Chapter 1186: The Plan of Inviting the Wolf into the House

"What? The Bala Kingdom, the Old Buddha Kingdom, the Aceh Kingdom, and the Perak Kingdom have been attacked by the Ming and want our Shun to send troops to rescue them? Isn't that inviting the wolf into the house? Don't they know how the Kingdom of Burma came to an end? I'd say these kingdoms are either fools or they're playing some kind of trick!"

The one spouting this nonsense was Li Jicheng, the Shun Imperial Grandson. The lad was not old, just past twenty. But his abilities were considerable — he had already made a name for himself on the Shaanxi battlefield, leading a juvenile palace guard corps modeled on the Ming New Army in repeated engagements against the troops commanded by Wu Sangui, and he had won more than he had lost!

But this lad's talent for stirring up trouble was about as great as his talent for fighting. While campaigning in Shaanxi, relying on his status as Imperial Grandson and having won a few battles, he held the old kings — Liu Zongmin, Li Dingguo, Yuan Zongdi, Liu Fangliang — in no regard at all. Behind their backs he mocked their skill at war as too shoddy, saying they had no idea how to command new-style armies. Though he was not wrong — this generation of founding princes was indeed somewhat outdated and failing to keep up with the times — saying it aloud was deeply offensive!

The Shun was not an autocracy under the Emperor, but a state governed by the council of eight princes. If all eight deliberating princes were provoked by him, his position as Imperial Grandson would become untenable.

So the Crown Prince, Li Laiheng, dared not keep him on the Shaanxi front, nor keep him at court causing trouble, and simply packed him off to Burma as Governor-General of military affairs.

Once he reached Burma, there was no one left to keep Li Jicheng in check, so his speech became even more unrestrained — and now he had actually called the dignified Shun, the great and benevolent Celestial Dynasty, a big gray wolf. If the Emperor Li Guo ever heard that, Li Jicheng's position as Imperial Grandson might well be gone!

Li Jicheng was not Li Laiheng. Li Laiheng, the Crown Prince, was nominally of the third generation, but in truth he was a founding meritorious official who had fought for the realm alongside those old kings, so his position was extremely secure.

Li Jicheng, however, as the fourth generation of the Shun, was a true junior. In the eyes of the old kings he was just an ignorant youngster. And the younger princes did not necessarily accept him either, because Li Laiheng had many sons. Although Li Jicheng was the eldest, his mother had died early, and after her death Li Laiheng had remarried, taking the daughter of Sun Kewang, the Prince of Qin, as his consort. Li Laiheng and Sun Kewang's daughter got along well, and together they had three sons and three daughters.

"Imperial Grandson!" Song Yaowen, son of Song Xiance — not much older than Li Jicheng but far more composed — hastily cautioned, "You must be prudent in word and deed! Many of the old kings are already displeased with you, and His Majesty the Emperor is also—"

The deliberating princes' displeasure with Li Jicheng would not by itself topple this Imperial Grandson, because Li Jicheng was the Imperial Grandson, not the Crown Prince. Li Guo was not even dead yet, and no one knew how many years Li Laiheng would remain Crown Prince before it was ever Li Jicheng's turn. So the deliberating princes were merely displeased; they would not actually exert themselves to remove Li Jicheng.

But Li Guo's displeasure with Li Jicheng was a real problem!

And Li Guo's displeasure was not because of Li Jicheng's arrogance, but because Li Jicheng believed that both the equal-field system and the fubing system had become outdated, and were even showing signs of degenerating into harmful policies.

The former, for lack of good land to equalize and with too many fubing households needing land, had already evolved into a system in which fubing households seized land from civilian households. The common pattern was to equalize good civilian land to fubing households, then equalize slope land and terraced fields to civilian households, or simply compensate Sichuan farming households who had lost their land with land in Yunnan or even Burma — migrating from Sichuan to Yunnan or Burma was no easy matter, and the land assigned to the farmers was all wasteland or even forest, requiring investment and development before it could become good farmland.

And the vast majority of Shun peasants could not scrape together the capital for migration and land reclamation, nor was there anywhere to borrow it, so they could only remain in their home villages and live as tenant farmers. Only a small portion, subsidized by the Shun court and the various princely households, were able to relocate to the two prefectures of Ava and Syriam in Burma.

As for the fubing system, it too had run into difficulties because of overly long active-duty rotations, insufficient allotment land, and too little subsidy from the court. The soldiers' lives grew poorer by the day, and their morale in service lower and lower.

What dissatisfied Li Jicheng even more was the growing rigidity within the fubing ranks — not only class rigidity, but also too many "old men" entrenched in high positions with no way to retire, thereby blocking the path for newcomers. This was connected to the Shun's "single outlet for profit" — apart from soldiering, there was no other path of advancement for those "old soldiers and old generals."

Moreover, the Shun army had no way to implement the hated last-place elimination system or the "997" — how could fubing be eliminated? Confiscate their land, or let their sons take over? And the fubing were soldiers-in-farmers; they practiced their martial skills at home and had no need for last-minute cramming in the barracks. So there was no tradition of "997," and since the fubing drew no pay, there was no tool to incentivize soldiers to train hard.

If the mode of warfare had not been changing with each passing day, the Shun's fubing system would still have been a fine military institution. But now these feudal landlord-soldiers were somewhat failing to keep up with the times. On the Shaanxi front, the main theater of the Ming-Shun confrontation, the signs of the Shun army's obsolescence were even more pronounced. Although Li Dingguo always outmatched Wu Sangui in strategic command, Wu Sangui, relying on a few New Army divisions, remained undefeatable.

Whenever the two armies met in open battle, even when the Shun army had superior numbers and superior terrain, it would still most likely lose in the end; and even if it barely won, it was certain to be a pyrrhic victory.

Only the juvenile army that Li Jicheng had raised performed relatively well, able to fight line-infantry volley battles against the New Army divisions under Wu Sangui, and it had even won several times.

But the new-style juvenile army was, after all, small in number, and because of its outstanding performance it became a priority target for the Ming army. Wu Sangui had even obtained the Young Guard from Zhu Cilang specifically to fight Li Jicheng's juvenile soldiers. So the Imperial Grandson Li had failed to break the deadlock in Shaanxi, had offended many people, and even the Emperor Li Guo was displeased with him — what Li Guo hated most was anyone exposing the shortcomings of the equal-field and fubing systems!

Hearing his trusted subordinate say this, Li Jicheng merely snorted a few times: "Those people — the older they get, the more stubborn they become. By now they can't even bear to hear the truth. If this goes on, what will become of our Shun!"

"Imperial Grandson," interjected Gao Yidao, who likewise served the Imperial Grandson, "marching south to Malacca might turn the tide!"

Li Jicheng shook his head. "It's useless. We are not the Ming. The maritime trade at Syriam earns practically nothing — it just lets us exchange what we have for what we lack."

From the Sichuan Basin to the port of Syriam was four to five thousand li, and the roads were poor, with range upon range of mountains along the way, making transport costs frighteningly high.

So the maritime trade at Syriam made no money at all; it merely exchanged for the fine horses, guns, and cannons the Shun dynasty needed, as well as the cotton required by the government-run handicraft workshops of Syriam and Ava.

"Imperial Grandson," Gao Yidao shook his head and lowered his voice, "that is opening new territory! And Malacca is a fine place to set up a checkpoint and collect tolls. Besides, this so-called Bala Kingdom is actually just a front set up by the Western red-haired country in the Southern Seas. I'd guess the red-haired country has been driven desperate by the Ming and wants us to go into Malacca and stir things up."

"The Bala Kingdom is the red-haired country?" Li Jicheng frowned. "I've heard the red-haired country is a Western power with plenty of fine guns and cannons!"

"Not just fine guns and cannons — fine ships too," Song Yaowen added. "If the red-haired country is willing to help us attack the Kingdom of Arakan, we'd be rich!"

The Kingdom of Arakan bordered Lower Burma and India, with a very long coastline, and had always been a trading nation. So although the country was not large, it was extremely wealthy, and Li Laiheng had long had his eye on it.

But because the overland route from Lower Burma to Arakan was very difficult, and Arakan's navy was relatively strong, Li Laiheng could only cast a few glances at it, with no possibility of attacking at all.

Li Jicheng waved his hand and said, "That won't do. Our Shun is a benevolent and righteous state. How could we let the red-haired country help us swallow up a small nation? If we did that, could the Old Buddha Kingdom, Aceh, and Perak still stay close to us?"

"The Imperial Grandson is indeed benevolent and righteous." Song Yaowen was slightly disappointed, but still offered a word of praise.

Li Jicheng continued, "But with the tyrannical Ming coming south, none of us will be left in peace, and the Kingdom of Arakan cannot stand apart from this. My view is that we should pull Arakan in and send troops together!"

(End of Chapter)