Guangzong Yaoming

Chapter 442: The Domineering Decision
Even though we are unwilling to easily fall into the dilemma of fighting on two fronts, as Shen Yourong said: the opportunity cannot be missed.

Only the bitter leaves will grow taller.

After the Privy Council had communicated well, Ye Xianggao and other ministers, of course, looked miserable when they heard the bad news.

What about the promised East Asia plan that is just the beginning of planning and forming the East Asia Fleet?

"Your Majesty, the wind and waves at sea are unpredictable. Isn't it too hasty?" Ye Xianggao gritted his teeth and advised.

"Your Majesty, I beg you to think twice!" Wang Yingjiao also said immediately, "Even if there is an opportunity to fight, the military strength of the Ming Dynasty is no longer what it used to be, but the Japanese pirates cannot be underestimated after all! Besides, as long as there are another three to five years, the Japanese fleet will be fully developed, and the chances of destroying the Japanese will be greater. Now that Outer Yunnan has been pacified, financial resources will be available, and it will be easier to take it! Sending troops to Japan at this time will do more harm than good!"

Zhu Changluo certainly agreed with what they said.

Waiting would be more beneficial to the Ming Dynasty. After all, the steam engine was successful and Malacca was taken, so time was on the Ming Dynasty's side.

The emperor and his ministers have no disagreement on the general direction of taking over Japan, but is it necessary to act immediately?
Zhu Changluo figured it out: "Even if Xizhi goes to Korea, we need to let the Korean civil and military families see that the Ming Dynasty is serious. With the victory, some of them will be willing to take action. In the first battle, only Tsushima Island will be attacked. The Ming Dynasty will send out the Beiyang Fleet and the elite troops of Liaodong Town, and Korea will send out troops and food. We will fight and decide the battle quickly. Tsushima Island can be defeated in a snap, and this will achieve our immediate goal."

"...How can North Korea afford to support the food and wages of such a large army?" Ye Xianggao sighed.

The key point is that after taking it, if you don't continue to advance, you must guard against counterattacks. What's the point of not holding the front after the army marches out?
Tsushima Island is an isolated island. If a large army is stationed there, all the food and supplies need to be transported there. It will take two or three years for the Ming Dynasty, the northern border tribes, and the Korean vassal army to launch a large-scale attack. Over the years, these food and supplies will not be a small amount.

"Plunder!" Zhu Changluo said without mercy, "On the Ryukyu side, only Takumi Tuanlian and the foreign company will go first, and when they arrive in Ryukyu, they will help them eliminate the internal thieves and get rid of the control of the Shimazu clan. In this way, they can only think of ways to prepare for war. The Beiyang Fleet will lead the battle, and let the Korean soldiers go ashore to plunder! In the past few years, not much silver produced in Japan has flowed out!"

When Tokugawa Ieyasu was engaged in the red seal ship trade, it was mainly the Portuguese who interacted with them. He obtained silver from them and then purchased Ming goods in Macau and brought them back to Malacca.

After the Portuguese were driven out of Macau, they were soon driven back to Malacca and their trade with the Ming Dynasty was severed. Tokugawa Ieyasu then began to ban religion and close the country. In recent years, even less silver was mined from their silver mountains.

Then naturally I will stay in Japan.

Ye Xianggao and others were trying to figure out what the emperor meant.

The Beiyang Fleet was escorting the battle, so they were naturally searching the coast. Although the soldiers who landed were all Korean soldiers, wouldn't they have to be brought back to the ship if they wanted to come back?
There must be a distribution mechanism that will make those North Korean civil and military elites feel the benefits and be willing to continue investing.

There are advantages to doing this: the daimyo in the southwest of Japan are in a state of panic, and I am afraid they have no intention of counterattacking Tsushima Island; even if they can organize themselves, they must first cross the strait and the Beiyang Fleet. If the defense pressure on Tsushima Island is reduced, the stationed forces will not need to be so large. After years of plundering, they will not be able to build a solid defensive fortress in the coastal area to withstand the bombardment of the Beiyang Fleet, and it seems that it will be much easier to land in the future.

It was possible that they could not plunder much, and it would definitely become less and less. Japan was mountainous, and the places with the most wealth were mostly mountain castles built by local daimyo. The fleet could not land, so how could the Korean vassal army that landed to plunder take down those large mountain castles?
If the troops are not sufficient, heavy artillery must be equipped to quickly blast open a gap.

This requires the Ming Dynasty's elite land forces.

Wang Yingjiao raised this question, and Zhu Changluo said, "We fought against Japan to help the three brothers, to build a vassal state for them and to eliminate the threat of Japan for the Ming Dynasty. How could Prince Lu not contribute to what he gained in Korea over the years? How could the local Korean clans who did not want to be officials of the Ming Dynasty not contribute? On the contrary, Tsushima Island will be in the hands of the court in the future. It is not only a military port for the Beiyang Squadron, but also a commercial port for exchanges between Liaodong and Japan. The main expenditure of the Ming Dynasty is the construction of this island."

After pacifying Korea, Prince Lu came to the court and Li Sancai was in charge of the situation. He had cleaned up a lot of people over the years. How much savings did he have?
For Zhu Changluo, it is only a matter of two or three years. They can afford the investment and must invest.

Moreover, this current investment is to reduce the difficulty of the future general offensive, and can greatly reduce the investment in the future general offensive.

The reward is the whole of Japan.

The Ming Dynasty does need Ye Xianggao to suffer, but this suffering is still within the bearable range.

Tsushima Island is not very big, and there is already a mountain castle on the island. In particular, when Toyotomi Hideyoshi organized the invasion of Korea, he lived in the Kiyomizu Mountain Castle on Tsushima Island, which had been expanded and had a good foundation.

With the Ming army approaching, it is very likely that they can take it down without much effort and the damage will not be too great.

So if we expand this island further, especially if it is mainly the port part, the amount of money required will not be too exaggerated.

"We can't just look at the annual revenue of last year or this year." Zhu Changluo said, "Since the establishment of the Xingang Xuanwei Division, I have already told the Dutch and Portuguese to take a message back. As long as their warships stay outside the South China Sea and trade with the Ming Dynasty, I welcome them. Let them bring silver, which will bring a lot of income. The South China Sea islands are now under the protection of the Ming Dynasty, and the foreign companies will surely be more enthusiastic. How much will the annual revenue of the Nandu Ship Division increase?"

This is just one of the reasons. There is also the situation within the Ming Dynasty.

"The special national debts issued in the past are about to expire." Zhu Changluo looked at Ye Xianggao again, "The court can't redeem all of them now. But the account can be settled for those purchased in the past. Now it's the whole of Japan. By then, the land and forests there can be used in accordance with the old rules of Xinbian and Chengde Prefecture. Another issue will be issued to redeem the previous bonds, and there will be more. After taking over Japan, regardless of the rest, the annual output of gold and silver there alone will be a huge income."

“…Not mined by San Francisco?”

"What's the point of keeping the silver after they mine it? The Ming Dynasty should earn it back with goods." Zhu Changluo paused and said, "I have thought about it. Since the Xingang Xuanwei Division has been established, and Dongyang and Outer Yunnan are on the agenda, then the Ming Dynasty Silver Bank should be prepared to be established. First, it will facilitate future trade, second, it will unify the currency system, and third, it will manage the various treasuries and make the national treasury worthy of its name."

Ye Xianggao was shocked.

How much silver should be hidden among the people?

do not know.

Although there are many private money houses, how could the Ming Dynasty know the total amount of silver circulating in them?
The reason why the Ming Silver Bank had not been launched yet was because the emperor wanted to solve the problem of the circulation of gold, silver, copper coins, and banknotes at the same time, as well as the central treasuries and local reserves.

After the establishment of the silver bank, the rich and powerful could still carry cash with them, but if it was a large transaction of tens of thousands of dollars, it was of course more convenient to use the silver bank.

As long as they all admit it, it will just be a number on the receipt, and the court treasury will have a large amount of cash without having to pay out.

The power to manage and use the funds was controlled by the imperial court, but the court must not dig up its own roots. It was necessary to keep enough cash in the head office and branches in various places to avoid bank runs.

These are the key points analyzed by the emperor during the previous discussion.

"With the success of the steam engine, we have been able to forge more sophisticated weapons and instruments in recent years, and we have the technical conditions to issue silver dollars and new coins." Zhu Changluo said, "The Institute of Research and the Imperial Household Department have been trying new formulas. By then, in addition to silver dollars, the alloy formula used in new coins will be difficult for the public to imitate. As long as they can be exchanged at any time and recognized by the public, then redeeming the treasure notes will not be a big problem."

"...Do you really want to redeem the treasure notes?" Ye Xianggao was very conflicted.

"Yes!" Zhu Changluo said confidently, "To establish the credibility of the new currency system of the imperial court, the remaining problems of Baochao must be solved!"

Baochao, the eternal pain in the Ming Dynasty's monetary system, can be called a cancer.

Zhu Changluo originally thought that the Ming Dynasty's treasure notes were in that state because they were only printed but not redeemed. However, when he took the throne and began to study them, he found that this was not always the case.

Zhu Yuanzhang certainly issued a lot of money, and Zhu Di printed even more crazily during his northern expedition. From about 5 million strings of banknotes issued per year during the Hongwu reign to about 20 million strings of banknotes issued per year during the Yongle reign, it eventually got out of control.

The situation got out of control very early. In the 27th year of Hongwu, one guan of Baochao was only worth 160 coins. Zhu Yuanzhang was in control of everything. He first banned the use of gold and silver, and later even copper coins. When Zhu Di wanted to conquer the north, he did something besides printing money like crazy: the household registration salt law.

This was actually to recover the treasure notes. At that time, the treasure notes had fallen to the point where one string was only worth twelve coins, so the court stipulated that every household must buy at least one pound of salt with treasure notes every month, at a price of three strings of coins.

But it's of no use.

By the time of Zhu Zhanji, the issuance of Baochao had been stopped, and at that time one string of Baochao was only worth five coins. Of course, the court still collected Baochao by levying a Baochao tax on ships, with one ship receiving 100 strings of Baochao.

However, the amount of banknotes issued during the Hongwu and Yongle periods was in the unit of 100 million strings, and these measures were useless. So during the Zhengtong period, the ban on the use of silver was first relaxed, and in the first year of the Chenghua period, Zhu Jianshen struggled a bit: for all commercial taxes, half of the money was collected, and each string of banknotes was converted into four coins, regardless of age, and all were accepted for the convenience of civilian use.

But this struggle was in vain, and finally gave up and stopped forcibly collecting the treasure note tax. At this time, a treasure note was only worth one penny, and people generally "pasted their walls with notes".

Today, Baochao only exists in account books. Zhu Yijun also used Baochao to make ceremonial rewards, but Zhu Changluo was not so shameless.

But it is a fact that Baochao still exists in large quantities, and this cannot be avoided if one wants to reform the currency system.

Besides, the Ming Dynasty now has the conditions.

Originally, it was indeed because of the shortage of silver and copper, but silver had been flowing in for a long time, and the emperor also had a sense of reserve, and the smelting and casting technology had improved a lot. In addition, Baochao had not been issued for many years, and the number of existing ones was far less than that during the Xuande and Chenghua periods, so the pressure of redemption was much smaller. Even if someone wanted to play tricks during the redemption, taking advantage of the fact that Baochao was relatively easy to imitate, how could the cost of making it old and damaged be low?
Zhu Changluo had another motive for redeeming the Baochao: to provide benefits to the truly poor people.

Because after so many years, the treasure notes are almost useless, but they still exist in the government's books. Many of the treasure notes that still exist were first given to the government by smart people in the private sector through the policy loopholes of the folding notes to replace part of the taxes payable, and the government then paid them to the people at some special times.

For example, in the past, many salaries, soldiers’ monthly rations, comprador fees, etc. were paid with treasure notes.

Although some of them would still fall into the hands of civil and military officials and wealthy businessmen, they were obviously smarter people and always found ways to make these banknotes circulate into the hands of truly poor people.

In the sixteen years since Zhu Changluo ascended the throne, he has consciously controlled this. All the treasure notes that circulated to the court were collected, and the treasure notes that were paid to the lower levels no longer existed. The regulations on the tax types that were folded into notes were abolished during the process of compiling the new policies, and the tax rates and tax amounts were reset. The gentry and wealthy merchants no longer had the motivation to use treasure notes to offset taxes.

Therefore, at present, it should be basically only the poor people who have treasure notes in their hands, and they cannot spend them.

"These treasure notes must be taken back." Zhu Changluo said decisively, "First issue silver dollars and mint coins. After these fixed-amount silver dollars and mint coins are issued, the government will only accept new coins for taxation, purchases, and salaries. People are naturally afraid that this is not a new treasure note. Mint coins may not be accepted for a while, but silver dollars are real silver. People from all over the country who have copper coins will definitely come to exchange them for silver dollars. Let them exchange them first!"

"...How many silver dollars should be given out first?" Ye Xianggao's scalp tingled.

"Most of the silver in the treasury can be deposited in the silver bank first and used to mint silver dollars!" Zhu Changluo said directly.

Over the past ten years, from Changminghao to Zongminghao, to the silver he had borrowed from Huizhou merchants before, as well as more than ten years of gold and silver and other income, Zhu Changluo was much better at managing finances than Zhu Yijun.

He is naturally the world's richest man at the moment.

"More coins are minted, but they are not easily accepted. The rich exchange old copper coins for silver dollars. Some of these copper coins are government-minted, while others are privately minted. There should be some loss after distinguishing them." Zhu Changluo has thought about a lot and talked about it endlessly. "This loss should be determined at a certain ratio. Silver dollars can no longer be cut into small pieces. They exchange small pieces and silver ingots for silver dollars, so there will always be some surplus to be exchanged for minted coins. However, the poor people simply don't have many copper coins to exchange for full silver dollars, so they will definitely not be willing to exchange them all for minted coins. What will we do?"

Ye Xianggao said quietly, "People are full of resentment. They think the few copper coins they have will be worthless like the treasure notes."

"That's right." Zhu Changluo said quietly, but his tone was a little grim. "Of course, I can't stand civil unrest, so local governments have to help. Officials, wealthy families and big families have no copper coins, and they can't use silver dollars for many expenses. There will always be a price that requires minting. When collecting taxes, the government must recognize the value of minted coins according to the face value. The wealthy families who have minted coins have a bottom line in their hearts, and the poor people naturally know that minted coins are valuable. But they use copper coins and broken silver to exchange for minted coins, what about the loss?"

Silver ingots are large amounts of silver, which are used in daily life, and are often cut into small pieces and weighed on scales. Fixed-quota silver dollars are naturally convenient, but they need to be paired with new alloy coins with smaller denominations. This process will build up the habit of using silver dollars and coins. Because they are all fixed quotas, even if the people privately devalue the coins, the local government has to grit its teeth and recognize the face value of the coins at the tax and procurement levels.

As a result, the wealthy merchants had the motivation to pay taxes with Baochao as they did in the past. At least when they had to pay taxes, they knew that the government would collect coins as taxes according to the face value.

This is the key to establishing the value of coinage.

Or they would take out small silver coins and exchange them for old copper coins from ordinary people. Everyone had a conclusion on how to exchange old copper coins for small silver coins. In this link, ordinary people would probably lose money, after all, local big households had information gaps and time gaps, and they could take advantage of the time when people were in a state of panic to drive down the value of old copper coins.

At this time, some ordinary people would be unwilling to accept this. What Zhu Changluo needed the local government to do was to recognize the nominal value of the coins and prevent the rich and powerful from taking the opportunity to suppress the value of the old copper coins.

To incite civil unrest is a capital crime.

How can this be done?
"After the decree is issued, every household must be informed that taxes can be paid with coins at a fixed value. Old copper coins and broken silver will not be accepted. The rich will doubt it, and the poor will also make trouble." Zhu Changluo looked at Ye Xianggao solemnly, "This is what every county and every township must do well. The silver bank branches will send people to every township and every village. The poor people cannot bear the loss, so let them use banknotes to pay it back."

There were so many privately minted copper coins that the court could not exchange them purely at face value, as the loss would be too great.

The amount of money flowing in and out between the rich and powerful and the government was relatively large, so they could afford the loss. The exchange order would clearly inform all places that the coins would be recognized as being usable for paying taxes at the face value. Even if the rich and powerful did not believe it for a while, they would not make too much noise because of their large family background.

The local governments had to complete this task, and the Executive Yuan had to come up with implementation methods. For the local governments, the routine had long been mature, and they must focus on the key points first, and let the wealthy families change first - after all, copper coins, broken silver, and silver ingots would no longer be recognized.

They would probably keep the silver ingots first, but they would always exchange them for copper coins and small change, at least part of them.

After that come the poor people, who are even more numerous.

There will be turbulence during the process, but the imperial court will redeem the treasure notes on a large scale. This is not only a way to appease conflicts, but also a big move to make the people trust the new currency.

How to use Baochao to pay off?
The depreciation ratio when old copper coins are converted into new coins has been mentioned above. This ratio represents the "new market value" of the Baochao.

The worthless treasure notes could suddenly make up for the loss, the imperial court could accept minted coins as taxes, and enough coins could be exchanged for corresponding silver dollars. If local government offices could do their jobs clearly when the villagers were making a fuss, the treasure notes would have established their value, and the poor people would not easily sell the treasure notes as paper.

The wealthy and powerful had already exchanged their money in the process of working with local officials. Even if they still had some left, they could not buy up large amounts of treasure notes to exchange for new money.

This depreciation ratio is the welfare that Zhu Changluo provides to the poor people.

The rich and powerful are unwilling to accept this? Then take out the treasure banknotes.

Why didn't you say before that the treasure notes could be used to offset the loss? Wasn't this to appease the people?

Why? The rich and powerful mainly use silver. How much silver is the depreciation ratio of the copper coins in their homes? Do they really want to turn against the court because of this?
This is the practical convenience that makes it possible to try to do this today: since the implementation of the Ming Dynasty Currency System, the people have essentially been on a silver standard, and copper coins are only used as change, with most of them scattered in the hands of truly poor ordinary people.

Rich people's change is also small change.

Zhu Changluo concluded: "After the implementation of the steam engine, the smelting output will be much greater, and the cost of work will be greatly reduced. As long as the value of the coins is recognized, the court does not need to mint so many coins. The quota is one, two, five, ten, twenty, and fifty coins, and the actual minting volume is far less than the existing number of copper coins. The key is to stabilize the face value. In the future, how to mint new coins is a specialized knowledge. I have told you the reason. After the implementation of the steam engine, many goods are increasing, and it is actually necessary to mint more new coins out of thin air..."

After saying all this, I finally got back to the key point of telling them not to worry too much about the financial plans later on.

To put it bluntly, after establishing a new monetary system, the Ming Dynasty could actually "print money" again like it did during the Hongwu and Yongle periods.

But this time, it can't be paper - the technology has not yet reached the level that allows people to easily imitate it, and the treasure notes have too much dark history, making it too difficult to promote.

But a compromise can be made - copper coins already have denominations of 20%, 30% or even 10% off, and now it's just a matter of standardizing it a little bit, so the denominations can be larger.

Moreover, Zhu Changluo required the court to formulate a new currency law that must include institutional constraints to control excessive issuance.

Money is just a general equivalent. Overall, as production expands and wealth accumulates, the amount of money issued needs to be expanded.

As long as the new monetary value system is established, some of the incomplete coins can be destroyed and more coins, especially those with larger denominations, can be issued.

Real "paper money" can only be made of more sophisticated materials and processes that are extremely difficult to imitate, and are only used in transactions of larger amounts.

For example, after the prosperity of the ticket industry, the silver bills have never depreciated, because they are just equivalent to deposit and withdrawal certificates, and there are various hidden charges. It is certainly not a currency, but it does not mean that special silver bills and gold bills cannot be printed after the Ming Dynasty.

All in all, fighting on two fronts does put financial pressure on us.

But the pressure is not about not having money itself, but about how to concentrate financial resources.

"Do you have any further concerns?" Zhu Changluo looked at Ye Xianggao and the others. "What you need to worry about is how to carry this matter out in an orderly manner and prevent the local area from causing a big mess. Let's gather our wisdom and discuss the details carefully."

Ye Xianggao looked at him resentfully.

You are the one who makes the final decision, yet you insist on starting a war on two fronts at this point in time.

With the involvement of such a major issue as the Money Law, it would be like fighting on three fronts for the other central government offices outside the Privy Council.

They suddenly thought: once this major domestic affair began, they seemed to have less energy to say anything more about the war.

Although there was a Privy Council, the other ministers could still participate in the discussion of military and national affairs, or at least communicate and express their opinions.

Now it's just cooperation, right?

(End of this chapter)