In early November, the Forbidden City, the East Warm Pavilion of the Qianqing Palace.

"Your Majesty, this is the minister's new army training plan, please take a look at it." Li Hongyu handed the piece in his hand to an attendant, and then bowed to the side.

"Sit down." Emperor Wanli bowed slightly to Li Hongyu, motioned for him to sit down on the round bench beside him, and then picked up Li Hongyu's recital and read it carefully, nodding his head from time to time, seemingly very satisfied with Li Hongyu's idea of a new army.

In Li Hongyu's new army training plan, there are not only new settings for the establishment of the new army, military ranks, military uniforms, etc., which are refreshing to the Wanli Emperor, but also have a detailed introduction to logistics, and it is obvious that Li Hongyu attaches great importance to logistics.

Li Hongyu sat there quietly, secretly observing Emperor Wanli's face, judging from the performance of Emperor Wanli, he was very satisfied with his new army training plan, which was completely within his expectations, the Ming army's guard system was too backward, and it was the culprit of the low combat effectiveness of the Ming army.

However, Li Hongyu's new army training plan needs sufficient military spending as support, which is why Li Hongyu set the number of troops in the Western Expedition at 20,000.

According to Li Hongyu's conception, the soldiers of the new army are divided into three categories, namely, officers, non-commissioned officers, and soldiers, among which non-commissioned officers are also soldiers, and they are the best among soldiers, that is, the so-called "soldier heads", who assist officers in handling daily affairs.

Unlike soldiers, according to Li Hongyu's setup, non-commissioned officers are professional soldiers like officers, while soldiers are semi-professional soldiers.

The reason why there is a division between professional soldiers and semi-professional soldiers is because it is related to military salaries, professional soldiers have high military salaries, which are enough to support a family of three, while semi-professional soldiers have low military salaries and can only take care of their own food.

Since the new army is an iron-clad battalion, Li Hongyu has also set a maximum age limit for officers and non-commissioned officers at all levels, and once they reach the age limit and cannot be promoted, they will have to retire.

The term of service of a soldier is five years, after which he will leave the army if he cannot be promoted to a non-commissioned officer or officer.

In this way, the new army will be replenished with a batch of fresh blood every year, so that the army will maintain sufficient vitality and vigorous fighting spirit.

"I've got this piece ready, so let's go ahead and prepare." After reading Li Hongyu's recital, Emperor Wanli looked at Li Hongyu and said with a smile, "It seems that I am going to give you an errand, so that you can legitimately organize a new army and form a sailor." ”

"Thank you for your grace." Li Hongyu was overjoyed when he heard this, and hurriedly bowed down to thank him, he had been looking forward to this matter for a long time, as long as he got the approval of Emperor Wanli, then he would be able to take charge of the army.

"In this way, I will make you the training envoy of the new army and the governor of the naval division, so that you can defend and do these two things." Emperor Wanli pondered for a moment, then said with a smile, "I am optimistic about you, you can't let me down!" ”

"The emperor can rest assured, the ministers will not disappoint the emperor's high expectations!" When Li Hongyu heard this, he immediately stood up, bowed his hand to Emperor Wanli, and replied solemnly.

"By the way, I'm going to announce the matter of the Customs Department to the outside world, and you go to the military camp outside the city to hide these days." Emperor Wanli smiled when he heard this, then remembered something and opened his mouth to remind Li Hongyu.

"Obey the order!" Li Hongyu bowed down when he heard this, and replied solemnly, this matter is not something he can get involved in now, so the best choice is to avoid the limelight.

Two days later, Emperor Wanli summoned the officials of various ministries and courtyards to the Dongnuan Pavilion and asked the chamberlain to read out two holy decrees, which made the ministers on the scene shocked.

One holy decree was to establish a customs department yamen directly under the emperor, and the other was to organize a new army and form a naval division, each of which was unexpected by the officials of various ministries and courts, and all of them were related to Li Hongyu.

According to the appointment of Emperor Wanli, the secretary of the Customs Department, that is, the director of the customs department is Ma Ran Xingrang, the princess of Shouning's mansion, and the secretary of the customs is Li Hongyu.

At the same time, Li Hongyu also served as the governor of the Navy Division and the training envoy of the New Army.

Among them, the Customs Department is the yamen of the five products, the department is the five products, and the department is the same as the five products.

However, the Governor of the Navy and the Commander-in-Chief of the Forces nouvelles were not permanent positions, but were temporary assignments like the governors, so they had no ranks.

However, compared to those permanent positions, the non-graded dispatch positions have more power because they are usually royal positions

At this moment, as the protagonist of these two holy decrees, Li Hongyu had already gone to the military camp outside the city to supervise the training of the new army, and interestingly avoided this dispute in the court.

Li Hongyu has not long stepped into the official career, and he can be described as shallow in the court, so he is naturally not suitable to be involved in this incident and leave, all he can do is to wait and see what happens.

Besides, even if Li Hongyu wants to get involved in this matter, he has no qualifications, at most he will defend Emperor Wanli in the capacity of Hanlin, but in this way, he will undoubtedly offend the entire civil official group.

Therefore, the best choice for Li Hongyu is to keep his mouth shut, stay out of the matter, and wait for the turmoil to subside.

Sure enough, after the issuance of these two holy decrees of the Wanli Emperor, there was an uproar in the officialdom of the capital, and many officials expressed their opposition to the establishment of the Customs Department.

As for the new army and the navy, the officials of the imperial court did not show any resistance, after all, not long after the defeat of the Ming army at Sarhu, everyone realized that there was a problem with the current system of the Ming army, so it was not inappropriate to train the new army and set up a naval division, which belonged to strengthening the military strength of the Ming Dynasty.

Most importantly, the Wanli Emperor specified that the cost of training the new army and setting up the naval division would be paid for by the Inner Treasury, so that the officials of the imperial court would have no reason to object.

The reason why the Customs Department received completely different treatment from the new army and the sailors was naturally because it had to govern the overseas trade opened by the Wanli Emperor.

In the decree of the Wanli Emperor, the Customs Department will lead the trade and trade with overseas countries, and the customs duties collected by it will be included in the Tai Warehouse.

This meant that the Wanli Emperor decided to abolish the tributary trade, which had already existed in name only, and that tributary trade was more of a reward from the Ming Dynasty to vassal states that came from overseas to pay tribute.

Due to Emperor Hongwu's ban on the sea, the overseas trade of the Ming people has been banned, and the trade between the Ming Dynasty and overseas countries is the tributary trade led by the government: overseas vassal states sent envoys to the Ming Dynasty to pay tribute and bring goods to trade with the Ming Dynasty-related yamen.

The Ming Dynasty regarded itself as the superior kingdom of the Celestial Empire, so it gave great preferential treatment and care to those overseas vassal states who came to pay tribute thousands of miles away, and did not care about the gains and losses of interests when trading with them, and purchased the goods brought by the tributary envoys at a high price, and sold them the goods of the Ming Dynasty at a low price, so that they made a lot of money on a trip to the Ming Dynasty.

It is worth mentioning that since the overseas tributary envoy team landed, the clothing, food, housing and transportation of the entourage up and down the team were responsible for the relevant yamen of the Ming Dynasty, enjoying the VIP treatment, and the Ming Dynasty spent a lot of money on receiving overseas tributary missions every year.

Because of the tributary trade of the Ming Dynasty, the tributary vassal countries received rich benefits from the Ming Dynasty, so not only the overseas vassal states were happy to do so, and frequently sent tributary missions to the Ming Dynasty, but also some lawless people also saw huge business opportunities from it, pretending to be envoys from small overseas countries to the Ming Dynasty to fish in troubled waters.

Although the Ming Dynasty has a lot of land and resources, because of the low tax policy of Emperor Hongwu, the annual income of the household department is limited, where can it withstand such a toss from those overseas vassal states.

Moreover, the most active period of tributary trade in the Ming Dynasty was the era when Zheng He went to the West, and Zheng He's trip to the West had already cost a lot, coupled with the increasingly frequent tributary trade, which had a serious impact on the finances of the Ming Dynasty.

Zheng He's voyage to the West was a great feat in the history of Chinese navigation, which not only promoted national prestige but also strengthened ties with Western countries.

Of course, the Ming Dynasty spent a lot of money for this, paid a huge economic benefit, in addition to the huge fleet of expensive expenses, the fleet and the overseas countries along the way of the trade is also in accordance with the principle of buying high and selling low, in order to promote the Ming Emperor's imperial grace.

This is also why since the Yongle Emperor and the Xuande Emperor, the Ming Dynasty has never organized a fleet to go west, which is really the country's financial inability to support the huge expenses of the West.

Therefore, the Yongle Emperor made regulations on tributary trade, except for the Korean state, which was a dynasty every year, and the rest of the overseas vassal states were every few years, and stipulated the number of envoys and the size of the goods to be carried.

Due to the decreasing return from the Ming Dynasty, and the considerable risks at sea, those overseas vassal states gradually lost interest in paying tribute to the Ming Dynasty.

Especially after the rise of the Western Age of Discovery, the Westerners invaded the east by boat, and many countries in the South Seas were colonized by Westerners, so naturally they would not pay tribute to the Ming Dynasty.

Although the tributary trade of the Ming Dynasty has existed in name only in the late Ming Dynasty, the officials of the Ming Dynasty have always regarded themselves as the superior kingdom of the Celestial Empire, and regarded the tributary trade as a favor from the Ming Dynasty to overseas vassal states, and it was the ancestral system set by the Hongwu Emperor, which showed the identity and status of the upper kingdom of the Great Ming Dynasty, and naturally could not be easily given up.

In addition, smuggling was rampant along the southern coast of the Ming Dynasty, and some officials of the imperial court benefited a lot from it, so those officials who profited from smuggling at sea naturally added fuel to the fire and used various reasons to oppose the establishment of the Customs Department, otherwise once they opened overseas trade through the Customs Department, their interests would be greatly impacted.

Emperor Wanli has been dealing with these ministers in the court for almost 50 years, and naturally knows that there will definitely be many officials who will oppose it.

However, Emperor Wanli did not intend to ignore the opposition in the court, and really forced him to be anxious, so he kicked those noisy ministers out of the capital and sent them to remote areas as officials, out of sight and out of mind.

After all, the Wanli Emperor has been in charge of the Ming Dynasty for nearly 50 years, and he has been fighting with the courtiers for nearly 50 years.

What is little known is that in addition to the three major expeditions, the Ming Dynasty also had two wars of considerable scale, one was the Battle of Ping-Burma, and the other was the Hetao Change.

This is also why Li Hongyu is anxious to promote the new army, sailors and overseas trade when Emperor Wanli is alive, in addition to Emperor Wanli, both the Emperor of the Apocalypse and the Emperor Chongzhen are quite dependent on the courtiers because they are young emperors, even if they want to promote these three things, I am afraid they will be powerless.

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