Chapter 1,165 Pingliang Prefecture Policy (two updates combined into one)
Chapter 1173 Pingliang Prefecture Policy (two updates in one)
After Wang Shao left, Zhang Yue immediately ordered someone to pass Fan Yu's visit to the palace. He put on his clothes and wrote a memorial. Just then he had a long talk with Wang Shao. He also had some ideas about how to make progress on Xihe Road in the future.
Zhang Yue wrote that if Xihe wants to take Liangzhou, the first priority is to have well-trained troops and sufficient food supplies. After the implementation of the general strategy, Xihe Road and all roads in Shaanxi will have soldiers as generals.
The refinement of the soldiers is actually better than before.
When writing this, an outsider reported that Fan Yu had arrived at the house, and Zhang Yue immediately summoned Fan Yu to see him.
Fan Yu came to visit and only bowed and said nothing. He knew that he often commented on politics and touched on Zhang Yue's politics, which made the other party unhappy.
It was night, and he was going to go to bed early to rest, but unexpectedly, Zhang Yue suddenly called him to the house.
Fan Yu thought that he would be criticized by the other party, so he made preparations in his heart.
Zhang Yue glanced at Fan Yu and wondered what this person was like. He had an impression in advance that he was probably a Kuang Sheng type of person. Zhang Yue didn't have a good impression of Kuang Sheng. Not only Zhang Yue, but even the officialdom rejected Kuang Sheng.
of.
But then again, arrogant people usually have talents.
Confucius said that if you can't find first-rate talents who can practice the middle way, then you need to find second-rate talents such as crazy people. Mad people make progress, while stubborn people don't do anything.
"Did I come to you all night to consult with you about Shaanxi affairs? It was the prince who recommended you. There is no need to be restrained, just speak out!"
When Fan Yu heard this, he suddenly realized that Zhang Yue was not looking for him to put on his shoes.
Did he blame Zhang Yue wrongly? The so-called prime minister can hold a boat in his heart, how could Zhang Yue hate himself because of his daily opinions on government affairs?
Maybe I am judging a gentleman's heart with a villain's heart?
Fan Yu's expression was caught by Zhang Yue's eyes, and he said as if he knew what Fan Xiang was thinking in his heart: "Of course you know the truth about your private remarks about government affairs."
"But the truth is not that no one is allowed to speak. Criticism must be based on true knowledge and insights, and be beneficial to the government. Such nonsense interferes with the government's agenda!"
Zhang Yue is not a provocateur. Our association allows healthy criticism, but those who complain and set the pace below must be dealt with.
However, Fan Yu was irritated by Zhang Yue's words and immediately said: "Is this a low-ranking official who complains? He has something to say to the prime minister."
Zhang Yue said: "This is true knowledge and insight. I am all ears."
Next, Fan Yu spoke truthfully one by one, and Zhang Yue listened carefully for a long time.
After Fan Yu revealed everything he had in his mind, he felt a little uneasy, but he still maintained a bit of a wild attitude.
This Fan Yu is really talented. He even thought of some things before me... Zhang Yue thought for a while and said, "How about I ask you to be the transport envoy for Qin Feng Road?"
Jumping from the supervisory censor to the Qinfeng Road transfer envoy in one breath? Such a high-ranking official in the border area? It is simply a blue sky. This is something Fan Yu never dared to dream of.
Fan Yu's face changed drastically when he heard this and said, "Does the Prime Minister really mean what he said?"
Zhang Yue raised his eyebrows when he heard this, and Fan Yu's expression changed on the spot. He immediately prostrated himself in the tunnel and said, "If the Prime Minister has any mission, Fan will die without mercy!"
It has changed too fast. I still like your arrogant and unruly look just now... Zhang Yue said: "The truth is that I have used your father's legacy and benefited a lot, so I want to give you a chance."
"I believe in Wang Zichun's vision, and I believe in my own vision. And what you just said, I will carefully implement it when I get to Xihe Road in the future."
After Fan Yu left, Zhang Yue wrote what he said into his own statement.
The next day.
Zhang Yue walked into the main hall, and Wang Gui was already waiting here.
Zhang Yue and Wang Gui chatted after saluting.
After Wang Zhongxiu's incident, Zhang Yue respected Wang Gui more and more.
Before telling the truth, when Wang Gui and himself had a private disagreement in Zhongshu, Zhang Yue did have the idea of overthrowing Wang Gui.
But now that he thought about it carefully, Zhang Yue gave up this plan and instead took the initiative to make amends with Wang Gui.
Why?
Because one Wang Gui left, another Wang Gui will come. In order to check and balance, the officials will definitely not let Zhang Yue dominate the power alone.
You want to drive Wang Guizhen away and replace him with someone more powerful than Wang Guizhen. What should you do?
Wang Gui is different from Yuan Jiang. Yuan Jiang is more arrogant and contradicts himself many times and opposes his own opinions in front of the emperor. Wang Gui is still careful to deal with the areas where he disagrees with him.
The most important thing is that Wang Gui doesn't have any opinions. After all, the other party is from a "ruling pen and ruling" background, unlike Zhang Yue, who comes from a local and hard-working background. As the prince of the three edicts, Wang Gui seems to be so at a loss when encountering major events and has no opinions.
, and at this time, everything was decided by Zhang Yue, showing that he was so wise and capable.
What a great foil.
Of course, although Wang Gui has no opinions, it does not mean that he has no opinions on political matters. The other party has a tight grasp on personnel matters, and even tit-for-tat to avoid being ignored by Zhang Yue in this regard.
Now that Zhang Yue had something to restrain Wang Gui, he took the initiative to reconcile with Wang Gui.
A big shot once said that when interacting with others, you should first show your value, then draw a clear line, and finally release your goodwill.
Zhang Yue was also like this, always seeking unity through struggle. There was no conflict among the ministers in the court, and there were often conflicts between himself and the emperor. This was inevitable.
As long as the processing costs are relatively high, everyone will be relatively tolerant.
Zhang Yue said: "Teacher, the students are planning to set up a cotton business on Qinfeng Road."
Wang Gui asked: "What kind of regulations are they?"
Zhang Yue said: "Now the imperial court is promoting the planting of cotton in various areas of Shaanxi. People are intercropping cotton with grain, such as planting five acres of sorghum and planting one acre of cotton. Since cotton planting can be tax deducted, the court's purchase price is not bad.
Therefore, the people are still happy about it."
"But this is not a long-term solution. Because cotton fields are cultivated by family units and cannot be scaled up, I plan to set up a business to do this. However, there are very few idle fields in Shaanxi, and almost all of them have been cultivated.
."
Wang Gui smiled and said: "Yes, as the saying goes, if there is no one to cultivate the wasteland, there will be competition for it."
"When people cultivate wasteland, they must first prepare enough food for one year to eat it for a year before harvesting the next year. If the wasteland becomes mature land, it will be easily taken over by local big families and the government, so the people do not like to cultivate wasteland.
"
Wang Gui said, and Zhang Yue smiled in agreement.
"Let's not talk about Arakada. The same goes for doing business. As long as there is profit, people will definitely pay attention to it."
"So the reclamation of cotton fields is still done by the imperial court. Just like the beji cloth spun from cotton, it will be better than silk in the future. That is a tax."
Cloth is a natural currency. For example, the court paid taxes in silk instead.
Wang Gui asked: "Where can I find idle fields?"
Zhang Yue said: "Among all the roads, only Xihe Road is full of idle fields."
Wang Gui asked: "We need manpower to open up wasteland. Where will the manpower come from?"
Zhang Yue said: "We have more manpower, and the ripe ones are already being taught how to cultivate them. As for the raw ones, we can let the ripe ones use incentives to get them to go down the mountain."
"As long as they come down from the mountains, they can cultivate the cotton fields. The imperial court not only obtains quite cheap labor, but also can further organize the people into households."
Wang Gui said: "This is actually a good business."
Zhang Yue said: "I plan to set up a cotton business on Xihe Road according to the design of Farujiaoyin, based on shares. It's still the same story as before."
Wang Gui's annual dividends from the Stock Exchange and Xihe Road Stock Exchange are as much as his income as prime minister, and these are his future pensions.
Now he is happy to add another cotton company.
Wang Gui nodded and said: "As long as it is beneficial to the country and the people, we will do it."
Official palace.
Zhang Yue came out first and said: "I have written the memorial all night, and now I present the policy of Pingliang Prefecture to Your Majesty!"
The officials had been waiting all night for Zhang Yue's memorial, and now they felt very encouraged when they heard the name of Pingliang Prefecture.
As soon as Shi De was presented to the officials, the officials immediately began to look at it impatiently.
"Is it necessary to implement household registration to equalize the people on Xihe Road?"
Zhang Yue said: "Exactly."
"The number of students in Xihe Road is at least two million. If we want to pacify Liangzhou, we must first fully mobilize Xihe Road."
This was Fan Yu's advice to Zhang Yue.
The Han people who moved to Xihe Road, including the garrison, officials, and prisoners of war, are now less than 300,000.
After ten years of development, the number of Shufans on Xihe Road has exceeded 500,000. Shufans are people who accepted the household registration of the Song Dynasty and received land grants at the same time. They can be recruited as archers or directly incorporated into the Song army at any time.
In addition to the Han people and Shufan, there are nearly two million Shengfan scattered in the mountains. For the Song Dynasty, it was impossible to control them all because Xihe Road was so big, as long as they occupied key points.
In the middle area, Shufan and Han people live together. As for the mountains and remote places, Shengfan live. Shengfan is still a tribal system. They listen to the tune but not the propaganda. They go down to the mountains to do trade with the Han people on weekdays.
Now Zhang Yue wants these students to come down from the mountain, accept the policy of establishing households and equalizing the people, and become subjects of the Song Dynasty from then on.
If it was the farming method before, and some mature farmers were recruited. Now, through the reclamation of cotton fields, Zhang Yue used the appearance of commercial operations, and the mature farmers came forward to recruit raw farmers to work in the mountains. The court promised that the profits from the acquisition of cotton fields would be sold to Qinzhou.
Weavers and dyers earn the price difference.
These matters were completed by the newly established business company mentioned by Zhang Yue and Wang Gui just now, which was also held by the imperial court and local Han people. At present, the entire Shaanxi Road, Qingtang, Uighur, and Dangxiang all have savings in cotton.
As long as there is a stable output of raw cotton, it will be sold through cotton cloth.
The imperial court controlled the production materials and sold them to merchants with almost zero risk. This was a business that was sure to make a profit without losing any money.
There are currently four major types of cotton in the world: upland cotton, sea island cotton, kapok and grass cotton.
At present, the cotton of the Song Dynasty is mostly produced by kapok trees in Lingnan and Lianghuai areas, while the cotton grown in Shaanxi Road is a combination of grass cotton and kapok. Regardless of grass cotton or kapok, the yield is still lower, and the fiber is not white enough and long enough.
.
Upland cotton, which is now widely used in the cotton textile industry, originated in Mexico and was not introduced to China until the 19th century.
However, the Song Dynasty was better than the Europeans. Europeans at the same time always believed that cotton was something that sheep grew on trees. Today, the main competitors of the Song Dynasty are India and Persia.
But in the future, they should not be able to compete with the large-scale cotton textile industry of the Song Dynasty.
We've always been good at keeping prices down.
Xihe Road In order to import raw cotton from various places, it was necessary to use the waterways from the Tao River, Huangshui River to the Yellow River. After capturing Lanzhou, a transit hub was obtained.
But this alone is not enough. It is also necessary to open up the Hexi Corridor, capture Liangzhou, and truly connect the Western Regions, so that the goods of the Song Dynasty can truly reach the hands of merchants from the Western Regions, and at the same time, Dangxiang's trade benefits will be cut off.
From then on, silk and cotton cloth (beji cloth) were the hard currency used by the Song Dynasty to travel to the Western Regions, thus reopening the Silk Road.
After reading Zhang Yue's plan, the officials used the profits from the cotton fields to induce people to go down the mountain and establish households to unite the people. This would increase the tax on Dingkou on Xihe Road and at the same time raise civilian services and soldiers, which would be useful when attacking Liangzhou in the future.
Come in handy.
Once the officials saw it, they felt that the case was feasible, but... it would just take time.
At the same time, the officials continued to look at it, and Zhang Yue carried out tax reforms on Xihe Road and the entire Qinfeng Road to prevent and reduce the increase of local subordinate officials, so as to achieve the goal of benefiting the people and enriching the country.
For the officials, Zhang Yue's two strategies are not bad, but their common shortcoming is "slow down".
Zhang Yue said: "For the imperial court, attacking Liangzhou is the goal, and restructuring is just a means."
"However, for me, restructuring is the goal, and attacking Liangzhou is just a means."
"I want to restructure Xihe Road and Qinfeng Road to make them new with the purpose of attacking Liangzhou."
What was the purpose of Wang Anshi's reform?
Make the country rich and the army strong, make the poor rich and poor, and suppress annexation. Later in Wang Anshi's reform, he proposed to "regulate the whole country", but it was too broad.
Zhang Yue is attacking party items.
Internal restructuring was carried out by defeating party items. Now, from defeating party items, it was refined to attack Liangzhou, and then to reorganize Xihe Road.
Zhang Yue said: "Your Majesty, throughout the history of the dynasties, in the early decades of the Central Plains dynasty, all the kings and ministers were wise and virtuous, and they strived to expand externally. Then in the following decades, when the expansion reached its peak, the kings and ministers began to maintain the status quo and reuse the system.
, seeking relief.”
"After several decades, many shortcomings have accumulated, and internal reforms are sought. But if the reform is not successful, it will be like Wang Mang, who will immediately destroy the country and the world. If the reform is good, like Xining of this dynasty, it will be nothing more.
It has been extended for more than ten years and for dozens of years."
Zhang Yue's words were so bold that all the officials looked at him with suspicion.
The officials were both happy and worried. They were happy that Zhang Yue was willing to speak out and pointed out the country's current shortcomings, but they were worried that it was true as the other party said. What he and Wang Anshi had done would only last for more than ten years and decades, so what should we do?
The official asked: "What good idea do you have?"
Zhang Yue thought to himself that the Qin, Jin, Sui and Zuo dynasties were not included in this list, but that was not the case in the Han, Tang, Song, Ming and Qing dynasties, and even in the neighboring country of Liao.
In the beginning, they were very capable of fighting, expanding their territory everywhere. After reaching the peak, when the losses in the war were greater than the gains, they began to relax their defenses and overhaul forts on the border.
Later, when internal problems arose, Wang Mang, Wang Anshi, Li Longji, Zhang Juzheng and later the Westernization Movement all aimed at reviving China.
However, there were many failures, successes did not last for a long time, and then they all declined.
Why isn't the cycle broken?
The problem is that it is done behind closed doors.
Behind closed doors, without external input and output, it is a zero-sum game. No matter how you change it, it is nothing more than giving more to the less, and giving more to the less. It seems fair, but every time the knife is used, there will be consequences.
loss.
There are only two ways to go out: war and trade, which are import and export.
If you don't want to fight with your own people, you can only rob others. In the early stage of the organization, through continuous wars and continuous victory and expansion, it was a scene of wise kings and wise ministers.
A county can produce some of the top three or five figures in ancient and modern times.
War is the fastest way to react and solve organizational problems hands-on.
Keep fighting and expanding to temporarily avoid internal conflicts. It was like this in the history of the Yuan Dynasty. Once the expansion stopped, the empire was immediately over and over very quickly.
The Qing Dynasty was much smarter and used Confucianism and Legalism to continue the state. Even with the decline of military force, it could still be maintained for a period of time.
Therefore, apart from war, the only way to achieve long-term stability is commerce.
This is like a martial arts competition. You can brag about being the best in the world if you practice on your own, but you can only know how good you are when you compete with others.
If you stand, you are the winner, if you lie down, you are the loser. It is obvious at a glance. What the winner says is the truth.
We cannot pursue temporary stability by closing the country in isolation.
This was the purpose of Zhang Yue's insistence on capturing Liangzhou and reopening the Silk Road. Reform without a purpose is a trick without a way, and it must be oriented towards external export, whether it is war or trade.
You cannot cultivate immortality and enlightenment behind closed doors. You must go out and save all sentient beings. Change yourself by changing others. To help others is to save yourself.
After listening to Zhang Yue's words, the official realized that he and Zhang Yue had different purposes, and in the end they both reached the same destination through different paths.
Changing the tax system and official system of Qinfeng Road is a strenuous task, but it must be done in order to seize Liangzhou.
The third plan of Zhang Yue's plan to ping Liangzhou was to use inducements and incentives to rebel against the Renduo tribe in Liangzhou and the Ganzhou Uighurs.
Instigating rebellion against the Renduo tribe is what Xihe Road has been doing.
Once Liangzhou is captured, the Song Dynasty's commercial benefits on Xihe Road will be doubled. This will be a benefit to the Renduo tribe and the Ganzhou Uighurs in the future, and it will also be a means to separate them from the Dangxiang camp.
The Dangxiang people were unethical in doing business and often forcibly intercepted the goods of merchants from the Western Regions, buying and selling them by force. Therefore, merchants from the Western Regions did not like to take the Hexi Corridor, but instead chose the road closer to the Qingtang City.
Therefore, the Renduo tribe and the Ganzhou Uighurs and the Dangxiang people could not share the meat, but it was completely opposite to the Song Dynasty.
Zhang Yue attaches great importance to the business environment of Xihe Road.
After reading it, the official said: "Zhang Qing still surprises me as always. I am correct on these three points! But who is in charge of this task now?"
Zhang Yue said: "Your Majesty, Deputy Envoy Wang Hou is qualified for the job!"
Li Xian was transferred back to the capital. Zhang Yue knew that the officials were suspicious and that Li Xian had been in power on Xihe Road for too long. The other party could not even trust his confidants, so he transferred Li Xian back to the capital to prevent him from gaining influence in the local area.
Now if we don't set up an envoy, it will just hang there.
In fact, in addition to Li Xian, there are also Zhang Zhi and Zhang Kai who can take over.
However, Zhang Zhi was seriously injured after the Battle of Mingsha City and has been in bed recuperating to this day. Zhang Kai was not favored by officials, and Zhang Yue did not recommend him.
So Zhang Yue recommended Wang Hou.
Hearing Wang Hou's name, the official frowned and said, "Wang Hou is a deputy general, but he is not powerful enough to be a general."
Zhang Yue thought to himself, you know it, it will be difficult for me to handle it if you keep changing coaches like this.
Zhang Yue said: "Although Wang Hou is not a long-term strategist, he is prudent in his actions. The attack on Liangzhou will be more gradual than urgent. This person can lead the army without any mistakes."
"Another minister recommended Fan Yu as Qin Feng Road's transfer envoy, and Sun Lu as Qin Feng Road's honest envoy!"
The official said without hesitation: "As you said, I have approved it."
