The Great Song Dynasty raised one million soldiers, and an average of thirty or forty people had to raise one soldier, and among these thirty or forty people, if the old and weak who were unable to work were deducted, the proportion was even more alarmingly high, and redundant soldiers had become the most serious ill of the Great Song Dynasty, and the annual military expenditure accounted for more than two-thirds of the annual revenue.

Last year, due to the war, it reached an astonishing 80 million yuan, which is equivalent to the total tax revenue of the Ming Dynasty in the past 20 years.

With regard to the malpractice of redundant troops, since the beginning of the Renzong Dynasty, groups of ministers have successively written letters requesting the disarmament of the DPRK. It can be said that the call for disarmament has never stopped.

The Great Song Dynasty had three redundancies: redundant officials, redundant expenses, and redundant soldiers.

Compared with redundant soldiers, the drag of redundant officers and redundant expenses is much smaller. Moreover, after the restructuring of Yuanfeng, many yamen were abolished and merged, and the problem of redundant officials and redundant expenses has been greatly improved.

What is plaguing the Great Song Dynasty now is mainly the problem of redundant troops.

Luo Cheng once again proposed disarmament, which immediately set off a heated discussion in the court; Empress Shaosheng asked everyone to express their opinions, and Li Keshi, the commander of the front division of the palace, went out and played: "Your Majesty, Empress Shaosheng, I have to raise millions of soldiers in the court, it is really a last resort, there is no danger around Tokyo to defend, once the Khitan conquers the three passes, you can drive straight into Tokyo, and the troops will come to Tokyo; The Western Xia is even more of a henchman, repeatedly invaded Guanzhong, all of this, not to suppress heavy troops, not enough to deter the enemy's courage, disarmament has been discussed for a long time, but decades have not been resolved, all because of many concerns, for the safety of the community, for the continuation of the national ancestry, the minister thinks that disarmament should be cautious and cautious. ”

Li Keshi's words are tantamount to directly opposing disarmament, and the reasons he listed are indeed the places that the Great Song Dynasty needs to worry about.

Fan Chunren, the secretary of the Ministry of Rites, then went out to play: "Nowadays, many fields in the Great Song Dynasty are barren, cultivators are scarce, taxes are very heavy, and the state is very insufficient, because of too many soldiers; The court discussed this matter, and said that it was to guard against the Khitan, but the Khitan country was not as strong as before, and our dynasty did not need to raise a million troops to prepare; If the husband takes the army from the people, the people will be sparse, and if the people are sparse, the fields will be barren, and the fields will be barren, and the people will be separated if the service is heavy; In the past, Emperor Wu of the Han Dynasty raised troops to make the world poor, in order to conquer the Xiongnu desert north, and now my Great Song Dynasty does not need soldiers and raises millions of soldiers, which also makes the people of the world poor, why bother? ”

Fan Chunren is an upright person, and his support for disarmament is by no means in favor of reformists like Cai Jing, but he also believes that the malpractice of redundant troops has reached a time when it cannot be dealt with, otherwise no matter how much revenue the Great Song Dynasty has, it will not be enough to fill this bottomless pit.

Pan Rui, the deputy envoy of the Privy Council, came out of the class and said: "Your Majesty, Empress Shaosheng, the ministers think that if there are too many eliminations, the human feelings will inevitably be confused, and the soldiers will inevitably be resentful. If the edict is issued, all of them will be eliminated immediately, and if people with ulterior motives spread rumors and incite the people, lest there be a rebellion, the world will surely be shaken; At that time, in order to appease the army, the imperial court can only collect and return the eliminated, and the imperial court will lose its prestige because of this, and it will be difficult to order these arrogant soldiers in the future. If it is implemented strongly, it will be difficult for the public to commit grievances, and the Liang Dynasty will be divided into Wei Bo's troops and Zhang Yan's rebellion, which can be a lesson for the past. ”

Lin Xi, a member of the Zhongshu House, then went out and said: "For decades, except for the soldiers in the northwest, most of the soldiers have never heard of the golden drum and know the battle array, and they are full of food and clothing for nothing, and it is inevitable to breed arrogance and laziness; Now the soldiers who have entered the capital to guard the army, they do not take their armor and let others take it for them, prohibit the soldiers from distributing rations, and hire people to help them carry them without carrying them, so arrogant and lazy, how can they be expected to sweat and shed blood to protect their families and defend the country? It's just a waste of national use. ”

He Shikuan, the secretary of the Criminal Department, continued: "As soon as I was killed in the Great Song Dynasty, the officials of the prefecture and county measured the growth of the people by the scale, and the strong ones were recruited as forbidden soldiers, and the second less than the scale and slightly cowardly were recruited as box soldiers. Therefore, in the event of a fierce year, only some of the old and weak people left for farming remain. The court said that it was not to accept young and strong soldiers for fear of becoming thieves, but how did they know that recruiting as soldiers did not make them fall into the grass for a while, but it made them arrogant and empty the national currency for life; Since ancient times, it is the strong who are responsible for farming, and the old and weak enjoy leisure, but my Great Song Dynasty is just the opposite, now the strong people are recruited as soldiers and let them do nothing, and the old and weak have to be responsible for farming, it is simply unreasonable! ”

The controversy in the court can be said to be more and more intense, you sing and I will appear again, the problem of redundant soldiers has plagued the Great Song Dynasty for nearly a hundred years, and it has not been effectively resolved, and many people hate it.

He Shikuan mentioned one point, that is, the recruitment of young and strong soldiers in the year of famine is to prevent their rebellion, which should be said to be applicable in the early days of the founding of the country, and now that the Great Song Dynasty has stabilized, there is no need to do this anymore; Imagine that if you don't recruit so many soldiers and only keep 400,000 to 500,000 troops, the imperial court will be able to save at least 30 million yuan of expenses every year, even if you only use one-tenth of the saved every year to prepare for disasters, even if it encounters a big disaster year, the imperial court will still have the ability to provide relief and let the victims survive the disaster year safely.

At the beginning, among Wang Anshi's reforms, there were many new laws that were formulated for the military aspect, and the knife was also used to deal with the problem of redundant troops, and the results were quite remarkable; During the Pingzhi period, the Great Song Dynasty had 1.16 million troops, and in the Xining period, Wang Anshi reduced the army to 568,688 people, and increased slightly to only 612,244 people in the Yuanfeng period.

Unfortunately, in the early years of the Yuan Dynasty, the new law was completely eliminated by Sima Guang, and Wang Anshi's military reform died before it finally took shape, and the Yellow River often flooded during the Yuan You period, and the Western Xia invaded every year, which made the number of troops increase sharply again, and now it has reached more than one million.

It was the turn of Shangshu Zuocheng Li Qingchen to go out of work, only to see him say awe-inspiringly: "Since ancient times, those who are good at using soldiers can make them go to the soup and fire. The soldiers will tell each other that it is the officials who ask for us, and the official document for the transfer of troops is also called a request; The husband rewards the reward, and now every big gift, there is no merit and reward, three years and again, the cost of ** million, there is no delay in the slightest; When a soldier is rewarded, he does not feel ashamed of his unmeritorious reward, but thinks that the reward is small, and compares the good and bad rewards, and if he is slightly unsatisfactory, he will shout and shout, gather a crowd to make trouble, and threaten the officials sent by the Son of Heaven; The fashion of nothing is like this, it can be seen how arrogant it is, and the reason why soldiers dare to be so arrogant is because they can't do it, and the legal system is not established!

The rebellion of the five generations was born from this. In the past fifty-three years, Yi Wu surnamed 12 monarchs, and eight people were killed in the country, the elders were only ten years old, and even died at the age of three or four.

Are these monarchs stupid? How can his heart hope for trouble, and not for long time? It's a last resort; At that time, there was Fenjin in the east, Qishu in the west, Qianghu in the north, Jianghuai, Fujian, Guangzhou, Wuyue, Jingtan in the south, the world was divided into thirteen and fourteen, surrounded by all sides, and China had rebels and strong ministers to cut it and live; Most of the people who are the rulers of the world have not won the country for a long time, and they have not been governed, so they have to raise soldiers like sons and wolves, and they are afraid that the soldiers will not be used, how can they dare to control them?

Now the Great Song Dynasty has been established for more than 100 years, and the country has been in turmoil and has no courage to resist the enemy; The town is cut inside, there are no rebellious ministers, the world is one, the sea is Yanran, the country is not long, and the world is not wide; However, the soldiers are not enough to be powerful on the outside and dare to be arrogant on the inside, how can the system be applied to all generations, it must become more and more complicated, if everything is left unchecked, and does not try to improve, what is the difference with the five generations? Therefore, the minister thought that even if the whole army was shaken, it was necessary to act strongly, and it was not necessary to seek peace! ”

Li Qingchen's words were resounding, according to his meaning, that is, even if disarmament will cause some turmoil, it must be carried out at any cost, otherwise if we do not wait for others to attack, I am afraid that we will be dragged down.

In this court meeting, anyone who supports the abolition of redundant troops and the reorganization of the army can cite a large number of reasons to prove that the time has come to use a knife against redundant troops.

Those who oppose it are most worried that they will not be able to control the arrogance, and that a large number of layoffs will cause radical changes.

But in fact, this kind of worry is a bit groundless, this is a typical literati mentality, always thinking about everything, afraid of this and that, afraid of it, dare not implement it.

When Wang Anshi began to disarm, Sima Guang, Han Qi, and Wen Yanbo jumped out to oppose it one by one, also because they were worried that disarmament would cause radical changes and at the same time make the national air defense weak; But what was the result, Wang Anshi simply cut more than one million troops in half, and more than 500,000 people were laid off, who do you see dare to rebel?

The national air defense is even more of a joke, Wang Shaoxi opened the river, fought with a bang, Zhang Dian swept through Jinghu, so that the barbarians have been obedient so far, Shenzong five roads to cut the summer, although the success fell short, but it was definitely not because of the small number of troops, poor combat power; The failure of the five-way war in the summer can only be said to be that God does not bless the Great Song Dynasty, Wang Shao died too early, and Shenzong lost the most ideal war summer coach, and the lack of an ideal war summer coach is the main reason for this failure.

Looking back, Wang Anshi laid off 500,000 troops, and not only did the Great Song Dynasty not rebel, but the national defense did not become empty, but strengthened the combat power of the army.

Now Li Keshi and others have picked up the old tune of Han Qi and those who oppose disarmament, which is really speechless. China's history is always repeating, as if it can never get around that strange circle, falling into the same quagmire again and again and unable to extricate itself, China has never lacked thinkers, but there is a lack of people who can put ideas into practice.

In fact, this time this issue was thrown out at the court meeting, just to test the water and see the reactions of various ministers.

Now that it is basically figured out, the purpose has been achieved.

In order to truly solve the problem, we absolutely cannot have such a rambling discussion at the DPRK meeting, so that there will be no result at all.

In particular, such a sensitive issue as disarmament should be carried out vigorously and vigorously after a detailed plan has been drawn up at the top level.

Just like Wang Anshi at the beginning, with the absolute trust and support of Emperor Shenzong, the seemingly difficult thing of disarmament was completed without causing any waves in the end.

(To be continued)