From Chief to Ball

Matchlock guns and flintlock guns have no generational difference in the history of firearms. They are both front-loading muskets without rifling, but there is a generational difference in Xiacheng.

Because flintlock guns need reeds, it takes thousands of quenching and heat treatment tests to accumulate usable reeds. Although bamboo pieces can be used as substitutes, their service life is too short to make them temporarily.

The matchlock gun relies on the gunpowder in the outer medicine chamber to ignite the gunpowder inside. What ignites the gunpowder is the match rather than the sparks rubbed by the reed and flint.

Bulky, low efficiency, rate of fire of 2 minutes, possible bombing, unusable in rainy days, etc., these are his shortcomings.

But direct aiming instead of projectiles, faster production than bows, no need for long training like archers, and mass production are his advantages.

If you put your heart and soul into it now, it can be done by concentrating the strength of the entire city.It also takes two or three years to make a qualified recurve bow, and it takes longer to train archers.Take the time to learn the bows of the Dongyi people and then train the archers. Why not just think about the muskets in one step?

With Xiacheng's current strength, it is possible to unify without making any changes, but unification is for the better development of the ethnic group, not for pure unification, so it is a waste of energy to do things that seem meaningless or even a waste of energy Worth it in the long run.

More importantly, it paves the way for future generations. After the advent of flintlock guns and bayonets, a farming country can recruit a large number of soldiers in a short period of time, and they can be thrown on the battlefield after three months of training. Herdsman - three months of training for archers is not shit, but ten fuzzi soldiers lined up to shoot a nomad is worth it.

In addition, there is an advantage of the times: the rest of the cities now do not have heavy armor.

Therefore, Xiacheng's matchlock gun does not need to have a long barrel, a large caliber, or even amazing power, which reduces the difficulty of manufacturing.

Wait until the technology has accumulated enough to lengthen the barrel and pursue precision.

There is nothing you have to wait until everything is ready to do it, and you will never do it if you don't do it.

Corresponding to the arquebus is the cannon, but this cannot use wrought iron or cast iron, only expensive bronze or brass.

Cannons for siege cannot be produced now, and cannons of thousands or even tens of thousands of catties are meaningless at this time.

But small-caliber field artillery can be made. The quantity does not need to be too large, and the quality does not need to be too good. If the technology is not enough, it depends on thickening the gun body. Anyway, the bronze can be recast after being blown up, just toss it slowly.

It takes three years to produce samples and train a group of craftsmen. Even if the effect is not good, it can leave an idea for this group, which can always be developed in hundreds of years.

Since the system cannot guarantee that it will not be corrupted, then use technology to crush the surrounding ethnic groups.

A unified empire with flintlocks and artillery, with new tactics to match.Even if the empire is corrupt, even if the ruling class of the empire is shameless, even if the soldiers of the empire have no sense of honor and are only educated with sticks, it will still not be defeated by the nomads. This has been proven.

As long as the meat rots in the pot, it doesn't matter who is orthodox.

Chapter 64 Preparation

After determining the future development plan, we have to prepare manpower in advance.

Judging from the situation of the Yucheng workshop system, the silly big black thick is basically the basic feature of various products of the Xiacheng system in the future.The purpose is to make the most and the easiest mass-produced things with the fewest people. All the fine work that can be handed down to future generations and be praised as the treasure of the ethnic group cannot be produced within at least ten years.

After the compromise, he won at least three years of recuperation time. The most important things to be done are all in charge of Chen Jian. He will no longer care about things that have a small scale before.

The improvement of gunpowder, tubular firearms, papermaking, and pottery printing are the four things that are the most important.

These four things need to train a new group of craftsmen, and to prepare for the scale in the future, at least [-] light and strong laborers are needed, plus [-] skilled workers from various workshops and [-] young people in Xiacheng who have completed the enlightenment education.

It seems that compared to the 3 people in the Yucheng system, the two thousand four hundred and five hundred people are not many.But if you calculate carefully, these two thousand and five hundred people must be young and middle-aged men, and the literal 500 people are not all men, let alone the strongest male labor force.

This is equivalent to a quarter of the young and middle-aged labor force in the Yucheng system, and Chen Jian took them away at once, which had a great impact on the normal development of the city.

But fortunately, his prestige is flourishing now, and no one objected in the high-level internal meeting. Everyone didn't know what he was going to do, but they still supported him unconditionally.

It is impossible for the original 1 people in the city to triple its production capacity within three years because of the extra 2 people.

According to the fact that one man, one woman, one ox, one plowshare and an iron tool can cultivate one hundred acres of land, 1 people are needed to ensure food supply and agricultural and sideline products, which is 1 people less.

As the population increases, the amount of coal and wood required also increases.The [-] miners brought back from Dongyi will also be invested in the mining they are most familiar with, which is another [-] less.

In order to ensure that all kinds of equipment needed for agricultural production in Yucheng are not included in export sales but only in-house, an additional 1000 people are required to fully prepare for domestic demand.

In order to ensure the transportation of basic survival, an additional [-] will be added.

After the reform of the military system, about 3000 people will be expelled from industrial and agricultural production.

Counting the more than 2000 young and strong people Chen Jian plans to leave, and removing the 6000 people who were able to maintain normal operations in the previous system, and removing some old and young people, the actual population that can be mobilized is only three to five thousand, and it will increase at most. About half of the original workshop production capacity.

Under this helpless reality, mass production without pursuing fineness has become the only choice.

Take papermaking as an example, the difference between a piece of yellow and ugly paper and a piece of white paper with excellent toughness is about three or four times the difference in manpower, and the process is also a few steps behind.

But what Chen Jian asked for was only the minimum use value of the paper, which could be written on, and could be dyed with ink or blue-black dye of nirvana.

Similar clothes, furs, shoes, and food all follow this model, only considering the minimum survival needs and use value, and completely abandoning the added value such as aesthetics.

In order to save manpower, the vegetable oil makes a burnt smell; to save manpower, the clothes are the same; to save manpower, the houses are exactly the same...

In this regard, Chen Jian made some explanations and speeches at a city meeting in early November, and put forward the slogan of the five-year plan. Within five years of the start of the city, the people of the country should endure this monotonous, everyone is a city. life of bricks and tiles.

He promised that there will be changes in five years, and asked the people of the country to give him five years of trust.

This is not unbearable for most of the lower-level people who have been exposed to life in Xia City.From their point of view, soybean oil does have a bad smell, but they didn't have to eat it before; the clothes are indeed the same, but they used to wear worse than this; the house is made of bricks, which is much better than the adobe house before.

This is not unbearable for the upper echelons of the system.The noble rank system in the system does not allow them to obtain some special offerings, but the Supply and Marketing Department can increase the prices of some scarce items to achieve inequality in the ability to pay money in the form of nominal equality.There are about a thousand people, including those who made special items for the chiefs and nobles of other cities, and the domestic sales prices of these items are not low, which can be regarded as guaranteeing the support of the high-level officials in the system for Chen Jian.

It's an unhealthy mechanic, but one that works best when surrounded by enemies.

At the same time, due to the technical advantages brought by Chen Jian's smuggling, this kind of horizontal comparison fully reflects the superiority of the Xiacheng system. At least in terms of ideology, there is no need to worry about the collective dissatisfaction caused by the comparison of other cities. The speeches of 99 people and 99 person have far-reaching influence. At least this generation is convinced that they belong to that part of 99 people. The [-] is still good.

As for the next generation, that's too far away and needn't be considered for now.

Moreover, they believe in Chen Jian's promise of change five years from now.They are full of confidence in their leader, or acting leader, or the person in charge entrusted by the real leader with carte blanche.

In this slogan of all for five years later, Chen Jian once again praised a group of outstanding workers who performed well during his expedition to Dongyi, awarded them various spiritual and material rewards, and publicized that everyone is for me and for me. Everyone's slogan.

Taking advantage of half a month before the second expedition, the propaganda machine was fully activated under the leadership of Chen Jian.

All the spearmen who followed Chen Jian to conquer Dongyi before returned to work in the workshop, leaving behind dozens of meritorious and potential professional soldiers. After the first batch of spearmen, the second batch of spearmen was recruited .

The second batch of Spearmen mainly consisted of mines and farms.

There is nothing to work on the farm in winter, and the high-level officials in Xiacheng don't have a too luxurious life, so they don't need people to dig ice to prepare for next summer, and they don't need to use winter to capture various wild animals.

On the whole, the three thousand miners brought back from the jade mine near Moucheng were the first to be integrated into the Yucheng system. They were all sent to the mine and accepted a new life easily. Xia believes that everything he does now is for himself.

Most of the remaining light and strong men in these two places have been recruited, and the farm should return before the spring plowing in March, and the latter only needs to leave a part of the backbone.

Most of the rest are temporarily assigned to work in Yucheng's workshops, and they are familiarized with the life of Xiacheng in a four-to-five way in accordance with the alternation of the old and the new.

It seems that there are a lot of people at once, but the overall labor efficiency has not improved much. Many people are not used to this mechanical reciprocating lifestyle, but they are forced by the two minimum survival needs of food and heating. do not accept.

Most of them can't get used to this completely different way of life from the past. Strictness is only one aspect. The biggest problem is that they have to learn all kinds of rules after finishing work every day, which is completely different from the loose and free life in the past.

Yucheng is like a melting pot, forcing everyone in the system to become a sample of discipline and understanding of rules.

From food to clothing, almost everyone is the same.