On March 27, 1913, Liang Qichao wrote a letter to his daughter Liang Sishun (Ling Xian): "With the death of the Song clan, urge me to be more cautious, and the person who assassinated Song (Chen Qimeiye, the messenger of Allah), and I am the second alternate, I will now cut and send the text of the proclamation, and I should be assassinated by a certain plot to the north. ”

It seems that Mr. Liang also believes that Chen Qimei is the mastermind behind the assassination of Song Jiaoren.

But Chen Qimei and Song Jiaoren have a deep friendship, and they are both comrades in the trenches, and when Song was assassinated, Chen was by his side, and his performance afterwards was also remarkable. In the Song case, although Chen Qimei was full of suspicions, there was no direct evidence to prove that Chen Qimei was the mastermind behind the killing of Song.

Those grievances and grievances of Song Chen are just chasing after the wind.

If Yuan Shikai, Zhao Bingjun, and Chen Qimei are not behind the scenes, is there anyone else?

In fact, in addition to the three suspects Yuan Shikai, Zhao Bingjun, and Chen Qimei, the mastermind behind the "Song case" may, judging from the available information, at least one of the other two people.

One of them is Hong Shuzu.

"Mr. Zhang Puquan's Memoirs and Diary" said: "After Song Dunchu was martyred, Hong came from the south and met the president again. The president asked who was responsible for the murder in the first place. Hong said: "This is still our people, the ones who contribute to the president." 'Yuan has no hesitation. Hong saw that Yuan's color was wrong, and when he left the presidential palace, he went to the Ministry of the Interior to take leave and go to Tianjin to recuperate. ”

Zhang Puquan: Puquan, a native of Cangxian County, Hebei Province. In 1899, he studied in Japan. In 1904, he participated in the establishment of the Huaju Association, and in 1905, he participated in the League. After the Wuchang Uprising, he served as the director of the communication department of the League and a senator of the Kuomintang. In 1913, he was elected President of the Senate of the first National Assembly. Since 1917, he has served as the first diplomatic representative of the French Protector Army in Japan and the first adviser to the army. In 1920, he served as an adviser to the Guangdong Army.

Zhang Puquan is a member of the Old League, and his words are highly credible.

Later, according to Yuan Kewen, the second son of Yuan, recalled: "My father once said: 'I have suffered too much from my generation, and I have never argued. Although I don't kill Dunchu, I will also be killed because of me, how can I argue! A sensible person must have sensed that if I wanted to kill him, I didn't have to invite him to kill him. I could have waited for him to come, and then framed him for his sin and killed him, why should I invite him several times and kill him while he was about to do it? This is obviously a way to give a person, and a fool will not do such a foolish thing. ’”

If it is true that Hong Shuzu and Yuan Shikai met and had a dialogue as recorded in the above "Memoirs and Diary of Mr. Zhang Puquan", then Yuan Shikai did not know about the assassination of Song Jiaoren. Instead, as Yuan Shikai's subordinate Hong Shuzu, he was eager to seek merit and privately arranged personnel to assassinate Song Jiaoren. This can be seen from Ying Guixin's later performance who wanted to invite merit and reward.

There is a historical record that Yuan Shikai once ridiculed Hong Shuzu, saying that he only talked empty words and did not do practical things, which was targeted. Previously, Hong Shuzu had said that he could use the materials to frame Song Jiaoren, and advanced 50,000 yuan from Yuan Shikai to reward money, but the reward money was taken out and nothing was found.

Therefore, when Hong Shuzu said that Ying Kuicheng could get something to frame "Sun, Huang, and Song" (Sun Yat-sen, Huang Xing, and Song Jiaoren), and then ask for money. Yuan Shikai asked to bring the things first, and then talk about the money.

Ying Kuicheng thought that the empty glove white wolf would cheat another 300,000 yuan, Hong Shuzu found out that Ying Kuicheng was lying to him, and felt that he had no face to see Yuan Shikai, and there was no way to explain to the president.

Hong Shuzu, who was ridiculed for not doing practical things, decided to do a practical thing, and he immediately told Ying Kuicheng to take the opportunity to do it if he couldn't get the materials. Because, he may have heard President Yuan Da say more than once that if Song Jiaoren became the general of state. reason, but than Tang Shaoyi as the general of state. It is much more troublesome. Hong Shuzu was self-righteous and "figured out the upper intention", thinking that Yuan Shikai wanted to get rid of Song Jiaoren, so Hong Shuzu made his own claim to assassinate Song Jiaoren.

Perhaps, Hong Shuzu should be the culprit that everyone has been looking for, and under his instructions, Ying Guixin arranged for Wu Shiying to assassinate Song Jiaoren. It is also in response to what Yuan Shikai said: "Although I don't kill Dunchu, Dunchu will also be killed because of me." ”

If Hong Shuzu was instructed by Yuan Shikai and Zhao Bingjun, there is one thing that makes people puzzled: Hong Shuzu did not say Yuan Shikai or Zhao Bingjun before he was executed. At that time, these two people had already died, if they really instructed them, Hong Shuzu would have no worries, on the contrary, he could mitigate his crimes, why did he need to keep this secret? Is this also proof?

However, when Hong Shuzu defended himself, he always insisted that the "destruction of the Song Dynasty" in the telegram he sent to Ying Guixin only destroyed Song Jiaoren's reputation, and the content of the previous telegram about collecting Song Jiaoren's "black information" can be proved. Except for "destroying the Song Dynasty", there seems to be no evidence to prove that Hong Shuzu instructed Ying Guixin to kill Song Jiaoren.

Therefore, there is another possibility, it is Ying Guixin herself who understands "destroying the Song Dynasty" as "killing the Song Dynasty". Or, Ying Guixin didn't mistake "destroying the Song Dynasty" as killing the Song Dynasty, because the materials for "destroying the Song Dynasty" couldn't be obtained, so she simply didn't do it twice.

Killing Song is more thorough than "destroying Song", and won't you get more reward? Such a possibility should not be ruled out. Therefore, the main envoy who killed Song Jiaoren was Ying Guixin herself, and this possibility also exists.

After Song Jiaoren's death, people were willing to spend a lot of time on "who is the mastermind ......", but everyone forgot Song Jiaoren's last entrustment: "Please continue to struggle, take saving the country and the people as your own responsibility, and don't think of me and give up responsibility." We must continue to follow the path of constitutional democracy of parliamentary elections, sunshine participation in politics, and fair competition. ”

Perhaps, as a keen politician, he should have had a premonition that his death would interfere with the republic's plans. In fact, Song Jiaoren's worries have just become a reality.

Song Jiaoren's death not only affected the political situation after his death, but also announced the end of the honeymoon period between Yuan Shikai and the revolutionaries.

After Sun Yat-sen returned to China, when discussing countermeasures with Chen Qimei, Ju Zheng and others in Huang Xing's residence, Huang Xing advocated giving priority to state affairs and taking the law as a legitimate solution, but he was strongly opposed by Dai Jitao and others.

Sun Yat-sen sided with the latter and strongly advocated an army against Yuan. His reasoning was that Yuan Shikai was the president, and the president instructed the assassination, which by no means could be solved by law, and only by force could be solved.

Huang Xing then pointed out that the southern revolutionaries were not strong enough, and if they rashly attacked, they were afraid that the overall situation would be eroded and eventually out of control. Sun Yat-sen did not think so, and he strongly stated that the killing of Song Jiaoren was not a matter of one person, and there was absolutely no other way than to quickly raise troops and solve it by force.

However, most people at the meeting agreed with Huang Xing's view, and the proposal to raise troops against Yuan ultimately failed.

There was another reason why the Kuomintang gave up force against Yuan, and that was that the National Assembly was about to convene. Because of their advantage in the number of legislators, some Kuomintang members believed that Yuan Shikai could be restrained through the Congress, and that the "Song case" would also be resolved by law.

On April 8, 1913, the first National Assembly of the Republic of China was held in Beijing, and the Kuomintang legislators gave Yuan Shikai a dismissal as soon as he came up, and Liang Shiyi, the representative sent by the presidential office to congratulate him, was reprimanded for being considered to have flouted the Congress.

On 25 April, the day before Cheng Dequan released the evidence documents for the "Song case," Kuomintang members Zhang Ji (that is, Zhang Puquan mentioned above) and Wang Zhengting were elected chairman and vice chairman of the Senate, and Lin Sen was elected chairman of the whole house.

Just when the Kuomintang was rejoicing at its victory, it was hit head-on. This is because, in the upcoming election of the speakers of the Senate and the House of Representatives, the Kuomintang, which had already won the majority of seats in the National Assembly, could not continue to maintain its advantage, and the speaker of the House of Representatives fell to the leader of the Republican Party. The KMT's influence in parliament has been greatly reduced.

Tang Hualong is actually one of the leaders of progressive parties such as republican, democratic, and unified, and has the support of Yuan Shikai behind him. During the election of the speaker of the House of Representatives, with the help of Yuan Shikai's bribery and division activities, he barely defeated Wu Jinglian of the Kuomintang after three rounds of elections.

The so-called wave is not settled, and wave after wave. Immediately after the "Song Case", another major event occurred that stirred up the political arena in the early Republic of China.

Because, that is, on the night of the congressional election, the General of State. Li Zhao Bingjun, Finance Minister Zhou Xuexi, and Foreign Affairs Minister Lu Zhengxiang were engaged in an extremely difficult negotiation with representatives of the banking group of Britain, France, Germany, Russia, and Japan in the HSBC building in Beijing.

The aftermath loan is a long-term huge loan borrowed by Yuan Shikai from an international bank group loan in the name of handling the aftermath reform. The negotiations between the two sides lasted for a long time, and finally reached a result in April 1913.

In the third year of Xuantong, Qing ** signed a contract with the American capital group, the British HSBC, the German Deutsch-Hua Bank, and the French Crédit Agricole CIB to borrow 10 million pounds for the reform of the currency system and the revitalization of the industry (only 100,000 pounds of capital was in place, and the Qing ** collapsed).

In order to get rid of the financial difficulties at the beginning of the Republic of China, Yuan Shikai planned to change this loan to the "aftermath loan" of Beiyang ** of the Republic of China in order to deal with the aftermath problem.

Beiyang** promised that the loan would be guaranteed by the salt tax, and listed the banking group of the four countries as the priority country for the Beiyang** loan.

The aftermath that Yuan Shikai had to deal with at the beginning mainly included four aspects:

1. To end the Nanjing Provisional **, the first thing is to dismiss the army in the south;

2. Repayment of outstanding external debts and reparations;

3. Fulfill the preferential conditions for the royal family of the Qing Dynasty.

4. Rectify Beijing's ruling institutions and strengthen its political, military, and other ruling forces;

In short, it is to solve the problems that arise from or leave over from the revolution. Yuan Shikai presented himself as the leader of the country, eager to solve these problems in order to establish his new ruling system and ruling order. All this requires money, and Beijing ** is already on the verge of financial bankruptcy, and for a while it cannot open up domestic financial resources, so it has to ask foreign countries for loans, and the most convenient object of begging is the bank group of the four countries.