Chapter 578 Barrel Theory
Chapter 578 Barrel Theory
Yuan Xiaoju sat in the carriage with his eyes closed in deep thought. Suddenly he opened his eyes and asked Wen Yuanzhen who was sitting beside him, "Does the King of Jin know about Yang Xuangan?"
Yuan Wenzhen shook his head. "It shouldn't be. Yang Xuangan was a bit outspoken before, but he has been very low-key in the past six months. If even the King of Jin knows about it, then the Emperor of Heaven should know it better, right?"
Yuan Xiaoju nodded slowly, "I also think he couldn't have known. He said there would be problems internally. Perhaps he was referring to a possibility. After all, there are too many people who are dissatisfied with the emperor. Once the emperor goes on another expedition to the east, it will definitely cause chaos in the world. This is what the King of Jin is referring to."
"Master, is he willing to sell it?"
Yuan Xiaoju shook his head. "He refused to sell the finished product. His excuse was that he was afraid that foreign races would get hold of the secret, but in fact, he wanted to monopolize the weapon."
"Have we made no progress in our research on the porcelain bottle fire bomb?"
Yuan Xiaoju snorted coldly, "If it worked, I wouldn't have come to Jiangnan in person. Since the King of Jin is unwilling to sell it, we have to find a way to get it from all aspects. After all, this kind of firearm was made by craftsmen, not by the King of Jin himself. Do you understand what I mean?"
"I have done some research before. The office in charge of military affairs is called the Military Equipment Department. Under it are various departments. One of them is called the Firearms and Gunpowder Department. It should be the department that developed the fire bomb."
Yuan Xiaoju shook his head, "It's useless to say these things, I want tangible results!"
Yuan Wenzhen said quickly: "Please rest assured, Patriarch, I have already made arrangements and will spare no expense to get this secret recipe."
As soon as Yuan Xiaoju left, Xiao Xia sent someone to find Li Luming. Li Luming was no longer responsible for external intelligence and focused on internal security. Facts have proved that she is very talented in charge of internal security. In recent years, she has organized all aspects of internal security in an orderly manner.
At present, the Internal Security is actually composed of one bureau and one battalion. The bureau is the Security Bureau, and the battalion is the Internal Security Battalion. The Security Bureau is composed of dozens of officials and three hundred secret agents with high martial arts skills, while the Internal Security Battalion has three thousand soldiers. For some major operations, it is not enough to rely solely on the spies of the Security Bureau, and the army must be coordinated.
The jurisdiction of the Inner Guard is actually very broad, ranging from the personal safety of the King of Jin and high-ranking officials to the private sale of pig iron and salt, etc., all are within the scope of the Inner Guard's responsibilities.
Among them, seven bureaus were set up under the Security Bureau, which were responsible for specific functions. Li Luming was in charge of the overall situation. The commander of the Internal Guard Battalion was also Li Luming. There were ten teams under him, each with a captain, led by Li Luming's deputy general Guan Ning.
Li Luming walked into the official room and bowed, "I pay my respects to Your Highness!"
"I was away from Jiangnan these past few months. Thank you for your hard work, Manager Li."
"Thank you for your recognition, Your Highness."
Xiao Xia smiled and said, "Today, Yuan Xiaoju, the head of the Yuan family, came to visit me and offered to buy our firearms secret recipe. Of course, I refused it outright, but they will not give up. If they cannot get it through legal channels, they will definitely use illegal means, such as bribery, theft, and deception. So you must immediately strengthen prevention and protect the craftsmen and their families. All officials who know about it must protect them secretly. In addition, you must also monitor every move of Wuchuan Trading Company."
Li Luming immediately clasped his fists and said, "Please rest assured, Your Highness. I have already formulated a complete protection plan and have been implementing it. I can now strengthen this plan."
Xiao Xia was overjoyed and asked quickly, "Did you bring the plan?"
Li Luming took out a booklet and handed it to Xiao Xia. Xiao Xia read it carefully, nodded and said happily: "The plan is good, strengthen the implementation immediately, and report to me at any time if there is any situation!"
At noon, Gao Jiong came to ask for an audience with Xiao Xia. Gao Jiong is currently retired and at home, and basically does not ask about government affairs, but if necessary, he will still provide advice.
Xiao Xia simply invited Gao Jiong to dine at Danyang Restaurant. In the elegant room of the restaurant, Gao Jiong handed a memorial to Xiao Xia, "This is a memorial I wrote to the emperor. I beg Your Highness to pass it on to the emperor for me."
"Sure! I'll send it to Luoyang tomorrow."
"No hurry. Your Highness, it would be best if you could give me some advice and see if there is anything I need to add. Also, is there anything I need to pay attention to in terms of tone?"
The Xiao family opened the memorial and took a look. It turned out to be an appeal to the emperor to give up the expedition against Goguryeo. Gao Jiong wrote it very frankly and to the point. He said that the dissatisfaction in the world was not due to the failure of the expedition, but because it consumed too much national strength and the cost outweighed the gain.
Xiao Xia didn't say anything for a while, Gao Jiong asked in confusion: "Your Highness, do you think there is something wrong?"
Xiao Xia said slowly: "Although Lord Gao spoke frankly, he did not mention the key issue. Why is it that the emperor still insists on his own way when the people are already boiling with resentment? What is the root cause?"
Gao Jiong clasped his fists and said, "Your Highness, please give me some advice!"
"In fact, the food and supplies consumed in the attack on Goguryeo were nothing to the Great Sui. The Liyang warehouse alone had 15 million dan of grain, tens of millions of pieces of cloth, and countless other supplies. The Luokou warehouse also had tens of millions of dan of grain, and the Luoyang warehouse had mountains of cloth.
The battle against Goguryeo only cost a few million shi of grain and tens of thousands of tents. This amount of material loss was not worth mentioning for the national strength of the Sui Dynasty. So when Lord Gao accused the emperor of wasting national strength, the emperor would take out the national storage report, and Lord Gao's memorial would be unconvincing. This was also the main reason why the emperor wanted to attack Goguryeo for the second time. The Sui Dynasty was strong and did not care about this amount of consumption. "
Gao Jiong hesitated for a moment and said, "Your Highness, do you mean that the problem is not the national strength?"
"That's right. There is no problem with the country's strength, but the problem lies in the people's strength."
Gao Ying bowed his hands and said, "I'd like to hear more about it!"
Xiao Xia said calmly: "Mr. Gao has been the prime minister for decades, and he should know very well that the characteristics of the Great Sui Dynasty are that the temples are rich and the monks are poor. The court has almost no military expenditures, and there is a large surplus in taxes collected every year. Over the past few decades, a huge amount of wealth has been accumulated, which also includes the wealth left by the Northern Zhou Dynasty and the wealth accumulated by the Southern Dynasty.
But the people in the world were very poor. They had to live a tight life every year and had no savings at all. If they encountered a natural disaster or the family laborers fell ill, the whole family would not be able to support themselves. The sky would fall for a family. The late emperor was also aware of this, so he promoted charity granaries. In case of a disaster or something happened at home, the grain in the charity granaries could be used to survive for a few months, so that the family would not go bankrupt.
The biggest problem of the current emperor is that he does not consider the people's ability to bear. He built Luoyang, dug the canal, repaired the Great Wall, and recruited people from Liaodong. He forcibly conscripted one or two million people at every turn, without any sympathy for the people's strength. Over the years, at least tens of millions of young and strong laborers were mobilized.
Of course, a lot of them were reused, but at least four to five million laborers were mobilized, and nearly half of them died in the end. Local officials took the opportunity to levy heavy taxes and make a fortune. In addition, the grain in the charity granaries was gone. This meant that four to five million households went bankrupt because they did not cultivate the land in time and had no other income. Our entire Sui Dynasty had a population of only eight million households!
Lord Gao, we have all commanded armies and we all know that an army will collapse if it suffers 30% casualties. The Sui Dynasty is also an army composed of civilians, and now more than half of its casualties have occurred. Will the Sui Dynasty collapse?
This is like a bucket. No matter how strong the national power is, if the other part, people's livelihood, is gone, the bucket will be useless because it cannot hold water. The entire northern part of the Sui Dynasty has seen people's livelihood decline, with starving people everywhere and bandits rampant. In the past six months, nearly 500,000 people have fled to Donglai County.
At this time, the emperor is going to launch the second Liaodong Campaign. He only sees how strong the official warehouse reserves of the Great Sui Dynasty are, but he doesn't care about the lives of the people below. Lord Gao, please add this one! If the people's power board disappears, even if the national power board is strong, the Great Sui will be doomed. "
Gao Jiong nodded silently. He raised his head and sighed, "I have been the prime minister for thirty years, but I still can't see things as clearly as Your Highness!"
(End of this chapter)