Regarding the fact that the Shimazu family wanted to buy weapons, Gao Pragmatic was a little surprised at first, but after thinking about it, he felt that it was reasonable.
The Shimazu family of Satsuma Domain, this place and this family have always been not economical, especially they like to be at odds with the imperial court that represents the central government. In the original history, Japan's Meiji Restoration began with the overthrow of the Satsuma and Choshu feudal lords.
Of course, most of the cabinet members in the Meiji government later came from these two vassals, and at that time, Japan had a saying of "Choshu Army and Satsuma Navy", which shows the strength of these two vassals. At the same time, it also illustrates another problem: the ultimate goal of these two powerful vassals is, to put it bluntly, that instead of you ordering us, it is better for us to order you.
The Choshu Domain will not go into details for the time being, only that the Satsuma Domain will turn its attention to the Beiyang Maritime Trade Alliance for help. This is really in line with their historical style.
The Satsuma clan in the original history is not just the history mentioned before. They will invade and actually control Ryukyu more than ten years later. However, the main purpose of this invasion is not the invasion itself, but to facilitate and do business with the Ming Dynasty - —of course, referring to the smuggling business.
The subsequent reverse scenes are too far away, so I won’t talk about them. Just talking about the fact that Shimadzu F4 (four brothers) invaded Ryukyu in order to do smuggling business with Ming Dynasty is enough to show that the Shimadzu family is completely "lawless".
It is completely understandable that such a family would feel unhappy after being beaten up by Toyotomi Hideyoshi and "humiliatingly" surrendering. It is also reasonable to want revenge.
But in this case, Gao Pragmatic must re-examine his "arrangements" for Japan's future.
Originally, Gao Pragmatic felt that he had too many things at hand now, and he did not have too many plans to interfere with Japan for the time being. Compared with Japan, strengthening the Ming Dynasty is his first priority, and leaving a retreat in southern Xinjiang is his basic guarantee. As for Japan... all his previous plans were planned after the war to aid Korea and resist the Japanese.
Why wait until this battle is over before making detailed arrangements? Because although this battle took a lot of effort for the Ming Dynasty and even almost wiped out Wanli's internal funds, if you look at it the other way around, Japan also spent a lot of money. As for North Korea, let alone that, it is simply a scorched earth.
At this time, it is more convenient to be pragmatic, rather than spending money and efforts to deal with Japan. After all, there are also great variables in what to do after Japan is settled. At least from Gao's pragmatic current view, it is still quite difficult to rule Japan in the way of southern Xinjiang.
Not to mention that if Japan is really dealt with according to the Southern Xinjiang model, it may also cause confusion as to whether the emphasis will be on Southern Xinjiang or Japan. In the current era, it is really difficult to rule two non-contiguous lands across thousands of miles of sea territory.
From the perspective of resource advantages, southern Xinjiang is definitely the first choice of "fallback" for high pragmatism. In addition, mastering southern Xinjiang can better resist Western colonial invasion, and it is more in line with the "underlying logic" of high pragmatic thinking.
But Japan is not without merits, especially if we want to talk about "a way out", then if Gao Pragmatic relies on the powerful Beijing-China fleet to hide in Japan, even if he really offends the emperor one day, he can rest easy.
But there is a problem here. According to the estimates of later Japanese historians, Japan's population was approximately 12 million in the late Azuchi-Momoyama period and on the eve of the Sekigahara War. In this way, how can Jinghua alone ensure that it can maintain its rule?
Southern Xinjiang is different from Japan. There are many desperate Han people who have escaped in Southern Xinjiang. For hundreds of thousands of years, there are actually not many people with Han ancestry in their bodies. Although many of them actually have weak blood, as long as they have With policy guidance in place, these people will soon become "Han Chinese" - the household registration and naturalization system is now being promoted very well.
Japan does not have the conditions of southern Xinjiang, although there are a very small number of Han people who have left their blood in Japan. Especially during Boss Wang's time, many Han pirates who were known as Japanese pirates left their blood in Japan. But if you throw those few people into the more than 10 million Japanese, you won't even see splashes.
Under such circumstances, if Gao Pragmatic planned to rule Japan by himself, the situation might be worse than if the Manchus invaded the Central Plains. Of course, Japan has its own special system, and perhaps the Imperial Family can come up with a solution, but those are all things that have no shadow, and I am too pragmatic to think about it now.
Another reason why Gao Pragmatic did not plan to intervene in Japan prematurely before was that after the death of Toyotomi Hideyoshi, Japan would have further civil war, the so-called battle between the Western Army and the Eastern Army, the most famous of which was the Battle of Sekigahara.
The Battle of Sekigahara was a battle that took place in the Mino Sekigahara area on September 15th (July 21) in the fifth year of Keicho, Japan. The Battle of Sekigahara in a broad sense includes a series of battles after the death of Toyotomi Hideyoshi. and a series of battles in other areas. The two warring parties were the Eastern Army led by Tokugawa Ieyasu and the Western Army composed of Ishida Mitsunari and others.
Both sides mobilized more than 100,000 troops in this war, and it was ultimately decided that the real center of rule in Japan would be the Tokugawa Shogunate.
Gao Jingshi's previous plan was to wait until before and after the Sekigahara War before suddenly intervening in Japan - at that time, his joining would be decisive, and no matter which side he favored, he could determine the direction of Japan.
However, the Shimadzu family's move this time made Gao Pragmatic a little shaken: It would be extra effort to wait until before and after the Sekigahara War to intervene, but in fact he also knew that it would definitely leave a lot of trouble, but if from now on Just start to penetrate?
For example, if we support the Shimazu family and train the Japanese alien Satsuma as his leading party, will there be a chance of success and the hidden dangers will be smaller?
Cultivating the Satsuma Domain is definitely a good choice from a geographical point of view. After all, as a powerful domain in southwest Japan, they are the closest to the Ming Dynasty. For Gao Pragmatic, who has a two-ocean fleet, not only is it convenient to contact him, but even Toyotomi Hideyoshi found out and was furious, Gao Pragmatic had nothing to fear.
I'm reluctant to kill too many servants in a land battle, but it's different if I only need to protect Satsuma. If you have the ability, just have a decisive battle at sea with me, Jinghua.
Considering Toyotomi Hideyoshi's current behavior and habits, Gao Pragmatic felt that this possibility was very small - as long as Satsuma maintained nominal surrender, Toyotomi Hideyoshi would probably not choose to use force. Speaking of which, Toyotomi Hideyoshi is somewhat similar to him in that matters that can be resolved by political means must not be resolved by force.
After the death of Oda Nobunaga earlier, Toyotomi Hideyoshi solved the internal problems of the Oda family, controlled the real power of the old retainers of the Oda family, and intended to unify Japan. At first, he wanted to use force to submit to Tokugawa Ieyasu, but was defeated in the battle between Komaki and Nagakute, so he immediately turned to diplomatic submission by reaching a peace with Tokugawa Ieyasu. After Ishikawa Sumasa suddenly took refuge, he immediately negotiated peace with Tokugawa Ieyasu, adopted Tokugawa Ieyasu's second son Yuyimaru, and then used marriage to make Tokugawa Ieyasu surrender.
Then Toyotomi Hideyoshi continued to use political means, using the invasion of North Korea and the prospect of the Ming Dynasty as bait to launch a war of aggression against North Korea, and lured a large number of powerful daimyo to join the war.
This battle was of course defeated, but it also severely weakened the military strength and funds of the major daimyo at the time. However, there were some surprises here: For example, Tokugawa Ieyasu was approved by Toyotomi Hideyoshi and was allowed to stay in Nagoya Castle to carry out garrison work in the name of crusade against the remaining forces of the Hojo clan. He did not directly participate in the two battles, so the war had a negative impact on them. He has less influence, so his influence gradually increases. Only Maeda Toshiie, who is also one of the five elders, has the strength to check Tokugawa Ieyasu.
Toyotomi Hideyoshi died of illness in Fushimi Castle on August 18 (September 18) in the third year of Keicho (1598). His successor was Toyotomi Hideyori who was less than six years old. At this time, it was obviously not feasible to continue the war in Korea. It was appropriate, so the Toyotomi family immediately transferred the generals who sent troops to Korea back to the country.
Before his death, Toyotomi Hideyoshi still did not forget political means and asked the "five elders" and "five elders" to exchange petitions to make them loyal to the Toyotomi family. Among them, the five elders were the five most powerful daimyo at the time, namely Tokugawa Ieyasu, Maeda Toshiie, Ukita Hideie, Mouri Terumoto, Kobayakawa Takakage, and later Uesugi Kagekatsu was added.
The fundamental purpose of Toyotomi Hideyoshi was to use the collegial system to suppress the rise of Tokugawa Ieyasu and ensure that the Toyotomi regime could be passed down from generation to generation.
However, fate is not as good as fate. Due to the sudden death of the number two figure, Maeda Toshiie, Tokugawa Ieyasu had no restrictions and violated the covenant many times, thus making the "Five Elders" nameless. Another political method was that Toyotomi Hideyoshi mentioned the marriage between Tokugawa Ieyasu's granddaughter Chihime and Toyotomi Hideyori before his death. This was also to achieve the purpose of winning over the Tokugawa clan.
Of course, things changed a lot later, but most of them were caused by the remnants of Japan's old system, coupled with the fact that the successor, Toyotomi Hideyori, was too young and was "suspicious of the country." In general, there is no doubt that Toyotomi Hideyoshi preferred to use political means to solve problems.
Please help, you can steal book stamps like food. Come and steal your friends' book stamps to vote for my books.
In this case, Gao Pragmatic feels that his slight "investment" in the Shimadzu family will not overly stimulate Toyotomi Hideyoshi, at least it will not cause Toyotomi Hideyoshi to change his main strategic stance and trigger unpredictable changes.
However, Gao Pragmatic felt that it was very necessary to control the intensity of this investment, lest the Shimadzu family really felt that they could challenge Toyotomi Hideyoshi and launch another rebellion, which might involve him and Gao. Although he was not afraid of trouble caused by Toyotomi Hideyoshi, he would not be able to explain to the nobles if Toyotomi Hideyoshi interrupted the trade.
The Shimazu family is relatively arrogant now. Even if they were taught a lesson by Toyotomi Hideyoshi, they have not been discouraged, so their support cannot be too strong.
The Battle of Miike Port was so small that it was not even considered a battle in the eyes of Gao Pragmatic, who was accustomed to the big world. At most, it was just an armed conflict. However, this battle may have greatly stimulated the Shimadzu family. At least it must have attracted great attention from Shimadzu Yoshihiro, which led to the Shimadzu family's proposal to purchase arms.
Shimazu Yoshihiro has always been a militant member of the Shimadzu family. Of course, his level is still worthy of recognition. For example, in the Kizakihara battle, Shimazu Yoshihiro's famous battle, he dominated the crowd and defeated ten times the opponent. Ended with his own army.
As a classic battle in which a small number of people defeated a large number, this battle was compared to Oda Nobunaga's Battle of Okehazama, and was called "Kyushu's Okehazama". Shimazu Yoshihiro also became famous in Kyushu because of this battle, and entered the ranks of famous generals in the Warring States Period.
In the original history, his performance in the Korean battlefield was also excellent. The Ming army's biggest defeat in Korea, the "Battle of Sizhou", was fought by Shimazu Yoshihiro's perfect performance.
However, this item also makes Gao Pragmatic particularly taboo. If after he strengthens the strength of the Shimadzu family, this strength is deceived by Toyotomi Hideyoshi and goes to North Korea as in the original history, will Shimazu Yoshihiro be more powerful than history? To achieve greater results? You know, the greater his victory in North Korea, the greater the losses for Ming Dynasty.
Although there is a saying in later generations that arms dealers who dare not sell weapons to enemy countries are not qualified arms dealers, Gao Pragmatic does not position himself as an arms dealer. This kind of behavior of subsidizing the enemy is extremely serious in his eyes. sin.
After much thought, he felt that if he wanted to support the Shimadzu family as the leading party, there must first be a prerequisite, which was to ensure that the Shimadzu family could be controlled, or at least restrained.
This is a bit troublesome. The Shimadzu family has more than 10,000 elite soldiers. Now that it is impossible to send its main combat power to Japan, Gao Pragmatic feels that it is quite difficult to suppress them.
Although Jinghua achieved a "one to five victory" record in the battle at Miike Port, the score was not as simple as arithmetic. Although there were only over a hundred armed servants participating in the war at Miike Port at that time, this did not take into account the artillery power on the ships in the port. In fact, the defeat of the Shimazu family's five hundred men was precisely because they were defeated and never recovered. The most powerful naval artillery bombardment I have ever seen.
