I want to be emperor

Chapter 500 Check and Balance of Military Power
Since ancient times, meritorious service has been a very dangerous profession, and the greater the merit, the more dangerous it is.

When the credit is so great that there is no reward to reward, it is basically close to death.

Especially more than 200 years ago, Zhu Yuanzhang liked to kill heroes, which left a great deterrent to future generations.

The founding generals of the Great Chu Empire, ordinary generals naturally don't have to worry about such things, but those generals with outstanding military exploits, in fact, many people are very worried about the future outcome.

For example, Li Chengtong.

In fact, Li Chengtong led his troops to capture Youzhou City last year, and then led his troops to capture Shanhaiguan. After defeating the coalition forces of Dongyao and Wu Xiang in Shanhaiguan, he had initially stabilized the situation in the north, and he had already resigned from Luo Zhixue. .

Of course, not through a formal memorial, but through various hints.

At least Li Chengtong didn't want to continue to be the commander of the Northeast Campaign, and he didn't want to lead troops to conquer the captives in the future, and then directly make a contribution to regain Liaodong and destroy the country.

When the time comes, how should His Majesty reward himself?

Is it possible to really get a marshal out?

Or give yourself a king of the opposite sex in terms of title?

That is the way to die.

Although the military rank system of the Great Chu Empire has the word marshal, it only exists in the documents, and it belongs to the top military rank. When the military ranks were first established, Luo Zhixue made it very clear that the rank of marshal is not awarded unless the merits of saving the country .

However, no matter how great Li Chengtong's contribution is, it cannot reach the level of saving the country.

Because the Great Chu Empire is very powerful, there is no need for him to save it...

So in terms of military rank, general is almost at the top.

In terms of titles, among the titles of meritorious officials in the Great Chu Empire, the Duke is the top one. There is no such thing as a king of the opposite sex. The titles of the Great Chu Empire, that is, county kings or princes, are only awarded to the clan.

The emperor's son confers on the prince or county king, and the prince's son can inherit the county king.

Others are not allowed to be crowned kings.

So Li Chengtong's rank of general came to an end, and his title of knighthood also came to an end after he was conferred the title of Duke.

At this time, if Li Chengtong is still relying on the post of commander of the Northeast Campaign, and then he makes a contribution to destroying the country, how will you ask His Majesty to reward him?

As a smart man, a senior general who can command hundreds of thousands of troops to launch large-scale battles, Li Chengtong is not an idiot, on the contrary, he sees things clearly.

Instead of thinking about how His Majesty will award rewards in the future, it is better not to give His Majesty a chance to think about it.

A qualified courtier will not embarrass his Majesty.

Ever since, after he was granted the title of duke, he formally resigned, not through a hint, but through a formal letter.

Sometimes, you can take a step back, and you can even go a step further.

Li Chengtong has already achieved the ultimate in leading the army, but he still hasn't done anything at a higher level, such as the counselor's confidentiality.

If he had the opportunity to enter the Imperial Study Room in the future and enjoy the addiction of the Minister of Affairs, he would be very happy.

And the military generals who can enter the imperial study room, even if they are only co-organizing ministers, are all military generals serving in Gyeonggi without exception, and none of them are generals who lead troops outside.

After taking retreat as an advance, His Majesty also approved his resignation, and transferred him to Jinling to take up a post, and smoothly entered the Imperial Study Room as a co-organizer.

Similarly, Huang Dingquan, who led the army outside like him, also made the same choice. Although Huang Dingquan shows his loyalty to others, it does not mean that he is a fool.

If he was an idiot, he would not have been able to squeeze out a large number of people to gain the trust of Luo Zhixue when he was in Funiu Mountain at the earliest. For the Great Chu Empire, Shaanxi is relatively strong, and the troops from the Central Plains and other places cannot go south, ensuring the safety of the Great Chu Empire's north.

In this way, the Great Chu Empire was able to free up its hands to go south to Chunan and east to Jiangnan.

So Huang Dingquan also resigned, and was transferred back to Gyeonggi with Luo Zhixue's approval.

The transfer of these two people also made many people in the court, especially the generals, breathe a sigh of relief.

In the future, Luo Zhi would not dare to say whether he would kill the heroes, but for now, at least His Majesty still treats them kindly.

At the same time, Li Chengtong also found out a new way to retreat for the generals who lead troops abroad.

That is, after leading troops abroad to the commanding side, when the military rank has reached the level of general and cannot be further promoted, there is still a new way of promotion, that is, returning to Gyeonggi to enter the Royal Study Room.

In this way, the military power can be handed over smoothly, avoiding His Majesty's suspicion, and at the same time, he can participate in the real strategic decision-making of the empire.

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Luo Zhixue could somewhat guess the thoughts of the courtiers, but in fact Luo Zhixue felt that they were overthinking...

If you want to rebel, you have to have this ability!
He, Luo Zhixue, has fought all the way to conquer the world, and his personal prestige is so great that it is unimaginable. He even said bluntly that as long as he is still alive, the empire will not be in chaos, regardless of whether it is Li Chengtong or Huang Dingquan, or even if someone really appears Marshal, you have to lie obediently in front of him, Luo Zhixue.

As for the problem that after Luo Zhixue's death, heirs cannot control the powerful ministers, although this exists objectively, it has been avoided in many ways. For example, the general who leads the army is not static, but keeps changing. A smooth transition of military power can be achieved through normal exchange.

Finally, in fact, prestige, tactics and planning are secondary. The most important thing is that the Great Chu Empire has a complete system of power checks and balances to prevent the army from becoming the private army of a certain general.

Not to mention the separation of the military and the government, and even the military power is divided into several parts, and they do not belong to each other.

For example, the right to recruit soldiers is the authority of the Ministry of Military Affairs.

The recruits are recruited by the Recruitment Division under the leadership of the Ministry of Military and Political Affairs, and through the cooperation of the recruiting agencies of the garrison headquarters of each province, recruit recruits, and then conduct recruit training.

The recruits who have completed the training are handed over to the various units.

During the whole process of recruiting new recruits, there was nothing to do with the frontline generals... Even after several reforms, there was nothing to do with the staff.

Similarly, the training and assignment of officers is also the responsibility of the Ministry of Military Affairs.

However, the Ministry of Military and Political Affairs cannot directly command them to fight. The training and command of existing troops is the authority of the General Staff Department.

During this process, the provincial garrison command assigned the command authority of some second-class divisions, but this part of authority was also strictly limited. One of them was that the garrison command did not mean that it could command all the second-class divisions in the province.

Part of the second-class divisions that were assembled to assist the first-class divisions in combat were not under the jurisdiction of the garrison headquarters of each province, but were deployed to each army or frontier defense, under the jurisdiction of the campaign headquarters, or under the direct control of the staff headquarters.

Only the second-class divisions scattered in various places and stationed in various cities with sentries, battalions, and regiments as units are under the jurisdiction of the provincial garrison headquarters.

In addition, the deployment of the scattered second-class divisions under the jurisdiction of the garrison headquarters was also greatly restricted.

For example, the infantry post of a second-class division stationed in county A, this company is under the command of the local garrison headquarters on a daily basis, and the county garrison has no right to mobilize the second-class division under its jurisdiction to perform tasks.

The higher-level government-level garrison command has this authority. Similarly, this government-level garrison command has no right to command the troops under its jurisdiction to go out of the government to perform tasks. The higher-level provincial-level garrison command has this authority.

The provincial garrison command also has no right to mobilize the second-class divisions under its jurisdiction to go out of the province to fight. The staff has this authority.

To put it simply, the Great Chu Empire divided the second-class divisions into two types. One is the second-class divisions that are stationed in scattered places on weekdays. There is a kind of local garrison force, which is somewhat similar to the armed police. This belongs to the local garrison Under the jurisdiction of the headquarters.

The other is to go to the front line to cooperate with the first-class divisions to fight, or to gather large-scale troops and station them in important places, mainly some fortresses, and the second-class divisions for frontier defense. These are the real second-line troops and directly belong to the staff. Jurisdiction, such as the Wusong Fortress, the 130th Eighth Division that was established not long ago, this division is the garrison force of the Wusong Fortress, with jurisdiction over the heavy artillery unit and garrison infantry, directly under the jurisdiction of the staff.

There are also more than a dozen second-class divisions stationed in Jiliao, Xuanda, and Shaanxi-Gansu. These are serious frontier troops, but they lack mobility. These second-class divisions belong to the Northeast Campaign Command or Xuanda, It is under the jurisdiction of the Shaanxi-Gansu Frontier Command.

Through a multi-level command system, Luo Zhixue divides the command power into fragments, and there will be no such thing as a high-level general outside who can directly control all local troops.

Finally, there is a rotation system!
Just like the rotation of civil servants every few years, the generals of the military will also rotate, and even this rotation is more frequent than that of civilian officials.

A civil official may be in charge of a place for several years before being rotated, and may also serve in one place for a long time, but this situation is impossible to see in the military.

The generals in the military will not serve for a long time, not to mention the era of large-scale military expansion, even if they are stabilized now, even if they are not promoted within two or three years, they must be transferred.

If it is a promotion, they must be directly transferred from the original unit.

And since last year, the Great Chu Empire Army has implemented a policy of remote promotion. This policy is very simple, and you must be transferred from the original unit when you are promoted.

For example, if a colonel serving in the first division is promoted to brigadier general, he must leave the division and serve in other division-level units.

Brigadier generals are promoted to major generals, major generals are promoted to lieutenant generals, and lieutenant generals are promoted to senior generals.

Anyway, you are not allowed to be promoted in the original unit, and you are not allowed to go around in one place and then climb all the way up, forming a trend that cannot be dropped.

Similar to these restrictions on military power, there are many more policies to prevent the army from becoming generals' private soldiers. For example, equipment issues are all directly developed and purchased by the Ordnance Department.

Another example is the military salary of the soldiers. This is not directly distributed to the army chief officer, and then let the army chief officer distribute it to the soldiers, but directly by the logistics department.

In order to pay salaries to the soldiers of the whole army, the logistics department directly set up a special salary agency in each army, which is specially used to pay the salaries to the soldiers.

Now the logistics department is still thinking about cooperating with the financial bank to pay the soldiers through direct bank transfers. However, there are still many practical constraints, so it has not been possible for the time being.

Many of these restrictions, to a large extent, can also avoid the problem of direct rebellion by the commanding general.

Of course, even if enough defensive measures are taken, if the emperor is a fool, or when the external environment changes drastically, rebellions and warlords will still appear.

But this has nothing to do with killing heroes or not.

(End of this chapter)