Chapter 3452 3454 [Operation on civil servants]
Xiang Nan launched a vigorous anti-corruption campaign in the military and soon achieved very high results.
The truth he found also made him feel a little shocking. It can be said that the Ming Dynasty's army was rotten to the core.
From the general to the general, down to the Qianhu, Baihu, general banner, small banner... any officer with a little bit of power will use the power in his hands to grab profits.
The big ones include embezzlement of food and wages, smuggling of arms, embezzlement of farmland, empty wages, etc., and the smaller ones include enslaving military households, bullying men and women, extortion... In short, almost everyone is corrupt.
It seems like in the film, thousands of households in Yumenguan often go to Longmen Inn to eat and drink for free, and they also take the opportunity to hook up with Jin Xiangyu. Moreover, they don’t arrest fugitives when they encounter them, and they release them when they are given money. There are countless similar situations.
In troubled times, Xiang Nan has no mercy for these corrupt generals. A group of people were detected and dealt with, either dismissed from office, demoted, or had their homes raided, or exiled, or beheaded... No one was spared.
The level of tragedy made all the officials tremble with fear after seeing it, and they wondered whether Xiang Nan was Zhu Yuanzhang reborn.
…
The anti-corruption storm launched by Xiang Nan began in the sixth year of Tianshun and lasted until the eighth year of Tianshun. More than 30,000 generals were beheaded, and more than 80,000 officials were dismissed or demoted. More than 20,000 households were implicated in having their homes confiscated...
After his vigorous attack, it cannot be said that no fish have slipped through the net, nor can it be said that corruption will be eliminated from now on. At least, the Ming army today is much more honest and correspondingly more powerful.
Although the Ming army in the past numbered more than two million people, in terms of numbers, it was the only one in the world. However, with such a huge military strength, the army has no combat effectiveness at all just because of the existence of each giant rat.
For example, some generals secretly smuggled the equipment of the Ming army to the Mongolian tribes for personal gain; some generals were paid empty wages, with an army of tens of thousands, but the actual number of soldiers was less than 5,000; some generals treated the soldiers like slaves, Farming, producing, looking after homes, and nursing homes for yourself...
Because of the existence of these corrupt officials, millions of Ming troops had insufficient food, clothing, and equipment. It was strange that they could win the battle.
That's why during the Jiajing period, dozens of Japanese pirates landed on the coast and then marched straight into Jinling to attack Jinling, as if they were entering uninhabited territory. There were dozens of guard posts along the way, and tens of thousands of soldiers could not defeat dozens of Japanese pirates. Such strange news is simply unheard of.
Now that these corrupt generals are eradicated, the new army will not only receive sufficient food and salary, but also obtain advanced weapons and equipment, and its combat strength will naturally be fully increased.
…
From the sixth year of Tianshun to the eighth year of Tianshun, Xiang Nan successively recruited another 200,000 new troops, bringing the total strength of the Ming Dynasty's new army to 300,000.
Although the number seems small, due to the advanced weapons and the bravery of everyone, it is enough to be worth the previous two million troops.
The funds used to recruit new troops naturally come from the revenue from punishing corrupt generals. Those big rats have been embezzling for so many years, and the amount of embezzlement is so huge, the amount of silver alone is as high as more than 60 million taels, which is really shocking.
So after punishing these corrupt officials, Xiang Nandu ransacked his house and recovered several rounds of blood.
After finishing packing up the army, Xiang Nan began to attack the civilian officials.
The generals of the Ming Dynasty were severely corrupted, and the civil servants of the Ming Dynasty were even more corrupt.
For example, they levied excessive taxes on the people and forced them to sell their children and daughters to pay the taxes under various names; for example, they colluded with the local tyrants and evil gentry to plunder the people, and then divided them in half; for example, they misappropriated the food from the national treasury, and then Fill it with white sand and loess...
In short, there are endless methods of corruption and it is difficult to guard against them. Even the city gate officials, who don't even have a rank, dare to exploit the people and traders who enter the city, which is like plucking the hair of a goose. "Jin Ping Mei", a novel about worldly affairs in the Ming Dynasty, tells the story of the Song Dynasty, but it corresponds to the worldly affairs of the Ming Dynasty. The male protagonist Ximen Qing is not only a big pervert, but also a big corrupt official.
He relied on clinging to powerful people to be promoted to the execution official of Qinghe, and by currying favor with Cai Zhuangyuan, he received 30,000 yuan of salt and took the opportunity to make a fortune.
There is a slave Miao Qing in the book who killed his master, occupied his master's property, and committed a heinous crime. However, Ximen Qing accepted one thousand taels of silver and released Miao Qing without charge, disregarding the court's laws.
In addition to being an official, he also engaged in business, and he also engaged in plunder and plunder. For example, when transporting goods, they use their connections to evade taxes. It was obviously silk, but it was falsely claimed to be tea; it was clear that there were ten cartloads of goods, but only less than five cartloads of tax were paid...
Another example is that he used his status as an official to lend Gaoli loans in the city, and the monthly interest was 5 cents. He also opened **** shops, drug stores, silk shops, woolen shops, etc., frantically suppressing his colleague Jiang Zhushan, and monopolizing all businesses in the city. Business.
Through these means, he only had a small herbal medicine shop from the beginning. Within six or seven years, he had accumulated a fortune of nearly two hundred thousand taels of silver. This shows how corrupt he is.
Xiang Nan has also heard about the corruption of Ming Dynasty officials for a long time.
However, at the beginning, he was still a restoration king who was pushed to power by civil servants, and he did not have the ability to use a knife on civil servants.
After all, power comes from the bottom up. Without the support of others, even if he is the emperor, he is just a puppet. If people can support him, they can naturally support others, so he didn't dare to attack civil servants at first.
But things are different now.
It has been eight years since his restoration. During these eight years, he has continuously vacated the cabinet and adjusted the six ministries and local officials. After a series of adjustments, I can't say that everyone from top to bottom is his, but at least half of them are his. is loyal to him.
Moreover, he also holds the most important military power, which naturally gives him the confidence to attack the civil service system.
So Xiang Nan then started an anti-corruption storm within the civil service system.
…
Compared with fighting corruption in the military, it is more difficult to fight corruption in the civil service system.
Because civil servants are always smarter and more cunning than military officers, their corruption is quite hidden, even reasonable and legal.
For example, an official likes to write and write, and sends his calligraphy and paintings to bookstores for sale. A businessman paid a high price of one thousand taels of silver to acquire this calligraphy and painting.
Although this kind of behavior is also suspected of bribery, it is not easy to investigate.
After all, the value of calligraphy and painting cannot be clearly stated. It can be a few pennies or tens of thousands of taels of silver. This cannot be used as evidence.
Moreover, civil servants are often connected through layer-by-layer relationships such as classmates, same subjects, same year, fellow villagers, etc., forming a dense network of human connections, which can affect the whole body.
The reason why businessmen in Jiangsu and Zhejiang dare to resist taxes is because there are scholars in Jiangsu and Zhejiang. There were a total of ninety champions in the Ming Dynasty, including as many as 79 champions in the south and as many as 52 champions in Jiangsu and Zhejiang.
So they formed a force in the court, and even the emperor had nothing to do against them.
(End of this chapter)