Feng Yunshan did not stay long at the Mid-Autumn Festival banquet in the Baiguan Palace, and after saying a few words of encouragement to the Baiguan, he turned around and left, and came to the side hall next to the Taiping Temple not far from the side to rest.

Not long after, Vice Premier Zeng Guanlan, Minister of the Navy Luo Xuan, Chief of General Staff Zuo Zongtang, Minister of Foreign Affairs Wu Ruxiao, Director of the Special Service Department Fan Ruzeng, Vice Minister of Communications Cheng Hengsheng and others came to the palace and saluted Feng Yunshan.

Feng Yunshan waved his hand and said, "All Aiqing should be flat." I have summoned you, firstly, to discuss how to take care of these territories conquered from the west, and secondly, the ministers of the court impeached King Yi, saying that King Yi plundered his troops, which is not very consistent with the benevolent and righteous division of our Chinese people since ancient times, and is not conducive to the external reputation of our Chinese Empire. Let's talk about it. ”

Luo Xuan jumped out first, and said with some anger: "Your Majesty, which sour Confucian in the court said that the righteous king is not?" Let Weichen know, if you don't want to fight this skin, you have to beat him up! It just doesn't make sense! Now he has led the army of the Western Expedition to attack Tsarist Russia, exporting evil qi for our Chinese Empire, and it has been a succession of victories, greatly expanding the territory of our Chinese Empire, and making immortal achievements. There is even an eyeless corrupt minister impeaching the righteous king, which is simply chilling, and makes the entire Western Expedition soldiers disappointed in the imperial court!

Your Majesty, Weichen suggested that all the ministers who impeached the righteous king should be punished, and they should be sent to the western frontier where the conditions were difficult, and even to the front-line battlefield, to see how they would deal with it. Wei Chen didn't believe it, they could use their Confucian and Mencian ways to make those vicious Russian soldiers and Russian foreigners bow down obediently!

It just doesn't make sense! Weichen agrees with King Yi's approach, for those blindless foreigners, he wants to slaughter the troops, kill the prestige of my Chinese empire, and make those foreigners afraid! Only force can make them submit, and only cannons and muskets can open up territory for our Chinese Empire! ”

Zuo Zongtang, chief of the general staff, also echoed: "What King Xinzhong said is right! Your Majesty, you can't let those ministers who don't understand military affairs point fingers, and they are also pointing fingers at the distant army of the Western Expedition and the King of Righteousness! To deal with Western foreigners, we should adopt some iron-blooded and ruthless means. We should support the righteous king, otherwise the soldiers will be afraid in the future, how can we have the courage to overcome everything?

Moreover, the righteous king may have considered the problem more far-reaching, and planned in advance for the future governance of the frontier and the governance of these newly occupied territories.

Returning to the first question that His Majesty said just now, the large new territories occupied by the Western Expeditionary Army, if we want to truly govern and develop these territories, we must rely on our own Chinese people. And in this way, we have to think about migrating from the local area in advance, and if we don't drive the locals out, how can we migrate in large numbers? If there are fewer immigrants, they will not be able to control it, and if there are more immigrants, they will definitely have conflicts with the locals, and eventually they will cause chaos. Therefore, it is better to clean up the locals of these territories from the beginning, not only to obtain a large amount of war supplies, but also to clear the living space for large-scale immigration in advance. It can be said that killing two birds with one stone, therefore, Your Majesty, Weichen believes that the righteous king not only cannot be impeached, but has a great merit! You have to ask for credit for the righteous king! ”

Zeng Guanlan, vice premier of the cabinet, also nodded and said, "Yes, Your Majesty!" The Western Expeditionary Army captured a large area of the country, increasing the territory of the Chinese Empire by more than half, and it was difficult to achieve such a vast territory without more than ten years or even decades of time to integrate if you wanted to really own it. A large number of immigrants are needed to settle in the local area, and be stationed in the government and the army. The number of men and wealth required would be unimaginable, so although arson would damage the reputation of the Chinese Empire, on the other hand, it would also make those foreigners fearful and afraid to invade easily.

Although the practice of King Yi's western expedition to the west violates the name of benevolence and righteousness of my Han family's sons, it can bring tangible benefits to our Chinese Empire: it facilitates immigration, accumulates wealth, and deters those coerced servants, and attracts those coerced soldiers, so that they can serve our Chinese Empire even more desperately. ”

Cheng Hengsheng, vice minister of the Ministry of Communications, did not dare to evaluate the righteous king Shi Dakai because of his relatively low official position, but made suggestions on how to govern the newly occupied territory proposed by Feng Yunshan: "Your Majesty, Weichen thinks that in order to better govern these newly occupied territories, it is not practical to rely on immigrants and garrisons alone. Because the area is too vast, the reason why our Chinese Empire was able to capture it was not only that our army had more advanced weapons and troops than the Tsarist Russian army, but also that the Tsarist Russia's original rule over these places was not stable enough!

But now that we have occupied it, this problem will be transferred to our Chinese Empire, and it will be difficult for us to manage such a territory. Let's take immigration as an example, how many people should be moved in such a vast territory? This immigration work is very costly, and now we have not even thoroughly governed the territory of the Chinese Empire that we occupied before, and there are no more people to develop and utilize, let alone this distant western frontier. After all, the same investment, the same number of immigrants, in the South Seas, or in the recently occupied Australia, or even in North America west of the Mississippi River, is much stronger than Siberia!

Therefore, Your Majesty, Wei Chen dared to suggest that it is better to occupy this piece of land in the western frontier first, and only resettle the most border areas and places with superior conditions suitable for development, mainly for military purposes. In this way, the best results can be achieved at the least cost.

In addition, Wechen suggested that a great deal of effort should be made to build a railway, so that no matter what happens, troops can be quickly transported to the local area by rail, so that this place can be completely turned into the territory of our Chinese Empire. Although the investment will be larger, it is the safest long-term solution! ”

Feng Yunshan nodded. Among these people's suggestions, he was actually the most satisfied with Cheng Hengsheng's suggestions.

Although Luo Gang's words are reasonable, they are only for the righteous king Shi Da. Zuo Zongtang and Zeng Guanlan also have similar meanings, Feng Yunshan naturally understands this truth, he has never blamed or complained about Shi Dakai. As the so-called general is outside, the king's order is not subject to it, not to mention that he has no orders. Moreover, since Shi Dakai was allowed to preside over the war of the Western Expeditionary Army, he had full confidence in him, and those civil officials who surrendered from the Manchu Qing Dynasty never took Shi Dakai's impeachment to heart.

But more, Feng Yunshan still wants to straighten out and govern these vast and vast lands that have suddenly become more than one of a sudden. Immigration is certain, but after all these years of immigration, the inland Central Plains of the Chinese Empire has become a bit "vast and sparsely populated".

The Chinese Empire, to be precise, began with the Taiping Holy Kingdom, successively occupied Taiwan and Qiongzhou Island, immigrated to these places, and later, occupied the Ryukyus, Korea, most of Japan, Vietnam and Nanzhang, Luzon and the East Indies Islands, and even the entire South Sea, as well as the Outer Northeast and the huge territory of Siberia in the west and northern Xinjiang, and even the New Mexico Province of Mexico in the north, the Hexi Kingdom west of the Mississippi River in North America, Ceylon Island and parts of India, and even the whole of Australia, so many territoriesMore than 15 million people have emigrated.

Although these 10 million people accounted for only one-thirtieth of the 430 million people in the original Chinese Empire, it was difficult and expensive to implement, and it became more and more difficult to implement. After all, not many people are willing to leave their hometowns to go out to break through, especially now that the policies and development of the Chinese Empire are getting better and better, even the poorest peasants, as long as they work hard, can support themselves, these easily satisfied peasants have food and wine and are unwilling to leave their hometowns where they have lived for generations, so more and more people are unwilling to leave their hometowns to immigrate to new places. It will be difficult to mobilize new immigrants.

Feng Yunshan is reluctant to forcibly emigrate, in this way, although it is beneficial to the overall situation of the whole country, but for the individual people who have been immigrated, they are extremely dissatisfied and even think that it is a disaster. Active immigration, the money of this subsidy, must be very generous to make people tempted, which must cost more.

As a result, mere immigration is no longer enough to solve the fundamental problem of governance of the newly occupied territory.