Gou was a member of the imperial family in the late Ming Dynasty

Chapter 296 No martial ethics
Ming Dynasty, capital.

Forbidden City, Qianqing Palace.

Emperor Tianqi looked unhappy, and he looked gloomy as he held a memorial in his hand.

This memorial was sent from Fujian, and the person who submitted it was Nan Juyi, the governor of Fujian.

In the second year of the Tianqi reign, the Dutch launched an attack in Penghu. At the end of the year, Dutch warships raided Xiamen. Although they encountered stubborn resistance from the Xiamen defenders and failed to capture the Xiamen Port, they sank more than 70 Ming merchant ships outside the Xiamen Port, causing serious losses to the Ming Dynasty.

At the beginning of the third year of the Tianqi reign, the newly appointed governor Nan Juyi wrote to the emperor to inform him of the matter. The Tianqi emperor issued an order giving Nan Juyi full authority to handle the war in Fujian and rejected the Dutch's brazen peace terms.

How could the great Ming Dynasty allow itself to be bullied by the red barbarians? The Tianqi Emperor scoffed at the conditions proposed by the Dutch and instructed Nan Juyi to gather troops to fight the Dutch back. Not only did he want to resolve the predicament in Fujian, but he also wanted to recover Penghu and completely expel the arrogant Dutch.

After receiving the imperial edict, Nan Juyi began to make preparations, recruiting soldiers and building ships. However, a year passed in the blink of an eye, and the Dutch in Fujian were still there. From time to time, they would run out from Penghu to Xiamen, make a few circles and fire a few cannons, relying on their strong ships and powerful cannons to show off their power on the sea, which made Emperor Tianqi extremely dissatisfied.

For this reason, Emperor Tianqi sent an edict to Nan Juyi in July of the third year of the Tianqi reign, urging him to solve the problem of the Dutch as soon as possible. Now this memorial was just sent by Nan Juyi, and the content of the memorial was a report on the results of the war with the Dutch.

The memorial said that Nan Juyi had just fought a battle with the Dutch not long ago, destroying one of the enemy's warships, damaging another, killing hundreds of enemies and capturing dozens.

Logically speaking, this was a memorial reporting victory, and Emperor Tianqi should have been happy after reading it. However, after reading the memorial, Emperor Tianqi was not happy at all. Instead, his expression looked extremely ugly.

In fact, two days before receiving this memorial, Emperor Tianqi had learned about the situation of the war in Fujian from the Jinyiwei. What happened was not at all as Nan Juyi wrote in the memorial, and it was not a victory worth boasting about.

The Imperial Uniform Guard secretly reported that Nan Juyi had indeed recruited soldiers and built ships in Fujian, but facing the Dutch with their strong ships and powerful guns, Nan Juyi was not sure of a direct battle. He had only been relying on the ports to defend the Fujian coast and confront the Dutch across the sea.

After receiving the urging from Emperor Tianqi, Nan Juyi felt that he had little chance of winning the war, so he started to have evil ideas and planned to defeat the enemy without fighting.

More than a month ago, Nan Juyi sent a Ming merchant to Penghu to contact the Dutch and proposed negotiations to resolve the current problem. The Dutch were a little anxious because of the long-term confrontation with the Ming Dynasty. Seeing the Ming Dynasty's intention to negotiate, they became concerned and sent two warships to Xiamen after discussion.

Considering the safety of the negotiations, the Dutch asked the Ming Dynasty to negotiate on board the ship, but Nan Juyi refused and insisted on negotiating on shore. He also repeatedly claimed that the treaty must be signed in the government office. This was the rule of the Ming Dynasty. If the negotiations were held on board the ship, there would be no need to negotiate. The Ming Dynasty had never had such a precedent.

After repeated persuasion by the middleman, and with Nan Juyi sending three officials to board the Dutch warship to eliminate the Dutch's vigilance, the Dutch finally let down their guard and sent a delegation of more than 30 people to land for negotiations.

But the Dutch never expected that Nan Juyi had no intention of negotiating from the beginning. He was trying to trick the Dutch. After the Dutch landed, Nan Juyi warmly welcomed them and sent people to entertain them, and even set up a banquet.

Just when the Dutch thought that the Ming Dynasty would follow the rules and the two sides would soon enter into formal negotiations, Nan Juyi secretly put drugs in the wine and food at the banquet to entertain the Dutch.

After eating the "spiced" wine and delicacies prepared by Nan Juyi, these Dutch people either passed out from drunkenness or had diarrhea and were on the verge of death.

In this way, the Dutch who landed were easily captured by Nan Juyi. After dealing with the Dutch on the shore, Nan Juyi sent out fifty small boats in the middle of the night, loaded with gunpowder, rockets and other incendiary materials, to launch a surprise attack on the two Dutch warships anchored in the port.

The Dutch were caught off guard by the Ming army's surprise attack while they were sleeping. One of their warships was burned and sunk, while another was wounded and desperately broke through the siege but escaped in embarrassment...

This is the true inside story of the so-called victory report. When Emperor Tianqi saw the victory report, he was so angry that his nose was crooked.

What the hell is Nan Juyi doing? What kind of a war is he fighting?
The Governor of Fujian of the Ming Dynasty actually did such a thing. Does he have no respect for the Ming Dynasty?

Although the Chinese have always believed that all is fair in war, how can Nan Juyi's tactics be used in a military manner? He is clearly using the court's credibility and reputation to deceive others. Even if the Dutch are red-haired barbarians, it is simply too despicable for the Ming Dynasty to do this. If the news gets out, how can the Ming Dynasty convince other countries?
Besides, if you, Nan Juyi, were to play tricks and completely wipe out the Dutch, it would be fine. After all, history is written by the victors. The Dutch were completely wiped out by the Ming Dynasty. The Ming Dynasty could find any excuse to fabricate this matter. Anyway, the dead Dutch could not crawl out of the coffin to refute. But he failed to do this. This victory was not glorious at all. Even the two Dutch warships that came to negotiate only one was left, and the other one ran away. How could Nan Juyi have the audacity to send such a good news to himself? If Nan Juyi was in front of Emperor Tianqi now, Emperor Tianqi would scold him to death.

"Idiot! Idiot!"

Emperor Tianqi angrily threw the memorial in his hand to the ground and cursed.

What a great Nan Juyi, he used these things to deceive me when I entrusted him with such an important task? Is I, the emperor, so easy to deceive?
What made Emperor Tianqi even more angry was not that Nan Juyi had used such tricks without any bottom line for victory and had brought shame to the Ming Dynasty, but the boastful look on Nan Juyi's face in the memorial. Thinking of this, Emperor Tianqi was furious and wished he could immediately issue an order to deprive Nan Juyi of his post as governor and put someone else in charge of the war in Fujian.

But after scolding Nan Juyi for a while, Emperor Tianqi gradually calmed down. He picked up Nan Juyi's memorial from the ground and read it carefully again. After reading it this time, Emperor Tianqi was not as angry as before, but seemed to be thinking about something.

It is not difficult to dismiss Nan Juyi from his post, and it is not difficult to replace him with someone else, but is it really a good idea to do so?
After all, Nan Juyi had been in Fujian for more than a year. During this period, Nan Juyi was in charge of the war between the Ming Dynasty and the Netherlands. This not only included recruiting soldiers and building ships, but he also directly led the army to fight against the Dutch several times.

In other words, Nan Juyi was very familiar with the situation in Fujian and the Dutch, and had experience in fighting. If someone else was perhaps worse than Nan Juyi, not only would it not achieve good results, it might even cause the situation in Fujian to worsen.

In addition, although Nan Juyi's plan was a bit mean, it was for the sake of state affairs after all. From the starting point, it was well-intentioned, but the means were a bit dirty. As for the memorial he submitted, Emperor Tianqi could understand it after calming down. It was customary for subordinates to report good news to the emperor but not bad news. Besides, this battle was indeed a small victory in essence, but Nan Juyi concealed his plan in the memorial, so it was not really deceiving the emperor.

Nan Juyi was a capable man, and as a civil servant, he had a lot of insights into military affairs. Once Nan Juyi was dismissed, there would be a dispute in the court over who would succeed him. At present, the Donglin Party was still powerful and the cabinet was still controlled by the Donglin Party. If the post of Fujian governor fell into the hands of the Donglin Party, would Emperor Tianqi have to watch the military affairs of Fujian being handed over to the Donglin Party?
Emperor Tianqi had already seen clearly what kind of people the Donglin Party were. When it came to talking, no one in the world was better than the Donglin Party, but when it came to doing things, no matter what it was, there would be no good results in the hands of the Donglin Party. Emperor Tianqi knew better than anyone else that the Donglin Party's tendency to gang up on dissidents would lead to dissidents. By that time, the war in Fujian would not only not be settled, but would even get worse.

After much deliberation, Emperor Tianqi decided not to move Nan Juyi for the time being. It was safer to keep him than to send others to Fujian.

However, Emperor Tianqi would not tolerate Nan Juyi's little tricks. He planned to issue an edict to reprimand Nan Juyi and make him sober up. He told him not to think that his little tricks could be hidden from him. Emperor Tianqi knew everything clearly about what Nan Juyi had done in Fujian and what he was thinking.

Immediately, Emperor Tianqi picked up the red pen and wrote an edict himself, carefully choosing words to tactfully remind Nan Juyi in Fujian. At the same time, he also warned Nan Juyi a few words, admonishing him that it was okay to use troops and strategies, but it depended on what strategies to use. Now the Dutch were injured but not damaged, and their strength was still there. If they just defended themselves, they would never be able to expel them.

Now we must turn from defense to offense, take the initiative, and repel the Dutch fiercely no matter how great the cost, and win a complete victory in a fair battle. Only in this way can we save the face of the Ming Dynasty.

After writing this edict, Emperor Tianqi asked someone to call Wei Zhongxian. This edict was then issued directly by the imperial edict without going through the cabinet, so it needed to be sealed by Wei Zhongxian's Silijian before being sent to Fujian.

Wei Zhongxian had a mansion outside the palace, but he basically lived in the palace on weekdays. His residence was not far from the Qianqing Palace. After receiving the news that Emperor Tianqi wanted to see him, Wei Zhongxian hurried over. He originally thought that the emperor wanted to see him for something important, but he didn't expect that he just wanted him to seal an imperial edict and send it to Nan Juyi in Fujian as soon as possible.

Although surprised, Wei Zhongxian did not ask any more questions. He took the imperial edict and stamped it readily. Then he arranged for someone to send it to Fujian as soon as possible.

"Wei Banban..."

"I am here!" After delivering the imperial edict, Wei Zhongxian came back to report. Emperor Tianqi drank ginseng tea and asked Wei Zhongxian: "What do you think of Nan Juyi?"

Wei Zhongxian's brain was spinning rapidly. The emperor had just issued an imperial edict to Nan Juyi, and now he was asking him what he thought of Nan Juyi. What was going on?
Wei Zhongxian was not very familiar with Nan Juyi. Although Nan Juyi had served as the Right Deputy Censor-in-Chief before becoming the Governor of Fujian, Nan Juyi served as a local official during the Wanli period. Moreover, he did not serve as the Right Deputy Censor-in-Chief for long and had no dealings with Wei Zhongxian during that time.

"Your Majesty, I have no friendship with Nan Juyi. I only know that Nan Juyi is not a member of the Donglin Party. He has been an official in the local area for many years and has served as the left and right governors. He has made outstanding achievements in local politics and is considered a capable official."

Emperor Tianqi nodded slightly. Although Wei Zhongxian didn't say much, he proved a key point, that is, Nan Juyi had nothing to do with the Donglin Party. In this case, it was okay for him to issue the imperial edict just now. He hoped that Nan Juyi would wake up after receiving his edict and not let him down.

(End of this chapter)