Qing Yao

Chapter 160 Teacher Zhao is a disciple of the second brother.

Strikes require money.

Because the canal workers also need to eat.

You can manage for a day or two, but who can endure it in the long run?

Zhao An estimated that if he wanted to force the canal transport authorities to back down, the strike would have to last at least ten days, and possibly even half a month.

The strike was mainly carried out by the second and third detachments that sailed directly. The members of these two detachments were mostly poor and had wives and children to support. They could stop for a day or two without any problem, but if they stopped for ten days, they would probably starve to death.

The strike to cut off the canal was initiated by Zhao An, the young master. With Zhang Baofa, the "uncle," clearly taking a passive stance, Zhao An, the initiator of the strike, had no choice but to provide the funds out of his own pocket.

The principle is that you can't just make the horse run without letting it eat grass.

In any era, without financial support, one can accomplish things with just enthusiasm, but it can never last long.

Zhao An's success today is not solely due to his opportunism regarding history, but more so to his own level of knowledge and vision, which are at the level of a top expert compared to the vast majority of people in this era.

In fact, any high school student from later generations who came to this era and organized an uprising would start at the same level as Yang Xiuqing.

If college students come, they will become vivid figures like Emperor Taizong of Tang and Emperor Taizu of Song.

This is the benefit of information overload.

Later historical novels were actually teaching materials on how to rebel.

If you read a few more books and are willing to risk everything, you could even bring down the emperor.

Even if you're terrible at practical skills, you can still become a Li Zicheng or Hong Xiuquan.

The act of cutting off the canal was not only a bold attempt by Zhao An to "steal" command of the Yangzhou branch of the Green Gang, but also a rehearsal for "rebellion".

The exercise focused on organization and action, rather than a direct confrontation between two armies or a battle for control of a city.

The entire Yangzhou branch controlled nearly 40,000 canal workers.

Distributing 15,000 taels of silver among 40,000 people would be a drop in the bucket. Fortunately, the members of the First Gang do not need to pay, because the First Gang has transformed into the entertainment industry, and its members are richer than the Second and Third Gangs.

Besides, it was only the canal that was cut off, not the brothels, gambling dens, and opium dens that were shut down by the gang of thugs.

The difference between the first gang and the second and third gangs is somewhat like the difference between the clean clothes and dirty clothes in the Beggars' Sect.

Therefore, in Zhao An's mind, the head gang was a chamber pot that needed to be removed, and also a piece of rotten flesh on the canal gang.

The organized grassroots poor people like the second and third gangs are the military force he truly needs.

Not everyone was mobilized to cut off the canal; instead, the second and third groups each sent 500 people to carry out the "paralysis" project in sections.

These thousand men, similar to a mobile unit, were the main force in this operation to cut off the canal. Giving each of them five taels of silver to ensure they had no worries was quite necessary.

Otherwise, if someone is on the "front line" but has to worry about whether their wife and children at home have food to eat, and has to run home at the drop of a hat, how can they fight the war?

The remaining ten thousand taels were for stability needs, to ensure that the disruption of the canal would not cause complaints from the gang members who were unable to find work.

It's considered compensation for lost wages.

That's quite a lot. The lowest-ranking canal workers in the canal guild only earned six taels a year. Only those who had absolutely no other choice would become canal workers. The low wages, coupled with the mixed quality of the workers, led the canal guild to transform into a criminal organization.

Looking at the 15,000 taels of silver notes on the table, everyone in the "command center" was deeply moved, including the two representatives of the first gang who were forced to participate in cutting off the canal.

Ding Jiu immediately questioned, "This is a matter for the helm, how can you, young master, pay for it! I'll go and tell Uncle that the helm will buy some rice and send it to the families of the brothers who participated in the operation and are experiencing financial difficulties."

"If it really comes down to money, our group can contribute some."

The speaker was An Shun, the head of the gambling den. Compared to the other leaders of the gang, he was much more loyal and had a strong sense of "collective honor".

He knows that his success today is not due to his own abilities, but rather because the company gave him the opportunity.

Therefore, from the beginning, they advocated raising money to redeem the people, so as not to disappoint the brothers in the gang.

Zhao An nodded to Ding Jiu and An Shun and said, "I don't care how the helm is arranged, but since this matter was proposed by me, the young lord, there is no reason for me to stand aside."

As he spoke, he stuffed the silver notes into Ding Jiu's hand, instructing the "financial director" to cash them out and distribute them. Then, he looked at the group of command team members and chuckled, "I, as the young master, may not be good at fighting on the ship, but I can certainly spare some money to encourage the brothers from behind."

“We understand Young Master’s intentions, but Young Master’s money doesn’t fall from the sky. Moreover, this matter was decided by the entire guild. If any money is to be spent, it should be from the guild. The brothers have no reason to take Young Master’s money!”

The one who said this was Xu Lin, the hot-headed leader of the three gangs, who managed three or four thousand canal workers and was originally a canal worker himself.

The transport soldiers were responsible for escorting the grain shipments. In the early years of the Kangxi Emperor's reign, each grain shipment ship had ten transport soldiers, but this was later reduced to one, with the remaining nine being recruited from the civilian population as sailors.

In other words, of the ten porters on a boat, only the leader was officially employed, while the rest were temporary workers. This gave the canal gangs the opportunity to grow and expand.

Today, regardless of which gang owns the cargo boats on the entire canal, all the porters are members of the canal gang, a tradition passed down from generation to generation.

The Grand Canal Transport Commissioner's Office registered a total of over 34,000 transport troops with the imperial court.

It is extremely large in scale.

However, because the old master was worried that someone would use the transport army to start an uprising and disrupt the vital artery of the canal transport, he deliberately divided and suppressed the canal gangs, which has now formed dozens of forces of varying sizes, with no subordinate to each other.

The four old masters above are merely figureheads, sitting there like mascots. All they can do is collect "gift money" from each branch, manage affairs in the martial arts world, and mediate conflicts between branches. They are willing but unable to do anything else.

Therefore, the more than 30,000 transport troops were unable to form a cohesive force, so that despite being a large military force, they were suppressed by the canal transport authorities and local governments.

When transporting grain through checkpoints, any minor official could treat the transport soldiers like dogs. If the soldiers dared to express any dissatisfaction, they would be subjected to layers of harassment, making their lives worse than death.

The reason why Xu Lin's three gangs refused to pay money to redeem Sun Rui and others who were imprisoned by the Grand Canal Administration was not because they were disloyal, but because they were too poor.

The gang members were referred to by city dwellers as "those in the shed".

This refers to the fact that members of the second and third gangs, unable to afford to buy houses, built wooden shacks along the canal to live in, which over time formed a large number of shantytowns.

"Inside the shed" is clearly an insulting term, similar to how people from Shanghai in Zhao An's previous life called people from other places "people from northern Jiangsu" or "people from northern Jiangsu."

"Money is a bastard. If you lose it today, you can earn it again tomorrow. But brothers, we only have this life and no next life. Don't think that just because I'm a young master and an academic official, I'm like those pedantic scholars who spout classical allusions."
"Now that I, the young lord, have taken out this money, there's no reason for me to take it back. If you all don't contribute, you truly don't consider me your brother."

After saying that, Zhao An laughed and said, "To be honest, I don't usually worship Confucius, but Guan Yu."

(End of this chapter)