When Cao Yue left Datong and returned to Beijing to take up his post and prepare to marry Zhu Yujiao, he asked several down-and-out European nobles under Constance to return to Europa and recruit young men who were willing to come to the East to make a living as mercenaries.

The two hundred mercenaries led by Constant, although they were outstanding, were few in number after all, and they did not play a huge role in several wars. Constantin was so annoyed by this that he even offered to lower his honorarium. However, Cao Yue discovered the value of Western mercenaries in contact with Justin and other foreigners, and came up with the idea of further expanding the scale of mercenaries. After several discussions with Constine, a decision was finally made to recruit more mercenaries and form a powerful army of foreigners.

Many of Constin's men with a certain background went to Europe to recruit more people who wanted to sell their lives for wealth according to Cao Yue's order to fight for the Ming Dynasty.

A year later, these people finally returned, and to Cao Yue's surprise, through the instigation of these people under Constin, more than 20,000 Westerners followed them to the East and wanted to join the foreign mercenary team of the Ming Dynasty. Cao Yue was of course overjoyed to see that there were so many new troops all at once, and he did not refuse to let these foreigners join the army under his control, and almost all of them accepted them.

Cao Yue asked Justin to be responsible for the daily management and training of these people, he did not interfere in the management and training inside, but he asked Constant, that is, he must manage these people well, and there must be no mistakes. After the training is completed, it will be divided into battalions and equipped in each army. As long as these people obey the management and dispatch, he will give them high salaries and rewards.

In his long contact with Cao Yue, Justin was full of admiration for this young high-ranking official of the Ming Dynasty, and he felt that following Cao Yue would achieve great success and make every soldier earn a lot of money. Cao Yue is a man of integrity, and he is a person who has achieved great things, and for these desperate people in Europe, they can obtain a decent status in the East. Good income, meet a very honest and promising employer, they have been very satisfied. He also patted his chest and promised Cao Yue that he would definitely manage the 20,000 newly recruited Europeans and train them into good soldiers to fight for the Ming Dynasty.

Cao Yue assured Justin in front of everyone that as long as they fought bloodily for the Ming Dynasty, he would give the mercenaries the highest treatment.

Cao Yue not only sent people to recruit more mercenaries,

John Tang, Riccius, Julius, Wei Kuangguo, Nan Huairen, Luo Yagu, Bi Fangji, Pan Guoguang, etc., are already in China, or admire the Chinese language. People who wanted to visit the East were all recruited by Cao Yue. After these people came to Nanjing, Cao Yue gave them generous treatment, wanting them to be used by the Ming Dynasty and contribute what they learned to China.

At the end of the Ming Dynasty, although China's development of science and technology and productive forces did not lag behind Europe by a large margin, the West had surpassed China in many aspects, especially in the military industry. The division uses long skills to control the country. Cao Yue, a traveler from later generations, understands very well the importance of learning from each other's strengths. He hoped that with the efforts of these Chinese scientists he had recruited, the Ming Dynasty's firearms manufacturing would develop by leaps and bounds, and he also hoped to use relatively advanced European science and technology. The scientific and technological level of the Ming Dynasty has been greatly improved, especially in military manufacturing.

Cao Yue hoped that he would be able to produce more advanced, more useful, and more powerful artillery, muskets, explosives, and other weapons in the shortest possible time, and that he would be far ahead of the Liukou and Jiannu in terms of weaponry.

Strict training of the army can greatly improve the overall quality of an army. If it is equipped with advanced weapons, the combat effectiveness of this army will be further improved, and it will be able to fight against the Liukou and Jiannu. It can achieve an overwhelming advantage. Cao Yue didn't want to pay attention to any benevolence and righteousness with his enemies, he just hoped to use advanced weapons to slaughter the enemy, and exchange the greatest victory at the smallest cost.

If he can defeat him with muskets and artillery, he will never use a bow and arrow, and war does not need to be reciprocal, as long as victory is achieved.

Cao Yue handed over most of the affairs of the court to Sun Chuanting and other officials, and he did not interfere too much, but he did not allow others to interfere too much in the affairs of the army, even Sun Chuanting. He believes that power comes out of the barrel of a gun, and as long as he controls the army, he is the person with the most right to speak in the world. The literati rebelled, and they didn't succeed in ten years, and the Wenchen, who didn't have a gun in his hand, couldn't make a big deal out of them even if they tossed around, as long as he had the military power of the Ming Dynasty in his hands.

Years later, Cao Yue also carried out a major military reform, and he announced the order to form a new army of the Ming Guards by order of the Grand Governor.

On the basis of the Nanjing New Army, 10 Guards Divisions were formed, each division had jurisdiction over three battalions of combat units and one battalion of auxiliary troops, each battalion had 5,000 men, one division was 20,000 people, and the 10 Guards Divisions had a total of 200,000 people. These 200,000 people, including the people recruited before and after, as well as the sergeants who were good in all aspects after the reorganization of Liu Zeqing, Huang Degong, Liu Liangzuo, and Gao Jie in the four towns of Jiangbei. All the men and horses reorganized were mixed into the Southern New Army, and in this military reform, they were divided into various guard divisions.

The chief officers and generals of all the guards divisions were personally appointed by him, and the important deputy posts were also personally selected by him. Some people who did not belong to his cronies, as long as they had a reputation in history, Cao Yue would give them the opportunity to take important positions in the new army and slowly cultivate and transform.

Cao Yue's military thinking is very different from that of other generals, and he has led the Ming army to change to the mode of hot weapon combat, and cold weapons such as bows and arrows have been placed in the position of generals. The 1st to 5th Guards Divisions were all based on the musket battalion. Two musket battalions plus a cavalry battalion, and the auxiliary units included artillery, pikemen and other auxiliaries. The 6th to 10th Guards Divisions, because the manufacture of muskets could not meet the needs of the army, could only be equipped with one musket battalion, not artillery, and the others were archers, pikemen and cavalry.

The muskets equipped by the ten guards divisions were produced by all the musket factories and Nanjing Arsenal in Nanjing during this period, and Cao Yue purchased them through outsourcing. This also includes a number of old-fashioned firecrackers. There was no way, the lack of production capacity constrained the army's redress, and Cao Yue had more than enough strength to replace all 200,000 troops with muskets and artillery.

The problem of money and silver also plagued Cao Yue, although Gao Hongtu, the head of the household department, had to obey his orders for various reasons, and worked very hard to solve many major problems for Cao Yue, but the lack of income of the imperial court made him have the confusion that it was difficult for a good woman to cook without rice. Fortunately, the Cao family's industry has a certain scale, and the Cao family's livelihood in Nanjing can provide a lot of money and silver every year, and also lead some industrial trade related to the national economy and people's livelihood, and the manufacture of firearms and muskets is completely controlled by Cao Yue himself, and everything can barely be supported.

Cao Yue is also trying to find a way to let the Cao family unite with those famous business giants in Jiangnan to make their lives bigger, and strive to make the Cao family a business giant at the national level and bring him more wealth.

In order to boost morale, improve his prestige, and further grasp the military and political power, Cao Yue was also intensively preparing for the Northern Expedition while carrying out military reform. It is necessary to boost the morale of the military and the people in the south, improve their prestige in the government and the opposition, and personally lead the new army of the Ming Guards to win a few battles! (To be continued.) )