I want to be emperor

Chapter 598 Landing in Siam
Luo Zhixue believes that things like financial reform need to be gradual and cautious. If something happens accidentally, the impact will be very large.

And Luo Zhixue didn't like this kind of accident, and he didn't like causing any problems.

Just like the gold standard, Luo Zhixue also knows that silver continues to depreciate. Adopting the silver standard will lead to domestic inflation and wealth depreciation. However, due to the lack of domestic gold reserves and a large amount of silver as a currency in circulation.

If the gold standard is forced, it will easily lead to currency shortage and deflation.

In addition, the large amount of silver in the country is not easy to deal with.

You can't tell people that silver is no longer a currency from now on, and the various silver currencies you have accumulated are no longer usable.

It's not nonsense!
Therefore, Luo Zhixue was very cautious in the issuance of legal tender, and continued to adopt the silver standard system, and did not even make major changes to the currency unit, and still marked one tael of silver as the legal one' yuan according to people's habits '.

According to the new legal tender rules, the newly issued legal tenders are silver coins as well as copper coins.

Silver coins have a face value of one yuan and a silver content of 37 grams; a face value of [-] jiao and a silver content of [-] grams; a face value of one dime and a silver content of [-] grams;
Ten jiao is equal to one yuan.

In addition, there are coins with denominations of fifty, twenty, ten, five, two, and one. These silver coins are mainly made of copper, and some other metals are added.

These silver coins are not priced by pure copper content, but by legal face value.

One yuan equals one thousand wen.

In fact, the entire exchange ratio has not changed much, it is still the same as before, more changes in the name, and the exchange rate is directly fixed by legal means.

At the same time, the meaning of copper, a precious metal, as currency is revoked in the legal sense.

Although the new silver coins were mainly minted from copper, copper is not currency, which is clearly distinguished.

At the same time, in the new version of coin issuance, more small silver coins with a dime face value and copper coins with small denominations such as one and ten coins are scheduled to be issued.

As for silver coins with a denomination of five cents and a denomination of one yuan, there are not many actually issued, because these are silver coins with relatively large denominations, which are rarely used in daily life, and are mostly used for large-value cash transactions.

The issuance of the new version of coins is actually similar to the old version of coins in the past. The craftsmanship and precious metal content are almost the same, and even the face value has not changed. The only change is that these new version of coins are legal tender, and the exchange is enforced by law. Proportion.

This is also the core goal of abolishing the two reforms, which is to establish a currency exchange system in the legal sense, instead of continuing to follow the market as in the past.

At the same time, the General Administration of Financial Supervision of the Great Chu Empire also issued a new administrative order, not advocating the continued circulation of various old-style precious metal currencies, such as silver ingots, broken silver, and various ancient and old-style copper coins.

In the next three years, it is just not advocated, but various government agencies represented by taxation agencies will continue to collect these non-legal currencies, which is used as a buffer to allow the public enough time to adapt and exchange.

But three years later, various government agencies will no longer accept all kinds of non-standard precious metals, and only accept legal tender and the first version of non-standard currency issued by the Great Chu Empire and the financial bank's bearer bank notes.

At the same time, various official agencies and banks are required to adopt a policy of only entering and not leaving all kinds of old-style coins that are not standard currencies.

All kinds of precious metal currencies collected will be unified into the central bank as raw materials to manufacture new legal coins.

As for banknotes, new legal banknotes are issued on the basis of the bearer bank notes of financial banks, with face value equal to that of coins.

After the issuance of legal tender, the issuance of original gold coins will be stopped, and efforts will be made to reserve gold at the same time.

And give priority to the use of gold for pricing and transactions in foreign trade, and further expand the amount of gold reserves.

After the amount of gold reserves comes up, it is time for the Great Chu Empire to adopt the gold standard system.

But now, it's still early, so we have to take our time.

The series of financial reforms of the Great Chu Empire are actually not very impressive to ordinary people. To ordinary people, there are actually some changes in the name, but the changes are not big. They continue to use silver coins and copper coins, and the folks Traditional silver ingots, broken silver and old copper coins are still used on a large scale.

However, as the government's publicity gradually increases, and a fire consumption fee needs to be deducted when paying taxes, the public will continue to hold new types of legal tender as much as possible in order to avoid damage to their own interests. .

In this way, all kinds of old currencies and metals such as silver and gold that have been preserved in large quantities by the people can be recovered slowly, and then turned into various legal coins.

And when the Great Chu Empire was vigorously carrying out currency reforms and financial reforms internally, the Great Chu Empire did not stop its external actions, but continued to increase the pace of expansion.

In April of the 13th year of Chengshun, Southeast Asia, the Beibu Gulf of the Gulf of Siam topped the Gulf of Bangkok, and the fleet of the Great Chu Empire appeared here again.

Last winter, the navy fleet of the Great Chu Empire came once, but that time it was only a deterrent notice to the Great City Kingdom, asking the Great City Kingdom to fully liberalize the market and allow the Great Chu Empire to operate in one of their cities. A coastal port anchors ships and so on.

After the Ayutthaya Kingdom refused, the fleet of the Great Chu Empire did not say to start the fight directly, but chose to evacuate the overseas Chinese, and returned after the evacuation was completed.

But since then, the cloud of war has actually hung over the Gulf of Siam.

During the winter and spring months, the fast communication ships of the Great Chu Empire Navy traveled to and from Southeast Asia and the local Wusong Naval Base many times, conveying the situation in Southeast Asia and local decisions.

However, after arguing with Allen in many ways, especially after referring to the opinions of the navy, the top leaders of the Great Chu Empire finally decided to use a limited war to open up the market for the products of the Great Chu Empire and obtain a military force in the Gulf of Siam. base.

After the highest level made a decision, the army and navy also started to act. This spring, the Great Chu Empire continued to increase its troops to Jin Ran Bay.

By April, the ground force in Cam Ranh Bay had increased to more than [-] people.

Among them are the Marine Corps of more than [-] people, the Second Marine Regiment.

The remaining troops are the No.13 Division of the Army

This army unit is a unit that is specially deployed for overseas operations. In order to adapt to operations in Southeast Asia, these ground forces are drawn from soldiers from Guangdong and Guangxi to adapt to operations in the tropical rain forests of Southeast Asia. At least Can adapt to the climate.

Since several operations in Myanmar were severely unsuitable due to severe non-combat attrition, the Great Chu Empire has improved its operations in Southeast Asia.

The first is to improve the soldiers, and recruit local soldiers from Guangdong, Guangxi, Yunnan, and Guizhou as much as possible for operations in Southeast Asia.

Among them, the fifth division of the first-class division of the army, which was deployed in the newly occupied area of ​​Yunnan and directly faced Burma, had all its soldiers changed in just two years. All the soldiers in the north were transferred away, and then they were replaced by Guangxi and western Guangdong. Conscripted soldiers.

At the same time, it is deployed in the direction of Guangxi and Lianzhou, Guangdong. The No. 14 Division of the First Class Division, which mainly faces Annan, also uses soldiers from Yunnan, Guizhou, Chunan, and Guangxi as much as possible.

The reason why the soldiers were not directly used in the province but transferred across the provinces was mainly to avoid the emergence of local warlords.

Therefore, the Great Chu Empire has always implemented a policy of serving in different places. Of course, it would not be foolish to send soldiers from Guangdong and Guangxi to fight in Siberia... That would be too nonsense.

Climate change is too bad, and it is too difficult for soldiers to adapt.

In addition, if the troop transfer journey is too long, it will be very troublesome, time-consuming and costly.

But this time, the military chose as much as possible new recruits from Yunnan, Guizhou and Guangdong and Guangxi regions, especially the regions close to the southern tropical rainforest, as combatants in Southeast Asia.

In China, there are the fifth division and the No.14 division, which are typical standing combat forces for combat in tropical areas.

The No.13 Division, which was dispatched to fight in Southeast Asia, is also a typical unit that specializes in fighting for the tropical rainforest, and at the same time joined the training of crossing the sea and landing.

This division used to be stationed in Yunnan, mainly facing the direction of the Nanzhang Kingdom. It was the only two first-class combat readiness divisions of the Great Chu Empire in the direction of Yunnan.

However, the Nanzhang Kingdom was chaotic and relatively weak. After collecting information for several years, the Great Chu Empire felt that this broken place was not worth using a first-class combat preparer to deal with it.

Therefore, the No.13 division was transferred to the areas of Lianzhou, Qiongzhou, and Gaozhou in Guangdong. On the one hand, it was used to guard against Annan, and on the other hand, it was also used for sea crossing and landing training, preparing for subsequent use in Southeast Asia.

Therefore, in the past three or four years, the No.13 Division has prepared personnel and weapons and equipment specifically for operations in Southeast Asia, and has also gone to Qiongzhou Island many times for sea crossing and landing training.

The hundreds of army troops sent by the Great Chu Empire to the Dagon military base in Myanmar were drawn from the No.14 Division.

After obtaining the Cam Ranh Bay military base last year, the military began to gradually send the troops of the division to Cam Ranh Bay. By the beginning of April today, with the last batch of soldiers arriving in Cam Ranh Bay, the No.13 Division had all been defending Cam Ranh Bay. bay.

At the same time, more than 4000 people who arrived in Cam Ranh Bay last year formed a mixed group, carrying a large number of ships and going south with the naval fleet.

There were also more than [-] people from the main force of the Second Marine Regiment of the Navy who went together.

In other words, in order to force the Great City Kingdom to open the market and lease the port, the Great Chu Empire used more than [-] troops just to cross the sea and land.

This is completely different from the Western colonial forces faced by the natives of Southeast Asian countries, which were no more than a few hundred people, and only a few hundred people at most.

European colonists, on the one hand, had a small local population and a large number of overseas colonies. Naturally, there were not many troops that could be squeezed out for a specific colony.

At the same time, more importantly, the distance is too far!

It is too troublesome for them to transport troops from Europe, which is why many European colonists want to form indigenous troops.

But the Great Chu Empire is different from them!
The Great Chu Empire is on the edge of Southeast Asia. Although it still needs sea transportation, because of the existence of the Cam Ranh Bay base, the Great Chu Empire can gradually transport troops, weapons, equipment, and supplies to the past.

Under such circumstances, the Great Chu Empire would be able to hoard more troops in Southeast Asia.

When the Great Chu Empire really wanted to expand in Southeast Asia and went all out, its mobilized war capabilities were terrifying.

There are more than 7000 ground combat troops alone, and there are more warships.

The navy dispatched four Jinling-class battleships in one go, in addition to six cruisers, eighteen frigates, and 26 naval free armed transport ships.

A total of more than 50 armed merchant ships of the size of the three major trading companies and private trading companies were requisitioned to transport personnel and materials.

In addition, more than 70 ordinary merchant ships were requisitioned.

In order to attack the Ayutthaya Kingdom, the Great Chu Empire gathered more than 100 ships in one go.

Although many of them are old ships such as Fuchuan and Niaochuan, they cannot hold up to a large number.

Moreover, dozens of new warships are even more powerful.

The Great Chu Empire Navy concentrated so many ships, on the one hand, to transport troops, weapons and equipment, and a large amount of supplies, and on the other hand, to prevent the Dutch from causing trouble.

According to the information from the Great Chu Empire, the Ayutthaya Kingdom has already contacted the Dutch, and the Dutch responded quite well to this. They have concentrated more than ten warships in Batavia and have protested to the Great Chu Empire many times. , and on time, if the Great Chu Empire insists on destroying the peaceful trade in the Gulf of Siam, then the Netherlands will not turn a blind eye to it.

Regarding this... the top management of the Great Chu Empire are too lazy to talk to them!

The mere Dutch barbarians are nothing... just because you also want to block the empire's Southeast Asian national policy, it's just a joke.

However, although the high level of the empire despised the Dutch, the navy, as the specific responsible for the operation, was quite vigilant about this, and directly pulled out the four Jinling-class battleships, and then pulled in a cruiser and frigate.

In order to deter the Dutch, the Dutch will fight as soon as their brains twitch.

As for the Ayutthaya Kingdom... Although their naval strength is somewhat, it is basically negligible compared to the Great Chu Empire's navy.

The appearance of such a huge fleet of the Great Chu Empire in the Gulf of Siam naturally caused a shock in the Kingdom of Ayutthaya.

But this time, after they once again received the request from the Great Chu Empire to open the market and the concession port, they did not refuse as decisively as before, but tried to delay the time, and urgently asked for help from the Dutch and the Kingdom of Johor.

The Great Chu Empire Navy did not give them a chance to delay. Seeing that the opponent did not respond for a long time, the fleet directly killed them.

On April 13, 26th year of Chengshun, the fleet of the Great Chu Empire rushed to the mouth of the Chao Phraya River!

The weak navy of the Ayutthaya Kingdom resisted, but facing the powerful strength of the Great Chu Empire fleet, this kind of resistance was meaningless.

On April 27, the fleet of the Great Chu Empire successfully landed on the west bank of the Chao Phraya River estuary, and began to build temporary trestles, using some small coastal piers for large-scale landings.

In the next few days, the Great Chu Empire Navy sent some frigates into the Chao Phraya River. At the same time, the marines and army troops who landed on the ground also advanced inland, and fought fiercely with thousands of local defenders of the Ayutthaya Kingdom. The Royal Army was defeated and defeated!
After entering May, the more than 7000 ground combat forces of the Great Chu Empire have reached a small fishing village named Bangkok along the Chao Phraya River, and are preparing to continue northward towards the capital of the Ayutthaya Kingdom, Ayutthaya City, which is 'Big City' marches.

The kingdom of Ayutthaya, the little overlord in Southeast Asia, fell into a huge crisis in just a few days!

However, they did not succumb easily. In addition, they had already realized the threat of the Great Chu Empire last year, and started preparing for the battle several months in advance, so they were attacked by the Chu army.

They also responded in a timely manner. After the mouth of the Chao Phraya River was occupied by the Chu army, and the local garrison was defeated by thousands of troops, they began to dispatch troops and generals in an attempt to block the troops of the Great Chu Empire from the capital city.

(End of this chapter)