Many people who know the history of the Ming Dynasty in later generations will have a question, why did such a powerful dynasty suddenly destroy the country because of a few peasant rebel armies that suddenly rose up and the braided clan in the northeast?

You must know that even the Southern Song Dynasty, which was regarded by later generations as the weakest military force among many Central Plains dynasties, resisted the Mongolian army for more than 60 years, but the Ming Dynasty fell apart in just over ten years and fell into the hands of foreigners. Pen @ fun @ pavilion wWw. ｂｉｑUｇE。 Moreover, in terms of combat effectiveness, the Mongolian cavalry that swept the world and swept across the Eurasian continent at that time was much sharper than the pigtail clan between the white mountains and black waters, which was really confusing.

In this regard, some people attribute it to external factors, such as climate change, the sudden arrival of the Xiaoice River period led to a sharp decline in crops, the displacement of people, and only rebellion. Another example is the serious annexation of land, which makes the court lose the support of the people, and finally there is no local force willing to serve the country.

Some people also summarized the internal causes, such as a series of wrong decisions by the last few monarchs, as well as the continuous party and government in the DPRK and China, and serious internal friction. But all of this still doesn't seem to fully explain the previous problem.

At least Yang Zhen felt that these were not the direct reasons why the Ming Dynasty was destroyed. Originally, he still had some doubts, but after learning about the Xuanfu incident and focusing on asking people to track down the situation in the Northland Army, a conclusion had been formed in his heart - the Ming Dynasty couldn't even destroy the rebel army composed of a few mud legs, and even the tens of thousands of pigtailed troops that had just emerged from the mountains and forests couldn't resist it.

In fact, the military strength of the Ming Dynasty at the beginning of the founding of the country was quite strong, not only able to stand out from the Central Plains several righteous armies and finally win the world, but also in the Chengzu Emperor went deep into the grassland, and directly killed the previously invincible Mongolian people split and fled. You must know that at this time, their opponent is no longer the Mongolian nobles who were hollowed out by wine when they were still in the Central Plains, but the Mongolian warriors who have regained their savage and vitality.

But such a powerful army, after two hundred years, or even one hundred and fifty years, has become extremely weak and deceitful. During the Zhengde Jiajing Dynasty, some of the Japanese who came from the sea killed the people of the southeastern provinces, and finally they could only be exterminated by relying on the lessons of several years of life; Later, the border troubles in the north and northeast continued to appear, stimulating the spirit of the Manchu monarchs and ministers.

All this, of course, is due to the fact that the imperial court emphasized literature and light military force after the Tumubao Change, but what really led to all this was that the generals of the border army only blindly pursued interests and did not think about training the army to serve the country. The border army, at this time, has long become a bargaining chip for those generals who hold military power to accumulate wealth.

If you really want to talk about it, the root of all this lies in the military system of the Ming Dynasty. When Emperor Taizu established the Wei system, it was for the sake of stability, just like a series of other edicts issued by him as emperor, all of which restricted the changes of the whole world. The identity division of artisan households, military households, and civilian households makes it possible for the descendants of a certain type of people to only live in this circle, but there is no possibility of jumping out.

In contrast, the children and grandchildren of artisan and private households are slightly more flexible, and they can at least change themselves through the imperial examination, but the military households, a group of people who exist in the more rigid army, can hardly see the slightest possibility of change. Your grandfather is a captain, and as long as he doesn't make any mistakes and doesn't make any contributions, when he comes to your grandson's generation, he will still be a captain.

In the same way, the children and grandchildren of generals will always be generals who lead troops. In this way, the Jiangmen family at the border also appeared. Although in terms of reputation, they are not as good as the local imperial examination families, but in terms of benefits, they are actually much higher than those big families.

For hundreds of years and several generations of operation, these generals have great power in the border army. In order to develop and consolidate their own power, they had to buy the cronies around them, so they nominally belonged to the imperial court, but in fact, there were a large number of private soldiers who obeyed these border generals. These private soldiers are far better than ordinary soldiers in terms of military salaries and other aspects, as for where do their extra income come from? Naturally, it was taken from the mouths of other guards and soldiers, and when they were unable to resist, they had to escape from the army and find another way to survive.

However, in the books of the imperial court's military department, these names are still there, and the imperial court still has to pay them various supplies such as military salaries every year, and these all fall into the pockets of local generals. As a result, the real number of troops in the border areas became smaller and smaller, but the expenditure of the imperial court did not decrease in any way, and only those greedy generals were cheaper.

When a strong enemy really appeared, in order to preserve their strength, these generals often led their troops to stop the war after only a little appearance, just like the performance of the major warlords after the Japanese invaded the Central Plains in later generations.

This is the direct reason why the Ming Dynasty, which has an army of millions of troops, has been completely subverted in just over a dozen years. As for these generals, some of them surrendered to the enemy in order to survive, and the rest were broken one by one.

However, there are no eggs under the nest, and the final outcome of these people is very miserable......

In fact, what these generals are doing is not hidden, and those officials in power in the DPRK and China have also heard about it, as long as they are willing to investigate carefully, they will definitely be able to find out the evidence, so as to change all this before it is completely irreparable.

However, these high-ranking officials of the DPRK and China are afraid of this matter and are jealous.

There are two things they are worried about, one is that those generals have become a little bit of a climate, if they really attack them, what if they jump off the wall and lead people to the enemy or rebel? At that time, not to mention the loss of the imperial court, the responsibility alone will be enough to drink a pot of yourself.

The second is that, in fact, most of the border generals also have interests linked to the DPRK and Chinese officials. As Yang Zhen found out, the sons and nephews of some officials were sent to the border areas to gild the army, and then they could make further arrangements. In this way, they have completely become a community of interests, and who will harm themselves?

With the passage of time, this malaise of harming the public and private interests and at the same time hollowing out the strength of the border army has become more and more serious, and the entire army system has become a pool of stinky stagnant water, which looks like there is no problem, but as long as it is stirred, all kinds of things will completely emerge in front of the people.

It's just that in the original history, no one in the Ming Dynasty had the ability and courage to stir up this pool of stagnant water until the final moment came......

But now, the situation is obviously different, because of the appearance of Yang Zhen!

After learning some of the reasons from Zhong Yu's mouth, Yang Zhen had already made up his mind to completely stir up this still stagnant water. Even if it would create many enemies, he was fearless. Moreover, he didn't think that those people could really threaten him, the Governor of the Brocade Guard.

However, before doing this, he still has to make some preparations, at least to have enough empirical evidence, so that the emperor who is in the palace can believe his hard work.

Fortunately, what Jin Yiwei is best at is this, Yang Dudu said a word, and the spies hidden in the major yamen, and even in the border army, they quickly moved, but in six or seven days, he had obtained a lot of information in this regard, which made Yang Zhen know that the time was ripe.

Ouchi of the Imperial Palace.

There are still a lot of notes piled up on the imperial case in front of him, waiting for his approval, but when he is restless, Zi Wanli really can't calm down to deal with these trivial matters.

Today, it has been eight days since the 800-mile rush from Xuanfu, but except for the decision to send some soldiers and horses from nearby prefectures and counties to support, the imperial court has not come up with a decent charter. What made him even more irritable was that at today's court meeting, the ministers were still silent about this matter, and they had to name themselves before they said a few words, and these words were useless empty words.

These courtiers are all at this time, and they are still looking ahead, for fear that their future will be affected because they say the wrong thing. These guys are still not my Ming officials, why aren't any of them willing to share my worries?

Thinking of this, Wanli's face became more and more gloomy, which made the waiters waiting next to him even dare not take a breath of air, for fear of angering the Son of Heaven and suffering an unwarranted disaster. You know, even a few days ago, even a person like Sun Hai and Sun Gonggong, who was deeply favored by His Majesty, almost received the court staff because of a trivial matter.

Just as they were thinking of Sun Hai, they saw him carefully open the door of the temple and walk in, and when he came to the Son of Heaven, he whispered, "Your Majesty ......"

"Huh?" Wanli was thinking about what was on his mind, and when he heard the greeting, he subconsciously responded, and when he raised his eyes and saw that it was Sun Hai, his expression was slow: "What's the matter?" Two days ago, because he was irritable, he reprimanded Sun Hai and almost let him go to the court to receive the cane, which made the emperor feel a little sorry for him.

Sun Hai saw that the color of the Son of Heaven was gentle, and he was relieved of most of his heart, and he really clamped his tail and behaved in the past two days, and he didn't dare to be the slightest presumptuous. However, someone came to report just now that Yang Zhen was asking to see him outside the palace, so he naturally didn't want to help him come to report: "Your Majesty, Yang Dudu asked to see him outside the palace, saying that he had something important to do." ”

"Huh? Yang Qing, he has something important to do? Wanli was stunned for a moment, and then remembered something: "Yes, he hasn't been in the palace for several days, and I am looking for him." Go, pronounce him in and speak. ”

Sun Hai hurriedly agreed and withdrew.

After a while, Yang Zhen walked into the hall under his guidance, and after performing the courtesy of the monarch and ministers, Wanli said with some emotion: "Yang Qing, you have been seeing me for some time recently, but what are you busy with?" ”

"Back to Your Majesty, the minister was uneasy because he learned about the war in the north, so he has been investigating relevant matters for many days, and today he finally has some eyebrows, and he is here to pay tribute to Your Majesty!" Yang Zhen said immediately.