Chapter 1310 is desperate
Population demand is not just a problem faced by Haikou City. In fact, in most areas under Haihan's rule, labor shortages are a long-term problem. Chief executives everywhere are also like Qiu Yuan, who is almost paranoid about immigration. of desire. Although the current total population of Hainan Island has already exceeded 300,000, which has increased by at least 20% compared to when the travelers first arrived here, for the quasi-industrial society that the Executive Committee wants to promote, He said that there is still a huge bottleneck in the number of labor forces, and population is still one of the shortcomings restricting Haihan's development speed.
Fortunately, time travelers have many methods to improve labor efficiency, which can make up for the shortage of labor to a certain extent, allowing the country to maintain a very high development rate despite a shortage of labor. If the current level of social productivity in the Ming Dynasty is used as a measure, then Haihan's development can really be described as a rapid development. In just eight years, Haihan's social productivity has evolved to a level much higher than that of this era.
Haihan's construction achievements undoubtedly made onlookers like Liu Shang both envious and jealous. Although he knew it was wrong, he still couldn't help thinking that if the Ming Dynasty had the same ability to govern, why would it encounter today's internal and external troubles? Difficult situation. At least the Ming Dynasty had as many labor forces as it wanted. The government could recruit civilian laborers with a single order. There was no need to worry about a large labor gap during the implementation stage of a certain project, and there was no need to spend a lot of resources and time recruiting from overseas like the Haihan people. and transporting immigrants.
The population advantage alone can leave Haihan behind for several years. Unfortunately, no one in the Ming Dynasty knows how to take advantage of this advantage. They can only watch Haihan poaching a large number of people from the Ming Dynasty and then use these manpower for construction. Haihan Kingdom. If you think about it carefully, this is simply a great irony of Ming Dynasty's ability to govern.
The second stop of the visit was the Haikou Military Port, located ten miles west of the mouth of the Nandu River. As an important coastal stronghold guarding the Qiongzhou Strait, construction here began shortly after the capture of Qiongbei from Haihan. Currently, the first and second phases of the project have been declared completed. , the follow-up mainly involves the construction and improvement of some supporting facilities. The Haihan Navy has an integrated fleet stationed here. In addition to guarding the Qiongzhou Strait and establishing armed maritime barriers, this fleet's operating area is actually very wide, reaching Zhijiang Estuary in the east, Beibu Gulf in the west, and the northern half of Hainan Island coastlines are all under its control.
This is not the first time that Liu Shang has had close contact with the Haihan Navy during this trip, so he doesn’t feel much novelty. Moreover, he saw a whole fleet of Haihan Navy in the "Crossover 1635" military exercise a few days ago. The steam sailing fleet has a much higher vision than before, and the fleet stationed at Haikou Naval Port will no longer surprise him. However, he had never set foot in a real naval port elsewhere, including Sanya, so the infrastructure here still made him feel a little novel.
There are various tall spreaders, pipes, steam-powered conveyor belts, etc. on the dock where the warship is docked. These equipment are used to quickly load supplies, such as ammunition, fresh water, coal, etc., to the warship. In addition, there are several dry docks covering a large area next to the pier, which are used to tow ships that need repair out of the water for maintenance. However, the technical strength here in Haikou is relatively limited. Although there is a shipyard, it does not have the ability to independently build standard warships. The navy's warships with larger tonnage are all built at the Sanya Shipyard.
To elaborate on this, of course, the Executive Committee intends to control the shipbuilding industry involving the military. Although the production capacity of Sanya Shipyard is limited, military shipbuilding orders have been scheduled for several years, but this does not mean that the Executive Committee If you know how, you can safely open shipbuilding institutions in other places that can build warships. Especially for high-end warships using steam power, final assembly and commissioning must be completed at the Sanya Shipyard.
In order to have sufficient self-defense capabilities, Haikou Naval Port also built several coastal defense forts according to the terrain. The huge cannon bodies made Liu Shang speechless. The largest artillery piece he had ever seen before was the city defense cannon at the head of Daming City, but compared with the Haihan coastal defense cannon, the city defense cannon seemed smaller in size. According to the accompanying officers, these coastal defense guns can easily hit solid shells weighing more than 40 kilograms into the sea several miles away, and their accuracy is not bad. If the number of invading enemy ships is relatively limited, there may not be a chance to force them to dock at the Haihan Military Port Pier.
Liu Shang didn't need to see the actual firing effect of this cannon. He just looked at the huge iron bullets piled next to the cannon body. He had no doubt that this kind of artillery could easily penetrate all the Ming warships he knew, and even very powerful. Perhaps even Haihan's own warships may not be able to withstand the long-range bombardment of such giant cannons. More than ten nautical miles to the north of this port is the southernmost tip of the Leizhou Peninsula of the Ming Dynasty. Who is Haihan trying to guard against by building such a powerful coastal defense fort here? The answer is self-evident.
However, in the past two years, with the continuous penetration of Haihan in the southeastern coastal areas of the Ming Dynasty, the Leizhou government has actually turned a blind eye to Haihan, and will not intervene at all to control what happens on Hainan Island, or even The message came through an intermediary that as long as they did not send troops to attack Leizhou, there would be no restrictions or restrictions on the Haihan people's residence and trade in Leizhou. Of course, recruiting immigrants is naturally classified as a matter of trade, and the Leizhou government will not regard it as a prohibited matter to resist or prevent it.
Regarding these matters, Qiu Yuan did not make it particularly clear when he introduced them, but after listening to Liu Shang, he could roughly imagine what this so-called "tacit understanding" situation between the two sides was like. Situations like this are not unique to Leizhou. In fact, as far as Liu Shang knows, most of the officials in the entire Fuguang coastal area have this attitude towards Haihan. Anyway, as long as they don't start a war within their own jurisdiction, what else will happen? Everything is easy to talk about.
Even just thinking about this situation makes people feel very sad, that the great Ming Dynasty should suffer such cowardice. But Liu Shang also understood that officials in these nearby areas had probably despaired of the possibility of resisting Haihan. During the previous "Crossover 1635" military exercise held in Danzhou, Haihan also invited some local civil and military officials from the coastal areas of Guangdong and Guangxi to observe the exercise. It is said that this has become a common practice, and such invitations are issued during the annual military exercise. This method showed the Ming Dynasty officials the power of Haihan's military force.
Liu Shang already had personal experience of how the officials of the Ming Dynasty would feel after watching the Haihan military exercise, so he made the previous judgment. Anyone with a normal mind, after seeing Haihan's powerful force, will probably no longer think about the unrealistic idea of how to defeat Haihan on the battlefield. They would rather think about how to maintain peaceful coexistence with Haihan. relations, peace is the most important thing in everything, and the outbreak of war should be avoided as much as possible.
For the officials of the Ming Dynasty, as long as the war started, it would basically lead to defeat. At that time, they would either die for the country or become prisoners, and normal people would not be happy to accept these two possibilities. After a compromise, the only way to keep the Ming Dynasty's territory intact and to keep one's own black gauze hat is probably to meet Haihan's needs as much as possible and maintain this slightly fragile peace.
No one knows how ambitious Haihan is, and no one knows when Haihan will lose patience, but the days of peace will last longer, and no one really wants to go head-to-head with Haihan.
"If a war breaks out, our fleet can set sail within two hours and set foot on the Leizhou Peninsula within four hours." The officer responsible for explaining the port situation to the inspection group did not hide the pride on his face. For the Haihan Army, the buffer time required to launch a war against the Ming Dynasty was only half a day. The Leizhou Peninsula on the other side of the sea has a flat terrain and no danger to defend. Xuwen County, which is the first to bear the brunt, may not be as reliable as the shore defenses of the military port. Liu Shang is not confident whether the local defenders can withstand a wave of attacks by the Haihan Army. Any hope. Once a war breaks out, the autumn wind will probably sweep away the fallen leaves, and the defenders in Guangdong and Guangxi will at most be able to delay Haihan's march.
At this time, Lu Ting added: "If we use force against Leizhou, there is no need to land in Xuwen County. We can go directly to the east coast of Leizhou Peninsula to attack Fucheng. The effect should be more immediate."
The battle plan given by Lu Ting was immediately approved by Qiu Yuan and Yu Xiaobao. War plans like this have been studied by both the military and the executive committee, and senior officials like them have naturally been exposed to them. relevant information. What Lu Ting said was basically Haihan's official plan, but the details were not full enough.
But when Liu Shang heard these words, he basically announced the death penalty for Leizhou Peninsula. The Haihan people are not a peace-loving race. Although they now have extremely close trade and personnel exchanges with the Ming Dynasty, when a war really breaks out, these people will definitely turn against each other and have no friendship with the Ming Dynasty. And listening to their words, it seems that they did not take the nature of the war with Ming Dynasty seriously at all. The reason is also very simple. They have already made preparations for the war and studied how to capture the island that is close to Hainan Island. Ming territory.
For Haihan, everything was ready, and it seemed that all that was missing was an excuse to start a war. But if we really want to go to war, are we still afraid that we can’t find an excuse? Even Liu Shang can come up with ten or eight at random. The initiative of the war lies in Haihan's hands. As long as the Executive Committee gives an order, Haihan's army will immediately cross the sea and attack Leizhou Peninsula. It turns out that the cloud of war is not far away, but has already shrouded the South China Sea.
Liu Shang sighed secretly, hoping that these Haihan people could continue to focus on trade, instead of such sensitive topics as when, where and how to launch an aggressive war against the Ming Dynasty. Even if it were to be discussed, one could only hope that they were joking about the topic.
But if you think about it further, after the Haihan people occupied the Haikou area, they rushed to build a military port and a fort. Doesn't this kind of action mean that they started preparing for war a few years ago? Even if they may not be able to launch a cross-sea battle against Ming at that time, it at least shows that they do not regard Ming as a partner who can coexist peacefully, but as a competitor that needs to be wary of at all times.
Thinking about it this way, the Ming Dynasty's only chance was when these people first arrived eight years ago and had not yet established a stable foothold. If the Haihan people were still fledgling at that time and sent troops to expel them from Hainan Island, it might still be possible. But it is more than a hundred times more difficult to take similar actions now than it was then.
During the visit to the military port, Liu Shang said nothing, but followed several important figures and listened to their discussions. He hoped to at least capture some good news from it. For example, Haihan had no plans to go to war with Ming Dynasty in the near future, or what kind of fear Haihan still had towards Ming Dynasty, so that they could always restrain themselves. Ambition. It's a pity that these people discussed and discussed, and the topics they talked about were almost all the military value of Haikou Military Port. What they cared about was only what preparations needed to be made to launch a combat operation against the Ming Dynasty from here as a base, and what could be achieved. the expected effect.
After completing the visit to this place, Qiu Yuan hosted a banquet in the officers' mess hall of the military port to entertain everyone. However, due to the conditions in the military, this banquet was obviously not as lavish as Zhang Xin's previous meal in Danzhou.
But Liu Shang's attention was not on the dishes on the table. After Qiu Yuan's introduction, he discovered that half of the local officers present were from the Ming army. Obviously, these people received good treatment after choosing to join Haihan. Those who should lead the troops continued to lead the troops, but they just changed their military uniforms.
As of now, only the Haihan Ministry of National Defense knows the exact number of how many soldiers and officers of the Ming Army have defected to Haihan. Liu Shang inferred from the current situation that he had access to that this number should be enough for the Minister of War to resign. There are a large number of former Ming Army personnel who continue to serve in the Haihan Army. These people understand the Ming Army's organization, training, weapons and equipment, and common tactics. They will naturally be very good at dealing with the Ming Army on the battlefield in the future.
Although Liu Shang was very ashamed of these people's betrayal of the country and surrender to the enemy in his heart, he still had to deal with them with a smile on the surface. After talking slowly, he discovered that not all of these officers served on Hainan Island before joining Haihan. Many of them came from Guangdong, Guangdong, Fujian, Zhejiang and other places. Liu Shang couldn't help but admire the methods of the Haihan people. He was able to recruit so many Ming officers from other places and put them under his command.
(End of chapter)