Chapter 666 East Palace
Eastern Palace.
Because the emperor went to Qizhou for hunting, and Chang'an was supervised by the prince, the regular officials were changed to the East Palace in the early court. At the end of the early dynasty, the prime ministers asked the prince to take charge of state affairs and hold an imperial meeting.
Chengqian sat in the hall, saying that he was presiding over the court discussion, but in fact, the prime ministers changed the original political affairs discussion to the East Palace. In name, the prince listens to and discusses state affairs, and the cardinal makes decisions. In fact, he listens there, representing that these important affairs have passed through the imperial power.
Of course, the final result is not to be copied to the Qizhou Emperor's Palace.
Qin Lang took out his achievements during this period of time, one after another arms sales and loan orders, and the other is the trade contract signed by the way.
The four kingdoms of Haidong, Silla Baekje Waguo and Goguryeo, and then there are thirty-six countries such as Gaochang in the Western Regions, and the northern tribes such as Xiqishi Wei Tiele and so on.
Taking advantage of the fact that the various countries came to pay tribute this time, Qin Lang invited them to negotiate.
Using arms sales as an introduction and borrowing as a bait to attract them to sign a loan agreement with Datang, purchase armaments, and then sign a trade opening agreement by the way.
Because the conditions are really too tempting, it’s as if Datang’s magic armor can be obtained without money, these fan countries are very tempted, especially some tribal barbarians, how can they figure out those terms, they just think it’s cheap Kezhan, although Qin Lang also made it clear that signing a loan, borrowing money to purchase armaments, and then repaying the loan in installments, there is interest in the capital, but how can the barbarians think about this.
I only know that now it is true that they can buy from Datang the magical weapons and treasure armor they saw on display without having to pay. , Which local products, etc. have to be used as compensation, don't think about it and don't care.
Let's talk about good things first.
By the way, it doesn’t matter if they sign a trade treaty. Isn’t the so-called trade treaty the opening of trade routes and the establishment of commercial halls? For some neighboring countries and tribes, Datang also required the establishment of embassies, post stations, and beacon fires on the Silk Road. They don't care about sending some beacon soldiers to send letters or something.
No big deal.
Even many tribes such as Xi and Khitan are still looking forward to this trade clause. After all, in the past, the Central Plains banned their markets and closed customs, so their fur and livestock could not be sold, and they could not buy goods from the Central Plains. I realized that I could only sell high-priced smuggled goods, and the losses were very large.
Sometimes they have to go through other tribes to make detour transactions, or make second transactions with others. If they can trade directly in the future, it is of course a good thing for them. It means that the prices of good commodities in the Central Plains will be lower in the future. Goods can be sold more easily.
Qin Lang specially made a map, and then signed the signed forms one by one on the position of each country on the map.
In addition, he specially made charts and charts to display groups of numbers in graphical form. This kind of simple PPT made Chengqian understand at a glance, and other prime ministers were also very vivid and intuitive to see clearly at a glance. .
"Selling so many armaments? Adding up, there must be tens of thousands of people's equipment, and they are all good equipment. Many of them are our enemies or potential enemies, such as Goguryeo, Champa, etc. Western Turks, wouldn't doing this be considered an enemy?" Wei Zheng, the servant, raised doubts.
"I reminded Wei Shizhong to look at the quantity and price of these armaments. The total amount is quite large, enough to equip an army of more than 50,000 troops. But if you look closely, the country that purchases the most armaments from us is Goguryeo. The total arms purchase contract is 15,000. There are thousands of sets of various armaments, and the others are less than one or two hundred sets, and one thousand or eight hundred sets."
"Five thousand is already a lot. Didn't Duke Wei ever think that the Goguryeo people would use our sophisticated equipment to arm 15,000 Goguryeo elites and come to attack us then?" Wei Zheng continued to ask.
"First of all, the 15,000 sets of equipment will not be handed over to the Goguryeo people at one time. They will be divided into multiple batches, and it will take several years to complete. In addition, even if they are given to them, we can use these ordnance to exchange them from the Goguryeo people. Get more things, plus this interest income, and our ordnance is already expensive, we sell them 15,000 sets, and the profits we earn can make more equipment for Datang."
"Isn't Wei Gong thinking too simple? To build weapons and armor, you need iron, you need steel, you also need cowhide, beef tendon, horns, bird feathers, etc. These things are very precious. If a large number of ordnance is manufactured and sold, How can we ensure that we can still have enough? No matter how much money we make, we may not be able to buy the materials we need at critical times, right?" Wei Zheng said.
"Of course, arms sales and trade have made money. We can also increase mining and smelting, increase workshops and train artisans. There are many benefits to doing this, one of which is to ensure our strong military manufacturing capabilities."
Wei Zheng shook his head straight when he heard this, thinking that it would always be dangerous to do so.
Prime Ministers such as Fang Xuanling and Changsun Wuji did not make a decision so easily, after all, there is no precedent for such a thing.
"During the chaos of the Sui Dynasty, Li Mi and Wang Shichong fought in Luoyang. Li Mi had grain in Liyang and Huiluo but lacked money, while Wang Shichong had Luoyang in the east. Later, Wang Shichong took the initiative to approach Li Mi and offered to buy grain with money, but Li Mi agreed. Later, after Wang Shichong purchased a large amount of grain from Li Mi, the crisis of food shortage in the city eased, and Wang Shichong was able to strengthen the city defense and appease the army and the people. However, in the end, he was defeated by Wang Shichong, isn't this a lesson from the past?" Wei Zheng cited an example.
"Wei Shizhong's example is good, but it is obviously a special case. Wang Shichong and Li Mi fought in Luoyang. In a special period and special situation, it is indeed a stupid move for Li Mi to sell food for money. But our current situation is completely different."
The entire military purchase plan is also a part of Datang's further opening up of foreign trade, and it is also a step for Datang to strengthen its influence on the surrounding feudal vassals. The countries in Hainan set up commercial offices in some ports, and even established trading ports in some coastal bays. Qin Lang even planned to rent some small coastal islands or harbors as concessions, establish overseas trading ports, and even set up trade ports for Prepare for the future development of the colony.
Even if you don’t think about the future colonies and concessions for the time being, at least take the opportunity to expand foreign trade, which is of great benefit, and even use trade to collect information conveniently.
Datang is so big, what are you afraid of?
Dai Zhou's focus is in another place.
"Sanlang, I saw that you signed a contract with the four countries of Haidong to provide coins to the four countries?"
"I'm afraid this is a bit inappropriate. You also know that the cost of casting money is relatively high. I am short of silver and copper in the Tang Dynasty, so there has always been a shortage of money. Therefore, in the past, not only money was banned from going abroad, but even the south of the Lingnan had to be banned from crossing the mountains. If If copper coins are allowed to flow into the four countries in Haidong, wouldn’t the money shortage in the Tang Dynasty be even more serious, and there will be no more money to use.”
Qin Lang smiled slightly.
"What Dai Xiang said was the old emperor's calendar before Zhenguan. In fact, in the past few years in Zhenguan, our Datang has added hundreds of copper mines, and through foreign trade, we have imported a large amount of copper materials from outside every year. After reforming the New Deal and promulgating new regulations from copper mining to manufacturing and use, it is now forbidden to use copper to make Buddha statues and copper ware, so that copper is mainly used for casting money, and the improvement of casting technology has made the cost of casting money more expensive. Great surrender, now the imperial court has already made a lot of profit for every penny made."
One of the keys to the money shortage in previous dynasties was the high cost of copper materials due to insufficient copper mining, coupled with the high cost of casting and transportation, so sometimes it led to a loss in casting money, even if it did not lose money, there was no profit at all. The great prosperity of Buddhism has led to a large amount of copper materials being used to cast Buddha statues and utensils, plus some daily-use copper utensils, making the copper available for casting money less and less, and many unscrupulous businessmen even took the copper coins cast by the court. Take it away and melt it into copper to cast it into bronze ware, etc., and you can get several times the profit if you change hands.
The imperial court became more and more short of money, so all kinds of bad money and fake money flooded, and bad money began to drive out good money. Everyone hid the good money and used the bad money, and the money shortage became more severe.
In the past few years in Zhenguan, the imperial court has made many special reforms to deal with these situations, such as a stricter copper ban system, prohibiting the use of copper statues and utensils, prohibiting copper materials from going abroad, and strictly prohibiting the hoarding of copper coins. On the other hand, it encourages businessmen Copper mines were mined and merchants were encouraged to import copper materials from outside.
Combined with the improvement of money casting technology, gold and silver coins have also begun to be minted, and the appearance of banknotes such as flying money and silver notes, and paper bills have greatly alleviated the problem of money shortage in the Tang Dynasty.
Although silk is still used as currency nowadays, in fact, the actual use of silk for transactions has been greatly reduced. People basically use copper coins for small transactions, and silver coins or even gold coins for larger transactions. Well, it's already directly a bill from a bank or a bank.
No one would foolishly bring a carriage of copper coins or several carts of silk to trade. Long-distance and long-distance travel are mainly based on flying money and bank notes, and no one will go to their own pigsty or cellar. There are many copper coins that are moldy and green.
On the other hand, the rise of many banks, money houses, and counter shops sucked the money from the people into these financial institutions, and then increased the currency circulation rate.
The same coin, better circulation rate, will inevitably alleviate the money shortage.
At this point in the fifth year of Zhenguan, the common people have hardly felt the situation of having no money to use in the past, and the situation of bartering rarely occurs again.
It is precisely because of this that Qin Lang, Silla and other Haidong countries took the lead in piloting this kind of currency circulation.
(end of this chapter)