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Yang Sichang boasted that he had found a way to deal with thieves, but it was difficult for a clever woman to make a meal without rice. Without enough money and food, how could he build guns and train a new army?

After all, what is lacking is not one hundred thousand or two hundred thousand taels, but an amount starting from one million taels, and three to five million taels is too small...

But can the imperial court give him five million taels of silver?

It's impossible to even think about it with your toes, because the court has no money.

But if the court has no money, it can still find a way!

Just as he said when he submitted a letter to Chongzhen for the first time when he resigned from the imperial edict, this eradication will definitely require money and food, but now that rats can starve to death in the warehouse of the Ministry of Revenue, the eradication should be increased to increase income.

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He also said that Ji Liao spends so much money every year, but they can't eliminate the Dongdu in a short while. It is better for Dongdu to negotiate peace first, so as to shrink the front, free up money and food, and eliminate the internal thieves first.
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After the Bao thieves are eliminated and the stray thieves are calmed down, they can then move their army eastward to destroy the Dongduo.

Such a renaissance is expected!

Yang Sichang's series of strategic suggestions to Chongzhen covered all aspects, and even proposed a very complete strategic plan for Chongzhen.

Negotiate peace with the foreign invaders first, and hold on guard. Anyway, the Eastern captives won't be able to kill them for a while.

Internally, the countercurrent thieves surrounded and exterminated them forcefully, taking this opportunity to completely eliminate the big thieves such as Gao Yingxiang, Zhang Zizhong, and Li Zicheng.

To protect the thieves, they adopted a containment strategy to buy time, and defended the Yangtze River natural moat in the south.

Defend Xinyang in the east and Ye County and Luyang in the north to block the rebel army from the Central Plains.

On the western front, you can continue to fight with the rebels in Guanzhong and eastern Sichuan, and use fortified city defense and counterattack to continue to wear down the elite defenders.

At the same time as the siege, more food and salary were sent to train troops, in order to gather elite troops to fight back against Chubei, and finally wipe out the protector thieves.

After wiping out the Bao thieves, then send the army eastward to destroy the Dongluo.

But, as a minister, he is not the kind of minister who joins the cabinet. He is not even a minister, and he cannot directly decide the strategic policy of the imperial court.

Therefore, whether his series of suggestions can be implemented is beyond his control.

Anyway, as a minister, he has already reported what he thinks is the best way to deal with it. As for what His Majesty and the cabinet ministers do, he cannot interfere.

The imperial court has not given much reply yet, but has followed some of Yang Sichang's early suggestions, carried out high-pressure encirclement and suppression against the bandits, and implemented a blockade and defense against the thieves.

But for others, I haven’t replied yet!

Because the high-level officials of the imperial court are still arguing endlessly, especially on matters such as peace talks with Dongluo and additional payments, there will be no results for a while.

There has been no reply from the imperial court for the time being, and Chunan is already facing the bandit army crossing the Yangtze River, and Wuchang is in danger.

Yang Sichang could only think of a solution on his own first. He contacted many other states in Chunan to collect money and food, and planned to build a batch of guns first and train thousands of new troops.

The best thing to do is to secure the Dongting Lake area first, otherwise Yang Sichang's hometown will be destroyed first...

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Not mentioning Yang Sichang's actions, we did say that the westward detachment led by Colonel Jia Heyun severely damaged the Ming army in the eastern suburbs of Linxiang and then reached the gates of Linxiang City. However, this time the westward detachment failed to successfully capture Linxiang.

The main reason was that the westward detachment lacked mortars for siege. They only brought two eighteen-pound mortars with the army, and only a few two-and-a-half-pound field guns. The artillery power was still relatively weak, making it difficult to fight against the city.

It provides too much cover for the troops.

As for the westward detachment, the main force is just one main infantry battalion, and the remaining more than 2,000 people are garrison troops.

Although the combat effectiveness of these garrison troops is much stronger than that of the Ming army opposite them, their strength is limited. At least they are not able to attack Linxiang even when their troops are at a disadvantage.

Therefore, after Colonel Jia Heyun commanded the troops to conduct a tentative attack without any results, he decisively gave up the continued attack on Linxiang, and instead chose to build fortifications and establish a camp outside Linxiang City.

If we can't take Linxiang, we just block the land of Linxiang City outside Wuchang Prefecture.

As long as the Ming army on the front line of Yuezhou Prefecture cannot get through, then Colonel Jia Heyun's mission will be successfully completed.

He was ordered to lead the westward detachment to fight. His mission was not to conquer any place, nor was it to enter Yuezhou Prefecture.

His most important strategic task is to stop the Ming army coming from the direction of Yuezhou Prefecture, prevent the Ming army from this direction from reaching Wuchang Prefecture, and interfere with the main force in the rear to attack Wuchang Prefecture.

As for the other things, it’s best if you have them, and it’s okay if you don’t have them.

Anyway, he had already led his troops to defeat more than 10,000 Ming troops, and captured 7,000 to 8,000 prisoners of all kinds.

Now these prisoners are under the management of the Ministry of Military Affairs to select qualified recruits who are willing to join the army. After the selection is completed, the Baoxiang Army will be able to obtain at least about 3,000 new recruits.

Adding these 3,000 surrendered troops to the 23rd Garrison Regiment, there will be more than 5,000 people, which can basically set up the frame of the 8th Garrison Division.

The new commander of the 8th Garrison Division, Zhao Hongshu, has been ordered to come from the Wuchang area and will arrive in Linxiang in a short time to formally take over the various departments of the 8th Garrison Division.

By then, Jia Heyun will be able to return to the main force of the 2nd Infantry Brigade, and maybe he will be able to participate in the battle of Wuchang again and gain another wave of credit.

With these achievements in hand, there is hope for subsequent promotion to infantry brigade commander.

Satisfied, Jia Heyun stopped advancing westward and began to lead the army to build a defensive line. The same thing happened in the eastward detachment.

The eastward detachment led by Colonel Kang Hongbao bypassed the Jiangxia County area of ​​​​Wuchang Prefecture and went straight to Wuchang County, and successfully defeated the local garrison of nearly a thousand local guardsmen and county warriors, and finally successfully conquered it in two days.

Got the place.

This chapter is not over yet, please click on the next page to continue reading!

It is worth mentioning that there were two places named Wuchang in Wuchang Prefecture at this time. People often refer to Wuchang City as the seat of Wuchang Prefecture, which is also the county seat of Jiangxia.

At the same time, there is also Wuchang County along the Yangtze River to the east of Wuchang Prefecture, which is later Ezhou.

The Wuchang that Colonel Kang Hongbao led his army to conquer was Wuchang County in Ezhou.

After Colonel Kang Hongbao led his army to conquer Wuchang County, he continued to lead his army south and successfully conquered Daye, an important iron smelting center.

This place is very important, because it is a traditional iron smelting area, and it is also a copper smelting area. It is rich in iron ore, copper ore and a large number of corresponding employees. The iron and copper it produces are widely supplied to the entire Huguang and even Jiangnan.

In the past, most of the large amounts of iron materials purchased by the Baoxiang Army came from Daye, and a considerable amount of copper materials also came from Daye.

It can even be said that the iron and copper produced in Daye support most of the machinery and weapons manufacturing industry of the Baoxiang Army.

Therefore, for the Baoxiang Army, Wuchang City may not be attacked for now, but Daye must be captured and actually controlled as soon as possible.

Because after capturing this place, the Chu Empire will completely solve the supply problem of iron and copper materials. It will no longer have to worry about the supply of iron and copper materials being cut off, and it will also be able to save a lot of money.

After all, when the Baoxiang Army purchased iron and copper materials before, the price they spent was often far higher than the market price. Now that Daye is controlled by the Baoxiang Army itself, the price of raw materials can naturally be greatly reduced.

Enough to save the Baoxiang Army a lot of money.

Because of the importance of this place, the army led by Colonel Kang Hongbao had just conquered Daye City, and the Daye County Government Office under the Wuchang Prefecture Government Office had already entered the city and started working on the same day.

Sun Maode, the first magistrate of Daye County, also had a very special background, because he was not a local official in the traditional sense. In fact, before he was transferred to Daye County as magistrate, he had been working in the Ministry of Commerce and Trade.

Iron material procurement and supply affairs.

In order to ensure that the iron and copper materials in the Daye area could be produced stably and that production would not be reduced due to the war, the superiors directly sent Sun Maode to Daye County as the county magistrate.

Sun Maode can also clearly understand that he has only one purpose in coming to Daye County, and that is to ensure the local production of iron and copper materials to continue supplying various arsenals and machinery factories in the rear.

For this reason, Sun Maode, who had just entered the city, issued an administrative order requiring the persons in charge of all iron and copper mines and iron-smelting and copper workshops in Daye County, whether they were government-run, private, or secretly mining and smelting workshops.

We must go to the county government to hold a meeting as soon as possible to ensure that the iron-copper mines and iron-smelting and copper workshops do not stop production, do not reduce production, and seek to increase production.

This frightened the people in charge of many iron and copper mines in Daye, especially those private mines and workshops that mined secretly. Many people thought that the thieves were going to liquidate them, and many people in charge immediately ran away overnight.

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In fact, they are simply overly worried. Sun Maode doesn't care whether you were legal before or not. He just wants you to be legal now and maintain production.

After many government-run and private mine managers and owners have fled, the Baoxiang Army will naturally not let these mines and workshops stop working.

The Ministry of Industry established the "Big Smelting Iron Works" early on, and immediately settled in Daye, and began to accept government-run mining workshops and private mining workshops whose owners foolishly ran away.

At the same time, they also purchased private mining workshops at high prices!

Rather than letting these private owners engage in small-scale mining and smelting, the Dachu Empire's Ministry of Industry is more willing to engage in large-scale mining and smelting by itself.

However, the Da Chu Empire has already been established. At the same time, compared with the traditional feudal dynasty that implemented a salt and iron monopoly, the Da Chu Empire has not established an iron monopoly system for the time being, but only implemented a salt monopoly system.

In fact, we originally planned to establish an iron monopoly system, but because the time was too short, and a very critical point was that most of the iron materials in the Chu Empire needed to be purchased from outside the control area, and these sources had to rely on private trading houses for smuggling.

What?

At the same time, the Great Chu Empire's demand for iron materials was extremely huge, so it tried every means to expand production. Regardless of whether you were privately owned or government-run, as long as it was iron, the Great Chu Empire would not refuse anyone.
Chapter completed!