Optimus One Pillar of the Ming Dynasty

Chapter 52
Seeing the iron mines that he would never be able to dig out in his lifetime, Emperor Jiajing boarded the ship with satisfaction and left the Xuanhua front line.

In a good mood, Emperor Jiajing sat on the bow of the boat on a grand master's chair and admired his empire on both sides of the river.

In this season of winter that is about to begin, the mountains and fields in the north are, to be honest, not beautiful at all. They look very desolate, which makes people feel inexplicably sad.

But Emperor Jiajing was in a good mood at this time, so he didn't mind the gray on both sides of the river. He sat on the bow of the boat with a smile on his face.

Emperor Jiajing indulged himself there for a while, maybe he thought it was not interesting!Emperor Jiajing invited Lu Bing and Wang Daoqiu to sit on either side of him, asked Lu Fang to make tea for them, and then began to talk about the construction of future steel plants.

After chatting for more than an hour, there was nothing left to talk about about the steel plant.Emperor Jiajing brought the topic to the government. Emperor Jiajing said: "When the iron and steel plant is established, there will be money and steel, and many things will be easier to handle. For example, the chieftains in Guangxi, Guizhou, Yunnan, Sichuan, and Huguang, Those people all make troubles every three years and five years. Every year, it's either these troubles or those who rebel, and they spend millions of taels of silver from the court every year. I'm so tired. Wait for the steel factory After this is done and my waist is strengthened, if any of them dare to make trouble again, I will not tolerate them anymore."

Emperor Jiajing changed his tone and talked about the issue of ethnic minorities always rebelling, and Lu Bing was also very angry when he mentioned this.He followed up Emperor Jiajing's words and said: "That's right, the imperial court used to be too used to them, and now they are all on their noses and faces. Just talk about the Yang family in Bozhou, good guy, this Yang family has been in the Tang Dynasty In his later years, Yang Duan planned to defeat Mu Xingtian of Nanzhao, and was granted the title of Bozhou by the Tang Dynasty. After the Song Dynasty and the Mongolian Yuan Dynasty, in the fifth year of Hongwu in our dynasty, the head of the family, Yang Keng, surrendered to Taizu. After that, the Yang family was He was regarded as the chieftain of the Miao territory, and Taizu appointed him as the envoy of Bozhou Xuanwei."

"Then the Yang family has ruled Bozhou since the end of the Tang Dynasty until our dynasty. It has been passed down for 29 generations, which is almost 700 years. It has almost become a thousand-year-old bastard. It is a real local snake. How crazy is it? Damn it! The little brat named Yang Lie, the No. 20 ninth generation of the Yang family in Bozhou two years ago, came to Beijing to ask for a title from His Majesty after his father died. He was so crazy that he had no choice. When he came to Beijing to see His Majesty, he brought I bought some bullshit local souvenirs, but nothing valuable!”

"Then Yang Lie is so rude. If it's because Bozhou is poor and can't produce good things, then we have nothing to say. But Bozhou is located between Sichuan, Guizhou, and Huguang. It has dangerous mountains and rivers and a radius of two thousand miles. The largest among the barbarians, the people are strong and wealthy. According to the information of our Jinyiwei, the silver mines in Bozhou produce more than 1 taels of silver every year. They also produce tens of thousands of tons of black lead and cut more than [-] pairs of cedar boards every year. More than [-] tons of tea are produced, and half the amount of grain and rice is sold out.”

"Every year, Bozhou will follow the Chishui River into the Yangtze River, and then go down the river to sell the wood, lead, rice, and tea they produce to major cities along the Yangtze River, making an annual profit of nearly one million taels. And the Yang family It has been nearly 700 years since they occupied Bozhou by the end of the Tang Dynasty. How much wealth has the Yang family accumulated in these 700 years, and how many good things do they have in their hands? How could they not come up with good things to honor His Majesty? Forget it, forget it, no I’ve said it, and I’m so angry when I say it!”

Having said that, Lu Bing drank a cup of tea with a dark face.In fact, what he felt most aggrieved was that he blatantly despised the imperial court when facing Yang Lie, the No. 20 ninth generation of the Banzhou Yang family, the year before last.Lu Bing wanted to ask for an order to take Yang Lie into prison, and let Jin Yiwei's torture tools teach that boy to be a good man.

But when Lu Bing raised the matter in front of the imperial court, most of the cabinet ministers and officials of the Six Departments at the time opposed it, while a few remained silent.Those people clearly knew that by doing this, Yang Lie was showing contempt for the imperial court.But what they said was that Yang Lie was still just a teenager, and his father had just died at home. It was normal for him to not follow some etiquette, and he asked Emperor Jiajing to treat the barbarians with mercy to stop the war.

What kind of bullshit is lenient? To put it bluntly, you are just afraid of war, afraid of having them spend millions of taels of military expenditure!Thinking of this, Lu Bing became angry. He was a teenage kid and a coward from the mountains.He actually stepped on the face of the Ming Dynasty court, but he, the dignified boss of the Imperial Guard and the emperor's own army, could not do anything about that kid. It was really infuriating to think about it.

Seeing Lu Bing's angry look, Emperor Jiajing felt uncomfortable.To put it bluntly, the reason why Lu Bing was so angry was because he was unfair to the emperor, right?
Feeling aggrieved, Emperor Jiajing patted Lu Bing's shoulder, forced out a smile and said: "Okay, don't be angry, there is nothing you can do to tolerate that kid. After all, we now have hundreds of thousands of Tatar cavalry in the north. Threats; there are Japanese pirates and Francois invading the southeast coast; there are more than 70 chieftains in the southwest who may rebel at any time, and these chieftains have as few as one or two thousand native soldiers, and as many as tens of thousands of native soldiers;"

"Take the Yang family of Bozhou as an example. They have more than 1 troops in peacetime and can mobilize 30 to 40 troops in wartime. If they really rebel, the court will need at least [-] troops and [-] troops to defeat them. To accompany the army and civilians. How much military expenditure does it cost to send [-] people to fight in those high mountains and ridges? Moreover, Bozhou has a radius of two thousand miles, with high mountains and dense forests. If the natives burrow into the high mountains and ridges, where can you find them?"

"Because we are protected by the endless mountains and dense forests, we can only defeat them, but we cannot eliminate them. Therefore, the court's policy towards them has always been that if they dare to rebel, we will fight. Once we have defeated them, , they admit their mistake, we will generously give them some rewards to appease them, and then everyone can live in peace..."

Emperor Jiajing explained the ethnic policies of the Ming Dynasty. After listening to this, Wang Daoqiu said "fuck you" one after another in his heart.Mudd, isn't this what later generations often call distribution according to work?The chieftains wanted things, money, and respect, so they rebelled.

Then as soon as your imperial court's counter-insurgency army arrives, he will do it if he can do it, and if he can't do it, he will go into the mountains and into the old forest.In the end, it will take you a while, and when your daily military expenditures are "rushing" like running water, you can't bear it anymore and want to find a step down.

The chieftains go to the table again, admit their mistake to your court, cry out for poverty, and say how much the war has affected the local people's livelihood. Please ask the court to provide more funds and materials for post-war reconstruction.In this way, your court will gain face, and their toast will benefit.

According to distribution, crying children are given milk. If you say that such a policy is implemented, will the southwestern minority area of ​​Ming Dynasty still be able to stop?After all, the real benefits are the motivation to make trouble!
Thinking of this stupid behavior of the Ming Dynasty, Wang Daoqiu couldn't help but slapped the table in anger and yelled angrily: "Your Majesty, who is this stupid guy who asked the Ming Dynasty to deal with the chieftain issue like this? This person should be Lingchi!" "What? Wang Aiqing, hasn't the imperial court always treated those chieftains this way? After all, the areas controlled by those chieftains are far away from Wang Hua, and they are all in remote mountainous areas with high mountains and dense forests. If the imperial court wants to destroy them, then It’s almost impossible, so we can only appease him.”

"Your Majesty, it is indeed unrealistic to use military means to completely annihilate the chieftain forces in those mountains and forests in the southwest where the climate is mild, evergreen all year round and there is no shortage of food and clothing. After all, people can hide in the mountains and forests. , if you don’t have enough people to go into the mountains to search, you will be giving away people’s heads. But if you want tens of thousands of people to gather together to search, then the logistical pressure will be too great. And tens of thousands of people go into those areas, and the radius is often thousands of miles. Even if we search in the high mountains, there are combs everywhere, and the natives can still escape by relying on their familiarity with the terrain."

"Yes, Wang Aiqing, that's the case. Therefore, the court mainly tries to appease those troublemaking chieftains. This is also a helpless move!"

"Your Majesty, the problem of the natives in the southwest cannot be solved by military means alone. They should be appeased. But the court is trying to appease the wrong people!"

"What? Wang Aiqing, what do you mean by this? I don't understand."

"Your Majesty, you see, every time the chieftains make trouble, the court will use gold and silver silk, porcelain, salt and iron to appease them. All these things from the court go into the pockets of the chieftains. What do the natives get? And every time our Ming army The first time we went to suppress the rebellion, we killed ordinary lower-class natives and burned down the thatched houses of the natives in the village. Even some scum in our Ming army would steal things and women after they invaded the native villages."

"As for the luxurious houses of the chieftains, everyone in our Ming army knows that the court will appease them after this incident. With this understanding, naturally our Ming army will not rob and burn the chieftains' houses, but will send troops to protect them. Your Majesty, you see, in this way, every time the chieftains cause trouble, not only will they not lose, but they will also make a fortune. And the natives below will bear all the losses of this war, and they will get worse again and again. Hatred for my Ming Dynasty.”

"The long-term consequence of this is that rebellion has become a way for the chieftains to make a fortune. They will often organize a rebellion, and when our Ming army's counter-rebellion troops arrive, the chieftains can use the vast number of natives to attack us. The hatred of the Ming army incited the natives to rebel with them. Your Majesty, think about the consequences of this! To be honest, the imperial court's past policies towards the natives were encouraging the chieftains to rebel and cause trouble in disguise?"

What Wang Daoqiu said is the summary of later generations' failed Ming Dynasty's policy on ethnic minorities in southwest China.This is also the reason why the Qing Dynasty later realized how screwed up this policy was and decisively implemented the policy of "returning the land to the locals".

Emperor Jiajing was a man of extremely high understanding, especially in his understanding of human nature.So once Wang Daoqiu explained the truth clearly, Emperor Jiajing understood it immediately.After all, I have been taken advantage of for more than 20 years, being played like a monkey by those "savages" from the Southwest for more than 20 years!
The reality was so cruel that Emperor Jiajing began to doubt his always confident IQ.So the joy of getting a big iron mine today is gone now.

Emperor Jiajing, whose mood had reached rock bottom, thought about his grievances, and asked Wang Daoqiu with a cold face: "Wang Aiqing, what should the court do?"

"Separate the chieftain from the natives, and change the position of appeasing the chieftain to appeasing the natives. If any chieftain dares to cause trouble, as soon as the imperial master arrives, the land and property of that chieftain and his close friends will be confiscated and divided equally among the local natives. Then press According to the system of our Han area, the imperial court sent civil servants and officials to govern the local area and collect taxes..."

"Pa", Wang Daoqiu just mentioned that he should change his land and return to his hometown. Lu Bing got excited after hearing this. He slapped the table and shouted excitedly: "Yes, yes, money and land, who wouldn't want this?" ? Especially those poor people at the bottom, their desire to own land even exceeds their own life span. Then they will definitely side with the imperial court. "

"And it turns out they are the chieftains. In this case, the chieftains must want to get their fields back, and the natives have been waiting for their fields for several lifetimes, how could they be willing to give it back to those chieftains? So...hehehe! The chieftains and Natives, they will become enemies."

"As for the chieftains who have lost the support of the natives, if the court wants to deal with them, it is not enough for the county government to send a few officials. Hahahahahahaha, Jie Yuanlang, you are really bad, letting the natives follow their Chieftains are like fire and water. And as long as the natives of one place are divided into their chieftain's land, the natives of other places will probably be looking forward to the king's master from the imperial court every day to go to their land and kill their chieftain. , they are so good at dividing the land. Hahahahahaha, it’s so bad, it’s so ridiculous that Lu is so ridiculous.”

Wang Daoqiu's method is too damaging, but it is absolutely effective. This is the grasp of human nature.Human nature is selfish, human nature is self-interested!
There are many people who are dedicated to serving the public and talk about these four words every day, millions or tens of millions.

Lu Bing and Emperor Jiajing were both people with a profound understanding of human nature. They knew those chieftains, and it was only a matter of time before they were swept into the garbage dump of history.

(End of this chapter)