Daming Yuanfu

This time when he was in the cabinet, Gao Wushi had nothing to do. He just stamped the cabinet's defenses on the decree that would be delivered soon, and after completing the approval procedures of "Fengge Luantai", he had nothing to do.At this time Wang Jiaping was still in the pavilion, and when Gao Yushi went to find him, Zigong was writing a scribble, probably writing a diary.

Gao Wushi couldn't point it out, so he had to pretend to be ignorant, and handed over today's chief writer and the cabinet's seal letter to him, and then walked out of the palace and came to the Ministry of Household Affairs.

Because of Zhao Zhigao's incident, one of the right servants, Yang Junmin, was absent today under the pretext of inspecting the warehouse, while the left servant, Cheng Wen, the right servant, Hu Zhili, and Zhao Yumin were all in the yamen.As soon as Gao Wushi arrived, he sent someone to invite them to discuss the material preparations for the Western Expedition.

Gossip aside, the Gods of Wealth of Daming quickly sat down in the small meeting hall. Cheng Wen, as the left servant of the "big household department", is actually equivalent to the "executive XX" of later generations, so he will first report to Gao Yushi .

Surprisingly, the first thing Cheng Wen reported was not the material preparations that Daming had made, but a thick letter of information that was handed over to the Ministry of Households by Jin Yiwei.

Theoretically speaking, this information is not considered military information, but it happens to be related to the economy. However, it is not the intelligence of the Ming Dynasty, but the private economic investigation of the Jinyiwei on the Yarkand area—or the current Chahar occupied area. .

It must be explained here that Jinyiwei conducts both internal and external investigations, but since the East Factory has long been a permanent institution, and the East Factory generally only conducts internal investigations, Jinyiwei's external investigations are somewhat different. Inside is even stronger.

In the original history, Jinyiwei had a relatively strict intelligence network for all Mongolian ministries and North Korea, and even showed that they had a certain degree of infiltration into Japan during the War of Resisting the Japanese and Aiding Korea.

Of course, it should not be said that Jin Yiwei's investigation of the Jurchen is quite problematic. It's not that there is no intelligence network, but that its network has been heavily reversed, and many front-line managers have been bribed and corrupted.But this is just a passing mention, because of the highly pragmatic relationship with butterfly wings, these things have nothing to do with today's Jin Yiwei.

Jin Yiwei's external investigations have always focused on Mongolia for so many years. After the Chahar tribe fled westward, Jin Yiwei also adjusted the direction of its investigation and infiltrated its forces into the Yarkand region.Over the years, these newly established intelligence networks have been able to send back some valuable intelligence.

Unfortunately, due to the great geopolitical changes, although Jin Yiwei has newly established an intelligence network in the Yarkand region, it is currently unable to break into the upper echelons of Chahar, and can only get some information from the middle-level and the people.

However, ancient society had its limitations after all, and the intelligence analysis work was far from comparable to that of later generations. Therefore, the news sent by Jin Yiwei to the middle and low-level range was often ignored—just like the ones sent today.

In fact, they have been lying in the Jinyiwei yamen for a long time, and no one took a look at them. Until this time, the two guards of Suzhou and Weilu were almost wiped out. Ganzhou, the five guards of Ganzhou did not dare to fight, and could only defend the city. The senior officials of Jinyiwei remembered this, hurriedly found it, copied a copy and sent it to the Ministry of Rites, the Ministry of Households, and the Ministry of War.

However, Jin Yiwei's senior management is not completely dry after all. At least this time, the information they sent has been carefully analyzed and sorted out. , not inferior to me" reason.

Jin Yiwei comprehensively analyzed more than 40 pieces of information of varying lengths sent back from the Yarkand area, and synthesized a rather comprehensive and in fact quite accurate information.

They learned that the Ottoman Turkish Sultan Mehmed III had sent many envoys to Central Asian countries in order to alleviate the threat of Tsarist Russia. Russian bloodletting.

However, there was a little surprise in this diplomatic operation, that is, the other khanates contacted by Sudan did not respond. Instead, it was the former Yarkant Khanate in the east and Chahar, which has now occupied the nest. Ministry, actually eagerly responded to Sultan Mehmed III.

On behalf of Buyanchechen Khan, Burhatu expressed to the envoys of Sudan that they were willing to go north to stop Tsarist Russia's eastward advance, and they were also willing to contact Ming Dynasty to the east in order to "help Sudan develop trade".However, they are not strong enough, especially lack of firearms at hand, and I am afraid that they will not be able to defeat the vanguard of Tsarist Russia's eastward expansion.

This is of course nonsense, because Tsarist Russia’s eastward expansion after defeating the Siberian Khanate was hardly considered an act of state for a long time, but the tsar supported some adventure groups in his own name, and these were often only a hundred or ten people , The adventure group of hundreds of people spontaneously marched eastward.

Tsarist Russia's degree of weaponization at this time is not very high, and may not even be as good as Ottoman.In contrast, because of the highly pragmatic military reforms in Ming Dynasty, the degree of weaponization on the whole was higher than that of Tsarist Russia at this time.

Of course, Daming and Tsarist Russia are still far away. Even if Tsarist Russia moves eastward crazily, at most they will encounter the Tumed tribe, which became very powerful after the victory in the Battle of Yuan. Tummet is still much taller.

At least Tsarist Russia's "shooting army" has been established for about 50 years, which shows that it has a well-organized musketeer unit.Of course, the main force of Tsarist Russia's eastward expansion was not the shooting army, but the Cossack cavalry, which will be discussed later.

Although Tsarist Russia has a shooting army, the Chahar Department has acquired the Yarkand and Hami regions in recent years, and its strength has recovered quickly. At least it is not a problem to fight the Tsarist Russian adventure team.

However, the envoy of the Sudan was not aware of this. After a private investigation, he believed that this large tribe that claimed to be the orthodox Yuan Dynasty might only have a total population of more than 40. It was indeed quite difficult to defeat the advance team of Tsarist Russia— Well, the envoy actually didn't understand that the eastward expansion of Tsarist Russia was not a state action.

Therefore, the envoy believed that it was feasible and appropriate to provide Chahar with some firearms, but it was not a free aid, but a fair sale, and the two parties should complete it through a transaction, rather than a unilateral gift from the Ottoman Empire.

Brihatu readily accepted the proposal from the Sudanese envoy, and immediately discussed the specific matters of the transaction with the Sudanese envoy seriously.At this point, Jin Yiwei obviously compiled information, because they detailed the current basic economic development of Yarkand.

The economy of the Yarkand region has always been dominated by nomads, and there are not many goods that can be provided to the Ottomans, and the Ottomans are not short of those.However, it may be that Burhatu, who has seen high-level pragmatic reforms and "Tumote reforms", was inspired. Under his promotion, Chahar has tried to walk a new path in recent years.

Arranged by Brihatu himself, he actually began to allocate manpower to farm in the Ili River Valley!
Of course, the Mongols of the Chahar tribe really had no interest in this, and most of the people assigned to farm by Brihatu were locals who had been conquered by them.In addition, there are some Han Chinese who came all the way from the original left-wing Mongolia.

These Han people were plundered to the Chahar tribe a long time ago. Their status was very low at first, but now they are very precious, because almost all of them have become technicians—specialized in farming.

In addition to farming, they also planted cotton, and by the way, they also made Daming looms to weave cloth with cotton.This is the right way to go. The local conditions are extremely suitable for growing cotton. As a result, the yield is increasing year by year. The cotton cloth produced is sold in the Khanates of Central Asia. It is very popular and has become the flagship product of the Chahar Department.

Although these Han people were taken away early, and they had never seen the jenny spinning machine brought by Gao Pragmatic Copy, their spinning efficiency is actually not high, but no matter how low it is, weaving cotton cloth for trade is better than the original grazing Too much.Of course, since they are also Han Chinese anyway, Jin Yiwei obtained the above information through some of them.

Therefore, the result of the discussion between Burihatu and the Sudanese envoy was "cotton cloth for guns", and in this way, Burihatu found that the current population of the Chahar tribe was not enough.

Whether they hope to expand cotton cultivation, or expand the size of the textile industry, they now need people very much.However, the population of Central Asia has always been relatively limited. Even if they conquer the Kazakh Khanate, the Bukhara Khanate and other places, I am afraid they will not be able to grab many people. Moreover, these Khanates have not yet declined too much. Chahar, who was wounded, did not dare to use force rashly.

What about the northern expedition to the Junggar tribe?Although Junggar is divided severely, their current combat effectiveness is not bad. Brihatu tried it twice cautiously, launched two limited-scale operations, and found that the effect was not good.

Junggar was originally one of the Oirat tribes, and also a descendant of the Mongols. It is also a serious horseback nation, so although Buri Hatu won the two battles, and it was not difficult to win, he didn't catch it. Seeing several people, this disappointed Brihatu very much.

As a result, Brihatu had no choice but to turn his attention back to Daming again, and the firearms held by their army were the Lumi guns that had been traded in the previous "cotton cloth for firearms".

At this time, Gao Wushi finally confirmed the source of Chahar's muskets, but this coincided with his previous guess, and it did not fully reflect the value of Jinyiwei's intelligence-although it was indeed very valuable.

However, soon, Gao Yushi obtained more valuable information: a standard Lumi gun being equipped in large quantities by the Chahar army.Cheng Wen said that this Lumi blunderbuss was obtained by Jin Yiwei from a centurion in the former army of Brihatu who had strict management. Take three lives.

This gun is now placed in front of Gao Yushi, Gao Yushi picked it up carefully and inspected it carefully, while Cheng Wen took the information sent by Jin Yiwei and told him about the gun.

The Lumi gun in Gao Yushi’s hand weighed about seven or eight catties, but Cheng Wen said that Jin Yiwei said that the Lumi gun that Chahar got varied in weight, and some only weighed six catties. Jin Yiwei speculated that the weight The difference may be due to the use of good or bad iron.

After all, Jinghua's firearms are the pinnacle level of today's Daming firearms. As an early technology provider, Gao Pragmatism is quite familiar with today's firearms.After a short look, he roughly understood the level of the Lumi Gun.

This Lumi gun is about six or seven feet long, and the firing mechanism is in the bed.Squeeze it and it will fall, and it will rise again when the fire ignites. There is a steel knife at the end of the bed. If the enemy is approaching, it can be used as a horse-cutting knife.When releasing the blunderbuss, it should be the front grip and the rest, and the back top of the butt.

Although this is just an arquebus rather than a flintlock, it only needs to pull the trigger to fire.This Lumi gun has a front sight, which is a little far from the eye. From the design point of view, the smoke and dust when the gun is fired should not be too large, so that it will not be disturbing.It should be better than those Japanese shotguns seized in the Korean battlefield not long ago.

Therefore, Gao Wushi looked at the original gunpowder and lead bullets that Jin Yiwei sent along with the blunderbuss, and judged that when they were used, they cost four dollars for medicine and three dollars for lead bullets.He carefully kneaded the gunpowder and looked at it. Its black powder manufacturing technology is not bad. Although it is obvious that it has not reached the so-called "granulation" technical height, it has a certain foundation. It should be called "black powder" in black powder. It is above average in quality.

However, the level of lead bullets is relatively average, the size of the bullets is different, and the shape is not regular enough, which is quite a bit crooked.Gao Wushi doubts that this thing is not made by the Ottoman Empire itself, or that it is not a projectile made by the Ottoman Empire military. Maybe it is a low-end version produced by a private workshop, which is completely aimed at "earning foreign exchange".

Of course, it is also possible that the Ottoman Empire was too lazy to send projectiles all the way for sale. This thing may have been produced by the Chahar people themselves. Due to the number and level of Chahar craftsmen, the quality of these lead bullets obviously cannot keep up with muskets. Level.

At this time, Cheng Wen also stopped introducing, and Gao Wushi frowned slightly, and asked: "There is another very important question, that is, how many Lumi blunderbuss did the Chahar Department get, and how much did Burhatudong commit this time?" How much did Gansu bring... Jin Yiwei didn't find out or forgot to mention?"

Cheng Wen shook his head and said, "It's not clear yet, Jin Yiwei's regulations didn't explain it."

Gao Wushi said decisively: "Send someone to the Jinyiwei yamen, and ask their person in charge to come to the household department immediately, and I will inquire personally."

Cheng Wen responded, and clapped his hands to call in a person who was a secretary from the Department of Household Affairs.Gao Wushi took a pen and ink to write a note, stamped his private seal, and asked the secretary to go to Jinyiwei's successor.

After the secretary left, Cheng Wen saw that Gao Wushi was silent, and asked, "Is this Lumi gun considered excellent?" Cheng Wen is a typical civil servant, and he really doesn't know anything about ordnance, so he asked this question.

Gao Wushi shook his head slightly, and said: "Compared with the firearms used by our officers and soldiers, this blunderbuss cannot be said to be sophisticated, but firearms... have a huge difference, especially in the case of a large number of equipment. Down."

"Really?" Because Cheng Wen didn't understand, he was still a little skeptical when he heard the words.

Gao Wushi nodded affirmatively, and said: "For firearms, as long as the equipment itself is not far away from each other, the difference in use on the battlefield will not be too big. The more important thing is the usage. What I am most worried about now is whether Burihatu will see it. If someone who has surpassed my subordinate's method of platooning guns, if he also deliberately imitates and is quite charmed, then the battle to conquer the west...will probably be bloody."

That's not true, if both sides queue up to be shot, it's really inevitable that blood will flow into rivers.
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PS: It's still 5 minutes to 0 o'clock, not bad, not bad, today's recovery is okay.