Daming: The system rejected my request for salted fish

Chapter 1111

After the helicopter landed, Wei Wu put it away, and a group of people found a small mound and camped on the back.

It’s not that Wei Wu and the others don’t want to find a better location, but there is none at all. The small slope is the best choice.

The location they are in now would be within the territory of Mongolia in the future, and near the capital Ulaanbaatar.

Even in later times, in this country where overgrazing has led to grassland desertification, grassland still accounts for 50%.

Not to mention that in this era, the grassland ratio of this land is definitely more than 70%, and there is grass all around.

Although Helin is a city, the Northern Yuan Dynasty was a nomadic people, so even if they built a city, they would definitely choose a location with abundant grassland.

It was impossible to find a forest to hide in nearby. Although there were trees, they were mostly scattered here and there, not forming a forest.

The only way is to fly a helicopter farther, perhaps dozens of kilometers away, but there is really no need for that.

Anyway, it was just a temporary place to stay, so Wei Wu took out a few tents from the system warehouse and it was done.

While the Wuchang team was setting up the tent, Zhu Biao and Wei Wu were standing on a small hill looking into the distance.

"If such a fine pasture were to become the territory of the Ming Dynasty, we would never lack cattle and horses!"

Although he knew that the cattle and horses Zhu Biao was talking about were not the kind of cattle and horses in later generations, Wei Wu still felt strange when he heard it.

But to be honest, the Ming Dynasty did lack cattle and horses. No, it was not just the Ming Dynasty, but almost all dynasties in the Central Plains lacked them.

Needless to say, horses are an indispensable source of animal power both on the battlefield and in daily life.

As cattle were the main labor force for farming, most dynasties had regulations prohibiting the private slaughter of oxen.

The Ming Dynasty was actually still doing pretty well. At least Zhu Yuanzhang took back the Hexi Corridor, giving the Ming Dynasty a place to graze its livestock.

But after all, the place is still a little small. If we can take over the entire desert, we will no longer have a shortage of cattle, sheep, and horses.

Wei Wu understood what Zhu Biao was thinking, but in fact he thought the same thing, even earlier than Zhu Biao.

So after hearing Zhu Biao's sigh, Wei Wu immediately responded.

"Brother, don't worry! In the future, this place and even the extremely cold places further away will become part of our Ming territory."

"As long as we have time to develop, we can build a railway directly here in the future, and conquering the grassland will be as easy as taking candy from a baby."

The main reason why the Central Plains dynasties were repeatedly invaded by nomadic peoples outside the Great Wall was that they were unable to completely conquer the grasslands.

First of all, the grassland area has a cold climate and barren land, which cannot support large-scale agricultural development. It is a pity to throw away the food.

Secondly, the terrain is vast, and the core assets of nomadic peoples are livestock and population, both of which are movable.

They would go wherever the grass was better, and once the Central Plains dynasty attacked, they could escape thousands of miles away with their property.

You must know that the desert that continues northward is not a sea with no way to go, but Russia, which later had the largest land area in the world.

If the Central Plains dynasty wanted to attack the desert, the first problem would be getting there quickly, which would take more than half a year to go back and forth.

Secondly, food supply is also a difficult problem. Transporting food for hundreds of thousands of people for half a year is more difficult than marching hundreds of thousands of people.

The Central Plains dynasty was unable to transport food quickly, and after a long time, it had to leave the desert with its army and return to the Central Plains for rest and recuperation.

This is one of the reasons why Zhu Di, despite having his eldest son Zhu Gaochi in charge of the court, still had to launch five expeditions to the northern desert instead of completing the task in one go.

But once the railway is built, things will be different. Both troops and food can be transported by railway.

If there had been railways at the time of Emperor Yongle, Zhu Di probably would not have returned to the capital at all, but would have lived in the desert and fought the Oirat Mongols to the death.

However, Zhu Di no longer has that opportunity now, but since the Ming Dynasty has railways, it is entirely possible to occupy the northern desert.

After hearing what Wei Wu said, Zhu Biao laughed on the spot, but still refuted it.

"The depths of the grassland are bitterly cold. The ice and snow are not suitable for survival. It will be useless even if we capture it."

"Even with the railway, we can't take over the grasslands. The best we can do is drive them away, but they will soon come back."

"After all, the grasslands are not suitable for us Han people to live in. This bitter and cold land can only be used for grazing, and there is no way to grow food to fill our stomachs."

Wei Wu was unhappy when he heard this and immediately retorted.

"Brother, you must not underestimate this bitterly cold place. It's true that the climate further north on the grassland is indeed extremely cold."

"But not only places where you can farm are good places. There are many good things underground in that bitter and cold land!"

"In my time, there was a country with the largest territory in the world, and also one with the most natural resources."

Speaking of this, Wei Wu's mind came to Russia's rich mineral and energy resources, and he almost couldn't help drooling.

In fact, it is normal for Wei Wu to have such a reaction. After all, who among the countries in later generations would not envy the inexhaustible resources in Russia?

But it has not been obtained yet, so Wei Wu quickly calmed down and explained to Zhu Biao again:

"Brother, the resources we need and can utilize right now are metals, such as gold, silver, copper, and iron, but this is only for now."

"In the future, we will need more resources, such as coal, oil, natural gas, gold, timber, rare earths, and so on."

"Just like the tanks and helicopters in my hands, the fuel they consume is extracted from petroleum."

"Even if we can't use these important resources for the time being, we have to keep them in our hands. Whether we need them or not is different from whether we have them or not!"

Zhu Biao didn't take it seriously before because he didn't understand the importance of resources. Now after hearing what Wei Wu said, he understood.

"Xiao Wu, what you said makes sense. The resources do need to be in our hands, but this desert is not easy to occupy!"

Seeing that Zhu Biao understood what he said, Wei Wu chuckled and then gave an idea.

"Brother, the dynasties of the past couldn't conquer the desert, but we are different. We have advantages that the dynasties of the past didn't have."

"Just think about it, we have cement, and we can easily build a few cities on the grassland. We just need to build them along the railway."

"Besides that, we can also arrange..."

Wei Wu has always been most interested in expanding territory, but this time he was not able to express himself to his heart's content.

He had just said two sentences when Zhang Hai suddenly appeared from the side and interrupted him with a sentence.

"Master, it's getting dark. Should we start moving?"