The weapon tycoon who traveled to Daqin

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"This, this plan. Novel." Ministers, look at me and I look at you. They are all very worried about this matter, because this matter has exceeded their imagination.

"Prime Minister, this plan is too bold," said the Minister of Finance.

"This is equivalent to outsourcing external military operations to these commercial organizations. Although this can solve financial problems, it is too bold to do so. And what does the Qin Army think about doing this? This is equivalent to seizing their military power. "The Minister of Finance said worriedly.

"Prime Minister, you'd better think again. It's a good thing for us to do this, but if we can't handle the military's problems well, once there is a trouble, the military and us will have great conflicts. We are in a difficult situation." The Minister of Finance said worriedly.

The treasury minister is right to be concerned.There was a great conflict between the civil official group and the military general group of Qin State. At this time, Meng Yi planned to use merchants to outsource the entire defense after eliminating these tribes. The entire defense was the responsibility of the Qin army, and Meng Yi did this , which is equivalent to letting go of the Qin army's defense issues to the Qin businessmen.To do so is to stir up conflicts between the Qin government and the civil official group.Doing so will cause great internal conflicts in Qin.

Such a big contradiction is bound to shock the entire Qin high-level.Although the current battle between civil officials and generals is only about military expenditures, Meng Yi now puts the issue on the defense of the Qin army. Defense is the business of the Qin army, and civil officials intervening in it will inevitably lead to counterattacks from the military. In this way, the struggle between the two sides will be enlarged, and the Minister of Finance does not want to expand this matter.I just want to focus the conflict on the issue of military spending.This is to expand the contradiction between civilian officials and generals, and the Minister of Finance obviously does not want to see such a situation.

"If we don't do this, our situation will be even worse. The Qin army's military expenditure remains high, and the financial resources and income are very tight. If we don't do this, we will have no money to make Qin's economy develop again." Meng Yi said worriedly.

"This is the overall situation." Meng Yi said.

The ministers present nodded their heads.But they mean something.This is bound to intensify the contradictions among the top officials of the Qin State. The military has already had a quarrel with the civilian group over the issue of military expenditures, and now it is going to take action on the defense controlled by the Qin army. This is equivalent to Meng Yi's attack on the military. counterattacked.

"Prime Minister, I think this matter should be taken slowly. Now is not the time to start this matter." The Minister of Economic Affairs said in a calming manner.

"En." Meng Yi also knew what the consequences of this matter would be.After all, all the civil servants present knew it.

"En. Okay, but I want to report this matter to the King of Qin. Then turn to resolve this matter." Meng Yi took a step back temporarily, but did not give up on this matter.

On the battlefield of the Eastern Front of Qi State.Tian Heng is discussing with a civil official about the logistics supply of the army.

"My lord, this time our army launched a thorough counterattack on the Eastern Front and seized some weapons and supplies, which greatly reduced the pressure on our demand for munitions," said the civil servant.

"However, the military expenses, the soldiers' military salaries have been in arrears a lot, and General Tian distributed some of the gold sand. But compared with the military expenses owed by the soldiers, it is too much. Moreover, there is also a lot of logistical material pressure. Especially the food demand. Our Qi people are already hungry to support this army. The current situation is very bad." The civil official said worriedly.

"I understand the problem you mentioned, it's an old problem." Tian Heng said calmly.

"My lord, it's the busy spring season. This is the time when supplies are most scarce. If the Chu army launches an attack, it will definitely be disadvantageous to us. And with so many laborers trapped on the eastern front, it will be a great loss to us." The civil official said. Said.

"Well, how much gold sand do we have?" Tian Heng asked.

"Because of the combat mission, we only excavated less than one stone of gold sand. If gold is smelted, it will be even less." The civil official said worriedly.

"En." Tian Heng looked helpless.

"My lord, I have a suggestion." The official said.

"I heard that your majesty has reached an agreement with the southern state of Chu, should we stop fighting the Chu army?" the civil official suggested.

"No." Tian Heng said.

"You have already formed an enmity with the Chu army in this battle, and it is impossible to resolve it. The truce is out of control," Tian Heng said.

"Oh. That's right." The official nodded and said.

"My lord, I just remembered something." The official then changed the topic and said.

"Oh. What is it?" Tian Heng asked.

"My lord, we can take advantage of the coast and go there to find some money and food. After all, wars rarely happen there, and the coast has the benefits of fish and salt. The north of Qi can no longer collect things. We can only think from the coast. I want to see it," said the official.

"Yes. There is a lot of fish salt in these places. We can also improve the food." Tian Heng said.At this time, Qi State has exhausted all its national power.Everything is slowly recovering, and recovery takes a long time to accumulate, but the coastal areas of Qi State have not been greatly affected by the war, because they have fishing boats and rely on their maritime advantages, which is very important for Qi State. importance.

"My lord, I have already sent someone there." The civil servant said with a smile.

"Hey." Tian Heng said with a smile.

"The state of Qi has been destroyed, and there is no material to use." An economic observer of the state of Qin said.

"The entire agriculture has come to a standstill. The people farming the fields are old and weak, and the cattle are hardly used. The farm tools are badly damaged." said the economic observer of Qin State.

"The commerce in Qi is no longer good. The number of handicraft workers is very small. Their commercial level has stagnated. It is impossible to carry out larger trade activities." Another observer said.

What they learned along the way was very bad for Qin.They simply couldn't find any place where Qi could have an advantage.

"There is another place that we haven't paid attention to. This place is the coastal area of ​​Qi State, and Qi State has the benefit of fish and salt. In this way, fish salt is the place that Qi State pays the most attention to. We just learned about Qi State's handicraft industry There is also agriculture. We don’t know the most important things in Qi. We might as well go to the coastal areas of Qi to see, that’s where we should pay the most attention.” The observer said.

1603 must

"General, the number of ships passing by the Yangtze River has been very small recently, and this has really affected us too much," Xiang Bo said.

"With the reduction of taxes, our money will decrease, and there will be fewer ships. Now there are more and more cannons, and many pirates and water pirates are equipped with a large number of cannons. The number of cannons on gunboats and medium warships has exceeded one hundred , but our medium-sized gunboats only have fifty. The number of gunboats is also less than those pirates." Xiang Liang said worriedly.

"Not only that. Now those merchants have begun to organize fleets, and there are also gunboats in the fleet. The number of cannons equipped by gunships is similar to that of medium-sized pirate gunships. The change in the number of equipment has greatly exceeded our expectations, and because of money, we relationship, I can no longer keep up with these people," Xiang Liang said.Xiang Yan just sat in the middle and listened patiently without speaking.

"Because we haven't been able to supply enough ships recently, our warships can't go to sea. If this continues, I worry that the overseas colonies we have managed to control will become enclaves." Xiang Liang said.

"Warships going out to sea have become the only communication line connecting these colonies." Xiang Liang said.

"But now, the warship has not been able to go to sea for a long time, I'm afraid." Xiang Liang said worriedly.

"The current tax has also been reduced a lot. We didn't collect much, but those nobles, they collected too much. When we come here, those merchants can't afford to pay taxes. Now, it's true There is no other way." Xiang Bo also said.

"In this way, the situation is not good." Xiang Yan said worriedly.

Xiang Yan's current situation is very bad.The income of Chu's navy is particularly small, but the number of troops supported is particularly large, and it is already difficult for the army to maintain itself.

Originally, Xiang Yan thought that after taking Changsha, the situation of the Chu State's navy would change a lot, but what he didn't expect was that the Chu State's nobles' violent expropriation would have a great influence on the Chu State's navy.The tax revenue of the Chu State Navy is not much at all.What's worse, Qin Guo Bank's loan was also cut off at this time.As a result, the source of income for the Chu State Navy was cut off.In addition, the Chu State's navy expanded greatly before, but now that the financial resources have been cut off, the situation of the Chu State's navy continues to deteriorate.

"Our overseas colonies can't collect taxes, so we can't keep up with the pirates." Xiang Liang said worriedly.

"En." Xiang Yan just nodded.Seeing Xiang Yan, Xiang Liang just nodded and didn't continue talking.Qin State continued to export a large amount of arms and weapons, and the export volume was increasing, which caused the prices of Qin State artillery, muskets, and various ammunition to drop a lot.Take an ordinary smoothbore gun as an example.The previous price was as high as one thousand gold, but now a smoothbore cannon is only one hundred gold.In some places, one hundred gold is no longer enough.This rapidly lowering price allowed more ships to be equipped with a large number of artillery.

The medium warships of the pirate ships were originally armed with fifty guns.But after the price of artillery was lowered, a hundred artillery pieces were quickly added.In this way, the firepower is doubled.However, the Chu State Navy could not keep up with the speed of artillery equipment because they did not have more money, which made the Chu State Navy lag behind the pirate merchant ships.

After the large-scale price reduction of artillery and other munitions and weapons, merchant ships also expanded rapidly.The expansion of merchant ships is due to the stimulation of sea and water transportation.The trade with Qin State is getting bigger and bigger, and more and more people are involved in it. The shipbuilding industry has developed rapidly. Not only has the scale of ships expanded, but the quantity and quality of ships have also increased a lot.The ships were much larger than they had ever been before.

Merchant ships used to be medium-sized cargo ships, originally only more than 20 feet long, and the number of such ships was very small.However, with the upgrading of shipbuilding technology, coupled with the expansion of the size of the shipyard.The length of the medium cargo ship suddenly expanded to a length of more than 30 feet.The width has also increased to five feet from the previous three feet.In this way, the loading capacity of the cargo is greatly increased, and some new wood is used, and the number of masts and sails is greatly strengthened.The layout is more reasonable.The price of ships has also dropped a lot rapidly.In this way, the price of the ship will be reduced rapidly.Under such circumstances, merchants naturally have a large number of ships to use.

A wealthy merchant already has the size of ten ships.These merchant ships are all armed merchant ships. Each of them is equipped with fifteen cannons. In order to strengthen their security, they will also specially equip one ship as a warship, so that the entire fleet will quickly increase its combat effectiveness.

And other less wealthy merchants would organize with each other and trade.And the reason why businessmen have such financial resources.From their primitive accumulation of capital.This kind of capital accumulation is very fast, because there is huge wealth overseas, so they have such rich financial resources to buy so many ships.

It is precisely because of such a huge gap that there is a big gap between the Chu state navy and the Chu state merchants, and this gap is widening a little bit every day.And the poor financial situation makes it difficult for them to compare with these businessmen.

Thinking of this, Xiang Yan was very helpless, because the soldiers couldn't do anything economically.The point of tax collection was taught by the people of Qin, and there is no way to get these things now.

"No, let's get people from Qin. People from Qin are doing very well economically." Xiang Yan thought for a long time.

"General." A doctor came up quickly and whispered.

"What is it?" Xiang Yan said.

"General, Jiujiang is here to report. It is said that several mines have been occupied by rioting slaves. The nobles are powerless to suppress it now. They ask us to send troops to support them." The doctor who came in said in a low voice.