Jingnan Strategy

Chapter 590 Postscript: Zhengde (1)
"Zhengde's heroic name has spread, and he dares to lead the expeditions in the south and the north."

"You will be mighty and peaceful throughout your life, and your country will be under your rule forever!"

On a car by the lake, a young man in his thirties stood on the roof with his arms outstretched as if to embrace the mountains and rivers in front of him, reciting a self-boasting seven-character poem.

On the lake, flags representing the times are hung on the flower boats that welcome and see off people, allowing people to understand the current time.

September 24, the third year of the Zhengde reign of the Ming Dynasty was the Emperor’s birthday.

"General, we should go home quickly. There are people searching for us outside."

A man who looked like a woman tried to persuade the man standing on the roof with a sad face. The man was not satisfied and clicked his tongue a few times. Then he jumped down from the roof and clapped his hands, saying:

"Minister Yang is controlling me too much. He can even mobilize the army..."

The man inherited the broad face and high nose of the Zhu family, but his beard was not very thick, otherwise he would look a bit like Zhu Zhanhe and Zhu Qiyue.

Emperor Zhengde Zhu Houzhao, who ruled the country for nearly ten years and was emperor for more than three years, was different from his father. He was a man who seemed frivolous on the surface but was actually very opinionated.

He appeared here not for sightseeing, but for one person.

He looked towards the lake and saw a black-sailed boat slowly approaching from the center of the lake, and on it sat a white-haired, thin fisherman.

"Xinjian Hou, I'm here to see you!"

Zhu Houzhao's voice suddenly rang out. The thin fisherman paused and looked towards the lakeside in surprise.

On September 24, the third year of the Zhengde reign, Emperor Zhengde Zhu Houzhao arrived in Yuyao, Zhejiang by train and asked Wang Shouren, Marquis of Xinjian, to serve as the Minister of Personnel to implement the new policy.

In the same month, the 89-year-old Minister of Revenue Yang Tinghe retired due to old age. He died of illness on his way back home and was posthumously named Wen Zhong.

After Wang Shouren arrived in Beijing, Zhu Houzhao used him and the Minister of Justice Zhang Cong as promoters of the new policy.

Wang Shouren read the documents of the Ministry of Personnel and promoted Zhao Zhenji, Gao Gong, Hai Rui, Shen Lian, Yang Jisheng, Tang Shunzhi, Hu Zongxian, Tan Lun and others from among the hundreds of officials, and appointed them to important posts such as vice ministers of six ministries and the Censorate.

In April of the following year, after more than half a year of rectification of the Beijing officialdom, Wang Shouren and Zhang Cong submitted "Twenty-Four Examples of Reform" to Zhu Houzhao, in which they analyzed twenty-four current problems in the Ming Dynasty and proposed solutions.

In the present Ming Dynasty, the military was in disrepair, the quality of generals was uneven, many meritorious officials were just sitting there doing nothing, and military officers were also living a life of luxury.

Under their command, the soldiers of the Ming Dynasty just muddled through, with none of the spirit they had during the Jingtai and Chenghua periods.

Wang Shouren believed that the examination of military commanders during the Hongxi period must be restored to kick out those who were just sitting there doing nothing.

In addition, most of the soldiers in the army are used to being idle, so some unqualified people must be laid off.

Apart from the military, more serious problems exist in the banking, bureaucracy and civil service administration.

Today, there are more than 68 million depositors in the Ming Dynasty, with a savings of billion taels (paper money). However, % of this billion taels of wealth is in the hands of less than people, including royal family members, meritorious officials, merchants, officials and other classes.

In addition, the total amount of loans owed by the people to banks is as high as more than 5 billion yuan, and the annual interest rate of % makes the people bear a heavy burden and private consumption cannot be boosted.

Wang Shouren believed that the distribution of wealth must be done well. The 10% business tax during the Hongxi period was no longer applicable today. He suggested that the tax on annual profits of more than 15 taels be adjusted to 20%, 30 taels to 50%, taels to %, and more than million taels to %...

According to the situation in the third year of Zhengde, the average household income of ordinary people was only 82 taels, and the income of small merchants in shops was between 200 and 1,000 taels.

Such adjustments will not harm the interests of the grassroots people, but the court can reduce or even exempt the people's loan interest after increasing taxes, thereby alleviating the burden on most people.

In addition, with the implementation of the new commercial tax system, the original agricultural tax can be formulated with the same progressive tax rates based on the farmer's land.

All farmers and herdsmen must pay commercial taxes according to their annual income. Those with income below 5 guan are exempt from tax, while those with income above guan are subject to a % commercial tax. The remaining income is mainly levied according to the New Commercial Tax Law.

Based on the cultivated land produced during the Zhengde period, the output of 50 guan required at least 200 mu of cultivated land, and 100 guan required at least 400 mu of cultivated land.

Although in the past sixty years, the cultivated land area of ​​Ming Dynasty has increased from more than 800 million mu to 2.4 billion mu today, and the per capita data has reached 7.6 mu, the land is still in the hands of the powerful.

These two policies, together with the official supervision in Beijing, are sufficient to solve the current financial and social problems.

In addition to these, other policies suggested by Wang Shouren and Zhang Cong are basically aimed at solving current social contradictions and problems.

As soon as the "Twenty-Four Examples of Reform" were submitted, it immediately attracted widespread attention from all walks of life in the Ming Dynasty.

Just like in the past, the powerful and wealthy began to put pressure on the 40-year-old Emperor Zhengde Zhu Houzhao, but Zhu Houzhao obviously did not care about these so-called pressures.

Over the past ten years, he has already taken control of Yanshanwei and Jilinwei, which is more than enough to protect his own safety.

In addition, as far as Taixue technology is concerned, he also kept a trick hidden from the outside world to deal with possible problems.

So in the face of so-called pressure, he continued to live naturally in the Forbidden City, unaffected at all.

On the second day of August in the fourth year of Zhengde, Zhu Houzhao approved the administrative reform memorial of "Twenty-four Reforms", and Wang Shouren and Zhang Cong began to implement the reform.

In order to facilitate the reform, Zhu Houzhao set up the Neihang Factory to conduct inspections on the Jinyiwei, the West Factory, and the East Factory.

He appointed Hu Bing, the sixth-generation grandson of Hu Lun and his playmate, as the commander of the Neihang Factory, and launched a Beijing inspection of the factory guards on the second day of September.

The Zhengde New Deal lasted for a hundred days, and the number of officials who were dismissed reached more than 4,600, and the number of clerks reached 30,000.

In addition, the military examination was held 100 days after the announcement of the reform.

Unlike the theoretical exams in military academies, the military exams test practical skills.

The practical examination lasted for three years and was conducted from Beijing to the local district governors.

Of the sixteen Shangzhi guards that were once brave and good at fighting, except for the military officers of Jilin and Yanshan guards who passed the assessment, only the two guards commanded by Qi Jiguang, the son of Xihai Earl Qi Jingtong and the commander of Tiance guard, and Qi Jimei, the commander of Longxiang guard, passed the assessment.

Zhu Houzhao promoted Qi Jingtong to be the governor of the Central Military Governor's Office, appointed Qi Jiguang as the commander-in-chief of Bohai, and Qi Jimei as the commander-in-chief of Liaodong.

His purpose in choosing these two people to serve as the commanders-in-chief of Bohai and Liaodong was very simple, that is, the war between Korea, Japan and Siam in Kunlun Continent was getting out of control, and accidental conflicts between the North Sea and the East China Sea could occur at any time.

In October, a wave of tax resistance swept the local area.

According to the New Commercial Tax Law, local big capitalists need to pay 50% of their income in taxes, which is undoubtedly a cut of flesh for them.

Because of this, officials, businessmen and capital colluded to launch a strike campaign against regional factories and incited a large number of workers to take to the streets.

In addition, military downsizing is also underway, and such a major move will undoubtedly bring panic to those incompetent people in the army.

At this time, the Ming Dynasty had been established for 181 years. All previous dynasties, at this age, were undoubtedly on the decline.

Although the new learning has been promoted for nearly 150 years, the so-called smart people are still inferring the current situation based on past experience.

They believed that the Ming Dynasty had reached its decline. After all, after 25 years of laissez-faire during the Hongzhi reign, the Ming Dynasty showed signs of decline in all aspects.

The powerful class in the Ming Dynasty was resisting the new policies, while ordinary people were being fooled and instigated by capital.

As early as the Hongzhi period, the Daming Newspaper had been infiltrated and turned into a sieve.

Millions of workers took to the streets to protest the New Deal. Even though they had received secondary education, they only received knowledge, not ideas.

Instigated by newspapers, capital and local officials, the losses they caused are incalculable.

Faced with this situation, Wang Shouren remained calm. He and Zhang Cong first laid off all local newspaper officials, and then recruited children from good families into the newspaper to turn public opinion to his side.

As public opinion changed, a large number of workers disappeared from the streets, and those who remained were basically organized people who were paid to do things.

Faced with this group of people, Wang Shouren no longer had much patience.

Through his tactics of pursuit, torture, and investigation, a large number of officials, officials, and merchants involved in the incident were brought to justice one by one.

Many founding heroes who had lived in the Jiangnan region since the Hongwu period were eventually eliminated after enjoying their rule for more than 180 years.

On the second day of June in the fifth year of Zhengde, Zhu Houzhao re-issued the "Regulations on the Imperial Family". This version of the Regulations on the Imperial Family was not just a simple restoration, but more importantly, it involved the issue of military power.

Before June of the fifth year of Zhengde, there were 53 princes in the Ming Dynasty, 26 of whom lived in the Central Plains. The number of guards was always strictly controlled, and there was no case where the number of guards exceeded one.

In addition to these twenty-six, the remaining twenty-seven basically have two to three guards, with a total force of nearly two hundred and twenty thousand.

These twenty-seven princes are basically princes from Zhu Gaoxu's lineage, and four of them are Zhu Houzhao's half-brothers.

While the Ming army had only 800,000 soldiers, the overseas vassal kings had 220,000 soldiers and horses, and in some areas the number of troops even far exceeded that of the imperial court.

In the past, the Ming army and the palace guards still had the advantage of a generation gap in weapons. However, during the 25 years of the Hongzhi Chengping period, a few princes had actually already mastered the technology of breech-loading rifles and equipped themselves with guards.

Faced with Zhu Houzhao's policy of reducing the number of guards in all royal palaces to 3,000 people per guard, some members of the royal family who were already dissatisfied with the "New Commercial Tax Law" chose another path under the instigation of capital...

"Boom boom boom——"

"As our ancestors taught, if there are no loyal ministers in the court, there must be treacherous people. We must raise an army to punish them and clear the court of evil!"

"I am the fourth generation grandson of Emperor Shizong Wu, and the uncle of the current king. Therefore, I follow the teachings of my ancestors and obey the will of heaven to quell the rebellion!!" On the second day of July in the fifth year of Zhengde, Zhu Youji, the King of Song in Dongzhou, raised an army to quell the rebellion, occupied Jinghai Prefecture, and invited the kings of Dongzhou to quell the rebellion.

At that time, there were 26 prefectures in Dongzhou, including 16 princes who were enfeoffed as vassals, with 42 guards and a total of more than 130,000 troops.

As the great-grandson of Zhu Zhanqi, the King of Song during the Hongxi period, Zhu Youji, who was born in the 13th year of Chenghua, realized from the time he came of age that the Ming Dynasty during the Hongzhi period was on the decline.

The Prince Song's Palace originally had two guards, and because of the old system, the two guards had a total strength of 11,200 people.

When the Royal Family Regulations were relaxed, he took immediate action.

The first step was to build an officer training facility in the palace, and the second was to obtain breech-loading rifles and Chenghua-style field artillery from the soldiers of the Dongzhou Xuanwei Division.
Due to his special identity, he can also obtain some military steel through some means.

Originally, he wanted to wait for the Ming Dynasty to decline step by step, and then find an opportunity to start an army. However, he never expected that Zhu Houzhao was determined to reform and began to reduce the military power of the princes.

Zhu Houzhao's actions undoubtedly put Zhu Youji in a dilemma.

He was very clear about the current strength of the Ming Dynasty. He alone could not shake the Ming Dynasty, even though the Ming Dynasty was now on the decline.

However, after a large amount of Central Plains capital found him and offered chips, and also brought in several allies for him, he had no choice but to embark on this path.

Relying on an army of more than 10,000 officers, Zhu Youji immediately liberated the natives in the local mining area after capturing Jinghai Prefecture, and at the same time recruited some exiled criminals to fight for him.

On July 15, when the news of the rebellion of Song King Zhu Youji reached Beijing, Zhu Youji had already mobilized 100,000 troops and began to attack in all directions.

Prince Xu Zhu Houran was enfeoffed in Suining Prefecture west of Jinghai Prefecture, but in the face of Zhu Youji's appeasement, he led his guards to defend the royal city and asked Beijing for help.

On July 18th, Zhu Houjin, the Prince of Taining Prefecture, raised an army to respond to Zhu Youji. The Taining Prefecture where he was located happened to surround Suining Prefecture on both sides together with the Jinghai Prefecture.

For a time, Suining Prefecture became an isolated island, and Prince Xu Zhu Houjin could only hold his ground and not leave.

When the news reached Beijing, Zhu Houzhao ordered the Kunlun Xuanwei Office and the Beizhou Xuanwei Office to rush to Dongzhou for assistance, and ordered the commander of the Neihang Factory, Hu Bing, to find out who was supporting the King of Song and the King of Xiang behind the scenes!
At the same time, Zhu Houzhao sent a telegram to the Four Western Kings, trying to win the support of these four younger brothers by offering brotherhood and the promise not to cut the guards of the three.

In August, after failing to capture Suining for a long time, Zhu Youji attacked southwards. Prince Ji Zhu Youyan was defeated and fled to Dongzhou, then went to Chaoge Mansion in Beizhou to seek refuge with Prince Wei Zhu Youzhen to avoid disaster.

The eight kings, including the King of Ji, the King of Cao, the King of Yu, the King of Yu, and the King of Qi, led their troops to resist but failed and fled to Dongzhou one after another.

On September 12, Wang Zhen, the envoy of Dongzhou, led 20,000 regular troops and 40,000 auxiliary troops to fight against the 40,000 troops of Zhu Houjin, the Prince of Xiang, at Dongshanhe (Bogota).

When Zhu Houzhao learned of Wang Zhen's actions, he quickly sent a telegram: "Look for your mother's head! Don't fight him!"

As the descendant of Wang Xuan in the past, Wang Zhen was too arrogant to accept it. Zhu Houzhao was so angry that he sent thirteen telegrams in a row, ordering the other military officers to stop his behavior.

As Zhu Houzhao expected, Zhu Youji, who was supposed to fight in the south, suddenly led his troops to appear in Dongshanhe. Wang Zhen, who originally led 60,000 soldiers to fight against Zhu Houjin's 40,000, was suddenly wiped out by Song Xiang's 120,000-strong coalition force.

Wang Zhen abandoned the remnants of his army and fled back to Ximen Port. Upon hearing the news, Zhu Houzhao cursed him as "a humble and cowardly beast with arrogant ambitions", "a foolish and incompetent person who deserves death", and "a disgusting and murderous beast."

No matter how much they cursed, the situation in Dongzhou was critical. Apart from Xu Wang Zhu Houran in the north, only Xiang Wang Zhu Zaihou in the south was still holding on. The rest of the vassal kings were basically defeated and fled to Kunlunzhou and Beizhou.

Zhu Houzhao appointed Xihai Earl Qi Jingtong as the General Pingdong, Qi Jiguang as the General Pingdong, and Qi Jimei as the General Pingzei.

The father and his two sons were authorized to lead the four naval fleets of Beihai, Donghai, Dongyang and Daming, as well as twelve guards from Bohai, Liaodong and other places to rush to Dongzhou for assistance, and to control the troops of Beizhou and Kunlunzhou.

On the fifth day of the winter month, the remnants of the Southern Kingdom occupied Qinghuai Prefecture in Dongzhou. The Southern Kingdom was restored, and the Song-Xiang coalition forces won victory after victory.

On the 24th, Huna Muhammad, a wealthy merchant in Hezhong, gathered more than 7,000 people to rebel, but was suppressed by the head of the group Li Chengliang, who was promoted to the commander of the Congling Guard.

On the second day of the twelfth lunar month, Japanese general Ashikaga Nobunaga defeated Korean general Yi Jeong in the Great Rift Valley. Thirty thousand Korean troops were wiped out, and seventy thousand Kunlun vassal troops were captured and killed in pits.

In that year, the population of Japan reached 40 million, of which more than 3 million lived in Kunlun Continent.

After two rounds of disastrous defeats, North Korea was forced to give up a large amount of land and population, but Japan was not satisfied. In order to achieve the "Japanization of Greater Kunlun", it continued to fight with North Korea and massacred North Korean soldiers and civilians.

The Japanese army committed countless massacres in Kunlun Continent. In the twelfth month of the fifth year of Zhengde alone, there were 57 massacres recorded by Ming Dynasty travelers, with no less than 500,000 deaths.

When the news reached the Ming Dynasty, Zhu Houzhao ordered a reduction in the amount of grain trade with Japan.

This action aroused Japan's rebellious psychology. In the eyes of Ashikaga Yoshiaki, the Ming Dynasty was already in turmoil, but the Ming Dynasty still treated him like this.

Japan, not satisfied with continuing to submit to the Ming Dynasty, began to stockpile large amounts of food. During this period, the tax rate borne by the Japanese people was around 42%.

On the seventh day of the first lunar month in the sixth year of the Zhengde reign, Qi Jingtong led the expeditionary force to Ximen Port to suppress the rebellion.

Lacking warships, Zhu Youji abandoned coastal towns and burned many of them to the ground.

At that time, Dongzhou had the largest population, and its main industries were animal husbandry, mining and metallurgy, while Beizhou had more than five million people, but their main industries were farming and mining.

Even so, it was still very difficult to provide food and fodder for an expeditionary force of 90,000 and more than 300,000 civilians with five million people and more than 60 million acres of arable land.

Zhu Youji and Zhu Houjin were both aware of this truth, so they cleared the land in Dongzhou to sustain the war.

Not only that, they burned a lot of farmland to create refugees, so that the Ming army had to fight and provide disaster relief at the same time.

Even so, they still had to fight many battles with the Ming army and were defeated one after another.

In the Battle of Dongshanhe, Qi Jiguang led 20,000 vanguard troops to fight against Zhu Houjin's 40,000 troops. Unlike Wang Zhi who was arrogant and short-sighted, Qi Jiguang advanced steadily and defeated Zhu Houjin's 40,000 troops with only 20,000 troops. His own casualties were only more than 200, but he was able to behead more than 3,000 rebels.

Zhu Houjin, whose army was damaged, retreated to Taining Prefecture. Qi Jiguang led his troops in pursuit and won twelve consecutive battles, beheading more than 6,000 people. The Xiang army was forced to retreat into Taining City and hold its ground.

When Qi Jingtong led his army to Taining City, Qi Jingtong led 30,000 troops to besiege Taining City, and ordered Qi Jiguang and Qi Jimei to lead 30,000 troops each to rescue Suining Prefecture and lift the siege of Xu City.

Compared with Zhu Houjin, Zhu Youji seemed more experienced. He relied on his own strategic depth to continuously create refugees and withdraw troops, while at the same time bribing the remnants of the Southern Kingdom to make them constantly harass the Ming army's rear.

Relying on this method, the Ming army's strength was dispersed, and Zhu Youji, adhering to the idea of ​​dispersing the Ming army and infiltrating heavy troops during the movement, began to carry out a mobile annihilation of the dispersed Ming army.

Faced with this tactic, Qi Jimei's troops did suffer a lot of losses. After all, the Ming army had to garrison in too many places, and they were unfamiliar with Dongzhou, so it was inevitable that Zhu Youji would successfully infiltrate and consume a lot of troops.

Of course, the reason why it was easily inserted successfully was mainly due to the poor cooperation among the various departments.

Qi Jiguang and Qi Jimei were sent to fight in the Northeast less than a year after taking office, and were unable to train the army well.

In addition, the Ming army's large-scale combat took place more than 70 years ago, so there was no question of coordinated combat among multiple corps.

Qi Jingtong submitted a petition requesting to train troops on the spot, steadily and steadily reduce the scope of the rebels' activities, and finally surround and annihilate the rebels.

Faced with his memorial, Zhu Houzhao, Wang Shouren, Zhang Cong and others all felt that there was no problem. Instead, the group of boastful officials in the temple believed that Qi Jingtong and his son were just nurturing the enemy to protect themselves.

Zhu Houzhao was ruthless in the face of memorials from this group of officials.

Yan Song reported to the emperor that Qi Jingtong was raising bandits and was bullied, but Zhu Houzhao scolded him, "At your age, you have no shame and believe in nonsense."

Xu Jie thought that he could send a military supervisor to supervise the battle, but Zhu Houzhao scolded him: "An old barbarian who doesn't know military affairs."

Faced with memorials from some meritorious officials who wanted to take credit for his achievements, he even launched a sweeping attack, scolding the meritorious officials as "arrogant, short-sighted, shameless, and like beasts."

In addition, there are words such as "despicable", "lowly", "cowardly", "confused", and "fart", which often appear randomly in the form of a "combination punch".

Mu Rong, the Duke of Qian, pleaded for Wang Zhen, but Zhu Houzhao started to scold him:
"Wang Zhi has failed me and is a mediocre and shameless person. You, Mu Rong, are also a mediocre and dishonorable person."

This scolding made Mu Rong so angry that he collapsed and died of illness a few days later.

However, Zhu Houzhao did not stop there. After all, he had already been fed up with these mediocre and incompetent guys during the Hongzhi period.

In addition to scolding directly, Zhu Houzhao also used sarcasm, irony, admonitions, and threats to his subjects on a daily basis. In short, he always taught them how to be officials and how to be human beings.

After his scolding, the number of people submitting petitions gradually decreased.

It seemed that as long as they submitted a memorial, the ministers would be scolded by Zhu Houzhao. Not only would they be punished during the imperial examination, but they would also be mentally insulted by Zhu Houzhao.

Fortunately, when faced with reasonable memorials, Zhu Houzhao was able to review them calmly. For example, many memorials from Hai Rui often embarrassed Zhu Houzhao. Some of them even bluntly said that Zhu Houzhao's language was vulgar and that a ruler should not be like this and should set an example.

Facing Hai Rui's frank words, Zhu Houzhao simply replied: "I don't want to be the emperor, but it is a gift from heaven, so I can only do my best."

"Your political views in your memorial are very good, and there is no falsehood in them. They are all beneficial to the country and the people, and they are in my heart."

"If all officials are like you, why would I scold them?"

"You should take good care of yourself so that you can be loyal and responsible to me and the Ming Dynasty."

It can be said that in comparison, even if Hai Rui attacked Zhu Houzhao in the face, Zhu Houzhao would not be angry, but would applaud and let the officials learn from him.

There is no need to say more about other memorials like those from Wang Shouren, Zhang Cong and others.

He has a clear mind and can see clearly who is loyal and who is treacherous, and who can be used...

(End of this chapter)