How to avoid tearing the skin and gradually control the prefecture and even the wider area under the Ming Dynasty in a more peaceful way has always been an important issue in the process of the Executive Committee's administration. As far as the Executive Committee is concerned, it will definitely hope to have a stable surrounding environment during the development period, and in order to expand the control area and fight with the local government of the Ming Dynasty, it is very unworthy in the eyes of the Executive Committee, because this is likely to have a great impact on the product sales market and population source of the group, which is obviously a practice that will do more harm than good. Moreover, the areas occupied solely by force will also have many hidden dangers to public security in the coming period.

Then, in order to achieve the effect of actual control, and to preserve the normal existence of the local government and other institutions as much as possible, so as to maintain the "normal" relationship between the crossing group and the Ming Dynasty, the safest way is to gradually empty the institutions of the local government through various means. The emperor is far away, and Yazhou, whose ruling foundation is not particularly solid, is undoubtedly an excellent test field, which can be used to verify whether the executive committee's set of measures is feasible. Initially, the executive committee targeted the state magistrates in Yazhou, but later found that it seemed easier and more effective to get a handle from the military, which had closer contacts.

The establishment of Yazhou Water Village is only 500 people, and the scale is not even comparable to the planned goals in the "1628 Naval Construction Plan" of the Military Police Department, in other words, the naval establishment formed by the Military Police Department is enough to completely replace the shell of Yazhou Water Village. If the Military Police Department can erect the Yazhou Water Village, then in the future, if necessary, it will be able to replace all the personnel in the future, and the subordinate navy can completely use the name of the Yazhou Water Village to carry out various activities in the South China Sea, whether it is a daily defensive patrol near Shengli Harbor or a foreign armed intervention operation, it is bound to be much more convenient after having this shell as a cover.

However, in the specific operation, there are still many details that may cause problems, such as the compilation that Luo Shengdong is particularly concerned about. It is not uncommon for civilian armed forces to serve the government in the Ming Dynasty, such as the Miao people who live on Hainan Island now, who are the descendants of Miao soldiers who were recruited from the mainland to quell the Li rebellion in the early years. And now Li Tong has also accepted the canonization of the Ming Dynasty, and a capital like Fu Nuo will have a hereditary military attache in his body, and he will also send troops to assist in the event of a war according to the requirements of the Ming army. The civilian armed nature of the Haihan militia will not be an obstacle to this backdoor plan, but only if it is approved and authorized by the Ministry of War.

However, from the point of view of the Executive Committee and the Military Police Department, they are not willing to accept this form of canonization. Even if it is a temporary expedient measure, it will easily be regarded by public opinion as recruiting peace, and if you want to turn your face with the Ming Dynasty in the future, will you not become a genuine rebel? This kind of negative image will have a great negative effect on winning the hearts of the people in the future, and no one is willing to serve in their own navy with the official titles of "100 presidents" and "1000 generals", which will definitely become a black history in a few years, and even future generations will be affected by this.

Therefore, in the end, the strategy decided to adopt by the Military Police Department was to take the middle route as much as possible, to obscure the nature of this behavior, to neither accept canonization, nor to tear up faces, but to make a fortune without saying anything. Of course, this middle line also requires the full cooperation of the Ming officers headed by Luo Shengdong, otherwise it will be difficult to complete the "legal procedures" and become an officially recognized co-operative army.

Seeing that Luo Shengdong's face was as black as the bottom of the pot, Yan Chujie changed his words and said: "Luo Qian doesn't have to be frustrated, this arrangement is actually the best choice for you and for us." It doesn't matter if you can't figure it out now, go back and think about it, if you feel that there is a problem with the cooperation between us, then it can be terminated at any time. ”

Hearing Yan Chujie say "termination", Luo Shengdong recovered from his depression and anxiety, and hurriedly responded: "Mr. Yan doesn't have to worry, he will return to Yazhou tomorrow to persuade General He to send a document to recruit the Haihan militia, and the procedures will be completed in a few days." ”

"It's for the best. Yan Chujie nodded and said, "You applied for a five-acre plot of land in the port area last month, and the executive committee has approved it." Go back and go to Ren Liang to go through the formalities, and if you want to use it to open a store and do business, you have to report to him first. ”

"Yes, yes, thank you. Luo Shengdong replied repeatedly. Luo Shengdong has been applying for land in the Shengli Port Business Zone for a month, but during this time, the Haihan militia has been fighting outside, and Luo Shengdong naturally does not dare to urge this matter. And Yan Chujie chose to release the news at this time, obviously with a certain purpose, if Luo Shengdong's attitude was not so cooperative, then the matter of the land would naturally be postponed indefinitely.

"Mr. Yan, then our inspection department ......" Wei Ping hurriedly seized the time to inquire about Yan Chujie's tone. It seems that there will be no other turn for the better in the matter of Shuizhai, and Luo Shengdong has no other way to choose except to accept the arrangement. As for terminating the cooperation, everyone knows that this choice is not actually in Luo Shengdong's hands. However, the Haihan people have now decided to attack Shuizhai, and Wei Ping is not only sad about the death of the rabbit and the fox, but also a little worried about his own situation.

Compared with Yazhou Water Village, the weight of the inspection department is too bad. Luo Shengdong is now the head of the sixth-rank thousand, and Wei Ping is just a nine-rank sesame official at the bottom, and the number of subordinates between the two is dozens of times worse, so it can be said that they are not at the same level of strength. Wei Ping knew that the reason why he was still able to sit here instead of working as a coolie in a labor camp was simply because the Haihan people still needed the inspection department to maintain their image to the outside world, indicating that this place was still under the rule of the Ming Dynasty. If you want to continue to live a good life, then it is best to follow the will of the Haihan people Yan Chujie wants to use the reputation of the Inspection Department, and Wei Ping will definitely respond immediately without hesitation.

"Inspection Division...... Let's maintain the status quo for the time being!" Yan Chujie replied without much concern.

Wei Ping relaxed slightly, but at the same time there was a slight sense of loss. Obviously, there is a huge gap between the Haihan people's attention to the two, and the weight of the inspection department is so light that the military police department has no intention of taking over.

"By the way, if you have a candidate who is good at detectives and interrogations, you can recommend them to us. Yan Chujie seemed to remember something, and added casually: "We need personnel in this area now, once hired, they will be treated preferentially!"

Wei Ping said in his heart that this is a good calculation, the Haihan people did not plan to take over the inspection department, they originally wanted to dig up the people from the inspection department directly to do things for them.

The Haihan people were preparing their own independent security administration, which Wei Ping had already heard. In Wei Ping's view, this is a move by the Haihan people to straighten out the security team that has not been clearly positioned. These security guards in black clothes and black pants have great authority in Victory Harbor, so big that Wei Ping is a little envious.

In addition to apprehending thieves and maintaining law and order, the Haihan Security Brigade also inspected foreign ships at the port wharf and managed the labor camps. Except for the uniformed Haihan militia, all other areas of the local people are under the jurisdiction of the security forces. If you really want to talk about it, in fact, the functions of the inspection department have been hollowed out by the security team from the beginning, which is one of the reasons why Wei Ping can accept the reality calmly.

It is true that some of the personnel of the Military Police Department had experience as a police officer before the crossing, but the professional experience of later generations is not completely effective under the current objective environment. Although the practitioners of this era are relatively backward in terms of equipment and technology, they are not without merit, if they talk about the mastery of the people's psychology and familiarity with the surrounding environment, these people who wear uniforms in another time and space may not be comparable to the local indigenous headhunters.

In addition, there are some dirty jobs that are not known to the outside world, and they also need someone to do them. For example, if you find someone who knows how to use torture techniques to carry out the method of extorting confessions, it is easier to achieve twice the result with half the effort, and this is one of the skills that the police officers lack in traversing. Directly poaching people from the yamen in Yazhou is undoubtedly one of the quickest ways, and there may be a lack of resources across the group, but the most important thing is money. As long as the treatment is announced, there will definitely be people who can't refuse this kind of **.

Just as Wei Ping was thinking about who was more suitable among the old catchers he knew, Yan Chujie's orderlies came in and leaned over to whisper a few words. Yan Chujie nodded, stood up and said, "I have other things to deal with now, please take care of yourself! If there is anything you don't understand, you are welcome to come to me for consultation at any time." ”

After Yan Chu left the Military Police Department, he went straight to the office area of the Executive Committee. Just now he hurriedly ended the conversation with Luo Wei and the others because Tao Donglai asked someone to inform him to attend a meeting with the executive committee immediately.

can make Tao Donglai and Yan Chujie, the two military leaders, pay so much attention to it, and the weight of those who come is naturally not light. After Yan Chujie entered the conference room, he saw that Tao Donglai and Ning Qi were there, and there was also a middle-aged man dressed as a Ming man, with a dark and dry complexion, who looked very much like a person who had been active at sea for a long time.

"Let me introduce you, this Mr. Dong is from Fujian. Mr. Dong, this is Mr. Yan Chujie Yan, who is in charge of the military on our side. Ning Qi made a brief introduction for both sides.

The middle-aged man got up and hugged his fists and said, "In Xia Dong Yanyun, I've seen Mr. Yan!"

"You're polite!" Yan Chujie also returned the salute with a fist.

"Mr. Dong came from Fujian this time and said that he wanted to talk to us about some business. Tao Donglai asked Dong Yanyun to re-sit and explained the situation to Yan Chujie.

In fact, this Dong Yanyun is not just a simple businessman, his identity is one of the important staff members of Fujian maritime merchant Xu Xinsu, who controls some of the freight routes to Southeast Asia under Xu Xinsu's name. On this special trip to Victory Port, the business we want to talk about is not just ordinary commodity trading.

Prior to this meeting, the two sides had already made several contacts in Guangzhou in advance. Dong Yanyun went to the Guangzhou Office twice to meet with Schneider and others to discuss the content of the transaction. However, in the previous talks, both sides had reservations, Dong Yanyun certainly wanted to know as much as possible about the real strength of Haihan's side first, and Schneider's side did not plan to completely explain to the other party, but only talked about commercial cooperation, as for military and political cooperation, no one on the Guangzhou Office, including He Xi, could make decisions on his own, so in the end, Dong Yanyun still had to go to Shengli Port in person to meet with Tao Donglai and other people in actual power.

Before Dong Yanyun set off from Guangzhou, the relevant meeting materials had been telegraphed to the desk of the Executive Committee, and Tao Donglai personally took up this work. It can be said that the Crossing Group attaches no less importance to the situation along the coast of Fujian and the Taiwan Strait than it is about the civil war in Annam, but due to its own limited maritime strength, the Crossing Group does not have enough ability to directly intervene in this battle of interests, and can only influence the trend of the war situation in Fujian in a more roundabout way.

As early as half a year ago, the Crossing Group sold a small amount of arms to Fujian through the channel of "Fu Ruifeng" and sold them to the Xu Xinsu Group to help it resist the offensive of the "Eighteen Zhi". In the following six months, weapons, ammunition and supplies worth more than $100,000 worth of negotiable coupons were sold to him on several occasions. It can be said that without the arms assistance provided by the crossing group, Xu Xinsu would probably only have half a life left even if he did not die, but now he is still alive and well, based in Zhangzhou, occupying Yuegang, the largest foreign trade port along the coast of Fujian, and Zhongzuo, the maritime gateway located in the east of Yuegang.

However, the arms trade through the group has not only brought huge economic gains, but also some more intuitive benefits, such as the exchange of artillery and other arms for a batch of sea ships to the Fujian side last year. In addition, some goods originating in Fujian have also reduced their procurement costs due to the underground cooperative relationship between the two sides. It can be said that so far, the cooperation between the two sides has been relatively smooth, and there has not been any form of unpleasantness.

"Mr. Dong, can you first introduce the current situation along the coast of Fujian?" Yan Chujie was naturally most concerned about the changes in the military situation, and immediately threw out questions after sitting down, in order not to waste time going around in circles, he also specially added: "The situation I am talking about refers to the current situation of the war between Xu Daguan and the 'Eighteen Zhi'. ”

"Although Zheng Zhilong is powerful at the moment, most of his subordinates are pirates, and they are unruly, and it is not so easy to go on land to fight the official army. In the past few months, the fighting has stopped, and they have not been asked to take advantage of the 'Eighteen Zhi', but they have been killed and injured a lot by firearms in the process of attacking the Zhongzuo Institute. My master had already planned to fight to the death at sea, but the warship was too slow to build and could not compete with the thieves at sea for the time being. Dong Yanyun introduced succinctly.

The three people present were all unimpressed, "Eighteen Zhi" is a pirate, how much better can Xu Xinsu be? Li Dan, a sea merchant who originally controlled the East Asian sea routes, is a pirate, and Xu Xinsu, who inherited a considerable part of his industry, naturally has a clean foundation. Of course, Xu Xinsu has successfully laundered his money by relying on political cash, and now he has become a cadre under Yu Zhigao, the general of Fujian, and even the pirate leaders such as Yang Lu and Yang Ce under Xu Xinsu have also changed and become officers of the Daming Water Division.

The combat effectiveness of such a ragtag army can naturally be imagined. In the original historical trajectory, Xu Xinsu was killed by Zheng Zhilong on Xiamen Island this year. Dong Yanyun was bent on whitewashing his master, but how did he know that the understanding of the war situation in Fujian by these people in front of him had far exceeded his imagination. To put it bluntly, what Yan Chujie wants to understand is not what the two sides are doing, but just wants to make sure that Xu Xinsu's group will not show a trend of failure in a short period of time.

The difference between the war on the coast of Fujian and the civil war in Annam was that the Executive Committee was now more inclined to help the North Vietnamese eliminate the South Vietnamese regime within a few years in exchange for the right to establish a base in the South Vietnam-controlled area, while the war on the coast of Fujian, no matter which one wins, will have little practical benefit to the Transit Group, because the ultimate goal of the Crossing Group is to control the shipping lanes of the Taiwan Strait, and it is obvious that neither side will be willing to give up this core interest. Therefore, the effect that the Executive Committee wants to achieve is to maintain the strategic balance between the two sides, and not let the Xu Xinsu group collapse in a short period of time, but it cannot be allowed to have too obvious advantages, which can be regulated through guò exports of weapons and ammunition.

Of course, as one of the belligerents, Xu Xinsu would not be merciful to the "Eighteen Zhi", and when he realized that the weapons from a remote location on Qiongzhou Island could help him defeat the opponent and achieve victory, he irrepressibly had further thoughts: as long as he was equipped with more Haihan weapons, it was not impossible to completely exterminate the "Eighteen Zhi".

However, wanting to increase the amount of arms imports is not something that Xu Xinsu can decide unilaterally. The only agent of Haihan Weapons in the mainland is "Fu Ruifeng", and the weapons sold to "Fu Ruifeng" are also subject to strict control, and even stipulate the sales targets. In other words, even if Xu Xinsu came to the door with the silver, he would not be able to buy more weapons and ammunition from "Fu Ruifeng". For this reason, Xu Xinsu specially sent Dong Yanyun to Guangdong to find a source of goods, and after spending a lot of time, Dong Yanyun finally took the line of the Guangzhou Office, and then secretly came to Shengli Port.

"I will bring 300,000 taels of silver with the ship this time, I hope you can relax the restrictions and sell more muskets and cannons, as for the specific price, everyone can discuss. Dong Yanyun didn't go around in circles too much, and in a few words, he directly picked out the meaning that Lao Tzu is rich and capricious, you are responsible for the offer, and I am responsible for buying, buying, buying.

Dong Yanyun's main task is very simple, that is, to purchase as many Haihan weapons as possible. As for the price, this is not a problem he needs to worry about, the big boss has already spoken, the Haihan people sell as much as they want, and the more weapons of all kinds, the better