In fact, the traverser did not ask the Qing court to build a vassal in Shandong, it was just that Li Hongzhang deliberately called a high price in order to scare the Qing court, which was not only to fight for his own interests, but also to shout a higher price for the traverser first, anyway, the Qing court and the traverser did not have direct contact, and they were not afraid of goofs. 81 Chinese ?(1)(8).(8)8(8)1?Z?? (8) C (viii) O?M traversers only demanded the acquisition of Shandong, but did not specify in what form Shandong would be occupied. Li Hongzhang's plan is to persuade overseas Chinese to accept the official post of governor of Shandong, if the overseas Chinese are not satisfied, and think that the governor's official is too small, then the imperial court can set up a governor in Shandong, Li Hongzhang estimates that the overseas Chinese will accept this condition, and in this way, the imperial court will also have face, and the requirements of the overseas Chinese have also been met, and they are all happy.

After Li Hongzhang arrived in Tianjin, he immediately started negotiations with Qin Zheng and threw out his own proposal, in addition to persuading overseas Chinese to accept the post of governor of Shandong, the other is to ask overseas Chinese to guarantee not to intervene in the struggle between the empress dowager and the emperor, and after the overseas Chinese obtained Shandong, they would immediately withdraw their troops from Beijing and not leave anyone in Beijing.

Qin Zheng immediately reported Li Hongzhang's proposal to the Executive Committee, and after discussion by the Executive Committee, it was believed that the traverser could accept the official position of governor of Shandong. After all, the Crossing Group only needs the skin of the Qing court now. In fact, with the current strength and power of the crossing group, it is not difficult to capture Shandong by force, but in this way, it will completely tear the face with the Qing court, although the Qing court may not dare to use troops in Shandong, but the crossing group wants to operate in other parts of China, such as propaganda and business activities in Shanghai, it can only be carried out in secret, such a result is naturally quite unfavorable to the crossing group, and the position of governor of Shandong is this skin. With this skin, then the entire crossing group will obtain a legal status in China and can move freely in China. As for the operation below this skin, the crossing group can do whatever it wants, so it doesn't have to care how much power the official position of governor of Shandong has.

After all, it is useless for the crossing group to occupy Beijing now, but no one is left, which is a bit too absolute, at least to leave an office in Beijing, so that it is good to collect intelligence, Beijing is the capital of the Qing court, and it is very important to understand the dynamics of the Qing court for the interests of the crossing group, but it can guarantee that all the troops will be withdrawn from Beijing. And the traverser is not interested in the confrontation between Cixi and Guangxu, which can be completely agreed.

As for the overseas Chinese to open an office in Beijing and keep some clerks, Li Hongzhang thought about it for a while and thought that it would be no big deal, but it was just a few people, and even the legations of various countries had been set up, so did he still care about an office? If the imperial court did not even agree to such a request, then he would have no choice.

Sure enough, after Cixi received Li Hongzhang's telegram, she was also very happy, of course, what made Cixi happy, first the overseas Chinese promised not to interfere in the government of the Qing court, then they naturally would not support Guangxu, and Lafayette was completely relieved. The second is that the overseas Chinese originally intended to accept the official position of governor of Shandong, which really saved Lafayette a lot of trouble.

Although Cixi also knew that with the strength of overseas Chinese, it was completely possible to make a Shandong governor independent in a change of direction, but after all, the governor of Shandong was an official position controlled by the imperial court, not to mention that the local officials in Shandong were appointed and dismissed by the imperial court, so that Lafayette could completely use this to infiltrate sand in Shandong, and divide and select overseas Chinese, and there was no need to worry about them taking the opportunity to become bigger, so in Cixi's view, to negotiate such a result, the Qing court actually took a big advantage, and Li Hongzhang deserved to be Li Hongzhang in the end. As for setting up an office in Beijing, it was not a big deal, Cixi had even thought about it, and simply set up the office of overseas Chinese in Dongjiaomin Lane, so that they could go and be the companions of foreign devils.

However, after all, Cixi is a sincere and serious person, and after the joy passed, she did not make a decision immediately, but found Ronglu to discuss secretly. Rong Lu proposed to Cixi that although Beijing was solved, Tianjin was still in the hands of overseas Chinese, Tianjin was Beijing's maritime gateway, and from Tianjin to Beijing was basically a flat river, almost no danger to defend, and the foreigners captured Beijing twice, both of which were to conquer Tianjin by sea, and then march to Beijing based on Tianjin. Therefore, the control of Tianjin by overseas Chinese is tantamount to stucking Beijing's throat, not to mention sending troops from Tianjin to attack Beijing, as long as the supplies transported to Beijing are pinched, within three months, Beijing will be in chaos by itself. Since the official positions of overseas Chinese have been solved, Beijing has also solved them, so it is better to solve Tianjin as well. If it really doesn't work, it will be allocated to overseas Chinese in exchange for Tianjin.

So Cixi also immediately sent a telegram to Li Hongzhang, asking Li Hongzhang to negotiate with overseas Chinese about the ownership of Tianjin.

And after Li Hongzhang received the telegram, he couldn't help but look up to the sky and sigh, whether it was Cixi or Ronglu, although he was shrewd, his vision was still too narrow. Li Hongzhang served as the governor of Zhili for many years, and the yamen of the governor of Zhili was set up in Tianjin, and he did a lot of foreign affairs in Tianjin, so would he forget Tianjin? However, if the imperial court can see the importance of Tianjin, how can the overseas Chinese not see it, but the imperial court used Shandong Province to exchange Beijing for the overseas Chinese, so if it wants to exchange it for Tianjin, it needs to use that province in exchange? If the overseas Chinese are allowed to control two provinces, will it not be a greater threat to the imperial court?

The reason why Li Hongzhang did not mention Tianjin was that he intended to delay the ownership of Tianjin, because it was not only the imperial court that was interested in the ownership of Tianjin, but also other countries, after all, all countries originally had colonies in Tianjin, but now they are all occupied by overseas Chinese, and they will definitely not be reconciled, and in addition, the customs in Tianjin are also intolerable to foreigners to be controlled by overseas Chinese, so Li Hongzhang intends to incite various countries to put pressure on overseas Chinese on the issue of Tianjin's ownership during the Shanghai negotiations, and when the two sides are deadlocked, the Qing court will come forward to play a round again, so that the price paid to recover Tianjin will be much smaller, even if it is inciting countries to do nothingFinally, it is not too late to talk to overseas Chinese about the belonging of Tianjin. But now when talking to overseas Chinese about Tianjin, they will definitely be rejected by overseas Chinese, and they will also give overseas Chinese a wake-up call, telling them that they still have a big card in their hands.

However, the relationship was too complicated to be explained clearly in the telegram, so Li Hongzhang had no choice but to propose to the traveler according to the requirements of the imperial court, and then negotiate the ownership of Tianjin. The overseas Chinese did not refuse Li Hongzhang's request, but agreed to return the old city of Tianjin to the Qing court, and they only controlled the concessions of various countries, and were willing to use the old city of Tianjin as the boundary and divide the Tianjin area with the Qing court.

At the same time, however, the overseas Chinese also put forward several conditions to the Qing court: First, neither side could garrison troops in Tianjin, but could only send police officers to manage local law and order, and restrictions on the weapons used by the police; second, the Tianjin Customs was still controlled by overseas Chinese, and the operation of the customs and the formulation of tariffs and berth rates were all independent by the overseas Chinese, but the overseas Chinese also promised that the grain tax on the supplies of the imperial court could be waived from customs duties. berth fees, etc.; third, the Kaiping Coal Mine and the railway are still owned by the Crossing Group; fourth, overseas Chinese want to obtain a piece of land in Shanghai, and the rights and interests are equivalent to the concession, as compensation for the transfer of the old city of Tianjin.

In fact, for the traverser, Tianjin's military value is not too great, although the occupation of Tianjin is indeed a considerable threat to Beijing, but as long as their own navy is displayed in the future, the delivery capacity of sea transportation is strengthened, and Tianjin can be captured at any time in the future, after all, it is too close to attack Tianjin from the Shandong Peninsula. Tianjin is an important seaport for material exchanges between the north and south of China, and it is also the main distribution center for the supply of living materials in Beijing, so both customs revenue and circulation economy are considerable. Another is that Tianjin is also connected to the Kaiping Coal Mine.

Considering the Qing court's own safety, it must not sit idly by and watch the traverser fully control Tianjin, so after consultation, it was decided that the old city of Tianjin could be ceded to the Chunting court, and only occupied the Tianjin concession area, but the Tianjin customs and Kaiping coal mine must be controlled, so that in addition to the loss of the old city, the traverser has almost no loss, and all the benefits that should be obtained have been obtained, and the Tianjin concession area has gone through more than 2o years of exhibition, whether it is urban planning, infrastructure, and public facilities, it is far better than the old city.

Of course, even the old city of Tianjin could not be ceded to the Qing court in vain, so the traveler proposed to ask for a piece of land in Shanghai as compensation. Because Shanghai is the most economically advanced area in China in this era, it is also a big market, so in the future, the traveler wants to develop its own industry and economy, it is definitely inseparable from the Shanghai market, which naturally requires the traveler to have a foothold in Shanghai, although the traveler now has an office, but the office is too small, and the location is too deep into the interior of Shanghai, for the traveler to carry out large-scale business contacts in Shanghai, the role is not great, it is best to have its own wharf. Just take the opportunity to solve the ownership of Tianjin to get a piece of land from Shanghai, so that the traverser will have his own territory in Shanghai.

After receiving the conditions of the traverser, Li Hongzhang could only smile bitterly, and with his shrewdness, of course, it can be seen that the conditions of overseas Chinese are actually to take advantage of all the advantages except for giving up an old city. However, at this point, the situation was no longer under Li Hongzhang's control, so he didn't bother to argue with the overseas Chinese one by one, but just passed on the conditions of the overseas Chinese to Xi'an and let Cixi decide.

As Li Hongzhang expected, Cixi quickly called back and agreed to all the conditions of overseas Chinese, and at the same time praised Li Hongzhang's reliability. It turned out that Cixi's perspective on Tianjin was different from Li Hongzhang's, and she first considered the security issue, so being able to return to the old city of Tianjin from the hands of overseas Chinese means that she can withstand the overseas Chinese on the front line of Tianjin, which is a great success, and the concession area outside the old city of Tianjin is not the Qing court, even if she wants to come back, it is estimated that she will be asked to go back by various countries as soon as she turns around. As for the customs and Kaiping coal mines, they are not in the eyes of Lafayette at all, Dachun State doesn't care about the few taels of silver from the customs, and there are many coal mines in Daqing Kingdom, and without Kaiping Coal Mine, can't you still afford to use coal?

After Li Hongzhang received the telegram, he had no choice but to sigh, forget it, the old lady has already decided, so let's do it.