The Yellow River is far above the white clouds, a lonely city and ten thousand mountains.

Why should Qiang Di complain about the willows, the spring breeze does not pass the jade gate.

The song "Liangzhou Ci" exhausts the magnificent scenery of the Northwest Frontier, and also expresses the hardships of the living environment of the soldiers in the Frontier.

Why do you say that the spring breeze does not pass the Yumen Pass?

It probably means that the wind in the area of Yumen Pass is either dry and cold, or dry and hot, and there is no warm, warm and vibrant feeling like the spring breeze.

Of course, Liangzhou is the name of the Western Han Dynasty to the Sui and Tang dynasties, in the Ming Dynasty, it was called Shaanxi Xingdu Division, and in the Ming Dynasty, the key passes of the Silk Road in the Western Regions were no longer Yumen Pass and Yangguan, but closer to Jiayuguan in the east.

At this time, Zhu Cijiong did not have any grievances, although the spring breeze did not blow to Jiayuguan, the envoys of the Western Regions came over one by one, and the Ming Dynasty finally regained control of the Western Regions after the Han and Tang Dynasties, which is a great thing that the whole world celebrates, and Zhu Cijiong is naturally overjoyed.

Now that the countries of the Western Regions have surrendered, the most important thing now is to send generals to collect their military power, disband their original armies, and reorganize them into vassal legions.

Regardless of whether it is a first-class vassal state or a second-class vassal state, the army must be controlled by the Ming Army, which is the foundation of controlling them, and naturally it is not allowed to be careless.

For this reason, Zhu Cijiong specially recruited Sun Yuanhua, the secretary of the military department, to Jiayuguan to negotiate the issue of the establishment of legions and the selection of generals in various countries in the Western Regions.

According to the analysis of the previous historical records and the previous wars of the Chongzheng Dynasty, Sun Yuanhua came to a problem that his predecessors understood but did not pay attention to, that is, the nomads were actually all soldiers, and their tribe was equivalent to the nature of the Ming Guard.

In order to make the nomads completely subjugate, it is necessary to change this situation, such as the Monan grassland is a very successful example, all the young and middle-aged let them go to the mines to earn living needs, and gather together to accept the management of the officials of the Ministry of Industry of the Ming Dynasty, over time, their wildness will be smoothed out, and they will no longer think about the problem of rebellion and hegemony.

Zhu Cijiong agreed with his point of view very much, if they were allowed to continue to live a nomadic life like a guard, and when they were prosperous and mastered gunpowder weapons, they might rebel again, or even peep into the Central Plains, and they must change their living habits in the nature of a guard, so as to stabilize the northwest of the Ming Dynasty.

It is very difficult to train civilians into guards, but it is much easier to turn them into civilians.

The easiest way to stop them from being nomadic is to gather them, that is, to build cities.

In fact, the population of the countries in the Western Regions is not very large, and the largest number of Vaspur, Yuejibe, and Kazakh are only more than one million, and there are only a few hundred thousand people in Yarkand and Khalkha, so it is enough to build a few big cities with hundreds of thousands of people, move most of the population there, and completely change their living habits.

As for how to change their living habits, it is actually very simple, they work hard to be nomadic everywhere, not just to survive, to be fed, to be warm, in the words of later generations, just for money.

As long as they are allowed to eat more and dress warmer without being nomadic, their living habits will slowly change.

Speaking of making money here, Zhu Cijiong came up with a lot of ways to think about it casually.

For example, let them plant cash crops, with the climatic characteristics of the Western Regions, it is a bit unrealistic to promote grain planting at this time, but there are many cash crops that are very suitable for growing here, so let the officials send a group of experienced officials to come over and start the cultivation of cash crops, and they will definitely make more money than when they were nomadic.

With cash crops, you can also promote primary processing, fine processing, and even commercial activities, so that they can earn more money, and a few people will work hard to run to nomadic herding, and it is estimated that when the time comes, they will be invited to raise horses, and few people are willing to raise cattle.

Of course, these are all later words, and it will take a long time to change people's living habits, and the most important thing now is to reorganize the army and establish the army of vassal states.

How many legions should be formed in the countries of the Western Regions?

If calculated according to the proportion of the population, whether it is according to the population ratio of Dongying, Korea and Ryukyu in the east, or according to the population ratio of Siam, Donghu and Annam in the South Seas, they can recruit 20,000 or 30,000 people at most with such a small population.

However, the number of armies in the countries of the Western Regions is far more than that, and they are now all soldiers, and they can pull out 100,000 or even 200,000 or even 200,000 troops at will.

If calculated according to the actual number, the total number of troops in the four countries of the Western Regions, Yuejibe, Kazakh, Khalkha, and Yarkand is at least five or six hundred thousand, how many legions is appropriate for so many men and horses to be reorganized?

Sun Yuanhua finally proposed that if he wanted to change, he would start from now on, simply, no matter what month he did, Kazakh, Khalkha, and Yarkand, only one Western Regions Army would be formed, and all the other redundant men and horses would be disbanded for him!

This proposal is indeed very good, but it is a little difficult to implement, and the two small countries of Khalkha and Yarkand may not oppose it much, because they do not have many troops in the first place, and it is very likely that the Kazakhs will be a little reluctant because their original army is more than 200,000.

However, since they have surrendered to the Ming Dynasty, they can't help it, and what is most beneficial to the Ming Dynasty is naturally how to come.

Zhu Cijiong thought about it for a while, then accepted Sun Yuanhua's suggestion, and formed a Western Regions army to subdue them at one time.

It is a bit difficult for this legion to be formed, it must have a competent general, and it must also cooperate with the Ming army, and the army will be overwhelmed, so that they will obediently dismiss the army.

Regarding the candidates for the main general of the Western Regions Legion, Sun Yuanhua provided a lot, such as Huang Degong, Sun Zushou, Heiyunlong, Ma Dengyun, etc., these are all veteran generals of the Ming Army, and they have all served as chief soldiers, and there is no problem with their qualifications.

If you want Zhu Cijiong to be elected, it is natural to choose Huang Degong, because he knows that when he wiped out the descendants of the founding fathers, the Jiangnan Shidafu Group and the corrupt officials of the Donglin Party in Jinling, he made great contributions, and his loyalty is not to be said.

Originally, Zhu Cijiong should have been promoted a long time ago as a general he knew, but he had been staying in Fengyang, too far away from the capital, and Zhu Cijiong was also busy, so he forgot about him!

Fortunately, this time Sun Yuanhua included him in the list of candidate generals, and he didn't have to say anything, just him.

Regarding the staffing of the Western Regions Army, Zhu Cijiong decided to recruit 40,000 each in Jibei and Kazakhstan in the month, and 10,000 in Khalkha and Yarkand, all of which were cavalry, and all the generals above the division level were transferred from the regular corps of the Ming army.

Immediately afterwards, Zhu Cijiong began to promulgate a decree that Huang Degong should come to Jiayuguan to give lectures, and ordered Sun Chuanting and Hou Shilu to send three legions into Yuejibi, and two legions to enter Kazakhstan, and cooperate with Huang Degong to reorganize the armies of these two vassal states first.

As for Khalkha and Yarkand, they were directly ordered to choose 10,000 elite horsemen each to go outside the Hami Acropolis to listen to the order, and the rest of the army was all disbanded, if they were not obedient, the consequences would be what they thought!