By the time Yama Aritomo and Oyama Iwa listened to Tamura's last words, the situation in Japan and Russia was already in danger. In fact, the contradictions between the two countries over Northeast China had been brewing since the end of the First Sino-Japanese War.

During the First Sino-Japanese War, the Japanese army occupied Liaodong, and after the war, the Qing government was forced to cede Liaodong, which touched the common interests of all the great powers. In order to exert pressure on Japan, the Tsarist government intervened with Germany and France on April 17, the day of the signing of the Treaty of Shimonoseki. staged a farce of "the intervention of the three countries to return Liao". At that time, after the attrition of the First Sino-Japanese War, Japan was unable to carry out a new war for a while, and under the pressure of the three countries, it was forced to "abandon the permanent possession of the Liaodong Peninsula", in fact, Lafayette, the great Kaizi, "redeemed" the Liaodong Peninsula to Japan with 30 million taels of silver, and this is still celebrating among the Manchurians, and he boasted that he was the hero of "recovering the land of the ancestors Longxing".

In this way, Russia became the victorious power of the victorious powers, and of course the ability to pull hatred was also the unique skill of the tsar. Subsequently, Russia blackmailed the Qing government under the pretext of "returning Liao's merits" (the world's number one Kaizi, who doesn't come to extort bamboo). The following year, he induced the Qing government to accept the Sino-Russian Secret Treaty, and immediately demanded privileges such as the construction of the China Eastern Railway and its branch lines. In the following years, it forcibly "leased" Lushun, Dalian and their nearby waters to the Qing Dynasty, and occupied the entire Liaodong Peninsula, thus obtaining the coveted ice-free ports in the Far East. It just so happens that this area is the so-called Kwantung continent in Japan in the future, that is, the birthplace of the Kwantung Army, which shows that Japan and Russia covet this peninsula.

During the Gengzi Rebellion, when the invading forces of other countries of the coalition withdrew from Beijing, the Russian troops occupying Northeast China at that time still relied on it, trying to dominate Northeast China forever and realize its so-called "Yellow Russia Plan". However, Russia's appearance was too ugly, which not only aroused the "strong righteous indignation" of the people of the Qing Dynasty, but also resolutely opposed it by Britain, Japan, the United States, France, and other powers out of their own interests. In the second year after the signing of the Treaty of Xincho, the tsarist government had to sign the Treaty of Settlement of the Three Eastern Provinces, and was forced to agree to withdraw its troops in three phases, which took 18 months to complete. However, Lao Maozi, who has always gone back on his word and, once again unexpectedly repented, and only four months later, Russia brazenly established the Far Eastern Governorate with Lushun as the center, and appointed the bearded Duke Alekseev who was saved by Wu Chenxuan as the governor-general, in fact, the three eastern provinces were regarded as Russian territory, and then reoccupied Mukden. At this point, Russia put on a posture of monopolizing Northeast China and did not hesitate to fight for it, which really frightened the Qing government and many foreign powers.

Britain, the boss of the great powers, has always regarded Lao Maozi as a potential opponent for his world hegemony. John Bull, who has always sowed discord, and the aggrieved Japanese who tied small paper figures soon came together. Britain attempted to pretend to prevent Japan from moving south to compete with it for the Yangtze River valley in China. Therefore, the two island countries of Britain and Japan, which were in love with adultery, colluded with each other to sign the Anglo-Japanese alliance treaty in London, and the spearhead was directly aimed at Russia.

Americans are not good birds, knowing that they cannot monopolize a piece of territory, they simply introduce an "open door" policy to disgust everyone. American capital tried to intervene in Northeast China several times, but was rejected by Lao Maozi who turned his face and denied people. In order to break Russia's monopoly on China's northeast, the US Government has rightly sided with Japan and Britain.

Britain and the United States have given Japan a large amount of economic assistance to boost Japan's arms expansion. Of course, the retribution is unhappy that these Japanese Army, armed with British and American aid, are precisely the backbone of the frenzied slaughter of "Mi British ghost animals" in Southeast Asia and Oceania in the future. It can be said that if it were not for the blood transfusion of Britain and the United States, many later Japanese war criminals would not have had the opportunity to join the army, or even enter the army, and in the face of the Japanese army, which was small and thin, they would not have the ambition of swallowing elephants. The instigation of the United States and Britain finally gave many innocent people's lives, of course, in the end they themselves did not escape the consequences of the backlash, but it is a pity that politicians are always short-sighted, and the Americans with good scars still raise wolf cubs as watchdogs, and maybe they will have to be bitten and bloody in the future before they can make up their minds to overtake this crazy slave with a stick.

France remained loyal to the Russo-French alliance at this time. In response to the Anglo-Japanese alliance, Russia and France issued a proclamation in Petersburg, declaring that the two countries reserved the freedom of their freedom of action in order to protect the interests of the two countries in the event of future changes in the Far East or China. This is to extend the Franco-Russian military alliance to the Far East, and the spearhead is unabashedly directed at the Anglo-Japanese alliance. Of course, France itself did not want Russia to invest its main military forces in the Far East, so as not to weaken the strength of the Russo-French alliance against Germany in Europe. A fool would go to the deed of his own national power for the benefit of someone else's thousands of miles away, so France had a certain degree of reservation in its support for Russia's Far East policy.

In line with the principle that "what the French do not like to do is what the Germans should do", Germany constantly fanned the flames and promoted the policy of Russia's eastward expansion. The Germans hoped that the contradictions with Japan and even Britain would intensify due to the Russian occupation of the northeast, and force Russia to transfer the Russian troops on the western border, so as to indirectly weaken the pressure of the Russo-French alliance on Germany, which even the vagabonds in Brussels could see at a glance. It is a pity that the simpler and clearer something is, the more complex it becomes in the international political arena. Lao Maozi was no exception, consciously his western border was much more stable, and the Russians' megalomania had intermittent attacks, and they began to prepare to occupy territory in the three eastern provinces, without fear of the Anglo-Japanese Alliance, an organization similar to the International Law Enforcement Bureau, to forcibly demolish their illegal buildings in the northeast.

Thus by the end of the year, the great powers formed two major blocs on the Far Eastern question: one was the Anglo-Japanese alliance, backed by the United States; The other is the Franco-Russian alliance. The Germans were duplicitous, defending France in Europe and Russia in the Far East. At this point, the international stage of the Russo-Japanese War has been built, and only two actors are left to appear. By the way, because the great powers were happily preparing to open the singing, they forgot to inform the owner of this stage, but fortunately, the owner of the pigtail who was hiding in the corner of the wall to draw circles was reasonable, and said, "You old people are playing to the fullest, don't take care of the porcelain on this stage, the younger brother is also watching the play under the stage, you have something to say!" Well, it's gone.

Of course, within Russia, there is no monolith on the issue of war against Japan, but there are two schools of opinion. Although they competed with Japan for such basic aspects as China and Korea, these two factions were the faithful executors of the tsarist government's aggressive and expansionist policy towards the Far East. Their disagreement is mainly in terms of strategy. One faction was represented by Chancellor of the Exchequer Witte and Foreign Secretary Ramsdorff, among others. Seeing Russia's difficulties both domestically and internationally, including in Europe and the Far East, they suggested that a decisive battle should be fought against China not lightly, but rather certain concessions, and at the same time intensify preparations for economic plunder and war against China. The other faction was led by the former minister Alexander? Bezobrazov, Interior Minister Vyacheslav? Plevy, the Governor of the Far East, Alekseev and others were represented. This is a bunch of fanatical chauvinists, imperialist adventurers; They underestimated Japan's strength, believing that it was a small state and vulnerable to attack, and that "it could be overwhelmed by throwing a hat", that Russia "needed a small victorious war in order to stop the revolution", and that "only by making Japan unequivocally understand that Russia was prepared to defend its interests in Manchuria and would not hesitate to resort to force if necessary" could they hope for success in the negotiations, and therefore advocated being tough on Japan. Neither of these factions even considered the question of defeat. Just as the controversy between the "imperial faction" and the "ruling faction" appeared in Japan in the same day, it was nothing more than a question of "rapid progress" and "slow taking." It can be seen that historical mistakes are always repeated, but they are only changed in time and place.

"So, there will be a war between Japan and Russia in the Northeast?" Xiong Bingsan listened to the boss's explanation like a commentary, and finally clarified the direct relationship between these powers. "We are still separated from the northeast by the sea, it is estimated that it will not affect too much, but there are a lot of refugees, although there are many people in Shandong, but the chamber of commerce and various factories employ more people, you might as well open your mouth to accept a group of suitable refugees, it is a good job."

This Xiong Xiling classmate didn't know that if it weren't for Wu Chenxuan's obstruction, this family would have gone out of the customs with the old master Zhao Erxun to take office, and now it should be the general office of the Reclamation Bureau of the three eastern provinces, and it is suffering in the war. Since Xiong Xiling took over the errand of the political envoy Yamen, he has almost devoted himself to the government affairs of Shandong. Now on the territory of the ten prefectures and two states, the official voice of Xiong can already be used as an order, and Lord Wu of the Zhengpai Domain often leads troops to go out on expeditions or calculates money in the chamber of commerce in the West Market, and has no time to deal with these government affairs. As for the governor of Shandong, Duanfang, he was obsessed with Lu Opera in the previous paragraph, and now he soaks in the Beiyang Opera Garden south of Jinan Station on the Jiaoji Line all day long to listen to the drama and learn the opera, and from time to time he also makes a cameo, and the ticket holder is very professional.

"Well, as soon as this war starts, Liaodong will inevitably be devastated, after all, they are all Chinese, I think the Shandong Chamber of Commerce and the political envoy Yamen should also arrange food and shelter for disaster relief, and the third brother Bing and Brother Xingcun will ask you two." Wu Chenxuan gave the order, and Second Brother Miao and Xiong Xiling both nodded in agreement.

"The military side should also be ready to go to war. We also have to take into account the two Huai territories that have just been defeated, and besides, this time we will give the Japanese a live demonstration, and by the way, we will make some cheap, so we don't need to work too hard, so we can't send too many troops this time. As soon as Wu Chenxuan said that he might participate in the war, the eyes of several gold medal guys of the Wuyi New Army lit up, and they all wanted to fight with the great powers. Seeing that the army's heart was available, Wu Chenxuan was also relieved, if the generals in the army were afraid of the great powers like tigers, then Wu Chenxuan would also have to consider whether to change blood.

"Since we want to participate in the war and expand our territory, the size of the army must also be expanded accordingly. The following is still the old rule, please ask Duan Senza to explain to you the next step of the expansion and formation of the new army of our armed wing. At this moment, the gold medalists sat even more upright, straightened their ears and listened carefully to the lecture of the unsmiling Duan Zhiquan Duan Dashen.