From the time of Zhu Yuanzhang to Qi Jiguang, it took almost a hundred years, during which time the Ming Dynasty had been building the Great Wall. This product left over from the Qin Dynasty was unexpectedly taken back by Zhu Yuanzhang and became the established national policy of the Ming Dynasty. Is this a step backwards of the Ming Dynasty? Looking back at the entire ancient feudal society, the Great Wall built by the Qin Dynasty has almost never been repaired on a large scale in the past dynasties.
However, in the early years of the Ming Dynasty, the Ming Dynasty launched a large-scale city defense construction, building a series of high-level city defense construction such as the Nanjing City Wall, the Xi'an City Wall, and the Datong City Wall, not only that, the general Xu Da also built a series of Great Walls. If you want to say that there is no instruction from Zhu Yuanzhang behind this, it is impossible.
The Great Wall built by Zhu Yuanzhang did not end until the era of Qi Jiguang, and it is really unknown how much the Ming Dynasty spent on it in order to build the Great Wall. According to rough statistics, it cost between 50 million taels and 100 million taels. This money has saved us the tourist attraction of the Great Wall. But in addition, it almost did not play any role in the stability of the Ming Dynasty.
At that time, the late Ming Dynasty did face the threat of nomadic peoples in the north. But often it did not come in handy, and Hou Jin's cavalry took a detour from the side and attacked the city of Beijing in an instant. With the financial revenue of the Ming Dynasty at that time, it was only more than 2 million taels a year, and it can be said that the Ming Dynasty spent its hundred years of financial accumulation on the construction of the Great Wall.
If this money is used to develop the economy, or to carry out other aspects of national defense construction, such as vigorously promoting the development of firearms, the ming dynasty will certainly not end up as tragic as later. What do you think?