Chapter 3615
While the anxious Tokugawa Ietsuna was busy arranging a new supply route, a Haihan merchant had quietly sneaked into Kyoto and had a secret meeting with a certain royal family member.
Of course, the identity of a businessman is just a cover. Being able to represent Haihan to meet with the royal family of another country is not a task that ordinary people are qualified to take on. And the person he met with obviously knew this very well. The entire contact process was very serious. Completely in accordance with diplomatic standards.
In order to prevent the news from leaking out, this unofficial meeting was conducted in a one-on-one manner. There was no third party present, and there was no meeting minutes. Therefore, during the half-day meeting, outsiders did not know what exactly the two sides discussed. No way of knowing.
However, shortly after the secret meeting, the royal family took the initiative to speak out and expressed concern about the prospect of the Tokugawa shogunate launching this war, believing that the war had caused great damage to people's livelihood. After the war lasted for half a year, a large number of civilians in the western regions of Honshu and Shikoku have been forced to flee their homes, but the peace that the people long for is still far away.
In order to reduce the damage caused by the war, the royal family will spend a lot of money and food to carry out relief activities and build large camps near Kyoto to accommodate refugees. At the same time, we urge both warring parties to quell their disputes as soon as possible and end this meaningless war.
Of course, everyone in Japan knew that the emperor in the Kyoto Imperial Palace was just a puppet controlled by the shogunate, and the real decision-maker was the Tokugawa Shogun of the shogunate. But the puppet emperor is also an emperor, an existence that is difficult for mortals to touch. His political status is second only to the shogun, and he still has extremely high prestige among the people.
The royal family's statement naturally won the favor of ordinary people immediately. Thousands of refugees who fled the frontline areas rushed to Kyoto after learning the news, hoping to get the needed help there.
Immediately, some daimyo close to the imperial family began to speak out, supporting the imperial family's views on the civil war and demanding that the shogunate end the war as soon as possible.
At a critical juncture of the war, the emergence of such discordant voices in one's own camp was undoubtedly a serious hindrance in Tokugawa Ietsuna's view.
However, the anti-war sentiment among the people is getting stronger and stronger, and the imperial family's stance is undoubtedly the target that the people are more willing to support. Considering the current situation and the direction of public opinion, it is inconvenient for Tokugawa Ietsuna to stand on the opposite side of the imperial family and can only declare to the outside world that he will be serious. The royal family's suggestions will be considered, and a batch of money and food will also be raised to support the relief activities organized by the royal family in Kyoto.
Tokugawa Ietsuna's statement was only forced by the situation, but he was by no means willing. He turned around and ordered his royal salary to be halved as punishment for his own actions.
Although the Japanese emperor was the nominal ruler of Japan and owned some land, real estate and exclusive businesses, he actually did not have much stable income. In addition, he had no right to interfere with the national treasury and taxes, so most of his food and clothing expenses were actually All are provided by the shogunate.
The Japanese emperor announced that he would provide refugee relief in Kyoto. To be honest, the shogunate was responsible for most of the expenses. At a time when the shogunate's army was facing serious logistical problems, the royal family had to use the shogunate's money, food and materials to win people's hearts. It's no wonder that the Tokugawa Ietsunai was very dissatisfied with this.
However, Tokugawa Ietsuna was still not fully aware of the seriousness of this matter at this time, so he just thought that the imperial family wanted to take this opportunity to be in the limelight and gave him a slight punishment as a warning. Anyway, the shogunate controls the financial resources of the royal family, and no matter how hard they try, they can't make big waves.
As for the big names who followed the royal family and waved their flags, he paid no attention to them. As long as the powerful lords in various regions still stood on the side of the shogunate, these small movements could be ignored. They were nothing more than a group of buzzing flies. That’s all.
For the shogunate, the most urgent task at the moment is to deal with the enemies across the Kanmon Strait as soon as possible. As long as the Nine Provinces Alliance Army is defeated, all current problems will be solved. Just when the shogunate thought that doing so would calm domestic public opinion, the situation quickly took a turn for the worse. Tokugawa Ietsuna received a report that among the refugee groups pouring into Kyoto, some people openly advocated such rebellious remarks as "supporting the emperor to regain control of the world" and "disbanding the shogunate and ending the civil war", and they had already won the support of many people.
Moreover, those who promoted these remarks were not ordinary refugees, but some unidentified wandering warriors. They called the Tokugawa shogunate a "power usurper and a traitor" and called on the people to support the emperor in wresting power from the shogunate and implement benevolent government that would benefit all people.
This is no joke. After hearing these reports, Tokugawa Ietsuna realized that the situation in Kyoto might have been out of the control of the shogunate. In the current chaotic situation, someone is trying to overthrow the shogunate's rule.
Tokugawa Ietsuna was not worried that those wandering samurai would rebel. No matter how many there were, they were just a bunch of ronin. In front of the regular army equipped with armor and firearms, they were just a bunch of rabble.
But he realized that behind these trouble-making ronin, there must be other masters planning and directing. It is impossible for these baseless ronin to create such a big momentum.
In addition, the royal family did not give a clear response to this. This ambiguous attitude was also a dangerous signal in Tokugawa Ietsuna's view.
Before this, he never even believed that the royal family had any ambition to resist the shogunate. After all, the royal family had no financial resources to support it and no armed force. Even if it wanted to rebel, it did not have enough strength.
But the current situation in Kyoto has allowed Tokugawa Ietsuna to see another possibility, that is, in addition to the royal family, there may be other forces that intend to take advantage of the chaos to pursue greater goals.
The reason for this idea is that Tokugawa Ietsuna, as the current shogun of the shogunate, is also very aware of how the power of the shogunate has changed over the past few hundred years and continues to this day.
The Kamakura shogunate was created by Minamoto Yoritomo as a power institution with the military power in his hands. At that time, the shogunate and the Japanese imperial court coexisted, and the imperial power had not yet been completely emptied.
The era of the Kamakura shogunate ended because Emperor Daigo raised his troops in 1324 and destroyed the Kamakura shogunate in 1333. However, the rule of Emperor Go-Daigo did not last long. Just two years later, he was overthrown by his former supporter Ashikaga Takauji and established a puppet emperor in Kyoto, thus entering the Muromachi Shogunate era.
However, for more than two hundred years under the rule of the Muromachi shogunate, Japan has been experiencing continuous civil wars, forming many local separatist forces in a country within a country. It was not until 1590 that Toyotomi Hideyoshi completed the great cause of domestic unification.
However, Toyotomi Hideyoshi did not enjoy a few years of happiness. Shortly after he died of illness at Fushimi Castle in Kyoto in 1598, Tokugawa Ieyasu quickly raised troops to replace him, and the Tokugawa shogunate became the third shogunate period so far.
Throughout history, the power of the imperial family has been weakened to the extent that it is not enough to pose a direct threat to the shogunate, but any careerist can use the excuse of supporting the imperial family to launch subversive activities against the current shogunate. The Tokugawa family is not the first to taste the benefits, and of course they will most likely become the target of others.