Datang Nongsheng

Chapter 606 Tubo's Interesting Decision

The reproductive ability of the Chinese people has always been super strong. When there is no economic pressure, everyone is willing to have a few more children. The tradition of having more children and more grandchildren is not known when it was passed down.

The Sun family was no exception, but this time Sun Xiangfu didn't get what he wanted, because both Hongmei and Chuntao gave birth to sons, and in the words of later generations, they were both debt collectors.

However, before these two debt collectors collect their debts, they first helped Sun Xiangfu earn a lot of money. In Jingzhou area, the eldest Sun Wuji, who is the most powerful in the officialdom, and Wang Xu, the most charismatic member of the aristocratic group, are praised by everyone in the business world. Brothers Ma Lin, Zhang Quan, Wang Fu and Wang Gui all gathered at Sun's house in Jiuyuan County on the third day of junior high school, and lined up to give Sun Xiangfu gifts.

The reason for queuing up is because the people of Jiuyuan County have come to give congratulatory gifts. They are not expensive things. According to the local customs, red eggs are served for the full moon wine, so everyone brought eggs. As a result, the eggs collected by the Sun family can be calculated by ton.

Changsun Wuji cared a lot about his official image among the people, so he insisted on queuing behind the people who arrived first. It is forbidden to enter the house after the people have dispersed.

"It takes an hour to line up to say congratulations. There is no second one in the entire Tang Dynasty."

"It seems that I, the master, have neglected you. Please make atonement, atonement!"

Both of them were talking with smiles, it was purely a joke. At this time, seeing Uncle De outside the gate also brought Wang Xu, Ma Lin, Zhang Quan and others in, the eldest grandson Wuji gave Sun Xiangfu a look, and the two were very happy. Soon came to the study to talk.

"Chengqian severely humiliated the Tubo envoy in Chang'an." Changsun Wuji took a sip of tea and said directly.

"What's the situation?" Recently, many ministers have asked Sun Xiangfu in letters, but he knows that Tubo sent envoys to Chang'an.

"Chengqian said, you taught him that the country should have the integrity of discord, no tribute, no compensation, no land, no tribute, the emperor guards the country, and the king dies. Therefore, he regarded Tubo's coming to propose marriage as a To tarnish my integrity in the Tang Dynasty, when the Tubo envoys arrived in Chang'an, they had to enter the city through the Yanping Gate, and let them kneel down in front of the city gate and salute the subjects who were watching on the city wall."

"And then? Did the Tubo envoys kneel down and worship?"

"Okay, this time, they came to pay tribute in the attitude of a lower state, but the gift list and marriage proposal document they presented were thrown down from the tower by Chengqian in public."

"This is a bit too much, what is the reaction of the people?"

It is definitely a great humiliation to discard the credentials held by the envoy who recognizes your status as a kingdom in public. Usually, it will lead to a freezing point in the relationship between the two countries. As far as the current disparity in strength between Datang and Tubo is concerned, I am not afraid What actions do they have, and even hope that they will run down from the plateau to fight a war.

But this kind of behavior will damage Li Chengqian's personal image. After all, he is an envoy who expresses his submission. Even if you are dissatisfied with his request, just refuse. Excessive humiliation will make people think you are mean and mean.

"The common people cheered for a while. After all, the people in Chang'an City know that Tubo has the intention of meddling in the Tang Dynasty, but it is the performance of the two brothers, Xiruo and Qinling..." Changsun Wuji said here, Frowning, Sun Xiangfu knew that it was a worried expression.

The sons of Lu Dongzan are not weaker than him. After his death, the eldest son, Zan Xiruo, assisted Mansong Mangzan for 18 years, raising the national power of Tubo to an unprecedented level. Ziqin Mausoleum is known as the God of the Tubo Army. After taking the position of Zan Xiruo, he was nearly [-] years old, and in the battle of Dafeichuan, he wiped out [-] Tang troops and almost killed Xue Rengui. Nearly eighty years old, together with his younger brother Zanpo, he defeated General Wu Zhou Li Jingxuan and Wang Xiaojie.

During the more than 50 years when their brothers were in charge of Tubo, there were few defeats in Tubo's war against the Tang Dynasty, which laid the foundation for Tubo to become a world power.

Sun Xiangfu didn't know about these histories, he only knew that in history, even at the time when the Tang Dynasty was at its strongest, Tubo could not be wiped out, on the contrary, it was almost wiped out by Tubo. , Sun Xiangfu has always maintained sufficient vigilance against Tubo.

"What happened to their brother's performance?"

"It's a little weird, it's hard to guess."

"Why is it weird?"

"After being humiliated and rejected, they didn't show much anger. Instead, they knelt outside the Yanping Gate, allowing the ministers and common people on the city wall to watch, and begged His Majesty to let them see their father."

Hearing this, Sun Xiangfu's heart skipped a beat. This move of the two brothers seemed to have lost Tubo's face, but it also gave Datang a bad reputation of bullying the weak. Thinking about it, he is as smart as Li Shimin, so he can't fail to see at this point.

Sure enough, Changsun Wuji said again, "Later, when His Majesty found out about this, he immediately allowed their brothers to visit him in prison. After they had seen Lu Dongzan, they didn't mention marriage proposals or release him back to Lu Dongzan. , but to ask His Majesty to give Tubo [-] sets of Four Books and Five Classics."

"Oh, this really surprised me." Sun Xiangfu was a little confused when he heard this.

In fact, this problem is not difficult to understand if it is looked at by someone who is familiar with the general trend of history, because the Tibetan kingdom of slavery in this period had an extremely strong desire for knowledge. In history, why did they deliberately seek knowledge? Princess Datang?

Songtsan Gampo is not one who lacks women. He has long married Princess Chizun of Nepal as his wife. What he seeks is the cultural knowledge and craftsmanship of the Tang Dynasty. want something.

Li Shimin thought that sending some Buddhist scriptures to the plateau could change the nature of the nation. In fact, this is not the case. Not only did Tubo not decline because of the entry of religion, but because of the entry of religion, all the people in their country A high degree of unity appeared in the tribe, which led to a leap in its overall strength.

Because, in places with a low level of civilization, religious culture is always easier to spread than other ruling cultures. For example, in Lingnan and Yunnan, everyone believed in witch doctors, even if that set was not at all No matter how clever it is, it is more powerful than the tribal leader, and it also awes the people.

The country of Wa is also an example of using theocracy to assert imperial power and finally successfully achieve great unification.

Li Shimin's approach in history, the final result was that Tubo became stronger and stronger, and after more than 100 years, Chang'an was broken.

But now, under the guise of getting married, they actually asked Datang for the Four Books and Five Classics, which made the whole thing even more interesting.

Judging from their praise for brother Xiruo, it seems that from the very beginning, they never thought about the success of their marriage proposal. After being rejected, they turned to ask for a book, which was their real purpose.

Even, the [-] sets of Four Books and Five Classics were probably called out on purpose by them to ask Datang to counter the price. Sun Xiangfu felt that even if Li Shimin only gave them [-] sets, they would go back in a hurry.

Because, since the Battle of Yanpingmen, the local population of Tubo has not even reached 100 million. He wants [-] sets of the Four Books and Five Classics, which can almost give them all the people under their control, and everyone will distribute one copy.

Even Tang Dynasty was not rich enough to allow everyone to read books, so how could it be possible for everyone in Tubo to read books!

"What does Zhengming think about this matter?" Knowing that Sun Xiangfu still had guests outside, Changsun Wuji asked without delaying his time.

"Easy, give them."

"Give them all? That's [-] sets, hundreds of thousands of books."

"The printing factory has engravings of the Four Books and Five Classics. The cost of printing a set of books is just paper, ink, and some labor costs. On average, the cost of printing a set is less than one hundred pennies, which is [-] sets. , It’s only a cost of about [-] guan. Didn’t they send [-] yaks and [-] war horses? We’ve made a lot of money.” Sun Xiangfu slightly calculated the account for Changsun Wuji.

"However, with so many books flowing into Tubo, won't it affect my Tang Dynasty?"

"If it is a book like "Qi Min Yao Shu", one book is too much. If it is the Four Books and Five Classics, 100 million copies, I think it is too little! In addition, if they do not know Chinese characters, I think they can send some Scholars who are willing to contribute to the liberation of the plateau go to Tubo. I think that since the Tubo people can go up, we Han people may not be unable to go up. We may need to explore and master the method of adapting. Even if we can’t find any effective method in the end, as long as Everyone in Tubo knows men and speaks Chinese, so the day when they are conquered by us is not far away."

Listening to what Sun Xiangfu said, Changsun Wuji remained silent for a long time. On the Tubo Plateau, Tang Jun suffered from severe altitude sickness just by going up, and it was difficult to move around, let alone high-intensity confrontation and fighting. Conquering by force, at present Kind of impractical.

In addition to force, the only thing Datang can use is cultural conquest. The method Sun Xiangfu said is a strategy that saves effort and is feasible.

"Okay! This matter, I will report to His Majesty to facilitate it, but it is Jiangling's matter. I have to ask you, is it really appropriate to let the hill of the Wang family take up most of the benefits?" Changsun Wuji figured it out. , nodded.

"For the imperial court, it doesn't matter who takes advantage of it. It's not the same tax collection. Whoever collects the tax is collected. But for their various hilltop forces, there will be different situations. This imbalance In order to stimulate them to compete for each other's interests, as long as they compete with each other, the imperial court can take the opportunity to do a lot of things.

A few days ago, Prime Minister Xiao wrote to me and asked me how to allocate the cultivated land of our Tang Dynasty more reasonably. Give policy a slant, non-conformists, you know what to do. "

Nationwide land allocation requires the face of powerful landlords across the country. Now that the imperial court has grasped their interests, they must use these interests to achieve the imperial court's political goals. It is definitely not possible to deploy it with the military farmland reclaimed by the army. This has too strong geographical space restrictions and cannot take care of the people of the whole country.

There is another reason, that is, the undeveloped land is not infinite. After the population enters a high-speed growth, it is necessary to leave enough reserve space to rectify these landowners who hold a large amount of high-quality land but do not actually participate in the cultivation. Only the powerful can reserve more reserve space to prevent future social conflicts due to resource allocation problems, let alone allow these powerful landlords to hoard land again at this time when the agricultural tax exemption policy is to be implemented.

(End of this chapter)