prosperous age

"Everyone, let's take a look at this memorial and discuss it."

In the cabinet duty room, Zhang Juzheng handed a memorial in his hand to Wei Guangde and said.

Wei Guangde took it over and took a look. He was not surprised. He just glanced at it quickly and handed it over to Lu Tiaoyang.

When Lu Tiaoyang read the memorial, Wei Guangde turned to Zhang Juzheng and said, "Brother, Lu Shangshu still holds a grudge in his heart about what happened last time and hasn't calmed down?" '

"Hey, to be honest, I asked his brother to take the lead. I wanted to use joining the cabinet to ask him to temporarily suppress his dissatisfaction. You saw the result."

Zhang Juzheng spread his hands and said: "His begging memorial was handed over to me this morning. I don't know what to say."

"Please give me some more advice. It's really hard to find someone more suitable to serve as Minister of Rites in the DPRK."

Wei Guangde sighed, and then lowered his voice and said: "Brother, you must have thought about this memorial before handing it over. I don't know how many criticisms there will be."

"Shandai, you should know the situation in the Ming Dynasty today. If we don't make some changes, I'm afraid it won't last long."

Zhang Juzheng met Wei Guangde's gaze and whispered: "This time, I have made up my mind to start with the administration of officials and establish a complete order. At the same time, I can collect the previous debts and solve the current financial difficulties of the court."

"If you think twice, I won't say it again."

Wei Guangde just whispered something, and then cupped his hands towards Zhang Juzheng, naturally meaning to let him take care of himself.

"Sir, Chief Assistant, this memorial seems a little inappropriate in assigning the power of supervising the six subjects to cabinet ministers."

Lu Tiaoyang had already read the memorial and expressed his opinion directly.

The memorial that Zhang Juzheng took out was exactly what he had given Wei Guangde to refer to in detail, and was named by Wei Guangde as "Inspecting the Chapter Memorial and Examining it to Revise the Practical Political Notes".

As the first step of Zhang Juzheng's reform, he was also very cautious. Not only did he devote himself to it, repeatedly weighing the pros and cons, but he also discussed it twice in private with Wei Guangde.

In fact, Wei Guangde had been worried about this before.

As we all know, the Six Sections are the sword in the hands of the emperor, so they are given the same rights as the Metropolitan Procuratorate. Since the establishment of the system, they have only been supervised by the emperor.

However, in Zhang Juzheng's reforms, in order to ensure that the examination method was perfect, arrangements were made for the government offices at all levels. The six subjects conducted examinations for the work of the six ministries and other yamen, while the cabinet supervised the six subjects, which was actually a robbery. the emperor's rights.

Although cabinet ministers cannot directly appoint or remove officials from the Sixth Section, they can evaluate their work, which is actually equivalent to strangulating their career and directly controlling the Sixth Section.

It was when Lu Tiaoyang saw this paragraph that he raised his objection.

"If the cabinet minister cannot take the assessment of the six subjects, does your Majesty have to take the assessment himself?"

Zhang Juzheng just asked lightly.

As a special being in all the yamen of the imperial court, Liu Ke's status became prominent at this time. His aloofness made him closest to the emperor, and he was the sword used by the Ming emperors to control the court.

"Sir Tsusuke, do you think this is okay?"

Lu Tiaoyang saw that Zhang Juzheng had already made a decision and knew that it would be difficult to convince him, so he turned to look at Wei Guangde.

He could also see that the two of them had probably discussed this memorial before, which was why Wei Guangde seemed so humorous.

"How could I not mention it, but Lord Chief Assistant?"

When Wei Guangde said this, he just glanced at Zhang Juzheng and saw that he just shook his head slightly and stopped talking.

"Although this method is good, I don't agree with it when it comes to these six subjects."

Lu Tiaoyang thought about it before speaking.

"It doesn't matter, I'll leave it to Qing He to draft the memorial, and leave it to the palace sage."

Zhang Juzheng seemed to be mentally prepared and said calmly.

Lu Tiaoyang still held the memorial in his hand. Hearing Zhang Juzheng's words, his mouth opened, but in the end he remained silent.

He took the memorial and walked to Zhang Juzheng's writing desk, borrowed the pen and paper here and started drafting the draft. At this moment, Zhongshu entered the room outside the door, saluted Zhang Juzheng and Wei Guangde and said: "Tan Lun, Minister of the Ministry of War, asks to see you. "

Zhang Juzheng just frowned slightly, and then said: "Invite him in."

To be honest, the Minister of War does not like to meet the Minister of War the most, because for small matters, they usually just pass official documents. Only when big things happen, the Minister of War will go to the Cabinet directly.

Wei Guangde was in the same mood as Zhang Juzheng at this time, and he was also wondering in his heart whether something had happened again.

After a while, Tan Lun stepped into the check-in room, and several people bowed to each other before talking about today's events.

"This is a report Wang Daokun sent back from Liaodong. Since the matter is serious, I think it would be better to hand it over to the cabinet for discussion first."

When it came to business, Tan Lun did not hesitate at all. He directly took out a Tang newspaper from his wide sleeve and handed it to Zhang Juzheng.

"Liaodong?"

Hearing that it was about Liaodong, Wei Guangde couldn't help but raise his eyes.

Decades later, it was the Jurchens outside Liaodong who rose up and finally destroyed the Ming Dynasty and unified the world, so Wei Guangde was still very concerned about this.

Zhang Juzheng spent a long time reading the Tang newspaper, and seemed to be thinking about it while reading.

Wei Guangde looked at Tan Lun several times, hoping to learn the contents of the Tang newspaper from him, but Tan Lun just shook his head and said nothing.

After a while, Lu Tiaoyang prepared the ticket and handed it to Wei Guangde.

Wei Guangde took it and looked at it, then nodded slightly.

Lu Tiaoyang's proposal is also fair. Some praise the examination method, but some think it needs to be discussed. However, he really can't think of a better way. It is recommended to try it out for the time being and then make adjustments.

In fact, this vote can be regarded as supporting the implementation of the examination law, but it just puts forward a few areas that need to be improved in the future.

After Zhang Juzheng finished reading the memorial and handed it to Wei Guangde, he looked through it impatiently.

After quickly browsing the entire Tang newspaper, Wei Guangde flipped through it again while thinking about the location of Kuandian in his mind. Wang Daokun, the Minister of War, wrote this report. It was Li Chengliang, the chief military officer, who proposed that the forts in the dangerous mountains be moved to the Shichakou area of ​​​​Kandian and rebuilt.

According to Li Chengliang's careful analysis and summary of the situation in Liaodong, Liaodong has problems such as the lack of border outposts, huge defense loopholes facing the Mongolian Plateau, natural barriers ineffective, open land with few people, and few soldiers.

These problems allowed the Tuman and Jurchen tribes to form an outflanking trend against Liaodong from the west, north and east. As a result, when the Ming army carried out defensive deployment, they would fortify everywhere, and the troops would be weak everywhere; if they did not fortify everywhere, the Ming army would be weak. Will take care of one thing and lose the other.

And when sending troops to attack the Tuman or Jurchen tribes, they often dare not pursue them deeply because they are worried that the other side will take the opportunity to attack. Therefore, the Tuman or Jurchen tribes must be "guarded" so that they cannot affect the Ming army in Liaodong. military operations.

"Tuman" refers to the Chahar tribe in the Ming Dynasty. Officials in the Ming Dynasty generally called the leader of the Mongolian Chahar tribe "Tumen", that is, Zasak Tuhan was called Tuman, and often called his tribe Tumen. The barbarian tribe is sometimes directly replaced by the word "Tuman" to represent the entire tribe.

At this time, Liaodong was still surrounded by Tuman and Jurchen tribes, and wars continued.

Based on many years of experience in fighting in Liaodong, Li Chengliang accurately selected the "guardian" objects, the relatively weak Jurchen tribes.

In fact, the reason why Li Chengliang chose the Jurchen tribes is not complicated. The main reason is that if the Jurchen tribes want to invade Liaodong, they must pass through the Shichakou near Kuandian, and the Kuandian area is "Wang Gao in the north and Wutang in the east". Donghu divided the main road... it is a must-win area for all the barbarians."

Therefore, as long as Li Chengliang sends troops to occupy the Kuandian area, he can "guard" the Jurchen tribes, and the Ming army can control the tribes by setting off from here.

"The soil in Zhang Qihara's Dianzi is fertile and arable, and it is a suitable place to go to Nuanyang and other places. Support is easily accessible, so it is suitable to move the Gushan Fort to the land... One hundred and eighty miles away from the dangerous mountain, we can also get fertile land, and the tenants can be wide and long. In the five districts of Dianzi, Shuangtaer, Changling and San, and when Songziling and other places are in extreme conflict, it is advisable to move the five forts to various places and build six forts..."

At this time, Wei Guangde couldn't help but read a paragraph from the Tang Bao, especially the four words "Yi De Fertile Land", the pronunciation was slightly stronger.

It's not that Wei Guangde is being pretentious, it's actually that in this era, the contribution of "opening up borders and expanding territory" was highly valued.

Li Chengliang's suggestion was actually to expand the Ming Dynasty's actual control area by 180 miles, which was already considered an expansion of territory.

However, Wei Guangde had some unspeakable emotions about this. It was not that this achievement was unattractive, but because he knew that there were thousands of miles of land worth exploring further north.

He couldn't even remember it if he didn't mention it in the past.

But so what if you think about it, the Siberian region at this time was not a place suitable for human habitation. Although there were villages composed of Jurchens and other small tribes there, the population was sparse and it was impossible to establish rule.

At this time, the Ming army was unable to advance that far and effectively occupy the local area.

Many people of later generations believed that if the Ming army was given enough warm clothing, they could send troops to occupy this place first.

Maybe Wei Guangde would have thought so before he came here, but he definitely wouldn't think so now.

Think about why the Jurchens moved to the south. It was because they could not adapt to the severe cold in the north at this time. If they stayed there, they would really die. So they were forced to move south to live on the border of the Ming Dynasty, and they were willing to bow to the Ming court for this.

Li Chengliang expanded one hundred and eighty miles to the north. Wei Guangde not only did not feel happy, but also felt a little sad.

He knew it was very attractive, but he couldn't let Li Chengliang continue to advance north and harvest more land.

When Wei Guangde handed the Tang Bao to Lu Tiaoyang, he was still in a bad mood and just lowered his head to think about the pros and cons of this strategy.

Expanding land outside actually has advantages and disadvantages, and the disadvantage is to extend the Ming Dynasty's supply line to the north again. With the Ming Dynasty's power in Liaodong at this time, Wei Guangde is a little worried about this.

From the Yongle to Hongzhi period, the Ming Dynasty made frequent mistakes in managing Liaodong.

First, during the Chengzu period of the Ming Dynasty, in order to regain the rights of the vassal king, King Ning was moved from Daning to Nanchang, which caused a huge loophole in Liaodong's defense facing the Mongolian Plateau.

During the Xuanzong period of the Ming Dynasty, the mature Jurchen tribes who were allowed to surrender by Hou Xian moved inward, causing the natural barrier of the Changbai Mountain branch to lose its effect, and the Ming Dynasty border troops came into direct contact with the Jurchen tribes.

Later, the Kaiping Guards were moved inland, which led to the complete collapse of the defense system north of the Great Wall built by Emperor Taizu of the Ming Dynasty with Dongsheng Guards, Kaiping Guards, and Daning Guards as the core. The Ming Dynasty's border defense outposts were all lost, so that during the orthodox period, the Zhiyuan Ala The Ora cavalry led by him were able to rush directly to the headquarters of the Ming Dynasty's Liaodong Capital Command in Liaoyang.

What was really fatal was the reform of the Kaizhong method by Ye Qi, the Minister of Household Affairs during the reign of Emperor Xiaozong of the Ming Dynasty, which was known in history as the Kaizhong Zese system.

The Kaizhong method was implemented in the Ming Dynasty in order to encourage merchants to transport grain to the frontier fortresses, exchanging grain for salt and giving merchants the qualification to sell salt.

Kaizhongfa encouraged merchants to transport grain to the border fortress. The direct effect of this approach was to provide sufficient food supply for the border fortress, which alleviated the previous shortage of grain and grass and was conducive to the stability of border defense.

At the same time, the decentralization of salt sales qualifications promoted salt commodity trade. The emergence of trade not only mobilized the enthusiasm of merchants, but also brought profits to the government because of salt taxation.

Although this law weakened the real power of the salt official and affected the income of salt workers in the salt field, the main problem was that it made it difficult for merchants to make profits by selling salt, which led to the imbalance and monopoly of salt management, and promoted the desire to monopolize the sale of salt. Businessmen will collude with officials, and officials themselves want to make profits, leading to collusion between government and businessmen and breeding of corruption.

But generally speaking, the opening of China to France is conducive to the stability of border defense. At least the border troops and border villages are not affected, and they still show a prosperous scene.

However, Ye Qi implemented the Kaizhongzhese Law, which stipulated that merchants would not have to transport military grain to border towns in the future. Instead, they only had to pay silver to the treasury to obtain salt for reuse.

This move led to the destruction of all the commercial and civilian villages in the important border defense towns of the Ming Dynasty, including Liaodong. Among them, Liaodong had no prefectures and counties and no immigration policies were implemented to consolidate the border. Therefore, "it was difficult for the few people in the open land to support the army." Problems such as the vast area and the difficulty of defending the area are particularly prominent.

Although Ye Qi's salt policy reform allowed the Ming court to increase its revenue by two million treasuries in one year, it completely changed the national military strategic policy of "combining salt policy with frontiers" in the early Ming Dynasty and replaced it with salt. Monopoly sales serve as a direct means of obtaining financial revenue.

This short-sighted approach only sees immediate financial benefits, but fails to see the impact on the national strategic level.

During the war between China and France, border merchants directly built border villages and towns in order to obtain higher profits, which promoted an adequate supply of military supplies in border areas.

However, after the change of colors, the basis for the economic development of the border towns was directly divided. Border merchants gradually withdrew, villages were abandoned, and military supplies in the border towns were once again tight. Military expenditures increased significantly, and the Ming Dynasty fell into a more serious crisis.

The essence of the Ming Dynasty's so-called "Hongzhi ZTE" was to sacrifice frontier development in exchange for temporary financial surplus for the imperial court.

At this time, Wei Guangde lowered his head and recalled the court documents he had seen in the Hanlin Academy and the reasons for the decline of the border town.

Regarding the current situation in Liaodong, although Li Chengliang's strategy of moving the fort was good, the disadvantages were actually not small, but the root cause still lies in the corruption of the salt policy, and the border towns and border troops completely lost their vitality.

“Lending well, lending well.”

While Wei Guangde was still thinking, he suddenly heard Zhang Juzheng's call.

"I'm so lost in thought. It's really rude."

Wei Guangde hurriedly explained with a smile.

“What are Shandai’s thoughts on this proposal?”

At this time, Zhang Juzheng was happy. He had actually chosen to support this proposal at the first sight. After all, it was a great achievement.

Just seeing Wei Guangde's reaction made him wonder if there were any problems that he hadn't discovered yet. (End of chapter)