Zhenhai Port.
Hundreds of ships, large and small, are practicing.
This time it was rare for the court to allocate arrears of pay, and they paid next month's military pay in advance, and they had enough food to eat, and even five pigs.
Although only the generals can eat meat, the others can only drink some oil soup, which is a rare treatment in these years.
In addition, the generals also said that if they win this time, they will receive a year's salary!
Can everyone not practice hard?
Han soldiers are not satisfied with their pay, but if they are fully paid, they are invincible.
The premise is that it is actually distributed to every soldier.
Just like Liaodong, the military salary is 4 to 7 million a year.
Calculated at 4 million, 200,000 soldiers can be paid.
The problem is that Liaodong only supports less than 10,000 servants with actual military pay.
As for the need for other ordnance, the problem is that there are still a large number of farms in Liaodong, which do not collect any taxes.
So the first bad thing about Liaodong was that the generals were greedy and colluded with officials. They used a lot of money and farmland income to enrich their own pockets instead of using all the money for military training.
Why are they greedy?
Because the Liaodong court did not establish a vassal feudal system.
If Shi Zhenyun* was as powerful as Mu Wangfu, he would definitely be able to pacify Donglu.
The problem is that Liaodong is too close to the capital. If Zhu Di appears, it will be impossible to establish the Liaodong vassal town again even if he is killed.
If you don’t set up a vassal town, but you are just a general, you may be transferred from north to south. In this case, why do they want to use the general’s salary and farmland income to train soldiers? Why don’t they even use their own servants as private soldiers? , after being transferred away, you can continue to take it with you.
This is not just a casual comment.
Later, when bandits were raging, 3,000 elite cavalry were transferred from Liaodong to the pass to suppress them. The battles were fruitful, but there was no replenishment, and they were finally exhausted.
No one is stupid. If the court does this, then the general will naturally put his selfishness first.
At this time, Wen Rensheng naturally asked these people to practice hard.
“Fierce oil burns violently, but it is easy to burn accidentally. You must pay attention to the safety of storage. The barrels must be prevented from seeping and there must be no smoke and smoke.” Zhangzhou General Soldier Zhou Ming reminded.
He was in the army, and he also knew how powerful fire oil was. Once it was contaminated, it would be useless to just throw water and soil on it. It had to be suppressed with bags of sand and soil, and it took a long time to extinguish it.
“The speed of the boat is still slow, and we have to find ways to improve it.” Yu Datao, the commander-in-chief of Jianfu, also raised a question after watching the drill.
Wen Rensheng nodded: "I remember there was a kind of car and ship in the south of the Yangtze River, which could be driven by oxen and was very fast, but the reminder was too big and it was not easy to build. Now the only way is to improve the shape of the ship and use longitudinal sails, which can recruit Australian red hair People help improve."
"The Australian red-haired people have always been respectful and took the initiative to pay land rent and trade taxes. They are indeed much better than the Pengdao red-haired people." Zhou Ming, the commander-in-chief of Zhangzhou, nodded.
He has also had a lot of dealings with Australia* Hongmao. Naturally, he knows that both the other party and Pengdao Hongmao are red hairs, but they are not from the same country.
And there are many contradictions.
They are absolutely willing to help Ming Dynasty repel Pengdao Hongmao. This Li Tongzhi seems to be a civil servant who knows the military well.
It makes people feel comfortable to get along with.
“In addition, you can use small boats to carry heavy artillery, transfer to the big ship, blast the gap directly from the back, and then send strong men to throw fire oil bottles to burn the ship from the inside.”
“If If the ship is burned from the outside, they can pour water on it, cover it with sacks, or push it away with a long pole. If it is burned from the inside, the other party has no choice but to abandon the ship."
Zhangzhou Commander Zhou Ming nodded: "That's good, let's practice more with this method."
"You can also use a small trebuchet on the ship. A small trebuchet can throw hundreds of steps. Throwing fire bottles in all directions can also be used as a containment. Of course, this kind of ship is slow and can easily be hit by heavy artillery, so it is only used as a deterrent and not as a proactive attack."
After the three discussed with each other, Wen Rensheng selected a group of loyal and brave men according to the training process, issued Anjia silver coins, and practiced day and night.
Yes, not only during the day, but also at night.
Because sailors eat more fish, fewer have night blindness.
Sneak attacks at night are also more convenient.
Because the cannon cannot be fired at night.
Even during World War II, artillery rarely fired at night to attack targets.
The main reason is that it is difficult to observe the other party's losses.
It is difficult to determine the effect of the bombardment and then correct the coordinates.
Of course using flares is one way.
But small boats can attack at night.
Taking advantage of the bright moonlight, the fireship is the equivalent of a carbon-based navigation torch.
At night, the artillery battle between ships from both sides will stop.
This is a common thing in battle. The disadvantaged side often delays time until nightfall. There is a saying that it is to escape during the night.
Some of the fast ones can often successfully escape.
This training lasted three months.
Of course, the Pengdao red-haired people did not rest. During these times, they contacted the surrounding pirates, spent a lot of money, and hired at least 100 pirate ships.
But the disadvantage is that they still only have 9 main Galenic ships.
If they were on the ocean, they would definitely be able to make dozens of naval ships flee in panic.
But if you are in an offshore harbor, you will face a major threat from fire ships.
If you want to attack Pengdao, there are two ways.
One is to spread the word like Wen Rensheng, attracting enemies to take the initiative to block one's ports, and ambush them in advance.
The other is to quietly lead a large number of ships and block the door directly before the enemy has assembled.
If the enemy's big ship is blocked in the harbor, the battle will be won.
If the enemy ship escapes, that's okay.
I am afraid that I will be discovered by the enemy and send a large ship to attack on the way.
The Battle of Liaoluo Bay in history was a successful sneak attack by the Zheng family, blocking the red-haired people's ship and the pirates' small boats in the bay.
As a result, the ship was heavily burned and retreated all the way.
Now Wen Rensheng is training troops and ships, and the red-haired man will definitely not let him continue training.
It’s just that there are disputes and disputes among the red-haired people.
They are just a colonial company now, focusing on trade.
I don’t want to completely offend Ming yet.
So we didn’t use the method of harassing the seaside for future generations. Of course, it was really harassing, and the problem was not big.
Because they are sailboats, they rely on wind power all the way north.
Therefore, the maneuverability cannot be compared with the steam ironclad ships of later generations, so it can be made back and forth within a year.
The number of people is small, and the threat to the seaside is nothing more than small Japanese pirates.
At least the Japanese pirates still have a bit of home field advantage and can keep coming.
There are only two to three thousand of them, excluding the sailors, and only a few hundred people actually go ashore to fight.
These men may be able to run rampant for a while, but they are accidentally overtaken by the cavalry.
Because of the matchlocks these days, a large number are needed to restrain the cavalry.
The Ming Dynasty also hired red-haired matchlock soldiers, but it had no effect.
It's not that they are not strong, but that they are hindered by the comprador class. They are worried that the red-haired people will be rewarded for their meritorious service and thus obtain trade privileges.
As a result, Hongmao was able to trade directly with the imperial court, and they lost the opportunity to be a middleman, so they paid a large sum of money to bribe Shilin Fengfeng, so that the mercenary ended up in vain and wasted.
Otherwise, 4 million taels of silver and hiring red-haired men to fight would definitely be more useful than Liaodong generals. As for the issue of loyalty, Westerners have long been accustomed to being mercenaries.
Because of their skin color, it is difficult for them to take root in the local area. It is difficult for them to turn their backs on tourists.
Hiring 50,000 red-haired men, no, just hiring 10,000, would be enough to deal with the barbarians.
At that time, the Portuguese man Hong Mao was wondering why the rich Ming people were afraid of the barbarians while the world was relying on firearms to crush the barbarians.
They are not afraid. In order to have trade privileges and to be able to directly purchase raw silk, tea, porcelain...these hard currencies, in a small land with a total population of only 10,000 to 20,000 people, they actually Actively organized a musketeer team of 400 people to go to the front line, and the morale was high. Everyone dared to fight, including black people, white people, and Ah San...
If there is a record, there are rewards, and there is trade privilege, they will definitely continue to hire mercenaries from the southeast, from Africa, and from Europe.
You know that is 4 million taels of military pay.
Enough to employ 100,000 people.
Arquebusiers are just cannon fodder. They don’t need armor from head to toe, just a gun.
In fact, the local people, especially the compradors, believe in the red-haired fighting power.
It is precisely because they believe that they have to interfere with it.
Afterwards, they fought several times and finally proved their strength. Even Emperor Yongli chose his whole family to become believers in God after seeing the fighting power of the red-haired mercenaries. This is ironclad proof.
You must know that he is the emperor. Even though he is the last emperor, he is still the emperor.
It's a pity that it's too late, Yongli no longer has the financial resources to hire.
Chongzhen, who had the financial resources to hire, encountered various constraints. He was not determined and could not understand, resulting in a wasted opportunity.
Wen Rensheng understood this very well.
In fact, Ming Dynasty has too many opportunities to save itself.
However, in a world where one family has one surname, when 95% of people encounter a problem, they first consider whether it can benefit themselves, then the surname, and finally the country and dynasty. No, they will not consider it in the end. Don't do anything, just rest by yourself.
If the system continues to operate like this, sooner or later it will collapse one day.
Because not many people are willing to think about the big picture first.
Only 5% of the seeds are dormant, waiting for a better opportunity to lead people to rise again.
This is the advantage of having more people. If there are fewer people, 5% of the people will be easily wiped out during the massacres over the years and will never be revived.
This is also the reason why small civilizations and small races are easily cut off. It is simple and direct.
Three months later, the soldiers and horses are not yet proficient, so they continue to practice.
However, a clipper ship has already arrived to report that the fleet of red-haired men appeared in the distance of the port. They watched with eager eyes and blocked the port.
It seems that the fighter plane Wen Rensheng was looking for has appeared.
However, the red-haired people are also very smart. As the proactive party, they are still five miles away from the port. At this distance, their cannons can hit the port.
But they couldn't be reached at the port.
And it is impossible for the fire ship to approach them at this distance.
The opponent can fly the kite by turning around.
But of course it is difficult to fly a kite, after all, the wind direction changes at any time.
But the fire ship must have suffered heavy losses.
Wen Rensheng would not bet on this trend.
At this moment, the two general soldiers came to him to discuss.
"Now that the red-haired man has taken the initiative to come to the door, should we send envoys to stabilize the opponent first?" Commander-in-Chief Yu Datao has some knowledge.
Wen Rensheng understood the other party's intention, pretended to deceive the other party, saying that trade was possible, and then took the opportunity to make a sneak attack.
"Yes, if we show our weakness to the enemy and take advantage of the opportunity to make a sneak attack, we can achieve a complete victory." Commander-in-Chief Zhou Ming also said.
"Such deceit will only make the red-haired people dissatisfied, thinking that they have not lost in terms of strength. Sooner or later, they will have to do it again, and they will not be able to leave." Wen Rensheng shook his head.
“Then what should we do?”
“Of course there is a way, select 50 clippers, 300 sea ghosts, carry gunpowder in bamboo tubes, seal them, and carry pig urine bubbles as air To use it, quickly go to the sea, sneak in at a distance of three to five meters, and get under the enemy's ship..." Wen Rensheng said.
"Here, the enemy can hide in the open sea, not in the harbor." Zhou Ming was not optimistic.
Wen Rensheng said: "Our clippers can approach from the outside and then send out water ghosts. The emphasis is on deterrence."
Hearing this, Yu Datao said: "In this case, I will personally take 20 large ships and 50 fast ships to drive away the enemy."
"Then there will be General Lao." Wen Rensheng said.
Then the Ming Navy navy began to fight in a mighty manner.
In this year, the Ming Navy still performed better than most of the battalions.
Living on the sea, most people rely on smuggling and fishing trade to still have enough to eat.
And it also has combat effectiveness at sea.
Wen Rensheng specially selected loyal and brave men, those who dared to work hard to gain wealth.
Wen Rensheng has already made an agreement with them that the deceased will also enjoy the pension from Kuaiji Shipping Company. From now on, the family will have rice, salt and silver available every month.
The reputation of this boat company is much better than that of the government.
At least most of these water ghosts have heard of this new boat line on the water.
With these rewards, morale is still quite high.
After a long time, the ships were dispatched.
The red-haired man never fired.
Wen Rensheng understood that the other party did not want to quarrel, but still wanted to rely on intimidation to allow the Ming Dynasty to engage in free trade.
However, what seemed to be a very simple and reasonable request in later generations was treasonous and contrary to ethics under the feudal tribute system.
How can you, a country of barbarians, be able to travel freely to my kingdom?
Impossible.
You have to use the tribute system to get trade, and there are limits.
As a result, smuggling has surged.
As for smuggling, the red-haired people have many restrictions, and the quantity and quality of the goods they can obtain are limited.
Moreover, Jiangnan maritime merchants would also smuggle it to the island countries themselves instead of selling to them directly.
Wait until the boat leaves.
Hongmao's five Galenic ships finally raised their battle sails and slightly reduced their speed to ensure the accuracy of their cannons.
However, this is undoubtedly a disadvantage given the Clippers' strategy of choosing close combat.
This is also the reason why the Ming Dynasty was able to expel the red-haired people without suffering a big loss.
Western ships of this era had great advantages in the ocean, but their advantages in offshore waters were much smaller.
There are no steamships after all.
Offshore wind is also limited.
The wind will definitely be affected when approaching the shore. It is affected by the mountains and soil, and the wind changes too much.
Especially those at sea ports, where the terrain and wind are very complex, and large ships dare not enter directly. If they enter, they will be besieged to death.
So the world is often dominated by pirates.
But this time, the red-haired people came to block the port, and obviously they did not have much advantage from the beginning.
Just being in a position where you can easily escape if you lose.