But it is impossible for China to stay in the society of small peasant economy forever, China needs to develop.It is inevitable to increase the circulation of commodities, change people's living standards, and increase the proportion of foreign trade. Once society develops to that point, the British will have more means to hold China's throat.At that time, if China and Britain go to war again, the British only need to blow up the factories along the coast of China and block the seaports, and the people who have become accustomed to the means of life such as flour, matches, toothpaste, and soap will rebel.

Therefore, when China is not yet fully strong enough not to fear the invasion of foreign enemies, it is necessary to find a country to replace itself to attract the attention of the British.Guan Xuqing chose Russia.In the late 70s, Russia under the leadership of Tsar Alexander II had recovered from the tragic failure in Crimea that led to the suicide of a czar and the sinking of the entire Black Sea Fleet. In the Tenth Russo-Turkish War in 1877, Russia used the national liberation war of the Balkan Slavs to declare war on Turkey under the banner of "liberation".With the cooperation of the Romanian army and the Bulgarian army, the Russian army successively conquered Pleven, Sofia, Adrianople and other important towns stationed by the Turkish army. If the British intervened in time, Russia might have occupied Constantinople and straits.However, this war also allowed Russia to acquire southern Bessarabia in Europe, Batumi, Kars, Ada and other places in Asia, and placed Romania and Bulgaria, two countries mainly composed of Yugoslavs and believing in the Orthodox Church, in under their own "protection".Such high-profile plundering by the Russians has aroused the dissatisfaction of the British. Anti-Russian sentiments in Turkey, Afghanistan and other British colonies are quite high. Guan Xuqing saw the right moment, deceived the Russian minister, and pretended to form an alliance.Use Russia to contain Britain and allow yourself to easily capture Burma.And let the British teach the wolf a lesson for themselves.

In the past three years, the Russians have been squeezed out by Britain and France everywhere, and their economy and military have plummeted.But everything has two sides, when everything goes wrong.The Russians simply developed their navy. The world's top three navies began to revive. From the end of the tenth Russo-Turkish war to the present, in just ten years, Russia has built the Ekaterina II, the Georgian Olgi Pobedonosec, Chesma, Sinop, Alexander II, Nicholas I, Twelve Apostles, Gangut, a total of eight large battleships, plus With the Peter the Great built in 1872 and the Navarin, which will enter service next year, the number of Russian battleships suddenly reached double digits. You must know that these are all big guys with more than [-] tons.

Armed with a powerful navy, the Russians began to pursue more persistently their windows to the great seas.On the coast of the Baltic Sea, they annexed the Kingdom of Lithuania and built a large shipyard there; on the coast of the Arctic Ocean, they snatched Finland from Sweden; on the coast of the Pacific Ocean, they leased Jeju Island; During the war they almost opened the way to the Mediterranean.Among the four oceans, they have ports on all three oceans, and the only thing left is the Indian Ocean, and it seems that they are not far from this goal.In Afghanistan and Iran, Russia's peeping is particularly strong, and it has always maintained a considerable force. Perhaps it is still brooding about being defeated by the British last time. When China made no progress, they put all their strength on the gamble in the Middle East.

And doing so has greatly damaged the traditional power turf of the United Kingdom.Especially threatening the Queen's crown jewel - India.Such an opponent is an excellent target to attract the attention of the British. When Britain and Russia launch an all-out confrontation, China can just hide behind the Russians and practice internal strength with peace of mind.In that way, after the British have cleaned up the Russians, when they think of China, they will find that China is no longer something he can rub casually.

Adhering to such a foreign policy, Guan Xuqing has maintained a strong attitude towards Britain in recent years, while making appropriate compromises towards Russia.Even though Russia still frequently sent troops to plunder the Northeast, Guan Xuqing just asked the Prime Minister's Office to protest the Russian ambassador with a few calm words and it passed.Sure enough, the Russians attracted most of John Bull's energy. They were busy wooing Turkey and Japan to involve the Russians and deal with land power countries. Traditionally, they would not go shirtless.As for China, it doesn't matter.That's why China has had a relatively stable development environment in recent years.

However, with the expiration of the re-guarantee treaty between Germany, Austria, and Russia this year, the situation has undergone new changes.Under Bismarck's initiative, the border security treaty signed by the emperors of Germany, Austria, and Russia in person made the three countries reach an understanding on issues related to Poland and the Balkans on the western front, and Russia was able to concentrate on expanding to the east. The Triple Alliance group dominates Europe, completely isolating Germany's old enemy France.This was originally a happy situation for all, but after the assassination of Tsar Alexander II who signed the treaty with one hand.The situation has changed slightly. Before Alexander II, every tsar followed a foreign policy close to Germany. The successive tsars of the Romanov dynasty married nine German princesses in succession, which itself was the foundation of the alliance of three emperors. one.However, Alexander III, who succeeded Alexander II, married a Danish wife.Under the influence of his wife from Denmark (Denmark was defeated in the Pudan War and was forced to cede the Schleswig Holstein area), he became disgusted with Bismarck and William I's Germany.In addition, the two Mediterranean conferences secretly held by Germany, Austria, and Italy fundamentally violated Russia's interests in the division of power in the Balkans, Asia Minor, and North Africa, causing cracks in the originally stable alliance.finally.Russia refused to sign a re-guarantee treaty.But France, which was isolated and desperate, won over.If history really develops in this way, Russia will most likely change its current expansion direction.Putting the main energy into the struggle for the Balkans, this will inevitably make Britain breathe a sigh of relief, and because of China's relationship, Britain and France have no conflicts in the Indochina Peninsula, and the two countries have come together ahead of schedule. Carve up China in two directions, just as they secretly planned in history, the Yangtze River valley belongs to Britain, and the north of the Great Wall belongs to Russia.

Such a thing is naturally very detrimental to China, and one of the main purposes of Guan Xuqing's visit to Germany is to think of some solutions on this matter.It is not suitable for others to go, but he himself understands the key points and speaks with enough weight.

At this time, Guan Xuqing was wearing a dragon robe, standing alone on the bridge of the "Zhenyuan", letting the sea breeze make the corners of his clothes rattle.Although it was already the largest warship in the Beiyang Fleet, it was still bumping violently in front of the manic sea. Not to mention the empress and some officials who accompanied Guan Xuqing on the visit, even the newly graduated naval officers from the Beiyang Naval Academy also vomited violently.But Guan Xuqing acted as if nothing had happened, and everyone from Deng Shichang on the Zhenyuan Ship admired him a lot. That's what makes a generation of sages superior.

Guan Xuqing took the train from the capital to Tanggu to board the ship.Now the Manchurian Railway (from Beijing to Qiqihar), the South Manchurian Railway (from Fengtian to Lushun), the Beijing-Puzhou Railway, the Beijing-Han Railway, the Longhai Railway, and the Shanghai-Hangzhou Railway have all been completed. Under the design of the German engineer Bao Ning, China’s The first bridge built on the Yangtze River is also the first road-rail dual-purpose bridge in China, the Jiangning Yangtze River Bridge, plus some regional railways that have not yet been incorporated into the large railway network, such as: Hengyue Railway (Guangzhou to Hengyang) , Southern Guangdong Railway (from Guangzhou to Chaozhou), Western Sichuan Railway (from Chengdu to Mianzhu), etc., the actual total railway mileage of the Qing Dynasty has surpassed that of Japan and India, ranking first in Asia.

In addition to these, the planned Guangdong-Han Railway from Guangzhou to Hengzhou in Hunan will also be opened to traffic within two or three years. At that time, not only will the first Yangtze River Bridge designed by the Chinese be built between Wuchang and Hankou, China It will also have the first railway artery running from north to south.The Hunan-Myanmar Railway (from Changsha to Yangon) running through the four southwestern provinces and the Southern Xinjiang Railway (from Changsha to Saigon) passing through Guangxi and entering Annan have also broken ground.Needless to say, the significance of the construction of these two railways is that both Vietnam and Myanmar are newly recovered lands.Because historically, the two areas also belonged to the frontier areas of disobedience to the king, and in addition, they have hardly been controlled by the central government for nearly 200 years, so the local separatist forces here are still very large.

Therefore, Guan Xuqing took a lot of stabilization and assimilation measures. In addition to establishing provinces in Vietnam and Vietnam, and setting up ministers in Myanmar in Myanmar, he enforced the popularization of Chinese and Chinese characters in the two places, and migrated a large number of people to change the population structure of the two places. .This naturally touched the inherent interests of local forces such as the old Annan royal family and chieftains of various ethnic groups in Myanmar.Conflicts between the two places have occurred from time to time in recent years. Vietnam also broke out a rebellion led by the former Annan Prince Ruan Shien. Fortunately, Liu Yongfu dealt with it in time and borrowed the strength of the navy stationed in Da Nang to wipe out the bandit leader in one fell swoop, so that no catastrophe occurred.Looking at it this way, there is no doubt that the social turmoil in the two places is a powerful army.It is undoubtedly the best way to subdue such rebellious emotions in a short period of time.However, China has a vast territory and many ethnic groups. If it needs heavy troops to garrison everywhere, even 1000 million troops will not be enough. Now that the country is vigorously developing its economy and catching up with European and American powers, it is undoubtedly unrealistic to raise so many troops.Therefore, a railway line that could mobilize a large number of troops at any time became the solution.

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Chasing East Asia Chapter 1 Visits Germany

"Toot..." The flagship Zhenyuan sounded its whistle, and the fleet sailed out of the mouth of the Bohai Sea and entered the Yellow Sea.In the distance, from the direction of Weihaiwei, seven warships, two large, five small, and seven large, came.first two bodies

The huge ones are the two first-class ironclad ships Jiyuan and Weiyuan, which belong to the same improved Saxon type as Ding and Zhen. The straight sides of the ships make them look more like a slender pencil box than a later generation.

The prismatic structure with raised sides, it is said that Bismarck personally asked about the construction of the second ship in order to get China's huge shipbuilding bill, but in fact this class of ironclad ship can also be called the whole

A masterpiece of the German shipbuilding industry in the 80s.

With a displacement of 7335 tons, the thick and shiny armor looks extremely solid. The perfect protection composed of the armored fort and the waterline belt armor provides them with great survivability.

During the naval battle in the Yellow Sea, Dingyuan and Zhenyuan were shot nearly 400 rounds together, and they remained motionless and sailed back to Lushun smoothly. They were called "unsinkable ships" both at home and abroad.As for firepower, although the rapid-fire gun

After it appeared, the Qing government still did not modify it, so that the Ding and Zhen ships were not as dazzling as their defenses. However, the four 4mm cannons distributed along the ridges are not a single one in Asia.

The armor of a warship can hold up.Historically, Zhenyuan almost sank the Sanjing warship with one shot, and the flagship Matsushima of the Japanese Navy withdrew from the battle.In this time and space of Guan Xuqing, because of the development of ships

He is more familiar with history, of course, it is impossible to ignore the rapid-fire gun modification of the Dingyuan-class ironclad ship again. Now the four ships Ding, Zhen, Ji, and Wei have removed the two 150mm Krupp breech-loading guns and the ship's side rails on the stern terrace.

Four 75mm Krupp sampan guns on both sides.Instead, it was changed to six 6mm rapid-fire guns produced by the Jiangning Arsenal of Jiangnan Manufacturing Bureau (formerly Jinling Machine Bureau).

Following the two ships of Jiyuan and Weiyuan are six cruisers that are obviously smaller in size, "Chengfeng", "Break the Waves", "Raise the Fan" and two cruisers "Flying" purchased in the UK in the 11th year of Guangxu.

"Eagle", "Sea Lion" and the "Rise" built by Jiangnan Shipyard imitating "Chengfeng".

With the help of German and American experts, Jiangnan Shipyard built the "Rise" protected cruiser based on the imitation of "Chengfeng". The water volume of both legs is about 5700 tons.

The key parts, such as armor and steam turbines, are still produced abroad and then shipped back to China for installation, but it is a new first-class cruiser successfully built in China, and the Rise is a dome cruiser.he

The hypothetical task of is.After the battle between the North and South Main Fleets and the Japanese Combined Fleet, the Japanese cruisers who were injured and escaped were caught up and destroyed. Therefore, the requirements for them are extremely fast and powerful

The firepower, so no matter how far or near it is, it can easily run at a speed of 19 knots without the use of forced ventilation technology.This means that in wartime conditions, Japan's active cruisers, including the fastest Chiyoda, cannot escape two

The palm of the ship, and the two 2mm Armstrong breech-loading guns and ten 203mm Jiangning rapid-fire guns it is equipped with can completely sink one-on-one, including the Sanjing ship with 10mm cannon and the "matchbox" ship.

"Any Japanese cruiser including the so-called Mubang.

These eight warships, together with Dingyuan and Zhenyuan, are the nine newest warships of the Beiyang Fleet, and they also constitute the entire main force of the Beiyang Navy.

After playing the banner of "Wishing my emperor good health and prosperity, and the prosperity of the Qing Dynasty", eight Beiyang warships led by Lin Yongsheng joined the visiting fleet.For certain purposes, Guan Xuqing's

This trip was of a semi-secret nature, and everything was kept secret from the cabinet down to the Prime Minister's Office. The news of his departure from Beijing is still unknown to some foreign envoys in Beijing.Actually it is very necessary

Yes, you must know that in history, China has suffered a lot from diplomatic leaks. For example, after the Russo-Japanese War, the United States deliberately signed an alliance with China to jointly curb the rapid expansion of power in the Pacific region.

Japan, which was inflated, was very beneficial to China, which was poor and weak at that time, and was struggling internally and externally.But it turned out that Tang Shaoyi, who was in charge of the negotiations, hadn't left the country yet, and Japan got it from the Chinese Prime Minister's Office first.

Shocked by the news, the Japanese government immediately ordered the ambassador to the United States to start consultations with the United States—not only repeatedly expressing its willingness to improve relations with the United States, but also promising that Japanese immigrants will flow to North Korea and China in the future

The Northeast is no longer the United States, and Japan will no longer cause trouble for the United States because of immigration issues.But requires the US to recognize its "freedom of action" in North Korea and northeast China.

On the other hand, since China did not have direct ships to the United States at that time.Tang Shaoyi could only go to Tokyo, Japan to change to the JKK ship to visit the United States.When arriving in Japan halfway, the Japanese government resorted to the usual small

clever.He was welcomed with extremely grand etiquette, and a steady stream of celebrities from the political, business, literary and academic circles were arranged to visit him. Tang Shaoyi was often given a small banquet every three days and a banquet every five days.

The scene of the banquet made me dizzy and it was inconvenient for me to go.At the same time, in order to prevent him from seeing the flaws, the Japanese side also incited the Chinese Revolutionaries in Japan to carry out protests through groups such as the Black Dragon Society.

Blood youths demonstrated, protested, and harassed outside Tang Shaoyi's accommodation with the encouragement and even connivance of the Japanese police—sadly, they also became

A tool with ulterior motives in Japan.Every time the heat was about to arrive, the Japanese police would come forward to disperse the crowd, and then detain Tang Shaoyi with words such as "the crowd is raging" and "there may be assassination activities".

He tried his best to persuade him to stay for a longer period of time under the protection of the Japanese government.

This side delayed Tang Shaoyi's itinerary, while the other side sent diplomats to actively negotiate with the United States. On the day Tang Shaoyi arrived in the United States, he was hit in the face. Japan and the United States reached an agreement in the form of an exchange of letters.

It became the "Rott-Gaoping Agreement", the main content of which is: the two countries maintain the status quo in the Pacific region, respect each other's territories in the region, and maintain the principle of equal industrial and commercial opportunities in the region.

Encourage the free and peaceful development of their respective businesses; the two countries use all peaceful means to safeguard China's independence and integrity, and maintain the principle of equal business opportunities for all countries in China.the text of the lei agreement is quite concise

Royal, obscure.But the meaning is very clear: Japan guarantees that it has no territorial ambitions for the Philippines and other American territories in the Pacific Ocean, and the United States promises Japan to use "peaceful means" in Northeast China.

expanding power.

Therefore, during this visit, Guan Xuqing did not ask the Beiyang Navy to line up a grand lineup to pick him up in Dagu, but to gather on the route on time just like the ocean training at this time of year.

The North and South Ocean Navy conducts ocean training once a year, either crossing the equator to Myanmar on the Indian Ocean, or crossing the Pacific Ocean to the west coast of the United States.Although such training is due to the Chinese

There is no overseas port and it costs a lot.However, it is extremely beneficial to the improvement of the ability of naval soldiers to shoot, sail, and repair and manage damage under wind and waves. Guan Xuqing always believes that only training that is close to reality

Only in this way can the soldiers not panic during the war.Therefore, although military expenditures have been cut over the past few years, the training costs for the navy are still high.Under the instruction of Guan Xuqing.The Ministry of Finance still hasn't skimped at all.

.In recent years, although the domestic economy has developed to a certain extent.But the actual increase in fiscal revenue is not much.First, in order to reduce the burden on farmers and ease domestic class conflicts, the

All kinds of miscellaneous expenses of farmers are collected, and only land tax is levied, which makes China's economy based on agriculture lose a big piece of cake;

More than half of the card and taxation bureaus have also been abolished. When industry and commerce have not yet developed and the vacancy is filled with industrial and commercial taxation, this gap can only be borne by the central government;

war, wiped out all the foundations accumulated since Tongguang, and owed a lot of war debts, which have not been paid off until now, which is another sum;

The United States and the United States also aggressively seized the market through the newly signed treaties, while some factories in China that made their fortunes by relying on war orders lost buyers.

When the extent of the blow, it also affected the growth of fiscal revenue.In addition, due to the abolition of the system of selling officials, there is no income from donating officials, and there is a deficit of several million taels of silver every year.

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