Lieutenant General Li Zhongzheng followed Lieutenant General Zhou Chang (previously written as a major general, now promoted to one level) and walked quickly into the capital room of General Li Zhongshan. During this period of time, they are probably the hardest people in the whole Ming Dynasty.

Zhou Chang and Li Zhongzheng are now in charge of the left and right military divisions of the General's Mansion. Among them, Zhou Chang was the military division of the Left Army, responsible for the military orders of the whole country, and was also responsible for formulating the Northern Expedition plan and supervising the implementation of the Northern Expedition plan. Li Zhong is the right military division of the army, mainly responsible for the recruitment, establishment and training of the army. Now the Ming Dynasty has entered a wartime state, and the Ming army is inflated like a balloon, but it can still maintain a relatively good order, so as not to leak air everywhere in a hurry, these two military divisions really paid their greatest efforts.

After more than a year of expansion and training, the military strength in the Nanjing General's Mansion is now as high as 1 million in terms of the number of people alone! Kangxi's five-way army is 800,000 or something, I really don't know how much water there is? And the one million land and water army in the Nanjing General's Mansion is real, and not a drop of water can be squeezed out.

And this million-strong army not only spread throughout the territory of the Ming Dynasty, but also three powerful expeditionary forces appeared on the American continent, Malacca and Luzon. And an oceanic fleet of 60 sail warships is now unknown where?

In addition, in the western Pacific region, the Ming also controlled several key strongholds with a small number of troops, including Kushiro Castle on Ezo Island, which has become a disputed territory of Asahi; Hoi An Fortress on the edge of the territory of General Quang Nam of Annam, nestled on the South China Sea; In Nanqi City, which originally belonged to Chenla and is now controlled by the Mo's Nanqi General's Mansion who fled from Annam; In the northern part of the Malay Peninsula, Pattani Castle is controlled by the Pattani Commander-in-Chief, who also came out of Annam.

In addition to the above-mentioned armed forces that belong to the Ming Empire on the surface, there are also three "military trading companies" under the Ming General's Mansion, namely the Ming Nanyang Trading Company, the Ming Yuehai Trading Company and the Great Mongolian East India Trading Company.

These various armed forces add up together, and the millions of people are only a lot more!

To assist General Li in managing such huge military assets, the weight of responsibility and pressure on the shoulders of Li Zhongzheng and Zhou Chang, the two most important military staff members in the general's palace, was unprecedented.

Among these two people, Zhou Chang was still a "pure military division", and he only had to lead the troops of the Left Military Division to formulate battle plans according to Li Yat-sen's instructions, and at the same time constantly sent people to the localities to supervise and inspect. Although things are cumbersome and difficult, it is Li Yat-sen who has the big idea. But Li Zhongzheng's role is different, he is not only the right army division, but also the actual "deputy general", and the successor of Li Zhongshan's "internal determination". This Ming general, Lu Shangshushi, is not a hereditary position, and Li Zhongshan does not want to be hereditary.

Hereditary, how can it be republic? He was quite serious about the republic. Moreover, the emperor will be overthrown by the revolution, and the shogun will not be able to deal with it. He is not even a rare throne, and he will guard a broken general and pass it on to his children and grandchildren?

Therefore, the future of his sons is to inherit his title and property, and how far they can go in the military and political arena depends on their own creation.

In his opinion, the position of general or prime minister in the future is best to go around between several major families, everyone does it, and finally let it go to others to do it. In this way, everyone will be a "general's family", and they can "protect each other" in the future!

And this "Zhongshan" to "Zhongzheng", it seems to be very appropriate, right?

Of course, this "internal determination" refers to the fact that in the heart of General Li Zhongshan and General Li decided that he could take over, on the surface, General Li didn't say anything, if he said it, then there will soon be "two suns" in the General's Mansion!

Therefore, Li Zhongshan is now just arranging for Li Zhongzheng to sit in Nanjing after he goes on the Northern Expedition, and staying behind is almost the status of Xiahou Dan's "Brother Xuan" in Boss Cao, considering that he is Li Zhongshan's good third brother, the two brothers are so good that they even look similar, and it is normal to give a "Brother Xuan" status.

In addition, since Li Zhongshan has "decided" Li Zhongzheng to take over, he naturally takes a very heavy responsibility on weekdays, and there are many tests, and there are all kinds of hot or offending errands handed over to him to deal with.

And now Li Zhongshan is about to take the general's mansion to Xuzhou to command the Northern Expedition army, and of course Li Zhongzheng has to deal with this matter of trouble in the south of the Yangtze River.

If he can't deal with this little thing, then I'm afraid this class won't be able to pick him up

When Li Zhongzheng followed Zhou Chang into the capital room, Yao Qisheng, who was also in charge of the Jinyi Guard, was reporting to Li Zhongshan with a heavy face about the military situation of the Qing Dynasty and the Great Zhou that he had just discovered.

All kinds of signs show that the strategy of 'one country guarding one city' provided by Shang Shuying is fake! Kangxi's true intention is likely to divide his troops into four to five routes, concentrate hundreds of thousands of troops, and fight a decisive battle with me on the line from Kaifeng to Xuzhou! If the war is unfavorable, it will be possible to pick up the strategy of 'one country defending one city' again. At present, it is certain that the Spanish Armada and the Japanese mercenaries will undertake one or two of these routes and attack from the southeast sea in order to threaten the land south of the Yangtze River and force our army to divide troops along the coasts of Jiangsu, Zhejiang, Fujian, and Guangdong, and waste troops! ”

Li Zhongshan was very calm, sat on the chair, lowered his head and took a sip of tea, raised his head and just wanted to say something, when he heard the loud voice of the guards at the door of the capital room and the roll call. He looked towards the door again, and saw that Li Zhongzheng and Zhou Chang had already walked in quickly to salute him.

Li Zhongshan nodded lightly: "Third child, Peigong, you came just in time, everyone just happened to discuss together."

Li Zhongzheng asked cautiously, "Second brother, what are you discussing?" Is it about the discovery of the main force of the Spanish Armada off the coast of Hangzhou Bay? The Spanish Armada must have brought Japanese mercenaries this time, right? If they want to land in Hangzhou Bay, the chosen landing site is either Zhapu or Yuyao" He glanced at Zhou Chang: "Just now Pei Gong and I talked about the difficulties of fighting against Japanese people along the coast, you might as well listen to his analysis first." ”

Li Zhongshan waved his hand: "Third brother, I will give you the errand left behind in the General's Mansion, the defense of the southeast coast is naturally fully responsible for you, and Xizhi will also stay in Nanjing to assist you, you can discuss and deal with this matter." I'm going to ask you one thing now, do you want to leave you with more troops? ”

Li Zhongzheng shook his head: "No need, second brother, the troops you have at hand are actually not very large, our army is said to be one million people, but the navy accounts for seventy or eighty thousand establishments, the General's Mansion and the Eight Governors Division occupy another twenty or thirty thousand establishments, and the commanders, general soldiers, Xietai, and garrison generals of the ten provinces occupy more than 100,000 establishments, and Huguang and Liangguang will each leave a legion for our father and our eldest brother, plus the legion left to me. That's half a million people!

Together with the troops deployed on Bintan, Luzon, Ryukyu, Ezo and the American continent, it is almost 100,000 again. Out of a million people, there are at most 400,000 left available. ”

It's really a soldier who hates less when he uses it!

When a million soldiers send money, it's a million dollars! Food, salary, and military funds, coupled with the consumption of the army and civilians, after the Northern Expedition army is fully launched, the military expenditure of 10 million taels a month does not seem to be enough, and if you want to fight a little richer, that is, 12 million taels a month.

But if it really wants to be used on the blade, there must be no 400,000 of these 400,000 troops refers to the number of Ming troops (excluding the people) who crossed the Huai River and entered the northern Central Plains!

If the people are allocated according to the ratio of one to one, then the number of the Northern Expedition army can reach 800,000!

In Xuzhou, a place of war north of Huaibei, 800,000 people were gathered. Well, I'm the advantage!

And this kind of 12 million two months of war, Rao is the Ming Dynasty, which holds the two economic centers of Jiangnan and Guangfu, actually can't fight for long. The reason why Li Yat-sen chose to make a truce with the Qing Dynasty and the Great Zhou a few years ago was actually to rectify the internal situation and accumulate military spending.

However, after saving for several years, Li Zhongshan has not even paid off the tens of millions of "huge debts" owed by Zhu Cijiong's "debt master" in his early years.

Of course, the extra 50 million yuan was not caused by Zhu Cijiong's extravagance as the emperor, but was spent on serious things, such as the large-scale construction of the navy, the construction of shipyards, arsenals, iron mines, and iron factories, as well as the construction of the Yellow River, the Huai River, the canal, and other "three rivers comprehensive management project", the construction of the "Huaibei and Huainan irrigation projects", the coastal fortress coastal defense project, and the large-scale military expansion, military training, and military reserves in the past year or so. Tens of millions of taels of silver, just like that!

And once the army crosses the Huai River and enters the frontier area, the cost in the future will be even more amazing!

According to the budget jointly prepared by the Great General's Mansion and Shangshu Province, from the beginning of the army's crossing of the Huai River to the victory of the Northern Expedition, the Ming Dynasty had to prepare 12 million yuan per month for military spending alone. That's 144 million taels a year! After two years, it will cost almost 300 million!

And the military budget prepared by the Great General's Mansion and Shangshu Province for this Northern Expedition is 300 million!

That is, you can only play for two years at most, and there will be no more.

And half of the 300 million military spending, that is, 150 million taels, had to be raised by relying on war bonds. With this huge debt, after the victory of the Northern Expedition, Daming's debt will be able to reach 250 million taels. What a real debt!

It is also thanks to Li Zhongshan's understanding of finance that he began to build a financial system with big banks as the core very early, and also used various methods to network large and small money banks in Daming, as well as Fujian, Guangdong, and maritime merchants, Lianghuai salt merchants, Jiangnan private merchants, tea merchants and other big businessmen.

And this system is highly controllable for the Ming court!

Therefore, the Ming court was able to set a high price for the credit of the heavily indebted Ming court through this financial system - this means that the Ming Dynasty can find a large number of public bonds at a lower interest rate and not worry about not being able to send them. Moreover, it can also allow banks and money banks in the Ming Dynasty to hold the public bonds of the Ming Dynasty as high-quality assets.

But now is not the era of credit money after all, so the debt expansion of the Ming court is not "unlimited", and the total public debt of 250 million taels is not far away, if not the limit.

Therefore, Li Yat-sen did not have much time at hand, and of course Li Zhongzheng knew about this difficulty, so he was not willing to divide Li Yat-sen's soldiers for him. If Li Yat-sen had used fewer troops for the Northern Expedition, it might have taken more time to complete the Northern Expedition.

After listening to his brother's answer, Li Zhongshan nodded with satisfaction: "I have 800,000 people, and the advantage of the Northern Expedition is great...... Within a year, it will inevitably be able to return to the court.

Third brother, as long as you can hold out in the southeast for a year and don't let the Japanese and Xiyi succeed, it will be considered a great achievement. ”

"Second brother, please rest assured," Li Zhongzheng said with a smile, "It's just a widow, why bother?" Zhongzheng has its own way to annihilate them all on the coast of the East China Sea! ”

Looking at his appearance, it seems that he has a full grasp, and Li Zhongshan is of course relieved.

"Good!" Li Zhongshan smiled and ordered, "Then the southeast matter, the foolish brother will entrust all the things to the younger brother!" ”

Li Zhongzheng clenched his fists: "Second brother, junior brother has to order!" ”

Li Zhongshan nodded, the Northern Expedition is already ready to fly! A large number of troops have already been drawn to the north, and armed civilians have been recruited in Huaibei, Huainan and other frontier areas, and the strategy of the Northern Expedition to the Central Plains -- that is, the plan of "step by step, until Beijing" -- has been elaborated and completed by Zhou Chang, the left army division of the Great General's Office, and a group of troops to join the army.

It is no exaggeration to say that an incomparably huge war machine, now fully activated, is rolling slowly but resolutely towards Beijing, the capital of the Qing Empire, with a crushing momentum!

Although Kangxi had several large armies, Li Yat-sen only went all the way to Beijing. And as long as Kangxi has no way to stop the rolling wheels of this war machine, his Qing Dynasty will be more than lucky!

In the twenty-second year of Kangxi, autumn.

In the city of Beijing, the Qing Emperor Kangxi was also engrossed in staring at the invasion of the Spanish Armada and the Japanese on the southeast coast of the Ming Dynasty.

Li Yat-sen's "800,000 army" in the Northern Expedition, if there were several heads one by one, there would definitely be one, and whether it was a regular soldier or a civilian, it would definitely be strong.

However, Kangxi's "800,000" cannot be said to have or not, it all depends on the progress of the war. If it goes well, all parties will work hard to add chips to the table, and 800,000 may really be there.

If the situation is not good, it is difficult to say. Not only did Wu Zhou and Golden Horde Galdan not necessarily follow, but even within the Qing Dynasty, it was difficult to say that no one would oppose the Qing Dynasty and Xiang Ming - the loyalty of those loyal ministers of the Great Qing Dynasty was a bit "much", so much that many monarchs could share it!

In the end, only the 200,000 heartfelt army of the Qing Dynasty fought a decisive battle with the Ming Dynasty against 800,000 around Beijing, and the advantage was in the enemy!

"Xuan Ye, has Li Zhongshan sent troops?"

This year's 71-year-old Empress Dowager Bumu Butai was walking by the water side of the Taiye Pool supported by Empress Yang Xiaomi, when she suddenly asked about military affairs that she rarely cared about.

Although Emperor Kangxi, who is now over 30 years old, is preoccupied, he still has a confident face, and when he heard the old queen's question, he just smiled and said: "I have already sent troops to swear on the eighth day of the ninth month, and I said that I would go straight to Huanglong, and I said that if I can't break Shengjing, I won't pay it back." ”

"Yo, even Sheng Jing is going to be broken!" Yang Xiaomi furrowed her brows, "You don't plan to leave us Daqing at all?" ”

Kangxi snorted: "That's all his wishful thinking!" The Spanish Invincible Armada carrying 20,000 Japanese pirates has arrived in Hangzhou Bay in the past two days, if he really dares to ignore it, as soon as those Japanese invaders land, the southeast will be miserable!

In addition, Wu Yingqi's envoy Guo Zhuangtu also arrived in Beijing in the past two days, bringing the news that Wu Zhou was preparing to launch an army of 100,000 to threaten Hubei, and the 100,000 army entered Henan as soon as Wu Zhou's 100,000 arrived in Henan, and King Gong's available soldiers at hand could reach 300,000, counting the people who accompanied the army, there were about 600,000. ”

"600,000 against 800,000. It seems that there are still a lot of people on the Ming side. Bumu Butai was still a little worried, "Also, although Changning is assisted by Laita, Bahai, and Feiyangu, his opponent is Li Zhongshan!" Can Chang Ning beat him? ”

Kangxi did not personally lead the army to confront Li Zhongshan this time, but named Changning as the general of Fuyuan, and ordered Laita, Bahai, and Feiyangu, the Manchurian tiger generals, to assist Changning.

And Kangxi himself is in Beijing, in the middle of the dispatch.

This made Bumu Butai a little worried...... Although Kangxi also seems to have a hard time fighting Li Zhongshan, Chang Ning's kung fu seems to be worse.

"Huang Mama, don't worry, there are a number of grandchildren, if you really want to fight a decisive battle with Li Yat-sen on the Xuzhou-Kaifeng line, your grandson will naturally lead the white-armored elite soldiers and the cavalry of Chahar Mongolia to rush to the front line together." Kangxi smiled, "But it's not necessary yet." ”

"Not necessary yet?" Bu Mu Butai frowned, "Li Zhongshan has already gone north...... You will be able to arrive in Xuzhou in a few days. After the Spring Festival, his soldiers should go all the way north from Shandong to our Beijing city, right?

Xuan Ye, you have to think clearly...... The closer the Northern Expeditionary Army of the Ming Dynasty is to our city of Beijing, the less authority you, the emperor, will have. All parties will be tempted! If you really want to defend a city with the strength of a country, the risk is extremely great! ”

"Huang Ma rest assured, her grandson actually has a clever plan to break the enemy." Kangxi smiled, "It's just that this trick is a bit detrimental to Yin morality, and Sun Er is the emperor, the lord of the north, so it's really not suitable to use." That's why Chang Ning went through this for his grandson. When he has a good plan, his grandson will go south to command the whole army, and he may be able to win a great victory. ”

"Detrimental to Yin's morality? What exactly is the bad move? Bumu Butai said in his heart: Are you still afraid of this? Your little yin virtue has long been lost, and now even if you eat vegetarian wood fish every day, you can't make up for it. ”

"Huang Ma Ma," Emperor Kangxi looked left and right, and found that there were no outsiders, so he leaned closer to Bumu Butai, "Grandson wants to replace the soldiers with water......"

(End of chapter)