Daming Military Empire

Chapter 179
Taiwan was called "Yingzhou", "Yizhou", and "Liuqiu" in ancient times. In the Ming Dynasty, the people generally used the names of the cities on the island. "Taiwan Members" and "Taiwan Members" and "Taiwan Wowan". The official name of the Ming Dynasty was "Dongfan", while the European powers continued to use the name given by the Portuguese and called it "Formosa". .

Since the middle and late period of Wanli, the Ming government gradually became corrupt, and party struggles became serious. The navy in the southeast coast was shrinking day by day, unable to take care of the Dongfan who was alone overseas. Japanese pirates and the Dutch began to wreak havoc on Treasure Island. Landed on the island to expel the Japanese pirates and Dutch who occupied Baodao, but Shen Yourong no longer paid attention to Dongfan, so Dongfan was occupied by the Dutch until the sixth year of Chongzheng.

Xu Tianqi should be the first Ming official to set foot on Dongfan Treasure Island in the past ten years, but he did not come here as an official, but pretended to be a maritime merchant, and he was not a local official or naval general of Daming. It was Jinyiwei Qianhu.

He is also a Jinyiwei spy under the command of Jinyiwei Zhenfu Wang Zhengnan, this time he did not come alone, but brought all the Jinyiwei spies under him!

In order not to attract the attention of the Dutch on the island, they did not come together. Some of his men were dressed as sea merchants, fishermen, refugees, fugitives and even pirates. At least a dozen people, as many as dozens of people, came in batches, and the more than 100 people he brought were the first batch.

In other words, did he bring so many Jinyiwei spies to engage in special operations, kill all the Dutch in one fell swoop, and regain Dongfanbao Island?Of course not, Zhu Cijiong would not be so stupid as to issue such an order. You must know that when Zheng Chenggong regained Taiwan in the Southern Ming Dynasty, the first batch of 6000 people were not captured, and the [-] people mobilized later were still not captured. In the end, they were only besieged by the Netherlands. The defenders left the city to surrender when they were running out of food.Although the history books have always been secretive about the casualties of the Ming Zheng army, it is generally believed that the casualties should be at least [-] or more, otherwise they would not deploy reinforcements!
Jin Yiwei's secret agents are all masters of fighting selected from thousands of people. Zhu Cijiong will naturally not consume them in this kind of battle that has no chance of winning. They are here mainly to collect information and prepare for the army's attack on Dongfan.

It is much more convenient to go to Dongfan to investigate than Java Island, because most of the islands are Han people, and there are basically no language barriers. Even Xu Tianqi and his big ship came up for inspection after they docked.The Han who led the team inspected the boat for a while, then came to Xu Tianqi with a smile and asked politely: "Dare to ask the shopkeeper, is this your first time in Formosa, but you are here for business? "

Xu Tianqi put on a cautious look like a businessman, and replied in a cautious tone: "Well, it's my first time here, and I want to do some small business here."

The leader of the team was not in a hurry to collect the money, but continued to ask with a smile: "Oh, then are you going to live in a hotel, or are you going to rent a house?"

Xu Tianqi's heart moved when he heard the words, after all, it is inconvenient to communicate on the boat, and there is no cover on all sides of the sea, a group of people always running to the same boat will definitely arouse others' suspicion.He originally planned to stay in the hotel. Although there were many people, it was better than being on a boat.He didn't expect that there were houses for rent on this island, so he couldn't help but tentatively said: "Is there any house for rent here? I'm number [-]. Except for a few people to guard the boat, everyone else has to go down to find a place to live. Is there such a big house in Yuancheng?"

Seeing that the business came to the door, the leader of the team smiled even more intensely, and he quickly introduced: "There are too many people here to do business, how can the inn be accommodated? Our Lord He specially built many large courtyards for all places. Merchants rest their feet, a hundred people are nothing, even a thousand people have a place to live."

Sir He?To be able to build so many houses in Dayuan City seems to be the confidant of the Dutchman, Xu Tianqi secretly kept it in his heart, but he did not directly ask the situation of the leader of the team, Master He, but pretended to say happily : "That's really great. I just want to stay here for a while to get acquainted with the business here. It's more convenient to have a yard to rent than to stay in a hotel. I don't know how much the yard costs?"

When the team leader saw something interesting, he immediately said enthusiastically: "Don't worry, I won't kill you. The price is very fair. It only costs 100 taels a month to live in a courtyard with a hundred people, which is much more cost-effective than staying in a hotel."

Xu Tianqi didn't particularly care about the price, he would rent it anyway no matter how expensive it was, but 100 taels is really cheap, he couldn't help but gratefully said: "Then thank you sir, I don't know where to pay the rent."

Seeing that the business negotiation was completed, the leader of the team was as happy as anything, and said with a smile: "Just hand it over to me, and I will take you there later, but you have to pay 100 taels of tax first, there is no way, this is It will be handed over to those red-haired devils."

Red Devils?It seems that these people are not so loyal to the Dutch, this is very useful information, he secretly kept it in his heart.He was a newcomer, and it was not easy to catch people asking questions, so he had to pay the tax first, and then followed the leader to the rented courtyard in the city.

The yard is indeed not small, but the location is a bit remote, but just right, he doesn't want to be in a busy city, and it's also inconvenient to do things like that.

Xu Tianqi readily paid half a year's rent, politely sent the team leader away, settled down a bit, and dispatched his subordinates to familiarize themselves with the situation, and left a signal for the later Jinyiwei to come and wait for orders.

Jin Yiwei's contact point in Dongfan was established in this way. Xu Tianqi pretended to be a businessman to inquire about the prices of various goods, and at the same time sent his men to secretly investigate the situation of the Dutch, and soon got a general understanding of the Dutch in Dongfan.

It turned out that the Dutchman did not live in Dayuan City, but built a castle not far from the city. All Dutch people lived in it, and usually sent some people out to make inspections. Many specific things were dealt with. It was handled by so-called compradors.

In Dongfan, there are two biggest Dutch compradors. One is called He Bin, who is the leader of the team. He is mainly responsible for the affairs of the port and Dayuan City; The management of cash crops in various places is responsible for the taxation of local civilians.

This He Bin and Guo Huaiyi are not ordinary people. Speaking of origin, they are both sworn brothers of Zhennan King Zheng Zhilong!
This Zheng Zhilong was not called Zheng Zhilong but Zheng Yiguan before he made a fortune. He was not the most powerful person under Li Dan, a great merchant, at that time. At that time, the second person under Li Dan was called Yan Siqi, but Li Dan and Yan Siqi followed suit. After his death, Zheng Yiguan teamed up with [-] pirate merchants under Li Dan to worship in Dongfan, known as the "Eighteen Zhis" of pirates, and Zheng Yiguan changed his name to Zheng Zhilong.

Later, Zheng Zhilong accepted Daming's consolation, but not all eighteen Zhilong followed him to seek refuge in Daming. Some continued to be pirates, some continued to be businessmen, and some disappeared.This He Bin and Guo Huaiyi were the two of the Eighteen Zhili back then, somehow they actually acted as compradors for the Dutch!
These two people naturally became the focus of Xu Tianqi's investigation. At the same time, he also decided to go to the vicinity of the Dutchman's castle to take a look.

On this day, Xu Tianqi brought a few men down to a forest three or four miles away from the Dutchman's castle. After he arranged the sentry post, he found a big tree and climbed up after a few steps.After climbing up the tree, he found a strong branch to stand on, then took out his binoculars and pointed it at the Dutch castle to observe carefully.

Oh, what the heck, just after looking at the exterior of the castle, he couldn't help cursing in a low voice, the Dutchman is really afraid of death, you said it's fine if you build a castle, but he still needs to build three floors, Each floor is two or three feet high, how can someone climb up it?
The more Xu Tianqi looked at it, the more frightened he became. The defense of this castle is too tight. There are dozens of cannons on each floor, and the fortress and shooting holes are all available. How can anyone attack it!
There are no armor-piercing or high-explosive bombs here, and it is almost impossible to smash the thick city walls with shells. Xu Tianqi can't figure out how to capture such a turtle castle.Fortunately, he is not a navy general, and this issue is not within the scope of his duties. After he carefully wrote down the layout of the castle, he flew down from the tree and led his men back to draw a sketch.

After investigating for more than a month, Xu Tianqi finally got a good idea of ​​the situation in Dongfan. He left a few hundred households and led people to continue the investigation here, and he himself rushed back to the capital to report to Wang Zhengnan himself. up.

As the spies of Jinyiwei sent back news one after another, Zhu Cijiong's frown became deeper and deeper. This Dutchman is really difficult to deal with.

It is now certain that the Dutch navy in Nanyang has 100 super battleships, more than 2 other small warships, and more than [-] navy troops, plus forty super battleships of the Dutch East India Company. In terms of number, the Dutch are almost twice as many as Ming. In addition, the Netherlands also has an escort fleet, which escorts a group of gold transport ships around the Dutch strongholds every year. The size of the fleet is not small. Don't worry too much, just turn on the phone when the fleet returns to Europe. Now that there is no satellite phone, it is impossible for them to turn back and help.

In addition to warships, the Dutch also have countless armed merchant ships shuttling around Southeast Asia. Now they have almost monopolized all transactions of spices, pepper, metals, medicinal materials, linen, cotton, grain, etc. in Southeast Asia. The Portuguese, Spaniards, and the British all You can only do a little business in your own colony!

Now the Dutch fleet plus the armed forces of the East India Company is not something Daming can deal with, not to mention that they have countless armed merchant ships, all of which are equipped with cannons, which are similar to the Dafu ship transformed by the Daming Navy. Gotta fight.

That is to say, if they go to regain Dongfanbao Island now, they will definitely be retaliated wildly by the Dutch. Although they may not be able to invade the inland of Ming Dynasty, they will definitely block the sea by them. By then, Daming will dominate the sea. Dreams will always be just dreams.

After careful consideration, Zhu Cijiong still decided to bear with it, at least wait until the next batch of [-] super battleships are built. Fuck them, at least they shouldn't be able to block the sea route.

(End of this chapter)