In this day and age, raising troops costs money, and it costs a lot of money.
Liu Bei Group now only has four counties in Jingzhou. Among them, Yidu County was separated from the original Nan County. In fact, it still controls the territory of the original three counties in Jingzhou.
The total registered population in these places is about 120,000 households, or 6.7 million people.
If we look at official data, Jingzhou has 60,000 soldiers, which is considered a military force.
Ten people raising one soldier is the limit of endurance in any era.
But in fact, there were nearly 80,000 soldiers in Jingzhou.
This has to be said about a strange phenomenon of this era - the difference between the actual population and the registered population.
The registered population of 120,000 households does not mean that there are only that many people in Jingzhou. Many people are actually refugees and hermits who have been hidden away by aristocratic families.
These people do not have to pay taxes, but they do not have household registration. They are also tenant farmers of aristocratic families, or farmers, and their number is no less than the registered population.
To give a simple example, after Sima Yan of the Western Jin Dynasty destroyed the Kingdom of Wu, according to statistics from the household registration books at that time, there were only more than 9 million people in the world. Then there were marketing accounts and at the peak of the Sui Dynasty, the population was more than 5,000 Thousands of people make comparisons, which illustrates the serious consequences of the troubled times in the Three Kingdoms.
But these people would not explain to everyone that just five years later, Sima Yan conducted a census, and the final result was that there were more than 16 million Dingkou in the world.
In five years, it has almost doubled. The more than seven million people cannot be all the new babies and children born in these five years, right? !
This was the result of a general survey when Sima Yan did not dare to offend the family in a big way.
Of course, this does not mean that we are going to clear the ground for the troubled times of the Three Kingdoms. After all, in such troubled times, it is true that the mortality rate of the people is high and the population is declining sharply. And it is true that the princes of this era should take the blame, but it is not as bad as ten. Deposit is so serious.
Well, back to the topic.
Because the aristocratic families hid a large number of people, the tax revenue of the princes was greatly affected. Therefore, the aristocratic families also had to make certain concessions in this regard.
For example, in Jiangdong, they adopted the "World Military System". Except for the tens of thousands of troops directly controlled by Sun Quan, the other soldiers were private soldiers of wealthy families. Sun Quan did not spend a penny to raise the troops.
This has its advantages and disadvantages. The biggest advantage is that under Sun Quan's control, the actual ratio of soldiers to civilians can be greatly reduced, leaving the burden of raising soldiers to those aristocratic families and reclusive households who do not pay taxes.
Cao Wei was different. Cao Wei used military and civilian villages to raise its troops.
Regardless of whether it is a military camp or a civilian camp, these camp residents are not included in the household registration. In other words, Cao Wei's real military-civilian ratio is not too high. The real sufferers are a large number of camp residents.
As for Liu Bei, because it started late, it took five or six years from the occupation of Jingzhou to the capture of Yizhou. There was still no time to completely sort out matters in this area, so the Liu Bei Group adopted a compromise method-let the family The wealthy families provided money and food in exchange for Liu Bei's group's acquiescence in hiding their population.
There was nothing that could be done about it. Liu Bei had a weak foundation and did not have enough time to sort out the internal situation, so he could only adopt a compromise and emergency plan.
In other words, there are only 120,000 registered households in Jingzhou, but they have as many as 80,000 soldiers. However, in addition to the large number of soldiers, the burden of paying taxes and raising soldiers in the registered population is actually not very heavy.
Most of the expenses for raising soldiers are provided by the wealthy families.
Zhang Xi knew this situation, so when considering how to increase the combat effectiveness of the Jingzhou Army, he did not consider the idea of increasing troops.
There may be no shortage of money and food, but the recruitment of soldiers will always occupy a share of the population and corvee labor. The 120,000 households of self-cultivated farmers may be able to support 80,000 soldiers financially, but if the recruitment is further expanded, the population cannot support it.
Recruiting soldiers for service can only be done from farmers with household registration or refugees who have fled. No wealthy family will take the initiative to take out their hidden Dingkou and give it to Zhang Xi to train as soldiers.
Therefore, if we want to improve the combat effectiveness of the Jingzhou Army, we cannot change the number of people, so we can only think of ways from the aspect of ordnance.
For this reason, Zhang Xi thought for a long time about how to improve ordnance and improve the field combat capabilities of his soldiers.
These days, in addition to hand-to-hand combat, the biggest offensive weapon in field battles is the crossbow. Zhang Xi doesn't have a good solution.
In terms of bows and arrows, it takes about a year to obtain a qualified archer. Zhang Xi cannot quickly increase the number of archers in a short period of time.
Therefore, even though Zhang Xi has a so-called "assembly line" operation that can speed up the production of bows and arrows and other ordnance, Zhang Xi will still be restricted by this era in terms of the number of archers.
Crossbow soldiers are a good choice.
It's just that the range of hand-held crossbows is relatively short. You only have three or four chances to shoot on the battlefield, and you have to be protected by heavy troops before you can shoot. After shooting, you have to retreat and rest, and you can only take physical action after changing weapons. Fighting is very troublesome.
The operation of the crossbow is too troublesome. A crossbow team requires three to five people. Zhang Xi does not have enough manpower to train the crossbow troops on a large scale.
To be honest, Zhang Xi had the heart to go to Chengdu and ask that dead fish head to get Zhuge Liannu out quickly to see what it looked like, and to draw and save it to save it from being lost again.
By the way, there are also wooden cows and flowing horses. I always feel that it cannot be something as simple as a wheelbarrow.
Well, I’m talking too much, let’s go back to Jingzhou Army ordnance.
In the absence of a good way to improve long-range weapons, Zhang Xi thought about it and seemed to have no choice but to use hand-held melee weapons.
Guan Yu increased the proportion of long sword soldiers because he disliked the inconvenience of spear soldiers and shield soldiers to climb the city wall to attack. Wouldn't it be nice to think of a weapon that can be used in both field battles and city siege? !
Zhang Xi thought hard about this for several days and locked two things.
One is a Pu Dao, and the other is a Miao Dao.
The Pu Dao is usually just a short knife, but you can add a long handle at any time and turn it into a machete like the one used by Song Jiang in "Water Margin".
The simple sword, which can be long or short, can be turned into a short sword for attacking during siege, or it can be turned into a machete for showing its power in field battles. It is simply the most ideal weapon nowadays.
As for the Miao Dao, it was made by Marshal Qi to chop Japanese pirates. It is much longer than the current standard weapon Huanshou Dao. The blade is thin and can be used for both stabbing and slashing. It is also suitable for Zhang Xi. Features common to field sieges.
But Zhang Xi always felt that the length of the Miao Dao was still a bit short after all, and he would suffer a loss when encountering a spear or something, so he just put the Miao Dao as an option and gave priority to trial production of the Pu Dao.
But during this trial production, something went wrong.
The first is a problem with the workmanship. In fact, this was the area where Zhang Xi thought the problem was least likely to occur.
Since the former Han Dynasty salt and iron official operation, the government has created many official iron smelting areas in various places, and the scale of some places is already very large.
The huge number of iron smelting areas not only brought a large number of iron tools, but more importantly, caused the iron smelting technology to be greatly developed.
Leaving aside some improvements in details, ancient Chinese iron-smelting skills began to appear in the Spring and Autumn Period, were perfected in the Wei, Jin, Southern and Northern Dynasties, and remained almost unchanged for more than 1,500 years.
Whether it is steel-making, steel-frying, or steel-filling, it actually existed in the late Eastern Han Dynasty.
Qi Guanhuaiwen's steel filling method only combined the experience of predecessors, improved the process, improved efficiency, and was completely recorded for the first time.
Just like Cai Lun who improved paper, Qi Wuhuaiwen only improved the method of filling steel.
Therefore, Zhang Xi originally thought that in terms of iron smelting technology, Zhang Xi had no place where he could use his advantages as a time traveler unless you built a blast furnace for steelmaking.
When it comes to blast furnace steelmaking, Zhang Xi only knows the words "blast furnace steelmaking" and doesn't even know what a blast furnace looks like.
But reality is not like this.
In this regard, Zhang Xi looks at the problem from the perspective of a later generation, without considering the actual situation of this era at all.
Yes, steel has been made over the years, but it is really time-consuming and laborious to build a weapon that has been made from steel.
These days, there is not even a hydraulic stamping machine. The so-called Hundred Refining method really requires the blacksmith to hammer it repeatedly, relying solely on human power to hit it hundreds of times.
Legend has it that it took Cao Cao three years to build five hundred-refined steel knives. It was really too extravagant to use hundreds of steel-refining swords to make ordnance.
There is also a method of frying steel, but in this era, this skill is really not something that ordinary blacksmiths can master. It is basically a secret that is not passed down by some old craftsmen, and is passed down from male to female.
Moreover, the operation of the steel frying method relies heavily on the experience and luck of the blacksmith. Even for the most experienced master blacksmith, the chance of frying the steel is 100%, and most of them have good wrought iron.
Moreover, the steel frying method has very high requirements for fuel. It is definitely not possible to use charcoal. Coal must be used.
But these days, coal is really hard to find.
As for the steel filling method, even the most experienced old blacksmith has only heard of it, but if you ask him how to do it specifically - he doesn't know.
Zhang Xi was speechless and realized what his problem was.
From the perspective of later generations, the steel filling method has already appeared in the Eastern Han Dynasty, but it does not mean that this technology has been completely mature and has been widely popularized.
Just like paper appeared in the Western Han Dynasty, Cai Lun in the Eastern Han Dynasty had improved the paper manufacturing process, but now people still use bamboo slips and silk as carriers of writing.
The steel filling method did exist, but in this era it was probably kept secret, or the technique was not perfect and was not taken seriously, so most blacksmiths didn't know it existed.
It doesn't matter if the craftsmen don't know, Zhang Xi knows. Qi Wuhuaiwen's steel filling method is not difficult to understand. It is to make the pig iron and wrought iron stick to each other, and then let the pig iron melt and merge into the wrought iron, and adjust the wrought iron. The carbon content in it.
Although I don’t know what the ratio of pig iron to wrought iron should be, I just need to experiment with the ratio a few times.
However, this method still has a troublesome problem - like the steel frying method, this thing consumes coal.
(End of chapter)
