Lin Gao Qiming

Chapter 611 War Guiding Principles
The venue finally gradually quieted down.Xiao Zishan first read the full text of the telegram from Guangzhou.Subsequently, the Plenary Assembly was requested to discuss the issue.

Of course, the conference is not to discuss whether to fight a war, nor is it to discuss how to win it.With the power of the crossing group, it is not a problem to win the [-] to [-] crusade army.The main purpose of this meeting is to decide the scale of the war and what to do after the battle is won.

Of course, the determination of the veterans was unanimous, that is, if there is no fight, it will be fine, and if there is a fight, the Ming army will be crippled and broken.This made it impossible for him to covet the Lingao regime and achieve the goal of peace by force.

But on the issue of how far to stop the fight, there was a big debate again at the meeting.

In the end, three mainstream propositions were formed:
The first is to maintain the current situation of no fighting, no going, and no appeasement. In the future, the Ming army will be completely defeated and wiped out, and it will end and continue to occupy Lingao.

Supporters believe that the advantage of this is that it will not completely tear the skin off with Daming, and it can still ensure the smooth flow of maritime trade channels with Daming, and it is also conducive to ensuring the safety of Guangzhou and Leizhou.As long as Guangdong officials do not fall into the prefectures and counties, they can still hide their defeat and claim victory after a disastrous defeat.In other words, keep the underpants for the Guangdong government.

The second is to pursue the Ming army to Qiongshan with a big victory, destroy the Ming army in Baisha Water Village, completely wipe out the main force of the Ming army in Hainan, and then attack the states and counties in Hainan to quickly occupy the entire island.So that the human and material resources of the entire Hainan Island can be fully utilized by the Time Travel Group.The formation of a separatist regime in Hainan.

The third is an upgraded version of the second, advocating not only occupying all of Hainan, but also conducting a punitive expedition to Guangzhou.Some people proposed to use holy ships to bombard the city of Guangzhou with heavy artillery on the deck to create panic in the whole of Guangzhou; Someone suggested that Wang Zunde's family should be wiped out directly.

Each of the three schemes has a group of supporters, and they fought with each other at the conference, refusing to give in to each other.

In general, the second and third are actually the difference between fifty steps and one hundred steps.The third is actively supported by Skade, who proposed a complete strategic plan:

1. Seize the whole of Hainan. Anyway, we have torn face with the Ming government, so we must take the opportunity to seize the whole of Hainan.Otherwise, the crossing country cannot develop.

2. Try to wipe out the Ming army on land, not just repel it at sea, so that Ming will be unable to attack in three or four years.And there will be a large number of captives as labor and bargaining chips!
3. Moderately counterattack the mainland, strive to seize the surrounding areas of Guangzhou, and even temporarily surround the city of Guangzhou, to fully deter Ming, but it is not suitable to capture Guangzhou, and the crossing country is not yet ready to compete in the mainland.

4. Pay attention to public opinion propaganda and protect private property.Our policy is to oppose the unprovoked raids by the Guangdong government, against corrupt officials who use the raids as an excuse to plunder people's wealth and kill good people for meritorious service.But it does not oppose the imperial court (internal opposition, external opposition), leaving room for peace talks.Protecting private property wins hearts and minds.

5. To force peace through war, Lingao is not afraid of Da Ming coming to fight, but he does not want to cut off trade with Da Ming within a few years.Therefore, for the time being after the war, peace talks with Da Ming were the main policy, and it was really impossible to negotiate.

In addition to these five points, Skade clearly requested to create panic in Guangzhou: He proposed to learn from the British model of burning Copenhagen, launch Congreve rockets on a large scale, or occupy Baiyun Mountain, and set up cannons on it to bombard the Guangzhou government office .

Ma Qianju offered to speak.

He stepped onto the podium and said, "Old men and women, whether to occupy Hainan after defeating the Ming army, or whether to bombard Guangzhou, we must first obey our political needs—the so-called military is the continuation of politics." He coughed, "In our Before discussing how large the scale of the war should be, I suggest that everyone first sort out the political and economic demands of the group in recent years."

The so-called political demands are directly related to the economic demands of the Traveling Group.

"For now, we still rely heavily on the resources, population, and sales markets in the Ming government-controlled area." Ma Qianju said, "If we use too fierce warfare, not only will Ming Dynasty not be able to obey our orders because of fear Will, on the contrary, will cause Ming Dynasty to carry out a comprehensive political and economic blockade against us, and it will inevitably be accompanied by continuous military offensives. Even if such military offensives are completely ineffective, the Ming government will continue to carry out such offensives to maintain the pursuit face."

"The Dugong is advocating his turtle technology tree theory again." Someone whispered in the seat.

"And he's right. It's fun to fight, but you always have to wipe your ass when you're done."

Skade immediately objected: "When we set up the cannon on Baiyun Mountain, I think Wang Zunde will still be tough! If not, let him release [-] Congreve rockets from the Pearl River! Burn Guangzhou!"

Lin Shenhe frowned below: Ten thousand.This group of people really just opened their mouths.The rocket was created by the first weapon design team a long time ago, and it was used to let off fireworks.Up to now, although the Congreve rocket has not been used yet, it has been included in his list of weapons to be eliminated. The first team has tested several Hale rockets of different calibers.This rocket is far more advanced than Congreve and doesn't require long stabilizer bars.

"The Ming Dynasty is not the Qing Dynasty. There is no senior official like Qi Shan who understands the general situation and takes the overall situation into consideration." Ji Tuisi snorted, "If we want to mess around like this, we just wait for the imperial court to collect Qiong's salary and start a war with us every year."

"Are we still afraid that the Ming army will fail, and then explain that the court's collection of Qiong's salary is not a dead end, which hastened the process of collapse?" Skade said.

"That's right, but the economy and population of Ming Dynasty are a hundred times that of ours. If the other side wants to be serious, send someone like a cabinet scholar to supervise the teachers. Fighting all day long is not good for industrial upgrading." Ma Qianju Go ahead and stick to your own opinion.

"It doesn't matter what the war is, the army has to be fought." When Wei Aiwen heard that there was going to be a war, he was already very excited and made a military expansion plan.He speculated that the naval division of the Ming army was not good enough, and the land division must be the main force. This is a good time for the army to shine.Moreover, the Ming army came with tens of thousands of people, and the army and company auxiliary troops added up to less than 4000 people.After deliberation, a group of people in the Young Officers Club believed that this was a good opportunity to ask the Senate to pass a resolution on large-scale military expansion.

The foreign enemy is at the head, and the army comes again. If the army does not expand, who will expand?This is what Wei Aiwen and Zhang Bolin had in mind.

"Wars cost money and consume materials. It is pure consumption. Our war mode is different from the army in this time and space. It is a typical high-consumption war. If we can't occupy the territory and population, this kind of war will not be worth the candle. It's gone." Ma Qianju was not very keen on the suggestion of fighting.

"I think it's better to take this opportunity to occupy Guangzhou, and then control the entire Pearl River Delta. With this territory, people need people, and materials need materials."

"Occupy the entire Pearl River Delta with an army of [-]? Defending Hainan has the support of the navy, which can offset the enemy's numerical advantage. On the mainland, this force is not enough."

"That's why we need to expand the size of the army." Wei Aiwen waited for this sentence.

"I am firmly opposed to investing too much resources in military projects at this critical moment of industrial upgrading." Wu De immediately expressed his opposition, "Occupying the Pearl River Delta region will inevitably involve us in long-term large-scale military conflicts. Excessive consumption of our limited strength."

Qian Shuiting also objected: "The size of the army is already sufficient to meet the existing tasks. Even in this battle, appropriate temporary supplementary troops and auxiliary militias are enough. There is no need to blindly expand the number of standing troops. And in our situation, there is no need Too many armies..."

"What did you say?!" Wei Aiwen jumped up - in his opinion, this kind of statement humiliated Lu Jun in public, "You are slandering Lu Jun!"

"I don't think this is slander." Qian Shuiting did not back down. "The size of the army must conform to the existing economic scale. I oppose all blind expansion of military operations."

"You are short-sighted..."

Xiao Zishan slammed the mallet: "Be careful with your words! Please don't make personal attacks!"

The motion to occupy the Pearl River Delta was quickly rejected, and most of the elders believed that it surpassed the current strength of the Traversing Group.Premature occupation of densely populated areas in the absence of military and administrative personnel will inevitably lead to a large number of old ruling personnel and institutions.Moreover, the Guangdong region was an important source of fiscal revenue for the Ming government, and the Ming government would never sit idly by.

Once caught in continuous military operations, it will seriously hinder industrial upgrading.And then affect the subsequent development.This is unacceptable especially for those in the industrial sector.Although the personnel at the industrial entrance very much hope to see the guns and weapons they make on the battlefield, they also hope to see the establishment of a modern large-scale industrial system in their own hands.

As for the agricultural port headed by Wu Nanhai, it is even more opposed to expanding the scale of the war-the agricultural port is more worried about its own pots and pans than the industrial port-the pots and jars of the industrial port are fortified anyway, agricultural land, irrigation systems, etc. The basic construction cannot be defended at all, and I also worry that the farmers and workers I have managed to train will be dragged to fight.

Therefore, Agrokou held the most conservative position at the meeting.The only requirement is to be able to repel the attack of the Ming army.Of course, Wu Nanhai also demanded that the enemy army be wiped out in order to convert the captives into agricultural workers.

But most people believe that the time has come to occupy the whole of Hainan.It is limited to Lingao again, and the future development space is very limited.And it left a lot of trouble behind.It was always possible for the imperial court to use local political institutions and resources to launch a siege.Moreover, the orthodox status of the imperial court has always been on Daming's side.The people in Lingao will feel like "following the thieves". Once the situation is slightly unstable, the people's hearts are likely to collapse.The survey of the Political Security Bureau shows that many "get rich first" people have a kind of worry about the future.

Seeing that the atmosphere at the venue clearly disapproved of the plan of only keeping Lingao, Ma Qianju decided to abandon plan A of only keeping Lingao and use plan B instead.

"First of all, do we need to maintain superficial peace with Ming Dynasty?" Ma Qianju said, "From a strategic point of view, this is very necessary!
"If we want to maintain economic and trade relations with the mainland and continue to import people and goods from the mainland, it is very important to maintain a superficial peace with the Ming government." Ma Qianju said, "So I oppose all expansion of the war to the mainland. What to do. Once the war spreads to the mainland, Ming Dynasty will definitely cut off trade and population flow with us.”

Of course, judging from Ming's administrative execution ability and limited sea operation ability, this kind of blockade is definitely incomplete.Moreover, the Traveling Group does not have to worry about finding enough agents to serve itself, and the business-intelligence system of the Shanhai Road under construction can also play a supplementary role.But such "smuggling" activities far exceed normal trade in terms of scale and cost.

"The means we use must be strategic—the Guangdong government must leave a fig leaf so that Wang Zunde, Li Fengjie and others can continue to fool around."

To achieve this goal, the cross-travel group cannot use overly drastic means-it cannot engage in large-scale beheading operations, it cannot bombard Guangzhou, and it is even inappropriate to openly occupy the government offices of various counties in Hainan.In short, it is necessary to give the local government of Guangdong a reason to save face and take responsibility.

"Secondly, do we want to occupy the whole territory of Hainan?" Ma Qianju talked eloquently, "I think this is necessary."

Someone below muttered: "Is this different from Duke Du's attitude a few days ago?"

It is too slow to increase the population solely by recruiting refugees from the mainland.Occupying the whole of Hainan will enable the Crossing Group to control at least 20 Han populations and an unknown number of Li and Miao populations—the latter numbering at least [-] to [-].This is much faster than the hundreds to thousands of mainland migrants moving in every month.Moreover, the number of refugees in Guangdong is unstable, and there is no long-term stable supply.Popping on-site is a good way to save time until other sources of population are exploited.

By occupying the whole of Hainan, the "Lingao Experience" can be promoted on a larger scale and the reform of the civil administration system can be carried out.This is also an experiment, but the scale has been expanded from a mere Lingao County to the entire Hainan Island. This is a test for the indigenous staff trained by the Traveling Group over the years.The Traveling Group also needs to use this to sum up the experience and lessons of training indigenous personnel and local administration, and prepare for ruling a wider area in the future.

"It is too difficult to occupy the whole of Hainan without being able to maintain superficial peace with the Ming government." Some people questioned, "The loss of a county is a major event to be reported to the court, let alone the loss of a government! Wang Zunde and Li Fengjie may not be able to Playing deaf and dumb to this point."

"So I suggest maintaining the Lingao model in the whole of Hainan, that is, we will wipe out all the subalterns and let our native administrators take over, emptying local officials and establishing our actual rule over Hainan. Example payment."

Qiongzhou Prefecture is located in a remote place, and the ruling foundation of the Ming Dynasty is extremely weak. Except for counties such as Danzhou, Lingao, Qiongshan, and Wenchang, which are relatively well established, the presence of local governments in Changhua, Yazhou and other places is very weak. Basically, government orders do not leave the city gate.There are several counties where no county magistrate has been appointed for a long time, and miscellaneous officials are acting as the county government. It is quite easy to take over the power from the county government—in many places, there is no county government in the first place.

Jiang Shan did not speak at the venue, he felt that this plan was a bit wishful thinking.It's okay for Lingao County, but it may be very difficult for Qiongzhou Prefecture to do this.There are several yamen in Qiongzhou Mansion: Qiongzhou Mansion, Qiongshan County, Hainan Road, Chief Secretary Branch Office, Haiphong Counselor...

With so many officials, it is not as simple as being in Lingao. In case a stunned young man who is unwilling to go along with the situation is emptied, and he must work hard to do something, it will be difficult to evade the local government. Perfect as tall.

And Qiongshan County also has a garrison.If the ostensible existence of the Ming regime is to be maintained, will the more than 2000-man ship of the Qiongya coastal defense general be allowed to continue to be stationed?This is the court's master of economics, not the already decadent guard.Even if it is destroyed in battle, it must be rebuilt.On the side of the couch, is such a team allowed to exist?

Jiang Shan thought, the most difficult thing is: once the counter-offensive army and navy approach Qiongzhou City and break through the Baisha Water Village, the officials of Qiongzhou Prefecture and Qiongshan County will either surrender or commit suicide.No matter which approach is taken, the news of the fall of Qiongzhou Fucheng will inevitably spread. Wang Zunde and others absolutely do not have the courage to lie and claim that the Fucheng is not lost.

But he does not plan to question these issues in person - there will be a special meeting to discuss this matter when it is implemented.In any case, whether it is to maintain "apparent peace" or to completely tear the face apart, he is in favor of occupying the whole of Hainan.

Although some people questioned whether this "maintaining superficial peace" could be achieved, most of the elders still had great enthusiasm for occupying the whole of Hainan—after all, Lingao was too small a place.Many people have a vague hope that once the political power is extended to the whole of Hainan, everyone will be able to hold their own - even if it is not good, they will be able to serve as the chief executive of other counties.

In the end, the Senate adopted three guiding principles for this war:

[-]. Completely wipe out the invading Ming army and other enemies from all walks of life, and at the same time eliminate the vital forces of the Hainan Ming army.

[-]. Occupy the whole of Hainan under favorable conditions.

[-]. The war will be limited to Hainan Island and the surrounding sea areas, and shall not be extended to the mainland and other sea areas—unless there is the approval of the Senate.

This operation was named the "Second Anti-Encirclement and Suppression Operation".

Skelder continued to tout the postwar program of peace talks with the local government of Guangdong.

The specific plan was to quickly release several high-ranking captives back to Guangzhou after the war, try to contact the top figures in the Guangdong government, and demand peace talks with them.Then send a special person to negotiate.

The location of the peace talks can be set in Macau, and the Portuguese will guarantee the safety of both sides.If the Portuguese were unreliable, other remote locations were also an option.

(End of this chapter)