Standalone Northern and Southern Dynasties

Chapter 308 Jinyang
Su Ze was very satisfied.

This is the difference between people.

For people like Houmochenshun, Murong Shaozong, Li Cunzhen, and Li Xian, there is no problem in letting them lead an army to fight alone. The difference between the four is that Houmochenshun is more brave in fighting, while Murong Shaozong is more conservative, Li Xian prefers to use unconventional strategies, and Li Cunzhen can fight tough battles.

If someone like Hou Jing were equipped with a capable civil official to assist him, he would be able to focus on one side and be entrusted with the defense of a county.

People like Yu Jin and Yang Kan can be entrusted with an entire state. They are already the top talents under Su Ze.

As for the Su brothers, they have chosen to work in the civil service system and have no prestige in the army, so they can only perform logistical work in a stable rear area.

As for people like Wang Sizheng and Wei Xiaokuan, they are still in the "leveling up" stage and do not yet have the ability to lead troops in combat alone.

Dugu Ruyuan's words show that he already has a strategic thinking that can look at the overall situation. In the Su Ze Group, the only one who can have this understanding is Hou Jing.

He is indeed a guy who can become the boss of a mountain. His vision is indeed correct.

Su Ze asked another question:

"Where do you think the heart of the world is right now, Dugu Lang?"

This is a difficult question. You need to have an understanding of the national situation before you can say something about it.

In the Su Ze Group, the only ones who can answer this question are the Su brothers and Yu Jin.

Yu Jin used to follow Su Ze, and learned Li Chong's military tactics. He also served as a local official in Gaoping County. He was considered to have the highest academic degree among Su Ze's "grassroots team".

The Su brothers were talented in internal affairs. Su Chao and Su Ze were both disciples of Li Daoyuan, and had a deep understanding of the geography of mountains and rivers in the world.

Dugu thought for a while and said:
"General, I am a frontier man. I have never been to other places since I came south from Hengzhou, so I don't know anything about Kyushu geomancy."

Su Ze nodded. This was just an additional question, and he didn't expect Dugu Ruyuan to be able to answer it.

But Dugu Ruyuan changed the subject and said:
"From what I have seen along the way, Jinyang is the key to the world."

This time Su Ze raised his head and looked at Dugu Ruyuan.

In fact, there is no standard answer to this question.

It can be said that Luoyang is the legitimate country of the dynasty, the heart of Henan, and the undisputed core of the north.

Of course, it can be said that it is the ancient capital of Yecheng, which is the center of North China. After Cao Mengde rose to power, it has become the capital of separatist regimes many times during the Sixteen Kingdoms period.

It can also be said to be Chang'an, the ancient capital of Qin and Han Dynasties and the core of Guanzhong.

Xiangyang, Pengcheng, Jiangling and Jiankang are also important cities.

But Dugu Ruyuan said Jinyang.

Su Ze asked:

"Why does Dugu Lang think that Jinyang is the key to the world?"

Dugu Ruyuan said: "It is still based on the previous judgment. If the court moves the six towns to Ding, Ying and Ji, the three states will be in chaos!"

"The Three States are the heart of Hedong. If the Three States are in chaos, how can the northern states such as You, Yan, and Heng be spared? At this time, the only place in the court that can serve as a barrier to the north is Jinyang."

It turned out to be this reason.

Su Ze was still very satisfied with Dugu Ruyuan. With this understanding, he was already on par with Yu Jin in terms of strategy.

Su Ze said:

"Dugu Lang is from the Six Towns. I plan to register him as a citizen in Hezhou and Xiazhou. I will let Dugu Lang handle the establishment of the Zhechongfu in Xiazhou. How do you think?"

Dugu Ruyuan crossed his hands and said:

"I don't know what Zhechongfu is, and I'm afraid I can't understand the general's intentions. Please help me solve my confusion."

Su Ze explained the main work of Zhechongfu and then said:

"Zhechoufu is a direct subordinate organization of the Shogun's shogunate. It is responsible for the manufacture of military equipment in peacetime and the training of reserve soldiers in the three villages during the slack season. In wartime, it cooperates with the governors of prefectures and counties to send the recruited soldiers to the front lines."

"In addition, we are responsible for the resettlement of disabled and retired soldiers, and there is another job."

Su Ze looked at Dugu Ruyuan and said:
"If the remnants of the six prefectures who have been fully registered are oppressed and wronged in their local areas, the Zhechoufu will also collect them and bring them to the Shogun's Office."

“The same goes for veterans who have been discharged with disabilities.”

Su Ze looked at Dugu Ruyuan. Normally, as a military general, he would not be willing to do these specific civil affairs work. However, at this moment, Dugu Ruyuan did not show any strange expression on his face and calmly accepted the task.

This was not Su Ze's intention to make things difficult for Dugu Ruyuan. Wei Xiaokuan also did the work of preparing for the Zhechoufu.

Zhechoufu is the basis of the fubing system, which is similar to the local people's armed forces department and veterans affairs administration bureau in later generations, and is an important link in the entire fubing system chain.

This is also Su Ze's cultivation of Dugu Ruyuan, an all-round talent.

Just after Dugu accepted the order as he wished, Su Ze said:

"I am promoting the change of Chinese surnames and names in Xiazhou. Dugu Lang should also change his name to a Chinese one."

For a Xianbei like Dugu Ruyuan, there was no legal obstacle to changing his name. He said decisively, "Please give me a name, General."

"A man without faith cannot stand. From now on, you will be called Dugu Xin."

"Thank you for the name, General."

Su Ze looked at Hou Mochen again and said:

"You should also change your surname to Chen."

Hou Mochen and his younger brothers also accepted Su Ze's change of surname.

The surnames of the grassland nomads are actually the names of their tribes.

For example, the Xianbei surname Tuoba of the Northern Wei royal family came from the tribal name of the Xianbei Tuoba clan.

The Northern Wei royal family has always loved changing their names and surnames. Emperor Xiaowen even changed his own surname and that of the entire Xianbei high-ranking officials.

The Six Garrisons still used Xianbei names, which was one of the reasons why the people of the Six Garrisons were excluded by the nobles in Luoyang.

Su Ze changed the surnames and names of the survivors of the Six Garrisons. They did not have much resistance, and having Chinese names also allowed them to better integrate into the local community.

After finishing the business, Su Ze gossiped:
"Dugu Lang, are you ready to get married?"

Dugu Xin shook his head and said, "The country is in turmoil, and my parents died early, so I haven't gotten married yet."

Su Ze then remembered that Dugu Xin was only eighteen years old.

When Dugu Xin gave birth to those daughters in the future, he should have already become successful.

The daughter who became queen of Yuwen was born to his wife Guo, who was the daughter of Taiyuan Guo.

The daughter Dugu Qieluo who married Yang Jian was born to Qinghe Cui, the successor of Guo after his death.

With Dugu Xin's current status and position, the daughters of these big families would definitely not marry him.

Su Ze looked at Dugu Xin. From the perspective of his character, there was indeed nothing wrong with him. His appearance was also first-rate. He couldn't help but think of his sister.

Su Yuyao is about to reach the age of marriage. His wife, Princess Chenliu, also talked about this a few days ago, but Su Ze is not satisfied with any of the marriage candidates she proposed.

Forget it, let’s wait.
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In the following days, Su Ze went to the camp to recruit soldiers every day, but he only recruited the elite among the elite, and recruited them according to the standards of elite personal soldiers. Su Ze recruited according to the standards of the Qinghe King's selection of soldiers when he entered the camp, and he planned to recruit a total of one thousand people.

There is no other way. With the administrative and financial level of today's era, being able to support so many standing soldiers already means that the Shogun's office has abundant talents.

The financial and taxation system is the best indicator of a country's administrative and technological level.

The function of the financial and taxation system is to send the taxes collected from the grassroots level to the central government layer by layer.

Before Zhang Juzheng's Single Whip System, the government collected taxes in kind, most directly grain and cloth.

This requires a financial department that is responsible for the central statistics and assessment of national tax revenue, a transportation department at the state and county level that is responsible for delivering grain and cloth, a supervisory department that is responsible for the assessment, and most importantly, tax officials and collectors who are responsible for tax revenue at the grassroots level.

Before the reforms of Empress Dowager Wenming in the Northern Wei Dynasty, even the salaries of officials were raised by themselves locally. Officials in the capital Pingcheng at that time relied entirely on royal rewards to survive.

The issue of collecting taxes was too complicated for the Northern Wei court, and its ability to collect taxes had not yet reached the level of the Western Jin Dynasty.

There have been several leaps in the tax system in history, namely the Two-Tax System in the Tang Dynasty, Wang Anshi's Reform in the Song Dynasty, and later Zhang Juzheng's One-Whip System.

The Two-Tax System implemented in the Tang Dynasty also took advantage of the progress in agricultural technology and the large-scale development of the south of the Yangtze River, which increased the imperial court's taxes by a large amount.

Wang Anshi was able to implement reforms because of the technological revolution in knowledge dissemination during the Song Dynasty and the breaking of the aristocratic families' monopoly on knowledge during the Five Dynasties. The literate population increased dramatically, and a large number of literate officials were trained, which made it possible for him to implement such complex reforms.

Zhang Juzheng's success in carrying out reforms and ending the two thousand years of taxation in kind was due to the historical opportunity of a large amount of silver flowing into the Central Plains at that time.

When it comes to the ability to collect taxes from the people, no one can surpass Emperor Wu of Han.

The weak financial capacity has resulted in the court being able to maintain only a certain number of central troops since the Eastern Han Dynasty, and to call up soldiers from prefectures and counties and recruit soldiers on an emergency basis when wars break out.

The same was true for Su Ze's shogunate. As the powerful families still controlled the land and the financial and taxation system had not been upgraded, he could only afford to maintain this number of standing troops.

This was only possible because Su Ze practiced strict economy and used the income from his own business to subsidize the army.

Su Ze thought of his sworn brother Erzhu Rong again. Even if the entire Xiurongchuan belonged to the Erzhu family, he could only afford to support an elite cavalry of no more than 10,000 people.

The army controlled by Erzhu Rong in the future was actually composed of Xiurong's cavalry as the core and the soldiers from the Six Garrisons who were recruited as captives as the backbone.

Su Ze promoted woodblock printing, tried to popularize knowledge, and recruited more grassroots administrative talents. Under these measures, he could only learn from Erzhu Rong's method of using elite standing troops as the backbone and mobilizing the government troops to fight in important wars.

And just like that, the end of the year came.

The first month of the second year of Xiaochang.

This year, God finally spared the north and there was no more white disaster.

But this kind of weather made Su Xiang (the boastful astronomy student) very nervous. After the Chinese New Year, he asked to see Su Ze and said:
"General, judging from the celestial phenomena, there will be a great disaster this year!"

(End of this chapter)