilong quickly explained: "The Shigao refers to how much food can be produced by all the fields under the hands of each prince, which is similar to how much food can be produced by the number of fiefdoms owned by the vassals of the Ming Dynasty. The yield is calculated, and this reverse land is roughly equivalent to one and a half acres of land in Daming, that is to say, the height of one stone is roughly equivalent to about three stones in Daming."

Calculated in this way, the territory under the Maori family can produce 360 million shi of grain every year, and the annual grain consumption of 10 horses is only 120 million shi. It seems that it is really no problem for the Maori family to recruit more than [-] horses .

Taichang nodded slightly again, signaling Zheng Zhilong to continue.

Zheng Zhilong quickly pointed to the map and continued to introduce: "The navy under the Mori family was originally the most powerful in Japan. After the Changzhou navy annexed the Murakami navy in the battle of Toyotomi Hideyoshi's unification of Japan, there were enough warships. More than [-] ships."

More than [-] large and small warships?

This strength is quite terrifying.

Taichang couldn't help but asked again: "Are Dongying's warships the same as the original warships of the Daming Navy?"

Zheng Zhilong shook his head again and again and said: "No, even if they are a small fishing boat that can only carry a few people, they are considered warships, and their warships with [-] materials are considered large warships, and their number of large boats is not much. If there is one so-called big ship among the ten warships, it is not bad."

It turned out to be the case.

If the so-called more than [-] large and small warships were the same as the original warships of the Daming Navy, it would be quite terrifying, because they could completely rush up and set fire to them!
To be honest, all building ships and gunboats are afraid of this tactic, except for the Aegis ship, other ships basically have nothing to do with this tactic.

Fire dragon boats, red dragon boats, mother-child boats, wheel boats and other large and small warships swarmed up. Rockets, kerosene, firewood, oil cans, etc. rained down on them, and the building boats and gunboats had to kneel.

Fortunately, even small fishing boats are counted, but there are only a hundred ships that are really counted as warships.

This strength is nothing.

Taichang nodded slightly again, signaling Zheng Zhilong to continue.

Zheng Zhilong then introduced: "The largest warship of the Dongying people is called an iron-clad ship. It is about ten feet long and two feet wide. It is equipped with several large cannons, more than [-] medium cannons, and more than [-] small cannons."

what?
The Dongying people also have iron-clad ships!
Taichang couldn't help asking again: "Is their iron-clad ship the same as the Aegis ship? What kind of cannon, medium cannon, small cannon, how many catties are there?"

Zheng Zhilong quickly explained: "No, their iron-clad ships only nailed some thin iron plates on the cabin, and they don't have many iron-clad ships.

According to the records in this book, the Changzhou Navy only had seven ironclad ships.

As for the big cannon, the medium cannon, and the small cannon, they are all earthen cannons, and neither the small cannon nor the medium cannon can be regarded as a cannon, they can only be regarded as earthen guns.

I don't know the specific weight of these cannons, medium cannons, and small cannons, but I have seen their so-called cannonballs.

The shells of the big cannon are the size of a fist, the shells of the medium cannon are the size of an egg, and the shells of the small cannon are actually about the same size as the bullets of our muskets. "

Well, it turns out that the Japanese people call guns and guns regardless of guns. To put it bluntly, they are some earth cannons and earth guns.

In this case, it is nothing, as long as the firepower is concentrated to sink their so-called iron-clad ship.

Taichang nodded slightly again, signaling Zheng Zhilong to continue.

Zheng Zhilong thought for a while, then simply closed the book in his hand, opened another book, and continued to introduce: "Actually, after the Sekigahara War, the strength of the Mori family has been greatly reduced.

Because the Mori family suffered heavy losses when Dongying invaded North Korea twice, and the Mori family was still the general of the Western Army during the Sekihara Battle.

After the Western Army was defeated by the Eastern Army of the Tokugawa Clan, although the Mori clan agreed to join the Tokugawa Clan, a large amount of territory was cut off. There are about 30 left. "

Immediately afterwards, he opened another book, pointed to the map and continued to introduce: "Now, the most powerful feudal lord in the west of Dongying is the Shimadzu clan of the Satsuma clan.

According to the records of the Battle of Ryukyu, they sent more than 35 warships when they attacked the Ryukyu Kingdom in the [-]th year of Wanli.

After the war, the number of stones in the Satsuma domain also reached 77 stones.

They also controlled the trade between Ryukyu and Ming Dynasty and profited from it. Moreover, they were still taking the opportunity to build warships and desperately develop their navy.

Wei Chen thought that the strength of the navy of the Shimadzu clan of the Satsuma domain should be similar to the strength of the navy of the Mori clan back then. "

It turned out that it was this Satsuma clan who captured Ryukyu, a vassal state of Ming Dynasty.

Very good, let's take this Satsuma clan for surgery!

Your navy is strong, right? Let me show you what it means to have a strong navy.

You are still desperately developing the navy, right? Then kill you first!
Coincidentally, this Satsuma clan is still in the southeast corner of Kyushu Island, the closest to Ming Dynasty.

Taichang thought for a while, then nodded slightly, signaling Zheng Zhilong to continue.

Zheng Zhilong, however, closed the book in his hand awkwardly, and said helplessly: "Your Majesty, I have also found out about this news. Others are found in these books. Moreover, the strength of other Japanese princes and Guan Yuan's joint battle There hasn't been much change in the time, and the rest, I won't be too long-winded, will I?"

Well, with these books and a few boxes of maps, it's almost the same.

After Zheng Zhilong introduced it like this again, he almost knew the real strength of the Japanese pirates.

Taichang stared at the map of Dongying for a while, and ordered someone to take out the whole map of Kunyu and Wanguo for comparison, and then asked: "I want to use Taicang Port as a backup base, and take down the Satsuma Fandom of Dongying first, what do you think? "

Everyone looked at the map, exchanged eye contact with each other, and then clapped their hands together and said in unison: "Your Majesty is wise."

They also saw that neither Wubei City nor Beiwa City is the best place to send troops to conquer Japan, because to go to Japan from these two places, you have to detour through the vassal country North Korea, and go around, at least three or four thousand miles .

Taicang Port is different, because it is facing the Dongying Satsuma Domain, and the straight-line distance is less than two thousand miles.

Moreover, Taicang Port is located at the mouth of the Yangtze River, and it is very convenient and quick to collect food, grass and luggage from the various prefectures in South Zhili.

Seeing that everyone had no objection, Taichang got up immediately, waved decisively and said, "Okay, everyone, go back and get ready. Starting tomorrow, we will move to Taicang and prepare for the expedition!"

All the generals hurriedly bowed and retreated.

Taichang then said in a loud voice: "Decree to block Taicang Port, and all merchant ships from various countries are not allowed to enter and not to leave. Order Zhenhaiwei to take these merchant ships to Liuhebao and Wusong River to take care of them first, and then release them after the army goes out. .”

It is estimated that the news cannot be completely blocked.

But it doesn't matter too much, because the transportation of people and horses in the Ming Dynasty is still very fast. Both the water transport ships and the navy warships are used. In addition, the cavalry of the [-] Shenwu Battalion can also drive across the land on horseback. It is not necessary to move to Taicang. too long.

Even if the Dongying people received the news, it would probably be too late to react.

(End of this chapter)