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Panda Novel

Chapter 1253 – Empire Strategy

The Imperial Court had a fixed number of posts. With their ability, they should at least be directors. They were even good enough to be one of the four ministers and enter the Cabinet.

Helplessly, these positions could not be adjusted.

Although the Cabinet did not have a fixed organization, Ouyang Shuo was not prepared to add in new elders. The current Cabinet had one Grand Secretary, three assistants, and two part-time ones, which was enough.

However, he had to arrange a post for them. He could not simply let such talents slack around doing nothing because that would be wasting treasures.

Just as Ouyang Shuo was in a pickle, Jiang Shang stepped out and said, “Your majesty, I think it’s time to arrange secretary-generals and commissioners for the governor-general houses.”

As a regional office, the governor-general house naturally was not an empty shell. Apart from the governor-general, there were two core officials – the secretary-general and the commissioner.

The secretary-general was similar to the chief of staff, while the commissioner was the advisor of the governor-general and could be seen as their strategist.

Due to Great Xia still focusing on separating administrative and military matters, the role of secretary-general was a lot higher than the position of governor-general.

Based on the Great Xia system, the governor-general house was split into two, the commander in chief house and the great general house. Basically, in the military, the commander in chief was ranked higher than the great general, and the position of the commander in chief house was higher than the great general house.

The commander in chief governor was a primary Grade 2 official, similar to the Censorate minister, Honglu Temple minister, and court of law head. It was a position higher than the four deputy ministers of the court and lower than the four ministers of the court.

Relatively, the secretary-general was primary Grade 3, similar to the position of provincial governor.

The great general governor position was a secondary Grade 2 position, which was the same as the four deputies of the courts and the Imperial Capital Governor. The secretary general would be secondary Grade 3, same as directors under the four courts.

During the previous adjustment, the Imperial Capital Governor was promoted from primary Grade 3 to secondary Grade 2, showing the strategic position of the imperial capital. At the same time, with the Great Xia Bank as the central bank, its president went up to secondary Grade 2 from secondary Grade 3.

The presidents of the business and agriculture banks would remain as secondary Grade 3 officials.

The Nanjiang Governor General House had five provinces under it. Naturally, it was a commander in chief governor house. Hence, the correct way of referring to it would be Nanjiang Commander in Chief Governor House. Beijiang had three provinces and was temporarily a great general governor house.

After taking down nine countries in Africa, the Africa Governor-General House was promoted to the Africa Commander in Chief Governor House.

Jiang Shang was suggesting that they equip them with secretary-generals and commissioners to strengthen the construction of the governor-general houses to support the G=governor-general. Additionally, it was to give relative restrictions and monitoring.

When Ouyang Shuo heard that, he was filled with thoughts as he said, “I’ll follow your suggestion.”

“Your majesty is wise!” Jiang Shang was delighted.

Things were just so coincidental. Li Si, Fang Xuanling, and Wei Liao were all advisors that were all rounded, and they even had similar levels of experiences.

After further discussion, they decided to send Li Si to Nanjiang, Fang Xuanling to Africa, and Wei Liao to Beijiang.

Out of these places, Africa’s situation was the most complicated, so Li Si was the best choice. However, considering Mulan Yue’s young age, she might not be able to control him. Moreover, Baiqi was there. To avoid suspicion, Li Si who was also from Qin could not be sent there.

Luckily, Fang Xuanling was an intelligent person with many ideas. He was also honest and had an even temperament. He would definitely be able to assist Mulan Yue and help her manage the overseas territory.

At this point, this round of personnel arrangements had finally come to an end.

Before leaving, Kou Zhun asked, “Your majesty, where should the Guanxi Province ruling city be set at?” Both Chang An and Xianyang were suitable. As such, it was a difficult decision.

The choice could easily make the civilians of the not chosen city unhappy.

However, Ouyang Shuo made an easy selection. He said with a smile, “First come, first serve. Let’s go with Xianyang.”

“Yes, your majesty!”

Kou Zhun was impressed. With those words, there was nothing that Chang An could say.

…

After sending Jiang Shang and the other two off, Ouyang Shuo still had more work to do.

Settling the officials and adjusting the relevant personnel matters was only the first step. Next would be the generals as well as the troops of Zhou, Song, Qin, and Tang.

In terms of surrendered generals, Qin had Wang Jian and Wang Ben, while Tang had Hou Junji, Li Shiji, Yuchi Gong, and Cheng Yaojin. Amongst them, Wang Jian and Li Shiji were the best and could become marshals. The next tier would consist of Wang Ben and Hou Junji, followed by the rest.

Wang Jian was even capable enough to be a warzone commander.

Next would be the surrendered troops. Amongst which, 650 thousand were from Zhou, 380 were from Song, and 500 thousand were from Tang and Qin, totaling at 2.03 million troops. Apart from Song, which was slightly weaker, the rest were all elites.

It would be a huge waste to disband all of them.

The problem was that along with the mid plains being unified, the current Great Xia Army needed to go through a round of disarmament to reduce expenditure. Making a new legion corps was not an option now.

Dealing with these two million troops became a huge problem.

At 3 PM, Zhang Liang, Jia Xu, and Du Ruhui were invited to the Imperial Reading Room to discuss this matter.

“How do you think we should deal with the troops of the four countries?” Ouyang Shuo asked.

Hearing this question, Zhang Liang was the first to step out and answer, “Your majesty, I think that settling them should not be an isolated matter and should be considered along with the disarmament.”

“What you’re saying is?”

Zhang Liang said, “Along with the mid plains being unified, our strategy can turn to the outside. Our disarmament should not be simply a rough and brutal disarmament. Instead, we should follow our strategic direction to decide troops. We should take this chance to rebuild and strengthen the current structure. The goal is to strengthen the empire’s overall strength and not to weaken it.”

Since Qin and Tang had submitted, the officials had all come to a common understanding to stop referring to Great Xia as an Emperor dynasty and call it empire instead. That’s right, with their current territory, although it was not an imperial dynasty, it was worthy of being called an empire.

Calling Great Xia an Emperor dynasty would be belittling them.

Ouyang Shuo allowed them to do so. No matter what, Empire sounded grander, and a newly rising superpower needed to have such confidence.

Zhang Liang’s suggestion pertained to more than just the two million troops and referred to a problem that was not a purely Great Xia military one. It was a problem that would affect the future two to three years and the empire’s progression beyond that.

The problem was huge and could not be avoided.

Ouyang Shuo smiled. As expected from a master like Zhang Liang. Ouyang Shuo was always open to opinions, so he said, “That’s great. Let’s discuss what the future strategy of our empire should be.”

Zhang Liang stepped out once more and said, “The requirement to become an imperial dynasty is to obtain the Overlord position in Asia. If we set out from this point, India in the southwest, Persia Empire in the west, and Romanov Dynasty in the north are enemies we cannot avoid. As such, they should be the focus of our strategy.”

Zhang Liang did not mention Java and the Mongol Empire, but it was not because he missed them out. Rather, it was because those two were just little flies that could be easily taken down with current strength.

“Further would be the Arica continent and the America continent, which is at its sprouting stage. Even with how to enter Europe in the future, it’s up to your majesty’s discretion.”

Unknowingly, Great Xia had built up a structure to rule the world. Its reach stretched over the globe. However, this structure was still really fragile and needed deeper roots.

Ouyang Shuo expressed, “Europe is temporarily not within our strategic considerations.”

In Europe, Great Xia only had one Jidian City. To use just one city to shake the entire continent was nearly impossible. More importantly, based on Ouyang Shuo’s long term vision, Europe should not be their main enemy.

In the future, they could possibly become allies.

“Understood!”

Zhang Liang nodded. He himself felt that giving up on Europe was a wise decision. One could not put one’s eggs into too many baskets.

At this moment, Du Ruhui stood out to say, “I feel that although expanding is important, we cannot forget our local defenses. No matter what, the mid plains are the core area of the dynasty, so we must not relax when dealing with it.”

Ouyang Shuo nodded and concluded, “Mid plains, South Asia, West Asia, North Asia, Africa, and America; of these six strategic directions, none must be given up and must be treated seriously. The dynasty is still facing huge challenges. Just as Zifang mentioned, we need to plan for this disarmament. Although we need to reduce the number of troops, we need to ensure an increase in our overall battle strength.”

“After this, the Grand Council, Privy Court, and Administrative Mentor Court needs to discuss the specifics to come up with an actual feasible disarmament plan to try to complete it by the end of the year.” Ouyang Shuo ordered.

“Yes, emperor!” The three ministers all nodded.

It was already the middle of the 7th month, so they were just five months away from the end of the year.

Logically speaking, this disarmament involved the entire army and would at least take three months or even longer. This also meant that not much time was left for the three organizations to come up with a plan.

Before this, they still had to deal with the two million troops. Toward this matter, Jia Xu had a plan to report to the emperor.

However, since this plan was really vicious, it might not be approved.

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