Chapter 53 A new generation of Eastern Invincibles

Yuan Shikai was very happy, but the Qing Empire was more tragic. Just as the Qing Dynasty was forced to resist Japan in Korea, another of its vassal states, Vietnam, was being attacked by the French.Korea and Vietnam are both vassals of the Qing Dynasty, but the declining Qing Empire has been unable to maintain its suzerainty. At that time, there were two main opinions within the Qing government on how the Qing should respond to the French invasion of Vietnam: The first faction mainly consisted of Chen Shijie, Zhang Peilun, Zhang Zhidong, and Zuo Zongtang, who advocated aiding Vietnam and declaring war on France.

Chen Shijie is the governor of Shandong, and he is a representative of this faction. Chen Daguan said that France has three strengths: strong ships, strong guns, and strict military orders, but it also has four weaknesses: First, France lost the German-French War in 1871, ceding land and paying compensation, and became a poor country, so it sent troops to Vietnam. It will be stretched (seems to have a little reason); the second is that the ministers are at odds, and there are internal conflicts (is it to judge others by themselves, alluding to the Qing court?); Did the French come here? Does it mean Germany?); Fourth, after the French occupied Vietnam, they imposed tyranny. As long as they sent someone to call for it, the Vietnamese people would respond, and they were surrounded by the French army (Chen Daguan really took it for granted).Therefore, if we go out to fight the French for a few months, they will make peace with us.

Ridiculous to the extreme, the words of a school of scholars!Other memorials such as Zhang Peilun and others cannot withstand scrutiny. The second faction mainly consists of Prince Gong Yixin and Li Hongzhang. They advocate using diplomacy to solve the problem, not getting involved in the conflict between France and Vietnam, and even abandoning Vietnam altogether.Since Vietnam has made peace with France without consulting the Qing Dynasty, it is better to throw it away if it is alienated from the Qing Dynasty. Both options are placed in front of Cixi, the top leader of the Qing Empire. How should Cixi choose?

A few days later, Empress Dowager Cixi seemed to have made a final decision: Although she did not agree to openly declare war with France, she supported sending troops to northern Vietnam to aid Vietnam in the main battle, acting according to circumstances. Did Cixi want to avenge the Opium War?The mystery will be revealed soon. By the turn of spring and summer in 1884, the Chinese and French armies had been fighting each other in the Vietnam battlefield for more than a year, and the Qing army was defeated and retreated step by step. At this time, in the capital city thousands of miles away from the battlefield, Cixi launched the second coup in her life, known as "Jiashen Yishu" in history.

Empress Dowager Cixi suddenly issued an imperial edict to dismiss the entire class of ministers of the Military Aircraft Department headed by Prince Gong Yixin.Immediately, she handed over two parts of Yixin's power to her cronies respectively—the head minister of the Military Aircraft Department to Prince Li Shiduo, and the prime minister's position to Prince Qing Yikuang. The reason she did this was: Yixin's poor performance in the Sino-French battle led to the defeat of the Qing army. Let everyone see the reason for such a far-fetched, right?The reason why Cixi supported the first faction in the main battle was to use this incident to consolidate her power.

What a smart person Cixi is, and how deeply the British and French allied forces impressed her. Of course, she knew that it would be difficult to defeat France, which is known as "the second in the world", but she needed a defeat as a reason to shock the main force. , Yixin, who is too big to lose her tail, rushed off the stage. Under this sudden blow, Yixin gradually became depressed, and in the remaining years, he gradually wore away his insufficient will, and died in loneliness in 1898.As soon as the prestige and strength of Yixin left, Cixi began to dominate the world, and no one could shake her position as the leader of the martial arts world!

After Cixi took down Yixin, she finally corrected her work attitude and began to strengthen preparations for war, especially the most important personnel arrangements.Under Cixi's orders one after another—— Zhang Peilun, the main combatant, became the imperial envoy and supervised the battle in Fuzhou, where the Mawei Shipyard was an important naval base of the Qing Dynasty. The main battle sent Zhang Zhidong (this person is still a growing angry youth for the time being, and will be introduced in detail later) to the front line, as the governor of Guangdong and Guangxi, to strengthen defense, and to help the anti-French armed forces in Vietnam-Liu Yongfu and his subordinates Black Banner Army.

Zuo Zongtang, the main combatant, has been fighting north and south for these years, and his body has been overloaded, but he was still arranged by Cixi to supervise the defense on the front line of the southeast coast. As for Li Hongzhang, the main peace faction, Cixi also arranged two special tasks for him. One was to make him always pay attention to the preparations for the draw, and the other was to let him send the elite Huai army under his command to the front line to fight. Judging by Cixi's layout, it seems that she is going to do a big job. Let's take a look at the battle between China and France.