I have read a few chapters but did not buy a copy for myself because it is not the same as Li Tao's work, which was compiled during this Dynasty in 1114
Now, I shall ask you for your burden of proof to prove our claim otherwise.
Did the Cambridge version forget to translate this part?
So I'm supposed to provide burden of proof for you inability to source quality sources what kind of logic is this?
On the wealth the reforms generated.
In 1076 the government spent only 6.4 million strings of the 10.4 million strings it collected in service exemption fees, for a surplus of 4 million strings. At the same time, the fund contained 8.5 million strings of unused “current funds” (hsientsai)
– in some circuits equal to an entire year’s income – built up through underspending and the accumulation of surplus emergency fees (k’uan-sheng chien) up to 1076. The winery and ferry account was equally well capitalized, with an income of 2.1 million units (primarily cash) over expenditures(1.7 million units). pg 426
In 1084 the government collected or held 18,729,300 million strings in service exemption fees, and 5,050,090 strings in wine and ferry fees. The transformation of the hired service policy into a mechanism of revenue extraction was complete. pg 426
Like all monopolies, however, the state trade agency was extremely profitable. For the single year of the tenth month of 1076 to the tenth month of 1077, the state trade agency reported net returns (hsi-ch’ien) of 1.41 million strings of cash, a return of 28 percent on its basic capitalization of 5 million strings at that time.By 1085 the basic capitalization had more than doubled,
to 12.26 million strings, which at the same rate of return should have yielded 3.45 million strings in interest. pg 433
We can be more precise about the profitability of the New Policies as a whole, which very significantly enriched government coffers. One historian estimates that in 1077 the major revenue measures – state trade, green sprouts,
and hired service – added an extra 18 million strings, or 33 percent, to the 54 million strings of cash obtained through traditional currency sources. Other than state trade, this new currency stream was collected almost entirely from the agricultural sector of the economy. pg 433
By the end of 1076,the Court of Agricultural Supervision (Ssu-nung ssu) had built up a surplus of
unspent reserves (hsien-tsai ch’ien) from the rural credit, service exemption, and winery and ferry franchise funds totaling 49.9 million mixed units, including 27.7 million strings of cash. pg 434
Debunking your accusation that the Song-XiXia wars made the Song go bankrupt:
For Shen-tsung these hoards were to be the life’s blood of his campaign against the Tanguts. And though the Tangut war of 1081–3 exacted an enormous toll in money and men, New Policies revenues were so robust that imperial treasuries remained full into the next reign period. pg 434
Debunking your claims that Wang Anshi was to blame for Tangut wars when Shenzong was at the helm:
As a young man Shen-tsung was fixated on recovering the northern territories occupied by the Tanguts and the Khitan, and he ascended the throne in 1067 eager to wage offensive wars. In Shen-tsung’s mind, recovering the northlands
was the raison d’ˆetre of the New Policies, and so it is ironic that only Wang An-shih, the architect of the New Policies, was able to restrain the emperor’s irredentist ambitions. pg 464-465
Wang put this prudent view to effect in a series of border issues that embroiled the two empires between
1072 and 1076, when he consistently sought to preserve peace, even where peace meant adopting a compliant attitude toward the Liao. pg 465
But in practice Wang preached a cautious approach to the Tanguts as well. Wang’s real views were revealed in 1070, after Sung incursions into Tangut territory had provoked retaliatory attacks in Ching-y¨uan circuit:
"What if we show a strong front to the [Tanguts] and they decline to obey; how will the court then deal with them? We are not now strong enough to match troops (chiao-ping) with them; and if we do not match troops, then what else can we do? It would be most inappropriate if we first put up a show of strength and are then forced to humble ourselves. Under the current circumstances, we should make a point of being accommodating (jou) toward [the Hsia]; by being accommodating we are least likely to miscalculate." pg 466
Wang Anshi wanted to annex Tibetan territories instead and some northwestern territories:
What then did Wang offer an emperor whose motivating ambition was to recover the lost territories of the north? In brief, he offered Shen-tsung a policy of expansion, colonization, and economic exploitation in the frontier regions of Hunan and Szechwan, and in the Tibetan tribal lands of the Tsinghai and Kansu region. pg 466
Wang Anshi advocated war when the Ly dynasty overstepped its boundaries:
In late 1075, Annamese troops attacked walled towns across the border in Kuang-nan West, searching for rebels harbored
by the Chinese. In addition, the Annamese claimed they were on a mission of mercy, “to save the people from the green sprouts and service exemption policies of the Middle Kingdom.” Taking this as a personal affront, Wang An-shih persuaded the emperor to launch a punitive expedition, for which he personally wrote the proclamation.pg 468
The blame on the fall of the Song dynasty in traditional works is mainly Cai Jing and his cronies as well as Huizong's emphasis on Taoism:
Judgments of the Hui-tsung era have tended toward high levels of generalization,for the documentary record of his reign poses a minefield of historiographic problems. Foremost of these issues is the moralistic praise-and-blame
bias of traditional Chinese historiography. In the standard dynastic histories of the Sung, and in privately compiled works of historiography, Hui-tsung and his long-serving chief councilor Ts’ai Ching (1046–1127) have been held responsible for a litany of crimes against the moral and territorial integrity of the state. Ts’ai and his fellow state councilors, pejoratively referred to as the “Six Felons” (liu tsei), were blamed for prosecuting the most sweeping factional
purge in Sung history, allowing governmental corruption to run rampant, and pushing the subjects of the empire toward impoverishment and rebellion. In the judgment of posterity, the greatest crime of these so-called felonious ministers
was their bungling of border diplomacy and military strategy, which precipitated the Jurchen Chin invasion, the sack of K’ai-feng, and the fall of the north. pg 557
In traditional historiography, the extravagance of Hui-tsung’s court and his promotion of religious Taoism are interpreted as harbingers of dynastic collapse. Hui-tsung is portrayed as a Neronic figure who frolicked in his sumptuous
pleasure gardens while the empire was impoverished, eventually succumbing to rebellion from within and conquest from without. And by declaring the Divine Empyrean sect of Taoism to be the state religion, the emperor invited
the moralistic scorn of later historians. pg 602
