How many regular legions can the Ming Dynasty expand now? In fact, this is not to see how much money Daming has now, nor how much Zhu Cijiong wants to expand, but mainly determined by the reserves and production speed of weapons and equipment.

Zhu Cijiong wanted to expand ten legions at a time, press them up, overturn all the tile spurs and Tsarist Russia, and then call it a day and let some of them go back to continue Tuntian.

However, the expansion of the army is not just about recruiting people, forming a regular army, which must be equipped with muskets, artillery, war horses, telegraphs, etc., without these things, it will be no different from a reserve army.

Zhu Cijiong didn't know much about the number of reserves of these things or the production speed, so he had to find someone to ask, and it just so happened that he had to find someone to discuss the specific strategy of the Western Regions, so he simply combined the two things into one and recruited all the relevant personnel at once.

said that it was all the relevant personnel, but in fact, he could not recruit much, because almost all the senior generals went to the front line, and only Qin Liangyu and Shi Kefa remained near the capital, and the civil officials were basically there, but it was useless to shout more!

In the end, Zhu Cijiong simply only invited Qin Liangyu, Bi Maokang, Sun Yuanhua, Cheng Guoxiang, Shi Kefa and Wang Zhengnan to discuss, there were only six people in total, and he didn't even need to go to the special conference room, just hold a meeting in his study.

Except for Shi Kefa, who was a little farther away, everyone else was in the capital, and the next morning, the six of them gathered in Zhu Cijiong's private study and began to discuss the strategy of the Western Regions.

Zhu Cijiong first gave a general introduction to the current situation, and then said categorically: "This time, it is obvious that the anti-Habsburg alliance is behind the ghost, trying to drag down or even drag down the Ming Dynasty, so as to gain time for development and catch up with the Ming Dynasty in an all-round way." And in order to catch up with the super-Ming, they must expand the colonies, otherwise the economy and resources will not be able to catch up. Therefore, we must end the war on two or three fronts as soon as possible, and free up our hands to curb their next expansion. “

The previous words can be understood by everyone here, and now the gap between the European continental powers and the Ming Dynasty in terms of military industry is not very large, and the two sides are mainly fighting for economy and resources.

Now, the vastness of the territory of the Ming Dynasty is simply incomparable to the European powers, whether it is fighting for economy or resources, they are not opponents.

Then, they can only catch up with the Ming Dynasty by expanding externally, frantically grabbing colonies, and frantically plundering resources.

But the last sentence to end the war on the two or three fronts as soon as possible is a little incomprehensible, the situation of the third line is clear to everyone, except for South Asia, there is still a little hope to solve it in the short term, the other two lines, no matter how you look at it, will not be able to solve it for a while and a half, because the Ming Dynasty has no troops to send!

Of course, Zhu Cijiong knew the crux of the problem, and he continued: "Now, the crux of the problem is that we don't have more troops to fight on two fronts, so I have decided to continue to expand the army, as much as we can!" “

Still expanding the army? Now the regular army and reserve army of the Ming Dynasty have all reached a terrifying 2.6 million, except for the early days of the Dynasty, when did the Ming Dynasty gather so many people, even in the early days of the Dynasty, it didn't last long to disperse most of the men and horses to Tuntian, because the national strength of the Ming Dynasty simply could not support so many troops.

Now Daming's tax revenue can't afford to support so many troops, Cheng Guoxiang knows this best, most of the military spending in recent years has been transferred from the Daming Royal Rixing Bank, which is the emperor's own money, not Daming's tax income!

He didn't know how much money the royal family could make in a year, so he had been worried that if the royal family couldn't make ends meet, it would be troublesome, you must know that it was a hole of tens of millions of taels a year.

At this time, when he heard that the emperor was going to expand the army, he immediately couldn't help but dissuade him: "Your Majesty, please forgive Weichen for being rude, I'm afraid this military budget will be difficult to maintain." “

Zhu Cijiong raised his hand and said arrogantly: "Zhong Ruo doesn't have to worry, even if he expands the army by a million, he can raise it!" “

When everyone heard this, they all showed admiration, all dynasties, only the state supported the royal family, and the royal family had not been obedient to make money to supplement the treasury, and now the Ming army needs how much military spending a year They can roughly estimate that it is not far from ten, that is at least hundreds of millions of taels, how much money does the emperor have to paste in a year!

It really doesn't matter how much money is pasted in, Zhu Cijiong really doesn't care, because this era is an era of the jungle, the stronger the army, the more colonies will be plundered, and the more colonies there are, the more profits will be obtained, so that sooner or later the money spent will be earned.

If you don't have a strong army, no matter how much money you have, you will be robbed of it when the time comes.

The Manchu Qing Dynasty is a good example, before and after being robbed of more than a billion taels of silver by the foreign powers, if this silver is used to expand the army, try to ask the world at that time, who is the opponent!

Thinking of this, Zhu Cijiong said categorically again: "Don't consider other issues for the time being, now, the Ming Dynasty must expand its army and suppress the great powers, otherwise, disaster will not be far away." Meng Hou, how many troops can be equipped with muskets and artillery in the current inventory of the Ministry of Industry? “

When Bi Maokang heard this, he roughly estimated it, and immediately said: "If you go back to the emperor, if it is a third-class legion, it can probably equip 150,000 people." “

It's only 150,000, which seems to be a bit small, but it can't manage so much, Zhu Cijiong nodded and said: "Well, immediately order all relevant factories to work overtime, and within half a month, I want the weapons and equipment of two third-class legions." “

When Bi Maokang heard this, he hurriedly bowed his hand again and said, "Weichen understands. “

Zhu Cijiong nodded, pointed to the map of the Western Regions on the conference table and continued: "I have decided to use the tile spur as a breakthrough to break through the passage of the Western Regions, directly repair the railway from Hamiwei to the Ob River Valley, and attack Tsarist Russia from the east and south, and take the whole of Siberia in one fell swoop!" “

When everyone heard this, their eyes lit up, the breakthrough point of the tile spur is indeed good, if the railway can be built to the Ob River valley, Tsarist Russia will definitely be defeated.

However, the strength seemed to be a little insufficient, and Qin Liangyu couldn't help but remind: "Your Majesty, all the countries in the Western Regions are the remnants of the Mengyuan Dynasty, if they unite, I'm afraid the 500,000 army will be more than lucky!" “

Zhu Cijiong nodded and sighed: "Yes, this has to be guarded against, come to Xian, how is the relationship between the countries in the Western Regions investigated?" “

Wang Zhengnan hurriedly arched his hand and said: "Back to the emperor, according to investigation, the Yarkand Khanate has the worst relationship with the Wathorn, because they are the descendants of the Eastern Chagatai Khanate that was destroyed by the Wathorn; There have also been clashes between Khalkha and Watts, but there has been little friction in recent years; The Kazakh Khanate was relatively close to Tsarist Russia, and there were also conflicts with the Vaspur tribe; As for Yue Jifaree, it seems that they rarely look north, and they are mainly fighting with the Persian Safavid Empire. “

The reason why Zhu Cijiong understands the relationship between the countries in the Western Regions is that he wants to pull a group to fight a group first, because the strength of the Ming army is indeed not enough now, and if he starts a war with the five countries in the Western Regions at the same time, he will definitely lose more than win.

Judging from the news found by Jinyiwei, the Yarkand Khanate should not help the Tile, and the Kazakh Khanate is now said by Tsarist Russia to use the joint Tile-spur to attack the Ming Dynasty, so there is no need to think about it, it must be fought.

The rest of the Khalkha and monthly levels are difficult to say, what to do? It's still not enough to fight together!