Li Hongzhang's meeting with Guangxu and Li Hongzao must not be hidden from Cixi. But Cixi is helpless now. Not to mention that it is a normal thing for the emperor to summon a minister. Even if he said something that should not be said, how can Cixi now?

How? Although Ci

Xi held the power of the Qing Dynasty, but this power was only effective with the support of powerful factions from all sides. If the balance of power is as it is now, if he does something excessive, he will force Li Hongzhang to take the sea route and send his Beiyang Army to the Qing Dynasty.

When it comes here, things will really change that day!

Isn't the current Beiyang Army already very tired? But no matter how tired it is, there is still no problem in drawing out 10,000 army troops. What does Zhili have now? Ronglu's northwest training army has already gone to the battlefield, and the Beijing Eight Banners and Green Camp have also prepared

On the battlefield, the problem in defending the Northeast, the land of Longxing for the Manchus, was that Cixi and Guangxu had no other choice. They had to defend the Northeast even if they hired people.

And judging from the performance of Ronglu and Yiketang'a, Cixi has no confidence in the Manchu army at all. Although the battle situation in Beiyang is ugly, they have been dealing with the Japanese army in North Korea for more than half a year, but Ronglu and Yiketang'a have no confidence in the Manchu army.

Ketang'ani

? With twice the strength, they persisted for less than two days and were captured by the Yalu River. This was the most capable of the Manchu army! If you want to rely on the remaining troops who are not even as good as the northwest training army to resist Beiyang

Master Lu, isn’t that looking for death?

There are two most basic methods of politics, one is suppression and the other is co-optation. When the attack is no longer effective, co-optation is the inevitable choice. But co-optation also comes at a cost. Although I don’t know that Li Hongzhang and Guangxu talked about

What. But with Prince Gong, an old fox, guiding him from behind, Guangxu would definitely give more to Li Hongzhang's request. But the specific amount was not something Cixi could know. After all, the only people present were Guangxu, Li Hongzhang and Li Hongzao.

people.

It's like two people are trying to buy something at the same time, but neither of them knows the price offered by the other. This kind of unknown is the scariest thing. If you bid lower, you will lose the thing. And if you bid lower, you will lose the item.

It's too high, and I don't know if I can bear it.

Judging from intuition, Li Hongzhang's conditions were indeed for the Qing Dynasty to win this war. Since the war began, Cixi had also become interested in a small country in the east. She also wanted to know why the country known as the Japanese pirates could conquer the country in such a short period of time.

It surpassed the Qing Dynasty within twenty years.

But as the understanding deepened, Cixi felt more and more inexplicable fear. Whether it was the emperor of Japan or the emperor of Germany, their countries were indeed powerful, but the rights of the supreme ruler were also affected.

Weakened! Compared with his own power in the Qing Dynasty, the power of foreign monarchs is much smaller, and by virtue of

From an intuitive point of view, the weakening of power is directly related to the various reforms! What is even more disturbing is that what Li Hongzhang did is a precursor to these reforms! Even if the Qing Dynasty, which does not keep its words, becomes stronger, it will

What's the use? Is it okay to let those ministers dictate what you do all day long? If they don't agree, you can't do it yourself?

"Go back to the Queen Mother, even if you don't agree, the emperor will agree. When the time comes, there will be support from the emperor and Qingliu in the center, and there will be support from the governors and governors of the provinces outside. Can you say no?" Sun Yuwen said.

"Then what you mean is that the great lands of the Qing Dynasty must be allowed to be criticized by outsiders?" Cixi glanced at Sun Yuwen and said dissatisfiedly.

"Don't be afraid of this. If the new method can really make Beiyang stronger, then Nanyang will also become stronger. Queen Mother, you can also use this method to make Lord Rong Lurong stronger. When everyone becomes stronger, the situation will be balanced again. .Is it much better than being the only one in Beiyang now?" Sun Yuwen said carefully.

"Is there no other way?" Cixi asked reluctantly.

"If this delay continues, Lord Ronglu's military training in the northwest may suffer even greater losses. Li Hongzhang doesn't have to go to the Northeast, but Lord Ronglu must go. If the emperor and the governors and governors of all provinces attack together, the Queen Mother will be passive. ." Sun Yuwen couldn't help but sigh and said.

"Actually, this is also an opportunity. Haven't you, Queen Mother, disliked Weng Tonghe for a long time? Weng Tonghe and Li Hongzhang have nothing to deal with in the first place. We can completely blame Beiyang's lack of funds on him. In this way , the imperial party lost an arm, and Li Hongzhang owes you another favor." A hint of a smile appeared on Sun Yuwen's face.

"Sun Zhongtang is indeed very intelligent." Cixi nodded with satisfaction. "I will leave the rest to Sun Zhongtang and Prince Qing."

In the next few days, the political situation in Bei Jing can definitely be described as an earthquake. First of all, King Qing and Sun Yuwen jointly submitted a letter, which was heavily involved in Weng Tonghe's book. The book accused Weng Tonghe of not being good at managing the household department and wantonly depriving Beiyang Shuilu Er. Division funds. Faced with the accusations of a prince and a military minister, Weng Tonghe couldn't argue. Even if he could cover up all the holes, there was a huge difference between the amount of money allocated to Beiyang every year and the amount stipulated. A crime of dereliction of duty is an absolute crime. He couldn't run away! Under the censure and attack from all parties, Weng Tonghe had no choice but to resign from the post of Minister of Household Affairs.

Then, at the request of the Empress Dowager Cixi, the Military Aircraft Department approved the move to borrow money from the private sector and allow private companies to open mines and build factories. However, the Military Aircraft Department and Li Hongzhang had a conflict over the use of the money. According to Li Hongzhang's opinion, This money must be used to build an army that can fight, and we cannot just cheapen the Eight Banners and Green Camp. However, the Military Aircraft Department believes that Beiyang's equipment is sophisticated enough. Now that Beiyang is being reorganized in Liaodong, this money should be used on the Eight Banners and Green Camp. As well as participating in battles and training the army, in order to repair and prepare the weapons for emergencies.

Just when the two sides were at a stalemate, Li Hanzhang, the governor of Guangdong and Guangxi, and Liu Kun, Zhang Zhidong of Nanyang, jointly submitted a letter and made the following suggestions for the use of the money. The money was divided into two parts, one part was used as war expenses, and each participating army was divided into two parts according to its own troops. Scale equipment and consumption can be obtained according to certain rules. The other part is used as a reward. As the saying goes, there must be a brave man under a big reward. If fighting and not fighting are the same, winning and losing, then there will still be people to fight. ?

Cixi was confused as soon as this excerpt came up. This method is obviously beneficial to Beiyang. The Beiyang army is large in size, well-equipped, and consumes a lot of money. Naturally, it will account for a considerable proportion of the war expenses. As for the second point, that is more It was Li Hongzhang's Beiyang who took the lead. Ronglu's training army, the Eight Banners Army and the Beiyang Army Division were so different! Aren't Liu Kunyi and Zhang Zhidong not dealing with Li Hongzhang? Why did they start talking to Li Hongzhang?

As a result, Cixi found the answer in the secret report of the Military Aircraft Department. The Beiyang Army consumed huge amounts of money. Because of the huge consumption, the Tianjin Machinery Bureau under Beiyang could not guarantee supply at all. Even if half of the Jiangnan Manufacturing Bureau controlled by Li Hongzhang was added,

Supply cannot be guaranteed. In this case, a batch of ordnance from the Jinling Manufacturing Administration under Liu Kunyi and Zhang Zhidong

The factory has a large-scale business. And this is just an arms business. The production of arms requires steel. This is easy to handle. Zhang Zhidong’s Hanyang Iron Works can provide a large amount of steel. Moreover, the shares of this Hanyang Iron Works include

The money provided by Beiyang and the purchase of some equipment were also carried out with the help of Beiyang. Zhang Zhidong should return the favor to Beiyang both emotionally and rationally.

This is not over yet. You have to transport these arms after you build them? Do you need ships for transportation? There are not enough ships in Beiyang? It doesn’t matter, we have them in Nanyang. And no matter what, we still have an 8,500-ton ironclad ship in Nanyang to fight with Beiyang.

, helped Beiyang go through the most difficult moment. You, Mr. Beiyang

Want to show something? Now that the naval battle is over, Japan needs to be blockaded. We still have some ships in Nanyang. Why don't we all go together? Liu Kunyi will never give up on making a fortune together. Moreover, the conditions offered by Li Hongzhang are too

Gao. Even if Liu Kun wanted to refuse, his subordinates would not agree.

And seeing that Liu Kunyi's old Hunan Army was also preparing to go to the battlefield, Liu Kunyi knew that his Old Hunan Army might not be as good as Ronglu's Northwest Training Army in terms of combat power. He was the Queen Mother's personal army. In terms of equipment, it was

It is said to be the best except for the Beiyang New Army. In terms of personnel, those who worked with Zuo Zongtang at that time were the best.

Jiang, and then suppressed rebellions and horse bandits in the northwest. Although the combatants were not regular troops, they could be considered to have been on the battlefield.

On the other hand, among our old Hunan Army, those who fought against the Taiping Heavenly Kingdom have long since disappeared. Those who participated in the Qing-France War have also been eliminated, and the rest are dominated by newcomers. In addition, Jiangnan is relatively stable, and the Hunan Army

Company training

There are so many places! It is estimated that on the battlefield, it will perform better than the already decayed Eight Banners Green Camp. Although the army is not good, it is the old Hunan Army after all. Can Liu Kunyi ignore his soldiers?

Originally, Liu Kunyi planned to strengthen his combat power, but this combat power can be improved in a short time? Let alone where to find those veterans and experienced commanders, even weapons you have no time to equip. From the Jinling Machinery Bureau

It is indeed possible to allocate part of it, but

This contract was signed before the Beiyang war started. Aren't you breaking the contract? And now the public opinion is already against Beiyang. If you misappropriate the weapons originally agreed to be sold to Beiyang, you won't be scolded to death? Liu Kunyi

I don't want to bear this crime.

After much deliberation, Liu Kun came up with an idea, which was to follow Beiyang in the war, to serve as subordinates, to help out, etc. The Hunan Army could still do it, although it was a bit ugly. But he thought that the current Beiyang Army was also composed of four units.

It's not impossible to join them together. The Hunan Army is not just following Beiyang's lead.

Faced with a joint petition from four governors (Li Hongzhang also agreed to this approach), could Cixi and the Military Aircraft Department say no? Once the North and South Oceans join forces, the central government will have no ability to resist, even if Cixi and Guangxu join forces at this time. This is

This cooperation really frightened Cixi so much that she

I can only agree. As for the new version of the new school and the transportation issues in the future, since the school costs less, can it be launched first, and railway transportation? Then let’s delay it slowly. Anyway, firstly, there is no money, and secondly, it takes too long.

But no matter what, the purpose of Li Hongzhang's trip to Beijing has basically been achieved!
Chapter completed!