Li Shimin scratched his beard, and the two mustaches on his lips were very oily, but the grooming was very short. Pen | fun | pavilion www. ｂｉｑｕｇｅ。 Hearing Li Chao's unhesitating certainty, he accidentally pulled off a beard with a force on his hand.

It hurts and his female teeth crack his mouth.

"Can you talk?" Li Shimin was worried. At the beginning of his succession, he had already sent envoys to the Western Regions to form an alliance with Tong Ye Hu, and the relationship was quite good before. Tong Yehu was also on the table again, and sent an embassy, and also sent a lot of cattle, horses and camels.

But now, Tong Yehu has suddenly become the number one enemy of Datang.

"The frontiers of the empire are defended by the swords of the soldiers, and the safety of the dynasty is not negotiated at the negotiating table. Without the backing of strong strength, if we go to negotiate, we will only be seen as weak and seek surrender, and will only further fuel the enemy's ambitions. ”

Li Shimin sighed and leaned back in his chair.

"So, we can really only meet each other with swords and fight them?"

"This war is unavoidable, and if we don't fight, they will only make us weaker and weaker, and they will not pay attention to our desire for peace. Only by fighting first, and then winning, can they return to the negotiating table. ”

Regarding the current situation with the Turks, Li Chao really looks far away. At the beginning of Li Shimin's succession to the throne last year, the Turks wanted to go south. Later, Datang maintained a peaceful posture and did not fight.

But after two years, the Turks still called, but Jieli Khan, who wanted to fight the Tang Dynasty, has now become Li Shimin's guest. What is going to be called now is the Moxi ally Tongye Hu Khan that the Tang Dynasty used to deal with Jieli two years ago.

The situation is changing at this time, and the situation is changing so quickly that it is really unpredictable.

But two years later, the strength of the enemy in the north became stronger, on the contrary, after two years, the territory of Datang was mostly large. However, after experiencing this once-in-a-few catastrophe in the north, the Datang treasury is empty, and it is now in an extremely weak stage.

Li Shimin wants to be tough now, but he knows that he is not confident enough.

The account book that Li Chao gave him was full of pages and pages of red letters.

If you have no food and no money, what will you do to fight? The disaster in the Central Plains has not yet passed, and now how to fight in the north.

"Wen Yuan, can't you really talk to Tong Ye Hu?" Li Shimin hesitated and gritted his teeth, "If Tong Ye Hu is willing to talk, I can give him Dingxiang first." ”

Li Chao was a little surprised, and he was willing to compromise.

"Your Majesty's intention is to send Daibei to Tongye Hu?"

Li Shimin nodded.

I know that my own background is fine, although the imperial court has a lot of soldiers and horses stationed on the northern border, and the generals are also elite, but the imperial court can't support them to fight a big battle.

Li Chao still shook his head.

After the oolong tea was brewed, Li Chao blew it with a small purple sand teacup, and took a sip slowly, and sure enough, the tea leaves of this tea tree king tasted the best.

"Your Majesty, we can't satisfy him by sending Daibei to Tongye Hu at this time. He had just defeated Tiele and annexed the Eastern Turkic tribes, and now that his army was strong, how could he be satisfied with this? If we make such a sum on such conditions at this time, it will only make him more and more greedy. ”

"Then what about giving the river loop to Tongye Hu as well?" Li Shimin asked again.

"I mean for the time being."

He saw Li Chao looking at him, and said helplessly.

The Hetao Plain was fought down by Li Chao, Li Jing, Li Ji, and Changsun Wuji together, and it was not easy to recover it, and now he wants to send it out, and he is also unwilling. But if you don't want to, you can't fight, at least this year, you can't fight.

Now Li Shimin only hopes that after Tong Yehu can accept the Hetao, his appetite will be satisfied, so that Datang can drag it out until next year or the year after that, and after recovery, he will go north again and settle old accounts with Tong Yehu.

"Your Majesty, the minister thinks that we can talk to the Turks, but we must know for ourselves that we must be prepared for war, and be prepared for a tough battle."

Of course, peace talks are possible, but this can be used as a means to deceive the Turks, whether he deceives or not, try first, at least delay the time, in case he is deceived.

But it's okay to deceive the Turks, you can't deceive yourself, and if you really believe that peace talks can be successful, isn't this wishful thinking stupid?

"There is a war, but the court has no money, and there is a deficit of 30 million." Li Shimin stretched out his hand to Li Chao.

Li Chao drank tea and didn't speak, of course he knew that the court had no money, he was now in charge of the household department, and the money bags of the court were in his hands, and even the court could owe 30 million, thanks to Li Chao. It's not Li Chao, who got out the national debt, where can Li Shimin owe 30 million.

Now Li Shimin told him that he had no money, and there seemed to be a deep meaning in his words.

"Wenyuan, can you issue some more bonds?"

"How much does Your Majesty want to send?" Li Chao asked rhetorically.

Li Shimin took a sip of tea, the top-grade oolong tea, the tea leaves of the rare tea king tree, but Li Shimin drank it all in one gulp like a cow drink, and he didn't bother to taste it carefully. "If you really fight with Tong Yehu, you will have to run 30 million yuan."

The military system of the Tang Dynasty is right, and the government soldiers are not wrong to provide their own equipment, but a big war with a mobilization of at least 300,000 people will have to mobilize almost fifty or sixty percent of the Tang Dynasty's troops, mobilize so many soldiers, and the food, grass, ordnance, etc. that need to be consumed, which is quite huge. What's more, in order to maintain such a big war and support so many soldiers to fight, it is necessary to mobilize a very large number of people.

In a battle of this scale, Li Shimin had a headache, and at least he could score several large armies, form multiple campaign corps, and fight on multiple fronts, so that he could command it.

Battles with more than 100,000 people are basically not fought in one place, but are divided into multiple theaters and composed of countless small battles.

No one can dominate the entire campaign at once.

If you really want to fight with Tongye Hu, then the entire northern border is a battlefield, from Hexi to Longyou, from Shuofang to Guanzhong, and then to Hedong and Hebei, such a long front of thousands of miles, Li Shimin has no shortage of generals who can fight.

Li Jing, Li Ji, Li Chao, Qin Qiongwei, Chi Gong, Chai Shao and a large group of famous generals, one person leads the way, this is not a problem.

Datang also has so many soldiers, but the key is the difficulty of logistics and food.

Li Shimin's calculation based on the mobilization of 300,000 soldiers, 30 million military expenditures, is the minimum standard.

When you fight a war, you fight for money.

Food, grass, ordnance, rewards, pensions, etc., all kinds of expenses are quite terrifying.

"Your Majesty, we can only dispatch less than 100,000 soldiers and horses at most, and if we exceed this number, we will collapse ourselves without fighting." Li Chao said to Li Shimin very unceremoniously.

Under normal circumstances, it would not be able to support a large army of more than 100,000 to fight, let alone 300,000. There are soldiers, but it is still the same sentence, and the logistics and food cannot support it.

"Can't you get 30 million?"

"Thirty million? There is nothing the minister can do, only ask Your Majesty to change the Ministry of Household Books! ”

"If you can't get the money, then there will be no one in the Manchu Dynasty who can do it." Li Shimin is also direct, when it comes to making money, there is indeed no one more powerful than Li Chao.

"Your Majesty, the imperial court has collected more than 12 million yuan in taxes this year, and has also issued 30 million bonds. Send it again now? No one dared to buy it either. ”

Although Li Chao himself bought a million yuan of bonds, he knew that in fact, many rich households were half-persuaded and half-forced by local officials.

I bought it several times a year, just to buy, without interest, who wants it.

If you say that once every other year or two, everyone can still understand, after all, this year's disaster, but 30 million was issued in the front, and it will be issued later, so it is really not cost-effective to print bonds.

"How much can you get together?"

"Three or five million at most, no more."

Three or five million, how can this money be enough to fight a big battle?

"Wenyuan, can you borrow it?"

Borrow? Li Chao looked at the emperor, is this trying to borrow money? Who to borrow? It's impossible to borrow from the rich again, because the last time I borrowed grain, I just used the money from the treasury bonds to pay the white slips, and then I actually owe the rich households the principal and interest of the treasury bonds.

If you borrow again now, you haven't repaid your previous debts, and it will be difficult to borrow again.

"I heard that Sihai Company has strong financial resources, a lot of profits, a large increase in stock prices, and a high market capitalization. I'm going to borrow some money from Sihai Company, do you think it's okay? ”

Li Chao was speechless.

It was just dumbfounded.

It's a mess.

Li Shimin looked at Li Chao's face was not good, and said again, "I borrowed the 20% shares of the imperial court in the Sihai Company from you, the prince sold 3 million shares in half of the shares, and the imperial court sold 20% of the shares, how about borrowing 15 million as a mortgage?" ”

Li Chaoxin said that you might as well rob it, the two shares of the imperial court were originally given to the imperial court by Li Chaobai. Besides, the prince's share is a stock with multiple decision-making powers, and the imperial court is a stock with no decision-making power and only dividends, so how can the value be the same.

Besides, you're only mortgaging, not selling.

Where is there a borrowing amount that still exceeds the value of the collateral itself, who wants to borrow money like you, and how much to borrow.

Li Chao felt that he couldn't get used to Li Shimin's stinky problem.

"Your Majesty, this is not appropriate."

Li Shimin glared at Li Chao dissatisfied, "Then what can you do to get a large sum of money?" ”

Li Chao really has a way to make money, but he didn't want to take out some methods before.

"Your Majesty, there is a not-so-good way here, you can raise money for emergency relief first."

"Oh, tell me, what a good idea."

Li Chao sighed, "This is actually not a good way, if this opening is opened, I am afraid that it will be very troublesome in the future." ”

Where does Li Shimin care about these now, he just wants to get money to fight, if he doesn't fight money, how can he start a war? When the time comes, the loss will be even greater!