Chapter 4 who to send

In the second year Duan Qirui took office in Qingjiang, he finally felt the significant changes in the situation under the surging undercurrent. The first was the Huanghuagang Uprising that broke out in April 1911. Although this uprising did not succeed in the end, it was enough to make the Qing court feel uneasy: "If the prevention and control is not strictly enforced, it may lead to great changes and be out of control. " In September of that year, there was a wave of road protection in Sichuan.Zhao Erfeng, the governor of Sichuan, "toughened the prevention and arrest", but the strictness was too strict, which led to bloodshed.The revolutionaries lurking in Sichuan took the opportunity to launch an attack and fell into dozens of counties.

The world was in chaos before Shu, and Yuan Shikai's prophecy of "union will be divided for a long time" finally showed its signs.As the crest of the waves, it was the Wuchang Uprising instigated by the revolutionaries on October 10.By the 12th, the rebel army had recovered the three towns of Wuhan, and the world was shocked. The Qing court immediately convened an emergency meeting of the cabinet to discuss countermeasures. The first question they encountered was who to send to the expedition. Among the nobles in Manchuria, Tie Liang and Liang Bi were both known as generals of the Qing Dynasty, but Liang Bi was young, and his qualifications and status were relatively low. Only Tie Liang possessed all the conditions of being "handsome". He is also often referred to as the "big guy".

Since the Empress Dowager Cixi decided to train the new army, Tie Liang was ordered to co-chair the training with Yuan Shikai.At that time, Yuan was in charge and Tie was in charge, and the personnel in the military training office called Yuan Shikai "Gongbao" (Yuan Shikai was once named "Prince Shaobao") and Tieliang as "Marshal". If he only commented on political achievements, it would be very difficult for Tie Liang to be Yuan Shikai's deputy.However, according to the consistent rules of the Qing court, all Manchu officials who have the ability to handle affairs, have a relatively clear mind, and are at the same time second-rank officials, have a much easier chance of gaining trust and being promoted and reused than Han officials.With the trust and appreciation of Cixi, Tie Liang served successively as Minister of Military Aircraft and Secretary of the Ministry of War in a short period of time, and his status was almost equal to that of Yuan Shikai.

During the military training, the power belonged to Yuan Shikai, and Tie Liangshang bowed to him and obeyed his orders.When "Gongbao" and "Marshal" can sit face to face, he will not be so easy to talk to.Around the use of the Beiyang New Army, Tieliang used orders from the Ministry of War to confront Yuan from time to time, which made Yuan very embarrassed.The conflict between the two gradually became clear, and Tie Liang became the main representative of the Manchu "Zhongxing School". There are six towns in the Beiyang New Army.With the support of Cixi, Tieliang took back four of the towns, which opened the prelude to the confrontation between him and Yuan Shikai.Although the practice of reorganizing the officers of the four towns was stopped by Cixi, Tie Liang had already won most of the power struggle.

Yuan Shikai's expulsion was originally a happy event within the "Zhongxing faction", and Tie Liang, who had had a deep grudge with Yuan Shikai, seemed to have lost a heart disease.But what he didn't expect was that with Yuan, his great enemy, he could still live in peace in the court, but once Yuan left, he would not be able to survive. The regent Zaifeng was cowardly, incompetent, and short-sighted. After he expelled Yuan Shikai, he pushed out his younger brother Zaitao and let Zaitao take control of the military.Zai Tao was only twenty-three years old at the time, and he didn't have much talent in civil and military affairs, so he had to rely on the guidance and assistance of military veteran Tie Liang for everything.

It is a common phenomenon in the Chinese bureaucracy that laymen lead experts.Faced with Zai Tao, a young man who knows nothing about military affairs, it is impossible for Tie Liang, who has many years of experience in handling military and political affairs, not to feel aggrieved, and sometimes he will inevitably show complaints and arrogance such as "you are not as good as me in military affairs". Brothers Zai Feng and Zai Tao were very jealous of this, so they removed Tie Liang from the position of Minister of Training of the Imperial Guard, and transferred him to run the navy, which actually emptied him.

Tie Liang knew that he could not be tolerated by the court, so he simply resigned from the Minister of the Ministry of War, and went home to live idle like his political enemy Yuan Shikai. Tie Liang lived idle at home for a year, but Zai Feng and Zai Tao still defended him as they guarded Yuan Shikai.Because he was afraid that Tie Liang would still be in contact with the generals of the towns secretly, he was specially appointed and asked him to be General Jiang Ning.For most of the history of the Qing Dynasty, the duties and powers of the garrison generals in various places were very important, but after Guangxu, they gradually became a nominal idle position with basically nothing to do.

Yin Chang, who replaced Tie Liang as Minister of the Army, had studied in Germany and specialized in military affairs.After returning to China, he served as a supervisor (equivalent to the principal) in Tianjin Wubei Academy for a long time. Duan Qirui, Feng Guozhang and others all respected him as a teacher. Yinchang's biggest flaw is that he has no military training, let alone the experience of leading troops to fight. At the same time, his prestige in the Beiyang New Army is far from that of "General" Tie Liang.But it was also because of this that Zaifeng and others felt that he was easy to control and would not hinder him when things went wrong.

In fact, Yinchang was in Germany when he received the appointment, and his position could only be temporarily acted by Zuo Shilang.Later, even when Yin Chang himself returned to the country, he still relied heavily on his deputy for the affairs of the Ministry, and he didn't even bother to deal with official documents. When the Wuchang Uprising broke out, Yin Chang had already served as the Minister of War in the cabinet.After several discussions in the cabinet meeting, they believed that Tie Liang had stepped down, Liangbi was too qualified, and only Yinchang was the only suitable candidate, so he decided to send him to supervise the suppression of Hubei.