New Warlords 1909

"No matter what he said is right or wrong, what I appreciate is his enterprising spirit and awareness of danger in times of peace. The development of the Air Force takes a long time and the speed is very fast. They have never encountered a really strong opponent, which makes They were a bit complacent, and began to be arrogant and arrogant. In just a few years, the Japanese caught up. I can't imagine that if the more than 100 carrier-based aircraft of the Japanese can take off completely, the ones we sent out How many bombers are left!"

"A dozen fighter jets escort, such a powerful bomber fleet, such an important combat mission, they actually sent a dozen fighter jets to escort, just think...they...how arrogant they are!"

As Hua Fei spoke, his emotions became a little excited.After realizing this, Hua Fei took a breath, sat down slowly, and said in a slow tone, "Although this battle has caused the Air Force to suffer, I think it is far from enough to be vigilant. The Air Force needs reform. , needs to be updated and impacted by new concepts. And this Ren Mingkong is exactly what I need.”

"If...if..." Hua Fei seemed to be a little bit unbearable, "If the people in the Air Force still can't understand the motive of my move, if they let me down again, I don't rule out appointing Ren Mingkong as the first officer. Commander, take full responsibility for the plan to build an offensive air force!"

"Haichen, you will always remember that the role of the air force is never for defense. The meaning and essence of the existence of the air force is very similar to that of the navy. Their mission is to attack, attack, and offensive defense. Their mission is to make All invasions and battles end outside the country and territorial waters! The anti-aircraft defense must be the anti-aircraft artillery unit!"

Hua Fei continued to shout loudly in his heart, and the surface-to-air missile unit...Hua Fei could not tell Qi Haichen the great significance of the Air Force in future battles.Even as recently as World War II, the role and significance of the Air Force has become too great to be replaced.Although technical constraints make the actual role of the air force as an auxiliary role of sea and land combat forces, what Huafei needs, the air force cannot catch up with the times in terms of hardware, but their ideas and concepts must be at the forefront of this era .

"In addition, inform the military not to disclose relevant information about the East China Sea naval battle to the media. Newspapers that report false reports by the people must be strictly managed. Let the military newspaper publish a commentator's article, the East China Sea, the aftermath is not over! The war, It's far from over!"

The war is far from over.Yes, this is a battle related to the future national destiny of China and Japan, and the Battle of the East China Sea is just an episode in this battle that does not know how long it will last.And victory, for China, is still elusive.

In Taiwan today, the toughest battle is over.At present, except for the Japanese army in some big cities in the north, which is still stubbornly resisting, the south is basically under the control of the National Defense Forces.After receiving the order from the headquarters, the platform army slowed down its attack rhythm, allowing the entire army to enter the first rest.This was the first major rest after the platform army landed, and the extremely exhausted army finally got a chance to take a breather.Of course, for the Japanese army in Taiwan, they also got a temporary relaxation time.It's just that they were not happy about it, because the [-] reinforcements who were full of expectations had now all died in the East China Sea.They have lost the power to support them!

The Japanese army in Taiwan did not dare to disclose this news, because in that case, despair would spread.But how long can they hide it?

309 Severe financial crisis

Information about the Battle of the East China Sea suddenly disappeared from newspapers and media.However, the changes in the positions of senior generals of the National Defense Forces, navy and air force have made many interested people and military and political followers unable to help but speculate.Did something unexpected happen in the Battle of the East China Sea?Or in the eyes of the National Defense Forces, such a lost victory cannot be called a victory at all?Otherwise, why were those main commanders not only not rewarded, but actually demoted!

However, some of these people's speculations were quickly confirmed, because although domestic newspapers never mentioned the East China Sea War, they could not prohibit relevant reports or even detailed battle report data from being published in foreign media.After reading the data comparison of these wars, people have nothing but admiration besides admiration.For such a victory, for the army of any country, even if it has no merit, I am afraid it will definitely have no fault.But in the National Defense Forces, this is definitely a very large loss in military history.

The Wehrmacht can afford defeat, but it is never willing to accept a miserable victory!After such a news commentary headline came out, there was an upsurge of heated discussions among the whole society.Those who agree with it have it, and those who have reservations have it.It's just that the National Defense Forces, who are the protagonists of the incident, have been silent all the time.

The Battle of the East China Sea was no less stimulating to Japan than the Great Kanto Earthquake. The [-] Japanese army was almost wiped out in the East China Sea. Countless Japanese soldiers who had experienced hundreds of battles were all swallowed up by the ocean like roosters who could not swim. .In addition, the Japanese combat warships suffered little losses though.But they lost three of their only four aircraft carriers, and the only remaining one was the extremely old Wakamiya Maru seaplane carrier, which, strictly speaking, was not an aircraft carrier at all.Hundreds of carrier-based aircraft were annihilated, which almost wiped out Japan's maritime aviation power that Japan has worked so hard to build over the past few years, and all advantages have returned to the situation a few years ago.

The League of Nations intervened in this East Asian dispute at the right time, but the League of Nations, with Britain and France as the leading forces, obviously lacked the enthusiasm for mediating the war between China and Japan.No matter who wins the final victory in the war, it is absolutely beneficial to them, and there is little damage to their interests.Disputes between the two countries will inevitably require help from foreign forces.This made Britain and France, which suffered a great loss in China's power in World War I, inevitably deepen the diplomatic weight of China and Japan.At the same time, if there is war, there must be a demand for arms.However, it is difficult for any country to fully rely on its own military industry to supplement the needs of the army.In addition, another direct result of the war was to sharply increase the export cost and pressure of light and heavy industrial products in East Asia, especially China. For countries such as Britain and France to quickly restore the proportion of each country in world trade, it is obviously an opportunity that cannot be missed.

However, for the militaries of various countries, the impact of the Battle of the East China Sea, especially the conceptual impact brought about by the innovation of tactics and tactics, cannot be measured in words.In particular, the first large-scale maritime air battle in the history of the world's military has caused the military of various countries to think about the nature and mission of the air force in many ways.

At the same time, this is also the first large-scale carrier-based aircraft air battle in history. Although the ending is so disappointing, the experience and lessons aroused from it are a new style of naval warfare for the rise of the ocean overlord represented by the aircraft carrier.had a profound impact.Since then, although all countries have continued their battleship construction plans, they have all slowed down or reduced their construction plans without exception, and instead started the construction of aircraft carriers one after another.Theoretical research on various new tactics has been released one after another.In the ease before this new bloody era, all kinds of war preparations did not stop their progress in the slightest.

In the Taiwan Strait, the war continues.Although Japan's reinforcements to Taiwan's army suffered heavy losses, their naval main combat strength was not affected much.Before Japan decided to adopt a new combat plan, the Japanese Combined Fleet was sent to the waters near Taiwan.A large number of destroyers, professional anti-submarine ships and anti-aircraft ships are only swimming back and forth in the strait between Taiwan and the inland, not only blocking the entire Taiwan Strait route, the dense anti-submarine listening network also poses a serious threat to submarines operating in the Taiwan Strait .

In addition, the main Japanese fleet is operating in the West Sea, North Sea, and South China Sea of ​​Taiwan, closely monitoring and blocking all external sea traffic in Taiwan.In addition to merchant ships from various countries, it is difficult for Chinese cargo ships to depart from northern ports and export to other countries.Fortunately, the Guangdong-Han Railway has been fully constructed and finally recently completed.So that the goods from Shanghai and other places can be transported southward by rail, and go southward from Guangzhou Port.

For this reason, Japan also organized several blockades of the sea routes from Guangzhou, and launched many small-scale battles with the fleet of the National Defense Forces.So Nai's blockade of Taiwan itself is a huge project.In addition to the lack of support for advanced reconnaissance and scanning devices such as radar.It is difficult to completely block large areas of water with limited warships only by visual telescope observation and monitoring.

Of course, Japan can also choose Bray.For example, they planted a large number of minefields in the Taiwan Strait.But it is obviously impossible for them to block the Bashi Strait and the Balintang Strait, because the importance of smooth sea routes is obviously more important to Japan than to China.And for the sake of commercial interests, countries will obviously not allow Japan to do this.

After the new top command of the navy and air force took over the top command, they quickly changed their combat tactics.You Japan implemented a blockade war against me, and we are no worse than you at this hand.The true value of the submarine, the sneaky hunter, is fully realized.A large number of submarines were sent out individually or in pairs. They avoided the Taiwan Strait, mainly relying on southern ports for supplies, and even stopped at Kaohsiung Port for supplies.Mainly intercept Japanese merchant ships.

However, since unrestricted submarine warfare is an aggressive tactic after all, it is too grievous and a helpless choice.Even Japan's current blockade of sea routes, according to the law of capture, only confiscates Chinese merchant ships and goods, and generally does not make it difficult for merchants and sailors.Under such circumstances, if China brazenly launches brutal and unrestricted submarine warfare, it will inevitably be completely passive in international public opinion.

Although Taiwan is temporarily blocked, food supplies can be temporarily settled on the spot, and a large number of arms supplies have been seized, so there is no need to worry for the time being.Especially after the intensity of the war has slowed down, even the supply of medicines is not so tight.Even if there is a shortage of my supplies, it can be transported through the air channel.Not only faster, but also very safe and convenient.The only disadvantage is that the freight is expensive, and it cannot be replenished in large quantities such as food.Large items such as arms.

Since there is no air supremacy, the destroyers, anti-submarine ships, and air defense ships in the Taiwan Strait can only stare at the transport planes flying high above their heads.Some unconvinced air defense ships fired a few shots into the air, but at such a distance, the effect was obviously frustrating.After coming down a few times, they basically began to get used to and ignore the transport aircraft fleet in the sky. Who made their only carrier aircraft fleet completely a thing of the past.Otherwise, if there are carrier-based aircraft supporting Taiwan's main island in the war, the Chinese soldiers will probably be the ones who stare blankly.

Submarines were densely distributed to interfere with Japan's sea transportation line and dispatched the Navy's First Fleet to deal with the Japanese Navy. Due to the strong support of radar, whenever the First Fleet found Japan's main naval fleet, it immediately avoided it.But if you find their anti-submarine squad or the escorting transport fleet, then you will be embarrassed, and there will be a burst of shelling when you rush up, bullying you so much that you want to cry without tears.So much so that a Japanese sailor who was captured once cursed aggrievedly, are you soldiers?If you have the ability to fight with the combined imperial fleet, you are always chasing after us to show off your power, and your [-]-inch main gun was blinded for nothing!

The officers and soldiers of the National Defense Forces scoffed at this.You said it lightly, when our national defense force is a fool!But if your Japanese navy is really brave, let's pick one, don't pretend that you have too many warships.The main gun is big, so we have to provoke us to fight you decisively.Is it necessary to cut?

The Air Force also rejected Ren Mingkong's offensive proposal. As soon as Ren Mingkong arrived at the staff, he suggested forming a remaining dive bomber fleet, and even dispatched all the old-fashioned torpedo planes and bluebird bombers to block Japan's anti-submarine operations in the Taiwan Strait. The fleet launched a powerful counterattack, opened up the sea channel, quickly increased troops to Taiwan, and resolved the battle in Taiwan in the shortest time.

After the Air Force rejected this suggestion, it also submitted a report to Hua Fei.Because Ren Mingkong went from a Beiyang soldier, to an unpopular instructor at Longteng Academy, and then to the Air Force Staff.This speed of promotion is even in the troops of the Beiyang Army.Even if he was Yuan Shikai's direct descendant, he probably wouldn't be able to soar like a rocket.Everyone understood that if it wasn't for Hua Fei, Ren Mingkong would definitely not be where he is today.Ren Mingkong also understands this very well. Although he is extremely arrogant and unruly, he is not unreasonable.He knew very well that the fundamental reason why Hua Fei reused him was that Commander Hua agreed with his strategic vision of building a powerful offensive air force.So in order to repay Hua Fei's kindness, Ren Mingkong submitted an extremely aggressive tactical plan to the Air Force Command on the first day he came to the Air Force Staff.

The air force's proposal is very simple. The current main task of the bluebird bomber fleet and fighter fleet is to suppress the Japanese army in the Northeast. Although Japan's carrier fleet has suffered heavy losses, their air force, especially the number of air force aircraft in the Northeast, is increasing month by month. increase, putting a strong pressure on the Wehrmacht Air Force.So at this time, the Air Force absolutely cannot take such a risk for Taiwan.

In addition, due to the large losses of dive bombers in previous battles, excluding those shot down, more than half of the planes returned with more or less injuries, and most of them were towed back to the aircraft repair shop for repair and maintenance.Aircraft in good condition need to maintain vigilance missions, because no one knows whether Japan will take the risk again and gather forces to launch retaliatory attacks on coastal areas such as Shanghai or Qingdao.That way, the dive bomber would be fully functional.For the current Air Force, the most urgent task is not offense, but defense.

However, the Air Force will not abandon Taiwan and ignore it. They have proposed a plan to build an air corridor and mobilize a large number of military and civilian transport aircraft to complete the most basic support tasks for the Taiwan Army.Even when necessary, soldiers can be transported and the wounded can be withdrawn.

In 1924, during the Lunar New Year of that year, Hua Fei returned to Hefei and finally spent a new year in his hometown.As soon as the new year was over, he rushed to Nanjing and finally signed the air force's combat plan.It is not that Huafei has changed the strategic conception of the offensive air force.It's not that Hua Fei doesn't want a quick solution to the Taiwan issue, it's just that a serious problem is in front of Hua Fei, which makes him have to make compromises in front of the status quo and slow down the pace of his military journey.

This problem is a serious financial crisis!In fact, the financial crisis has been accompanied by Hua Fei's development from beginning to end. Hua Fei's private assets are increasing, but the public finances have never been rich, and they have always been unable to make ends meet.

At the beginning of the autonomous region, although the expenditure was high, the region was limited after all, and with the issuance of bonds, the government could basically maintain a balance in terms of finances.However, since the unification of the whole country, the scale of this kind of government expenditure has suddenly increased several times, but the income has not reached this level of growth.Coupled with the government's policy of benefiting farmers and promoting business that is generally implemented in various places, the fiscal revenue is almost a few percent lower than that of the Beiyang government.

In addition, successive major earthquakes and nationwide droughts not only continued to increase the government's financial burden, but also continued to reduce fiscal revenue by several levels.In addition, the repayment dates of various bonds borrowed in previous years have begun to arrive in full swing.If the government fails to repay these bonds in time, it will inevitably lead to a complete collapse of the country's credit.I am afraid that it is delusional to rely on issuing bonds to accelerate construction and development.Moreover, most of the holders of these bonds are patriotic gentry and overseas Chinese. Failure to repay the debt on time, for Hua Fei, is even more morally guilty.

According to the country's financial situation, it should not have launched the war between Taiwan and Northeast China so early, and started fighting with Japan prematurely to consume national power.However, the opportunity of the Great Kanto Earthquake is really a rare opportunity for China.Hua Fei wondered if he didn't seize this opportunity, would he have to wait another ten years?That would be extremely bad in terms of national security strategy.

Hua Fei had known for a long time that the government was in financial difficulties, so he basically didn't use a penny of financial resources for the protection of cultural relics and the construction of museums, and most of the funds were donated by private individuals.But when the detailed fiscal year budget report for 1924 came out, Hua Fei was taken aback.Because this is no longer a serious fiscal deficit problem, but if effective measures cannot be taken to solve this problem this year, there are only three outcomes waiting for the central government in Nanjing.One is to stop the construction of the current announced facilities on a large scale, and reduce the government, military, education, and medical budgets.The second is to increase the printing volume of banknotes, but this can only solve the problem in a short period of time, and will bring about a series of serious economic problems such as currency devaluation and inflation, and the consequences are unpredictable.The third is that the government's finances are completely bankrupt, and the government cannot continue to operate in an orderly manner.

The first ending Hua Fei is unwilling to accept, doing that is tantamount to drinking poison to quench thirst, which is really not what Hua Fei wants to see.Hua Fei has also considered the amount of printed banknotes, but compared to the huge loopholes in fiscal expenditures, limited inflation cannot solve the problem at all.Moreover, the consequences of doing so are also very serious. The comparison will have a great impact on the credibility of the new currency, which will not only cause a huge obstacle to the promotion of banknotes, but also cause unpredictable and even devastating blows to the fragile economic system. .In particular, doing so will reduce the wealth of ordinary people, especially a large number of industrial workers, and make their hard-earned money evaporate invisibly.In other words, the essence of doing so is to plunder the wealth of the people of the country so that the government can survive the financial crisis by itself. This is obviously a bad idea.

This is also the biggest reason why Hua Fei left Beijing and returned to Nanjing.High-level government officials were widely recruited, and some well-known private scholars and professional researchers were also ordered to come to Nanjing to receive consultations and provide suggestions.Hua Fei understands that this matter has a great impact on the government.Not only has it affected the construction plan for this year, but it has also affected the spring offensive to the Northeast that was originally scheduled to launch in spring!

A suggestion was made to continue selling bonds and repay existing debts with new borrowings.This is a feasible strategy, but it cannot completely solve the problem.Because the gap in fiscal expenditure is too large, and this crisis cannot be concealed, it will make it difficult to issue new bonds and the number is limited.

It was proposed to borrow money from banks in various countries to survive this crisis.This method may be the most convenient path.But not to mention that countries such as Britain and France still owe China a small amount of foreign debt. Germany itself is a huge debtor country, so how can it borrow money from China.The only country that can borrow a lot from China is the United States, but even a country like the United States will not borrow from you without any conditions. It will inevitably be accompanied by various harsh conditions, and the number may be limited.

Some people also proposed to increase taxes and temporarily cancel the policies to promote business in various places.Temporary industrial and commercial taxes are imposed on industrially developed areas such as Shanghai, Zhejiang, and Jiangsu.Those who made the proposal lay out detailed figures that if the government did so, it would increase revenue by more than half.If we can further cut public spending on education, medical care and other aspects of people's livelihood, the financial crisis will be solved easily, and it will not be a problem at all.

This is a contradiction. Stopping the policy of promoting agriculture and business and increasing the collection of industrial and commercial taxes will indeed allow the government to increase a lot of income in a short period of time.But this kind of growth did not come for no reason. He bought it at the expense of several times, ten times, or even dozens of times the increase in fiscal revenue in the future.

Hua Fei resolutely rejected this plan, because in a sense, this is the method of killing chickens to get eggs.However, this person's proposal gave Hua Fei a flash of inspiration, that is to start a monopoly system for tobacco and alcohol, or add a monopoly system for salt and sugar!

310 Dawes Plan

The salt and sugar monopoly is not a new idea.In particular, the salt monopoly has a long tradition in Chinese history.Even in the Ming and Qing Dynasties, a change in the salt monopoly system directly affected and changed the fate of several famous business groups in Chinese history.

The salt and sugar monopoly is a monopoly system, a powerful monopoly policy implemented by borrowing state tools.The only difference from general monopoly is that salt and sugar are necessities consumed by the people, and monopoly cannot be used as a means to seek huge profits in terms of price.This is not only inconsistent with the purpose of state monopoly, but also inconsistent with Hua Fei's political philosophy.However, the cost of salt production is so low that it is unimaginable. For the current Nanjing government, the financial revenue increase brought about by the monopoly can not only produce immediate results, but also quickly generate a large amount of income, and will not affect the economy. Large oscillations and impacts.

Tobacco and alcohol monopoly is not uncommon in China. Since tobacco was introduced into China at the end of Ming Dynasty, the first paper cigarette manufacturer opened in 1889, and the first cigarette manufacturer was born two years later.

In 1915, the Beiyang government promulgated the "Provisional Regulations for National Tobacco and Alcohol Sales" and the "Organization Law of Tobacco and Alcohol Sales Stores", and established the "National Tobacco and Alcohol Sales Bureau". Set the public sale price and notify all regions for implementation.The proceeds from public sales belong to the central finance.However, the so-called "public sale" at that time was only to increase and rectify the tax on tobacco and alcohol, and did not really manage the market.Due to various considerations, the Nanjing government did not inherit the policy and legal system of the Beiyang government after its establishment, so it did not continue this tobacco and alcohol public sale system.

The profits brought by the monopoly of tobacco and alcohol are huge, and the effect on increasing fiscal revenue is also significant.And tobacco and alcohol are different from salt and sugar. To some extent, they are not consumer goods that are advocated for consumption, so the price can be increased to reduce the number of sales.However, the reduction in quantity does not affect the huge profits of these two commodities.

Moreover, the realization of tobacco and alcohol monopoly will not have an impact on the current national economic environment. At present, most of the domestic tobacco companies are mainly foreign-funded, and the national capital is not only limited in number, but also not very strong.The most famous one is Nanyang Tobacco Company established in Hong Kong by two brothers Jian Zhaonan and Jian Yujie with a capital of 10 Hong Kong dollars.Nanyang Tobacco moved to Shanghai in 1909 and changed its name to "Nanyang Brothers Tobacco Company", and launched "Pegasus" and "Airship" brand cigarettes, occupying a certain market share in China.However, the most famous cigarette in modern times, Meili brand cigarette, has not yet been born.

Therefore, the realization of tobacco monopoly in this period will cause limited damage to national capital, but it will be a huge blow to foreign tobacco companies that occupy the vast majority of domestic shares.

However, in the plan for tobacco and alcohol monopoly, Hua Fei made a certain distinction between tobacco and alcohol monopoly.Regarding alcohol monopoly, Hua Fei gave a rough timetable for lifting the restrictions on alcohol monopoly.Calculated in 1924, the shortest period of this alcohol monopoly restriction is 20 years later, and after 20 years, it will be extended or gradually lifted as appropriate.

Liquor monopoly is not only to increase fiscal revenue in a sense.But to reduce food consumption.The gap between the grain output of this period and that of later generations is unimaginable.The yield of rice per mu is four to five hundred catties, which is already an absolute high yield.If there are such rice seeds in a certain place, even if people walk hundreds of kilometers, they will inevitably ask for some rice seeds.In this era when the average yield of rice per mu was only three to four hundred catties, although the population did not expand as in later generations, the food crisis has always been a major problem for the government every year.

Most of the strategic material reserve measures that Hua Fei has worked hard and carefully planned for many years have already achieved initial results.Only this food, a little food accumulated with great difficulty in the past few years, has been exhausted due to the Haiyuan Earthquake, especially the last nationwide drought.Although Hua Fei has long started special research on hybrid rice, such a great invention that changes the world and even the destiny of mankind cannot be successfully interviewed in a short period of time.

Therefore, liquor monopoly is also a disguised way to control the sales of liquor and save food.However, compared with the tobacco monopoly, the stress response caused by the alcohol monopoly in the market will definitely be much greater.After all, liquor has a long history in China, and there are countless baijiu brewing families, which have a great influence on them.Moreover, in the current society, the impact of foreign wine on China is limited, and the whole of China is mainly dominated by domestic liquor.So Hua Fei is preparing to give a time limit on the liquor monopoly.In other words, the voice of opponents can be weakened.However, later researchers found a strange coincidence here, that is, the end time of the liquor monopoly was about the same time as the end of World War II in history, and the degree of coincidence was amazing.

The new and complete detailed decree will be released soon. Along with the Salt, Sugar, Tobacco and Alcohol Monopoly Act, the financial and economic report of the Nanjing central government last year will be promulgated at the same time.In the report, the Nanjing government did not hide too much about the current financial crisis, and was frank about the huge financial crisis challenges the government is currently facing.In this annual economic report, the Nanjing government also gave a solution to the problem. The monopoly of tobacco, alcohol, salt and sugar is one of the ways to increase fiscal revenue.

In addition, the Nanjing government has also formulated a plan to issue a new batch of national bonds and an intention to borrow from foreign banks.At the same time, the government's financial expenditure should be reformed and compressed.The main direction of compression is the government's administrative cost expenditure, public consumption expenditure, and even military expenditure.For the fields related to infrastructure and people's livelihood, we only control the growth of expenditures, do not add new expenditures, and maintain the original scale of expenditures.