Strategy for the Revitalization of the Late Ming Dynasty

Chapter 244: Comprehensive Development of the New Ming Dynasty
Zhu Cilang looked at the cavalry formation that had run for a distance, especially the cavalry of the Thousand Headquarters that followed closely behind the formation, and he basically had an idea of ​​the training level of the Tianqi Army.

For a commander, the difference between an army that has experienced actual combat and one that has not can be seen at a glance.

Although the current formation and speed of the Tianqi Army have not undergone earth-shaking changes, the coordination between the cavalry formation and the Thousand Headquarters Cavalry following closely behind the formation during the movement is already different from before.

Although it was impossible for Zhu Cilang to directly overlook the entire picture of the more than 6,000 cavalrymen, he had already developed the ability to quickly see the whole picture and distinguish the differences when he took the civil service examination in his previous life.

The Tianqi Army's training went smoothly as planned. After the Huguang Campaign ended, Lin Changfeng displayed the results of the training over the past two months directly in front of Zhu Cilang and a number of high-ranking civil and military officials of the Ming Dynasty.

Soon, the cavalry had run more than three hundred steps and their speed began to increase. The dense sound of horse hooves rumbled like thunder, but the cavalry formation was still neat. The rows of dazzling iron armor were like the shimmering surface of a lake under the sunlight, magnificent and imposing.

This cavalry, as well as the Valiant Cavalry Corps that is organized in the same specifications and is currently undergoing intensive training, will become a nightmare for the main force of the Eight Banners of the Qing Dynasty!
As Zhu Cilang inspected Hanyang, Wuchang, Jingzhou, Yuezhou, and Jiujiang, good news finally came from Shaanxi.

In the turbulent tide of rebellion in northern and southern Shaanxi, hundreds of thousands of rebels gathered and Xi'an was finally successfully recaptured. Manchu officials such as Meng Qiaofang either died in battle, surrendered to survive, or committed suicide.
At the same time, the three divisions of the Palace Army, the Tianqi Army, the Zuozhen Army, the Youzhen Army, the Zhongzheng Camp, and the Jiangbei Two Towns, as well as the various naval forces that were originally mobilized to various prefectures because of the war, have also completed their deployments one after another, returned to their respective bases, began to replenish troops, and carried out training before the Second Northern Expedition.

Tian Jianxiu's Right Army also completed new deployments in Nanyang, Xiangyang, Yunyang and other places. While guarding against the Qing army in the north of Henan, they carried out farming and training operations, especially against the rebel armed forces that combined the defeated and fleeing Green Camp Qing army soldiers and local bandits.

After the expansion, the two armies under Sun Kewang and Ai Nengqi were transferred to Jiangnan. Zhu Cilang planned to reorganize them into the Third Town of Jiangbei to take over the defense area of ​​the original Fengyang Battalion.

With Dorgon's attacks on Jiangbei, relying solely on Gao Jie and Huang Degong's troops was no longer enough to cope. The garrisons in other locations did not undergo major adjustments, and essentially maintained their original deployments.

After Zhu Cilang inspected the vast horse-breeding areas and various naval forces in Hanyang-Jingzhou, when he arrived in Yuezhou and Jiujiang, he focused his inspection on the economic recovery and workshop construction in these two important commercial cities.

Under Zhu Cilang's arrangement and the vigorous construction of the Ministry of Households, a series of workshops specializing in the production of trade goods have been established in these two transportation hubs with crucial geographical locations and very convenient transportation. With the support of the Jiangnan workshops, the scale of employees has grown rapidly and has become very large.

With the experience of building Jiangnan before, the Ministry of Revenue of the Ming Dynasty made the construction of the workshop system in Yuezhou, Changsha, Jiujiang, Wuchang, Nanchang and other places much more reasonable and efficient. It not only optimized the process and shortened the construction period, but also avoided a lot of unnecessary duplication of construction.

You must know that the focus of Jiangnan at this time was foreign trade, but the maritime trade markets in Japan, Southeast Asia and other places were not infinite. Even if the market of competitors such as the Zheng family in Fujian was seized, the annual trade surplus of the Ming Dynasty in the short term would only be several million taels of silver.

In other words, once the behemoth Ming Dynasty was fully mobilized under the guidance of the state apparatus, the workshop system in Jiangnan alone would quickly be able to meet the needs of the entire overseas market.

If Zhu Cilang expands production without planning, the market will soon be in oversupply, which will be a huge problem.

During this period, the Ming Dynasty did not experience the massacres by the Qing Dynasty. In places like Jiangnan and Jiangxi, less than half of the population was lost, and productivity recovered very quickly.

Not only the workshops that are currently in use or under construction, but also the Industrial and Commercial Bureau under the Ministry of Households, at the request of Zhu Cilang, must conduct production capacity planning and market analysis in advance every year, which can prevent problems in advance to a certain extent.

Once the Ming Dynasty's production capacity explodes, it will be terrifying in the next few years. However, Zhu Cilang has no idea how big the entire domestic and foreign markets are, apart from the army and the artisan group.

However, after inspecting the important prefectures along the Yangtze River, Zhu Cilang did not return to Nanjing directly, but instead brought Zhou Shixian, Chang Denggui, Zhang Huangyan and others to Jiangbei.

This place has now become the best source of military personnel for the Ming Dynasty. All the villages and settlements in various places are organized according to Zhu Cilang's reforms, and the entire organization and operation based on the villages and settlements also serve the war.

You know, this was the most crucial line of defense for the Ming capital during wartime, and also the front line of the battle between the Ming and Qing dynasties. Li Banghua personally supervised the two Jiangbei garrisons, and Zhu Cilang now planned to establish a new garrison directly in Fengyang Prefecture, ultimately aiming for the next major war.

Before this, the scouts of the two towns in Jiangbei were still strong. As usual, they launched harassment attacks from time to time, eliminating the scouts sent by Ajige for reconnaissance and harassment. They also raided the grain teams in eastern Henan and southern Shandong from Xuzhou, Guide and other places from time to time. The Qing army was simply unable to defend themselves.

The triangular defense system composed of Xuzhou, Fengyang and Huai'an is unbreakable under the protection of local garrisons.

This is the place that Zhu Cilang does not need to worry about the least. The peasant soldiers and garrison troops recruited from various prefectures in Jiangbei have long become a military force that cannot be ignored. Even if Ajige sends all his main forces, it is almost impossible to break through quickly.

Of course, Zhu Cilang came here on the one hand to inspect the construction of the fortress, and on the other hand to review the peasant soldiers and garrison troops who were transferred there.

The peasant soldiers in Jiangbei are an important support for the Ming Dynasty's army building, and are also the key to the resettlement of veterans and wounded soldiers. They will also be responsible for the training of peasant soldiers, and the peasant soldiers share the defense of the front line.

At this time, the Ming Dynasty's peasant soldiers, like the local garrison troops, were all trained in square formations. During the slack season, they basically maintained a small drill every five days and a large drill every ten days. Although their combat effectiveness could not be said to be strong, it was not weak either.

After all, their weapons and equipment were only behind those of the field army. With sufficient supplies and fighting on the interior, they were much better than many of the original Ming troops.

However, considering that they were defending the fortress, Zhu Cilang did not give priority to equipping them with new equipment. This was the result obtained after the "Five Military Commandery" simulated the situation.

After Jiangbei, Zhu Cilang's next stop for inspection was Suzhou and Songjiang south of the Yangtze River. Most of the government-run workshops here, in addition to continuing to produce civilian and trade goods thanks to local characteristics and resource endowments, basically served the production of military equipment.

Of course, they are all part of the entire system. Nanjing, relying on its large-scale and comprehensive weapons workshop system and unique political status, is still the largest firearms production base in the Ming Dynasty.

Zhu Cilang came to the two prefectures of Suzhou and Songjiang to inspect the workshops that produced and supplied nearly half of the armaments for his army. The powerful combat effectiveness of the Palace Army relied to a large extent on these well-made weapons.

The center of Ming Dynasty weapons production remained Nanjing. At this time, Nanjing's Jinling University had already begun establishing various disciplines serving the military and production, further fueling the continued growth of Nanjing's large-scale and comprehensive weapons workshop system.

After an inspection that lasted more than two months from west to east and across the north and south of the Yangtze River, Zhu Cilang was basically satisfied with the construction performance in various places.

After victory after victory on the battlefield, the Ming Dynasty's bureaucratic system has gradually formed a trend of equality between civil and military officials, which has enabled Zhu Cilang's various political orders to be better implemented.

For the Ming Dynasty's system, with a less united bureaucratic group, the emperor's decrees were easiest to implement.

After more than four years of transformation and development, the Ming Dynasty's military, civil affairs, and industrial and commercial systems no longer have any problems in the big picture. Those minor flaws will have to rely on the laws of development of things to make up for and correct them.

You must know that any truly perfect and scientific system is not artificially set up, and must have the ability to correct and repair itself in order to develop healthily.

Zhu Cilang finally returned to Nanjing City. As a horse-riding emperor, he probably spent less time in the Forbidden City every year than on horseback.

However, although Zhu Cilang was not in the city, the Ming Dynasty's system was running smoothly, and it would probably take Zhu Cilang several days just to inspect various places in the city.

Of course, among all the affairs nowadays, what Zhu Cilang cares about most are actually commercial taxes, customs duties, and the newly restored or newly established yamen such as the Maritime Customs Office.

Their dedication to duty is the basis for the Ming Dynasty's growing financial revenue and military expenditure.

Zhu Cilang also attached great importance to the development of education in the Ming Dynasty. Although it was not the most urgent thing, it was very important. It was the core competitiveness of the Ming Dynasty to successfully move towards the future.

After the expansion of "Jinling University", its functions and mission became clearer. Famous scholars and masters from south and north of the Yangtze River, and even from all over the southwest, even the red-haired people, all devoted themselves to teaching and research in the school.

Many of these people were actually very resistant to Western learning, but more of them had an attitude of learning and absorption and had firm cultural confidence, which can also be regarded as a characteristic of literati in the late Ming Dynasty.

Against the backdrop of the imperial examination reform and Zhu Cilang's deliberate guidance, the personal preferences and biases of those newly emerging new forces as teachers also influenced the atmosphere in the school to a certain extent.

Of course, because the Ming Dynasty’s investment in basic education was insufficient at that time, Zhu Cilang’s so-called “higher education” was not yet systematic. Whether it was traditional literati or literati who had been exposed to Western learning, they still adhered to the original set of ideas.

In other words, "the learning of sages" is still prevalent in the university hall, and Zhu Cilang's new discipline research and development currently mainly rely on missionaries and a very small number of enlightened scholars who have done some scientific research.

This is inevitable in the development process. Years of eight-legged essays have limited the development of many disciplines in the Ming Dynasty to technology, and the theory is quite scarce.

Of course, Zhu Cilang also wanted to develop basic science quickly and quickly cultivate a group of experts and scholars who would contribute to the development of science. But not to mention the students, he couldn't even solve the problem of teachers at the moment, not to mention the influence of textbooks and traditional public opinion.

It should be noted that the reforms and academic settings of Jinling University had previously been criticized by Jiangnan scholars. Thousands of local scholars even signed a petition, accusing the school of introducing low-brow practices such as instrument making and accounting.
As the actual highest institution of learning in the Ming Dynasty at that time, the students in the University were almost all the cream of the crop in the country. Under the traditional social hierarchy, they naturally faced great pressure.

What gave Zhu Cilang the most headache was actually the "Hua-Yi dispute" within the University. In the eyes of some people, the "Red Barbarians" were not worthy of entering the University, let alone being the teacher of a half-saint.

For this reason, some people involved this issue in the national system, ethical principles, and even sensitive issues such as "the difference between Chinese and barbarians", forcing Zhu Cilang to take action.

His determination to reform is unquestionable, and the reform of "Jinling University" is the focus. He must take back the right to speak in public opinion from the hands of those so-called great scholars and guide the development of science and thought.

During the late Ming Dynasty, the central court's control was extremely weak. In the late Ming Dynasty, a society with highly developed commerce, the court almost lost its control over the grassroots. Traditional Confucianism suffered a huge impact, and various thoughts flourished.

Among them, many are based on the common people, which is actually in line with the characteristics of civil society growing stronger with the development of commerce.

Zhu Cilang was aware of all this. He certainly wanted to seize the right to speak in public opinion from traditional Confucianism and reshape social values, but all of this needed to be done step by step.

Otherwise, the Ming Dynasty's future series of reform measures, especially in ideology and culture, will face a more severe situation.

You have to know that Zhu Cilang cannot dominate everything. What he can do is just to provide guidance and demonstration in terms of system.

But he also knew that these were inevitable setbacks on the road to progress. Everything required time to accumulate, and this process could take as short as three to five years or as long as ten years, or even dozens of years.

However, as the first batch of students were trained and possessed the ability to continue learning, and this group was given important positions and began to dominate the administration of the Ming Dynasty, the development of the Ming Dynasty was able to get on the right track.

Of course, no matter what, for the current Ming Dynasty and Zhu Cilang, military victory is the most critical.

After a period of rest and recuperation, as the Ming and Qing dynasties gradually recovered their strength, the situation in Jiangbei and the Central Plains suddenly became tense.

(End of this chapter)