When Liu Xin came to Jingang this time, she did not come alone. She was accompanied by several generals of the Liu family, and as many as a thousand of the Liu family's servants who moved the world - Jiangbo Yiding.
After the Yunnan-Burma War, the number of Liu family servants increased to just over 4,000. This time, Liu Wei handed over a quarter of the Liu family's wealth to his sister and asked her to bring her to Jingang.
When making this decision, Liu Wei didn't even know what conditions Huang Zhiting offered his sister. The only thing he knew was that his sister had been smart since she was a child, and she would not squander the Liu family's wealth.
It wasn't until the Thousand Japanese Yiding arrived in Dingnan that Liu Xin wrote back to Liu Wei. Although the letter did not directly explain it, it also hinted at something.
For example, Huang Zhiting once said that Beijing has always had a tradition of rewarding based on merit. Generally speaking, where meritorious services are performed, rewards will be given there.
For example, Gao Silian, who once served as the Huaying colonial envoy, had made great contributions to the opening up of the Huaying territory. Therefore, although he is now serving in southern Myanmar, he has 3,000 acres of fertile land and about 500 acres of homestead in Huaying with high pragmatic rewards. . After he made meritorious service in Myanmar, he was rewarded with a large warehouse land in Daguang Port (later Yangon) in southern Myanmar (only the land was given, and he needed to build it according to Beijing standards), and a slave building in Bago City. The Marquis's mansion confiscated by the Burmese royal family.
At that time, Gao Silian was only a general in the field, and his status was no more than a pragmatic servant, so his rewards were already so generous. But this time Liu Xin was used as a "commander in the field", and he was going to fight a "battle to destroy the country." As long as the battle is won smoothly, the reward the Liu family will receive will definitely not be a small amount, which will only be beneficial to the strengthening of the Liu family's strength.
After all, whether the general is strong depends on the servant, and whether the servant is strong depends on how much money he can spend.
A powerful general like Tieling Li can produce 40,000 servants. Even more powerful is Gao Pragmatic. Liu Wei didn't even know how many servants he had.
Anyway, if all the members of the Gao family from all over the world are counted together, Liu Wei feels that even if Gao Pragmatic wants to gather an army of 100,000, it will not be difficult.
Fortunately, most of the Gao family's servants who actually operate according to the "Jingzhi Army" are in various countries in southern Xinjiang. In the Ming Dynasty, except for a small number of servant escorts stationed in Jianxinzhai and Sanshenyuan in the capital, they are basically used to protect the people in other areas. There are factory teams and mine protection teams, as well as the cavalry who run outside the entrance all year round. Generally speaking, they are not that conspicuous.
However, the Gao family's "Navy Master" is very strong and barely conceals it, which is different from the "Land Master" style. Everyone in the court, whether they were relatives or officials, knew that Gao Pragmatic's "fleet" was very powerful. Not only did it "cross the North and South Oceans", but even the main inland rivers in the country were almost all Gao's ships. The team’s sphere of influence.
The navy... In the eyes of ordinary people, "no matter how strong you are, you can't get ashore." Therefore, no one in the Ming Dynasty thinks that someone can rebel by relying on the navy. It doesn't matter how powerful the Gao family's fleet is - your hometown in Xinzheng is still in the Ming Dynasty. Well, how dare you not do anything to your ancestral graves?
But Liu Xin's current feelings are probably completely different from those of the Dukes of the imperial court.
In her opinion, Gao Pragmatic's strength in Southern Xinjiang, just from what she saw with her own eyes, was already terrifying.
Liu Xin, who had stayed with Huang Zhiting for several months, knew that after the "big military expansion in southern Xinjiang" a year ago, Gao Jinggong's strength in southern Xinjiang had reached a new peak.
As for the Army Division, Beijing now has five main garrison forces in southern Xinjiang, namely the Thang Long Garrison, the Jingang Garrison, the Vientiane Garrison, the Dingnan Garrison, and the Bago Garrison.
Among them, the establishment of each garrison is somewhat different. According to Huang Zhiting's suggestion, Gao Jinggong readjusted the establishment and strength of the five major garrison in early October last year.
According to the latest establishment, the most powerful garrison has now become the Dingnan garrison, with a total force of 50,000 people. The defense area it is responsible for is "Siam's largest territory" including Angkor and Chiang Mai. Moreover, this garrison is not fighting alone. It is also supported by the "Annan Assistance Defense Force" including Huang Zhiting's wolf soldiers and Burmese surrender troops. This "Association Defense Force" also has nearly 30,000 people.
The second strongest one is the Thang Long Guard Army, which still maintains a heavy force of 50,000. The reason why it is ranked behind the Dingnan Garrison Army is because this army has been in a state of "supplying blood" to other friendly forces from the outbreak of the Yunnan-Burma War until now. The veterans in the army have been deployed one after another, and now It is already a force with nearly 40,000 new recruits - there are only about 10,000 veterans left, and its strength is much worse than at its peak.
Moreover, after Dingna City was planned by Gao Pragmatic as the core of southern Xinjiang in the future, Gao Pragmatic was also the most generous in replenishing the Dingnan Garrison. New muskets and artillery were first equipped with the Dingnan Garrison after they were finalized and mass-produced. Relatively speaking, It is said that the status and strength of the Thang Long Garrison have declined accordingly.
In third place is the Golden Port Guard Army. The situation of the Golden Port Garrison is opposite to that of the Thang Long Garrison. Since Gao Pragmatic has already planned to attack the Mekong Delta, its importance is on the rise. Its strength has also been increased from the previous 30,000 to 40,000, and its equipment priority has also been increased. Relatively forward.
Ranked fourth is the Bago Guard Army. In addition to guarding the "restored" "Bago Kingdom", this garrison also has the remaining territory of the Toungoo Dynasty within its surveillance scope. However, since the "Bago Kingdom" itself still has some areas where Mon people live, The army (reorganized from the former rebels and temporarily disbanded) exists, so the number of this garrison is only maintained at 30,000.
However, the strength of the 30,000 Bago garrison is not bad, because most of them are from the expeditionary force, that is, veterans account for the majority, so their combat effectiveness is relatively reliable.
The Vientiane Guard Army ranks last in terms of strength among the five major guard forces. This garrison was newly established recently, with a core of only 3,000 people, all drawn from the Thang Long garrison, and a total strength of only 20,000 - mainly because the Nanzhang Kingdom is really poor, and Jinghua's garrison As a rule, the military was provided by the local kingdom, and Jinghua itself was only responsible for armaments.
The Nanzhang Kingdom is not only poor, but also has a small population. Gao Pragmatic estimates that it has a population of three million, and transportation in their area is inconvenient. Although two minerals have been discovered, Gao Pragmatic has no interest in developing it-unless it is What's the use of a large gold mine, otherwise it can't be transported out? The reason for gold mines is that the quantity is small but the price is high, and the unit transportation cost is low.
Therefore, at present, the Nanzhang Kingdom can only maintain 20,000 garrison troops at most. If there is any more, Gao Pragmatic will have to pay military salaries in reverse. In fact, they are already paying in reverse, but not much, because Princess Biajue In response to Gao Pragmatic's request, some of the imperial guards of the Southern Kingdom were abolished, and the military salary was saved for the guard army. She went to Annan to get married.
Huang Yinglei is quite satisfied with marrying a princess. Although she is just a princess of a small country, Nanzhang is still a kingdom no matter how small it is, and its land area is actually not small, it is larger than the entire Guangxi. (Note: Laos at this time was larger than later generations because the southwest part was not occupied by Siam)
This incident was the most satisfactory Huang Yinglei had felt with his sister in many years, but he may have made a mistake: he thought that Princess Biajue had served as the regent of Nanzhang Kingdom, and that he would also have the opportunity to regent Nanzhang in the future.
In fact, this was because he was overthinking it. Gao Pangshi had never considered letting him regent the Nanzhang Kingdom. Gao pragmatic asked him to marry Biajue just to stabilize Nanzhang, and also to improve the Huang family's reputation from the side.
As a result, the five major garrison armies have a total formal establishment of up to 190,000 people, plus the highly pragmatic and mobilizable Cenhuang Langbing, Annan Old Army, and three colonial armies (Huaying, Champa, and Nanpan, The number of troops is small, and the organization is affiliated with the Jingang Guard Army). Gao Pragmatic can mobilize at least 250,000 troops in southern Xinjiang!
Liu Xin even sometimes couldn't help but think that if the overall situation in southern Xinjiang was completely stabilized now, and Gao Pragmatic managed things well, there would be a chance to launch 200,000 elite troops for the Northern Expedition to the Central Plains.
Based on Liu Xin's understanding of the current strength of the Ming Dynasty, she felt that if Gao Pragmatic used an elite force of 200,000 garrison troops in the Northern Expedition to the Central Plains, not to mention turning the world around in one fell swoop, but at least by crossing the river to conquer it, there would be no problem.
With his pragmatic background and scholarly reputation, it is very likely that he will not be completely resisted by scholars. At least he will definitely be a hundred times stronger than the later bandits such as Li Zicheng, and it will be easy to win over a group of people who hope to become "Conglong Heroes" Landowners and wealthy businessmen, the possibility of a successful rebellion is not low.
It's just... I don't know if Gao Pragmatic has such an idea.
At this point, Liu Xin is still not sure until now. Because in her opinion, Gao Pragmatic's performance is more contradictory. While he worked hard to expand his strength in southern Xinjiang, he also worked honestly as an official in the Ming Dynasty.
The direct generals of the Ming army that he inherited from the three former chief assistants were also used by him on the front line in northern Xinjiang. They seemed to be completely prepared for foreign wars, and he had no intention of taking action against the Ming court. .
This made Liu Xin hesitate, because if Gao Pragmatic wanted to turn things around, these direct generals should be used as close to the capital as possible. Once he decided to take action in the future, Yanjing would be able to take it directly, and the army in southern Xinjiang would also You can reach Songhu directly by sea, and then capture Nanjing by lightning.
With the two capitals changing hands and the world becoming more powerful, doesn't it mean that the Ming Dynasty has been acquired?
But now it seems that Gao Pragmatic had no such plan. He not only left all his direct descendants in the frontier areas, but also helped the imperial court organize the Beijing camp and asked Qi Jiguang to compile and train 60,000 imperial guards... Huh? ?
Could it be that the Imperial Guard was a secret move, apparently to strengthen the "Central Army" directly under the imperial court, but in fact this army was privately controlled by Gao Pragmatic?
Liu Xin is not sure about these things now. She just wants to finish the battle in Cambodia quickly, and then find an opportunity to go to Yanjing to meet Gao Pangshi in person and ask him what he wants to do.
As for why she wanted to intervene in this matter... Liu Xin told herself: I just look at the face of "the same people in the world" as him, so I can help him a lot - besides, if I don't help him, I will always There is no way to solve the problem of my father writing letters every three days to urge me to get married.
If Gao Pragmatic wants to rebel and become emperor, then if I help him fight the war and make meritorious service, and if I change my "golden words" and never marry for the rest of my life, won't it mean that no one will dare to say more?
As for whether this reason is reliable or not, Liu Xin convinced herself in this way anyway.
Except for the approximately 10,000 members of the Jinggang garrison who had clear garrison duties who could not be mobilized, the remaining 30,000 people gathered in Jinggang and held a "non-routine" competition. According to Huang Zhiting's authorization, Liu Xin will Twenty thousand of them were selected as the lineup for this expedition.
Twenty thousand people may not seem like a large number of troops, but it depends on who you compare with.
When they first attacked Myanmar, the Toungoo Dynasty of Myanmar was basically still at its peak, and Huang Zhiting's troops were slightly more than this. Although Liu Wei and Deng Zilong's troops were still watching in northern Myanmar as a check, in fact Huang Zhiting defeated the arrogant Mang Yingli with the few people she had on hand.
But now, the only thing she has to deal with is Cambodia, and the 20,000 garrison troops are fully capable of taking it down - Cambodia is defeated by Siam, Siam is defeated by Myanmar, and Myanmar is defeated by Beijing.
Can this be defeated?
It took five days to watch the entire competition carefully. Liu Xin felt that although this newly expanded Jinggang Garrison Army had a lot of recruits and did seem to be worse than the previous expeditionary force, 20,000 people were selected. When visiting Cambodia, you should still ask if he is big enough.
This idea is not entirely "paper talk", because not only Jinghua has been investigating the strength of the Phnom Penh Dynasty for several years, but also the envoy sent by Jita I to the Ming Dynasty has also confessed a lot. With these two facts confirmed, Liu Xin felt My judgment on Cambodia's strength should be pretty accurate.
If we talk about military strength alone, Cambodia does have a lot of them now.
Perhaps due to its control of the fertile soil in the Mekong Delta, Cambodia's population is almost the same as that of Siam, and may be slightly better than Annam's current population, about six million. And the key is that it has no shortage of food, so in After Huang Zhiting sent troops to "reinforce" Angkor, Gita I released more than 40,000 troops on the northwest border alone, and there were at least more than 10,000 troops around Phnom Penh. Although the eastern parts were relatively empty, there should be more than 10,000 troops.
Calculating this, Cambodia has at least 60,000 to 70,000 troops.
However, despite the large number of people, in Liu Xin's eyes, they are just chickens and dogs. According to the account of King Gita I's envoy, Cambodia's domestic productivity is low. These troops can't even get together a knife for each person. Many people have weapons. It's just a bamboo spear.
Bamboo spears are not incapable of fighting. For example, the wolf soldiers like to use bamboo spears. But the wolf soldiers' bamboo spears are not only a special product soaked in tung oil, but also the spearheads are made of refined iron.
However, the bamboo spears in Cambodia are really just bamboo spears. The so-called spearheads are made by sharpening the bamboo.
If you want to say that this thing can kill people, that's not true. However, poor equipment means poor equipment. Facing the latest Wanli II-type bayonet muskets equipped by the garrison, as well as more than a hundred light and heavy artillery for the 20,000 people...
With such rubbish weapons, Liu Xin felt that even if the Cambodian army was replaced by Cen Huanglang soldiers to help them fight, he would not be able to lose this battle, but the casualties might be higher.
She now believes that Huang Zhiting's overly pragmatic words to her were no longer a joke.
"Actually, pushing flat all the way is my favorite way of playing, because I can use less brain."
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