New Shun 1730

After Kuroda Jitaka also expressed his idea of ​​peace talks, Ino Masatake had nothing to say.

The purpose of his existence as a daimyo is to monitor the outer daimyo, and the southwestern feudal domains are his key targets of surveillance.

Previously, these daimyo were worried about the occupation of their territories and the fate of the Tosa domain, so they united and really wanted to fight a decisive battle with Dashun.

Now that they found that there was no possibility of victory, they also decided to give up the Shimazu domain and ask the shogunate for peace talks for their own interests.

Kuroda Jitaka finally sighed and said: "As long as the Tang people do not occupy an inch of land, they can be equivalent to Japan's material resources and win the favor of the Tang people. As long as they do not occupy the land, the Tang people can build ships and cast firearms, so can't we do it?"

"Only by being humiliated temporarily now can we have a chance to win back in the future. On the contrary, if we continue to fight, the Tang people occupy the land and treat the people well and seduce the uprising, we will be destroyed."

Ino Masatake actually knew in his heart that Kuroda Jitaka's words were not wrong. Even he chose to stand on the side of the feudal domains, so what else can be said?

After reaching an agreement, the feudal lords summarized their ideas and wrote to the shogunate. At the same time, while Dashun had not yet captured Shimonoseki to control the strait, each sent a feudal elder to Kyoto.

For a period of time afterwards, it was still calm.

The Dashun Army, which occupied Hagi Castle, did not go south, but only consolidated the defense of Hagi Castle and collected grain, rice, gold and silver from all over Hagi Castle.

The navy was busy drawing a map of Japan's coastline, and from time to time it would flow to the south and turn around near the shore, but it did not waste the expensive artillery shells to bombard everywhere.

At most, after landing, the Marines would escort a group of people, draw maps, and measure precise longitude and latitude.

Moreover, the navy also sent a message directly to the feudal domains along the coast: if the map drawers were attacked, Dashun would definitely capture the attacker's feudal office. If you don't believe it, try it.

The samurai of various domains turned a blind eye to this situation, knowing that the Dashun group could do it, so this threat was extremely powerful.

During the short period of calm, in Nijo Castle in Kyoto, Tokugawa Yoshimune was listening to the requests of the lords of various domains or the elders of various domains.

Before and after Dashun captured Kyoto and withdrew his troops, Tokugawa Yoshimune gathered a large number of hatamoto and went to Kyoto.

He wanted to make a big show here.

Since the beginning of the war, Dashun has not caused much actual damage to Tokugawa Yoshimune. Whether it is population or city, Dashun has only fought a few hereditary daimyo at most, and has not taken action against the three major families and the direct territories of Tokugawa.

Whether it is Nagasaki or Iwami, these important sources of wealth controlled by the Tokugawa family, Dashun did not fight.

However, the loss of reputation is too great.

Even if Emperor Go-Mizunoo went to Nijo Castle to meet Tokugawa Iemitsu, the emperor's meeting with his subjects was unprecedented, and in fact he had already acknowledged his submission to the rule of the Tokugawa family.

Even if the emperor's daily food and drink expenses were not guaranteed, he had to rely on selling calligraphy and paintings and tickets from time to time to let merchants enjoy the scene of the emperor meeting the nobles.

But after all, the emperor's arrest was unprecedented. This was very detrimental to the rule of the Tokugawa family.

The previous actions of the Dashun side made Tokugawa Yoshimune unable to understand, thinking that Liu Yu was crazy and really wanted to force him to fight to the death.

However, when the news came that the Dashun army might attack Shimonoseki, besiege Hagi Castle, and completely annihilate the coalition forces of Choshu, Changfu, Hiroshima and other clans, Tokugawa Yoshimune suddenly became happy.

The situation was once again in his favor.

When he arrived in Kyoto, the Tokugawa family announced that the whole of Japan would establish a new emperor, fight to the end, and never surrender.

A large number of lower-class samurai, even the sons of lower-class samurai, brought their own dry food and were inspired by this declaration of fighting to the end. They spontaneously went to Kyoto to join the army. Some samurai even donated their property.

Tokugawa Yoshimune certainly did not want to fight to the end. The result of fighting to the end was likely that the southwestern vassal states would defect and stand on the side of Dashun to fight the shogunate together.

But after the slogan was shouted, the shogunate regained the initiative from the passivity of Kyoto being captured before.

In Nijo Castle, the old and important officials of the southwestern vassal states handed over the proposals of the southwestern vassal states.

"General, we can't fight anymore. The Tang people are not defeated by the current military preparations. Moreover, the emperor did not make any mistakes and took the initiative to negotiate with the Tang people. How can we establish a new emperor because of this?"

Similar voices were constantly raised, and they met wave after wave. The lords of the coastal vassal states almost all had the same idea.

Almost all of the highest-ranking outer daimyo supported a ceasefire and peace talks.

The Kaga Domain, with a nominal 1 million koku, supports peace talks; the Sendai Domain, with an actual koku of 1 million koku and its own copper mines to mint coins, supports peace talks; the Kagoshima Domain has no right to speak, because no matter whether there is peace talks or not, the Kagoshima Domain will definitely be dealt with by the Dashun; Chikuzen, Kumamoto, Hiroshima, Saga... all support peace talks.

Excluding the shogunate, among the top ten daimyo with high koku, excluding Nagoya and Wakayama, two of the three great families that are consistent with the shogunate, and excluding the Kagoshima Domain that has no right to speak, all support peace talks.

The remaining small domains, as long as they are in western Honshu, Kyushu or Shikoku Island, and Mutsu Dewa near Ezo, all support peace talks.

But Tokugawa Yoshimune did not agree immediately, but insisted that a new king should be established and he should fight to the end, and he must not give up easily.

The samurai who gathered in Kyoto, and the samurai sons who brought their own dry food, also started to discuss internally. Because Tokugawa Yoshimune deliberately let someone spread the news, the news that "the shogunate was about to fight to the death, why did the various vassal states surrender first" spread everywhere.

Not long after, an assassination occurred in Kyoto.

Seven low-level samurai spontaneously attacked the old middle-ranking official of the Chikuzen Domain, hacked him to death near Nijo Castle, and shouted the slogan "Heaven punishes the traitors of the country".

After this incident broke out, Tokugawa Yoshimune chose to formally discuss whether to establish a new monarch, fight or make peace in public in the name of "calming down the anger of the warriors".

All the vassal states knew that the shogunate wanted them to take the blame, but at this time, they could not care too much.

Someone has to take the blame for this.

If the shogunate takes the blame, the shogunate will die. It will die sooner or later, so it is better not to take the blame and fight to the end.

If the feudal domains betrayed the shogunate, the prestige lost by the shogunate would all be wiped out. A large number of lower-level samurai who were dissatisfied with the feudal domains might form associations and even plan to withdraw and reduce the feudal domains.

The shogunate was defeated in this battle and its prestige was destroyed, but it turned the tables with the cooperation of Dashun.

Now Tokugawa Yoshimune directly made things clear and wanted to debate in public to force the feudal domains to make a choice.

In a debate, winning may require some skills, but it is not difficult to lose.

Just before the debate began, Toki Yoritoshi, who had previously served as Kyoto Shoshidai, committed suicide by seppuku and took the responsibility for the capture of the emperor.

Not only did he take the responsibility for the capture of the emperor, but he also wrote a last letter, saying that he had mishandled the situation during his tenure as Kyoto Shoshidai and during Dashun's surprise attack on Kyoto. It was entirely possible to take the emperor to Osaka for temporary refuge before Dashun attacked.

Therefore, the capture of the emperor was not the responsibility of the shogunate, but he, the Kyoto shogun, lost his chance because of panic.

After he "committed suicide", the Osaka Castle Lord Ota Sukeharu also committed suicide.

Ota Sukeharu believed that he also had a great responsibility. The shogun's arrangement was fine. A large number of troops were reserved in Osaka, which was enough to protect the safety of Kyoto.

But he acted on his own initiative and fell into the Dashun's strategy of luring the tiger away from the mountain, and transferred the mobile forces in his hands to Tottori.

If it weren't for his own initiative, Kyoto would not have been broken.

The death of Toki Yoritoshi and Ota Sukeharu eliminated the last bit of responsibility of the shogunate.

After all, they were not executed by the shogunate, but committed suicide. In Japan, even if there is no such muddy statement as "everyone is dead", many things are really hard to pursue after apologizing for death.

Toki Yoritoshi and Ota Sukeharu both committed seppuku on the street in front of Nijo Castle. They read out their mistakes in public and chose to be beheaded by the kaishakunin, so they didn't die so painfully.

After the two died, the debate about war or peace began in Kyoto.

On the shogunate side, Matsudaira Terusada, a trusted elder councilor and a close friend of Tokugawa Yoshimune when he was a child, came forward to preside over the debate.

The shogunate officials who nominally supported the faction of fighting to the end cited the story of the emperors of the Song and Ming dynasties who fought to the end after being captured and establishing new emperors.

The faction that supported peace talks without ceding territory pointed out that the armaments of Dashun were really beyond the resistance of Japan at that time.

If there was no peace talks, the situation would only get uglier.

And the fault of this matter was indeed the Shimazu clan. No matter what, Ryukyu was a vassal of China. Toyotomi Hideyoshi had already given the answer to the consequences of touching the vassal of the Celestial Empire, but the Shimazu clan did not learn from it.

They did not say anything about the story of sleeping on straw and tasting gall, but simulated the tactics of the Dashun Army and asked how the shogunate should deal with it if the Dashun Army continued to fight?

In the battle of Hagi Castle, Dashun proved two things.

First, Dashun could concentrate about 10,000 troops anywhere west of Hagi Castle. This was just the bottom line, and it could be more.

Second, to defeat Dashun in a field battle, a large number of national collapses and at least three to four times the troops were needed.

In other words, even if the shogunate wanted to fight, it would need to gather about 50,000 field troops, plus logistics such as straw sandals, which would require about 80,000 to compete with Dashun.

But about 50,000 field troops were already the limit of what the shogunate could mobilize. After this batch of field troops were mobilized, if Dashun used the same trick again and made a feint to the east and attacked the west, taking advantage of the advantages of sea transportation to raid Edo, Wakayama, Osaka, Nagoya and other places, what should the shogunate do?

As long as the navy of Dashun is not destroyed, the initiative is in the hands of Dashun. The shogunate assembled 70,000 to 80,000 troops, and the speed of action must be slow. They slowly arrived at Hagi Castle. If Dashun does not want to fight, they can jump on the ship to attack.

Ten days of sea transportation is enough for these 70,000 to 80,000 troops to run on land for more than a month.

If those who support a decisive battle can give an effective way to deal with Dashun's tactics, then the feudal lords will support a decisive battle.

If not, the feudal lords will not fight anymore.