Chapter 2397
The purpose of the measures Chen Yixin mentioned is of course to prevent a large number of standard weapons from flowing into uncontrollable areas. In the past, there have been cases in the south where people pretended to form militia groups in order to purchase Haihan weapons and equipment in bulk. They only waited for the items to be obtained and then resold them at a higher price to make extremely huge profits. However, the destination of these weapons and equipment would inevitably change. Become a hidden danger threatening Haihan's safety. After Haihan noticed this situation, he tightened the rules on arms sales, and the review of weapons purchased by civilians in the Ming Dynasty also became extremely strict. It was stipulated that the number of personnel who had actually passed Haihan's military training assessment must be used as weapons. Restrictions on sale.
It is not an easy task for trainees to pass the military training hosted by Haihan. There are strict requirements for the length of training and the level of mastery of military skills. These require real money and time. In order to meet the conditions, the cost of training is even higher than the cost of purchasing weapons and equipment, which has already dissuaded quite a few people with ulterior motives.
Naturally, someone like Zhen Lang who has just started to interact with him cannot gain Haihan's trust quickly. Chen Yixin explained the threshold to him because he also wanted Zhen Lang to understand that if he came with other intentions, then he would not be able to gain Haihan's trust quickly. This is where you should give in.
Zhen Lang couldn't help frowning when he heard this. He originally thought that this kind of matter could be solved by spending more money. It was just that the price of purchasing weapons was higher, but as long as it could be put to use, he could protect his family's foundation in Qingzhou. , he wouldn't feel bad about spending a little more money in this area, and at the same time, he had already been mentally prepared to be ripped off by Haihan. But judging from Chen Yixin's reply, it was not as easy as he expected.
But Zhen Lang still held a glimmer of hope and asked: "General Chen, is there no other way to accommodate this matter?"
Chen Yixin said: "The state has national laws and families have family rules, not to mention the military orders. How can we be flexible at will? But if Boss Zhen has good candidates, I suggest that they be sent to the military for training first. The skills they can learn are limited." Not only can they use muskets, but even if they can only use traditional weapons such as swords and bows in the future, their strength will definitely not disappoint.”
Zhen Lang responded: "Having said that, everyone knows that the firearms of the Haihan Army are unparalleled in the world. If they cannot be equipped with Haihan muskets, wouldn't the training effect be greatly reduced?"
Chen Yixin shook his head slightly and said: "Boss Zhen, you have to eat your food one bite at a time. In your situation, I can only provide you with this condition at the moment. Besides, even if you are allowed to buy muskets in bulk, it may not be good for you and your family. It’s a good thing. When the time comes, you will be targeted by many forces, including the government, because of your possession of guns. There will be countless troubles coming for you. Even if someone has a gun, they may not be able to protect themselves.”
Zhen Lang said: "Then I would like to ask General Chen, how did your country's partners in the south solve these problems?"
Chen Yixin responded: "It's very simple. As long as the strength is strong enough, no one will dare to provoke him. For example, if Boss Zhen can maintain a musketeer team of a thousand people, then no one in the local area will dare to provoke him. It’s boring.”
Thousand people scale? Zhen Lang couldn't help but feel a headache after hearing this. The Ming Dynasty had strict control over civilian armed forces. He had never heard of any local militia in Shandong that could have a thousand members, let alone be equipped with muskets. If he really caused such a big battle in Qingzhou Mansion, he would probably be directly accused of rebellion. Not to mention alerting the local government, even the imperial court would probably send troops to kill him.
But the tone of Chen Yixin's words didn't seem to be joking with him. Could it be that the situation in the south was different from that in Shandong, and that rich and powerful people could openly own private soldiers?
Chen Yixin saw Zhen Lang's expression and roughly guessed what he was thinking, so he explained to him: "This kind of thing is not complicated to operate. It is nothing more than donating money to an official and changing the identity of the private armed forces to become a legal existence. Whether they are private soldiers or officers and soldiers, sometimes they just have different names. Once you have enough armed forces, you no longer need to look at other people's faces. This is how the current Fujian Commander-in-Chief Xu came up. ”
The most convincing example in this regard is undoubtedly the history of Xu Xinsu's fortune. He was originally a maritime businessman. In order to fight against Zheng Zhilong, he donated money to become a navy commander. Who would have expected that later with the support of Haihan Then he got out of control and actually took charge of the military power in Fujian. Xu Xinsu currently has tens of thousands of troops under his command, and he is already the local emperor in Fujian. Even the court has nothing to do with him, and must exercise restraint on his behavior. Otherwise, if Xu Xinsu rebels in Fujian, it will be a disaster for the Ming Dynasty. But it’s just adding insult to injury.
Of course, Xu Xinsu is just a special case created by the current situation, and it is difficult to replicate a situation like his in other places. Even though many people later imitated his successful methods, hoping to achieve personal success through military cooperation with Haihan. ambition, but there was no second Xu Xinsu.
It's a pity that Zhenlang is located in the inland of Shandong, and I have never heard of Xu Xinsu's deeds before, so I am not very impressed by the example given by Chen Yixin. However, the path mentioned by Chen Yixin was actually similar to his original plan, except that he never thought of relying on official donation to start an official career. After all, Zhen Lang is just a businessman who wants to do big business, and he still lacks understanding of the role of force. Otherwise, he should have been able to detect that Chen Yixin's words were already testing his attitude.
Chen Yixin has read countless people, and he also felt from Zhen Lang's hesitation that the other party's attitude towards the development of force was not firm, so there was no need to use military resources to vigorously support him. Otherwise, even if Haihan Han trains a large number of musketeers for Zhen Lang, it will be difficult for him to control such an armed force, and sooner or later he will take advantage of others.
Chen Yixin immediately changed the subject and said: "Based on Boss Zhen's situation, I think there is no need to rush to train a private army. A traditional militia may be more suitable for your needs. The cost is low, the training difficulty is low, and it won't Let the government keep thinking about you, and I can guarantee that the combat effectiveness after formation will be better than other local militia groups in Qingzhou, and even stronger than the local guard army. Boss Zhen may wish to consider it again. "
It is much easier to form and train an armed organization at the traditional militia level than to train musketeers. This can be said to be the product of two different eras. For people like Zhen Lang who yearn for private armed forces but lack the decisiveness, forming a militia is obviously a better choice.
In the end, Zhen Lang did not make a decision right away. During the conversation, he also realized that he did not know enough about the matter. In this case, the choice he made might indeed deviate from his original intention. He still had to plan carefully and take a long-term approach. OK. Chen Yixin is not disappointed about this. After all, partners like the Xu family in Fujian and the Li family in Guangdong are hard to come by, and he cannot expect that every partner he meets will have the same courage. And objectively speaking, Li Jifeng and Xu Xinsu were engaged in maritime trade activities in their early years. Their vision and insight are not comparable to those of their business counterparts in inland areas. They also have a clearer view of the prospects of cooperation with Haihan. Naturally, they will not be like Zhen. Lang was so hesitant.
But in any case, with the framework of Shanhaihui, Haihan has many ways to slowly win over people's hearts and use real benefits to draw these wealthy people from Shandong into his business system. Once they become vested interests in cooperating with Haihan, the local forces represented by these people will naturally gradually become Haihan's spokesperson, playing a role in Haihan's promotion of economy, trade, culture, education, finance, and military in the Ming Dynasty.
Haihan already has a relatively mature plan for operating these matters. Chen Yixin does not even need to be in charge of Shandong in the future. Someone from each relevant department will follow up and conduct next-step negotiations with these members of the Shanhaihui to agree on specific trade in the future. Cooperation methods and projects ensure that the cooperation agreements reached on Zhifu Island today can be transformed into practical results.
The fleets coming from other colonies in the south arrived at Zhifu Port about a week later than the fleets coming from Zhoushan due to the long distances. However, it is precisely because of this that the fleet they organized is much larger than the Zhoushan fleet, so that they can bring more people back in one trip. If the number of refugees collected in Shandong is limited, it must be first come, first served. Then in the time it takes the southern fleet to make two trips to Shandong, the Zhoushan fleet may have made three trips. Naturally, they have to make every trip as efficient as possible. Return with a full load so that more people can be transported back to their own place.
In this era, population is equivalent to wealth for Haihan's overseas colonies, especially in areas like Taiwan Island that seriously lack Han immigrants. It is not easy to have such an opportunity to introduce a large number of people. Naturally, the locals will not let it go easily. Pass. Although it is expensive to organize a large fleet to go north, compared with the value that these populations can create in the future, these costs are obviously well worth it.
"General, the fleet from Kaohsiung Port has arrived. They also brought a letter written by Mr. Li, please read it." Zeng Xiaowen came to Chen Yixin's office and reported to him the latest progress.
"Oh?" Chen Yixin immediately put down what he was doing and took the letter from Zeng Xiaowen.
Chen Yixin and Li Dou participated in the time-travel operation together. The two were close friends before they time-traveled. After arriving in this time and space, they ate and lived together for a long time. They were even stationed together at Dawanshan Island at the Pearl River Estuary. , the partnership of one man and one man won the recognition of the executive committee with his excellent performance.
After finishing the garrison on Dawanshan Island, the two were transferred to Penghu to garrison together in 1632. However, this deployment did not allow them to partner for a long time. At the end of that year, Haihan began to build Kaohsiung Port in southern Taiwan. The following year, Li Dou was transferred to Kaohsiung Port as the chief officer, while Chen Yixin followed the army north to Zhejiang to attack Zhoushan. .
In 1634, Chen Yixin led his army to exterminate the local indigenous people in Miaoli, Taiwan, to clear obstacles for the oil exploration plan. During this period, he had a brief meeting with Li Dou. But that summer, Chen Yixin went north to Shandong again with the army, and from then on he rarely returned to the south. After that, when Chen Yixin was getting married in Fushan County, Li Dou made a special trip all the way here, and from then on, only letters and telegrams remained in contact.
Although the opportunities to meet are becoming increasingly rare, the friendship between the two has been maintained well. In addition to maintaining communication, the two will also send each other some local specialties from time to time. During the chaos in Shandong, Chen Yixin returned to Dengzhou to take charge of the overall situation. After determining that the southern colonies needed to share the pressure of refugee resettlement, he notified Li Dou immediately and asked Li Dou to organize as many large ships as possible to bring people to Shandong.
Although everyone from the Southern Fleet is welcome to come, Chen Yixin is still happy to use the power in his hands to provide some special treatment to his friends, such as increasing the proportion of young and middle-aged refugees among the refugees provided to Kaohsiung Port. Some.
Chen Yixin opened the letter and read it carefully. In fact, the content of the letter was not very special. As always, it was just Li Dou sharing some trivial matters about work and life. For example, the second phase of the Kaohsiung Port project has come to an end, or that Li Dou's youngest daughter had just recently arrived. full moon. Although these things have little to do with the current situation in Shandong, Chen Yixin still read them with gusto, and seemed to be able to feel the joy, anger, sorrow and joy of his friends from the words.
Of course, Li Dou also mentioned in the letter the production status of the plantations currently invested and established by the Ma family in the Kaohsiung area. After Chen Yixin married the Ma family, he persuaded Ma Dongqiang to use part of his assets to invest in plantations in the colonies ruled by Haihan. These plantations have been in operation for two or three years, and it is time for some cash crops to start to generate profits. After the plantation has income, the Ma family's doubts about these investments should be completely dispelled.
In fact, the Ma family is not the only one investing in Kaohsiung. Chen Yixin has also invested part of his personal assets in the local area, on the one hand to obtain stable long-term income, and on the other hand to support his friends' investment promotion work. However, the projects he invests in are not just plantations. He also has shares in local infrastructure facilities such as ports and warehouses. The better the Kaohsiung Port develops in the future, the more dividends he will receive. Therefore, although they are thousands of miles apart, Chen Yixin is also concerned about the local development situation both in public and private matters.
After reading Li Dou's letter, Chen Yixin put down other things and spent more than an hour writing a reply. Then he called Zeng Xiaowen in and told him two things. The first is to provide supplies to the fleet coming from Kaohsiung as soon as possible, and prioritize young and middle-aged refugees to board the ship. The second is to go to his house to find Ma Yuling and ask her to take out the gold bracelet and longevity lock prepared at home. Zeng Xiaowen will forward it to the person in charge of the fleet together with the reply letter, and ask him to take it back to Kaohsiung and give it to Li Dou as Li Dou. A gift for my little daughter’s full moon.
(End of chapter)