Everyone in Zi Zhang knows that the Javanese Yuan and Ming dynasties have been hostile for a long time. Therefore, Guo Kang was very suspicious that asking Sun Shiwan for help was asking for trouble.
If you include the vassal states and tribes, the Javanese Yuan's power covers almost half of Southeast Asia, and it seems to be very powerful. But in fact, their territory was dotted, rather than continuous like the Central Plains of the Ming Dynasty, the Hezhong of the Tamerlane Khanate, and the Balkans of the Purple Horde. The real territory of Java is a series of large and small seaports and surrounding ancillary areas.
Merchants relied on this network of ports to provide supply depots and safe havens for ships to maintain shipping lanes. Outside the port area, there are generally areas where handicraft industries gather, followed by large plantations, mines and forest farms.
The large number of craftsmen gathered in the handicraft area not only maintain ports and ships, but also produce various goods for trade. Woodlands provide timber for navigation, mines provide raw materials, and plantation estates provide food for nearby residents and cash crops for trafficking.
Outside of these places, it has little to do with them.
Between the ports and outside the Javanese reclaimed areas, there are numerous large and small indigenous groups. Some are just primitive tribes, while some have formed relatively complete feudal states. Javanese had only a general interest in them, and only asked them to obey him, join the trade network, abide by the trade rules set by himself, and pay an unspecified amount of tribute. Some tribes with relatively reliable planting capabilities will be required to plant specified crops, which will be purchased centrally by merchants. This is generally the upper limit of jurisdiction.
Previously, the great powers and overlords in the Nanyang region all adopted this structure, which was called the "Mandala System" in later generations. For the natives, although the Javanese Yuan has more control, the overall nature is not much different. This is also the tacit understanding gradually formed with the local people over more than a hundred years since the Yuan Dynasty conquered Java.
On the other hand, Javanese actually cannot trust the locals.
The backbone of the Javanese Yuan's armed forces were the servants and fleets of wealthy merchants such as the Yangzhou Sun family, the Fujian Chen family, and the Lin'an Wu family. In addition, there are the Ruan family and Hu family who came to seek refuge after Annan Kingdom (Vietnam) was annexed by the Ming Dynasty; the Duan family of Dali who escaped after the defeat of King Liang, etc. These Jiangnan Han people, Jiaozhi people, and Dali people formed the core part of the army.
Since the number of troops is still too small compared with the Ming army, Javanese Yuan will also organize larger peripheral armies as supplements. Champa and Siam are one of the main sources. They swung back and forth between the Ming Dynasty and the Javanese Yuan Dynasty in order to maintain their independence, so they often turned a blind eye to the latter's efforts to recruit troops on their own territory.
In addition, Javanese also widely recruited mercenaries to fight for itself. To the east, there is a gang of ronin from Japan. To the west, there are Turkic-style armed forces who fled after the Delhi Sultanate was defeated by Timur. Although these people have varying combat capabilities, they are also a supplement to the Javanese military power.
As for the natives on the Southeast Asian islands, Javanese Yuan has little confidence in their combat effectiveness. In the earliest days, the vassal's indigenous troops were mobilized to fight, but their extremely poor performance made the Javanese officers believe that the side effects had outweighed the positive effects.
Most of the indigenous armies have almost no effective role except to replenish their numbers and will only consume supplies in vain. They always collapse quickly on the battlefield, bringing negative psychological effects to friendly forces. If you take this kind of person with you, it's better not to take him with you.
Theoretically, if trained rigorously, the indigenous army should not have such poor combat effectiveness. But Javanese Yuan has dealt with various indigenous forces. Many of them only surrendered temporarily and resented their efforts to compete for ports and land. Therefore, the Javanese Yuan did not worry about training them. He only occasionally sent a few vassals to serve as cannon fodder. They could not even face the Ming army and could only suppress other tribes.
With the expansion of trade, ocean trade routes became more and more open, and they gradually discovered some new methods.
Timur's western expedition penetrated the eastern coast of the Mediterranean and brought the place into a long-lost unified situation. After that, the smooth trade routes allowed an endless stream of Slavic slaves to start from southern Russia, pass through the Caucasus, enter the Persian Gulf along the two rivers, and then be transported all the way to the East. Soon after, the Purple Horde also joined in, opening a route from Constantinople to the port of Damascus, allowing the flow of slaves to continue to increase.
These white slaves were unfamiliar with the place and did not speak the same language. For the Javanese, native slaves were unreliable and could easily arouse the anger of local kin tribes, but white slaves did not have these shortcomings. Those who are more loyal and robust can also be replenished during the march.
Therefore, from that time on, the Javanese became one of the main buyers of white slaves, filling them into plantations in Java, Luzon, and Borneo.
Since the Ming Dynasty monopolized a large number of handicraft products and tried to crack down on Javanese dollar trade all day long, Javanese dollars have been trying to use self-produced products to replace the Ming Dynasty's smuggled goods, which have become increasingly risky and unstable in recent years. Although there are still some problems with these silks, ceramics and ironware, they are also quite popular in the West, allowing them to make considerable profits.
However, Western buyers often cannot provide bulk products that are valuable and can be supplied for a long time, so that the ship can be pulled back. Returning without filling is a waste of precious transportation capacity. The slave trade across the Indian Ocean made up for this shortcoming.
