Chapter 171 Silent Ambition
If you are willing to give up, you will gain only if you give up. A truly mature person will not strive for perfection, because there are many flaws in this world that cannot be compensated. Only by combining the actual situation and coming up with practical solutions is the real attitude to do things.
For example, the two clearly knew that the Japanese/pirates had their specialty in land combat, and their skills in naval battles were inferior. Because there was no other way to naval battles in this era, large ships beat small boats, large guns beat small guns, many ships beat small ships, and many guns beat small guns, and the role of personal bravery has been limited to the minimum.
If half of the army's military expenditure can be allocated to build a navy, an invincible navy can be established that retreats can guard the sea and borders, and can directly attack the Japanese and pirates' nests. By then, the Japanese and pirates are just native chickens and tiles, and the one who sells the first bids!
Qi Jiguang was particularly fanatical about this. He seemed to see himself leading the powerful navy and driving all the invaders out. He felt that if he could have such a day, he would not live in vain in his life.
So when Silence was about to lift this out of the wall, he held down the paper and said in a nearly begging tone: "Can you think about it again? Maybe the next flash of thought can find a way to achieve it."
Looking at him silently, he said in an almost cruel tone: "If this one is not removed, I dare to guarantee that our entire plan will be abandoned by Zhang Butang."
"Why?" Qi Jiguang stared at him, as if a child had a toy snatched.
"Zhu Wan once proposed to develop the navy." Chen Si said softly: "His experience is a lesson from the past."
"Maybe he hasn't found the right way. You can't just choke to death and everyone won't eat, right?" Qi Jiguang was not such a convincing person.
Silently patted his shoulder and said softly: "Come on, sit down and listen to me."
Qi Jiguang sat down obediently, but his face was still stubborn.
Chen Si didn't speak as soon as he came up. His eyes fell on the room and hung a self-pickup couplet from Qi Jiguang: "It's not my intention to be a marquis, I hope the waves will be smooth!" Chen Si asked himself that he was not that high, but he was unwilling to be a worm who was determined to pursue profits and avoid harm. In that case, even if he was a first-rank official, he was only one of the many mediocre officials of the Ming Dynasty. How could he deserve the second life given by God?
Then unify personal struggle with the treatment of the country! This is the silence of ambition - it is also the first time he has established a belief in life in this life. So this front-line journey is definitely not as simple as dealing with the emperor's fate. The more important purpose is to take a pulse for this old empire through what he saw and heard with his own eyes, to see where the disease came out and whether it was saved. If there was still a rescue, how should he save it?
The room was very quiet, and Qi Jiguang didn't speak until he came back to his senses when he was silent.
After sorting out your thoughts, he said quietly: "The ancients said: 'The major affairs of the country are in sacrifices and military affairs.' It can be seen that military affairs have been the fundamental affairs of the country since ancient times. Therefore, any military issue must be considered in the political environment. What the political environment allows you to do, then you can do it. If you are not allowed to do it, you must not do it, otherwise..."
"Don't always use Lord Zhu as an analogy, let him rest in peace." After saying that, Qi Jiguang laughed first, and the silence also laughed together. After laughing, the atmosphere returned to normal.
Silence continued: "Since you have no objection to this, we can discuss why the navy cannot be developed now. Because the problems involved and the consequences it will cause have exceeded the arms problem and reached politics."
"Actually, my Ming Dynasty was not without naval troops, but it was too small and the ship was too poor, so I didn't dare to confront the Japanese/pirates at all." This was not a discussion with Xu Wei in the scholar. Everything that was specious could be nonsense. This was a serious proposition with a general. Without investigation, there would be no say. Fortunately, Shen Mo had already investigated, so he said with confidence: "If you want to defend the enemy outside the country, at least two hundred large ships, four hundred small ships, and fifty thousand naval troops... Have you ever thought about how many shipyards, how many docks, and how much manpower are needed to serve them? How much money will it cost in a year?"
"It will cost at least 50,000 people." Qi Jiguang said softly: "Even if the civilians can be requisitioned, the salary of officers and soldiers alone will be at least one million taels... plus the cost of shipbuilding and going to sea, it will have to be another one million." As he said that, he also felt that the number was a bit nonsense, so he remedy: "But these 100,000 people can be transferred from the army, so wouldn't there be new military expenditures?"
"Just follow your method to make some of the army transfer into navy." Chen Shu bowed and said, "General Qi, how many provinces and how many mansions are you going to draw these 100,000 people from?"
"Is this..." Qi Jiguang also realized the difficulty of the problem. This was equivalent to splitting a part of the troops of each province and the prefecture. At the same time, the finances of each province and the prefecture must be cut off accordingly and managed by the naval department.
This may not be difficult in other dynasties. As long as the method is good, you can use the central finance to unify it. But it was absolutely impossible in the Ming Dynasty... because the Ming Dynasty did not have the central finance.
Logically speaking, the Ministry of Revenue is the center of national finance. It should coordinate the overall situation and control the allocation of national tax revenue, so it can naturally concentrate financial resources to do major tasks. However, because Emperor Taizu did not understand the economy very much, he felt that collecting a lot of money and then sending it on, which was a waste of time and financial resources. It was really a waste of time and fart, and it was a waste of money. Therefore, he stipulated that the money that should be spent in many places should not be sent to the treasury and just sit in the collection and payment.
For example, the military expenditure, which occupies an absolute majority in the national finance, is that local governments directly purchase military supplies according to the prescribed amount and then send them to the nearby garrison. The flow of military expenditure is directly omitted to the national treasury.
There are many such situations, and they are all saved by Lao Zhu in order to save trouble. Otherwise, there would be no strange things that the Ming Dynasty, which only collected three to five million taels of national taxes in one year, but the people on the other hand were forced to survive by tying taxes. The key is that the tax silver, which is seven to eight times or even ten times more than the national tax, was intercepted by local governments legally but never reasonably.
In this case, the Ministry of Revenue in the Ming Dynasty could only supervise the financial income and expenditure of various institutions and local governments, so the existence of the Thirteen Qingshuo Office. As for the money spent, the local government must solve it themselves. The country's little money is left to pay salaries to Beijing officials, save disasters in difficult areas, and build gardens for the emperor.
After thinking about this, Qi Jiguang gave up and unified the finances of each province and every prefecture and centralized management. That would be an enemy of all local bureaucrats... It would be better to let him alone eliminate all the reality of Japanese/pirates coming.
The high enthusiasm was so low that Qi Jiguang stood up and took the paper off the wall. He stood there for a long time before hissing: "Is it that my Ming navy will never have hope?"
Chen Si took the paper from his hand, carefully folded it, and said in a deep voice: "Believe me, I am the one who most hopes for a powerful navy in the world in the Ming Dynasty. I will use all of my to realize this dream." As he said that, he handed it to Qi Jiguang, his voice was low and firm: "Please hold our common ideals, and when it can be realized, you will return it to me."
Qi Jiguang nodded solemnly and put the piece of paper close to his body.
When this issue was revealed, Qi Jiguang rarely objected to the silent veto, and the progress was much faster. In the end, the two of them took three days to select 88 feasible plans.
Next, based on these precious materials, we wrote the final training plan and submitted the report to the Governor's Office... It is obvious that the former is purely military issue, while the latter is mainly political.
The two divided the work, Qi Jiguang wrote the military training plan, and it was better for Shen Mo to handle political matters.
For Chen Si, the focus of his report is not to explain the idea of ​​building a military, but to impress the people in power, that is, Governor Zhang. You must know that Zhang Butang is the military affairs of six provinces and acts cheaply! In other words, as long as he thinks he can do it in this acre of three-point land, he can do it!
How can we impress our superiors, especially some stubborn ones? First of all, we have to let him accept it, that is, we should not deviate from his understanding; secondly, we have to be innovative and have to come up with something that makes people shine. We will not be recognized by picking up people's teeth. Finally, we make him feel that doing this will only benefit and not harm him. If we do these three things, I believe Zhang Jing will definitely be moved.
After thinking about it, I felt that it was a bit shocking to directly propose "training a new army"... Because recruiting soldiers has always been the power of the governor's office, and now a general wants to get involved, it is obviously a rush to go.
After discussing with Qi Jiguang, he changed the first word to "train" and trained the new army, which means that only requires the new recruits recruited by the government to be assigned to Qi Jiguang for training, so that Zhang Butang would not curse her at first sight. In order not to make Zhang Boss Zhang feel that Xiao Qi is not doing his job properly, Chen Mo added, "The last general thought that killing thieves and training soldiers can be carried out in parallel."
Then it reflects the characteristics, which makes Boss Zhang's eyes lit up, and feels it is beneficial or harmless. After silentness, he selected two unique items from those materials that are more unique and will not make Boss Zhang curse. One is to ask for the establishment of a barracks so that the troops can "retreat when they retreat, and be relied on the confrontation when they advance." The other is even more unique, it is to ask for the establishment of a special fire-headed army, where soldiers carry dry food with them and can start a group at any time. On the one hand, it can reduce the burden on the combat troops, and on the other hand, it can better supply the troops.
Chapter completed!