The main purpose of Lin Lian's visit to Xuzhou to inspect defense affairs is to adjust the deployment of troops and defense ideas in Xuzhou.

In the north of Xuzhou, the Luxi Flat is open, and there are Bianshui and Surabaya to communicate, but the current situation, Beiyan gave up the effort to fight Xuzhou from here, and Huaidong did not gather superior forces to counterattack Jining, Dongping, Tai'an and other places in the north in a short time.

Next, Huaidong should strengthen the competition and control of the Mengshan, Yishan, Kunyu Mountains and other mountain systems in the central and eastern parts of Shandong, as well as the Jiaolai River.

Lin Lian's adjustment of the Xuzhou camp, Liu Miaozhen as the chief manager in charge of defense, and Li Wei in charge of political affairs, the division of labor remained unchanged.

The North Division of the Military Intelligence Department was moved to Xuzhou so that it could collect and analyze military intelligence in the north nearby, so that Xuzhou's soldiers and horses could respond to changes in the situation in a more timely and accurate manner; Wu Qi was transferred to Xuzhou as the deputy general manager of Xuzhou Xingying and the North Division of the Leading Intelligence Division.

Sun Zhuang was transferred to the deputy commander of the forbidden camp horse army, and will return to Jiangning with Lin Tie to expand the cavalry camp in Jiangning, and the cavalry unit in Xuzhou was reorganized into the third brigade of the cavalry battalion, with Li Liang as the brigade general, and Zhao Bao as the deputy general as the commander of the army, stationed in Xuzhou and other places.

Ma Lantou was the deputy head of the camp and the governor of Yizhou, controlling Chu Zheng, Liu Xilin and other departments, and was responsible for the infiltration and control of the eastern soldiers and horses into the mountainous areas between Yizhou and Qingzhou.

Yang Shi was reappointed as the deputy commander of the Second Water Battalion, and he shared the waters outside Huaikou and the Huaisi waters on the inner line with Ge Cunxin, and accepted the control of the Xuzhou camp together with Feng Lijun, who guarded Shanyang and other places.

In addition, Sun Jingtang resigned from his post as the commander of the industrial battalion and was reappointed as the deputy chief of the Xuzhou battalion, in charge of the recruitment, organization and training of reserve soldiers in Xuzhou, as well as the affairs of military engineering, industrial and mining and ordnance, and shipyard workshops.

Lin Jian originally set up a labor battalion to accommodate the tens of thousands of displaced soldiers who had been attached from the Huaisi War, in addition to undertaking the affairs of engineering and planting, the more important purpose was to provide qualified reserve soldiers for the Huaidong Army.

In the past two years, the scale of Huaidong's soldiers and horses has expanded dramatically, and reserve soldiers have been drawn from the workers' battalions, and the expansion of the workers' battalions has not kept up, and the scale has shrunk to half of its heyday. At the same time, as the area under the control of Huaidong continued to expand, the recruitment and training of soldiers and other management affairs would inevitably be dispersed to various battalions.

In the future, Xuzhou will be a key area for the north and the south to win, and if Huaidong wants to take the eastern route to the north, it will inevitably take the Xusi area as a bridgehead. In fact, the recruitment and training of reserve soldiers in the Xuzhou camp is far more important than that in other regions. Nearly half of the budget for the workers' camp is also invested in Xuzhou.

In addition, the people of Huaisi and the north through Xu Si to the south are in trouble, the people are fierce, and they have always been elite soldiers recruited by generals, and the quality of soldiers is better than that of Zhejiang and Fujian and other regions.

Lin Jian specially asked Sun Jingtang to stay in Xuzhou and recruit Jianyong from Huaisi and the northern turmoil to prepare for the future Northern Expedition.

After the adjustment of the Xuzhou camp, Liu Miaozhen and below, Wu Qi, Sun Jingtang, Ma Lantou, Li Wei, Ge Cunxin, the commander of the Second Water Battalion, and Ning Zechen, the commander of Feng Lijun, are all the core figures of Huaidong, and also include Li Liang, Geng Quanshan, Chu Zheng, Liu Xilin, Yang Shi, Zhao Bao and other good generals.

More than one-third of Huaidong's troops are deployed here, in addition to preventing the Yan army from moving southward and preparing for the future Northern Expedition, it also forms a powerful clamp on Huaixi in the west......

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Since the beginning of summer, the water potential of the Huai River has continued to rise, and the embankments on both sides of the river have been in disrepair for many years, and everyone in Shouzhou has been nervous, worried that the fragile embankment will not be able to withstand the impact of the flood peak - in late June, seeing that the south bank of the embankment is showing signs of collapse, Dong Yuan was forced to order Tao Chun to dig the embankment on the north bank to discharge the flood.

The north bank of the vortex is a war buffer zone, except for the camp near the city wall, most of the area is deserted, as long as the flood does not break the city wall, the loss is always much less than the south bank embankment failure.

Standing on the top of Kip Rock Mountain, you can watch the vast flood water flow from the excavated embankment to the low-lying area on the north side, forming a large lake and expanding the lake area at a speed visible to the naked eye.

Liu Tingzhou walked over, smoked a bench, sat down, soaked his boots in water, took them off, and dripped water from his trousers and socks under the eaves.

"Lord Liu, has the water level really receded?" Yuan Hancheng turned around and asked Liu Tingzhou.

Huaixi can't stand the big toss, the north bank of the flood, Yuan Hancheng also came from Shouzhou City to Kip Stone Mountain to watch. Standing on the top of the mountain, they could see the overflow of the mouth after digging the embankment on the north bank into a lake, but they couldn't see the rise and fall of the water level of the Huaishui River under the mountain, so they naturally asked Liu Tingzhou, who had just climbed up from the bottom of the mountain.

"There are three feet down, as long as it doesn't rain heavily in Xinyang for the past two days, the embankment on the south bank should be able to be saved!" Liu Tingzhou said.

Although the loss of flood discharge on the north bank is small, the road that crossed the Huai River to connect with the military fortresses such as Wuyang in the past still needs to be rebuilt, and it is impossible to have no loss at all; The key is to protect the south bank.

Yuan Hancheng was relieved to hear that the embankment on the south bank could be saved, and said: "Thank God, people can breathe a sigh of relief, and their hearts are submitted to their throats - hundreds of thousands of acres of tuntian are under the embankment, and once the embankment collapses, a year's hard work will be in vain!" ”

Liu Tingzhou pretended to smile lightly and said: "Lord Chu is really tired, after the autumn, he has to make efforts to repair the embankment, and he can't be so worried about it next year......

"That's it," Yuan Hancheng said, "Huaidong hired civilian laborers, since it has relieved the poor people, built water conservancy, and opened up tax sources for the future, it will be more profitable in one fell swoop." You still have to learn what you need to learn! ”

Huaidong only gave this side a two-year buffer period, and after two years, the money and grain for the soldiers and horses in Huaixi mainly had to be raised from the three prefectures of Haozhou, Shouzhou, and Xinyang on the south bank.

In fact, even if Huaidong promised that the money and grain of the Huaixi Army would be supplied by Jiangning in the future, under the condition that Jiangning's military, government, and finances were all in Huaidong's hands, they and Dong Yuan really believed in Huaidong's promise, that would be stupid - if they wanted not to give Huaidong control and lead the nose, they had to have the capital and confidence.

It was Yue Lengqiu who was forced to occupy only the two counties of Chizhou on the west bank of the Qiupu River, and these days, it was also a large-scale inventory of acres, suppressing wealthy households, and forcibly confiscating nearly 100,000 mu of official land on the west bank of the Qiupu River and turning it into tun farming.

If the food of the soldiers and horses is controlled by Huaidong, won't Huaidong be pinched and rounded in the future?

Yue Lengqiu had a total of 50,000 soldiers and horses in his hands, controlling the territory of the two counties, so there was no need to compromise with the local forces. But for Yue Lengqiu, the territory of the two counties west of the Qiupu River is too narrow, and the combined population of Qiupu and Shicheng counties is not even as large as the soldiers and horses in Yue Lengqiu's hands, and these two counties have many mountains and few fields.

Yue Lengqiu couldn't rely on the local food and support, so he could only drive Huaidong to the west to fight Jiangzhou - the situation in Huaixi was better, in addition to the Wuyang Town on the north bank, south of the Huai River, west of Hongzepu, and northeast of Huaishan, he also controlled the land of Sanfu. After the Huaisi War, the Haoshou refugees gradually returned to their hometowns, and a large number of refugees from Henan and other places crossed the Huai to the south and stayed in Huaixi, and now the population of the three prefectures in Huaixi is also 1.2 or 300 million.

Under normal circumstances, the taxes provided by a population of 1,230,000,000 are far from being able to support a huge armament of more than 100,000 men, because the resources produced by these people will be in the possession of the local gentry and officials, who eat the rent.

Taking tenant farming under the conditions of large-scale land annexation as an example, 5 to 60 percent of the harvest of one mu of land is given to the landlord as land rent, and 1 to 20 percent is collected as a tax to the government, and the tenant farmers have to feed themselves.

The good thing about Huaixi is that in the war that has lasted for many years, the local forces have been devastated, and there is no huge scale of the middle rentier. As long as Huaixi can resume production, it can directly harvest 5 to 60 percent of the peasants' cultivation income to raise the army, so that it can barely raise 100,000 military horses.

The extravagant family is based in a corner of eastern Fujian, and at most it can raise more than 200,000 soldiers and horses, and the reason is that the imperial court wants to have sufficient financial resources, suppressing the middle rentier, suppressing the wealthy households, and suppressing land annexation, which is often the core idea of the New Deal.

In the eyes of Yuan Hancheng, Liu Tingzhou, Ding Zhiru and others, Lin Lian's rise from Huaidong is nothing more than these means, and Dong Yuan is also famous for governing politics.

After Dong Yuan entered Huaixi, the most urgent thing to do was to reclaim the land and tuntian.

When Dong Yuan was in Huaixi, there were abandoned borderless lands everywhere, and Tuntian was not afraid of no land.

Tuntian can be used to raise pawns, and Tuntian can be sufficient.

Huaixi Tuntian, the tun pawn received money and grain, and the income from the tun planting was owned by the official; If the tun households cultivate, half of the harvest will be paid to the officials.

After Emperor Yongxing returned to Jiangning, Jianghuai, Fujian and Jiangxi fell into relative silence, to put it bluntly, all forces were buying time.

Huaidong bought time to completely control Jiangning, while Huaixi, Chizhou, Jinghu, Xiangtan and other feudal towns bought time to increase the cost of self-protection.

The time in Huaixi is still too tight, and after the war in Xuzhou, Huaixi began to cultivate on a large scale, and it was only a year.

In addition, Huaixi had to provide necessary seeds, farm tools, and cattle to the tunhu and tun soldiers, and the scarcity of these resources limited the expansion of the scale of the tuntian.

Before the middle of last year, with the support of salt merchants, Dong Yuan had relatively sufficient capital in his hands, and was able to purchase a large number of farm tools, ploughing cattle, and growing grain from Weiyang, Jiangning, and other places, thus expanding the total scale of Huaixi Tuntian by 400,000 mu in one year.

The scale of 400,000 mu of tuntian is far from sufficient, and in order to support the 110,000 troops and have the reserves to continue fighting one or two large-scale wars, it is necessary to directly control at least 2 million mu of tuntian. In this way, taxes and silver can be saved, and they can be used for the construction of armor, warships, and the support of officials.

Lin Jian began to rectify the salt affairs in Jiangning in late February, causing a large number of children of salt merchants to flee to Huaixi with their family wealth.

In the short term, the children of salt merchants brought a large amount of gold and silver, which was extremely beneficial to Huaixi. The children of salt merchants should be resettled in Huaixi, and the purchase of houses and wasteland to recruit people for cultivation will be conducive to the further resumption of production in Huaixi. By selling the ownerless wasteland and recommending the children of salt merchants to become local officials, the Huaixi camp could directly obtain a large amount of gold and silver to make up for the lack of financial resources.

However, not without grim consequences.

After the salt merchant forces were suppressed, Weiyang Mansion became mediocre, even if the later prefect was recommended by Shen Rong, but it was difficult to support it. In addition to providing taxes to Jiangning, it is difficult for Weiyang Mansion to do anything else.

The establishment of the Jiangning Lijin Bureau incorporated Weiyang Mansion and Dongyang Mansion into it, which actually brought the previous water and land passage from Weiyang Mansion to Huaixi under the control of Huaidong.

Nowadays, the material trade flow between Huaidong and the seven provinces in the south of the Yangtze River, the two Zhejiang provinces and eastern Fujian and other places, the tax has been reduced to the low level of "thirty taxes and one", which is the substantial benefit of Lin Tie to the seven provinces in the south of the Yangtze River, and the price of grain and iron in the south of the Yangtze River has soon fallen, and the people have benefited, and the situation has been much more stable.

However, under the control of the Jiangning Lijin Bureau, the tax rate was immediately raised to the high level of "five taxes and one" when it was shipped to Huaixi, Chizhou and other places, and the tax rate of iron, mules, horses, and cattle was even higher.

In order to expand the scale of the tuntian, it is necessary to need a large number of farm tools, ploughing cattle and growing grain, compared with the Weiyang Mansion under the control of the salt merchant forces in the past, Huaixi at this time to buy these materials, at least nearly four or five percent more gold and silver - the salt merchants' children fled to Huaixi to carry gold and silver, probably not for long, will be exhausted. Huaidong's ruthlessness makes people feel a lot of powerlessness.

Huaixi also has iron and coal, and it can also be excavated, but first of all, the remnants of the bandits in the Huaishan Mountain must be cleaned up, and the investment in the early stage of mining is also huge.

In addition to Tuntian, the armor and ordnance warships of Huaixi soldiers and horses will have to be raised by themselves in the future.

Even if the workshop under the jurisdiction of the Ministry of Industry was not destroyed in the war, it would be impossible for Huaidong to send excellent armor to Huaixi.

Huaixi soldiers and horses, at present, are fully armoured, but there are no reserves. Once a large-scale war occurs, the consumption of armor bows and arrows is great, and Huaixi has to build its own armor to supplement, one lacks iron materials, and the other lacks craftsmen.

Yuan Hancheng and Liu Tingzhou sat under the eaves of the corridor and talked about the military and politics of Huaixi, and the more they talked, the more chilling they became: If there are ten or eight years, they may be able to slowly straighten out these things, but will Huaidong give them ten or eight years? Will Yan Lu give them ten or eight years?

If ten years later, Huaixi, Chizhou, Xiangtan, and Jinghu are still like this, I am afraid that no one will be able to stop Emperor Lin from standing on his own......

Dong Yuan went to Xinyang to inspect the water situation and could not return today, so Liu Tingzhou and Yuan Hancheng also left the camp of Kip Stone Mountain and returned to Shouzhou City.

On the side of Shouzhou City, the heavy rain had long stopped, Liu Tingzhou and Yuan Han entered the city in a carriage and horse, and it happened that a post horse galloped from the southeast.

Liu Tingzhou intercepted the post horse, and the post horse said: "Chongguo Gong and the privy envoy went to Luzhou via Hongzepu before the date, and ordered Huaixi to send people over to discuss important military and political affairs......

Dong Yuan was not in Shouzhou, Lin Bin's order letter, naturally Liu Tingzhou came to receive it, he opened it and looked at it, and handed it to Yuan Hancheng, saying: "The privy envoy stayed in Xuzhou for a month, and when he went to Luzhou, he thought of sending someone to our side to participate in the military and political affairs. ”

At present, Beiyan is focusing on attacking Guanshan, which greatly reduces the pressure on Lianghuai and Nanyang, and Chen Zhihu has 50,000 or 60,000 troops in Henan, and it is not enough to attack Nanyang or Hezhong Mansion alone, so it is naturally difficult to pose any threat to Nanyang, Hezhong Mansion and Huaixi.

"Xu is going to solve the Xiangfan Changle bandit?" Yuan Hancheng asked.

Taking advantage of the inability of the Dongyu to look south, Huaixi, Nanyang and Jinghu went all out to attack Luo Xiancheng and eliminate the hidden dangers in the Xiangfan area, which is also an urgent matter to be solved at present.

Liu Tingzhou was much more familiar with military affairs than Yuan Hancheng, shook his head, and said: "It's difficult, there is no money and food, how can the army be allocated?" ”

When the army is opened, don't wait for a big fight, it will involve many problems such as garrisoning and logistical supplies, and the consumption will far exceed the date of the permanent garrison - what Emperor Yongxing negotiated with Huaidong when he returned to Jiangning was the money and grain of the garrison area, and the soldiers and horses left the defense area to fight, and Jiangning needed another money and food. It is indeed necessary to have another expenditure, and Huaixi's current reserves of money, food, and military resources cannot withstand the consumption of the war at all.

The household finances are tightened like that, in a short period of time, where can an additional few million dollars of silver be spent to fight Luo Xiancheng? Even if there is some wealth, Lin Jian must first restrict the luxury family from taking root in Jiangxi.

pacified Fujian and Jiangxi, even if Yan Lu occupied Xiangfan, he could still divide the river and rule; Fujian and Jiangxi are still the henchmen of Huaidong after Jiangning.

The post rider sent a message, and Liu Tingzhou and Yuan Hancheng went directly to the Yaya to see Ding Zhiru, and asked Ding Zhiru to send someone to chase Dong Yuan and tell him about Lin Tie's summons in Luzhou.

Lin Jian is a privy envoy, and he has sent a letter to summon him, and Huaixi always has to send someone to deal with it.

Ding Zhiru wanted to consult with Liu Tingzhou: "Huaidong is recruiting in Xuzhou, it is difficult to be a pawn, I don't know how the news came here, dozens of families in Shouzhou have abandoned their land and fled east in the past two days, this matter cannot be ignored......

"Oh!" Liu Tingzhou frowned, and also felt that this matter was not trivial, so he sat down with Yuan Hancheng and asked for details.

Lin Tie expanded the new policy of rent reduction and tax reduction on a large scale in Huaidong very early, and the families of the soldiers had more preferential services, and the war exploits and disability pensions were very generous, which was also the core guarantee of the Huaidong Army's combat strength - Huaixi did not have this condition to learn from Huaidong.

However, when the news in the world is blocked, Huaidong and Huaixi have their own systems, and the spread of news between them is even more sluggish, if the people here still abandon the land and flee east under normal circumstances, it is likely that Huaidong is making trouble inside, deliberately sending people to sneak in to spread the news and confuse the people.

"It's better to go to Xuzhou, after all, it is blocked by Hongzepu and Huaihe, if Huaidong also recruits displaced people on a large scale in Luzhou, the conditions are much better than Huaixi, it will be a bit of a headache." Ding Zhiru said.

Along the east of the river up, is Luzhou, Lushou is only more than 100 miles apart, in the middle except for the low hills and mountains to obstruct each other, there is no other natural obstacles.

At present, Henan is completely crippled, and Huaixi has finally gathered a population of 1.2 or 300 million, which is also the foundation of Huaixi's future foothold. If these people were not satisfied with Huaixi and continued to flow south, Huaixi would be even weaker.

Ding Zhiru threw out a very tricky question and asked Liu Tingzhou and Yuan Hancheng to sit there and have a big headache.

Send troops to block the border? That Huaidong also happened to build fortresses on the north side of Luzhou and Dongyang at the same time, how could Huaixi have the resources to engage in military confrontation with Huaidong now?

"Huaidong can't deceive people too much, it's really not good, I'll go to Luzhou." Liu Tingzhou said.

Dong Yuan was afraid that it would be difficult to return if he went to Luzhou, but Liu Tingzhou did not have this worry.

"Let's see what the deputy envoy's opinion is......" Ding Zhiru didn't know what role Liu Tingzhou could play in Luzhou, and it was the responsibility of the local government to pacify the troubles, so he couldn't accuse Luzhou of appeasing the troubles and the conditions given by him were too good, and attracted the people of Shouzhou, right?

"I really shouldn't have let Luzhou out in the first place." Yuan Hancheng said.

Ding Zhiru smiled bitterly: Everyone knows the importance of Luzhou, but at that time, Huaixi insisted on occupying Luzhou, and the consequences were probably much lighter than directly leaving Emperor Yongxing in Juchao.

At that time, Huaidong did not want to make a split situation in which the two emperors stood side by side, but it did not mean that when the real split, Huaidong did not have the ability to grit his teeth and continue to fight - at that time, Huaidong already had 50,000 water infantry troops stopped at the Yijiang River on the south bank of Luzhou.

Huaixi has never had the confidence and capital to occupy Luzhou.

On the contrary, in order to welcome Emperor Yongxing back to Jiangning, Huaidong also made a lot of concessions, such as the Ministry of Households, the Ministry of Industry and the silver deposits of the Inner Government, which were divided between Huaixi and Chizhou, and Huaidong also pretended not to know, and the matter was fooled. But Huaidong is not easy to bully after all, last year the salt merchants supported Huaixi, Lin Jian first took the salt matter, and then blocked the trade routes connected to Huaixi, and then there will inevitably be actions against Huaixi in Luzhou.

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Yinping Mountain, located in the south of Chaocheng City, is located between Luohu Lake and the Yangtze River, and you can see the scenery on both sides of the mountain.

After entering July, Yangzi Water is also the time when the water is in full bloom.

The embankments on both sides of the Yangtze River in the Luzhou section have not been repaired over the years, and they have been washed away by the river, and only a section of the remnant embankment stands in the river. When the water is dry, the waterway of the Yangtze River in the Luzhou section is narrow and only two or three miles wide, and at this time it rises up, and the north and south banks are vast and cannot be seen closely, and they are afraid that there are nearly 100 miles away.

In order to run Luzhou, Lin Lian transferred Chen Huawen to serve as the prefect of Luzhou, and merged Luzhou with the newly placed Yijiang Mansion to defend the defense area, and transferred Zhang Gou to lead the troops to suppress Luzhou and control the two wings of the nest, hidden mountains and other key places.

"Not only does the Yangtze River flood to both banks, but there are also many floods along the shores of Luohu Lake in the summer, and it is necessary to control the embankment to guide the water in order to facilitate farming," Chen Huawen stood beside Lin Tie and accompanied him to Yinping Mountain to look at the water situation of the Yangtze River, and said, "Everything is ready now, and Lord Zhu is indeed a capable official. ”

Lin Jian listened to Chen Huawen praise Zhu Ai, glanced at Zhu Ai sideways, and said with a smile: "Governing the embankment and tuntian is only a matter, whether you can save 350,000 combined soldiers depends on Zhu Ai's means!" ”

"Zhu Ai should live up to the expectations of the lord." Zhu Ai responded to Lin Tie sonorously and forcefully.

Lin Lian smiled and talked about some trivial matters related to the embankment.

If Luzhou is not controlled, Lin Tie will inevitably garrison a large number of soldiers and horses in Jiangning, so that Jiangning lacks the necessary strategic buffer. Just as the Huaibei Expedition will use Xuzhou as a bridgehead, Lin Jian will clean up Huaixi, Chizhou, and Jinghu in the future, so the most important thing now is to run Luzhou into the core place that Huaidong completely controls.

Lin Jian promoted the new policy on a large scale, not wanting to cause major turmoil, but in the Luzhou Prefecture, if anyone is not pleasing to the eye, he will destroy Rong Ru - suppressing local forces, reducing rents and taxes, relocating the displaced people, and matching the land and the people, this is what Chen Huawen has been doing since he became the prefect of Luzhou.

In addition, Lin Jian didn't want to call too many troops to contain and couldn't move in Luzhou, a certain number of elite soldiers and horses plus a large number of reserve troops were the reasonable garrison deployment that constituted the barrier on the western line of Jiangning.

In addition to Xuzhou, Luzhou will be the second area in Huaidong that should focus on expanding and reserving reserve soldiers, and Lin Liancai will transfer Zhu Ai, Tang Xitai, Hu Qiaoyi, and other capable officials to strengthen control over Luzhou.