Emperor Zhengde

Chapter 325 Yu Dayou and the Development of Electricity in the Ming Dynasty
"What Mr. Wang said makes sense. However, we want to recapture Jiaozhi in order to actually occupy it and make it an important base for the Ming Dynasty to control the food supply and shipping routes to the West. In other words, whether Mo Dengyong surrenders or not, for the sake of the people of the Ming Dynasty, he and Nguyen Gan, the native lords of Jiaozhi, must be eliminated!"

Zhu Houzhao said something at this time, which set the tone.

The officials who participated in the court discussion were all hawkish officials who were good at governing the army on horseback and the people on foot. They only cared about how to maximize national interests and did not care about their so-called reputation.

Therefore, the officials in the court also understood and accepted Zhu Houzhao's meaning. They knew that the Ming Dynasty was different from the previous dynasties and it was impossible to be self-sufficient. As long as the current Ming Dynasty did not find ways to plunder other countries, the problem of rich and poor in the country would be aggravated and chaos would occur.

The Minister of War Gui E stood up at this time:

"Your Majesty, I think that if Mo Dengyong of Jiaozhi surrenders to the Ming Dynasty as Wang Ge Lao said, the Ming Dynasty can take this opportunity to demand that Mo Dengyong's army accept the reorganization of the court, his officials accept the training and appointment of the court, and his territory must be governed by officials sent by the court. As for Nguyen Gan's troops, the court can inform Nguyen Gan of Mo Dengyong's surrender and force him to surrender. If Nguyen Gan refuses, then the court can send another army to attack him!"

Lin Tingxuan, who had been the governor-general of Guangdong and Guangxi, could not help but take over the conversation: "Your Majesty, I don't think Mo Dengyong would be willing to be an idle official of the Ming Dynasty as Gui Butang said. If you want to take away his benefits, you must cut off his life. We can't avoid war with Jiaozhi."

"Mr. Lin's words make sense. I also believe that war is inevitable. I currently have three strategies, good, medium and bad, for your Majesty and the officials in the court to refer to," Wang Shouren also took over the conversation at this time.

Upon seeing this, Zhu Houzhao asked Wang Shouren to come up with three strategies, the best, the middle and the worst. Although the Ming Dynasty's attack on Jiaozhi was basically like a tiger eating a sheep, and the outcome was no suspense, it would naturally be best to recapture Jiaozhi at the lowest cost.

In this life, Wang Shouren did not suffer serious physical damage due to being exiled to Longchang, so his physical condition did not deteriorate quickly as in history due to being beaten with a stick in the court and then exiled to Longchang, so that he died before he reached the age of sixty.

However, in this life, Wang Shouren was still able to stand in the court and provide advice to Emperor Zhu Houzhao.

Now, even when it came to strategic matters such as the recovery of Jiaozhi, Zhu Houzhao found it much easier to handle with Wang Shouren in the court.

Wang Shouren said at this time: "As ordered, I think the best strategy is to agree to the Nguyen clan and send troops to attack the Mo clan, but ask the Nguyen clan to allow our royal army to land in Thanh Hoa and attack the Mo clan from the south. At the same time, if the Mo clan surrenders, we will also accept the surrender of the Mo clan, and in the name of suppressing the rebellion of the Nguyen clan, ask the Mo clan to allow the royal army to pass through the Mo clan's territory, and take the opportunity to destroy the Mo clan with the northern army and the Nguyen clan with the southern army."

"The middle strategy is that even if the Mo clan refuses to surrender, the imperial court will still ask the Nguyen clan to allow the royal army to land in Thanh Hoa and destroy the Mo clan first and then the Nguyen clan from the north and south."

"The worst option is that if the Nguyen clan refuses to allow the Ming Dynasty to pass through the country, whether the Mo clan surrenders or not, we must first destroy the Nguyen clan and then the Mo clan. This is because Jiaozhi is mountainous in the north and plains in the south. It is naturally easier to attack Jiaozhi from the south by sea!"

After Wang Shouren said this, Zhu Houzhao smiled and nodded. He couldn't help but become more convinced that Wang Shouren was a very outstanding military adviser who could consider all changes clearly and foresee the future. Because he was familiar with history, he knew that the Mo family would definitely surrender.

"Your summary is comprehensive. I believe that the Mo family will definitely surrender, so now it depends on whether the Nguyen family is willing to let us pass through the Ming Dynasty. But no matter whether the Nguyen family is willing or not, the Ming Dynasty army must land in Thanh Hoa, an important town in southern Jiaozhi. If the Nguyen family agrees to let us pass through the Ming Dynasty, it will be fine. If not, we will directly occupy the important town of Thanh Hoa and look for an opportunity to destroy the Nguyen family!"

Zhu Houzhao made the final decision. Although the court officials present all said "Your Majesty is wise!", they did not understand why His Majesty was so confident that the Mo family would surrender to the Ming Dynasty. Even Wang Shouren did not understand why the emperor was more confident than himself, but he had to admit that although the emperor was younger than himself, impulsive, and seemed reckless and imprudent on the surface, he seemed to know the world 500 years earlier than them and could always anticipate opportunities.

Therefore, Wang Shouren did not question Zhu Houzhao at this time.

The envoys sent by the Nguyen family left the capital with the conditions that the Ming Emperor asked the Nguyen family to agree to allow the Ming army to land in Thanh Hoa and use it as a transit point to destroy the Mo family.

And at the same time.

The express courier of the General Staff of the Imperial Guard also went to Guangzhou Prefecture with Zhu Houzhao's order for the navy to immediately gather troops to Qinghua.

anyway.

The Ming Dynasty’s basic strategy for recovering Jiaozhi has been established, and the next step is the specific combat issues of the front-line troops.

During this period.

Zhu Houzhao also asked the Ming Stock Exchange to issue war bonds in order to gather capital to launch a war.

Because the Ming Dynasty had issued this type of bonds before in order to occupy Goa, and it also made the people who tried it for the first time make a lot of money, and even created many millionaires or even tens of millions of dollars.

And now, the Ming Dynasty has once again discovered national debt because of the war, and the people are still rushing to invest money in the Ming military. The reason is simple: everyone believes in the strength of the Ming Guards. After all, they have seen the army running on the cement road of the main road every day, and naturally they can see that the Ming Dynasty will win the war against Jiaozhi.

At this time, the people of the Ming Empire clearly had confidence in the Ming Empire.

As a result, the Ming Dynasty's army received a large amount of financial support. Of course, this financial support also represented the support of the people.

And because the people have invested in the war, they are paying more attention to the empire's wars than ever before. It seems that nationalism has suddenly increased a lot, which is better than the effect of brainwashing education. This is especially true for some selfish middle and upper classes. They don't care about national justice, but now they believe in the strength of the imperial army and have invested in the war, which makes them pay more attention to the war that Ming is about to launch than ordinary people.

"Warming the country and its people is not beneficial to the country. Killing should not happen in China!"

The great scholar Bai Songyi criticized the current dynasty's policy of advocating martial arts in Yuelu Academy without any politeness. But after his speech, he handed the silver he received to his servant and said, "Go to Wuchang Prefecture immediately to buy some national debt. There are more and more troops from Changsha to Baoqing. Everyone can see that the possibility of Annan becoming Jiaozhi this time is at least 90%!"

"Master, my family sent me a letter saying that my master invested all the 50,000 silver dollars in the mansion, and that he is waiting for you to recover Jiaozhi for the court, so that he can make a hundred thousand dollars and try to get the latest batch of two-stage steam mining machines produced by the Royal Industrial Company first!"

Even Mao Bowen, the commander of the Northern Army of the Imperial Guard who was in Wuzhou at the time, received a letter from his family. For a moment, he felt a lot more pressure. He knew that he could not be careless when leading his troops to attack Jiaozhi this time, otherwise he would not only lose the court's troops, money and food, but also his own money.

Because of this, Mao Bowen had to lower himself and ordered his deputy general: "Go and call the boy named Yu!"

Mao Bowen's deputy general couldn't help but wonder when he saw this: "Master, Yu Dayou has always had a bad temper and dares to contradict anyone. Don't you hate him very much and even transferred him out of the central army? Why do you want to see him again today?"

"What can we do? Damn it! Those officials in the court are really old foxes. Their advice is really vicious. We must win this war now. Not only must we win, but we must also fight well. Otherwise, it will not only be the court that suffers, but also ourselves. Although the guy surnamed Yu has a bad temper, his analysis of the war situation is better than that of the military staff. What he said the day before yesterday is no different from the imperial edict issued by the General Staff of the Guards!"

Mao Bowen threw the document in his hand onto the table and said, "This Yu Dayou is young and far away in Wuzhou, but he has the same ideas as His Majesty and the elders above. You can tell he is incredible! Next, it would be a good idea to ask him how to fight!"

Mao Bowen couldn't help but wave his hands and said, "Forget it. This guy has a stubborn temper. I ignored the military law and beat him with a military stick. He probably still hates me as the commander. I will go to see him in person and bring the good wine that Huguang Governor Qin Jin sent me a while ago!"

Mao Bowen's deputy general was very surprised, wondering when the commander's temper became so good that he could even tolerate Yu Dayou.

……

Yu Dayou was still using the telescope used for marching to observe the terrain in Wuzhou. He determined the accuracy of the military map surveyed by the Jinyiwei in Jiaozhi by calibrating the actual terrain of Wuzhou with the military map published by the Ministry of War.

"Zhi Fu, have you asked the military bond dealers to help you buy bonds? The war hasn't even started yet, but the price of war bonds has increased several times. Even if the court doesn't pay them, I'm afraid the brothers will fight like hell. When will the war start? I really want to wait until the war is over so that I can exchange them for real silver dollars and marry your sister-in-law!"

Lu Tong, a former classmate of Yu Dayou who has now graduated from the Marine Corps Department, participated in the war to retake Jiaozhi in order to gain some experience in land and jungle warfare, but this also allowed him to fight side by side with Yu Dayou.

Yu Dayou was not angry because Lu Tong was younger than him but pretended to be his elder brother. He just stood up, brushed off the grass debris on his body, stomped his thick-soled military mountain leather boots on the ground, and began to untie his trouser belt, whistling and saying:
"Why buy a ticket? I, Yu Dayou, did not join the army to make money. However, the war in the north cannot be fought for the time being. I estimate that our army will have to stay in Guangxi for a while. But you will probably be transferred. In my opinion, the court will probably start from the south this time! You, a marine warfare department, are just right for it."

"Why did the imperial court mobilize hundreds of thousands of land forces to gather in the southwest? To find the Ru women (the ancestors of the Zhuang people were called Ru people in the Ming Dynasty, which is also the same as wolves, and the wolf soldiers are more famous) to sing folk songs?"

Lu Tong said this and pointed to a woman who was looking over here in the rice field ahead: "Look, that woman is very pretty, just right to be my sister-in-law!"

Yu Dayou pulled up his trousers and kicked Lu Tong onto the soil that he had soaked: "You can't spit out ivory from a dog's mouth. Can't you tell who is the younger brother and who is the older brother?"

"Don't think you're invincible just because you beat everyone in Shaolin Temple. I'm afraid of you. Look at your legs!"

As Lu Tong spoke, he feinted a kick and sent his iron fist straight towards Yu Dayou's temple. Yu Dayou dodged to the side and was about to attack Lu Tong's chest with his elbow when he heard a folk song. Yu Dayou could not help but retract his attack, grabbed Lu Tong who had missed his target, and looked at a woman who was walking towards him.

The woman pointed at Yu Dayou and said to an old man, "Father, I want him!"

"What's so good about a Han soldier? We have plenty of handsome guys among our Wolf Soldiers," said the old Zhuan man.

The pretty girl said coquettishly, "I want him," and then her face turned red with shame.
Lu Tong burst into laughter at this time. Yu Dayou didn't know what was going on, and thought that these were probably wolf soldiers who were transferred here by imperial order, so he just bowed and said, "Yu Dayou, a centurion of the Fourth Infantry Division of the Third Army of the Imperial Guards, greets you two. May I know who you are?"

As soon as Yu Dayou finished speaking, a messenger came riding over: "Lu Tong, the general has ordered you to lead your troops to Qinzhou immediately to board the ship to Xiangshan!"

Lu Tan was shocked and thought that Yu Dayou's words had actually come true.

At this time, the voice of "The Marshal has arrived" was heard again. Yu Dayou couldn't help but frowned and thought: "This guy must have bought war coupons too!"

After Yu Dayou came to Mao Bowen, he found that Mao Bowen really wanted to analyze the war situation himself, and he also saw that Mao Bowen wanted to fight the war beautifully and make more money.

Yu Dayou then told Mao Bowen his analysis of the war situation, and knew that the imperial court would now land in Qinghua in the south.

of course.

Yu Dayou's analysis undoubtedly coincided with the decisions of Zhu Houzhao and Wang Shouren in the court.

A nation in any era will always have outstanding talents in certain areas, and a peaceful era will naturally make use of capable ministers and generals, while a chaotic era will often cause capable ministers and generals to suffer unjust death or failure.

Yu Dayou was undoubtedly a star general of the Ming Dynasty, which has been proven by history.

but.

At that time, except Zhu Houzhao and Mao Bowen, no one knew that Yu Dayou would become a star general.

Even Yu Dayou himself doesn't know now that he will become a star general in the future, and he doesn't even know that the Emperor has begun to pay attention to him.

Zhu Houzhao did set up an archive, and although he did not tell others directly, he was indeed secretly observing these talented people who had performed outstandingly in the original history.

Zhu Houzhao believed that even if he, as a time traveler, could change history and bring changes to society, it could not conceal the value of these heroes in today's Ming Dynasty.

Maybe there will be no more Japanese invasion in the Ming Dynasty at this time, but this does not mean that Yu Dayou will not become a famous general.

……

"After the landing in the south, more land field forces will be needed. We can't just rely on the marines. Let's think about whether we can draw troops from the 1st Division of the 3rd Army of the Guards on the northern front and transport them to the south via naval transport ships!"

Zhu Houzhao knew that Yu Dayou was in the First Division of the Guards, so he naturally wanted to see Yu Dayou's performance on the battlefield in advance. So when he thought about increasing the army's strength on the southern front, he would transfer Yu Dayou there first.

When Emperor Zhu Houzhao spoke, the Privy Council dared not disobey.

However, Yu Dayou was not happy after receiving this order. He said bitterly: "What should I do? I'm seasick!"

……

But no matter what, even Mao Bowen could not say anything about the central government's order, let alone Yu Dayou, who could only obey military orders.

In any case, the Ming Dynasty's southern corps has begun to gradually gather towards Yazhou. Regardless of whether the Nguyen family of Jiaozhi agrees to allow the Ming Dynasty to land in Thanh Hoa and use it as a conquest mode, the southern corps must march from Yazhou to Thanh Hoa.

War is not a fight that can be started just by saying so. Even if an accidental war conflict wants to lead to a major war, there will be a gradual process ranging from months to years. Now, it has been almost ten years since the Ming central government proposed to recover Jiaozhi and officially mobilized troops to establish a strategy. Even after the strategy is established and the troops are mobilized, it will take some time to officially fire the first shot. After all, food and fodder must be sent before troops move. Logistics and tactical command by front-line commanders all take time.

At this time, Zhu Houzhao also did one thing, which was to decide on the commander of the southern front corps. The northern front was led by Mao Bowen, a veteran with rich experience in mountain warfare in the south, while the southern front corps needed to be proficient in both sea and land warfare. Zhu Houzhao still let Wang Hong be the commander.

After all, Wang Hong is a famous naval general who has defeated the invasion of Western colonists several times. Although he is in the civil service system, it is naturally safer to use Wang Hong. After all, Wang Hong is the most familiar with the Nanyang area because he has been in Guangdong and Guangxi from the position of Deputy Censor to Governor-General.

After Zhu Houzhao established the commander of the southern front corps, he considered the issue of unified coordination between the north and south fronts, so he appointed Wang Shouren as the deputy privy envoy to supervise the army in Southeast Asia and coordinate the command of the north and south front corps to recapture Jiaozhi. He even gave Wang Shouren full authority to handle the matter and report it to the central government later.

There was no way around it, because although the Ming Dynasty had entered the steam age, it had not yet entered the information age, and there were not even radio waves. Due to geographical isolation, it was difficult for Emperor Zhu Houzhao himself to remotely coordinate the north and south lines from a distance of more than 5,000 kilometers.

Under such circumstances, in order to improve the efficiency of war command, Zhu Houzhao had no choice but to delegate power.

Moreover, when Wang Shouren went to the south, he had to trust Wang Shouren completely. He could neither change commanders at will nor give commands to people above his level. History has proven that even if he is a military god, it is easy to run into problems if he gives commands to people above his level. He cannot learn from Chiang Kai-shek.

Therefore, Zhu Houzhao now simply relaxed and did not worry about anything, just waiting for the outcome of the war. If the result was good, he would naturally reward according to merit, and if the result was not good, those who should be held accountable would be held accountable. Now he just did things he liked to do.

Zhu Houzhao is now in the state of stealing a half day of leisure from his busy life. He decided to do something that his heart wants to do. For a time traveler like him, the most regrettable thing in this era is that there is no Internet, no movies, TV and other videos, and no various electrical and intelligent devices that can make people comfortable.

Although he lived in the 21st century in his previous life, he was poor and did not have the time or ability to enjoy many so-called things.

But now, he is the emperor of the Ming Dynasty and is fully capable and qualified to have the best in the world, including women. However, there are some things from later generations that he cannot possess, which is a pity for Zhu Houzhao.

Zhu Houzhao started from his own heart, and he really wanted something new to emerge.

Therefore, he asked the Academy of Sciences to speed up the research and application of electricity. Of course, the research on electricity was not just to satisfy Zhu Houzhao's inner demands. Zhu Houzhao himself knew that if electricity appeared, it would undoubtedly bring more earth-shaking changes to the world.

The Ming Dynasty is actually now able to manufacture the voltaic cell. After all, it is simple, it is nothing more than a copper-zinc battery, which serves as a power source.

But in terms of the actual application of electricity, the Ming Dynasty at that time could only produce light bulbs, which were lit by large voltaic batteries.

As for light bulbs, Ming Dynasty only had arc lamps and tungsten filament lamps.

Arc lamps use electric arcs to emit light, which requires metal electrodes, consumes a lot of energy and has high temperatures, making them unsuitable for home use. Apart from military use, they are of little significance. Therefore, Daming's current focus of research is on how to install tungsten filament lamps in homes and keep them lit by electricity at any time.

Because Zhu Houzhao knew that the best filament material ultimately chosen for the light bulb invented by Edison was tungsten filament, the Ming Dynasty now took fewer detours when manufacturing light bulbs and did not first use various fiber materials for filament experiments.

If the Ming Dynasty wanted to make progress in electricity, or at least achieve electric lighting, what it lacked was not qualified light bulbs, but sufficient electricity supply.

Electricity has been used by humans in history because Faraday discovered electromagnetic induction, which used magnetic induction to produce electrical induction and then electric current. Today, the Ming Academy of Sciences has begun to re-experiment with the theory proposed by Zhu Houzhao and has proven it, so that many people believe that electricity can indeed be generated through electromagnetic induction, but it will take time to apply it directly.

But Zhu Houzhao hoped that this time would not take too long. After all, he really hoped that the electrical age would arrive soon, and in the end at least enter the radio age, making communications more convenient for the Ming Dynasty. After all, in the future, the territory of the Ming Dynasty would be more vast, and it would be more difficult to rule.

But no matter what, Zhu Houzhao was now able to use electric lights for short periods of time. Sometimes even a faint light between the beds was more interesting than groping around in the dark.

But for Zhu Houzhao's concubines, His Majesty would not only turn on the night lights in the bed curtains at night, but also let them wear all kinds of strange clothes, and called it uniform temptation.

Zhu Houzhao admitted that he sometimes had too much fun, but life is meant to be fun, as long as it doesn't affect others.

The emperor of the Ming Dynasty could now let his young concubines dress up in nurse uniforms or white-collar clothes and play various games in his spare time, but at this time in the South China Sea, the empire's fleet was gradually approaching the Kingdom of Jiaozhi.

The Nguyen family of Jiaozhi was not stupid either. They guessed the Ming's intention and rejected the Ming's request to land in Thanh Hoa. This meant that the Ming had to rely on force to take over Thanh Hoa first.

At this time, Yu Dayou, who had already worked hard to solve the problem of seasickness, and his officers and soldiers had already transported the Ming version of the Gatling machine gun, and quietly landed at night using landing assault boats, preparing to give the monkeys of Jiaozhi a baptism of new era and new firearms.

(End of this chapter)