The Ming Dynasty did not revolutionize

Chapter 192 Northern Agricultural Corporation and Northern Industrial Corporation

Zhu Jianxuan arranged the main divisions to work, control the situation in Shuntian City, and drive and escort the residents out of the city.

He also returned to the palace in Nanhai Zi to consider and evaluate the current situation again.

Now that the Central Plains region has been completely recovered, it should only be a matter of time before we continue to recover Shanxi and Shaanxi regions.

The next thing he had to do was to deeply integrate and control the "Ming Dynasty homeland" he had recovered, which was the traditional northern agricultural area.

According to Shenzhou's historical experience, there are two standard answers that can be copied to complete this very typical traditional task.

The first is to eliminate the existing middle and upper class landlords, seize the large amount of land they once owned, and allow the monarch and the court to directly control enough land.

Then distribute the land to landless farmers, encourage them to reclaim wasteland on their own and create enough self-employed farmers.

Self-cultivating farmers were the most stable group in the agricultural era and the easiest group to manage. They were the social foundation of the traditional Chinese Empire.

The second was to recruit the remaining middle and low-level landlords as officials through the imperial examination and absorb them into the ruling group.

Prevent them from opposing the court, and at the same time obtain people to help you govern the world.

However, the newly established dynasties in the past usually experienced large-scale and long-term wars, which consumed a large number of the Central Plains population and caused large-scale abandonment of land.

Self-employed farmers can obtain relatively more land, which means they have a relatively high ability to resist risks and are not likely to lose their land again.

The current situation is that the Wu Kingdom defeated the powerful Qing Kingdom.

It was still a quick victory strategy. The battle in the Central Plains lasted only about half a year, and there was basically no loss of population in the Central Plains.

The natural disasters in the past few years have slightly consumed a portion of the population, but the total population of the entire Central Plains region is still very large, and there has been no large-scale abandonment of land.

In this case, wanting to create self-cultivating farmers is equivalent to equalizing land distribution in a prosperous era.

Each self-employed farmer obtains very little land and has very low ability to resist risks, making it easy for them to lose the land again.

However, as the king of Australia, the king of America, the king of the Netherlands, and the ruler of the states in East Africa and North Africa, he owns a large amount of overseas land to be developed.

At the same time, the Ming Dynasty had begun to enter the industrial age, and the Wu Kingdom was a pure industrial country.

The North, which is now under his rule, will have to face the direct impact of industrial society in the future and it will not be possible for it to continue to maintain its agricultural society.

So the traditional standard answers of the past are no longer suitable for now.

We must consider the environment of the industrial age, the situation of the capitalist age, and the situation of overseas colonization and land reclamation.

Zhu Jianxuan was not prepared to distribute the land or create self-cultivating farmers on a large scale. Instead, he was prepared to continue to promote land concentration.

The dry fields of the northern plains are very suitable for building large-scale farms and are far more suitable for industrialized and capitalistic farms than the fragmented paddy fields in the south.

Concentrating cultivation on a sufficient scale of land is the basis for improving agricultural production efficiency.

In the past, because the population in the Central Plains was too dense and there was no industry to absorb the excess labor force, the only way was to engage in intensive farming and increase the yield per unit area as much as possible.

Now that we have wasteland waiting to be reclaimed overseas, and with subsequent industrialization continuing to absorb population, we can start trying to build large farms.

First of all, all the land seized from the Eight Banners nobles and senior officials of the Qing Dynasty has now been listed as "royal property", and will be prohibited from being sold or traded to other countries in the future.

In the future, a certain number of tenant farmers will continue to be recruited to establish military farms and garrisons to concentrate on cultivating these royal lands.

Twenty percent of the income from the military farms was turned over to the imperial court, and thirty percent was distributed among all residents of the garrisons.

Fifty percent of the income was used for daily expenses of the garrison, including paying salaries to garrison managers, building granaries and canals, purchasing public tools, and setting up canteens and schools.

The garrison provided three meals a day for free during the busy farming season, taught the children in the garrison to read and write for free during the slack farming season, and organized the residents of the garrison to build houses together.

The 30% of the income distributed to the residents of the garrison may not seem like much, but they only need to deal with food and clothing during the slack season, and do not need to purchase farm tools, seeds, oxen or houses.

Therefore, the actual income available to the residents of the garrison is likely to be higher than that of ordinary self-cultivating farmers and tenants.

At the same time, a "Northern Agricultural Company" was established to manage and supervise private land transactions in the Central Plains.

In the future, all land transactions in the Central Plains must be conducted under the supervision of the Northern Agricultural Company.

All land transaction contracts must have the seal of the Northern Agricultural Company, otherwise the court will not recognize or protect them.

As a court agency, the Northern Agricultural Company had the right of first refusal to all land.

Before all private land transaction agreements are signed, Northern Agricultural Company must be asked in writing whether it is interested in purchasing the land.

Only after Northern Agricultural Company clearly refuses can the transaction continue to be made to others.

The role of the Northern Agricultural Company was to use its privileges as a court institution to actively interfere with private land annexation in the north.

Through relatively mild means, scattered land can be concentrated for use, while avoiding excessive concentration of land among the people, which would in turn affect the authority and stability of the court.

The land concentrated by the Northern Agricultural Company will be operated in the form of capitalist farms.

Free farmers were hired to work on the farm, and farm tools and lunch were provided while they worked, but nothing else about the farmers mattered.

Thirty percent of the farm's income was turned over to the imperial court, thirty percent was used for farm management, and forty percent was distributed to the farmers who came to work.

Compared with ordinary tenant farmers, farm farmers do not need to worry about farm tools and seeds, and their actual disposable income should not be lower than that of ordinary tenant farmers.

Another Wu Immigration Company will be established to be responsible for official immigration operations within the jurisdiction of Wu itself.

A fixed steam sailing route was established from Shandong, Liaodong, Vladivostok, Miaojie, Ezo and other places, running from the North Pacific to the west coast of North America.

Organize fixed routes to Australia, East Africa, North Africa and other places, and a round trip should be able to be controlled within three months.

The surplus population in the Central Plains, mainly unemployed landless farmers, were sent to North America, Australia, East Africa and other regions to open up wasteland.

While the Wu State was deeply integrating and controlling the northern agricultural areas, another major problem it encountered was the acceptance and management of other areas that originally belonged to the Qing State.

The Liaodong region and North America should also be able to be taken over peacefully.

After arranging garrisons and establishing guard colonies, more stable control can be achieved.

There were already a large number of Han immigrants in the area, and Qianlong's orders had a relatively good effect in the local area.

When Qianlong's surrender was delivered, most of the Manchu and Han officials would probably accept their fate and would not fight the Ming Dynasty anymore.

Even if there were a small number of people who were unwilling to obey, they would soon be defeated by the main force of Wu and tens of thousands of auxiliary troops from other garrisons.

Liaodong belongs to the traditional territory of the Ming Dynasty. Recovering Liaodong is a matter of course and does not require any special reason.

Especially in the farming areas in the southern region, regaining them can generate direct income and can be directly managed using the traditional system of the Central Plains.

The place where the Qing Dynasty's American camp was located is the area from Seattle to Vancouver in later generations, which is also a place suitable for agricultural development.

The Qing Dynasty has developed very well in recent years, and directly occupying it will have a similar effect.

But it is more difficult to control the remaining areas.

Such as the grassland areas in the north, the forest areas north of the grassland, the mountainous and swamp areas in the northeast and east of Liaoning, and places such as East and West Siberia and Alaska in the previous life.

It should be relatively simple to ask local leaders to surrender, but it would be very difficult for the court to exercise direct control.

For the people of the Ming Dynasty, the grassland was already a bitterly cold place, and the forests and snowy plains to the north of the grassland were simply not a place for human habitation.

If people from the Ming Dynasty were asked to serve as officials in such places, they would most likely resign directly.

If we only look at the finances, the only way to avoid a direct loss is to leave it alone or just surrender in name only.

Even if you use the method of controlling others, if you want to control them a little more firmly, you need to spend money.

If you want to arrange for a temporary official to govern, you will have to continue to lose money. It's not just the Ming Dynasty that loses money. When the Qing Dynasty ruled the grasslands, the northwest, the snowy areas and other places, it basically lost money.

Even though the Qing Dynasty did not set up temporary officials in these places.

In the history of the Qing Dynasty, when soldiers were sent to these places to fight, they basically had to bring their own dry food.

The local rulers could hardly supply anything and were still waiting for rewards from the emperor.

In history, the Qing Dynasty used abundant taxes from the south of the Yangtze River to forcibly maintain its rule over these places.

The ruling group of the Qing Dynasty was the Eight Banners, which was independent of the gentry group in Jiangnan. The Eight Banners could suppress Jiangnan through force and forcibly implement this financial subsidy.

Even so, by the late Qing Dynasty, the Eight Banners court was no longer supportive of such subsidies.

In the original history, many places in Outer Northeast and Outer Northwest had actually been abandoned by the Qing court itself and were actually occupied by Russia.

The subsequent treaty actually made the Qing government formally recognize that these places belonged to Russia.

Russia can make profits in these places, and has the motivation to continue to develop and control these places.

Before the industrial age, income from the fur trade in Siberia and the Far East accounted for more than one-sixth of Tsarist Russia's total fiscal revenue.

This was a gain that was difficult for Tsarist Russia to give up.

The Qing Dynasty in this world did not have Jiangnan, but it also started the fur trade, which gave it the motivation to crawl to North America.

However, the profits from the fur trade were a drop in the bucket for the Ming Dynasty and were not enough to offset the costs of direct jurisdiction.

In the middle and late Ming Dynasty in history, the ruling group was the gentry group in the Central Plains and Jiangnan, and it was impossible for them to allow the court to subsidize the grassland.

But if these places are not controlled, they will go south to rob money and risk their lives when they are driven crazy by poverty.

This was a long-term risk and was difficult for the gentry groups at the time to understand.

Even the current Ming Dynasty would find it difficult to deal with it.

The Ming Dynasty's industrial and commercial groups in Jiangnan were always calling for a northern expedition to the Central Plains and for the recovery of their homeland and old capital.

Their purpose is just what they said.

They are Nanzhili, Beizhili, Shandong, Henan, Shanxi, Shaanxi, and at most the Liaodong region.

As for the grasslands, Mobei, and the mountains, forests and swamps north of Liaodong, they had no interest in them, and they would not provide financial support for the conquest of these places.

However, they are an industrial and commercial group after all, and no longer a group of gentry who simply pass on their family traditions of farming and studying.

As long as there is profit in the local area, they will support the occupation.

For example, a mineral deposit is discovered in a certain place.

Although their attitude has little to do with Zhu Jianxuan.

The Wu State was currently in a basically planned economy state and was basically unaffected by private industrial and commercial groups.

With his authority in Wu, he could also force the Wu army to obey his orders and occupy any place unconditionally.

However, if such a compulsory decree fails to bring tangible benefits in the future after its implementation, it may damage one's own prestige and one may be criticized privately.

The key logic of shaping power is to make subordinates believe from the bottom of their hearts that obeying their orders can help them resist risks or gain benefits.

When you order the occupation of a place, it is best to be able to gain benefits from this place in the short term.

At the very least, people should be able to believe that these places have potential benefits in the future.

The easiest way is to look for minerals.

Let his subjects take it for granted that there may be unknown minerals beneath all barren lands.

In fact, this is also the reason why I hope to directly control more land.

Based on the experience of previous lives, I can quickly develop mineral deposits in some barren lands and let the people of the Ming Dynasty form the perception that "land is minerals and is wealth."

For example, the large coal mines in Ordos and Hetao areas, as well as the large gold-bearing copper mines at the border between Inner and Outer Mongolia.

At the same time, the development of the Wu State itself also needs to consider investment returns.

Zhu Jianxuan also wants to accumulate as much social assets as possible, increase his control over the country as much as possible, and increase his influence on the world as a whole.

Continue to enhance your prestige in the society as a whole.

So Zhu Jianxuan's management ideas for these areas came out.

For the time being, he only required these places to submit to him and allowed them to maintain a high degree of autonomy.

Select and explore suitable areas for mining in these places, and vigorously develop the steel industry in our core areas.

Railways were built from the core areas and ports to connect with selected mines inland, and then development of these mines began.

Build forts at suitable locations along the railway, and use the railways and forts as a basis to control the surrounding wilderness.

Use points to control lines, and use lines to control surfaces.

Using inland resources as the driving force, these foreign lands were gradually brought under the jurisdiction of prefectures and counties.

With bolt-action rifles and breech-loading rifled cannons, and railways as logistical supply lines, even if these barbarians from foreign lands want to fight to the death, they will only die.

Zhu Jianxuan planned to set up a "Northern Industrial Company" to be responsible for the development of northern mineral resources and industrial construction.

If we want to complete industrialization as quickly as possible, we still have to implement a planned economy. Relying on a market economy is too slow.

First, develop the coal mines in Kaiping and Luanzhou areas in the eastern part of Northern Zhili and the iron mines in Qian'an area, and build a steel industrial center near Lulong County, Yongping Prefecture.

Develop coal and steel in Anshan, Benxi, Fushun and other places, and build a steel industrial center in Shenyang or Anshan.

Use railways to connect the two steel industrial centers, and at the same time connect the Northeast Plain and the North China Plain by land, strengthening control over Liaodong.

This railway will then continue to extend southwards and connect with the existing railway from Yingtianfu to Bengbuji.

Build railways connecting Xi'an, Luoyang, Kaifeng, Xuzhou, and Haizhou, and build railways connecting Lushunkou, Anshan, Shenyang, Hegang, Miaojie, and Vladivostok.

Select suitable locations in coastal areas such as Lushunkou, Tianjin, and Luanzhou to build large shipyards.

Build a railway to Suiyuan (Hohhot) and the Hetao region, and cross Inner and Outer Mongolia from south to north, connecting to the North Sea, that is, Lake Baikal.

Develop the coal mines in Ordos along this railway, the iron mines and rare earth mines in Baotou, the Oyu Tolgoi gold and copper mine in Outer Mongolia and several copper mines and gold and silver mines to the north, and finally the gold mines in Chita area north of Outer Mongolia.

Coal mines can be seen everywhere in Outer Mongolia, and most of them are open-pit mines. There are also many around this railway line.

However, there is no shortage of coal in the northern part of Shenzhou, and the coal in the inland of Outer Mongolia is not worth transporting out in the short term. Simply mining one or two places for the garrison personnel is enough.

What could drive the Ming Dynasty or the Wu Kingdom to immediately expand to the north are high-value minerals such as gold, silver, and copper, which are also minerals that are lacking in Shenzhou.

With this railway and a number of fortresses built along the way, the entire grassland can be divided into two parts, east and west, and the snowy area in the north of the grassland can be basically controlled.

On this basis, by extending the railway westward to the Western Regions and even Central Asia, we can begin the Western Expedition.

The Western Regions and Snow Regions in traditional concepts must be completely recovered.

At the same time, Shun State must publicly and formally recognize his identity as the Shun King of the Ming Dynasty. The monarch of Shun State may no longer continue to use the title of emperor in his country, and can no longer simply verbally call him the Shun King when communicating with the Ming Dynasty.

Shun State must open its market to the Ming Dynasty.

(End of this chapter)