But after listening to Wang Tom's boasting, Li Jin still didn't understand how Haihan made a profit after investing heavily in building a fleet, and if he didn't understand this key issue, Haihan's "advanced experience" could not be introduced to the Ming Dynasty. Li Jin had to be cheeky and asked his previous question again: "General Wang, how does this fleet operate in order to earn profits?"

Wang Tom stared at Li Jin and couldn't help laughing: "General Li, are you joking or serious?"

Li Jin said: "Naturally, I am seriously seeking advice, and I implore General Wang to solve my doubts in Xia!"

Wang Tom nodded and said: "The Ming Dynasty has been fighting with the wild boar skin outside the gate in the north for so many years, and it can be regarded as winning and losing each other, but why does the wild boar skin still raise troops to attack every year, has General Li thought about the reason?"

Li Jin replied without thinking: "That's naturally because wild boar skins can loot a lot of property and people from the pass...... What does General Wang mean that the Haihan Militia is also making profits in this way?"

Wang Tom nodded and said: "The reason is as simple as that, if you want to maintain a strong army, you have to increase investment, and if you want to invest this money not in vain, you have to find a way to wage war against the outside world to obtain benefits." Of course, the premise is that you have to beat your opponent, otherwise it will be useless to invest more. ”

Li Jin was half angry after hearing this: "So if this method is to work, you must first invest a huge amount of money to build an army like the Haihan Mintuan?"

Wang Tom responded: "That's right, this is actually the same as doing business, if you don't have capital, you can only do some small business to make a living, if you want to make a lot of money, you still have to invest more capital to operate." ”

Li Jin secretly said that this set of theories of doing business is probably only available to you Haihan people, if it can be done in Daming, the northern battlefield will not have been passive for many years, and it is long overdue to go out of the gate to burn the house of wild boar skin and grab the land of wild boar skin. However, the fact is that the imperial court invests a huge amount of military expenditure in the northern battlefield every year, but it is difficult to build the Guanning Iron Cavalry to carry out active strikes against the enemy, and it is almost always in a passive state of defense.

Li Jinqiang couldn't help but be unconvinced, and continued to ask: "What benefits have the Haihan militia made so far from the war, and can General Wang give me a few examples?"

Wang Tom smiled: "General Li's curiosity is really heavy enough...... Since you asked, I am not afraid to sue you. First of all, this population, as we all know, there are not many Haihan people who have crossed the ocean to settle on Qiongzhou Island, and Sanya, where we have settled, is a vast and sparsely populated place, but our development model requires a large number of labor to complete various infrastructure projects and production tasks. In addition to recruiting the people of the Ming Dynasty to work for us, we also brought in a large number of immigrants from Annam, and so far tens of thousands of immigrants from Annam have become naturalized people and work for us on this island. Why did the Annam Imperial Court allow these people to move to Qiongzhou Island? It was precisely because our militia army fought valiantly in Annam and assisted them in accomplishing the reunification of the country. ”

There have been rumors of the Haihan militia intervening in the internal affairs of Annam in cross-sea operations for several years, and Li Jin has naturally heard it, but it is only today that he has heard the high-ranking officers of Haihan admit the truth of these rumors to their faces.

Wang Tom continued: "We have a strong maritime armed force, enough to blockade the entire coastline of Annam, and at that time, both the Annam court and the southern rebels were under our control from the sea. With the help of the navy, we were able to bypass the defense lines of the rebels in the south and attack the cities in their rear, and our approach proved to be very effective, not only did we break through Hoi An, the first port city of Annam, but also took Hue, which is known as the first fortified city of Annam!"

When Wang Tom said this, he suddenly lowered his voice and said, "I'm not afraid to sue you, after a big city like this is breached, the income will be calculated in millions of taels of silver." ”

Li Jin's heartbeat couldn't help but beat several beats faster, which was simply astronomical for him. Hoi An and Hue are famous, he has naturally heard of them, and it is said that their prosperity is not much worse than some port cities in the Ming Dynasty, and the Haihan militia can still attack the local city in cross-sea operations, and its combat power is indeed amazing. With their method of directly attacking the city, the benefits of natural warfare would be considerable. Even in this Danzhou City, it is said that the losses during the pirate occupation of the city last year were as high as nearly one million taels.

Li Jin coughed dryly and continued to ask: "In addition to population and money, is there any other benefit from such a tactic?"

"Yes, of course there is!" Wang Tom nodded and said: "The most important income, I will only talk about, is land! We are now in Annam, from north to south, there are as many as seven harbor concessions. It can be said that more than ninety percent of Annan's shipping industry is controlled by us. These seaports will provide us with uninterrupted economic benefits and population for decades to come, as well as provide the necessary stopover for the shipping routes between us and the South Seas. ”

Li Jin automatically ignored the less important water in these words, and focused on the sentence that Wang Tom said, "control the route between the Ming Dynasty and the South Seas". Li Jin used to be an official in Guangdong, so he naturally understood how much oil and water there was in the ocean-going trade between the Ming Dynasty and Nanyang, and if Haihan could really control this route, it would be too polite to describe the benefits that would be obtained from Rijin Doujin.

Of course, Li Jin did not ignore the necessary prerequisites for this step - first, you must have a strong sea force. And at present, it seems that in the territory of the South China Sea, only the Haihan people have such strength, and even if the Ming Sailor has this idea, he can only stay in the process of making up for it, and there is not enough money to realize this kind of big plan.

Although Li Jin was not a general of the naval division, he also knew that the combat scope of this naval division was relatively more limited, and it was thousands of miles away from the mainland to the South Seas. The construction of port wharves is definitely a time-consuming, laborious and expensive project, and only Haihan, a master who is not bad for money, has the ability to build so many ports in overseas foreign lands.

Speaking of this, Li Jin also seems to understand why Zhang Xin and Wang Tom have repeatedly emphasized the importance of "money", without these big investments, it is indeed impossible for the Haihan people to continue to expand their influence overseas, and the huge benefits they have obtained in maritime trade and even foreign wars are indeed closely related to their military investment, and it is with the strong army and navy to provide protection, many ideas of the Haihan people can be smoothly promoted and implemented.

But if the same method is put in the Ming Dynasty, there are too many infeasible points. First of all, the bigwigs of the imperial court will never agree to take the initiative to wage war with foreign countries to obtain such a dangerous approach, after all, since the Yongle Dynasty for more than two hundred years, the territory of the Ming Dynasty has been shrinking, and by the time of the Wanli period, the territory of the Ming Dynasty has only been equivalent to one-third of the area of the heyday of the Yongle period. The experience of being beaten passively for two hundred years and being forced to shrink the territory has formed an inherent thinking in the hearts of the imperial court, including the emperor, of defending the territory. As for opening up the territory to the outside world, it is difficult to defend it now, so we should not think too much about it. Even Li Jin himself thought that this kind of military expansion was simply crazy.

Li Jin thought that if he wrote to the Ministry of War, asking for more investment in the army and taking the initiative to launch a foreign war, the secretary of the Ministry of War would definitely think that he was crazy, and he would probably immediately order his dismissal and investigation. After all, at present, the Ming Dynasty is constantly suffering from internal and external troubles, the wild boar skin in the north knocks on the pass every year, and the more it fights, the stronger it gets, and the displaced people in the Central Plains rebel everywhere and suppress them inexhaustibly.

Therefore, although this practice of the Haihan people has achieved great success in the South China Sea, it is difficult to directly copy and implement it in the Ming Dynasty. Li Jin shook his head helplessly and said: "I understand all the truths that General Wang said, but Haihan's approach makes it difficult for Daming to follow suit!"

Wang Tom smiled: "That is also divided into places, not everything can be copied, but it is not that there are no benefits that cannot be learned." You should have heard of the situation in Fujian, and Xu Xinsu, the current Fujian commander-in-chief, has a very close cooperative relationship with us. The ordnance and tactics used by his troops were provided by our side. ”

"No wonder the Fujian Sailor has such an amazing record in recent years, it turns out that you are behind it!" Li Jin suddenly realized.

A few years ago, Xu Xinsu was just a maritime merchant who donated money to a military position, and this situation is not uncommon in the southeast coast, and in order to facilitate the smuggling trade, the maritime merchants who do smuggling trade will spend some money to buy an official position in the military, so that their ships can freely enter and leave the harbor, and they can also avoid paying taxes.

However, Xu Xinsu was a step stronger than ordinary smugglers, and not only did he have a large number of sea vessels engaged in the smuggling trade, but also thousands of armed men at his disposal, so he was a little confident in buying this military attache position. But his opponent "Eighteen Zhi" is even stronger, not only to destroy Xu Xinsu, but also to the entire Fujian Sailor Division. However, it was in such an unbalanced comparison of strength that the "Eighteen Zhi" was gradually cleared out of the coastal areas of Fujian, and Xu Xinsu, who had only bought a position with silver, had risen year by year by virtue of his exploits in killing pirates, and had already sat in the position of the chief soldier of Fujian, and his promotion speed was second to none in the southeastern officialdom.

Li Jin was an official in Guangdong, so naturally he didn't know how Xu Xinsu fought in Fujian, but he could win a big victory every few months, and Li Jin would often see relevant news in the newspaper. Before he and Yan Mingjun came to Qiongzhou to take up their posts, they were waiting for the Haihan leader Marik on the dock outside Guangzhou, and Mariko was late because he was going to meet Xu Xinsu. However, Li Jin didn't understand until today that it was the Haihan people who supported Xu Xinsu behind his back, so it was no wonder that his army was so capable of fighting that he actually won the position of the chief soldier of a province for him step by step.

Tom Wang continued: "Every year, Lord Xu will send a group of young officers to Sanya to receive our military training, and then apply our training methods to his army when he returns. In addition, the various ordnance and armaments that Lord Xu buys from us every year are as much as hundreds of thousands of taels of silver, and it can be said that in the southeast coastal area of the Ming Dynasty, they can already be regarded as the second strongest army!"

Li Jin almost asked, "Who is the number one", and suddenly came back to his senses when the words came to his lips, since this Fujian sailor ranked second, then naturally their teacher Haihan Mintuan ranked first. In the past, Li Jin may not agree with such a ranking of rivers and lakes, but after living in Danzhou for so many days and seeing the true strength of the Haihan militia, he really has nothing to say about it.

Li Jin still couldn't help but ask: "If the Haihan militia fights with the Fujian Navy, what are the odds of victory or defeat?"

"Personally, I think that the Fujian sailors still have the strength to fight. Tom Wang commented calmly.

However, before Li Jin could relax, Wang Tom added: "But there is a premise for this kind of battle situation, that is, the size of their participating troops is at least three to five times that of the Haihan militia group." Otherwise, they don't stand a chance. ”

Li Jin almost spurted out a mouthful of blood, and seeing that Tom Wang looked relaxed, it didn't seem that he was bragging about it. Li Jin asked, "General Wang has such a great grasp of his own combat strength?"

Wang Tom nodded and said: "Our weapons are better than theirs, our equipment is better than theirs, the tactics are all learned by us here, and even the ammunition they need to fight has to be bought from us, you say that if we fight, what reason do we have to lose?"

"This ......" Li Jin was also speechless when he heard it, and he couldn't find a reason to refute it. If this key point is pinched in the hands of the Haihan people, such as muskets and artillery, which is extremely dependent on the supply of ammunition, then it is true that this battle cannot be fought at all.

Wang Tom continued: "Now Lord Xu still wants to buy ships from us, and the upgrading and maintenance of these ships in the future will still depend on us. It can be said that Fujian, the strongest army, is a copy of our model in the Ming Dynasty. If they hadn't benefited from the previous years of fighting, do you think Lord Xu would have invested so much money in it?"

Why Xu Xinsu of Fujian fought endlessly with the "Eighteen Zhi", even a layman knows a little about this, and the ultimate goal is to seize several major trading ports on the Fujian coastline, as well as the sea route between Fujian and Dayuan Island. Originally, after Zheng Zhilong killed Xu Xinsu in time and space, he began to collect fees from passing ships, and now, Xu Xinsu is doing the same thing.