June and July of the eleventh year of Wanli can be said to be quite restless.
First, the cabinet debated over the construction of the Guards Fortress, and finally it was handed over to the emperor for approval. However, two days in a row, the memorial never received the emperor's approval. If it was said that it was approved, it was not like it. , it seems that it was simply put aside temporarily, and I don’t know what the emperor is weighing.
Next came Zhou Yongshangshu, the governor of Jiliao, who believed that Nurhaci in Jianzhou had been very active recently and put a certain amount of pressure on the border defense in eastern Liaoning, so he requested that Qi Jin, the guerrilla at Gubei Road in Jizhen, and his troops be transferred to garrison in eastern Liaodong.
The Ministry of War responded to this memorial, expressed appreciation for the border minister's proposal to strengthen Liaodong border defense, and further proposed that Qi Jin be transferred to Shenyang guerrillas.
Zhu's approval of this essay and the ministry's reply was quickly received, and the emperor expressed his agreement the next day. Because Qi Jin's transfer would cause chain changes in important positions in the border defense in eastern Liaodong, he asked the Ministry of War to mobilize the entire eastern Liaodong. Make a summary report.
This kind of behavior is not very common, but it is enough to show that the emperor is now very concerned about military affairs in Liaodong. The reason is obvious to everyone. This is to prepare for the final "Eastern system" of Western Huaihuai.
Following the order, the Ministry of War immediately held a meeting between the ministers and the four ministers.
There is no need to describe the process of the meeting in detail. In short, the final ministry meeting submitted to Mr. Wu Ge for review was arranged as follows:
The position of Deputy Commander-in-Chief of Liaodong, Cao Yu, remains unchanged; he is assigned to guard Haigai, the right general Ma Dong; he is assigned to guard Kaiyuan, general Ma Chengen; Shenyang guerrilla Qi Jin; Tieling guerrilla Cao Jian (Cao Yu's younger brother); Jin Fu is the new guerrilla general. Zhang Wanbang appointed him.
At this point, the only important position that Li Chengliang still holds in the eastern Liaodong region is Kuandian General. But this is not a big deal, after all, he is still the chief military officer, and Li Chengliang's main force has long been concentrated in the western Liaoning region.
Wu Dui did not make any changes to this ministry proposal and presented it directly to Shen Shixing for review. Shen Shixing thought about it for a while and submitted it directly without making any changes.
The reason why Shen Shixing did not express any objection was because he felt that as long as western Liaoning was in the hands of Li Chengliang, there would be no problem. After all, once a war against Tumen Khan was launched, troops would definitely be sent from western Liaoning, not Liaodong.
At most, Liaodong can only make a start. It doesn't matter. You can't eat the meat yourself and leave no soup for others. That's not possible. The Ministry of War is in the hands of the Real School after all. If there is a panic, If you eat them, maybe everyone won’t be able to eat.
The emperor received the memorandum from the Ministry of War and quickly approved it. Immediately afterwards, an unexpected incident occurred, which was neither big nor small: on Xinchou day, the Taibai star was visible in the daytime.
As an atheist, Gao pragmatically is famous for not agreeing with the theory of interaction between heaven and man even in today's Ming Dynasty politics. Of course, he never takes this phenomenon seriously. However, he doesn't care. There are still many people who care, such as Shen Shi. Xing Bian expressed his opinion on this.
It doesn’t matter how it was said specifically. Anyway, the final result was that the emperor sent him, Duke Dingguo Xu Wenbi, eunuch Zhang Cheng, the eunuch Bingbi, to review the longevity palace selected by Tianshou Mountain. Although Zhu Yijun was still very young, he had always been It is such a rule that no matter how young you are, you must survey your future longevity palace in the underworld in advance. Zhu Yijun's longevity palace has been surveyed and determined a few years ago, but it has not been built yet.
As a result, Shen Shixing, the chief minister, temporarily left Beijing.
Tianshou Mountain is not far away. Generally speaking, checking the longevity palace like this time is not a big deal. As long as there is no big accident, they will basically say everything is fine when they come back. It will take at most five days. .If Shen Shixing is in a hurry, he can even go back and forth in three days.
But whether it was three days or five days, this time was enough - Shen Shixing had just left the capital, and the next day the emperor announced that he was pragmatic and entered the palace to "call for the right".
The so-called platform call is basically equivalent to the state of the nation consultation, that is, the emperor consults the ministers on certain government affairs. Generally speaking, he mainly consults local feudal officials and calls for government affairs. In some cases, he will also ask important officials in the court.
The so-called "platform" here is, of course, specific. The Jianji Hall is in the middle and towards the back, high above the Sanlin white jade railing. Opposite the Qianqing Gate, the Yuntai Gate is also facing the latter on both sides. The west gate is called the back right gate, which is the left and right gates of Yuntai, also known as "platform".
When summoning ministers and other officials, they would do so on the platform, which is the back left door. The rule at that time was that the ministers (or a certain minister) stood in awe, and the emperor sat there. When he encountered a problem, he would call the official's name, and the official would kneel forward. If you answer there and the emperor approves it, you can also stand there and say it, which is to summon the right person for the platform.
In the past, when the emperor wanted to talk to Gao Jingshi, he usually went directly to the Wenhua Hall. This kind of summons was relatively ordinary and cordial, and of course it could be said that it was less formal.
Compared with the Wenhua Palace summons, the platform call is much more formal. Generally speaking, it only occurs when there are major state affairs that require serious inquiry.
This is strange. Building a large military camp is considered a major state affairs? Even if the military camp is fortress-like and the investment scale is relatively large, the "big" is only a relative concept - for the Ming Dynasty's financial level, Building such a large bastion plus a variety of housing, warehouses and other comprehensive military camps is quite stressful.
However, in fact, according to highly pragmatic preliminary calculations, the absolute value of the "total construction cost" is not large: only about 70,000 to 80,000 taels.
This... is not as expensive as building a large-scale ship. How can it be considered a major state affairs?
Gao pragmatic entered the palace with doubts. It was not until he met the emperor that he realized that what Zhu Yijun wanted to ask was not just about building the Beijing Camp.
What Zhu Yijun asked was that Taizu "raised millions of soldiers without wasting a grain of rice for the people." Why now, nearly 70% of the world's expenditures are spent on the army?
He also asked, if so much money is spent, the army is extremely powerful, so that's it. However, there are very few armies that are truly good at fighting. If the military commanders do not bring their servants, almost most of the armies will have no combat effectiveness. Why?
He could answer this question with high pragmatism and confidence, but he was surprised why Zhu Yijun suddenly had this doubt.
More importantly, does this matter have something to do with the last time Shen Shixing expressed his opposition to the construction of the Imperial Guards Fort of Beijing North Camp? Did Shen Shixing say something to the emperor before he allowed the emperor to submit the proposal in the memorial? Put it on hold for now?
Of course, doubts are doubts, and the emperor's question still needs to be answered first. After all, is it "the platform calls for the right one"?
This problem actually has historical roots, and looking back, it doesn’t just start with Zhu Yuanzhang.
After the late Tang Dynasty, especially in the late Southern Song Dynasty, the status of the regular army has continued to decline, while the auxiliary troops have achieved remarkable development. The so-called auxiliary troops are inferior to the regular army or the main combat troops in terms of military organization or status, ranking second.
It has important status, or it is an armed force that is outside the regular army establishment, but has a certain official and legal color - such as the Yue Family Army, or the current armed servants.
The reason is that since the Northern Song Dynasty, society has valued culture over military affairs, and the central government has suppressed the army, resulting in the decline of the status of soldiers. Correspondingly, the treatment of soldiers has also been declining, because military households are not allowed to engage in side jobs, and officers regard shortfalls as income.
Source, undoubtedly greatly reduced the combat effectiveness of the regular army.
Soldiers who used to have a higher status in the Sui and Tang Dynasties have now not only become a class below the peasants, but have even become a negative image of those who are not doing their jobs properly. The continuous decline of the status of soldiers has led to an increasingly low morale of the regular army, and the composition of the army has become increasingly complex and unfit for use.
When the Ming Dynasty's garrison military system was first established, it solved the problem of logistical supplies and reduced the financial burden. It was characterized by integrating troops with farmers and guarding the fields. Farming became one of the important responsibilities of military commanders at all levels. According to
At that time, it was stipulated that the proportion of garrison garrison in the border guards was one-third to defend the city and seven to garrison. This saved a lot of military expenditures.
Taizu Zhu Yuanzhang once proudly declared: "I raise millions of troops at no cost to the country." However, in fact, the combat effectiveness and training level of the army have been gradually weakened due to the large number of land reclamation tasks.
The reason why the army during the Zhu Yuanzhang period and even the Zhu Di period still maintained strong combat effectiveness was mainly because the military meritorious groups at that time were still relatively strong, and the surrounding areas of the country were not peaceful. There were opportunities for "actual combat training" from time to time, so the military at that time
The army relies on this inertia to maintain a certain level of combat effectiveness.
In fact, it can be seen from the Battle of Jingnan that the combat effectiveness of the troops around Nanjing at that time had declined. When the unit strength was roughly the same, Nanjing's army obviously could not defeat Zhu Di's troops. The reason was that the south had already reached peace.
In the new year, Zhu Di is still making films with Bei Yuan at every turn.
In addition, the strict separation of military status and civilian status is also a big problem. People with military status are divided into two types: officers and soldiers. Both types of people have military land, and both are hereditary. Hereditary officers become nobles, and hereditary soldiers become
If you kill the serfs, that's fucked up.
Soldiers are hereditary. Once they join the army, they will always be a military household and will never mix with civilian households. Although the advantage is that the supply of soldiers is guaranteed and the life of soldiers is relatively stable, as the life of officers as hereditary nobles is too secure, they continue to be lazy from generation to generation.
, and eventually it gets worse and worse as time goes by.
As hereditary serfs, the soldiers were driven by others for life and had no hope for the future. Those who were slightly motivated would flee spontaneously. And the constant escape weakened the combat effectiveness of the guardsmen to a great extent - after all.
The rest is all rubbish.
Furthermore, in the Ming Dynasty, the emphasis on literature over martial arts was more prevalent than in the past, and the prosperity of the imperial examination was also greater than that of the previous dynasty. The imperial examination became the most desirable and smooth way for all classes to enter the dynasty. The military career was even more despicable, the morale and status of the guardsmen became increasingly low, and their combat effectiveness became more uneven.
Not even.
As the saying goes, "The emperor values heroes, and articles teach others. Everything is inferior, but reading is good." Why is Gao Pragmatic's status so unique? In addition to his birthplace and the experience of accompanying the prince, the most fundamental reason is his "Six Number One Scholar"
Identity is too mythological in this era.
In this social atmosphere, the social status of the children of military households who were excluded from the imperial examination and official career appeared to be low. In the Ming Dynasty, there was the so-called "enjun" system of consigning criminals to the army, which invisibly made the social image of military households even more unsatisfactory.
.Business began to develop in the Ming Dynasty. Although businessmen were not in the upper class, they were looked at differently because of their prosperous life.
Only the military households were strictly bound to the camp and were not allowed to engage in business. This made the morale and living conditions of the military households always low. They lived like dogs. Of course, there was not much enthusiasm for normal training and war.
.
Of course, there are also military households who take the imperial examination. For example, Zhang Juzheng was born in the military. But you must know that Zhang Juzheng's military status is not that of a soldier. He is an officer, so he can take the imperial examination. People with soldier's status should not think about such a good thing.
.
Another point is that the military system of the Ming Dynasty stipulated that during wartime, the imperial court would temporarily send generals to form a wartime military leadership organization, and then transfer troops from the garrison to their command. When going to war, the original establishment of each garrison was often dismantled.
, regroup them and assign them to various generals. This will cause inconvenience in command, coordination, management and other aspects.
In fact, when Gao pragmatically established the Imperial Guard, he quietly bypassed this issue, but he didn't say it explicitly.
In addition, there is a terminal illness in the politics of the Ming Dynasty, that is, eunuchs can have a hand in almost everything. In addition to using civil servants as commanders during the war in the Ming Dynasty, there was also a system of eunuchs to supervise the army, which is the so-called "eunuch to supervise the army".
"Most of these eunuchs only know about corruption and amassing money. From this, the combat effectiveness and discipline of the army can be imagined. Even if there are a few good ones occasionally, but if calculated in proportion...it is a drop in the bucket and will not change the overall situation.
Gao Pangshi had told the emperor before that the supervisors of the Imperial Guard must strictly define the scope of their duties. This was also considered from this aspect. Otherwise, if the eunuch was favored by the Holy Spirit and liked to meddle in military affairs at will, then this forbidden eunuch would be
Sooner or later, the Guardsmen will be played to death and crippled by him.
Gao Pragmatic talked and analyzed these situations one by one, and Zhu Yijun's expression became more and more serious.
As he said himself, only the most pragmatic person in the world dared to speak the truth frankly in front of him, even if the truth sounded heartbreaking.
What Zhu Yijun was particularly shocked and even admired was that Gao Pragmatic actually thought that it was wrong for the nobles to be noble and the military to be cheap. Of course, what Gao Pragmatic said was that it was wrong for the nobles to be noble and the military to be cheap to the extent they were today, but that was enough to shock Zhu Yijun.
However, Gao Pingshi truly spoke from his heart. He was indeed dissatisfied with the current social trend of the Ming Dynasty. The status of military officials was too low.
According to Gao's pragmatic view, it is not surprising that culture is more valuable than military force. Any normal country in later generations will value culture more than military force at the level of national policy, because once force is more important than culture, it will most likely fall into a vicious cycle of corruption, which is not conducive to
Social stability and development.
But this disparity between civil and military forces should not be too great. A situation like that of the Ming Dynasty should never be the case - you do not give military personnel a reasonable social status and economic treatment, but when the time comes to fight, you ask them to fight to the death. How is it possible?
After a long while, Zhu Yijun gradually came back to his senses, looked at Gao Pragmatic with complex eyes, opened his mouth and sighed again.
"To be honest, do you know what Mr. Shen said in the draft when the Ministry of War's memorandum came up a few days ago?"
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