Chapter Fifty-Seven: The Guiding Principles of the War

The conference hall gradually fell silent. Xiao Zishan began by reading the full text of the telegram from Guangzhou. Then, he called for a general discussion on the matter among all the members of the assembly.

Of course, the purpose of this general assembly wasn’t to debate whether to fight or not, nor was it to discuss how to win. With the power of the Transmigration Group, defeating an expeditionary force of ten or twenty thousand men was not a problem. The main objective of this meeting was to decide on the scale of the war and what to do after achieving victory in the campaign.

The determination of the Elders was unanimous: if they were to fight, they would fight to cripple the Ming army, to shatter its morale so thoroughly that it would never again dare to covet the Lingao regime. The goal was to compel peace through force.

However, a major debate once again arose on the question of how far to go before stopping.

Ultimately, three main proposals emerged:

The first was to maintain the current situation of “no war, no retreat, no appeasement.” The campaign would end once the invading Ming army was utterly routed and annihilated, after which they would continue to be based in Lingao.

Supporters of this view argued that its advantage was that it wouldn’t lead to a complete break with the Ming Dynasty, thus ensuring that the maritime trade routes with the mainland remained open. It would also help guarantee the safety of their stations in Guangzhou and Leizhou. As long as the Guangdong officials didn’t lose any prefectures or counties, they could still spin a disastrous defeat into a victory. In other words, it would allow the Guangdong authorities to save face.

The second proposal was to ride the momentum of a great victory, pursue the Ming army to Qiongshan, destroy the Ming forces at the Baisha naval base, and completely eliminate the main Ming forces on Hainan. Following this, they would launch a campaign to conquer the various prefectures and counties of Hainan, swiftly occupying the entire island. This would bring all of Hainan’s manpower and resources under the control of the Transmigration Group, creating a state of de facto secession.

The third proposal was an upgraded version of the second. It advocated not only for the occupation of all of Hainan but also for a punitive expedition against Guangzhou. Some suggested deploying the Holy Ship and using its deck-mounted heavy cannons to bombard Guangzhou, creating an atmosphere of panic throughout the city. Others proposed dispatching the Special Reconnaissance Team to carry out a decapitation strike against the officials in Guangzhou who had advocated for the use of force against Lingao—many suggested simply wiping out Wang Zunde and his entire family.

Each of the three plans had its own group of supporters, and they engaged in a fierce, uncompromising debate in the assembly.

In general, the second and third proposals were merely a matter of degree. The third proposal received active support from Si Kaide, who presented a complete strategic plan:

1. Seize all of Hainan. Since they would have already broken with the Ming government, they must take the opportunity to seize the entire island. Otherwise, the Transmigration State could not develop.
2. Strive to annihilate the Ming army on land, not just repel them at sea. This would render the Ming incapable of attacking for three or four years and would provide a large number of prisoners for labor and as bargaining chips in negotiations.
3. Conduct a limited counter-attack on the mainland. Aim to seize the area around Guangzhou, perhaps even temporarily besieging the city to thoroughly intimidate the Ming. However, it was not advisable to occupy Guangzhou itself, as the Transmigration State was not yet prepared to contend for control of the mainland.
4. Pay attention to propaganda and the protection of private property. Their official stance should be to oppose the Guangdong government’s unprovoked campaign of suppression, and to oppose corrupt officials who used the campaign as a pretext to plunder the people’s wealth and kill civilians for merit. But they would not oppose the Imperial Court (internally they did, but not externally), leaving room for peace talks. Protecting private property would help win the hearts and minds of the people.
5. Force peace through war. Lingao was not afraid of a Ming attack, but they did not want to sever trade ties with the Ming for the next few years. Therefore, after the war, the main policy towards the Ming should be peace talks. If talks failed, they would fight again.

In addition to these five points, Si Kaide explicitly called for creating panic in Guangzhou. He proposed emulating the British burning of Copenhagen by launching a massive barrage of Congreve rockets, or by occupying Baiyun Mountain and setting up cannons there to bombard the government offices in Guangzhou.

Ma Qianzhu requested to speak.

He walked up to the podium. “Fellow Elders. Whether we occupy all of Hainan after defeating the Ming army, or whether we bombard Guangzhou, must first and foremost serve our political needs—for as they say, war is the continuation of politics.” He coughed. “Before we discuss how far to expand the scale of the war, I propose that we first clarify our group’s political and economic demands for the next few years.”

These so-called political demands were directly related to the Transmigration Group’s economic needs.

“For now, we are still heavily dependent on the resources, population, and markets in the areas controlled by the Ming government,” Ma Qianzhu said. “If we adopt overly aggressive methods of warfare, it will not make the Ming submit to our will out of fear. On the contrary, it will lead to a full-scale political and economic blockade against us, which will inevitably be accompanied by constant military attacks. Even if such military attacks are completely ineffective, the Ming government will continue to launch them to save face.”

“The Director-General is at it again with his ‘turtle strategy’ tech tree theory,” someone whispered from his seat.

“He’s not wrong, though. Fighting is satisfying, but you have to clean up the mess afterward.”

Si Kaide immediately stood up to object. “Let’s see if Wang Zunde can still act tough when we have our cannons set up on Baiyun Mountain! If that’s not enough, we’ll launch ten thousand Congreve rockets from the Pearl River! Burn Guangzhou to the ground!”

Lin Shenhe, sitting below, frowned. Ten thousand rockets. These people really knew how to talk big. The First Weapons Design Group had developed rockets long ago and had even used them for fireworks once. By now, although the Congreve rocket had never been used in combat, it was already on his list of weapons to be phased out. The First Group had already test-fired several different calibers of Hale rockets. This type of rocket was far more advanced than the Congreve and didn’t require a long stabilizing stick.

“The Ming is not the Qing. They don’t have high-ranking officials like Qishan who can see the bigger picture,” Ji Tui’si snorted. “If we go about this recklessly, we can expect the court to levy a ‘Hainan Pacification Tax’ and wage war on us year after year.”

“Are we afraid of the Ming army? Besides, wouldn’t a Hainan tax be a self-destructive move for the Ming court, accelerating its collapse?” Si Kaide retorted.

“That’s true, but the Ming’s economy and population are a hundred times ours. If they get serious and send someone like a Grand Secretary to oversee the campaign, being at war day in and day out will be very detrimental to our industrial upgrading,” Ma Qianzhu continued to insist on his viewpoint.

“What’s wrong with war? An army is forged in battle,” Wei Aiwen said, his heart already blooming with joy at the prospect of war. He had already drafted an army expansion plan. He reasoned that the Ming navy was weak, so their main force would have to be their army, which was the perfect opportunity for the Army to shine. With the Ming army coming in the tens of thousands, and the Army having less than four thousand men including auxiliary units, the Young Officers’ Club members all agreed that this was the perfect chance to push the Senate to pass a resolution for a massive army expansion.

With a foreign enemy at the gates, and a land-based one at that, who else would be expanded if not the Army? This was precisely the calculation Wei Aiwen and Zhang Bailin had made.

“War costs money and consumes resources. It’s a pure consumption activity. Our mode of warfare is different from that of the armies of this era; it’s a typical high-cost war. If we can’t gain territory and population, such a war would not be worth fighting,” Ma Qianzhu said, unenthusiastic about the prospect of war.

“In my opinion, we might as well take this opportunity to occupy Guangzhou and then control the entire Pearl River Delta. With that territory, we’ll have population and resources.”

“Occupy the entire Pearl River Delta with four thousand troops? Defending Hainan has the support of the Navy, which can offset the enemy’s numerical advantage. On the mainland, that number of troops is not enough.”

“That’s why we need to expand the Army,” Wei Aiwen said, waiting for exactly that line.

“I am firmly opposed to diverting too many resources to military projects at this critical moment of industrial upgrading,” Wu De immediately voiced his opposition. “Occupying the Pearl River Delta will inevitably draw us into long-term, large-scale military conflicts, excessively draining our limited strength.”

Qian Shuiting also objected. “The current size of the Army is sufficient for its existing tasks. Even for this operation, a temporary and appropriate supplement of troops, supported by the militia, will be enough. There is no need to blindly expand the standing army. Besides, given our situation, we don’t need a large army…”

“What did you say?!” Wei Aiwen jumped to his feet. In his view, this was a public humiliation of the Army. “You are slandering the Army!”

“I don’t believe it’s slander,” Qian Shuiting said, not backing down. “The size of the military must be in line with our current economic scale. I oppose any move to blindly expand military operations.”

“You’re being short-sighted…”

Xiao Zishan slammed his gavel. “Watch your words! Please refrain from personal attacks!”

The motion to occupy the Pearl River Delta was quickly voted down. The majority of the Elders believed it was beyond the Transmigration Group’s current capabilities. With a lack of military and administrative personnel, prematurely occupying a densely populated area would necessitate relying heavily on the old ruling personnel and institutions. Moreover, the Guangdong region was a major source of financial revenue for the Ming government, which would certainly not sit idly by.

Once embroiled in continuous military operations, it would severely hinder their industrial upgrading and affect future development. This was unacceptable, especially for the personnel from the industrial sector. Although the industrial personnel were eager to see the guns and cannons they produced demonstrate their power on the battlefield, they were even more eager to see a modern, large-scale industrial system established by their own hands.

As for the agricultural sector, led by Wu Nanhai, they were even more vehemently opposed to expanding the scale of the war. The agricultural sector was more worried about their assets than the industrial sector—at least the industrial sector’s assets had defensive measures. Agricultural land, irrigation systems, and other basic farmland infrastructure were impossible to defend. They were also worried that the agricultural workers they had painstakingly trained would be drafted to fight.

Therefore, the agricultural sector’s position in the meeting was the most conservative. They only asked to be able to repel the Ming army’s attack. Of course, Wu Nanhai also demanded the complete annihilation of the enemy forces, so that the prisoners could be converted into agricultural workers.

However, most people believed that the time had come to occupy all of Hainan. To be confined to Lingao alone would severely limit future development space and also leave a major hidden danger. The imperial court could always use the local government institutions and resources to launch encirclement campaigns. And the legitimacy of the orthodox government was still with the Ming. The people of Lingao would feel like they were “following bandits,” and if the situation became even slightly unstable, it could lead to a collapse of public morale. The Political Security General Bureau’s investigations showed that many of the “nouveau riche” commoners had a sense of anxiety about the future.

Seeing that the atmosphere in the meeting was clearly not in favor of only holding Lingao, Ma Qianzhu decided to abandon Plan A of defending only Lingao and switch to Plan B.

“First, do we need to maintain a superficial peace with the Ming?” Ma Qianzhu asked. “From a strategic point of view, this is absolutely necessary!”

“If we want to maintain our economic and trade relations with the mainland, and continue to import population and resources from there, maintaining a state of superficial peace with the Ming government is crucial,” Ma Qianzhu said. “Therefore, I oppose any action that expands the war to the mainland. Once the flames of war spread to the mainland, the Ming will inevitably sever trade and population flows with us.”

Of course, given the Ming’s administrative execution capabilities and limited maritime operational capacity, such a blockade would certainly be incomplete. The Transmigration Group would also have no trouble finding enough agents to serve its interests, and the under-construction Shan-Hai dual-track commerce and intelligence system could also play a supplementary role. But such “smuggling” activities would far exceed normal trade in both scale and cost.

“The methods we adopt must have a certain strategic quality—we must leave the Guangdong officials a fig leaf, so that Wang Zunde, Li Fengjie, and others can continue to muddle through and shirk responsibility.”

To achieve this goal, the Transmigration Group could not use overly drastic measures—they couldn’t carry out large-scale decapitation strikes, nor could they bombard Guangzhou, and it was even inadvisable to openly occupy the administrative centers of the various prefectures and counties of Hainan. In short, they had to give the Guangdong local government face and a pretext for shirking responsibility.

“Second, should we occupy the entirety of Hainan?” Ma Qianzhu spoke with eloquence. “I believe this is a necessity.”

Someone below muttered, “This is different from the Director-General’s attitude a few days ago.”

Relying solely on receiving refugees from the mainland to increase the population was too slow. Occupying all of Hainan would allow the Transmigration Group to control at least two hundred thousand Han Chinese and an unknown number of Li and Miao people—the latter numbered at least fifty to sixty thousand. This was much faster than the influx of several hundred to a few thousand mainland immigrants per month. Moreover, the number of refugees from Guangdong was unstable and could not be a long-term, stable supply. Before opening up other sources of population, developing the local population was a time-saving solution.

Occupying all of Hainan would allow them to promote the “Lingao experience” on a larger scale and carry out reforms of the civil administration system. This would also be an experiment, but the scale would expand from a single county of Lingao to the entire island of Hainan. This would be a test for the native staff that the Transmigration Group had trained over the years. The Transmigration Group also needed to use this opportunity to summarize the experience and lessons learned in training native personnel and local administration, in preparation for ruling a larger area in the future.

“To occupy all of Hainan and yet maintain a superficial peace with the Ming government, that’s too difficult,” someone questioned. “Losing a county is a major event that must be reported to the imperial court, let alone losing an entire prefecture! Wang Zunde and Li Fengjie can’t possibly pretend to be deaf and dumb to that extent.”

“Therefore, I propose that we maintain the Lingao model throughout Hainan. That is, we sweep away the local clerical class and have our native administrative personnel take over, effectively making the local officials powerless and establishing our actual rule over Hainan. The taxes and grain required by the imperial court will be paid according to the established quotas.”

Qiongzhou Prefecture was a remote area, and the Ming’s ruling foundation there was extremely weak. Apart from counties like Danzhou, Lingao, Qiongshan, and Wenchang, which were somewhat established, the presence of local government in places like Changhua and Yazhou was very weak, with government decrees barely reaching beyond the city gates. Several counties had long been without an appointed county magistrate, with their duties handled by subordinate officials. Hollowing out the county government and taking over power would be quite easy—in many places, there was hardly any county administration to speak of in the first place.

Jiang Shan had remained silent throughout the meeting. He felt that this plan was a bit wishful. It was one thing for a single county like Lingao, but to do this for the entire Qiongzhou Prefecture would likely be very difficult. There were several government offices in Qiongzhou Prefecture: the Qiongzhou Prefecture government, the Qiongshan County government, the Hainan Circuit, a branch of the Provincial Administration Commission, the Coastal Defense Commandant…

With so many officials, it wouldn’t be as simple as in Lingao. If one of them turned out to be a stubborn idealist who was unwilling to be a figurehead and was determined to govern effectively, it would be difficult to make the hollowing out of the local government as perfect as it had been in Lingao.

Moreover, Qiongshan County also had a garrison. If they were to continue to maintain the superficial existence of the Ming government, would the two thousand-plus men and ships of the Qiongya Coastal Defense Commandant still be allowed to remain stationed there? This was a regular army of the imperial court, not the already dilapidated garrison-and-post system. Even if it were destroyed in battle, it would surely be rebuilt. Would they allow such a force to exist right under their noses?

The most difficult thing, Jiang Shan thought, was this: once the counter-attacking army and navy reached the gates of Qiongzhou city and destroyed the Baisha naval base, the officials of Qiongzhou Prefecture and Qiongshan County would either surrender or commit suicide for their country. Either way, the news that the prefectural city of Qiongzhou had fallen would inevitably spread, and Wang Zunde and the others would absolutely not have the courage to falsely claim that the city had not fallen.

But he didn’t intend to raise these questions openly—there would be special meetings to discuss these matters when it came to actual implementation. In any case, whether they maintained a “superficial peace” or had a complete break, he was in favor of occupying all of Hainan.

Although some questioned whether this “superficial peace” could be maintained, the majority of the Elders were very enthusiastic about occupying all of Hainan—Lingao was, after all, too small a place. Many had a vague hope that once the regime expanded to the whole of Hainan, everyone could take charge of their own area—at the very least, they could serve as an administrative head in an outlying county.

In the end, the Senate passed the three guiding principles for this war:

One: Annihilate the invading Ming army and all other enemy forces, and at the same time, eliminate the effective strength of the Ming army on Hainan.

Two: Under favorable conditions, occupy the entire island of Hainan.

Three: The war will be confined to Hainan Island and the surrounding waters and shall not be expanded to the mainland or other sea areas—unless approved by the Senate.

This operation was named the “Second Counter-Encirclement Campaign.”

Si Kaide continued to advocate for peace talks with the Guangdong local government after the war.

The specific plan was to quickly release a few high-ranking prisoners back to Guangzhou after the war to try to establish contact with the leading figures of the Guangdong government and request peace talks. Subsequently, special envoys would be sent to negotiate.

The location for the peace talks could be Macau, with the Portuguese guaranteeing the safety of both sides. If the Portuguese were unreliable, they could also choose another remote location.