Counterfeit currency is something that has not happened in the era of paper money. There were also incidents of counterfeit currency being minted in the era of metal currency.
All kinds of shortages are as big as a thousand. The government and the private sector work together to drive out bad money and drive out good money. Every time, the people are bloodbathed, making the people miserable and miserable, and in one fell swoop the currency market is plunged into a bottomless abyss.
It can only be said that this thing is too profitable. It is similar to killing a chicken to obtain the eggs. As long as the people are not prepared, they can make a lot of money in a wave of cleaning, and their mouths will be full of oil.
As for what happens next...how many people really care?
Naturally, wealthy families have their own methods to stop losses, not to mention the ruling class. In the end, it is the wealth of the people that is bloodbathed, and the rulers will not care about this kind of thing.
Even if one or two conscientious officials raise objections, it will not change the overall situation.
The government will play this way, and of course the private sector will play this way too. Not everyone has a conscience. Who wouldn’t take action in this kind of money-making business? Therefore, if there are real coins, someone must make counterfeit coins. The only difference is the quantity and difficulty.
Some currencies are genuine and have a strong currency value, which makes it profitable to trade. Some currencies are so bad that they are unprofitable to trade.
Su Yonglin remembered that god-like joke——
Why are you making counterfeit money?
Because I can't make real money.
Regarding this kind of thing, Su Yonglin feels that there is no need to dialectically think about whether it will happen. Instead, we should consider when it will happen and the response strategy after it happens.
Because at this moment, Su Yonglin didn't have enough money to give up Bai Tiao.
In order to repair the Yellow River, to launch water conservancy projects in various places, and to restore vitality to the Central Plains, the Ming Empire's I-Tiao policy will inevitably continue to be used, and the "tradition" of borrowing money to do things will have to continue for a while.
Although we haven’t received any news about forged IOUs yet, we need to be prepared for a rainy day.
In order to avoid future fraud that would damage the government's credibility and affect future plans, Su Yonglin felt that it was necessary to upgrade Bai Tiao.
Anti-counterfeiting upgrade.
After investigation, Su Yonglin decided to use special water-textured paper as the material for all the white strips after the anti-counterfeiting upgrade.
Water-textured paper is also known as floral curtain paper. This kind of paper can show shiny lines or patterns other than curtain lines when viewed in the light. The purpose is to add the potential beauty of the paper. Its origin can be traced back to the Tang Dynasty.
In the early days, water-textured paper was mostly used as letter paper, poetry paper, and writing paper. It was purely a reflection of the leisurely mood of literati. Its main value lay in the artistic aspect, and only artists with money and leisure would care about this beauty.
After Su Yonglin made this decision, he ordered to buy out all the workshops and craftsmen who made water-grained paper in the Ming Dynasty, and imposed a monopoly on the entire water-grained paper industry by government order, prohibiting private production and sales.
All personnel with relevant skills were forcibly employed by the government as employees of the Ministry of Industry of the Ming Dynasty. They were given the status and treatment of officials and were forced to move to Zhongdu for close supervision and surveillance.
In addition, Su Yonglin also ordered the private sector to recycle a large amount of unused water-grained paper. He obtained all the water-grained paper before taking action and cut off the storage of private water-grained paper.
Fortunately, this kind of paper itself is also a high-end paper and is expensive. It is not a popular product that can be widely used by the people. Except for the literati and other people with money and leisure, it is not popular among the people, the output is not high, and it is not involved. It wasn't big, it didn't cause any waves.
In the end, the relevant people either surrendered to the Ministry of Industry of Ming Dynasty or kept silent after receiving sufficient compensation.
So on the 13th day after the founding of the People's Republic of China, Su Yonglin ordered the Ministry of Industry to ask the water-patterned paper production department to produce water-patterned paper with a new pattern, making it complicated and inconvenient to forge, as the basic material for IOU.
The pattern can be a work of art, a bird or an animal, or even a landscape painting. In short, it should be complex, with subtle tricks that are not easily discovered.
The best thing is to make people who want to forge despair, so that the price they have to pay far exceeds the benefits they can get, thereby forcing them to give up forging.
Later, in terms of writing on the pages of Bai Tiao, cinnabar was used as the writing material.
Cinnabar was either used to make elixirs or to write official documents. In this era, it generally had mysterious and solemn symbolic meanings. This color represented the importance of Bai Tiao.
In terms of writing, Su Yonglin also demanded the uniform use of prescribed characters and the engraving printing method. The engravings were stored in the warehouse of the Ministry of Finance. If the Privy Council and the Ministry of Industry wanted to use them, they must obtain permission from the Ministry of Finance.
After multiple layers of overweighting, a new set of white strip patterns appeared, and Su Yonglin saw the sample on the 28th day after taking the throne.
Everything else can be ignored, except for the landscape painting hidden deep in it when facing the sun, which is quite graceful and adds a romantic mood to this vulgar thing for no reason.
This feeling is like turning currency into a work of art, which is quite aesthetic.
This is how we will make banknotes in the future, right?
Su Yonglin suddenly had such an idea.
Although the cost may be slightly higher, it is still a piece of paper after all. There is plenty of time to improve the process, and it is more cost-effective than using copper to cast money.
Su Yonglin ordered to reward the craftsmen who completed this innovation, and mass-produced part of this batch of white bars for reserve.
This time, in order to recruit 100,000 civilians from the Shandong area to assist with military logistics, the Privy Council submitted a batch of IOU applications to the Ministry of Finance at the request of the Shandong local government.
After the Ministry of Finance reviewed and confirmed that it was compliant and feasible, they approved it and decentralized this batch of IOUs to the private sector.
At the same time, the Shandong province began to explain the styles and differences of new Baitiaos, and opened the business of exchanging old Baitiaos for new Baitiaos in equal amounts, encouraging people to exchange unused old Baitiaos for new Baitiaos, setting the stage for the next step. Make preparations to clean up the flow of Baitiao among the people.
Su Yonglin also ordered that the exchange of old IOUs and new IOUs should be limited to a limited time. After a certain time limit, the old IOUs would be invalidated and exchanges would no longer be allowed, thus accelerating the upgrading of private IOUs.
It is too easy to forge the old IOU.
Taking advantage of the war, the Ming government under the leadership of Su Yonglin prepared many things, and did not just wait for the victory of the war and the acquisition of Sui coins.
Although this battle must be won, the Ming government still needs to do too many things.
At the same time, on the front line of Haizhou in Shandong Province, Zhou Zhi also obtained a large amount of information on the movements of the Song army through the second operation team of the Skynet Army, which penetrated deeply into the Song Dynasty.
Judging from the intelligence on the movements of the Song Army, it is not that the Song Army did not do any intelligence work at all.
They obviously also knew that the Ming army was gathering in Haizhou and were preparing for large-scale operations, and correspondingly strengthened the naval alert force in the Jianghuai area and the defense force of Zhenjiang Prefecture and Jiankang Prefecture on the south bank of the Yangtze River.
Judging from the layout of the Ming army, the Song court clearly judged that the Ming army planned to launch an attack from Haizhou, go all the way south, break through the Huaihe Yangtze River defense line and set foot on the land south of the Yangtze River.
Therefore, it is not surprising at all that they strengthened the defenses of Zhenjiang Prefecture and Jiankang Prefecture.
According to the intelligence of the Ming army, it can be known that the number of Song troops in Zhenjiang Prefecture is said to be 50,000, but the actual number is about 40,000. The number of Song troops in Jiankang Prefecture is said to be 70,000, but the actual number is about 40,000.
Both armies were starved of pay, but one side ate more and the other side ate less.
From this point of view, Wang Quan is indeed a fool.
As for the navy, the Song Army's navy in the Huaihe area can basically only be regarded as patrol and alert, with only a few dozen warships. As part of the combat navy, it is concentrated on the Yangtze River defense line, with the number of warships exceeding 200. The number of divisions is about three thousand.
More than 300 Mingzhou naval warships and more than 7,000 sailors, the main force of the Song Navy, were still anchored at the port of Dinghai County and did not take any action.
Based on this judgment, it is obvious that the Song Dynasty believed that the Ming Navy had the possibility of attacking from the sea to Lin'an, so it asked the Mingzhou Navy to become the Great Sea Wall of Lin'an City.
So this battle is between 63,000 Ming army and 90,000 Song army.
The difference in strength between the two sides is not too big, and they can barely be considered evenly matched. However, considering that the Song army has a home field advantage in fighting and may increase its troops at any time, the Ming army still needs to fight quickly.
