Chapter 206: Digestion

Chen Haiyang nodded and ordered someone to accept it. As usual, he said some words of encouragement and comfort. Then Shi Shisi presented a gift. This was specially selected from the treasures of each family for today’s ceremony: a pair of fine Japanese katanas, a pair of pure white and flawless Hetian jade lions, a set of wine vessels: a gold-inlaid treasure pot and four white jade cups inlaid with gold. Finally, there was a box of small red gold ingots, each weighing one tael, a total of fifty.

Chen Haiyang glanced at it and thought to himself: this group of pirates really has a solid foundation!

However, he had heard the sailors who came earlier complain that they had been owed wages for one or two months. It seemed that although there was no money to pay wages, the private purses of the leaders were still very full.

Since this was a public gift, it was a symbol of submission, so Chen Haiyang naturally had to accept it. He immediately ordered it to be accepted and handed over to the Planning Committee for accounting and storage.

After accepting the gift, Chen Haiyang slowly looked them over, waited for a while before speaking:

“Since you leaders have come to serve me in Lingao, you are now my people of Australia. From now on, we are one family. Working together with one heart is not just a saying, but something that must be truly achieved. Do you all understand?!”

“Yes, we understand!” Shi Shisi’s back began to sweat.

“Please, leaders, take your seats at the merchant’s hall.” A smile appeared on Chen Haiyang’s face. “A welcome banquet for you leaders!”

After the ceremony, Lin Baiguang led the leaders to the cafeteria in Bopu, where a welcome banquet had already been laid out. As for the men, women, old and young on the boats, people from the Yanghe Quarantine Camp would naturally come to count the number of people and register them. Then they would be taken for “purification” and meals. As for the inventory of materials, because there were still the private property of the people on the boats, the Planning Committee would not go on board to check the food and materials on the boats for the time being, but only sent people to stand guard at the gangways of each boat.

There were eighty large and small sea boats, the smallest being a large sampan that could carry more than twenty people, and the largest being more than four hundred tons. They were all common Guangdong and Fujian boats in this area.

With the addition of so many ships, the navy not only greatly increased its maritime strength, but also solved the long-standing shortage of sea transportation. The situation of having to be both a warship and a transport ship was finally alleviated.

Just after the welcome banquet, Chen Haiyang had already begun to plan the distribution of these ships in the Navy Department. Now there were too many miscellaneous ships under the Navy Department, and a good adjustment and planning was needed.

But things were not that simple. These ships were still the private property of the leaders. Their surrender was not an unconditional surrender, but a kind of “partnership.” As the chairman, he could not directly deprive the shareholders of their means of production. The result of doing so would be that no one would ever “join the partnership” in the future.

In terms of strength, the pirate leaders were now at an absolute disadvantage. It was impossible for them to either resist or escape. But winning the hearts of the people was a long and arduous task.

What the transmigrators needed was “absorption,” not “alliance.” This was the basic principle of absorbing natives into the transmigrator group, so giving them the status of allies was not considered.

This group of pirates who came to serve were not prisoners of war who had been deprived of everything, nor were they desperate refugees, but an organized armed group with a complete establishment.

To be completely absorbed, these leaders would naturally not be happy—this kind of group had a strong private nature, and everyone regarded the ships and sailors as their own private property. Therefore, how to “reform” this group of pirates with a complete establishment became an urgent task.

“Xiao Wei, this task is up to you,” Ma Qianzhu said in the office. “You have to use your brain to help us swallow this team of more than a thousand people, and you can’t have indigestion. Understand?”

“Yes, Chief Ma, you can count on me for this matter.” Wei Aiwen was full of confidence.

Wei Aiwen’s absorption plan was very traditional. In short, it was “appease the upper level, win over the middle level, and win over the lower level.”

The most important thing was to win over the lower level. They were numerous and powerful, and had always been in a neglected position when it came to the distribution of benefits. They did not have much common interest with the leaders, and might even have many complaints. It was relatively easy to win them over.

Once the lower level was won over, the middle-level elements would be like grass on a wall, and even if the upper-level elements had complaints, they would be powerless to resist because they had lost the support of the grassroots. At that time, it would be fine to treat them favorably as an example, or to directly eliminate them humanely, all depending on the interest of the transmigrators.

As for the upper-level elements, Wei Aiwen believed that they could also be divided—the demands of the leaders were not consistent. In the report submitted by Lin Baiguang immediately after landing, he pointed out that the current ideas of this group of leaders were not consistent. Some, like Fatty Hu, wanted to find a comfortable nest to enjoy a stable life; Lin Dan was anxious to find his wife and children; Shi Shisi wanted to climb this big tree to continue to make a fortune…

“We can divide and rule them, and we will soon be able to absorb them.” Wei Aiwen explained his thoughts to Ma Qianzhu.

“You are fully in charge of this matter. You also have to work on Ren Fu and He Xin’s group. We are short of ships, and even more short of sailors. We must win over the sailors and the technical backbones inside as soon as possible.”

“Also, there is the issue of the treatment of the leaders,” Wei Aiwen hesitated. “There must be a statement on this matter. The sailors are easy to deal with, and the supply of naval soldiers is sufficient. What about these leaders?”

Now, the transmigrator group has implemented a system of worker types and technical grades among the natives, but for administrative personnel and army and navy officers and soldiers, a communist-style supply system is still adopted. Officers and administrative personnel only receive a little more allowance, which is not much different from ordinary soldiers and employees.

“Don’t worry about this for now, the Executive Committee has to consider it.” Ma Qianzhu remembered that the administrative grade system he proposed at the meeting was rejected. “Now it’s good, what kind of treatment do you set for this group of people?”

The first is the issue of salary and treatment. They did not rely on this to make a living under Zhu Cailao. Robbery and trade were their sources of income…

Thinking of this, Ma Qianzhu’s eyes lit up: that’s right, if we force them to become navy captains or fleet commanders and live on salaries, their enthusiasm will not be high and they will have complaints. It is better to let them use their strengths and do their old business.

“Their position is not in the Navy Department, but in the Foreign Trade Committee!”

He sat down again and began to draft an opinion on the handling of this group of people.

In the evening, a meeting was held in the Executive Committee. Ma Qianzhu explained his views and ideas at the meeting.

“This is a good proposal, otherwise this group of people would be difficult to deal with. It’s probably not reliable to let them lead troops.”

“Well, let them do their old business!”

So someone proposed to reconsider the establishment of the “Southeast Asia Company.” The Executive Committee had been thinking about this so-called “Southeast Asia Company” for many days. Its purpose was to directly trade with Southeast Asia to obtain agricultural, forestry, and mineral resources from Southeast Asia. After its strength increased, it could also undertake the work of colonial expansion, similar in nature to the East India Company.

However, this idea was shelved because the Navy Department did not have many ships suitable for long-distance voyages, and they did not have familiar talents in this area. Now it was just right to let the leaders under the great sea merchant Zhu Cailao do this.

“In the past, one was that there were not enough ships, and the other was that we were afraid that if there was a conflict in the local area, we would not be able to protect ourselves with few people and ships. But now with the addition of such a new force, the conditions for direct trade in Southeast Asia are mature,” Ma Qianzhu said.

Li Haiyang was very excited: “When necessary, they can also be asked to carry out privateering in the local waters to attack the trade of Europeans there.”

“It’s not time for that yet,” Wen Desi objected. “Privateering will cause hostility. Our presence in Southeast Asia is still blank. We should not do this before we have a firm foothold. The Dutch, the Spanish, and the British are not to be trifled with. If there is a real conflict, we have no foothold in the local area and can easily be defeated by them. In addition, privateering is a kind of piracy. This group of people is both merchant and pirate. If they get a taste of the sweetness of robbery and simply become pirates in the Southeast Asian waters, we may not be able to control them. At that time, it will be an endless disaster.”

Wen Desi continued: “Whether it is privateering or developing colonies, we should not do it before we have the ability to truly intervene in Southeast Asian affairs. We just need to protect our own trade security.”

In Wen Desi’s vision, the ships of the Southeast Asia Company would trade in convoys. Each voyage would form a large convoy—similar to the annual sea trade tour conducted by the Venetians in the Mediterranean and the Black Sea. Such a large fleet would have enough personnel and force to protect itself during the voyage. Neither the Europeans nor other sea merchant groups would be a threat.

“We in the navy don’t understand trade,” Chen Haiyang said. “I just want to know: what is the Executive Committee’s attitude towards their people and ships? Are they allowed to retain their original establishment and command system, or are they to be completely broken up and reorganized?”

“Peaceful adaptation and retention of the establishment,” Ma Qianzhu said.

That is to say, the establishment is retained in name, but in reality, the method of personnel infiltration and personnel structure adjustment is used to gradually deprive the leaders of their control over the original personnel.

“According to the numbers on the roster and the inspection results sent by the quarantine camp,” Wu De opened the folder, “there are a total of 1803 people. Among them, there are 230 women, children, and elderly people over fifty. In fact, the average number of sailors on each boat is less than 20.”

Obviously, even if the women, children, and the elderly were included, and the small boats that only needed a few people were removed, they were still seriously short of manpower.

“In this way, in order to make these ships operate again, it is necessary to supplement the sailors.” Wu De looked at the ship inspection form of the Planning Committee. “Excluding the small sampans and so on, at least 1,500 more people need to be supplemented for these ships to operate fully.”