Be invincible!

Emperor Zhu had no doubt about this. As long as he turned the entire country into a powerful war machine, he would inevitably win the war.

Of course, the premise is that the strength gap between the two sides is not too big.

How to launch a "total war" is not just about mobilizing manpower. It is an extremely complex system engineering project that involves all aspects of a country, from manpower mobilization to industrial mobilization. What needs to be mobilized is not only manpower, but also industrial production. It is an extremely important test of the leadership and organizational capabilities of the government.

It can even be said that only the country that wins this test can win the war.

As a new country, it was impossible for Ming Dynasty to establish a highly organized society capable of conducting total war in just 33 years. However, Ming Dynasty was different from other countries in that it originated from companies.

During the Nanhua era, almost all of Nanhua's industrial and commercial enterprises were built and developed by Nanhua Company. Even now, many "imperial properties" including Nanhua Company still control the industrial lifeline of the empire.

Even after years of deliberate division, the reality that almost all of the empire's economy is controlled has not changed. The leaders of various industries must be subsidiaries of Nanhua Company or companies split off from it.

How big is the scale of the companies related to Nanhua Company?

It accounts for more than 50% of the Ming Empire’s GDP!

For a country, is it good or bad to have such a chaebol that almost controls the empire's economy?

It’s hard to say, but one thing is certain: having such a consortium during the war is definitely a good thing for the country.

"Your Majesty, after the outbreak of the war, the headquarters established the "Wartime Industrial Committee" and the "Wartime Raw Materials Management Office". The former is responsible for allocating government orders and managing military production, while the latter has 59 military supply companies under it, specializing in the collection and allocation of various industrial raw materials, and giving priority to the supply of important raw materials and materials to key enterprises..."

During Fang Zhanbo's report, Emperor Zhu just nodded slightly. The establishment of these two institutions was carried out at his instruction. In fact, long before the outbreak of the war, the empire had a shadow agency - the National Defense Mobilization Committee. This committee was responsible for investigating the mobilization potential of the empire and formulating corresponding mobilization plans.

After the outbreak of the war, the Ming Dynasty mobilized all aspects according to the plan of the National Defense Mobilization Committee. At the same time, the National Defense Mobilization Committee also moved from a shadow organization to a public one. Its responsibility was to supervise and control all economic sectors and become an important institution for regulating the empire's military economy. The "Wartime Industrial Committee" and the "Wartime Raw Materials Management Office" were both affiliated with the Mobilization Committee.

Now Fang Zhanbo is the director of the committee, specifically responsible for mobilization work. To a certain extent, his power even exceeds that of the prime minister.

“That’s not enough!”

Emperor Zhu shook his head and said.

"As the war drags on, we need to develop a systematic set of standards for the order of distribution of scarce raw materials. Well, we must have some kind of cross-industry thinking, that is, we must make some kind of planned arrangements for future consumption structures."

"I understand that the Wartime Industrial Committee has already asked the military to propose next year's material needs and expand them by 50% on this basis. Then, the production will be contracted out to various mobilized enterprises based on their production capacity. This planned arrangement can ensure the normal production of military supplies."

In fact, Fang Zhanbo was not unfamiliar with planned production. To a certain extent, this was order production, but it was just more complicated. Moreover, the "planned industrial planning" implemented by the empire over the years was, to a certain extent, closely related to this planned production.

After thinking about it, Emperor Zhu said.

"This planned arrangement is not just about the production of military products. We also consider other aspects. For example, with large-scale conscription, it is bound to affect the empire's agricultural production, which will inevitably cause a shortage of grain, meat and dairy products in the market. Of course, the textile industry will also be affected. The army's demand for clothing will affect the civilian supply. In this case, we need to consider incorporating people's basic consumption into the government's planned management track and form a relatively sound and complete plan, that is, to investigate consumption in an accurate, precise and strict way."

In fact, it is a comprehensive planned economy. Planned economy is essentially a wartime economy. Everything is based on plans. It plans not only industrial production and people's consumption. Under the premise that all industrial production must obey military needs, in addition to planned industrial production and ordinary people's life consumption, there is also control over enterprises and labor. To a certain extent, it has deviated from the market profit orientation of economic development and turned to production according to government requirements.

What is this model of state control over the economy? It is to establish the government's dominant role in the economy and make the economy obey the specific political will of the state.

“Plan everyone’s life consumption?”

Fang Zhanbo couldn't help being surprised, then said.

“Can this be planned?”

The reason why he was so surprised was that in his opinion, this was almost impossible. After all, everyone's living expenses were different, so how could they be planned?

"Of course we can plan. We can set a standard, such as how much food, tobacco, cloth, alcohol, meat, and oil should be supplied to adults every month. Of course, this plan is not made out of thin air, but is determined based on the basic consumption of the people last year. Then we can formulate an industrial production plan based on this consumption. This industrial production is determined by the amount of remaining production capacity after meeting military production needs..."

Although he had not experienced the era of planned economy, Emperor Zhu had heard a lot about people's lives under this economic model. In fact, during World War II, even in the United States, a certain degree of "rationing system" was implemented. As for countries such as Britain and Germany, it was naturally a normal thing.

Then Emperor Zhu naturally introduced food coupons, cloth coupons, meat coupons, industrial coupons and other similar tickets.

"Tickets are issued to everyone every month based on customer allocation. This ticket is the qualification to purchase. You can't buy it if you have money but no ticket, and you can't buy it if you have a ticket but no money. Only when you have both money and tickets can you buy the consumer goods you want from the market..."

Listening to His Majesty's description of "planned consumption", Fang Zhanbo pondered for a moment and said.

"Your Majesty, this will affect the lives of many people..."

"Influence……"

Emperor Zhu took a newspaper from the table and pointed at the news on it.

"It has already been affected. If it hadn't been affected, how could prices have risen and how could there have been a black market? Under the quota system, perhaps people's lives would have been affected, but at least for the vast majority of people, it is fair..."

Emperor Zhu pursed his lips and said.

"Fairness...maybe it's the only thing we can do in this war that is bound to make the people suffer!"

After saying this, Emperor Zhu made a direct decision after sighing.

"Let's do it!"