In August of the fifth year of Guangde, all regiments of the Eastern Expedition Army completed their withdrawal, and 200,000 troops were withdrawn from Nagasaki, Busan and other ports into the country in batches.
The Sixth Corps was in charge of the rear, and Zhao led his men to stay in Kyushu and continue to complete the final finishing tasks of the Eastern Expedition.
The so-called mopping up mission is to completely clean up the descendants of the evil god entrenched in the hinterland of Kyushu, leaving no one behind.
The war is over, but the killing continues.
Deng Changxiong was puzzled by the Sixth Corps' move to exterminate them all. In his opinion, the remaining Japanese pirates were insignificant. It was better to let them stay on the barren land, starve and freeze to death, and fend for themselves than to kill them directly. Good deal.
After all, the poor rats eat the cats, the dogs jump over the wall, and the Japanese pirates are at the end of their rope, so there is no need to kill them all.
However, Zhao Shujiao, the commander of the Sixth Corps, did not think so. He insisted on killing all Japanese pirates.
For this reason, Deng Changxiong and Zhao Lijiao had a fierce dispute.
The other corps don't care much about the remaining Japanese pirate forces on Kyushu Island, which means they can kill them or not.
It has been more than a year since the army marched eastward. At this moment, all the regiments are eager to return home as soon as possible and end this protracted war.
The long period of bloody killings caused serious damage to people's hearts. This was a great test for both the Japanese and Qi forces.
From Deng Changxiong's perspective, not killing the Japanese pirates immediately does not necessarily mean mercy. Death by starvation and freezing is a slow process;
From Zhao's point of view, burning and killing all the Japanese pirates does not mean cruelty, at least it can reduce the enemy's pain.
Zhao Shujiao has long been blinded by hatred. Regardless of it, he just wants to make Kyushu cleaner, so clean that there is no Japanese.
In the end, Deng Changxiong couldn't restrain Zhao Shujiao, who was almost crazy, and had to let him go.
~~~~~
After the eruption of Mount Fuji, the life and death of the Supreme Emperor and his whereabouts were unknown. Although Deng Changxiong was the nominal commander-in-chief of each corps, he did not have much deterrence.
In the absence of the Supreme Emperor, the commanders of the various corps did not pay much attention to Deng Changxiong.
The power chaos caused by the absence of the supreme power has spread to all the Qi Army Corps.
Chaos will soon spread from the army to ordinary people, thereby threatening the foundation of Daqi - the polar circle system.
Not everyone supports such a strong system.
The Da Qi Empire urgently needed a strong power center to fill the power vacuum caused by the lack of supreme power.
At present, various factions have different demands. Some people firmly support the "Chinese Land Acquisition System", while others dare not speak out against polarism.
Of course, more soldiers and civilians are confused and will support whoever can feed them.
Regardless of whether Guangde Emperor Liu Kan is ready or not, he must complete the reorganization and control of power as soon as possible, otherwise the empire will once again face the fate of falling apart.
At the end of August, the Guangdong campaign was basically over.
This war, which lasted for nearly two years, caused irreparable losses to both Daqi and the Japanese. The Qi army suffered more than 20,000 casualties, and the Japanese army suffered 300,000 casualties. Of course, the main force of the shogunate army was buried under the sea in the eruption of Mount Fuji volcano. Adding the casualties of soldiers and civilians of each domain, the Japanese country lost a total population of tens of millions.
If the remaining tens of thousands of Japanese people are not counted, the He clan can be said to have been completely exterminated.
Considering that Honshu and Shikoku have sunk to the bottom of the sea forever, Kyushu and Hokkaido have been completely cleaned up, and the tens of thousands of surviving Japanese people are scattered in the mountains of Kyushu and Hokkaido.
~~~
Massive amounts of grain and grass supplies were gathered at ports such as Busan and Dengzhou. It was initially estimated that about 10 million stones of rice were "collected" by the Qi army to various ports and transported back to Daqi by ships and merchant ships around the clock;
Grain and cloth waiting to be shipped piled up in mountains at various seaport terminals, and polished rice and wheat overflowed from the cracks in the gates like a flood.
As for the various samurai swords, armors, paper fans, lacquerware, gold and silver jewelry seized, there are countless...
Because there was nowhere to store and no way to transport a lot of materials, they had to be thrown into the sea and left to float. Of course, more of them were placed on the docks and no one cared about them.
This kind of wasteful behavior can be seen everywhere in various ports. The seizures from this Eastern Expedition were so rich that the food obtained was enough for the Qi army and civilians for two years, and the iron and copper materials obtained were enough to cast tens of thousands of cannons, so that the northern provinces mobilized tens of thousands of cannons. A cargo ship, along with the Imperial fleet, could not transport all the supplies.
Moreover, a considerable number of prisoners must be transported.
The Supreme Emperor once said that the most important resource in the seventeenth century was talent.
During this Eastern Expedition, no less than a million Japanese pirates were captured, half of whom had starved to death and froze to death. The remaining more than 50 people had gone through layers of selection, and nature selected the fittest to survive. They were the best miner seedlings.
Considering that the imperial industrial revolution is in full swing, coal mines, iron mines, ports, and salt wells in various places are in urgent need of a large number of cheap young labor.
These Japanese pirates, who have been selected at all levels and eliminated in multiple rounds, are undoubtedly the most suitable source of labor.
The essence of industrial revolution is to squeeze the labor force. Of course, the imperial textbooks talk about "the liberation of the working people." The working people here obviously do not include the Japanese captives who were transported to various parts of Qi to work hard.
Since the Eastern Expedition army captured Tsushima Island, civil affairs and chamber of commerce staff have successively escorted Japanese pirate prisoners back to the country. The once arrogant warriors were driven away like animals by civil affairs officials after more than ten days of rough seas. They got off the sampan and arrived at various ports. After being reorganized into teams, they were dispatched to mines and factories across the empire.
What awaits these people will be years or even decades of hard work that never sees the light of day, provided that these craftsmen live long enough to last more than ten years.
As for the treatment of Japanese women and children, the civil officials also showed sufficient wisdom.
In line with the principle of full utilization of resources, unmarried Japanese women under the age of 25 captured during this Eastern Expedition were given priority to Liaodong, Shandong, Hebei and other places, and distributed to local soldiers, farmers, and veterans to satisfy them. marriage needs.
In principle, it is required that no more than three Japanese women be allocated to each village, each fort, and each street, and these three people cannot be from the same domain to prevent them from escaping together.
Just when Xie Yang and others were worried, it turned out that the obedience to Nanquan in the blood of the women of the island country made these cross-border marriages go very smoothly, and there were basically no escaping, regretting, taking away the bride price and other immoral behaviors.
Most of the Japanese women who were over twenty-five years old or married were given good homes. Of course, the remaining stubborn ones who tried to avenge themselves were sent to the south of the Yangtze River in batches under the leadership of the Civil Affairs Bureau and organized by the Chamber of Commerce, especially the Soviet Union. In the Hangzhou area, the brothel industry there is currently a legal and compliant operation, and it is an industry that pays more taxes to Daqi. Many of these Japanese women have been sent to brothels in various states and counties to continue to contribute their meager efforts to the empire. .
Among the children captured by the Japanese state, those under the age of seven were placed in various prefectures in Korea to receive royal education, while those over the age of seven were directly sent to the army for training.
In short, the Emperor's "big cleanup" strategy has been implemented most thoroughly.
The Imperial Eastern Expeditionary Army plundered all the materials on the land of Japan.
According to the high priest Francisco, "not even a single inner treasury was left for the Japanese."
According to statistics, a total of 300,000 Japanese prisoners eventually returned to Daqi.
In fact, the total number of vassal armies and shogunate armies that surrendered to Da Qi far exceeded this number. It's just that the Qi army has limited transportation capacity and can only arrange a maximum of 300,000 prisoners. Most of the Japanese pirates are destined not to be able to board the ships returning to the west. What awaits these people will be a disaster more terrifying than earthquakes, volcanoes and floods.
~~~~~
"Father, where have you gone? If you don't explain me clearly, I will go to Japan to look for you!"
September 25th, Fengtian Hall, Forbidden City, Nanjing.
Liu Kan, the Emperor of Guangde, was in tears. He was sitting on the dragon chair, holding the whisk and armor that his father had used during his lifetime, and his body was shaking constantly.
The high priest, the chief steward, the generals of the Eastern Expedition Army, the cabinet ministers, the imperial guards, and the commanders of the raincoat guards all stood in front of the little emperor. Everyone lowered their heads and remained silent.
Dongfang Zhu took a step forward, grabbed the ground with his head, and cried out in tears: "Your Majesty, my crime is punishable by death! I failed to serve the Supreme Emperor well!"
Liu Kan gritted his teeth and turned to look at Zhang Dong:
"My father usually trusts you the most. In terms of seniority, you are all my elders. Such a big thing happened in the court. The Supreme Emperor disappeared, but you came back safe and sound. How can there be such a reason? Come on!"
Emperor Guangde claps his arms and rises.
"Take down Zhang Dong, push him out and chop him!"
