Summer goes and autumn comes, autumn goes and winter solstice. In a blink of an eye, the New Year of the eighth year of Longwu is coming.

As the New Year approaches, wars in all parts of the world have ended, and the disputes between Ming and Qing dynasties have temporarily ceased.

After the Qing army lifted the siege of Wuchang, the army did not launch a counterattack, but temporarily stationed in Wuchang, waiting for the opportunity to counterattack.

In 1651, the Qing army's plan to recover Hudong failed, and the Qing army in Huguang lost Yuezhou and Xiangyang as important towns, and the situation had developed in a direction that was unfavorable to the Qing army.

Dorgon was very angry about this and transferred General Mandahai, the expedition general, back to Beijing and demoted him to the prince. Haoge, who lost in Huguang, was directly imprisoned, causing turmoil within the Qing Dynasty.

Due to continuous failures, Dorgon's prestige was damaged, and the doubts among the Qing nobles continued to be questioned, which made Dorgon quite angry.

In order to regain prestige, Dorgon took the initiative to resolve his past grudges with Ajige and sent Ajige to Jiangning. At the same time, he launched a large number of Han generals to recruit Green Camp Army and supplement the army.

After the Qing army cleared the troops of Donghai Town in Liaodong and Shandong, the north was basically stable. In the eight years after the Qing army entered the pass, various places gradually recovered, and it was able to provide a certain source of troops and money for the Qing Dynasty.

Meng Qiaofang, the governor of Shaanxi and Gansu, recruited tens of thousands of Green Camp soldiers for the Qing court, led by Zhang Yong, Zhao Liangdong, Sun Sike, and Wang Jinbao, the four Han generals of Hexi, and went to Yangzhou, Luoyang and other places for training.

Shanxi paid million taels of silver to be responsible for the food and salary consumption of the Green Camp soldiers.

The northern provinces, poor provinces, and wealthy provinces contribute money. Dorgon is expected to expand 200,000 to 300,000 Green Camp troops and prepare to launch the next war.

On the Ming Dynasty, the Longwu court and Zhejiang towns were also expanding their troops to prepare for war.

After Emperor Longwu's eldest son was born, Zhu Yihai was always a little uneasy. As the eldest son grew up, Zhu Yihai, as the crown prince, felt threatened...

Therefore, Zhu Yihai wanted to lead Zhejiang towns to recover Nanjing before Longwu recovered Wuchang, making his position as the crown prince of the Ming Dynasty unshakable.

To this end, Zhu Yihai ordered a large number of muskets and cannons from Huaxing Company and wanted to expand the Zhejiang team except Zhao Ming to 200,000.

In order to reshape the authority of the central government, the Longwu court was unwilling to restore Nanjing first, and also desperately expanded its army. Not only did it order firearms from Huaxing Company, but it also sent the eunuch of the Lijian Supervisor Pang Tianshou to Macau to contact the Portuguese to help the Longwu court cast weapons and set up a cannon casting bureau in Guangzhou.

Among the many Western barbarians, the relationship between the Portuguese and the Ming Dynasty has always been good, and it is also the most peaceful group of Western barbarians.

The Portuguese not only had to pay taxes to the Ming Dynasty for renting Macau every year, but also sent mercenaries to serve the Ming Dynasty more than ten years ago.

Pang Tianshou, the eunuch of the Silijian, was a Catholic. After he arrived in Macau, he discussed with the Portuguese Governor, and the Portuguese immediately agreed to the Longwu Dynasty's request.

Portugal's national strength is unlike the Netherlands and Spain. They may have a relatively clear understanding of their own strength. The Qing Dynasty was too far away from Macau, so they were very hesitant and immediately chose the Longwu court.

Suzhou City is getting closer and closer to the New Year. Every household in the city is preparing sacrifices, cleaning the houses and waiting for the New Year with lights and decorations.

After Shanghai opened its port at the end of November, a large number of merchant ships flocked to Shanghai to transport the silk produced by Susong and tea produced by Zhejiang overseas.

This caused a large amount of money to pour into Susongchang, causing the prices of various assets such as houses, land, etc. to rise. Fortunately, there were grain, fruits, meat, dried fish transported from Taiwan, and dried fish transported from Zhoushan, and the prices of various daily necessities increased very limited.

The people of Susong can buy some meat, dried fish, fruits and rice for a good New Year. Firecrackers in the city are ringing from time to time, and the New Year atmosphere is very strong.

The atmosphere of the New Year in the Governor's Mansion became stronger. On the tenth day of December, the Duke's wife gave birth to a son. The joy in the mansion was gone. The New Year was approaching. Doctor Li came to help and gave each servant in the mansion a red envelope of ten taels of silver. Everyone in the Governor's Mansion was very happy.

On the 25th day of the twelfth lunar month, early in the morning, just dawn, Zhao Ming exercised his muscles and bones, then washed and ate some breakfast, and then came to the front yard.

The Governor's Office in the East China Sea is Fu Shangrui's Nanzhili Governor's Office. It was previously a large mansion occupied by the Governor Su Song of the Qing Dynasty.

In the front yard of the Governor's Office, it is the shogunate, with office spaces such as the Seminar Hall, and the back yard is the area where Zhao Ming lives.

At this time, Zhao Ming came to the front yard and participated in the last meeting of the seventh year of Longwu, and made a plan for 1652.

When Zhao Ming arrived at the meeting hall, seven people in the meeting hall, as well as the Donghai Niusi Yamen, the Fantai Yamen, and the chief officials of the commander-in-chief yamen also arrived, with a total of fourteen people.

Everyone had breakfast early and rushed to participate in the discussion. They were talking about their hosting in groups of three or three.

At this time, when the guards saw Zhao Ming coming, they immediately put their feet together, held a gun in front of their chests, shouting, "The Great Commander is here!"

Zhao Ming raised his hand and bowed in a casual manner, then walked into the lobby. Everyone had calmed down and saluted together, "Welcome the commander!"

"You guys are here so early!" Zhao Ming smiled and waved his hand, walked to the central hall to sit down, and signaled everyone to sit down.

In the entire lobby, Zhao Ming sat in the middle with a big golden sword, the seven shogunate secretaries in the meeting hall were sitting on the left, and officials from the three major yamen sat on the right.

This was done on purpose by Zhao Ming, in order to enhance the status of the shogunate so that the shogunate can control the decision-making power of the East China Sea military and political affairs.

Zhao Ming and the maids took the tea and stepped back, then tapped the seat lightly, and the lobby became quiet, so they smiled and said, "Today is the last discussion in the seventh year of Longwu. I summoned everyone to come, mainly for one thing, that is, next year, whether to go south or north!"

After failing to attack Changzhou, the Qing army withdrew to Nanjing, Zhenjiang and other places and turned to defense.

At this time, there were still more than 100,000 Qing troops near Nanjing. In addition, the 100,000 Green Camp soldiers who came to Yangzhou camp, and the Qing Ying Prince Ajige were in charge. Donghai Town did not have the ability to attack Nanjing.

To capture Nanjing, the force must be at least twice that of the Qing army. Now Zhao Ming and Zhu Yihai do not have this strength.

Of course, the Qing army was not able to attack Zhao Ming at this time, so Jiangnan was about to enter a stalemate period, and Jiangnan could not do anything. Two plans were formulated within Donghai Town. One plan was to go south to attack Luzon, drive away the Spaniards, or ruin the transaction between the Qing Dynasty and the Spaniards. The other plan was to go north to eliminate the Manchu Navy, which was almost in a climate, block the Bohai Sea, ban the Dutch and Spanish merchant ships, and go to Tianjin to trade with the Qing Dynasty.

The ultimate goal of these two plans is to destroy the arms trade between the Qing Dynasty and the Western Yi.

After Zhao Ming finished speaking, Ma Shiao, as the representative of the army, immediately stood up and said, "Master, the Qing Dynasty has expanded its troops recently very quickly, but with the national strength of the Qing Dynasty, Dorgon was completely overdrawing its national strength and preparing to launch a war. This battle was successful and the Qing Dynasty could maintain its army if it was seized. If it was not successful, or it was delayed for too long, I thought that the Qing Dynasty would inevitably have problems in its finances. Now, since we know that the Qing Dynasty was going to prepare for a war, we should try our best to block the trade between the Qing Dynasty and the Western Barbarians, so that the Qing Dynasty could not obtain equipment from the Western Barbarians. In this way, the Qing Dynasty had only two possibilities. One was that it was insufficient preparation and launched a war. The war was delayed, and the Qing Dynasty was exhausted from its military funds and food, and it had problems. The result of these two situations was that the Qing Dynasty would be defeated!"

The Qing army expanded the green camp this time, and the money for the expansion of the army was mainly donated by Shanxi merchants and taxes levied.

This is not a continuous amount of money, it will be gone after it is used up, and Shanxi merchants cannot keep paying for their troops.

Therefore, the Qing Dynasty had to launch a war in a short period of time and achieve results to obtain money to maintain the army, otherwise there would be big problems.

Zhao Ming Wenyu said: "What the soldiers mean is to implement the Northward Advance Strategy!"

Ma Shiao nodded, "Yes, fighting Luzon and not fighting the Netherlands will not cut off the transaction between the Qing Dynasty and the Western Yi. Only by defeating the Qing Dynasty's naval army can we complete the blockade of the Qing Dynasty and completely cut off the passage of the Qing Dynasty to obtain firearms from the sea. Moreover, the tragic death of tens of thousands of brothers from Shandong Wei and Liaodong Wei was aggrieved, and the soldiers were depressed and they must avenge them."

Zhao Ming nodded slightly, his eyes turned to Chen Mingyu and others, "Do you have the opinions of the Fanshi and the Nishi?"

Chen Mingyu said: "Reporting to the Grand Marshal, Taiwan still needs a million people to expand its colonies. You can first advance north to obtain the population, then go south to capture Luzon, and send a garrison to expand its colonies."

Zhao Ming Wenyu nodded, "I understand! Let the secretary of the Secretariat Hall vote!"

Qian Qianyi and others heard the words, so they raised their hands together, "We agree with the strategy of advancing north!"
Chapter completed!