My Pen Pal Zhu Yuanzhang

Chapter 108: Old Zhu's Troubles

Forming a musketeer team of 10,000 people with 10,000 needle-fire rifles is the minimum configuration to ensure that the musketeer team can completely crush the Yuan court cavalry.

This was the conclusion reached by Xu Da, Li Wenzhong, Tang He, Lan Yu and others after several drills, from sand table to actual exercises, constantly organizing the gun teams and adjusting the number of people in each group.

The 10,000-man musket team was organized into 20 musket battalions, with 500 people in each battalion. That is to say, even in the most extreme environment, the Ming army had to ensure at least one musket battalion to guarantee firepower.

The musketeers of each battalion were divided into five rows, with one hundred men in each row firing in unison.

This fully takes into account the soldiers' proficiency in handling guns and the fact that on the actual battlefield, it takes three to five breaths of time from shooting to reloading, and this period of time is exactly the shooting time of the other four rows of soldiers.

After the front row finishes shooting, they squat down to reload, and the soldiers in the back row start shooting. After they finish shooting, they continue to squat down to reload, and the soldiers in the back row continue shooting. This continues until the last row of soldiers finishes shooting and the soldiers in the first row have reloaded, so the firepower can continue.

Such an arrangement can ensure continuous output of firepower, but it also brings a big problem: ammunition!
Not taking into account the ammunition reserves needed for the Northern Expedition, even the current training of musketeers consumes a large amount of bullets every day.

If the soldiers are not allowed to actually wield guns, when a real battle breaks out, they will be in a panic and by the time the Mongolian cavalry arrives they won't even have bullets loaded. That would be a real tragedy.

In his letter, Li Han repeatedly emphasized that more sweat in peacetime and less blood in war. Although this conflicted with Zhu Yuanzhang's idea of ​​military farming in the garrisons, Xu Da and others thought it was very reasonable.

If soldiers are not allowed to practice practicing gun practice, when a war really breaks out, what is the difference between such a good needle-shot gun and a fire stick?
All the problems can be summed up in two words: lack of people!
Li Min was shouting about the shortage of people all over the world every day, and he wished he could immediately pull all the thousands of students from the Craftsmen Academy to the Military Equipment Bureau!
Although Wu Daoxing joined and many Confucian scholars enrolled in the Academy of Craftsmen, these scholars who were unable to carry anything and could not even tell the difference between steel and iron, were asked to make guns and ammunition?
Come on, Minister Li doesn’t want to shorten his life.

Fortunately, due to the continued mining of several large silver and copper mines, the imperial court was not short of money at present, and Yang Siyi had a rare few days of prosperity.

Most of the silver entered the national treasury as reserves, and the treasure notes and newly minted copper coins issued based on the reserves were put into production in factories and mines. The currency depreciation problem that Zhu Yuanzhang was worried about did not occur.

However, Yang Siyi's life was not easy either. The Ministry of Revenue had newly established a Statistics Department to count the output values ​​of agriculture, industry and commerce across the country, which would be used as a benchmark and the basis for the issuance of treasure notes in the coming year.

Under Zhu Yuanzhang's plan, the use of copper coins and silver coins would be gradually reduced, and eventually they would all be replaced by treasure notes.

This also lays a solid foundation for the century-long plan of maritime trade.

Craftsmen were needed everywhere, so Zhu Yuanzhang had no choice but to issue imperial decrees to all prefectures, counties and districts, asking government offices to spread the news that the court needed craftsmen in order to recruit more craftsmen.

Although they had considered asking local government offices to organize local craftsmen to come to Yingtian Prefecture, they took into account that the officials in the government offices would forcibly conscript able-bodied men in the name of corvée labor for the sake of political achievements, or even falsely report the number of people and claim wages. This would only backfire and cause public outrage, so this idea had to be abandoned.

Governing a big country is like cooking a small fish. You have to do it slowly and not rush into things.

But the current problem also needed to be solved urgently. Zhu Yuanzhang thought about it and decided that he would write back to Lao Li as well, so he decided to ask him.

After finally getting rid of Li Min, he prepared to write a reply and instructed the eunuchs and guards not to disturb him. This was one of the few moments that could allow him to completely relax, apart from reading letters.

Spreading out the letter paper, Zhu Yuanzhang wrote:

"Old Li, that hot air balloon is truly magical. I never imagined that a mortal's strength could produce such a powerful force and allow people to fly into the sky.

You didn't see it. That day, in front of tens of thousands of common people and students, I took the great scholar Wu Daoxing and flew into the sky on a hot air balloon, leaving everyone stunned.

It’s a pity that you, Lao Li, were not here. This is our only regret.

That time, not only did Wu Daoxing feel the greatness of technology, but all the Confucian students were also completely convinced.

Old Li, you are right. If you want to make scholars submit, it is meaningless to just debate with them. You have to completely conquer them ideologically.

From that day on, no one said anything nonsense about the official school of technology, and many Confucian students volunteered to study at the Craftsman Academy. I think these people can also become the future cornerstone of the craftsmanship of the Ming Dynasty. I dare not take credit for it, all of this is the credit of Old Li.

After removing the resistance from the literary world, the next step is to prepare for the Northern Expedition and completely eliminate the threat posed by northern alien races to China for thousands of years.

We plan to formally march into the desert after the autumn examination. One reason is that after autumn, the grassland will turn yellow and horses, cattle and sheep will not have enough fodder, and the Mongolian tribes will gradually migrate south and harass our Ming border. But this will also save the Ming army the journey and avoid going deep into the desert and becoming exhausted.

Secondly, in order to compete for pastures with water and grass, the various Mongolian tribes would attack each other and weaken each other's strength, which gave the Ming Dynasty the opportunity to wipe them out in one fell swoop.

However, before the Northern Expedition, there was still a key problem that needed to be solved urgently, and that was the production speed of needle-fired guns and bullets, which was still too slow.

It would take a skilled craftsman at least two to three days to make a needle-fired gun, but there were not enough skilled craftsmen.

This does not include the craftsmen needed to produce the bullets.

The Craftsmen Academy has only just begun to train craftsmen and is currently not capable of producing firearms and ammunition.

If we don’t prepare enough guns and bullets before the Northern Expedition, we may miss the opportunity to fight. I wonder what you think about this, Lao Li.”

After finishing the letter, Zhu Yuanzhang began to prepare gifts. In the past few communications, he had never sent any gifts to Li Han. Although he knew that Li Han would not mind, he still felt bad about it.

What Li Han gave to Zhu Yuanzhang and the Ming Dynasty, both ideas and artifacts, were enough to change the current situation, and it would not be an exaggeration to say that they were the country's sacred artifacts.

Just like the medicines and radios in the beginning, and the computers and needle guns later, various precious mineral maps, and now the hot air balloons, almost every one of them is the capital for Ming Dynasty to leverage the world!
What is even more valuable is the extraordinary knowledge that Lao Li selflessly imparted to him.

But what Mr. Zhu could give back to Mr. Li were only worldly things.

The only way to repay Li Han is to shoulder the mission he gave me and create eternal peace for the Ming Dynasty and even China!
But that is a long-term goal. The most important thing now is to find a suitable gift for Lao Li.

Zhu Yuanzhang wandered around the palace, thinking over and over again, but he still didn't know what to give. This almost became his biggest problem.

Should we send him some maids and guards, or some singing girls?

It's too vulgar. Even Old Zhu is not interested in it, let alone a free and easy person like Old Li.

As he walked, suddenly, an idea came to him.

Many of the gifts given by Lao Li contained miraculous craftsmanship, which seemed to be in line with the thoughts of Mohism during the time of the Hundred Schools of Thought.

It just so happened that there was a copy of "Mozi" copied by Liu Xiang and his son Liu Xin during the Han Dynasty in the palace!
The copy copied by Liu and his son was originally copied on fine silk and was a scroll book.

However, this book has disappeared, and the "Mozi" copied by Liu and his son has 18 volumes and 71 chapters, which has many missing parts compared to the original "Mozi".

After the war at the end of the Song Dynasty, only 16 volumes and 61 articles of this version of "Mozi" remained, but it is still a treasure of Chinese culture.

The version collected in the palace today is the one from the Song Dynasty.

Giving the wisdom of the sages of the pre-Qin period to Mr. Li, I believe he will understand Mr. Zhu's intentions.

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(End of this chapter)