The Prosperous Era of Longwan

Speaking of which, it has been nearly two hundred years since the founding of the Ming Dynasty, and the country has experienced great changes in development.

But in terms of the national system, it has continued the system established during the period of Zhu Yuanzhang and Zhu Di in the early Ming Dynasty. Naturally, there are many outdated things that need to be improved.

Originally, Emperor Jiajing, a monarch who came to power under special circumstances, could implement these reforms, but unfortunately he was obsessed with Taoist practice. It was the "Jiajing New Deal" that stalled after easing the already tense social and class conflicts.

Now Yin Shizhen pointed out directly that Wei Guangde's suggestion to King Yu was likely to trigger a war in Liaodong and allow the Ming army in Liaodong to withstand attacks from the Mongols and Jurchens further north.

Still smiling and shaking his head, Wei Guangde said unhurriedly: "The Mongols in Liaodong actually have little fighting power. They are just a piece of loose sand. As for the Jurchens over there, are they really capable of resisting the army?"

"But I'm afraid that the Tatars on the grassland will hook up with them, which will be dangerous."

Yin Shizhen said very seriously.

Wei Guangde didn't care. Yin Shizhen's idea was actually to avoid the outbreak of war in Liaodong, which was actually a good thing for the country and soldiers.

But they didn't know that in just a hundred years, the now weak and fragmented Jurchens would be unified by one person, and like other newly unified tribes, under the leadership of their national heroes, a powerful and unmatched war would break out. force.

His descendants even led this weak nation into the Central Plains and occupied this great land.

In the past, Wei Guangde had thought about finding an opportunity to arrange for people to go to Liaodong to directly exterminate the lineage of Jianzhou Jurchen clan leaders, which would reduce a lot of trouble.

It's just that right now, he doesn't have enough influence, and the time is still far away anyway, so he's not in a hurry.

However, since Yu Dayou transferred Guangxi, Wei Guangde began to pay attention to the Ming Dynasty's little transformation of the southwest region, and found that this seemed to be a solution to the Jurchens once and for all.

The Ming Dynasty's policy towards minority areas was actually very flexible.

The Ming Dynasty was established to accept the political legacy left by the Yuan Dynasty. In the early Ming Dynasty, the strength of the Ming army made the ethnic minorities in the southwest awed and naturally had no choice but to surrender, just like they did to the Yuan Dynasty.

The Ming Dynasty also implemented a tolerant policy towards them, and those who voluntarily surrendered were treated in the same way as the Yuan Dynasty treated them, that is, they still used the local official system to govern these places.

China has a vast territory and numerous ethnic groups. How to handle the relationship between ethnic minorities and the Han people has always been a major problem for the rulers.

During the Tang and Song Dynasties, in order to strengthen control over states and counties where ethnic minorities made up the majority, tribal leaders were generally authorized to serve as local officials for management, and supervisory officials appointed by the court were added. This was the policy of restraint.

When the restraint policy evolved to a certain stage, that is, during the reign of the Yuan Dynasty, the chieftain system was derived.

The Mongols overthrew the old dynasty and established the Yuan Dynasty, which had an unprecedentedly vast territory and numerous ethnic groups. According to historical records, "the Han Dynasty covers 9,320 miles from east to west and 13,368 miles from north to south."

In order to strengthen its local rule, the Yuan Dynasty established a provincial system whereby the central government directly administered a few areas. In addition, the Jisi prefectures established by the Tang and Song Dynasties before that were also placed under the jurisdiction of their respective provinces.

In addition, the Yuan Dynasty also implemented the method of "Mongolian and foreign participation in governance" based on the actual conditions of various places.

On the one hand, the central rulers dispatched clan royal families to guard minority areas; on the other hand, they widely accepted local indigenous leaders and recommended them to become local non-commissioned officers.

In this way, not only can the enthusiasm of the ethnic minority people be fully mobilized, but also the rule of the central dynasty in ethnic minority areas can be guaranteed.

The governance strategy of "Mongolian and barbarian participation in governance" was the predecessor of the "native official system". At that time, the Yuan Dynasty unified all types of officials in the country into two categories - "native officials" and "liquid officials".

At the two levels of the provincial and Xuanwei departments, the main ones are the local officials, supplemented by the local officials. However, at the level of Lu and below, the local officials are widely recommended.

In addition, the Yuan Dynasty also gave some special preferential treatment to native officials. As long as officials were loyal to the court, they were allowed to rule the region for a long time and could hold hereditary official positions.

The Ming Dynasty adopted a policy of "favor" and "combination of power and virtue", which enabled the Ming Dynasty to finally win the support of ethnic minorities and achieve victory without a fight.

Of course, the emperor also had his own thoughts on doing this.

The emperors of the Ming Dynasty have long advocated the idea of ​​"guarding the four barbarians" in border governance. They took "guarding" as the core of their management of the southwest region, took the Yuan Dynasty as a lesson, and opposed the practice of military expansion relying on the southwest border.

This idea of ​​border governance was obviously influenced by traditional national thoughts since the Han and Tang dynasties, but it focused more on the reality faced by the Ming Dynasty.

Taizu of the Ming Dynasty often warned ministers and his descendants not to use force against the southwest region. Taizu of the Ming Dynasty believed that most of the places where "barbarians" were located were remote and wilderness areas. Expeditions to the southwest were a waste of people and money, and even if they were conquered, they would not gain much benefit.

These ideas of his were naturally accepted by his descendants, just as they easily decided to abandon Nuergandusi in order to reduce military expenditures.

Officials are only sent there regularly to conduct routine inspections, but they pay no attention to the local area.

When the Ming army in Nurgandusi retreated, the very small number of Han people also followed the Ming army's southward retreat and retreated to the Liaodong area.

However, the Ming Dynasty did not blindly implement the native official system in the southwest.

Affected by the Ming Dynasty's policy of focusing on defense against ethnic minorities in the north, Huairou methods were used as much as possible in the southwest ethnic areas in order to avoid arousing resistance from the ethnic minorities in the southwest and stabilize the ethnic minorities in the southwest.

Therefore, the Ming Dynasty's military and political governance in the southwest ethnic areas was mostly moderate and prudent, and few radical measures were taken.

However, because of the Ming Dynasty's expedient defense strategy in the southwest ethnic areas, once the opportunity is found, the Ming Dynasty will carry out reform and return.

In the middle and late Ming Dynasty, the Ming Dynasty changed the status of some chieftains in the southwest, but the Ming Dynasty's measures to change the status of chieftains to local chieftains were also quite mild. If the change caused rebellion among local ethnic minorities, the Ming Dynasty would change the status of chieftains to local status again. official.

The Ming Dynasty did not take coercive measures to promote official exile in the southwest ethnic areas. Instead, it tried its best to comply with the laws of historical development and implemented land reform and return to exile in a gentle and steady manner.

This is also the fundamental reason why rebellions occurred frequently in the southwest during the middle and late Ming Dynasty.

The Ming Dynasty's military and political goals for the southwest ethnic regions have always been clear, which is to strengthen centralized rule and maintain the Ming Dynasty's dominance in the southwest region.

The ethnic policies implemented by the Ming government served this purpose from beginning to end.

What Wei Guangde wants to do now is to implement it in Nuergandusi. This is to fundamentally negate the decisions made by previous emperors on the Liaodong issue, especially since a large number of Han people have shrunk back to Liaodong. In Nuergandusi There was almost no one around.

It would be impossible for such a change to be realized in the hands of Emperor Jiajing.

Therefore, Wei Guangde could only turn his attention to King Yu, subtly change King Yu's position, and gradually implement it after King Yu ascends the throne in the future.

As for the Mongols and Jurchens in Liaodong, Wei Guangde really looked down upon them.

Regardless of how powerful the Jurchens will be a hundred years later, when the Jurchens faced off against the Ming Dynasty's army, they would be beaten like chopping melons and vegetables.

Otherwise, the Liting Sweeper would not launch a wave from time to time to harvest a crop.

In fact, Yang Hao commanded the encirclement and suppression of Jianzhou Jurchens, that is, the Battle of Sarhu, which was itself part of the Liting Cave Clearing Plan. However, Emperor Wanli was indeed a bit lazy and started the war late. In other words, Nurhaci was really powerful. , can quickly accumulate strength in a very short period of time.

After all, it only took thirty-four years to accumulate, and finally formed a crushing power over the suzerain Ming Dynasty. There is no doubt about Nurhaci's ability.

In short, various reasons gave him the opportunity to develop his own power, which ultimately rang the bell for the collapse of the Ming Dynasty.

In addition, Wei Guangde also speculated that the Ming Dynasty's war to aid Korea may be one of the important reasons that delayed the Ming army's encirclement and suppression of the Jianzhou Jurchens.

However, now that he is here, he naturally does not want such history to happen again.

After seeing the actions of the Ming Dynasty in the southwest, Wei Guangde planned to follow suit and copy the policy of returning natives to Liaodong. The first area to be implemented was Jianzhou, followed by the Jurchen tribes in Haixi.

As for the so-called Jurchens from the East China Sea, they are further north, so forget it for the time being.

However, Wei Guangde's biggest headache is actually the lack of Han people in the local area. There will be great resistance in the court to implement the official transfer system, because the teacher has no name, so he can only do it step by step.

Therefore, he proposed to King Yu to upgrade the administrative level of Liaodong.

"As far as I know, the Jurchen tribes in Haixi have long been close to some Mongolian tribes due to their location, especially the Yehe tribe."

Wei Guangde said that he learned about the news in the northeast of Liaodong from Liaodong merchants. After all, they had to travel between the white mountains and black waters all year round to purchase goods, and their information was actually more accurate and faster than the Liaodong government.

"However, because of the deterrence of the military force, they can only defy the country and dare not openly rebel, at least on the surface."

Hearing what Wei Guangde said, Yin Shizhen nodded.

Regarding the situation in Liaodong, the Jurchens did go to the Han territory from time to time to plunder and rob some property and people. However, they would soon be intercepted and returned by the army, and then some of their tribal leaders would be punished.

"Yang means obedience, Yin means robbery." This was the situation in Liaodong during this period.

"The fundamental reason is still due to the influence of our Ming army's southward retreat a hundred years ago.

In such a large slave Gandusi, there are actually no officers and soldiers of our country stationed there. Those natives are naturally arrogant and think they can challenge the dignity of our country.

Even though the imperial court sent officials to patrol Nurqian from time to time, it was inevitable that the Jurchen people would despise me, the Ming Dynasty.

And because our country's military attack on the powerful Jurchen tribe has further aggravated the antagonism between our country and the Jurchen tribe.

If things go on like this, if the current situation is maintained, it will be fine for each Jurchen tribe to fight independently. However, once the Jurchen tribes are unified, it will be a fatal blow to our Ming Dynasty's rule in Liaodong and the Nuergan area. "

When Wei Guangde said this, he glanced at Yin Shizhen, who seemed to be deep in thought, and continued: "In my opinion, we should take advantage of our current situation of crushing the Jurchens to directly break up their long-established tribal system.

After the reform, they were not allowed to continue to divide the tribes according to the tribal system. Instead, they were divided into various places by force, divided into states and counties, and officials were sent to manage them.

According to the gold seal and imperial edict issued by the imperial court, the chiefs of each tribe moved southward and lived in the place designated by the imperial court. Only by completely separating them from their tribesmen could the imperial court's control over the Nurgandusi area be restored. "

"It sounds simple, but they will never sit back and wait to be killed. The rebellion of the chieftains in the southwest is a representative example."

Yin Shizhen shook his head and said.

"Yes, it is difficult to conquer the southwest region."

Wei Guangde smiled, but paused for a moment, and then continued: "But if we ignore it, there is no guarantee that we will annex each other, and even the united Jurchens will not backlash against us.

Brother Zhengfu, does he still remember the incident of ‘Fake tribute from the king’? "

"The king's fake tribute?"

Yin Shizhen frowned slightly when he heard Wei Guangde mention this.

Of course he knew about this matter, and it caused quite a stir in the court.

In fact, the matter is simple, that is, Haixi Duolinshan and other guards, the governor Qianshi Ezhenge, and others came to pay tribute to the horse, and the guards commanders such as Gucheng and Zhihata paid tribute at the same time.

During the roll call for rewards, Brother Ezhen called Zhu Yi Naiwangzhong tribe Ekenie and others, instead of Weihata and others from Gucheng, and he was an impostor.

At that time, there was an uproar in the court, because the people who came to pay tribute all carried the gold seals and imperial edicts issued by the Ming Dynasty to confirm their identities, but some of them were accused of being impostors, not to mention being identified in front of the emperor.

The final accurate information obtained after investigation is that Wang Zhongzhong first joined forces with the Haixi Yi Wuyunzhu to rob Tie Leshan and other Wei Yi to seize Tu Langzhong and others, and seize them from carrying the gold seal and the thirty-five edicts, and then Disguised as them and went to the capital to pay tribute.

This incident was a big deal at the time, but the most important thing is that it fully demonstrated that the Ming Dynasty had seriously neglected the actual situation of Nuer Gandusi's entrustment of various guards, and could not even identify the identities of these leaders.

The imperial court granted tribal leaders official positions, seals, imperial crowns, and court uniforms. Tribal leaders who wanted to go to Beijing to pay tribute or to go to Liaodong Ma Market for trade must bring their own seals and edicts to prove their identity.

This subsidiary identity authentication system based on seals and edicts has been maintained for more than a hundred years, but it has long since changed.

"What is the current situation of the Jurchens and the three guards of Uliangha? Does Brother Zhengfu know?"

Wei Guangde asked again.

But this time Wei Guangde didn't wait for him to answer, so he thought to himself and said: "There is not much news about the Jurchen tribe, and my knowledge is limited. However, as far as I know, the three guards of Wuliangha have been captured by Chahar and Nei Kalkha, Horqin and other parts were eaten.

The gold seals and edicts given by the imperial court were also taken away by them. After getting these edicts, they pretended to be the three guards to associate with our Ming Dynasty. This is also the reason why the so-called three guards of Wuliangha often rebelled.

Wherever there is Wuliangha now, the so-called "Duoyan", "Taining" and "Fuyu" have long been the Chahar, Nekalka, Horqin and other tribes. "

"really?"

Yin Shizhen exclaimed.