Daqin Engineering Corps

In addition, Qiu also established a trading market between the new district and Shazhou City.

This makes the transaction between the Central Plains caravan and Shazhou easier... Before, there would be a lot of trouble in exchanging the Central Plains silk and satin, mainly because the Yue clan did not have its own currency and usually used barter.

What if a piece of silk is exchanged for spices... all the spices are not enough for half a piece of silk?Cut in two?

In addition, there is also the problem of scattered items. Central Plains merchants often have to visit Shazhou once if they want to change to their favorite items, and sometimes it is not enough.

During this period, it is inevitable that there will be disputes, language barriers, disputes and other issues.

However, it would be much more convenient for Qiu to build a market in the middle.

Caravans from the Central Plains transported silks, satins, cloth, etc. to the market, while the Yuezhi people brought in a variety of special products, clearly marked prices in the market, and there were people to manage and resolve disputes... greatly reducing transaction time and transaction costs.

What's more, Qiu Jiu took advantage of the momentum to form his own caravan.

This is how Qiu reported to Shen Bing:

"General."

"The Yue clan is not rich, and the goods from the Central Plains are shipped in batches. I am afraid that the Yue clan will not be able to exchange all their feet!"

"In my king's opinion, it is better for the Yue clan to form a caravan to transport the exchanged items to the Western Regions."

"So the Yuezhi can bring more Central Plains needs from the Western Regions..."

Shen Bing agreed without thinking.

To the west is to go through the desert area, and it needs to be transported by camels and requires experience.

This can not only increase Yuezhi's wealth, but also open up the market in the Western Regions in a relay way and extend Qin's influence.

Chapter 4 Chapter Seven

Recommend a friend's book: "Secret War Silent", brothers who like spy wars can pay attention to it.

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Of course, not only the Yuezhi merchants are interested in doing business in the Western Regions, but also the Central Plains merchants.

It is said that Shazhou businessmen have developed a habit, that is, every time they set off from Shazhou to the Western Regions, because they have to cross a dangerous desert area.

In order to pray for blessings, before the trip, they will dig caves and build Buddha statues on the mountain, and they can pay back their wishes after returning.

As time goes by, there are more and more caves, and it has become the famous "Mogao Grottoes" in modern times.

From this we can also see the importance of Shazhou in terms of geographical location. If you don’t make preparations to replenish water and food in Shazhou before setting off, it is almost impossible to reach the Western Regions under the conditions of ancient times.

Shen Bing didn't care much about these things, he was more concerned with military plans.

There were [-] more cavalry in an instant, and they were still the Yuezhi cavalry who were good at riding and shooting.

During the first inspection, when Shen Bing saw the high morale of these Yuezhi cavalry troops, he knew that he was doing the right thing.

Now he is able to command this army with confidence, and a considerable part of the reason is that Qiu Jiu has become the king of the Yue clan. Otherwise, the eyes of these Yue clan cavalry looking at Shen Bing are full of suspicion, Be wary and resist, instead of looking forward to it with awe as it is now.

What Shen Bing didn't know was that the reason why these cavalrymen behaved like this was because of King Yuezhi on the one hand, but more importantly, the Qin army had just defeated them, and they were convinced of their defeat.

Nomads usually have a habit of fearing the strong.

As I said before, this is a primitive, instinctive, jungle law of survival of the fittest.

Just like a pack of wolves regards the strongest wolf as king, the Yuezhi people take it for granted that they should be inferior to the strong.

What's more, the Qin army defeated the [-] Yuezhi army very simply with less than [-] troops.

What frightened Yuezhi even more was... Qin Jun's magic-like "thunderbolt fireball", "poisonous smoke" and "fire bomb".

They have long been frightened by Qin Jun's new equipment.

At this time, he became an ally of the Qin army... Of course, he was still an ally in name, so he immediately felt a sense of security and pride.

There is another reason for this, that is, the concept of a country with a low level of nomadic culture is not very strong, and even its own country is the result of the annexation and fusion of various ministries and ethnic groups, and it is easier to accept the reality in front of it.

However, although this cavalry army has a large number of troops, it is still unable to take on major responsibilities.

After all, most of their officers are Yuezhi nobles.

Shen Bing knew very well that the nobles of the Yue family had their own interests. At this time, they were begging for everything to follow the Qin army in order to survive, so at the critical moment, they could not be expected to sacrifice their lives desperately to fight the enemy.

At the same time, for the Yuezhi cavalry army, they are actually the slaves and appendages of the Yuezhi nobles.

Therefore, there is no such thing as saying that after sacrificing one's life to kill the enemy and becoming a hero, one will be rewarded or even promoted to a fief... This also makes them have no motivation and reason to sacrifice themselves.

Therefore, after all, Shen Bing valued the cavalry he formed, that is, the cavalry of the Western Regions led by Ji and based on the cavalry of Pu Lei.

They have the motivation and reason to sacrifice themselves.

Because they were commanded by the Qin army, they also followed the Qin system. The [-]th military merit title system also applies to them. If they die in battle, their families will get fiefdoms, and the titles can also be passed on to their children.

To put it simply, the Yuezhi Army is still an army without a soul, without a military soul, and even the national identity is in a state of chaos.

Shen Bing has a clear understanding of this and a clear goal.

So don't think about it, continue to expand the scale of the Pulei cavalry and recruit a large number of recruits from the Yuezhi.

This recruit has a great impact.

Shazhou has a total population of 40. When the Yuezhi led the conscription, the people hid as much as they could... They were slaves under the Yuezhi, and they received almost nothing except death and injury as soldiers.

But the Qin army's recruitment is different. Not to mention the freedom of the person and the title of military merit, the more important thing is that the family can be admitted to the Qin nationality.

This is necessary. If the family members are not registered in the Qin Dynasty, how can the soldiers give the fiefdom and titles to their families after they have made meritorious service?

With such a big temptation and such a big contrast, of course it is to join the Qin Army.

So in just over ten days, the number of Pu Lei's army that was put down has increased from more than [-] to more than [-].

This is actually what Shen Bing did intentionally... The cavalry cannot be dominated by Pu Lei's family, even if he is loyal to Shen Bing.

After recruiting a large number of Yuezhi cavalry, two major forces, Pulei and Yuezhi, will be formed.

In fact, it should be said to be the three major forces... The third force is the stragglers from the countries of the Western Regions. If they are too weak, they will inevitably gather together to keep warm.

These three forces will naturally form a competitive relationship and check and balance each other.

But of course, "forming cliques" in the military is not a good thing after all.

In future battles, Shen Bing will exchange those officers who have made meritorious service and promotion.

That is to say, the Yuezhi soldiers were transferred to Pulei after promotion, and the Pulei soldiers were transferred to Yuezhi after promotion, and the scattered soldiers were also operated in the same way.

Over time, this army gang will naturally be broken up.

What surprised Shen Bing was that the Yuezhi also had the technology to smelt copper and iron.

After asking Qiu Jiuque, he found out that the Yueshi's smelting technology was learned from Qin Guo.

But Qiu answered Shen Bing like this:

"Originally, we didn't want to bother to smelt copper and iron. We only need to use cattle, horses or furs to exchange with Qin."

"Smelting iron is time-consuming and of poor quality, it is better to raise more cattle and sheep!"

This has always been a huge pit in terms of equipment and technology.

There is a modern saying that "it is better to buy than to make".

To put it simply, if you want to build many things by yourself, such as the production of tanks and aircraft, the investment in research and development costs, the time and capital costs of personnel training are a bottomless pit.

From the perspective of money alone, it is true that "making is worse than buying", because the cost of making will be much more expensive than buying, and sometimes even dozens of times the money invested in making things is not as good as buying.

So why not just spend some money on it?

It's cheap and hassle-free, and it's even better.

However, once you buy a certain kind of equipment and give up making it yourself, the result is that the military is stuck by other countries and is doomed to become a second-rate or even a third-rate country.

So on the Internet, it is said that a certain country has purchased advanced equipment... Just ignore it, buy equipment and not produce it yourself, once a war starts, it will lose one and lose one.

Conversely, if the self-produced equipment is added to the industrial base and production capacity, then one can be produced for the loss of one, and more can be produced.

In short, the purchased equipment can basically be said to be a vase, which is used for appearance in peacetime.

The Yue family could have bartered to buy metal from the Qin State, but if they were driven to Shazhou and away from the Qin State... they would not be able to produce it by themselves.

Chapter 4 and Eight

The Yue Clan in history was actually a blessing in disguise, because it learned how to smelt iron from the Qin State, which had a great influence on its becoming a powerful country in the Western Regions and even moving west to the Lan Clan City to easily establish a country...

At this time, the Western Regions were still in the Bronze Age, and Yuezhi's iron smelting technology gradually matured in the Han Dynasty.

As for the TV series saying that the iron smelting technology in the Western Regions is more advanced than that in the Central Plains, and even the Xiongnu learned iron smelting technology from the Western Regions, so their equipment is more advanced than that in the Central Plains... That is purely to make the enemy stronger. .

Iron smelting technology in the Western Regions was actually brought from the Central Plains after the Han Dynasty opened up the Silk Road.

Another place where iron smelting technology is more developed is in the Middle East, in present-day Turkey, where iron tools unearthed are 1000 years earlier than those in the Central Plains.

Although Turkey is an Asian country, because it is only separated from Europe by a strait, after the Assyrian Empire destroyed the ancient Hittite kingdom, it brought the more mature iron-smelting technology of the Hittite kingdom to Europe, making the originally backward Europe instantly Entered the Iron Age.

At this time, Zhongyuan was still in the Spring and Autumn Period, and after hundreds of years, the ironware of the Central Plains had not been widely used in the military until the end of the Warring States period.

However, the appearance of Shen Bing changed this situation.

At this time, Shen Bing was thinking about a question, the Western Regions could also be said to be a potential opponent of the Central Plains, so should he teach Yuezhi the new iron technology to improve its productivity?

If this new iron technology spreads to the Western Regions and the Central Plains on the other side is artificially restricted... For example, Qin Shihuang collected all the metals in the world to make bronze figures because he was worried that the people would conspire, and stagnated the development of iron smelting technology, then will the Western Regions reverse in the future? Come over to form a technological advantage over the Central Plains?

After thinking about it again and again, Shen Bing felt that new railways should be developed in the Western Regions.

First of all, there is an advantage to developing new iron in the Western Regions, that is, it is safer and easier to keep secret... Far from saying that the Emperor Shangao of the Western Regions, most of the people around him have little interest in and experience in iron smelting technology, and even Yuezhi’s iron smelting technology The workers are all Central Plains slaves.

Secondly, if the iron needed by the Qin army had to be shipped from the Central Plains, the transportation cost would be too high, especially the army's demand for iron can be said to be endless.

So Shen Bing didn't think much about it, and immediately ordered him to take an iron smelting team with the caravan from Hetao to the Western Regions.

Another thing Shen Bing did was to build two fortresses in Shazhou and deploy [-] troops each to garrison them.

The locations of these two walled cities are actually the "Yang Pass" and "Yumen Pass" known to modern people.

There are ancient poems such as "Going out of Yangguan in the west without an old friend" and "The spring breeze never crosses Yumenguan".

Among them, "Yangguan" and "Yumenguan" refer to these two checkpoints. They can almost be said to be the farthest points that the Central Plains can completely control, and they are also the two most important transportation hubs for Shazhou.

Hold these two passes and use wooden fences to connect several mountains according to the terrain, and then build some simple fortifications and earthen fortresses, which can roughly prevent the Huns from entering the Hexi Corridor.

The reason why I say "probably" is because the Great Wall was built in this area during the Han Dynasty to completely stop the Huns.

So the [-] garrisons in Suzhou were no longer needed, only [-] were left in place, and all the rest were transferred to Shazhou.

Shen Bing also thought about building the Great Wall in Shazhou to improve its defense.

In fact, Shen Bing thinks this is necessary, because the terrain of the Hexi Corridor is very special, with mountains on both sides and only two exits, east and west.

The west exit is Shazhou, and the east exit is Xitao.

If history develops, Meng Tian built the Great Wall in Xitao to prevent the Huns from invading the Central Plains.

But since Shen Bing has controlled Shazhou in the west, there is no need to build the Great Wall in Xitao.

Therefore, it is necessary to build the Great Wall in Shazhou, because once it is completed, it can keep Shazhou invincible... Nomads are not good at attacking cities, whether it is the Huns or the 36 countries in the Western Regions, they can only face the Great Wall. helpless.

This is what the Art of War says, "Advance can be attacked, retreat can be defended", and then Shazhou can develop with confidence.

The difficulty is that the Qin army has just gained a firm foothold in Shazhou, and supplies, supplies, and troops are insufficient. Is it appropriate to spend money and people to build the Great Wall at this time?

If labor is recruited from the Yuezhi, will it arouse the resentment of the Yuezhi and even the countries in the Western Regions?

Thinking about it, Shen Bing thinks that this matter should be reconsidered, at least until the Qin army's dominance in Shazhou can not be shaken before starting this project, otherwise, if it is not good enough, the sky will be angry and people will rebel, and all previous efforts will be wasted.

At this time, Wang Ben hurried into the tent and reported to Shen Bing:

"General, something is wrong. The Xiongnu have captured Gushi and Loulan."

Shen Bing couldn't help being greatly surprised, and asked back:

"Conquer? You mean... the Xiongnu occupied two cities and garrisoned them?"

Wang Ben nodded and replied:

"Exactly!"