Liu Wei mainly expressed two concerns. The first point is the storage and transportation of military rations, and the second point is the problem of military morale in other ministries.
According to Liu Wei, Song Fujun had previously raised the issue of grain storage in Sichuan with him. One thing he mentioned was that the grain storage in various local government treasuries in Sichuan was nominally as high as 1.7 million shi, but there may be a relatively large amount of it. A large virtual amount, as well as a larger proportion of moldy food and bad food.
Because the financial system established by Zhu Yuanzhang is rather strange, the central government and the local governments actually do their own thing. So much so that even Gao Jingshi, the Minister of Household Affairs, does not know exactly how much grain is stored in the local government treasury in Sichuan.
The Ministry of Household Affairs only has an approximate figure, which is derived from some data in the yellow album and the fish scale atlas. How much of it can be taken seriously is something that even the gods dare not vouch for.
As for why the yellow book can be used to store grain backwards, this is very complicated. We must first explain what the yellow book and the fish scale album record.
At the turn of the Yuan and Ming Dynasties, various Yuan Dynasty household registration, cadastre and other information were either lost or no longer accurate due to war losses and other reasons. In order to effectively manage household registration, control the labor force, and ensure the collection of taxes and levies by the Ming Dynasty, Zhu Yuanzhang conducted a nationwide census and compiled a general inventory of household registrations across the country - the Yellow Book.
In the 14th year of Hongwu's reign, Zhu Yuanzhang ordered all prefectures and counties across the country to compile a yellow list. The method was to use 110 households as districts. In each district, ten landowners with more grain were selected as district chiefs, and the remaining 100 households were divided into ten. The top ten are organized in order and take turns serving.
Men in Class A are considered adults when they reach the age of 16. Adults must serve in the military until they are 60 years old. Every year, there is a Nianli Chang and a Nianjia. The leaders of Nianli Chang and Nianjia lead the adult men of Nianjia to provide government errands. Within ten years, each armor will turn once, which is a cycle.
In this way, each person only has to serve for one year within ten years and rest for the remaining nine years. The year of service is called "this year", and the year of non-service is called "pai year". The li is organized in the countryside, the one in the town is organized into the square, and the one near the city is organized into the Xiang.
The 110 households in a mile are compiled into a book in order of the amount of grain. The name, place of origin, population, age, land industry, etc. of each household are recorded in the book. Among them, there were widows and orphans who could not serve, so they were attached to 110 households and were called Jiling.
The yellow book is made in two copies, one is kept in the book and the other is handed over to the prefecture and county. Prefectures and counties collect the registers of each li and make the general register of the state and county, which is also made in two copies, one is kept in the state and county, and the other is handed over to the government.
In this way, governments at all levels prepared it in accordance with the law and handed it over to the Chief Secretary. The Chief Secretary finally remitted it to the Ministry of Household Affairs in the imperial court. Because the book submitted by the Chief Secretary to the Ministry of Household Affairs must be covered with yellow paper, it was called the "Yellow Book". .
After the yellow books recording the total population of the country were collected in the capital, they were stored in the Yellow Book Library of Houhu (i.e. Xuanwu Lake in Nanjing). Zhu Yuanzhang built several special archives rooms on several small islands in the center of the lake to store yellow albums and other important archives. The great ancestor probably thought that being surrounded by water would prevent fires. Moreover, these small islands in the middle of the lake had little contact with the outside world, so the storage of archives would not be easily disturbed by outside interference. It was a good place to collect archive documents.
Even after Chengzu moved the capital to Beijing, the Yellow Register Library was still kept in Houhu, and all the Yellow Registers registered in the Ming Dynasty for more than 200 years were sent here for safekeeping.
The Yellow Book was an important basis for the Ming Dynasty to collect taxes and servitude. With it, the Ming Dynasty clearly knew the total population of the country and the land ownership. With the help of the Yellow Book, it could forcibly collect labor from the people listed in the Yellow Book. , apportion taxes. In order to prevent changes in the burden of taxes and servitude caused by changes in population and land rights, Zhu Yuanzhang also stipulated that the household registration should be investigated every ten years and the yellow register should be updated again, which was called "Dazao".
As for the fish scale atlas, it is a book directly related to the yellow book system.
In order to accurately grasp the land ownership situation, in the 20th year of Hongwu, Zhu Yuanzhang sent students from the Imperial College to measure land across the country. The area with a grain payment of 10,000 shi was regarded as one area, and all the cultivated land in this area was compiled into one volume. Draw the square and circular shape of each field in the book, number it, write down the four directions, the area and the name of the land owner, and indicate the nature and grade of the land.
So, when I opened these books, I saw overlapping land graphics like fish scales, so it was called a fish scale atlas. The Fish Scale Atlas is the general inventory of land in the country.
The Yellow Book is mainly based on the household registration of the Ming Dynasty, and the Fish Scale Book is based on land. The two volumes corroborate and complement each other. These two volumes play the role of one warp and one weft, like a big net woven by warp and weft, covering all the people's population and land.
So to put it simply, the Yellow Book is based on household registration, and the Fish Scale Book is based on land. The two volumes corroborate and complement each other. These two volumes play the role of one warp and one weft, like a large net woven by warp and weft, trapping all the population and land of the Ming Dynasty.
It stands to reason that since this is the case, Gao Xiang, or the Ministry of Household Affairs, can obtain relatively accurate grain reserves of each province according to the yellow book and the fish scale atlas. After all, in an era when agricultural technology has not made any significant leaps, grain output is basically relatively stable, excluding years of major disasters.
At the same time, the amount of grain taxes collected by the court is relatively stable, so the portion that can be retained by the local government can of course be calculated. In addition, grain is not gold or silver. It has a storage period, which can also be calculated. Therefore, in general, the local grain storage department should at least have a broad but roughly certain data from the Ministry of Household Affairs.
However, this is not the case. In the early Ming Dynasty, the two-volume system was formulated based on Zhu Yuanzhang's strict investigation, and it indeed played a positive role. But as time went by, some local officials in charge of registration began to engage in corruption and fraud, and powerful landlords also concealed their household registration and land.
For example, in the 24th year of Hongwu, the total land area in the country registered in the Yellow Register was 8,804,623 hectares. However, in the 15th year of Hongzhi during the Xiaozong period, the total land area in the Yellow Register was only 4,292,310 hectares. Isn’t it ridiculous that the country’s land (cultivated land) area has shrunk by more than half in just a hundred years? Was this a large-scale nuclear attack?
The degree of population leakage is as serious as the land. In the 26th year of Hongwu, the number of Dingkou (adult males) in the country had reached 60.54 million. In the fourth year of Hongzhi, after the Ming Dynasty enjoyed peace for a hundred years, the number of Dingkou registered in the Yellow Book Instead, the population dropped to 53.28 million. What's the matter? Could it be that the Ming Dynasty in the feudal era had developed to the point where it could create a population trap?
Obviously it is impossible. After a hundred years of peace and the addition of yellow rolls in some remote areas, the total population has decreased instead of increasing. It is conceivable that there are many omissions in the yellow rolls.
Therefore, in the original history, by the late Ming Dynasty, the Yellow Book had completely lost its role and was almost useless. In order to save trouble, local officials often copied the population names and real estate from the old books. Year after year, the yellow books compiled in some places were exactly the same as they were decades ago.
As a result, centenarians in the yellow book appeared in large numbers. Therefore, at the end of the Ming Dynasty, some people satirized the absurdity of the Yellow Book by saying that "many people are hundreds of years old, and their wealth lasts for generations."
What's more, some officials even prepare yellow books in advance, and when they turn them in during the "big construction" year, the task will be completed. As a result, in the early years of the Qing Dynasty, it was found that some places had already prepared yellow records for the 24th year of Chongzhen - the Ming Dynasty died in the 17th year of Chongzhen!
However, in the original history, Zhang Juzheng's clearing of land was mainly for utilitarian purposes. Some land that was originally omitted was added to the fish scale album, and it was not linked to the yellow album. The practical school of this generation went a little deeper than Zhang Juzheng in clearing the land. In addition to finding some unreported fields, they also sorted out some exaggerated pornographic records.
However, as mentioned before, the two provinces with the biggest problems found by the Practical School of Land Clearing were Huguang and Shandong, so the correction of the Yellow Book was mainly based on these two provinces. [Note: The concealment of reports in Huguang and Shandong was largely due to the concealment of reports by the military. Among them, Huguang was also the most important commercial grain-producing area in the Ming Dynasty. The Dongting Lake plain belt replaced the Yangtze River Delta plain belt that had been transformed into economic crops. ]
As a result, Gao Pragmatic's local grain storage that he could more accurately grasp did not include Sichuan. In addition, his previous inventory of warehousing was only inventory of household warehouses, and had not been deeply involved in the local area, so he still paid little attention to Sichuan's grain storage. A smear of darkness. Now that I saw what Liu Wei said in the letter, my heart suddenly skipped a beat, and I secretly thought that something was wrong.
This is an unshakable basic principle of ancient warfare before troops and horses move forward with food and fodder. In order to defeat the Yuan Dynasty, Gao Pragmatic actively stocked up on grains in the capital two or three years in advance, but he forgot that he had to stock up on grains in advance to quell the Bozhou Rebellion. He focused on strengthening military equipment for Liu Wei, but forgot to store food and grass in advance for the counter-rebellion army. At this moment, he couldn't help but regret it.
However, it was not entirely without reason that he made such a low-level mistake. The main reason was that Huguang, as the main grain-producing area of the Ming Dynasty, was "next door" to Bozhou.
Sichuan itself is actually a major grain-producing province. There are two reasons why it has not become a major grain-tax and commodity-grain province. First, the Shu family has too much land, which cannot be taxed and cannot enter the market; second, the Three Gorges is too difficult to navigate. , it is impossible to sail easily, so transportation is too difficult, even if there is food, it is difficult to leave the province.
[Note: The situation of the Three Gorges being difficult to escape at this time has been mentioned in the previous article. It was probably mentioned by Gao Pangshi on his way to Guangxi. It may have been mentioned in passing when he and Liu Xin were parting. I am too lazy to go back and check the specific chapters. ]
Looking at it now, Sichuan's grain stocks may have a big problem, and the 1.7 million shi may have to be discounted in half. Although 850,000 dan is a lot, it depends on how the food is used. If the army piled up in Chengdu, there would definitely be enough food, but this is not reality.
Transportation in Banshu is obviously inconvenient. This inconvenience means that more than half of the food will actually be consumed in transportation. Only 30% of the food that falls into the hands of the front line may be left, which may not be enough to eat.
Of course, not all of the more than 200,000 troops dispatched this time will eat Sichuan's military rations. Guizhou will also get some, about one-third or one-quarter in terms of military strength. However, Guizhou's grain output is much lower than Sichuan's, and its daily grain reserves can only be more tight than Sichuan's. Most of the troops dispatched from Guizhou will need Sichuan to provide grain.
Now things are getting serious. According to Liu Wei's estimation, judging from the current grain reserves in Sichuan, if there is no foreign aid for the army's encirclement and suppression of Bozhou, the total duration of the military operation cannot exceed three months. These three months still include three stages: marching, pacifying, and withdrawing. That is to say, after three months, several armies will not only have to quell the Boshu Rebellion, but also have to completely return to the starting point.
Even with Liu Wei's pride, he could only say that this was an impossible task. Gao Pragmatic fully agreed with him, except that this was not a war at all, just a lightly armed march.
No wonder the Bozhou Rebellion in history lasted for four years. Gao Pragmatic originally thought that this was mainly because the Ming Dynasty was mainly fighting the Korean War with Japan at the time and did not pay attention to Bozhou. Now it seems that there are other reasons, such as the inability to keep up with logistics and the inability to fight faster.
With such a big trouble in front of him, Gao Pragmatic's face suddenly became ugly. After a cursory glance at Liu Wei's second worry, he felt that military morale was not worth mentioning compared to the hidden dangers of military rations.
Liu Wei mainly believed that the officers and soldiers sent this time only accounted for about one-third, and the rest were chieftain troops. It is really difficult to say what the mentality of many chieftains towards the conquest of Yang Yinglong was.
Yang Yinglong's rebellion has a lot to do with the imperial court's ambition to reform the country and return to local rule, and judging from the attitude of the court now, after pacifying Bozhou, he will definitely change his country and return to local rule. No matter how loyal these chieftains who sent troops with the imperial court were, they were still chieftains. What would they think of this?
In this desperate situation, will they not be able to do their best work? Will some of them even hook up with Yang Yinglong in private? These are all huge hidden dangers.
The reason why Gao Pragmatic thinks this matter is not a big problem is mainly based on the historical development process. After all, at that time, there were no cases of corruption among the various chieftains. For example, the Ma family of Shili Xuanwei Division worked conscientiously in front of and behind the horse, and fought more actively than many officers and soldiers.
Gao Pragmatic estimates that in addition to the hard-to-explain reason of "loyalty", the chieftains may still have some "survivor bias" and feel that rebellion will definitely lead to a dead end anyway, so it would be safer to not give the court an excuse to target them.
This idea may be a bit ostrich, but it is also very realistic. After all, judging from the performance of the imperial court in recent years, even the Mongols have been beaten. How can they withstand it? We can only muddle along, as long as it lasts.
In fact, Gao Jingshi didn't know. These chieftains were now more honest than he thought, and some of them even included Gao Jingshi's "contributions" in southern Xinjiang. Although the Cen and Huang chieftains of Guangxi left their homeland in Guangxi, they lived a very prosperous life in southern Xinjiang. The number of "native people" under them expanded two or three times, and the size of the wolf soldiers directly under them expanded a lot.
In the view of the Sichuan and Guizhou chieftains, with the marriage of Gao Jingshi and Huang Zhiting, if the court is willing, the soldiers and horses of the Cen and Huang chieftains can be transferred back to the north to suppress them. These two chieftains are also "specialized in mountain warfare." Once they are transferred north to cooperate with the imperial army to suppress them, no matter which chieftain they are, or even if they unite, there will only be a dead end.
It's better to pretend to be dead than to commit suicide. There's nothing you can do about it.
Therefore, Gao pragmatically turned his attention back to the problem of grain and grass, and found a map to look at carefully and think about a solution.
He found that around Bozhou, when Sichuan and Guizhou were likely to be short of military rations, the only province that could support them was Huguang. Although there is certainly enough food in Huguang, transportation is blocked by the Three Gorges.
The famous Three Gorges is the general name for the three canyons of Qutang Gorge, Wu Gorge and Xiling Gorge. The administrative division in later generations is from Baidi City in Fengjie County, Chongqing in the west to Nanjinguan in Yichang City, Hubei Province in the east, spanning Fengjie County in Chongqing and Wushan in Chongqing. County, Hubei Badong County, Hubei Zigui County, Hubei Yichang City, 193 kilometers long.
However, according to the current division, it has nothing to do with Chongqing. Instead, the entire territory is in Huguang, starting from Kuizhou Prefecture in the west and Yiling Prefecture in the east. The distance is naturally the same, nearly four hundred miles.
There is actually a post road along this road, and it is a water post road. If you look at it from east to west, it starts from Fenglou Shuiyi in Yilingzhou, passes through Huangniu Shuiyi, Jianping Shuiyi, Bashan Shuiyi and ends at Yongning Shuiyi in Kuizhou Prefecture.
However, the water post is just a water post. This road is mainly used for communication, especially the communication down the river. It can indeed be said that "the farewell to the White Emperor is among the colorful clouds, and the thousands of miles of rivers and tombs can be returned in one day." But if you want to transport food upstream...the Three Gorges is a natural chasm with rapids and shoals at times. You can't rely on sails. Have you asked the trackers how they feel?
Even though Beijing has a strong inland shipping system, the eastern half of its Yangtze River waterway has always stopped at the Three Gorges, while the western half is only responsible for Chongqing, starting from Jiading (later Leshan) in the west and ending in Kuizhou in the east. Therefore, even if Gao Pragmatic asked Jinghua to help, he could only transport the food to Yiling, and Yiling was still quite far away from Chongqing, more than a thousand miles away.
This was really worrying Gao Situ. He felt that after traveling twenty years, he couldn't just fight the Battle of Bozhou for four years like it had in history, right? Where to put the face of the time traveler!
However, a time traveler cannot transform into a steamship, and it is even more impossible for a time traveler to not regard the trackers as human beings and force one hundred thousand trackers to do this.
The waterway is impassable, and the land route is all mountains. No wonder it has been a pile of toast since the beginning of western Huguang. It's really not that the imperial court doesn't want to change its land and return to its homeland as soon as possible. It's really that geographical factors dominate. Even if the imperial court is powerful, it can't display it... not to mention that it wasn't very powerful before.
Seeing that the Three Gorges waterway is really unimaginable under the current level of science and technology, Gao Pragmatic can only change his habitual thinking of relying on waterways and turn his attention back to land routes.
The problem now is that the passage from Huguang to Sichuan is blocked by the Daba Mountains and the Wuling Mountains. The waterway between the two mountain ranges is the Three Gorges. If you don't go through the Three Gorges, you have to pick a mountain to climb over.
If you have to go over mountains and ridges, then taking the Daba Mountain in the north will obviously take a long way around. This is obviously not something you need to consider. You can only go over the Wuling Mountains in the south.
This side of the Wuling Mountains... Hey, are they all under the jurisdiction of chieftains? Gao Pragmatic was stunned for a moment, and an idea suddenly came to his mind.
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