Although Zhu Ciyu was nominally pro-government, in the first half of the pro-government, the control of the general rhythm of the government was still completely in the hands of his father, Zhu Shuren.

Zhu Ciyu has only been given considerable autonomy in handling daily government affairs. For example, every few days in the court, especially the big court meeting, Zhu Shuren sometimes excuses himself no longer to participate.

Anyway, the content of these meetings is nothing more than whether certain prefectures should provide disaster relief, whether a certain province should approve special funds to strengthen water conservancy repairs, whether there are any new construction projects in Heilongjiang or Kyushu that require additional budgets and technical personnel support, and so on.

All major events that are on a year-by-year cycle will not be discussed at this kind of court meeting.

In this case, it is like a group, the original CEO finally does not have to receive a bunch of emails as soon as he arrives at the company every morning, and then waste an hour or two to browse and pick the key points to reply. All of these tasks can be delegated to newcomers.

Zhu Shuren was already tired of these tedious and mundane affairs, and he couldn't wait to throw them out. And Zhu Ciyu is also full of freshness and energy, and the two of them take what they need just right.

Taking advantage of Zhu Ciyu's freshness, the three months in the spring and summer of the fifth year of Xiaokang passed smoothly quickly, and Zhu Ciyu did not toss any moths.

As the time came to May, the Ming court finally began to make a big move in this year according to the original plan - that is, according to the rhythm that Zhu Shuren told his son before, it began to send diplomatic condemnation envoys to Burma and Vietnam, and talked to them about the old accounts of four or five years ago.

As we all know, four and a half years ago, when Zhu Changshu had just died and Zhu Ciyu had just ascended the throne, there were still three or four small-scale careerist rebellions in the Ming Dynasty, some of whom were the surviving vassal kings of the Ming Dynasty, and some of whom falsely claimed to be the third prince of Zhu.

Although the scale of the rebellion could be described as pitiful, at most it gathered an armed force of a few thousand men, and all temporary rabbles were counted. The one that lasted the longest didn't last for two months, and it was immediately extinguished.

But the problem of the remnants of their sins escaping still exists, and the Ming Dynasty also has evidence to prove that those people either went north or south.

Da Ming just didn't rush to investigate it before, and wanted to spend a few years in peace first, but this delay dragged on for four years, and now he came to turn over the old accounts.

In the scorching heat of May and June in the middle of summer, it is of course very hard to go to the tropical neighbors in the south to fight with each other, and it is also necessary to consider the physical health of the envoys, whether they can go to Burma alive in the summer, and whether they will die of heat on the way.

Therefore, Zhu Shuren did not directly send officials from the Ministry of Rites in Nanjing to Burma, but only sent people from Nanjing to Kunming to proclaim the decree to Li Dingguo, and then authorized Li Dingguo to elect two local officials in Yunnan and go to Burma and Vietnam with their credentials.

The living climate and environment of the local people in Yunnan and the adaptability of water and soil are not so different from those of Myanmar and Vietnam, and the envoys from Nanjing, who left Nanjing in early May, should be able to arrive in Yunnan in mid-June. Officials departing from Kunming will be able to arrive in Myanmar in early July.

……

The rulers of Burma and Vietnam, of course, were unwilling to directly succumb to the sudden question of the Ming Dynasty.

The current king of the Taungoo Dynasty of Burma is Mangbai, and he can be regarded as the relatively powerful king of Burma at that time-

In the original history, Mang Bai killed his brother in a coup d'état in 1661, and the following year he changed the free-range posture of the first king Mang Dali period, and took the initiative to launch the curse of the water, killing more than 30 ministers of the Yongli Emperor, and also killed a bunch of guards and pro-army, and then tied Yongli to Wu Sangui, which shows that he is still a little ruthless.

It's just that now history has completely turned upside down, Da Ming has regained his sight, and there was no contradiction in his relationship with Da Ming before.

However, a person's temperament endowment is often brought out in the mother's womb and accumulated through years of life experience. Since Mang Bai is such a ruthless hero, he is destined not to be soft because of a little trouble.

Even though the wording of the Ming Dynasty's condemnation letter was very harsh, the first thing he thought of was that "it is the height of summer, and the Ming army is simply powerless to take the Burmese army in the tropical rainforest of the Shan State Plateau in the south", so even if he is afraid, he is not in a hurry.

It's better to prepare for the war first, then pull in foreign aid, and then drag him for a few months to see where the wind goes.

If there is a chance to stabilize the situation, then there is no need to give in. If the wind is not in the right direction, or if something is dangerous, it's not too late to soften when winter approaches.

Anyway, the Ming Dynasty is the kingdom of the Celestial Empire, and it is about face and quality. From ancient times to the present, I have not heard of a letter to the Ming Dynasty to admit his mistakes and surrender, and to express his change of heart, but he was not accepted by the Ming Dynasty.

Since Da Ming is so qualified, of course he has to make full use of Da Ming's weakness and try to take advantage of it.

After Mang Bai understood this Taoist ideal, of course, he would not waste time, so he immediately made several preparations.

He recruited his sons, Manro, Manliti, and his confidant Dibuti, as well as Van Derif, the commercial representative of the Dutch East India Company (VOC) in Bago.

He first instructed the crown prince Mangluo: "You immediately personally supervise the handling and let people catch a group of scapegoats." It must include some remnants of the Ming rebels who entered Burma a few years ago.

Find two more Tusi tribal leaders who have oscillated between Ming and Myanmar in recent years. Then the former was captured alive and sent to the Ming Dynasty envoy to bring back, and the latter was directly chopped up and asked the Ming envoy to bring back the head.

Then he replied to the Ming envoy with kind words, saying that the fact of sheltering the traitors was a temporary mistake and not intentional. It's just that after a long time, most of the arrivals have disappeared incognito, and I can only find these few in Myanmar, and they have all been handed over, which shows the sincerity of my Myanmar.

However, the Ming Dynasty's request to cede all the Tusi tribes to the Ming Dynasty could not be done for a while, and it was hoped that the Ming side would retract this request, and the rest of the land would be ceded and compensated for the crime could not be discussed. ”

Even if Mang Bai intends to resist, he will not completely lose face to Da Ming. He felt that killing a few small characters among the generals, as well as a few disobedient tribal toasts, and giving Daming a step down, this price could still be paid. After all, this is all face-oriented, and there is almost no real profit.

Mang Luo did not go against his father's will and did it directly.

After the frontal diplomacy stabilized, Mang Bai continued to prepare internal armaments and try to attract other foreign aid.

So he instructed his other son, Mang Liti, to mobilize Burma's own army as soon as possible, clear the wilderness, and prepare for war.

Again, he instructed his confidant Di Buti to contact all forces in Vietnam to see if anyone was willing to join forces against the Ming Dynasty.

This person can be regarded as a famous diplomatic liar under Mang Bai, and in history, Mang Bai sent him to deceive Mu Guogong and Emperor Yongli, saying that he would invite them to drink the curse water and swear an oath, and then trick the people around Emperor Yongli to kill him.

At this moment, he has received the task of uniting Vietnam, which can be regarded as a return to the old business, and it is a historical coincidence.

Today's Vietnam is actually divided into two dynasties and four surname forces, and the internal chaos is also very chaotic, and it is absolutely impossible to say that all forces are willing to join forces to deal with the Ming Dynasty.

However, considering that there is internal enmity between the various forces in Vietnam. So once some of them take refuge in the Ming Dynasty, the other part will definitely have to fight against the Ming Dynasty, so it is indeed quite valuable to unite.

……

After arranging the delay, mobilization and finding foreign aid, Mang Bai's last chess piece was his trade relationship with the Dutch East India Company-

But don't think of Myanmar in the 1660s as a primitive Nanban country. At that time, the Kingdom of Taungoo in Burma already had a standing army of 70,000 men, of which 5,000 were musketeers using flintlock muskets imported from the Netherlands.

Because the Dutch had already opened a VOC office in the port of Bago in Burma as early as 1627, until the conflict between the Ming and Burma, the history of trade and trade between the Burmese and the Western colonizers has lasted for 40 years.

To put it bluntly, Myanmar's mode of exchange with the West at that time was already close to that of India's Mughal Empire to a certain extent, and the British, Dutch, and Portuguese all had perennial business. They will not be as forbidden to the sea as the Ming and Qing dynasties in history.

It is precisely for this reason that the conflict with Burma during the Yongzheng period in history, and the Qing-Burma War during the Qianlong period, the Qing army actually suffered several defeats (but Agui and He Shen reported that they were victorious), because after the Burmese army entered the 18th century, the musket was definitely much more powerful than the Qing army.

Later audiences imagined the Burmese army as winning only by poisoned arrows and war elephants, all because of the poisonous whitewashing of Qiong Yao's pigtail dramas such as "Huanzhu Gege".

Of course, since ancient times, Europeans have always kept a hand when trading with East and Southeast Asian countries.

So even though Burma had been doing business with the Dutch East India Company for 40 years, the muskets they actually bought, in terms of quality and style, were basically the products of the previous generation of the Dutch.

European colonizers were never so kind as to sell the most advanced weapons directly to Asians.

Consider the bloody iterations, eliminations, and battles between the Dutch and the British over the past half-century of the Thirty Years' War in Europe. The flintlock pistols sold by the Dutch to the Burmese king were mainly pre-war production models that were eliminated after the start of the Thirty Years' War in 1618, with about four or five thousand pieces.

A few were eliminated in 1652 during the First Anglo-Dutch War, which was already considered the best, and more than a thousand were equipped in the Burmese army.

And now, in the face of the direct threat of the Ming Dynasty, Mang Bai had to continue to dig out a little more red sapphires and other precious jewels in the Burmese treasury, and promised the Dutch certain mining rights, and did everything possible to urgently purchase more weapons from the Netherlands.

Van Dry, the commercial representative of VOC in Bago, was also a little embarrassed after hearing about Mangbai's request. Because now that the Dutch trade relationship with Daming is also maintaining a good relationship, he doesn't want to get into trouble anymore.

However, after all, the discipline of European colonial adventurers is at the level of three domestic slaves per capita, and the principle is not worth the benefits of real money and silver for individuals? Mangbai had been dealing with the Dutch for many years, so he chose to give Van Dleeff a large bribe of jewelry, and the Dutch immediately complied.

Finally, Van Deeve said privately: "Your Majesty, you want more Dutch muskets, unless you agree to two more conditions. ”

There is not much nonsense in the reckless white, so that Van Dleeff can fart directly. Van Deve was also polite: "First of all, we in the Netherlands don't want to have a stiff relationship with the Ming Dynasty, so no matter how many muskets you get, if your country really goes to war with the Ming Dynasty in the future, please bite the bullet,

Admit that these muskets were built up before the war, as a result of the trade of the past forty years. Anyway, even if we deliver the goods after the war in your country, we will only admit that it was delivered before the war, or that the information is not well-informed, and the specific traders do not know that you have started a war with Daming. ”

Mang Bai didn't bother to dwell on this, and nodded directly and cheerfully: "Yes, Lone just wants a weapon, why do you betray you if you have nothing to do?" You Holland are thousands of miles away, and if you are betrayed, you can't be dragged along to start a war with the Ming Dynasty, and it is not good for you to harm others in vain. Okay, let's talk about the next condition. ”

Van Drev continued to offer: "Another difficulty in selling weapons to you is that the delivery cycle is too long. If you can wait two years, or at least a year and a half, then we can go back to the Netherlands and place an order slowly, and then ship it back.

But I'm afraid that if you are in a hurry, the scale of supply will be very limited, so I can only find a way to replace some of our VOC equipment in service with the garrisons in Batavia and Palembang as soon as possible, and supply it to you urgently.

But we want to make sure that we can only give a small part of our trade, and the price will be very high - how much you can offer depends on your bid, you know, we take a lot of risk in this trade. ”

For this, Mang Bai also understood, saying that as long as the Dutch tried to help him raise money, the price was negotiable. As for those things that will be delivered in a year and a half, he will definitely not be able to wait, so let the Dutch's own armed forces wait for the replenishment in a year and a half, and he can give a small deposit first, but it is impossible to pay the full amount in advance.

Van Deeve negotiated with Mang Bai again, and finally set the deposit for new orders in Europe at 20%, and the remaining 80% waited for a year and a half to two years after the cash on delivery. As for the spot transferred from Batavia and other places, Mangbai must pay the full amount immediately and deliver the goods.

After this planning was done, Mang Bai finally didn't worry so much in his heart. All he had to do was wait, because even if the muskets were to be transported from Batavia to Bago, it would take more than two months to make a round trip, which was much faster than the year and a half of transferring goods from Europe.

At the same time, he also has to continue to negotiate with Da Ming's diplomacy, if he can solve the problem without ceding the land and not giving up the vassal Tusi, even if he wants to give Da Ming some gifts, it is acceptable.

Unfortunately, the reckless attempts to rip off the skin did not work, and the Ming always bit the grain to death and demanded land cessation as reparation, and Myanmar had to give up the Tusi on the Shan State Plateau that swayed between the Ming and Burma.

In other words, for the sake of the sins of the year, the Ming Dynasty only allowed Myanmar to retain most of the territories directly under it, and for those places where even Myanmar itself could only be ruled by "bondage", it must be handed over by the Ming Dynasty, and then the Ming Dynasty will slowly change the land and return to the stream.

With such a stalemate in the negotiations, Mang Bai also fell into hesitation, and the time dragged on for more than a month, and it was almost late August.

Just when Mang Bai was hesitating, the news of a misfire on the border directly shocked him.

It was about the 20th day of the eighth month of the lunar calendar, and although the Mid-Autumn Festival had passed, the scorching heat had not yet completely ended on the tropical rainforest plateaus of Southeast Asia. Mang Bai didn't expect that the Ming army might make a move at this time. In his original prediction, the Ming army would have to wait until October to come.

Because winter is the coolest in the south, and the rainy season in September of the lunar calendar on the Shan State Plateau has not yet ended, it is hot and humid. It doesn't rain all the time, but even an hour or two of rain around noon every day can cause mud and dampness and mosquito breeding.

Mang Bai has been accustomed to the setting that "the people of the Central Plains cannot tolerate the humid living environment in the tropics", which has been branded in the hearts of the monarchs of Southeast Asian countries since Zhu Di invaded Vietnam in the south. Now the sudden sneak attack of the Ming army caught the Burmese by surprise.

Because of the lack of sufficient troops deployed at the front, after receiving the sudden announcement from the Ming envoy that "because the Burmese side was not sincere and refused to agree to the conditions of the Ming ultimatum, the negotiations broke down", the Ming army immediately drove straight in, and first won a preliminary victory in the border area.

Because the Burmese army was not fully fortified, Li Dingguo led tens of thousands of elite Ming troops from Yunnan along the Nu River valley into Burma.

After using cavalry artillery to cut through several Burmese fortifications at the choke points along the Nu River Valley, Li Dingguo continued to advance rapidly, leaving behind the Burmese flank troops on both sides of the Nu River and cutting off their supply routes by water.

When things came to this point, Mang Bai could only admit that he was unlucky, and immediately organized the main force of the Burmese army to prepare to go north to intercept Li Dingguo.

(End of chapter)