The river is wide and the clouds are low, and the birds and gulls are soaring.

More than 100 East Coast tax policemen crouched low among the vast fields of thistles and reeds, staring at the rocky beach ahead. There, a group of merchants from the east coast rowed their boats to bring all sorts of goods ashore, while behind them, a small two-masted galleon loomed over the river de la Plata.

It was clear that it was a group of smugglers, and that they were in the process of handing over the goods to the liaison, as a group of apparently dressed in Spanish costume were also moving out of various hideouts on the rocky beach. They brought with them a large number of mules and horses, and at the same time they carried a lot of goods with them, such as leather, tallow, and tendon, which could offset part of the payment.

The commander of the tax police company who led the team gestured to a subordinate, who nodded, and then blew the copper whistle in his mouth violently, only to hear a burst of gunfire like beans, a total of 240 tax police officers on the east coast surrounded from the east, south, and west, and squeezed towards the group of smuggling merchants.

A total of more than 60 smugglers from Spain and the East Coast were caught off guard, and four or five people were killed in an instant, and they were immediately a little confused. After discovering that there were tax policemen wearing khaki cloth uniforms on the left, right and rear, these people's fear reached the peak, some of them resisted with guns under the command of the leader, some of them ran around like headless flies, and many more people cried and ran into the muddy mudflats, especially those smugglers from the east coast, who were desperately pushing the boat, and the goods were gone, and went directly into the deep water, apparently trying to escape back to the boat.

"It's done!" Huang Hanhua excitedly clapped his fists and said: "It's a pity that we can't do our best, some scum from our country are afraid that they will flee back, we should contact the navy in advance and transfer a 'Star' class light cruiser over, so that we can catch and judge all these scum." ”

"It's too late, sir." Cai Dao, the son of Cai Huaze, who has been in charge of the Patagonia region for many years, explained softly to Huang Hanhua: "It is always very difficult to contact those people in the navy. Although those 'Star'-class light cruisers themselves also have anti-smuggling tasks, they belong to the First Fleet, not a full-time anti-smuggling fleet, and they are very ineffective in mobilizing, and they often need to be coordinated by high-level officials like you, Chief Huang, which is very delayed. ”

Huang Hanhua was silent when he heard this. Yes, those light cruisers are not full-time anti-smuggling ships after all, how can they be like an arm? If you really want to be on call, you still have to raise a fleet of the tax office itself, but how is this possible! You know, in today's East Coast Republic, even the General Administration of Customs, which has just become independent from the Ministry of Trade, has not yet equipped an anti-smuggling fleet, so how can their General Administration of Taxation give priority to the allocation of ships? Now that we can set up a full-time tax police battalion and stabilize the violent machinery of taxation, it is already a great luck, so let's be content!

Thinking of this, Huang Hanhua also secretly laughed at his discontentment, and then said to Cai Dao: "Company Commander Cai is right, this kind of anti-smuggling operation, after receiving the tip, often has not much time to prepare, and it is already a fluke to catch them red-handed, let alone others." Actually, that's not bad, at least it's a deterrent to these smugglers. In the past, our country was really tolerant of these people, and lost a lot of taxes in vain. ”

"That's right, Chief Huang." Cai Dao lit a cigarette for Huang Hanhua, and then said with a smile: "In the past, our country was grass-roots, and various systems were careless, and there were many inconsiderate points, and in order to develop the economy and encourage exports, we turned a blind eye to some smuggling activities. It can be said that in the past few decades, more than half of our country's foreign trade was actually smuggling that bypassed state supervision, but the taxation, customs and other departments could not do anything about it. Now that we have been established for more than 50 years, it is naturally impossible to indulge in this, so we need to clean up these people and let them know that the world has changed, and they must pay taxes according to the rules in the future. ”

In fact, Cai Dao's brothers Cai Hao and Cai Jue once did smuggling business. At that time, not long after the country had just developed the Hejian region, the two brothers and Xu Zhongwu resold all kinds of goods between the river and the steppe on the east bank. It is really difficult to say whether these commodities have gone to the customs branches of the East Bank Government on both sides of the Wujiang River to pay import and export duties. Cai Dao estimated that some of them paid taxes, some of them didn't, in short, there was a suspicion of tax evasion. But most people were like this in those days, and the government had very few tax collectors, and the supervision was not in place, and it was impossible for businessmen to realize that it was impossible, and even business tax, consumption tax, etc., could only be collected with these people on a fixed amount. As for the more difficult import and export tariffs, it is simply laissez-faire, and the customs in charge of collecting customs duties can only grasp the large and let go of the small, that is, concentrate on the collection of goods carried by the ships of the major trading companies in various ports, and the rest is honestly a little inadequate.

Of course, the Cai brothers no longer do this, they leased large hillsides in the north of Hejian, set up a plantation of tung trees imported from the Far East, and then bought some yerba mate, animal husbandry products, timber, medicinal herbs and other specialties from the vicinity, packed and transported them to the wharf on the banks of the Wujiang River, and sold them to merchants from the steppes on the east coast. These businesses are basically very "innocent", although there are inevitably tax evasion and tax evasion projects, but to be honest, there are very few, and it can be said that they are model taxpayers.

In fact, there are many people like the Cai brothers, and there is a trend of more and more, the main reason is the gradual improvement of various rules and regulations, as well as the increasing number of tax collectors, the risk of tax evasion has been magnified many times compared with the past, and enterprises that can make a lot of profits through legitimate channels really do not need to take great risks and let themselves fall into an unnecessary bad situation. You know, the punishment for tax evasion is getting heavier and heavier, if the amount is small, the fine may be fine (but the amount of this fine is often very painful), if the amount is large, the participants are likely to be sentenced to exile overseas as cannon fodder, that is nine deaths!

Company Commander Cai's words are very good, but there are still many people who have not kept up with their ideas and concepts, and they lack reverence for the government. I always think what is the tax system of the Ming Kingdom, and what is the taxation of the European continent, but is that the same thing? Huang Hanhua took a hard puff of his cigarette, looked at the "battlefield" in front of him, and said: "Now that the tax police battalion has been established, the tax police offices in various towns and villages have been gradually improved, and the number of cadres and clerks of the tax bureaus in various places has also doubled, we can no longer let these young people be happy!" ”

As the two men spoke, the battle ahead — well, that might be an exaggeration, for the whole thing lasted only twenty minutes — was soon over, and with the exception of a few smugglers who had been knocked down at the beginning, most of the others gave up resistance and were taken down on the spot, with only a few people shot and killed in the ensuing shootout with the tax police. Of course, there were probably less than ten people who escaped back to the deep water in small boats, and the tax police couldn't chase them, so they could only let them go after a random shot, but the goods of these lucky smugglers could only be left on the beach, and it is estimated that they will die of heartache when they return.

Huang Hanhua quickly snuffed out his cigarette and strode over to the shivering smugglers. These people will be surrounded by armed tax police, one by one dejected, obviously predicting their fate. However, there are still a few people who seem to be unwilling to be exiled to the miasma, and they are loudly defending something, which makes people feel annoyed to hear it.

"Sir, these are Spaniards, the buyers of this shipment. They argued that they did not know that the goods they bought were smuggled goods, and that they were subjects of the Kingdom of Spain, and that we could not arrest and try them. Cai Dao stopped his subordinates from beckoning these people with gun butts, and translated towards Huang Hanhua.

"Hehe, it's a clever time to say something. Don't worry about it, catch them all, even if the Spaniards come to make trouble, don't be afraid, how big can it be! Huang Hanhua smiled coldly after hearing this, and said, "Is it reasonable to conduct smuggling transactions with illegal businessmen in our country?" Take them all away, I want to see if the Spaniards have eaten the bear's heart and leopard gall or what, dare to go to our tax police camp to pick up people, let's go, close the team! ”

"Yes, Chief Huang." Company Commander Cai nodded when he heard this, and then waved his hand to let the troops begin to gather mules and horses, carry goods, and escort prisoners.

During this time, there were some Spanish riders who spied on from afar. As for the identities of these people, Huang Hanhua faintly guessed that they were probably attracted by the Spanish cavalry who were attracted by the burst of gunfire just now. However, it is difficult to say whether they are members of the smuggling gang or not, because in the financial situation of Spain, the soldiers of the colonial legion are often in arrears of salaries, and their treatment is very poor, and it is difficult to maintain themselves without engaging in smuggling or anything. Therefore, it is possible that these cavalrymen were from the Buenos Aires garrison, and they came to see the smuggling caravan under their shelter, because it had been attacked. It's just that they probably didn't expect that this time it would be planted in the hands of the East Coast Tax Police, and it seems that the East Coast people dispatched more than 200 people, so there is no way, and it is impossible to rescue them halfway, so they can only watch them leave.

However, it can also be seen from this incident how far the Spaniards have been cowardly, and how their Buenos Aires Inquisition Court District has been infiltrated by the East Bank: these pagans from across the Río de la Plata not only built roads, houses, and markets in the suburbs of Buenos Aires without paying a penny of rent or land purchases, but later set up barracks for the armed forces (tax police battalion) in the nearby port of Nancun, which really did not give the Spaniards any face - of course, Compared with the garrison or something, today Huang Hanhua and Cai Dao led more than 200 armed tax police to openly enforce the law on the territory of the Kingdom of Spain, and they also beat and killed, which is to completely throw the face of the Spaniards into the gutter, it is estimated that some big people in Buenos Aires have hot faces, but they don't know what to do, and it is sad to say.

After returning to the barracks at Nancun Port with the prisoners and belongings, Huang Hanhua also took the time to sit down and write a report. Behind him, Cai Dao, the commander of the camp (two companies of tax policemen stationed in this barracks), began to screen and interrogate these people. According to the usual practice, these captured smugglers, whether on the east bank or abroad, will be sent to the other side of the Río Plata River, where they will be tried by the People's Court of Mall County - if nothing else, the fate of these people will be to exile in overseas colonies, such as New China, Australia, Blackwater, and other places where the environment is more harsh and urgently needs to be developed, and their surplus value can be regarded as exploiting. As for whether there will be any trouble in trying those Spaniards, hehe, that's really a lot of worry, the Spaniards have the courage to come to the door to theorize, anyway, with their usual performance, they should be coaxed to the end, even if the East Coast people are almost already trampling on their faces.

On March 20, 1682, after inquiring about some other affairs of the Nancun Port Tax Police camp and approving some of the reports, Huang Hanhua finished his part of his work and returned to the port of Mall on the liner of the state-run river transport company that traveled to and from the banks of the Río de la Plata.

The port of Mall was an important port for trade between the Eastern Republic and Spain, and it was also a major tax revenue destination for merchants from both countries. So he delayed here for a few days, inspected his work – he had the right to do so, as the director and inspector of the General Tax Administration, in principle, he had the right to inspect the work of any taxing authority other than the customs – and then took a train back to the capital, Vostochny, via the Southwestern Railway.

When he had just returned to the capital to catch his breath, his immediate superior, Wang Yan, a member of the executive committee in charge of finance, finance, and taxation, gave him a special task: to introduce the tax system and collection situation currently being implemented on the east coast to Zhao Chuyan and his entourage who had come to visit the eastern country, and if possible, to arrange some special training courses in this regard for several people in the DPRK mission, so that they could have a preliminary understanding of the modern taxation system. The Kingdom of Korea has been serving as an ATM for the Far Eastern feudatories in the East for so long, so naturally it also wants to give some benefits, and the people on the East Coast have never been very stingy in this regard, they even accept students from the Principality of Courland and the Indian tribes of North America, let alone the Koreans in the Far East?