Nowadays, the conditions for recruitment in the Tang Army are not low, and it is necessary to select soldiers from a large number of people, and the population of Zhili Sidao is large, so there are naturally many soldiers who can be selected.

In fact, at present, the four regions of Zhili have already provided at least 30% of the army's resources for the empire!

With such an important conscription area, the War Department of the Cabinet naturally set up a rather dense recruitment site here, and the Army also set up numerous recruit training camps here.

After these recruits complete their training, the relatively good ones will be sent to serve in the major infantry divisions, while the rather poor ones will be assigned to the reserve divisions.

Therefore, in that respect, the importance of the four provinces to the empire is undoubted, which is why the empire has stationed a large number of troops here.

The total strength of the front-line field forces and reserve divisions of the entire army has reached nearly 700,000 people, and the ratio of front-line field troops to reserve divisions is about 1 to 1.

And this total force figure is actually quite terrifying.

Because of the above-mentioned troops, regardless of whether they are front-line field troops or reserve divisions, they are actually all out of production army!

Even though the military has already carried out vigorous military reclamation and self-reliance, the pressure on military spending is still quite heavy.

Many of the military's plans have not been carried out, and many of the old iron-cast five-pound guns that have been used for many years in the troops have reached the end of their lifespan, but they have no money to replace them.

Because most of the military's expenses are used to pay the salaries of soldiers and soldiers, and a small part is used to replace flintlock pistols and equip grenades, the rest of the army is also incomparable.

The army has a hard time, but the navy is very chic, Xuanping's seven-year fleet expansion plan is almost over, and they immediately put forward a new round of fleet expansion plan in Xuanping's ten years.

Not long after Li Xuanwei returned from a private visit, he frowned slightly at the fleet expansion plan he saw.

The navy should continue to expand, this is what Li Xuan believes, but the expansion he supports is not a blind effort to build ships, ignoring other aspects.

What do you say that starting this year, we will start construction of more than 10 battleships, more than 20 cruisers, and 30 frigates at the same time every year, and build a huge fleet of battleships with a total of more than 300 capital ships within five years!

What a joke.

Not to mention how much it costs to build it, is there so many slipways that can be started at the same time, even if it is built, can your navy find so many officers to command, and so many sailors to pilot?

And the title written at the beginning of this plan was still 'Navy Supplementary Plan Fold' When Li Xuan first read the title, he thought that the Navy was just making a small fuss, making a few capital ships or something to supplement some lineups, but he didn't expect that the people in this Navy were selling dog meat on the head of a sheep.

Build 300 new capital ships, this is called supplemental?

Your navy doesn't have a total of dozens of capital ships now, okay!

If the title of the excerpt was something like 300 capital ships, he probably wouldn't waste any time looking at it, and would just call it back!

Now too, he just glanced at it slightly, he was too lazy to write any instructions, and directly gave it to Admiral Lewan: "Take it back and send it back after changing it!" ”

Li Xuan's reaction was naturally expected by Admiral Lei Wan, as one of the only two admirals in the navy, the minister on duty in the imperial study, and had been working in front of the emperor for many years, he naturally knew what the reaction of the Son of Heaven would be.

But it doesn't matter if you don't agree, this is not a lion's mouth, how can there be meat to eat!

is the so-called sky-high price, landing to pay back!

Our navy said that we want 300 capital ships, Your Majesty, you can directly make a discount, 150 ships are acceptable to our navy, but it really can't be done, 100 ships, 50 ships are also okay.

It's really not good, if you approve thirty ships, our navy will be very happy!

Well, that's right, the bottom line in the hearts of the generals of the Navy is thirty capital ships, roughly one five or six battleships, about ten cruisers, and about a dozen frigates.

But you can't be so honest in making plans, the person who made the plan below asked Admiral Lei Wan how many numbers he wanted, and Lei Wan said two hundred ships at the beginning, but as soon as he spoke, he changed his words, three hundred.

Now the plan has been beaten back, it doesn't matter, I'm making a copy, write a hundred and fifty ships next time, and then it will be called back, and then it will be a hundred, fifty, and finally thirty.

There is a routine in the whole process, it seems to be bargaining with the Son of Heaven, but in fact, it is for sympathy, because the navy does have its own plan, so in the end, the navy will stick to the bottom line and die thirty capital ships without letting go.

The previous bargaining process was actually a buffer with the Son of Heaven, if it was stupid to say thirty ships, and the Son of Heaven directly vetoed it, then it would be a big trouble.

Now what Lei Wan has to do is to go back and revise one or two, and then come up with some new things to send the new plan again, and after repeating this a few times, when the Son of Heaven is annoyed by the noise, he will forget it, get out of the way, don't scream crookedly, the purpose of their navy has been achieved.

Li Xuan actually sees this kind of routine of the navy, sometimes he is quite helpless, and he also knows the reason why the courtiers like to do this, it is nothing more than that he is afraid that the numbers will be too dead at the beginning, and in the end, the two sides will not be able to step down.

When the time comes, either the Son of Heaven will bow his head, or the Navy will bow his head!

And to ask the Son of Heaven to bow his head, it is impossible, it is impossible in this life, if the Son of Heaven bows his head and admits his mistake, the whole world will be doomed, because in that case, it is almost equal to the political theoretical basis of the Tang Empire, and everyone can pick up a knife and gun and say that he is the chosen one to rebel.

It is impossible for an emperor who has committed two edicts in three days to maintain his sacredness, and it is not in line with the theoretical basis of the Tang Empire.

In the Tang Empire, there is no such thing as the Son of Heaven and the scholars ruling the world together, this is a serious political incorrectness, and it will be targeted by the Hantong Eagle Dog.

The political theories propagated in the Tang Dynasty newspaper in recent years mainly have two points:

The first point is that the land of the world is not the king's land, and the shore of the land is not the king's minister, which is simply to say that whatever is the Son of Heaven, no matter who is the subject of the Son of Heaven.

The second point is that 'the Son of Heaven is not a man'.

That's right, it's just not human!

As for why I say this, this involves one thing that the Tang Dynasty Daily has been doing in recent years, that is, to deify Li Xuan!

In the early years, it was said that the Son of Heaven was ordered by the Heavens, and that he was the Son of Heaven, but now, the official propaganda caliber has directly changed to the Son of Heaven.

said that Li Xuan was the son of heaven and was born with the essence of heaven and earth, so he naturally cannot be an ordinary person, he is a god, the only god in the world!

Li Xuan is greater than the Three Emperors and Five Emperors, and even a higher God Emperor than the mythical Five Gods!

Therefore, Li Xuan is not a human!

He is God!

Li Xuan, who is not a human being, is naturally impossible to make mistakes, and those who make mistakes are those courtiers, who deceive their superiors and subordinates, resulting in many harsh governments, and the targets they want to target are not the Holy Son of Heaven, but those traitorous ministers.

The secretary of the Tang Dynasty Tax Department, the minister on duty in the imperial study, Qian Aoli, is currently the biggest traitor in the world, and countless landlords and businessmen are eager to eat him and drink blood!

In the face of a deified Son of Heaven, this kind of thing cannot be handled in the usual way of getting along with kings and ministers in many cases, and if this kind of thing is placed in the previous dynasty, then it is normal, and it can even be regarded as a good story.

But in the Tang Dynasty, if that courtier catches Li Xuan and scolds him, saying that Li Xuan, you are wrong here and wrong there, then the end is often not good.

Because it's not about right or wrong, it's about political correctness!

When you want to advise something, you have to say that it is the fault of other courtiers, and it must not be said that it is the fault of the Holy Son of Heaven!

This is not to please the Son of Heaven or anything like that, but because the political environment of the Tang Dynasty is like this!

Behind this, in fact, what is represented is the unprecedented concentration of imperial power!

For thousands of years of Chinese history, although it was already a monarchy in the Xia, Shang and Zhou dynasties, the imperial power was always too big, during the Spring and Autumn Period and the Warring States Period, the aristocracy was in charge, and before the Sui and Tang Dynasties, the family was in charge.

After the Song Dynasty, although the imperial power was further concentrated, the literati class replaced the previous nobles and families and became a new class that restrained each other with the imperial power.

This class reached its peak during the Ming Dynasty, even if it was a fierce man like Zhu Yuanzhang and Zhu Di, who was killed over and over again, but in the end he still had to compromise with Wenchen.

Then Emperor Zhengde was also a very awesome person, but he was so awesome, he was also overboard by those ministers in his early years, and he almost burped.

Emperor Zhengde, who has been in power for more than 40 years, is still unable to suppress the civil official group in the matter of establishing a prince!

It can be seen that for thousands of years of history, in fact, the imperial power has not been concentrated too much!

And this situation has been earth-shaking here in the Tang Dynasty!

At the beginning of the Huangzhushan era, Li Xuan expanded the Hanlin Yuan through the expansion of the cabinet, and regarded the Hanlin Yuan as a secretarial body, and at the same time set up independent army privy councils, naval command, inspectorate, grand court and other institutions to balance and divide the power of various institutions within the Tang Dynasty, and directly grasped the power in his hands.

In this way, the concentration of imperial power in the Tang Dynasty has reached an unprecedented level in China for thousands of years!

This is not just about Li Xuan's power, but about imperial power!

If it was just Li Xuan's words, then with Li Xuan's current prestige, in fact, he would not need any superfluous means to firmly control the country.

But why did he still do this, because he wanted to establish the centralization of imperial power from the system.

To ensure that after his death, the Tang Empire will still be able to remain a complete unified country, not be torn apart!

Li Xuan can't help worrying about this problem, although he is still very young, but now the territory of the Tang Empire is getting bigger and bigger, even if there may be steamships and telegraph communications in the future, making it easier to rule, but there will still be many problems.

If he had died decades later, he would have been as torn apart as the Mongol Empire!

Now, he is beginning to plan ahead to ensure that after his death, this huge empire will still be a complete empire, and a high degree of imperial centralization, in fact, in other words, is the centralization of monarchy.

The core of it is not to say how much power the monarch has, but how much power the central government has, to avoid local divisions!

The centralization of imperial power is the goal that Li Xuan has been pursuing in recent years, and many things that have happened in this process are actually serving this goal.