Su He took Li Fengming to the Commander's Mansion to familiarize himself with the environment, and also gave him a large house.
Let Li Fengming go home and rest first, and start work tomorrow.
Su He recruited Su Ergou and the county magistrate Li Zhisheng.
"Ergou, you immediately send someone to investigate the northern border of Shaanxi to determine whether there is heavy snow in northern Shaanxi and the Mongolian areas outside the pass."
Su Ergou took the order and retreated, and arranged for his elite men to investigate the situation.
He is no longer in charge of the reconnaissance camp training and has left it to his deputy Zhang Wansi.
Su Ergou focused all his energy on intelligence work.
Now the main focus is on Dashan Pass and infiltrating into Hanzhong and the northern prefectures.
Li Zhisheng walked into the commander's office in an anxious mood, still wondering why Su He was looking for him.
Could it be that Wu Donglin whom he recommended was in trouble?
Li Zhisheng entered Su He's study, and at Su He's signal, sat across from him drinking tea and waiting for Su He's order.
“Lizhi County, Henan is an important cotton producing area and is closest to us.
I am going to pay to hire businessmen to form a caravan to purchase cotton in Henan. "
In the Ming Dynasty, cotton was widely grown in various places. Due to severe drought in Shaanxi, cotton could only be purchased in Henan.
The weather in Henan this year is pretty good, but in a few years there will be a severe drought in the entire north.
Li Zhisheng's nervous expression relaxed a little and said: "Commander Su, this is no problem, there are caravans in our county who are familiar with the route.
These people have not run away, have not done business recently, and are worrying.
But now the trade routes are not smooth. There are small groups of rebels in various places, and merchants are afraid to transport goods. "
"That's no problem, I will send troops disguised as caravan guys.
The Tonglingfu is responsible for safety along the road, except for the cotton designated by the Tonglingfu. The caravan can purchase some items at its own expense. "
Li Zhisheng readily agreed to this matter. He was familiar with the merchants in the county and was confident that he could handle this matter well.
Suhe is purchasing cotton now to prevent heavy snowfall in September and October, as Li Fengming said.
Now that soldiers and civilians are all wearing single clothes, many people will not be able to survive a sudden heavy snowfall.
Su He also ordered Su Yan to arrange for severe labor reform prisoners to dig coal in several coal mines they controlled.
…
Li Fengming walked into Su He's study wearing a khaki military uniform.
This dress was made of linen and the style was very rustic, but he was very happy wearing it.
Su He picked up four books, "The Art of War", "Thirty-six Strategies", "The Romance of the Three Kingdoms" and "Water Margin".
These are simplified Chinese versions written by him himself, with pinyin annotations on them.
He used these four books as templates and asked craftsmen to make engravings. Thousands of copies have been printed.
The mutual recognition of traditional and simplified characters is very simple. Su He can easily understand traditional characters. He tries to teach simplified characters to his subordinates.
After familiarizing themselves with a book, these people can also recognize simplified Chinese characters.
He planned to popularize literacy among the army, especially among the officers.
The difficulty of learning traditional Chinese characters is one hundred, while the difficulty of learning simplified characters is only ten.
If we don’t want a certain class to monopolize knowledge, we can only universalize literacy.
It is true that the literacy rate is universal. Unlike the memory of a large country in South Asia, if you know your own name, you are not considered illiterate.
The most convenient way is to popularize literacy and promote simplified Chinese characters and pinyin.
Crossing the river by feeling the rabbit is a magical way to make more than one billion people literate.
Pinyin text is a relatively low-level text, and it has a very excellent feature, that is, it can be written quickly.
Because it's simple, it's quick.
Adults can learn Pinyin in a week or two even if they are stupid.
But you can’t just learn pinyin. Chinese characters have irreplaceable advantages and are the best writing.
Shakespeare, the great English master, only needed tens of thousands of words to write a masterpiece.
Ordinary people only need a few thousand vocabulary to be competent in their daily life.
But with the development of society, Pinyin script can only derive more words.
At this time, you need to memorize millions of words, otherwise you will become illiterate in the new era.
Chinese characters do not have this shortcoming. Two or three separate characters can form a new word.
As long as you learn to read, you can understand no matter how complicated the content is.
Su He began to introduce simplified Chinese characters and pinyin to Li Fengming, and also taught him Arabic numerals and basic mathematical operations.
He only said it once, and Li Fengming completely grasped the content.
“I’ve seen this kind of writing before, and Hong Mao Fan said it’s Romaji.
That doesn't seem to be their pronunciation. Li Fengming asked curiously.
"This is my improved Pinyin pronunciation based on Roman script and Ming Dynasty Mandarin." Su He said shamelessly.
Su He took Li Fengming to the military camp outside the city, where officers stationed near the county seat were waiting.
"This is Staff Officer Li Fengming. He serves as the brigade staff officer and is usually responsible for strategy, tactics and officer training."
Su He introduced Li Fengming's identity to many officers.
"We need to set up night schools in the military to train the troops during the day and learn knowledge at night.
You officers will learn the knowledge first and then hand it over to ordinary soldiers.
From now on, when promoting officers, priority should be given to those who are literate, and they must learn at least 500 words. "
Su He announced a new policy to promote night schools in the military and popularize literacy and military skills.
This is an important means to improve the military's combat effectiveness.
His eldest brother Su Xiong can rely on his talent to keenly detect the enemy's flaws.
But such people are too rare. After learning the art of war after becoming literate, they can absorb the wisdom of their predecessors and cultivate qualified officers in large numbers.
Su He distributed the four printed books to every officer.
"Today I will teach you Pinyin first, and starting from tomorrow, Staff Li Fengming will teach you how to read."
"Read after me, ah, oh, goose..."
Su He taught them all morning, and some people had quick reactions.
For example, Su Xiong and Su Ying learned how to use pinyin in one morning.
There are also people who are stupider, like Li Dazhuang, who is the slowest to learn, "Ah, oh, goose." They don't even admit it.
…
Li Fengming trained with the soldiers during the day and became familiar with the army.
He needs to understand the character of each officer so that he can be well aware of it when arranging tactics.
They went to night school together in the evening, with him as the teacher and the other officers as students.
The curriculum is divided into mathematics and Chinese classes, and officers must be literate in numbers and literacy.
In math class, Li Fengming held up several numbers with "0", "1", "2", "3"... written on them.
Su He told him that these were numbers invented by the ancient Indian civilization, and they were easy to write and even easier to read and write.
Li Fengming taught the officers four arithmetic operations and the multiplication table.
In Chinese class, Li Fengming picked up the military book "Thirty-Six Strategies".
The book contains the original text of the Thirty-Six Strategies and the classic applications of the strategies.
"Today I will explain to you, the first of the thirty-six strategies, to hide the truth from the sky."
"If you are prepared for the week, you will be lazy; if you are familiar with it, you will not doubt it. Yin is within Yang, not the opposite of Yang. Sun, Taiyin."
“You don’t need to memorize the original text, just know it.”
"Next, I will use an example to explain how to hide the truth from the sky. In the 17th year of Emperor Taizong's Zhenguan year, the emperor personally went on a military expedition..."
"Everyone should study the book of war and thoroughly understand the ideas mentioned above. It is better to have no book at all than to believe in the book. You must be able to use it flexibly in the future.
You also need to combine pinyin to understand the words in the book.
Next, you copy the text to strengthen your memory. "
Li Fengming looked at the officers copying the contents of the book.
The pens they used were extremely special, and it was the first time he saw them.
This kind of pen, called a pencil, is made of graphite and clay pressed into a refill, and a wooden stick is used to hold the refill.
Can write content clearly on paper without ink.
Li Fengming is not used to using this kind of pen yet, but he is trying to adapt.
In order to facilitate pencil writing, the writing format from top to bottom has also been changed from left to right.
Li Fengming saw Li Dazhuang and Su Ergou gesturing for him to come over.
Go to Li Dazhuang who is nearest to him first.
When Li Dazhuang saw Li Fengming coming, he said excitedly: "Counsel Li, I can finally recognize the pinyin and understand all the contents in the book.
Thank you for teaching me often in private and not giving up on me because I am a slow learner. "
"That's your hard work. Keep working hard until you can recognize words without looking at pinyin." Li Fengming encouraged happily.
He walked to Su Ergou again.
"Counsel Li, I've been reading books these days and found that even the minor characters in the book don't have a name like Ergou.
Please help me choose a more pleasant name, preferably one that is easy to understand and I don't like the formal one. "
"Su Changsheng, what do you think of this name?"
"Changsheng, Changsheng, this name is very good. I am also a person with a name." Su Changsheng said happily.
