Wind Rises in North America 1625

Chapter 266 Peace Talks (I)

On December 12, a pirate ship once again visited the port of Acapulco.

However, unlike two months ago, the pirate ship did not bombard the port or make any other provocative moves.

Moreover, from a distance, the ship seems a bit like the "Santo Domingo" that disappeared in the Pacific Ocean several years ago.

Just as the Spaniards were on full alert and ready to launch a strong counterattack, they saw the pirate ship lower a small boat and then slowly row towards the port with a white flag.

When the boat docked, the Spanish soldiers who had been prepared for a long time quickly surrounded it and pointed their muskets at the pirates who had landed.

Although Lin Afu was scared to death under the pressure of more than a dozen muskets, he thought that he was entrusted with the trust of the entire Xinhua and that he came as Xinhua's negotiating representative to negotiate a ceasefire with the Western Yi. So he suppressed his inner fear, raised his head, straightened his back, and loudly stated his identity and purpose.

Acapulco city governor Eric Garcia Lopez, who hurried over, looked at the three of them with a complicated expression, nodded slightly, and ordered people to take them back to the city for settlement.

Soon after, several messengers rode on fast horses and galloped towards Mexico City.

As early as mid-October, after Xinhua had completely annihilated the Spanish landing forces, the decision-making committee convened an emergency meeting. At the meeting, many representatives reached a consensus on ending the war, preparing to call it a day and restore peace so that they could focus on developing the domestic economy and social development.

Since mid-May, when the Spanish sent envoys to formally declare war on Xinhua, this war has greatly consumed Xinhua's already limited financial resources and seriously slowed down the normal development of many affairs.

After all, in order to fight a war with the Spaniards that cannot be lost, it is necessary to mobilize and organize all of Xinhua’s manpower and resources, forcing the new regime to enter a state of full wartime.

Although the entire war lasted less than half a month, all kinds of supplies were consumed extremely quickly. The stocks of gunpowder, lead bullets, and artillery shells were less than 50% of the pre-war reserves. If the Spaniards came again, they would probably not be able to withstand the consumption of a few battles.

In addition, the stocks of coal, steel, cloth and meat have also been consumed a lot. The stocks of many materials have reached the critical point of shortage and urgently need to be replenished or production and transportation increased again.

Although the war did not cause much damage to agricultural production, with only farmland and ancillary agricultural facilities near the battlefield damaged, it ultimately delayed the autumn harvest, causing a slight decrease in grain production compared with previous years.

More importantly, because of this war, the scale of immigration to Xinhua dropped sharply.

The Portuguese, unwilling to get involved in trouble, refused to help Xinhua transport immigrants two years ago because of the possible war it might cause, causing the population growth trend that had just achieved explosive growth to instantly fall to a very low level.

Even though Xinhua's shipbuilding industry has slowly started to take off and successfully built two clippers specifically for immigrants last year, this additional capacity has not filled the gap created by the withdrawal of the Portuguese.

Besides, for those time travelers who are extremely eager for population, the greater the transportation capacity, the better, and the more immigrants, the better.

This year, after returning to Xinhua, the immigrant fleet also brought back a very important message.

In April 1633, the Tokugawa shogunate issued a stricter trade ban, began to increase restrictions on foreign ships coming to Japan for trade, banned Japanese from leaving the country, and even planned to stop dispatching red seal ships (the red seal ships were stopped in 4). The trend of isolationism became increasingly intensified.

At the same time, under the influence of Xinhua, the Spanish trans-Pacific galleon trade became extremely unstable, and the demand for trade dropped sharply, which also indirectly affected the Portuguese Philippine re-export trade.

Under the influence of multiple factors, a large number of Portuguese merchant ships traveling to and from the Ming Dynasty waters are bound to be idle.

They kept asking through the Xinhua trading post in Guangzhou when the military conflict between Xinhua and the Spaniards would end so that the immigration transportation business between the two sides could be resumed.

In addition to the urgent need for immigration, Xinhua was also worried about the increasingly severe situation in the Ming Dynasty.

The Denglai Rebellion, led by Kong Youde, Li Jiucheng, Geng Zhongming, and others, was put down by mid-March (due to the burning of nearly all of the boats they relied on as a retreat, which in turn led to a more determined resistance, resulting in a period of more than a month later than originally reported). Tens of thousands of rebels were captured and killed, and rebel leaders such as Mao Youshun and Mao Chenglu were beheaded. However, history has its own inertia. Kong Youde, Geng Zhongming, and nearly 900 other core rebels, after plundering all means of crossing the sea around Denglai, obtained over 30 large and small boats and sailed away at night.

They were intercepted by the troops of Huang Long, the general of Dongjiang Town, in the waters near Lushun. After suffering half of their casualties, they took the opportunity to escape and disappeared in the vast ocean, and their whereabouts are unknown.

It is said that Kong, Geng and others fled to the sea near Gaizhou, then landed and headed towards Liaoyang, where they surrendered to the Jiannu.

There are also reports that the two thieves may have fled to North Korea and found a remote island to temporarily shelter.

Some even said that their ship encountered a storm at sea and was eaten by fish and shrimp in the sea.

But no matter what, the largest mutiny that broke out during the Chongzhen period has been completely quelled, and the glorious Ming Dynasty can continue to "stumble forward".

Well, the reason why it was "stumbling" was that the riots of refugees in the Ming Dynasty were getting more and more intense, and were gradually becoming difficult to control.

On February 11, just as the imperial court was gathering a large army to encircle and kill the Denglai rebels, a large number of refugees from Shanxi took advantage of the lack of military forces in Hebei and poured into Hebei.

On February 16, Zhaozhou Lieutenant General Yang Yuchun led his troops to attack them, but was ambushed and killed.

From February 17th to March 15th, within a month, the refugee army captured Zhaozhou, Xishan, Shunde, Zhending and other prefectures and counties.

On March 19th, the refugee army went west from Motianling in Xingtai and reached Wuan, where they defeated Zuo Liangyu's army.

On March 20th, Nanhe was captured, and the garrison commander Cao Ming and the chief clerk Wu Yingke were all killed in the battle.

As a result, the refugee army's power in Hebei was greatly shaken.

In the Central Plains, in June, Deng Qi, who had just been promoted to commander-in-chief for suppressing the Denglai Rebellion, was ordered to lead the army to suppress the refugees. He won at first but was defeated later, losing more than 3,000 soldiers and was trapped in a woodcutter's nest. Fortunately, he was rescued by Liang Yu, but the "bandits in Henan were very powerful" and difficult to suppress.

Although the refugee uprisings that broke out in various parts of the northern Ming Dynasty were still sporadic and small-scale mobile fighting, and there was no unified organizer or leader, these uprisings and riots that occurred one after another seriously disrupted the stable social and economic order in the north, laying the foundation for the outbreak of large-scale uprisings later.

The refugee uprising gradually spread from Shaanxi to Shanxi, Henan and other places, and eventually formed a nationwide peasant war.

The death knell of the Ming Dynasty has sounded, the dynasty's edifice is about to fall apart and decay, and its collapse is not far away.

However, at this time, Xinhua had a small population, a weak economy, and weak strength. It was far from being able to make corresponding interventions or exert influence on the current situation in the Ming Dynasty. This made the time travelers feel anxious and eager.

We cannot afford to get entangled with the Spaniards any longer. The military conflict between the two sides must be stopped so that Xinhua can concentrate all its efforts on developing production, increasing immigration efforts, and striving to improve its own strength.

Considering the arrogant and conceited character of the Spanish, even if their expeditionary fleet suffered a major defeat, they would certainly not lower themselves and come to Xinhua to seek peace.

In this case, if the mountain does not come to me, I will go to the mountain. Why not let Xinhua give them a way out and take the initiative to send peace envoys to Mexico to sign a peace agreement acceptable to both sides to end the war between the two sides.

Lin Afu's mission on this trip was to negotiate a ceasefire and win precious time and space for Xinhua's development.

(End of this chapter)