Emperor Zhengde

Chapter 323 Industrialized Ming and Modernized Ming Army

Zhu Houzhao forced the royal family to stay in the capital. Naturally, they were not as free in the capital as they were in the prince's palace in the vassal state. The living environment they lived in every day was naturally not as good as that in their own prince's palace. Moreover, they had to be monitored by the guards.

However, these nearly 10,000 royal family members were unable to cause any waves, and they did not even have the courage to rebel. All they did every day was sigh and hang out in brothels and get drunk.

But no matter what, the royal family reform is still in progress, and the royal family reform details issued by Zhu Taihan have been approved by the cabinet and issued to the country.

However, during this reform, Zhu Houzhao and the court officials discovered that although the princes could not resist the court's royal family reforms, they could use soft and violent resistance.

The most obvious thing is that they simply degenerate to the lowest level. Indulging in brothels and drinking is the least serious of them. Some simply gamble away all their money in one night, and then pay off their ten years' salary on credit. Some gambling house owners even take the bill to the clan house.

As for stealing things and eating and dodging, they are commonplace. He is not afraid of being caught and thrown into jail by people from Shuntian Prefecture. In short, he makes himself look like a hopeless case, as if he is determined to degenerate and be shameless to the end, and you, the court, cannot ignore me!
"Your Majesty, these royal family members are afraid to commit big crimes now, but they keep committing small crimes. The government offices dare not punish them too harshly. Now they have caused unrest in the entire capital. There is one Shu King Zhu Rangxu, who has taken in five concubines in the capital in the past few days because the restrictions on taking concubines will start from next month. He has spent all his money and has no money to buy rice. He even sits in front of the Ministry of Revenue to ask for next year's annual salary!"

The chief minister of the cabinet, Zhang Cong, could not help but tell Zhu Houzhao about the current situation of the royal family after they stayed in Beijing.

Zhu Houzhao had never expected that these clan members would behave like this and would actually ignore their own status to such an extent. However, as the emperor of the Ming Dynasty, he could not ignore the lives of these nearly 10,000 clan members. After all, these clan members were still human beings and his relatives in this world.

"We need to give them something to do. Didn't I ask your cabinet to issue an announcement to lift the ban on the four classes of people? Isn't there any one of these princes who does something useful?" Zhu Houzhao asked.

Zhang Cong shook his head. "The royal family members are used to a life of luxury. They are unwilling to work on the farm or do business. They only order their subordinates to do the work. However, the court has replaced their subordinates with court officials. Naturally, they can't order them around, and they can't do anything."

"It seems that the court has to solve the employment problem of these royal family members," Zhu Houzhao said helplessly. He knew that these royal family members were using soft violence against him, and one by one they were forcing him, the emperor, to let them go back to their fiefdoms to be free princes.

Zhu Houzhao summoned Zhu Taihan and others from the Clan Court. In the past few days, the Clan Court composed of Zhu Taihan, Zhu Houcong and Zhu Zaile was the leading agency in the clan reform, and was specifically responsible for the statistical work of data on the descendants, concubines, and expertise of each clan member, and even eliminated a number of fake clan members.

During this process, it was inevitable that some hot-tempered princes did not support the work of the three men, and there were even court officials who fanned the flames. Although Zhu Taihan was good at giving suggestions, he was not decisive when encountering problems. Zhu Houcong used a combination of soft and hard tactics to prevent these clan members from daring to embarrass the Clan Court. He even used the identity of the eldest son Zhu Zaile to punish several clan members with a stick and establish the majesty of the Clan Court.

Zhu Houzhao saw all of this, and was more certain that Zhu Taihan was a man with ideals and insights, and that Zhu Houcong was obviously ignorant and incompetent in normal times but could respond when faced with real problems, worthy of his reputation for repeatedly defeating the civil service groups in history. His own eldest son seemed to have both qualities, but sometimes he was more like a signboard, because the eldest son had a special status in Confucian etiquette, so both the royal family and the court officials gave him some face because he was the eldest son.

Now, since the problems of the royal family have not been dealt with yet, Zhu Houzhao still wants to let them deal with it. In Zhu Houzhao's view, perhaps the clan government can play more functions, not only managing the royal family's jade butterfly titles, salaries and benefits, but also managing the royal family's moral behavior norms, education, employment and other matters.

Zhu Houzhao expressed this idea to Zhu Taihan and others, who couldn't help but think deeply about it.

Zhu Houcong was the first to come up with the idea, but he was reluctant to speak it out first. He hoped that someone would step forward and take the risk of offending others.

Zhu Zailei's mind was always on the research of cylinder boring for two-expansion steam engines. He had little interest in state affairs, especially in managing his family members. He even felt that it was unnecessary. Since these family members did not strive for success and work hard, why should the court care about their lives?

Zhu Taihan was the only one who was thinking seriously, and after thinking for a while, he said, "Your Majesty, the royal family members are idle because they lack discipline. Since they are not good at politics, farming, or business, it is better to let them study and hire strict teachers to supervise them so that they can become talents. Then the court can assign them to different places according to their academic performance."

Zhu Houzhao nodded and said, "That's the only way. Studying is probably the most suitable for these princes. You should jointly establish an imperial academy with the Ministry of Clan Affairs and the Ministry of Education. From the chief priest to the instructor, you need the most rigorous people to take up the posts. Just like the Imperial Academy, you should manage these royal families in the strictest way! Graduates will be directly assigned by the Ministry of Personnel!"

then.

A new higher education institution thus came into being.

The so-called Royal Academy is obviously also a so-called aristocratic university. However, Zhu Houzhao did not intend to have the Royal Academy filled with only royal family members. The circle needs to communicate with each other, otherwise these royal family members would never know people from different classes.

Therefore, Zhu Houzhao required that the Royal Academy, while mainly responsible for training royal family children, should also recruit no less than 10% of students from poor families and no less than 10% of students from aristocratic families. Only in this way could the royal family children get to know the diligent and intelligent students from poor families and the talented children from aristocratic families.

Prince Dai Zhu Junji was complaining bitterly at this time. He had never been afraid of being in the prison of the Ministry of Justice before, but now being locked up in the Royal Academy made him feel like his life was a year. Moreover, when he thought of how his palms were beaten like bear paws by the old-fashioned old scholar because he could not memorize the multiplication table, he burst into tears and kept shouting that he wanted to return to his fiefdom.

Zhu Houzhao also came to the Imperial Academy that day. When he heard the royal family members howling in agony, he felt so happy. In his opinion, it would be good to educate these royal family members well. Even if they could not cultivate a few pillars of the country, it would be good as long as they did not all become waste.

It was not until this time that the reform of the royal family was almost declared complete. It was a fact that the princes were confined to the capital. As for how these princes would use them in the future, that was naturally a matter for the future.

Zhu Houzhao felt that it would be best for these princes to continue pursuing the academic route. After all, as royal relatives, these clan members naturally had no worries about food and clothing. Whether they were in business or politics, they would inevitably receive special care due to their status. If they engaged in academic research, the special treatment brought by their special status would help them abandon their utilitarianism and focus on research.

Moreover, for some people who still attach great importance to the ancestral system, they would rather see the royal family members engage in academic research rather than farming or business.

In order to cultivate the royal family's interest in academic research, Zhu Houzhao also specially prepared to take these royal family members to visit the Ming Dynasty's scientific research base in the capital. Of course, now that the recovery of Jiaozhi is imminent, and according to the intelligence provided by the Jinyiwei, as the Ming Dynasty has been in a position of trade surplus for a long time and some unfriendly behaviors towards Portugal and other countries before, these Western forces and even countries such as Japan have begun to boycott the Ming Dynasty's trade, and even have the intention of retaliating against the Ming Dynasty. Therefore, Zhu Houzhao really needs to understand the Ming Dynasty's scientific and industrial progress, and see how much confidence the Ming Dynasty has gained in the competition for global hegemony.

The Ming Dynasty started modern education with the establishment of Imperial University of Peking, but the Ming Dynasty started natural science research with the establishment of the Royal Industrial Experimental Base. It was initially a personal act of Emperor Zhu Houzhao, but now it has become a strategic base that the entire country needs to pay attention to.

Today, the western part of the imperial city of Beijing is now the political and technological center of the empire.

In terms of science and technology, the area on the left side of the Imperial City's West Garden has both the comprehensive Imperial University of Peking and the military research university and the Imperial University of National Defense Technology run by Yang Yiqing, as well as the Ming Industrial School which focuses on engineering, the newly established Royal Academy and the Palace Academy, research institutes such as the Ming Academy of Sciences, the Academy of Engineering, and the Ordnance Bureau, as well as manufacturing companies such as the Royal Industrial Company. It can be said to be an industrial base integrating industry, academia, and research.

If it weren't for environmental considerations, and the ironworks and some chemical plants were moved to Tongzhou, the industrial system here would be even more complete.

Of course, it would be even more complete if the shipbuilding and naval weapons research institutions in Nanjing and Quanzhou were added.

The Ming Dynasty has now entered the stage of steam smelting and mining in heavy industry.

In the mechanical industry, improvements in steel smelting technology made it possible to manufacture hydraulically driven boring machines. Otherwise, good steam engines would not have been manufactured. The emergence of boring machines also made it possible to bore steam cylinders.

The bored steam cylinder has better airtightness, and it even led to the development of double-expansion steam engines. Once the multiple-expansion steam engine was successfully developed, it meant that it would be possible to manufacture steam ships.

However, it is now feasible to build steam locomotives.

Even at the experimental base of the Daming Academy of Engineering, simple rails and simple locomotives have begun to be used to transport large experimental equipment and instruments.

However, Zhu Houzhao's main focus now is still on the manufacture of firearms, artillery, gunpowder and other weapons.

After all, war may break out at any time, and if Ming Dynasty can take its weapons manufacturing technology to the next level, it will undoubtedly be more confident of winning the battle for world hegemony.

Zhu Houzhao changed into a Ming Dynasty style blue military uniform and led a group of people into the production workshop which was strictly controlled by the Ordnance Bureau.

The rumbling sound of hydraulic impact sounded like thunder beside the boring machine, and standard gun barrels and gun barrels were bored out one by one and went directly to the inspection worker's workbench through the assembly line. The inspection worker checked them and then loaded them onto a truck and transferred them to the outer platform via pulleys for test firing.

The whole process was very orderly and efficient. Zhu Houzhao even personally inspected a gun barrel. It was obvious that the gun barrels of the Ming Dynasty had begun to be bored with rifling, and the rifling threads were gradually becoming finer. The materials used to make gun barrels were also gradually changing from simple and separable copper and iron metals to alloy gun barrels doped with various heavy metals.

"At present, the Ordnance Bureau has eliminated smoothbore gun barrels and gun barrels and has adopted rifled barrels. We have special boring masters who are paid a high salary of one thousand silver dollars a month. These boring masters can basically guarantee the same speed as those of making smoothbore gun barrels and gun barrels. Your Majesty, you came today just in time. I, several boring masters, and Academician Cheng of the Imperial University have made a gun that can fire continuously without pulling the bolt. This gun should be the machine gun your majesty mentioned, but it is larger, has a few more barrels, and also has a water tank. Even if it has wheels to move, it needs four or five people to serve it."

At this time, Academician Tong was telling Zhu Houzhao about his latest research results in vivid detail. Zhu Houzhao was very curious and asked Academician Tong to take him to see them.

Zhu Houzhao followed Academician Tong to the experimental field of the Ordnance Bureau, and soon, a technician from the Ordnance Bureau came out with a large iron lump that looked no different from a gun carriage. The officials and clan members following Zhu Houzhao all started to talk about it.

While these clan members and officials were still discussing, Zhu Houzhao could not wait to ask Academician Tong to start test firing immediately. He could determine that this machine gun was very similar to the Gatling gun of later generations, but it was slightly larger in size, and the water tank for cooling was also larger.

clap clap clap!
Not long after, this Ming Dynasty version of the oversized Gatling gun began to fire. Puffs of white smoke overflowed from multiple barrels. The operator kept turning the barrels, firing bullets one after another, hitting the wooden target on the opposite side with holes.

Except for Zhu Houzhao, all the officials and royal family members present opened their mouths wide. They couldn't believe that there could be such a firearm. For a moment, they didn't know whether to call it a cannon or a gun.

The Minister of War Gui E immediately turned around and suggested: "Your Majesty, I suggest that this type of guns and cannons be mass-produced immediately. If we have these guns and cannons, we don't need cavalry!"

"Don't worry, Mr. Guibu. This gun cannot be mass-produced yet. Now it is just an experimental product. We have to wait for some time before it can be standardized and mass-produced," said Academician Tong, who couldn't help coughing.

Zhu Houzhao nodded: "No hurry, but I hope it can accompany my Ming soldiers to fight monkeys in the southwest in the future!"

Beat the monkey?
No one present understood what the emperor was talking about, but Gui E suddenly realized, "Your Majesty named the natives of Jiaozhi monkeys, and the meaning is quite appropriate! If we use this thing to hit the monkey, it would be quite interesting to see the monkey jumping up and down!"

……

Coming back to the topic, Zhu Houzhao now had to admit that the current Ming Dynasty was no longer comparable to any country in the world in terms of science and technology and industry.

At the same time, Europe was still in the early stages of the rise of capitalism.

Portugal's international status was greatly reduced because its shipping routes and trade markets were taken away by the Ming Dynasty. Only Spain still dominated the Western Hemisphere by relying on trade in the Atlantic and plundering in North America.

Not to mention America, the tragic fate of the Indians had just begun. The Inca Empire in South America was defeated under the northward strategy of Marquis Jianchang of the Ming Dynasty, and in less than half a month, the country was destroyed due to the disparity in strength between the two sides.

Apart from the Ottoman Empire, which spanned Europe and Asia and had some strength in Asia, the Ming Dynasty had nothing to fear.

The real threat to the Ming Dynasty lies within.

The accumulation of wealth can corrupt a person and make an empire lose its enterprising spirit.

The strong small peasant economy still allows Confucianism to exist stubbornly on this land. There are still many scholars and officials who value agriculture over commerce and tend to be conservative. There are still voices hoping that the empire will stop its conquests, cultivate the kingly way internally, and be friendly with its neighbors externally.

But now, Zhu Houzhao could see that the industrialization of the empire had become an irreversible trend.

The steam industry made the urbanization of the empire increasingly obvious. In the Jiangnan, Guangdong and Guangxi regions and the capital area, there were already considerable numbers of bourgeoisie, handicraftsmen and working class. In the eastern region, tens of millions of people made a living by working and doing business. No one dared to make tens of millions of people unemployed in order to restore the ancestral system.

There are even many such people who have participated in court politics.

Moreover, the rapid progress of industry at present is also driven by the profit needs of this kind of people. In the fields of science and technology, industrial research and teaching alone, there is already a large group of professionals who have a high political status and a high status in economic life. Their enthusiasm for natural sciences is no less than that of some masters after the European Renaissance.

Therefore, Zhu Houzhao believed that even a hundred years after him, the newly enthroned emperor and the new ruling group of the Ming Dynasty would find it difficult to turn the Ming Dynasty back into an empire that was under the absolute control of Confucian society and only knew how to close the country to the outside world, emphasize agriculture and suppress commerce, and tend to be conservative and rigid.

The landlord class, or the scholar-official class, now has no way to ignore the trend of the decreasing number of their tenants, nor can they change this trend. The huge profits from industry and commerce have forced them to transform from traditional landlords to industrial and commercial capitalists, and the tenants have gradually changed from landless farmers to workers.

However, both the traditional literati and the emerging bourgeoisie that had already transformed themselves had a certain degree of selfishness. They would try not to pay taxes if they could, and would evade taxes if they could. This forced Zhu Houzhao to first implement a new tax policy in Jiangnan and then to re-collect mining taxes in the interior of the country. Finally, the empire has become an empire that can be reasonably controlled by the central court.

The Ming Empire had now become a monarchical capitalist industrial empire. What it needed most was raw materials, and agricultural products were one of the raw materials. Therefore, the Ming Empire came up with the idea of ​​recovering Jiaozhi for food.

Many scholars and officials who were still relatively conservative in their thinking watched this phenomenon helplessly, watching the Guards officers and soldiers being transferred one team after another to the south on the newly built cement road.

Wang Yi, the deputy censor of the Shandong Provincial Surveillance Department, saw these guards holding steel guns, pushing artillery carts, or riding large horse-drawn carriages, galloping on the wide cement road:

"I never expected that the imperial court would allocate huge sums of money to build this cement road directly connecting Guangdong and Guangxi, and recruit nearly 200,000 Shandong refugees to build the road. It turns out that this is to facilitate the transportation of troops to the south today! It is true that wherever this cement road is built, the Ming army will arrive there. However, this act of excessive military expansion may not be a blessing for the country!"

Although traditional scholars were worried about the court's external expansion, the officers and soldiers participating in the Royal Guards were all smiling at this moment.

"Have you not seen Han Zhongjun, a young man, tied up the enemy and asked for a long rope? Have you not seen Ban Dingyuan, riding a light horse in a remote area, urging the enemy to fight! A man should be brave enough to take on dangerous tasks, so how can he let his scholarly appearance ruin his life?..."

At this time, an adapted version of the military song that had been passed from the Imperial Palace to military academies and then to the Imperial Guards was being sung loudly by the officers and soldiers of the Imperial Guards marching among the rapeseed flowers on the cement road.

Their spirits are full and they are enthusiastic about war. The generous reward system and military merit system, as well as the fact that after retiring from the army they can directly transfer to the class of soldiers and serve as grassroots officials or even be promoted to high-ranking officials, naturally make them very motivated to fight.

They are not afraid even of death, because the empire's insurance system and pension system can allow their children to receive special care because they are orphans of martyrs. It is precisely because of this that when they really go to the battlefield, some low-level soldiers will dare to die bravely.

The army's political department also did sufficient ideological work for them, so that they not only understood who they were fighting for but also why they were fighting. This was different from previous military officers and soldiers who did not know why they were participating in this war even when they arrived on the battlefield.

At this time, the officers and soldiers of the Guards had already learned from the officers and staff of the political system that they were doing a just thing, which was to recover the homeland for the Ming Dynasty, rescue their compatriots enslaved in Jiaozhi, and fight for enough food for their families. Therefore, they did not have any psychological burden about the impending war, nor did they feel that they were invading or committing a crime. They even truly regarded this war as their own career.

Yu Dayou, a young officer who graduated from the Ming Army Military Command College, was studying the materials about the expedition to Jiaozhi during the Yongle period borrowed from the Royal Library. Although he was only temporarily stationed in Baoqing Prefecture at this time, he often played sand table games with several grassroots officers who had received military command education for many years. They all regarded the war to retake Jiaozhi as a career they were passionate about.

This kind of army is just like the armies in later generations that fight for ideals and ideologies. Once they accept war spiritually and even hope to realize their own values ​​through war, their combat effectiveness will undoubtedly be terrifying, even without advanced weapons.

The worrying literati were unable to stop the guardsmen whose minds were armed with ideological weapons.

When the people were well fed and well clothed, they had no resistance to these officers and soldiers with strict military discipline. In fact, because a large number of grassroots officials were retired officers and soldiers of the Guards, and the idea of ​​military and civilians being one family established by the Guards from the beginning, the grassroots people were particularly respectful of the officers and soldiers of the Guards, and the relationship between the military and the people was particularly close, which changed the previous concept of the people that soldiers were bandits.

The food and drink described by literati even became a reality.

At this time, Yu Dayou had just entered a village and was about to find the village head to discuss the matter of staying overnight. A local pointed at a group of people carrying a Ming Dynasty Gatling gun and asked, "Soldier, where are you going to fight? Why are you going south? What are you carrying? So many pipes?"

"My fellow countryman, you don't know, we are going to the south, that's called a machine gun, specially used to shoot monkeys!"

Yu Dayou said something.

The phrase "take machine guns to Jiaozhi to fight monkeys" spread from the Ministry of War to the Guards and became popular all of a sudden. Now even basic commanders like Yu Dayou habitually say it.

Thanks to the book friend Jianhun platform for 2500 starting coins. Thank you to the book friend Taoshenshi for 100 starting coins.

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(End of this chapter)