On June 22, Wang Yuan and his entourage arrived in Yaozhou, and immediately ordered the Jiannan army stationed in Yaozhou to be stationed in various border towns in Jiannan and Tubo. Although the worries of the Nanzhao Kingdom have been resolved, due to the war in the Nanzhao Kingdom, the relationship between the Tang Dynasty and Tubo has fallen to the freezing point, and a major war may break out at any time. Jiannan has limited soldiers and horses, and can only garrison troops and horses in Yaozhou, Netzhou, Yazhou, Hanzhou, Maozhou and other places on the border of Tibet to form a defensive line.

In comparison, the threat of the border city north of Chengdu is not too great, after all, Jiannan Jiedu makes it north of Wang Zhonghe's Longyou Jiedu to coordinate the defense of the Tubo. Hanzhou Maozhou is located between the two major festival envoys, and it is the safest place. No matter how stupid the Tubo people are, they will not be stupid enough to attack the junction under the jurisdiction of the two major knots, and they will be attacked from top to bottom. Therefore, the troops of Hanzhou and Maozhou do not need too much, and each of the two states can add 1,000 soldiers and horses to maintain daily border defense.

However, in Yaozhou, Wangzhou, and Yazhou, the situation is completely different, and these three cities are the most important in Yaozhou. Because once Yaozhou is lost, the southern passage will be blocked. To the north, you can attack the south of the sword, and to the south, you can attack the southern Zhao, which is the most tricky. Therefore, Wang Yuan left 15,000 men and horses for Li Mi and asked him to firmly hold the city of Yaozhou. There are 10,000 soldiers and horses stationed in Wangzhou and Yazhou, which is also the total number of troops that Wang Yuan can give at present. Of course, these two cities are also very important, and if one of the two cities is captured casually, the passage to the hinterland of Jiannan will be opened. Capturing one of these two cities would directly threaten the safety of Chengdu.

But fortunately, the western side of these two cities and the border with Tibet are deserts. The last time the Tibetans attacked, they had to capture the small city of Huichuan from the city of Luqi along the Jinsha River to the southeast, and then turned north to attack Wangzhou, sparing a big circle alive. Of course, on the one hand, it was to cooperate with the soldiers and horses of the Nanzhao Kingdom, and on the other hand, it was also because of the obstruction of the desert.

In any case, there are only these cards in his hand, and Wang Yuan can only make the best use of them. Fortunately, there is no indication that the Tibetans are planning to attack Nanzhao, and everything they do is just to prepare for a rainy day. Even if there is no war, the Jiannan army needs to be stationed in various places.

Two days later, Wang Yuan and his entourage arrived in Wangzhou. In Wangzhou, I unexpectedly met Liu Dehai, who was recruiting soldiers here. In the more than 20 days that Wang Yuan left, Liu Dehai was responsible for recruiting and replenishing the 20,000 new soldiers in the imperial court. The matter of recruiting soldiers will be busy with Liu Dehai's feet, this matter is too difficult.

Liu Dehai began to complain when he saw Wang Yuan, and in the past 20 days, he ran all over seven or eight cities from north to south, but the soldiers he recruited were extremely limited. So far, less than 5,000 of the 13,000 soldiers have been recruited. Most of the people were reluctant to join the army. Especially in the past half a year, Jiannan Dao first lost nearly 40,000 soldiers and horses in the hands of Xian Yu Zhongtong. Even if Wang Yuan suffered fewer losses after accepting it, after several major battles with Nanzhao, he lost nearly 20,000 soldiers and horses. The 60,000 soldiers and horses lost were the sons and husbands of the people of Jiannan Province, and there were a large number of dead soldiers in almost every place, which had a great impact on the people. It is no wonder that many people immediately walked away when they saw the recruitment of soldiers in the Jiannan Army, without even looking at it.

"Marshal, recruiting soldiers and horses like this is like asking for food, and my dignified Jiannan Army still requires these mud legs to enter? Otherwise, according to the old method of recruiting soldiers a few months ago, it would be impossible for Latin to forcibly join the army, so why do you have to recruit and volunteer? What are you doing with these Jiannan's mud legs? I don't think it's necessary. In the yamen of the Wangzhou Governor's Mansion, Liu Dehai foamed.

Wang Yuan frowned, it turned out that Jiannan Dao had always recruited soldiers and horses by force, and aside from other reasons, this way of recruiting soldiers and horses alone was very problematic. First of all, the soldiers who are so hard-pulled into the army are psychologically unwilling to fight, and secondly, the harm to the common people in this way is huge.

"You can't do this, it turns out that Xian Yu Zhongtong has always recruited soldiers and horses like this, isn't this a duck on the shelf? The Jiannan Army would rather be all elite soldiers and strong generals who voluntarily joined the army, rather than forcibly pull in the rabble who joined the army. Wang Yuan reprimanded.

Liu Dehai smacked his lips and said: "But in this way, the number of soldiers is not satisfied." ”

Wang Yuan frowned and paced: "If you want the people to voluntarily join the army, in addition to not using the way of forcing Latin, the best way is to be attractive to them." The salaries in the army are not high, and they have to risk losing their lives, so it is no wonder that everyone is not highly motivated. If we can increase the salary of the soldiers, and add other benefits, such as halving the tax contribution of the family of joining the army, or giving all the preferential treatment, I think it will not be difficult to recruit soldiers. ”

Liu Dehai was stunned and said: "Although the handsome's idea is good, this is not just a mouthful. Now the salary of the soldiers of the Jiannan Army is the same every month, and in order to attract the people to take the initiative to join the Jiannan Army, it must be at least two or more, if there are two salaries, I believe that the difficulty of recruiting soldiers will be greatly reduced. ”

"Are you saying that after raising it to two times, the people will flock to it?" Wang Yuandao.

"Needless to say? With two salaries, who doesn't want to be a soldier? In the capital, a man in the prime of life can earn two yuan a month and can support several people. What's more, it's in Jiannan. Liu Dehai said.

Wang Yuan nodded slightly and said: "You see, the solution is so simple, increase the salary of the soldiers, people die for money, birds die for food, there is no need to force the method at all." ”

Liu Dehai opened his eyes wide and said: "Marshal, you're not kidding, raising military salaries is a matter that affects the whole body." To increase the consistent salary, it is necessary for veterans and new recruits to raise it together. The 50,000 Jiannan Army has an extra 50,000 yuan a month, and it is 600,000 yuan a year. The imperial court doesn't give you any money, does the marshal have so much money to subsidize the soldiers? ”

Wang Yuan shook his head and said, "No." Even if there were, it wouldn't be possible for me to come out. ”

Liu Dehai said: "Yes, that's not in vain? ”

Wang Yuan frowned and said, "How can you say it in vain?" Didn't we come up with a solution? It's just that this method can't be implemented for the time being. In the current situation, we can't use this method for recruitment, so I wouldn't have done it. ”

Liu Dehai said: "My commander, what about the 8,000 soldiers that the Jiannan Army is lacking now?" I'm so burned. ”

Wang Yuan said: "It's very easy to do, upgrade all the regimental training soldiers and horses in the state capitals and incorporate them into the jurisdiction of the Jiannan Army, and there are seven or eight thousand local regimental training soldiers and horses in dozens of state capitals in Jiannan, all of which have been upgraded to official soldiers and horses, isn't this solved?" ”

Liu Dehai was stunned and said: "All the soldiers and horses trained by the regiment have become the Jiannan Army? This...... Can the military department agree? ”

Wang Yuan sighed: "The military department has lost the salary expenditure for the regiment to train soldiers and horses, and it is too late to be happy." It's us who are in trouble. After the regimental training of soldiers and horses was included in the Jiannan Army, local law and order could only be maintained by the Jiannan Army, to put it bluntly, the soldiers and horses that my Jiannan Army spent money to raise, but they had to do the regimental training of soldiers and horses, and we suffered a loss for this matter? ”

"Oooh." Liu Dehai nodded again and again, in fact, he didn't understand Wang Yuan's intention to do this.

Of course, Wang Yuan's intention to do this was not that he said that he was suffering a loss. What Wang Yuan thought was that after the regimental training of soldiers and horses was included in the Jiannan Army, there would be only one soldier and horse in the entire Jiannan Province in the entire Jiannan Province. The security of the state capitals can only be maintained by the Jiannan Army, which will better control the situation of the entire Jiannan Province, and the Jiannan Army can control all the cities, which is a very advantageous step to form the Jiannan Province under their own control.

The practice of incorporating regimental training soldiers and horses into the local regular army is actually unruly, but Wang Yuan believes that Yang Guozhong will not disagree with his own practice. Standing in Yang Guozhong's position, he will acquiesce in everything he does, as long as it is not too much.

However, in the long run, the problem of soldiers is still a big problem. Wang Yuan was not satisfied with the overstretched 50,000 soldiers and horses at hand. Although 50,000 soldiers and horses seemed to be a large number, when he thought of the imminent upheaval, Wang Yuan felt that it was far from enough. And the root cause of this matter is not that Jiannan's military resources are insufficient, but basically that the people of Jiannan's army are unattractive. On the premise that Zhuang Ding cannot be recruited into the army, if the people can take the initiative to join the army, they need to have preferential treatment. So the crux of all the problems boils down to one word: money. These are not small money, but big money. Small money is easy to raise, but big money is difficult, and it is absolutely impossible to just reach out to others. Wang Yuan suddenly realized that he was still missing a lot of things, a lot of important things that were enough to support his progress.

Leaving Wangzhou and going north, at noon on the 27th, Wang Yuan finally returned to Chengdu with Princess Aluo. Walking on the streets of Chengdu, A Luo's dress has attracted the attention of many Chengdu people. Not to mention a woman with a masked face riding a horse on the street, what is even more surprising is that this woman walked side by side with Jiannan Jiedu Wang Dashuai. Wang Jiedu took care of her very much, his face was full of pity, and he laughed with her from time to time.

There are many well-informed people among the people, and soon, Arlo's identity is revealed. The news that Wang Jiedu married Princess Nanzhao home as a concubine also spread throughout the city, and the people in the city were talking about it, all of them grimacingly discussing this matter.

Some people say that Wang Jiedu is really spicy, and even wants to taste the taste of barbarian women, and they also paint and say that Wang Jiedu makes what Silla maids in the family, Kunlun Heimei has them, and now she has married a barbarian princess, and she really likes to stimulate people who try it.

Some people are more sensible, saying that in order to make friends with Nanzhao, Wang Jiedu gave up his life to marry barbarian women, because it is said that barbarian girls are wild and have green faces and fangs. Reputedly...... It is said that there are still teeth biting people below, and Wang Jiedu is fighting for the peace of Nanzhao, and Wang Jiedu should be given high respect.

In short, this matter has become a big focus, and in the contemporary era of lack of entertainment, the gossip news of high-ranking officials is also a good topic to pass the time.