After Liu Wei left, Gao Pragmatic said with a smile: "If I guessed correctly, the way to make money in Baili Gorge is probably in the north?" ”

Cao Gan was taken aback: "You...... How would the young master know? ”

This "young master" was called out without Liu Wei present, Gao Shishi was quite satisfied, but what was even more satisfied was Cao Gan's reaction.

It seems that my estimate is not wrong, and the real business that Baili Gorge relies on for a living is really a trade with the Mongols.

Gao pragmatic was not like some ministers in the imperial court, who was resolutely opposed to any trade with the Mongols. In Gao Shishi's view, the Ming Dynasty's trade with Mongolia was not only profitable, but even because the Ming Dynasty had a huge economy that completely crushed Mongolia, it could achieve the goal of using economic means to control the Mongolian ministries, so he not only supported trade with Mongolia, but also hoped to vigorously expand the scale of this trade, until the Mongolian ministries formed a serious economic dependence on "no way to live without the Ming Dynasty". At that time, Mongolia will be said to be a vassal of the Ming Dynasty, why not?

This is the mindset that Gao Pragmatic developed as a small political figure in his previous life: what can be solved by economic means is resolutely not used by political means; If it can be resolved by political means, it is resolutely not necessary to use military means.

I insist on having the ability to kill you, but at the same time, I insist that I will never fight until the last minute. After all, in such a thing as a war, the first will inevitably cause too much attrition, and the second will inevitably have accidents.

"Sun Tzu's Art of War: Seeking Attack" says, "All the art of using soldiers, the whole country is the first, and the country is second; The whole army is the first, and the broken army is second; The whole brigade is the first, and the broken brigade is second; The whole pawn is the first, and the broken pawn is second; The whole army is the first, and the army is second. Therefore, a hundred battles are won, and the good ones who are not good are also; The soldiers who surrender without a fight, and the good ones are also good. ”

Isn't it more cost-effective to gradually control Mongolia by economic means and make Mongolia gradually available to us than to spend the whole country and spend huge manpower, material, and financial resources to conquer Mongolia? Besides, even if Mongolia is conquered, will the Han people go to Mongolia to build a city on the left and a city on the right? How much effort did the Han Chinese have to exert to maintain the occupation of the Mongolian steppe, which was not suitable for farming?

Unless the revolution in the productive forces and military affairs has reached the level of later generations, Gao Pragmatic insists that the best way to achieve long-term peace and stability is to govern Mongolia with Meng.

What's more, the Mongols can not only turn enemies into friends with the Han Chinese, but even become comrades-in-arms with the Han Chinese: you must know that in the future, there may be wild boar skins that will jump out to cause trouble, and you need Mongolian friends to send troops to cooperate with the Ming - of course, they are not friends yet.

When Cao Gan asked this, Gao Shishi laughed, but did not answer his words, but continued to ask: "You trade with the Mongols, what do you sell, what do they sell?" Or are you bartering? ”

Gao Shishi's question made Cao Gan a little excited, and said: "The Mongolians need a lot of things, silk, silk, cotton flowers, needle clues, comb grates, rice salt, candy, shuttle cloth, otter skin, sheepskin boxes...... I like everything, I want everything. After a pause, he said, "As for us, we have a wide harvest, including horses, oxen, sheep, mules, donkeys, horse tails, sheepskins, and leather jackets." ”

Gao was slightly surprised: "Why do we still have otter skins to sell?" Mongolia does not have? I have to say that Gao Shishi's understanding of wild animals is not very good, and he also thinks that all kinds of animal skins in Mongolia should be very sufficient, and even the leather making technology is also very advanced.

"Otters mostly inhabit rivers and lakes, and Mongolia does not mean that there are no at all, but compared to us, there are many fewer of them, and they live as nomads on weekdays, but they do not hunt otters and the like very often. And Mongolia is quite cold in winter, otter skin is very useful to them, plus our Han people are skillful, the leather is exquisite and durable, so Mongolians like to find us Han people to buy otter skin, especially Mongolian nobles, they all like otter skin. Cao Gan explained.

Gao Pragmatic thought about it again and asked, "You don't sell those iron pots and the like?" ”

Cao Gan shook his head and said: "The price of things like iron pots can't be said to be cost-effective, but the government and the border army sometimes check it." The villain thinks that he can feed the Bailixia gang of people by doing other business anyway, and he can't commit to breaking the ban for a few iron pots, causing the government to look sideways and asking for trouble. ”

Gao pragmatic praised: "Okay, your idea is very clever. Then he asked, "But I've heard that the official market is not open often...... Are you taking the line of the private market? ”

In fact, the direct trade between the Mongols and the Han people has not been cut off at all, not to mention, just say that the Ming Dynasty, Yongle years, Alutai and the Ming Dynasty began the "tributary trade", "years or a tribute, or another tribute, as usual". This "tributary trade" was an official trade, mainly at the request of the Mongol feudal lords. They wanted to be rewarded with a double reward through tribute, and to obtain high-end products such as silk and satin that they could not produce themselves but which they wanted to enjoy.

This "tributary trade" is a different kind of commercial activity from the inter-market trade between the common people, and it is not the same as the exchange between the nomadic and agricultural economies. Didn't Marx say that "the interrelations between nations depend on the degree of development of the productive forces, division of labor, and internal exchanges of each nation." In the early Ming Dynasty, "tributary trade" was a form of trade that was compatible with the social and economic development of Mongolia at that time.

Around the middle of the Ming Dynasty, the social economy of Mongolia had developed. In the sixteenth year of Chenghua, Dayan Khan, known as the little prince in the History of the Ming Dynasty, eliminated the division and chaos within Mongolian society. During the Jiajing period, "the little prince was the richest and strongest, controlling more than 100,000 strings, many livestock and shells, a little tired of soldiers, but migrating to the east, called the barbarians, and the tribes were divided into many people in the northwest." "Years of adoption of filth. At the same time, I have a mouth, day by day, that is, the little prince, Ji Nang, and I answer the tribes, but three or four hundred thousand, depending on the past life and poverty, no horse arrow, Sheng Ye? decay".

It can be seen that the development of animal husbandry production and the growth of population in Mongolia during this period enabled them to exchange more livestock products as commodities on the one hand, and on the other hand, there were also "many tribes and insufficient food". Under these circumstances, Mongolia inevitably had to develop a strong demand for foreign trade in order to exchange its own livestock products for grain and other consumer goods produced by the Han Chinese. When this demand could not be met, the Mongol rulers had no choice but to wage war in an attempt to open the door to trade with the Han Chinese. In fact, the "Gengxu Change" is a microcosm of this kind of war.

During this period, although there were frequent armed conflicts between the Mongol and Han rulers, and intermittent wars between ethnic groups, in fact, trade activities had spontaneously appeared among the people, which was historically called "private markets".

The "private market" is not new, in fact, it has appeared as early as the Hongzhi period, "I have recently heard that the northern captives pay tribute and coerce horses into the border private market, and the people in the city get all to return to the powerful family, because of the huge profits." Under the "huge profits", merchants and people will flock to it, "merchants near and far often trade with prisoners with iron goods, and residents of villages and cities also violate the ban." Although the Ming court issued a series of bans in an attempt to ban the "private market", the trade between Mongolia and Han was an inevitable product of the social and economic development of Mongolia and the Han people, and it was not something that the Ming court could suffocate by using the coercive power of the state.

Wrong, how can Gao Gong take the opportunity to promote the major event of "I answer the tribute" in the coming year? It can be seen that there are various foundations for doing this, and as long as there is a politician in the Ming court who can really look at the problem from a practical standpoint, it will definitely take advantage of the trend.

The private market is a concrete manifestation of this foundation.