"Yes, Your Majesty." The prime minister nodded, then turned to look at the ministers, "Now, the meeting begins!" The main purpose of today's meeting is to attack Japan, and the emperor's intention is to raise a large army to defeat the Japanese shogunate in power with a thunderous force, so that the shogunate will agree to our court's request, hand over the gold and silver deposits to our court, and let our court monopolize the right to trade with Japan. ”

After saying the opening remarks, the prime minister's eyes quickly stayed on Zhao Song.

"If Japan wants to be left to the disposal of our dynasty, it is natural that the first thing is to defeat the shogunate and make them have no way out. Therefore, military affairs are the most important affairs, and everything is premised on winning a war. In this expedition, the person who led the commander of the troops was Xingyang Bo Zhao Song, and now it is up to him to talk about military preparations. ”

"Yes." Zhao Song stood up when he heard the sound, and then several senators next to him also took out some pamphlets that had already been copied from the boxes beside him and distributed them everywhere in everyone's hands.

"The booklet contains confidential matters related to the attack on Japan, and I would like to ask you to keep them confidential." Zhao Song first told these people, and then continued to explain, "This expedition to Japan, because of logistical limitations and to facilitate the transfer of operations, the strength of this expedition to Japan is limited to a strengthened brigade. This specially formed brigade will have three fully formed regiments, each of which will be strengthened with elite companies compared to ordinary regiments. In addition to the infantry, it was also to be accompanied by a cavalry battalion composed of three knight companies, a brigade directly under the brigade, fifty artillery pieces, and a total of 2,000 people from the baggage regiment and the engineer regiment, for a total strength of about 8,000 men. ”

"Eight thousand,......" the prime minister muttered slightly, "this number is not small, and the transportation and supply are not simple, can't it be less?" ”

"Prime Minister, although the shogunate is old, but after all, it is a behemoth, although it cannot be compared with our dynasty, but it still has some strength, no matter how weak its soldiers are, the number of people is always there, and it cannot be taken lightly." Zhao Song hurriedly defended himself, "Our army must keep a certain number of troops in order to fight with it and win a decisive battle." We understand the difficulties of the expedition, and we have always wanted to keep the strength to a minimum, and this strength has been the result of my detailed study and repeated discussions with several senators, and our army, in addition to the baggage and engineers, can only fight 6,000 soldiers, and can no longer be reduced under any circumstances......

"It seems that there is no less." Because Zhao Song was reasonable, the prime minister did not dwell on the issue of troops, but nodded in agreement with him, "Where are you going to transfer that soldier?" ”

"Since there are so few troops, and what I want to fight against is a behemoth, so this time we must be cautious in the selection of soldiers, and we must select elite soldiers. In addition, there are strategic directions that now require heavy troops, so they cannot be drawn from there. Zhao Song first bowed his head to the emperor to express his gratitude, "The specific plan for selecting troops is to select a regiment from the brigade originally led by the Liaodong general, and then select a company under the command of Marshal Shi Manqiang Shi from the direction of Guichuan to form a regiment, with Li Huanghe as the regimental commander and another company and battalion commander; A regiment was transferred from the direction of Liangguang, with Ma Tongji as the head of the regiment, and the commander of the company and battalion was selected. In this case, the three regiments will be selected troops, and we will definitely be able to defeat the Japanese shogunate with one heart and one mind! ”

The prime minister nodded again and did not question anything more.

Zhao Song's words implied that the construction of his troops was personally approved or even formulated by the emperor, and he had never been able to manage the personnel arrangements of the army, so he did not plan to dwell on this issue.

"Eight Thousand Men Expedition at Sea...... It's a lot of money. The prime minister fell back into a deep groan, and then suddenly raised his head and looked at Admiral Liu Tao, who was sitting not far away. Jiujiang Hou, can your navy support it? The strength of the army of 8,000 people and the subsequent heavy grain and straw are not small amounts, and there is no difficulty in transporting them. ”

Sitting in the corner of the round table, the soldier wearing a blue military uniform and wearing a first-class silver orchid medal was Liu Tao, the minister of the Military and Political Department of the Navy, the Marquis of Jiujiang.

He was a maritime merchant before, and after he began to operate maritime commerce and trade in Xuzhou, he quickly devoted himself to the power of Xuzhou, and participated in the creation of the navy, becoming one of the founders of the navy, so soon after the establishment of the new dynasty, he became one of the heads of the navy and was made a marquis.

The navy is a new branch of the army specially established by the emperor after the establishment of the Han Dynasty, and is under the control of the Navy Military and Political Department in Beijing.

He is in charge of the formulation and use of the navy's budget, the construction and maintenance of naval warships and naval bases, and is the central yamen of the navy. And all the warships in the ports and at sea were under the control of the various fleets of the navy, and the commander-in-chief of the fleet was a Westerner, Louis de Rocheford.

This Westerner was originally a missionary, but he had no religious enthusiasm, but wanted to make a fortune, went through a lot of hardships and came to the Oriental countries, he originally wanted to cast cannons for the emperor of the Ming Dynasty, but he did not expect to fall into the hands of Xuzhou, and soon devoted himself to Xuzhou, and taught the craftsmen of Xuzhou the knowledge of casting, machinery and shipbuilding accumulated over the years.

As a result, he later became the main founder of the navy, and after the establishment of the new dynasty, he was continued to be appointed by the emperor as the commander-in-chief of the various fleets. Because he was already from a French aristocratic family, he declined the title of the Chinese emperor and only accepted the title of marshal.

In order to facilitate the command of the fleets on the various seas, he was usually stationed in Songjiang Prefecture in peacetime, and mainly commanded the fleets in the East China Sea and the South China Sea.

And his deputy, the deputy commander-in-chief of the naval fleet, is Langya Hou Cai De, who is stationed in Tianjin on weekdays, mainly commanding the northern fleet, and he is also complicated affairs, so neither of them attended the meeting, and only the minister of the Navy Military Affairs Department attended on behalf of the navy.

Over the years, although the navy has not received as much military expenditure as the army, but because the emperor attaches more importance to it, it has been able to develop vigorously, and after years of hard work from top to bottom, the strength of the navy has become magnificent, with a huge combat fleet, and it has become the undoubted master of the western Pacific region.

It is precisely because they are so confident in their own sea power that the emperor and Zhao Song are so confident and bold in planning to conquer Japan.

After hearing the prime minister's question, the Marquis of Jiujiang, who had a serious face, did not dare to slack off, and quickly replied respectfully.

"Back to Prime Minister, the resources required for this expedition are indeed very large. After our calculations, we came to the conclusion that it could barely be supported, and now that a large area of the northern sea is frozen, many of the transport ships that originally transported grain from the south are now idle...... If all the surplus transport ships of the various fleets were to be temporarily transferred at the same time, there should not be much problem in supporting this expeditionary force. ”

"We still need to transfer transport ships from each fleet......," the prime minister was a little surprised, "this won't affect the normal cruising of each fleet, right?" ”

"We have contacted Tianjin and Songjiang before, and they have replied that there is no major operation at the moment, and a number of transport ships can be freed up for this attack." The tone of the Marquis of Jiujiang was still very respectful, and he did not have any disrespect for the prime minister because of the principle of separation of civil and military, "However, they all said that this war needs to be ended, otherwise if these transport ships cannot be used for the whole year next year, it may have an impact on the actions of the naval fleet next year." Other than that...... The task of transporting grain from the south is also urgent. ”

"The Ministry of Civil Affairs has already reported to me that the grain storage in the granaries of Gyeonggi and Beizhi is very optimistic recently, and it should be able to support it for a long time next spring and summer, so the task of transporting grain in spring and summer next year will be looser." The prime minister immediately relieved his doubts, "However, we can't always rely on grain storage to consume, after all, the world has been decided, and the agriculture of Gyeonggi and Beizhi has not fully recovered...... You have to do it quickly! ”

In fact, before the establishment of the world, officials of the Ministry of Civil Affairs and the Ministry of Agriculture had been worried about the food situation in the Beizhi region, for fear that after the unification of the world, the imperial court would not be able to transport enough grain to feed all the people in the north, and it would cause famine and displacement and affect the order of the Gyeonggi region.

Who knows, when they really unified the whole country and took over the land of the former Ming government and the imperial family, they found that the situation was much more optimistic than they had imagined.

Taking Baoding Mansion as an example, in Baoding Mansion, the former Ming royal family had a large number of royal farmland, even in the last years of Wanli, when there were frequent famines, they were able to produce a large amount of grain. However, the imperial horse supervisors and local tyrants who managed these imperial villages falsely reported the grain output of these imperial villages, and then hid all the grain and sold it privately, making a windfall, and at that time, countless Li people were wailing in the famine, struggling on the verge of starvation.

After the establishment of the new dynasty, the emperor felt bitterly the bloated palace institutions and the rampant eunuch groups in the former Ming Dynasty, so as soon as he ascended the throne, he abolished all the internal supervision institutions in the former Ming court, and announced that he would never use eunuchs in the palace again. The eunuchs in and outside the palace of the former Ming Dynasty were also dismissed one by one, and those who were educated and capable were hired as scribes, and those who were not educated and old and could not find a way to live were placed in a centralized manner. At the same time, the emperor also clearly announced to the world that the Han Dynasty would never use eunuchs from his generation, and control the palace expenses at the same time, so that the eunuch system that lasted for 2,000 years finally died after the establishment of the new dynasty.

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