Chapter 215: 1878
After attending the meeting held by López Jr. and returning to Rio Gran do Sul, Li Mingyuan immediately turned to the state of dealing with domestic affairs, and time gradually passed in a busy manner.
At the end of September 1869, Hou Yaoguang, the owner of Yee Hing Tong in the Malay Peninsula, was accidentally hacked to death by a Chinese under the opposing party in a fight, and five days later, the owner of Tai Kung Tong was killed by his traitors.
In just half a year, the Taiping Society completed the unification of the Chinese forces in the Malay Peninsula, and in the name of more than 60 Chinese gangs under its control, it dispersed to Thailand, Annam, the East Indies and other regions to establish local branches of the Taiping Society.
On October 5, 1869, Huang Shengui, who received the support of more than 200 Chinese congregations, took the initiative to retaliate against Rui Sheng Tang, at this time, Rui Sheng Tang due to the expansion of its power after nearly two months, more than 500 gang members, Rui Sheng Tang defeated Huang Shengui again by virtue of the numerical advantage, on October 12, the representative of Rio Gran do Sul in the United States personally went to San Francisco to meet with Huang Shengui and had an hour-long conversation with Huang Shengui, two days later, Huang Shengui announced that he would join the Taiping Society and reorganize Hong Shun Tang into the American branch of the Taiping Society. After Huang Shengui announced the reorganization of the gang, Ruishengtang, who thought that he had a chance, launched a blow against Huang Shengui in the name of crusading against Hongmen traitors, but was attacked by a group of unknown Chinese armed elements, and Ruishengtang lost most of the congregation, and even the head of the hall was injured by the other party in the fight, and died of his injuries three days later.
After Liu Xing's death, the remaining 200-odd Chinese congregation, fearing retaliation from Huang Shengui, either took refuge in other Hongmen gangs. Either dissolve and leave San Francisco on its own, and with Ruishengtang's fate as a comparison, other Hongmen Tangkou did not dare to accuse and attack Huang Shengui's other door, and stayed out of the matter to watch Huang Shengui's strength grow step by step with the support of Rio Gran do Sul.
At the beginning of 1870, Rio Gran do Sul drew on the experience of introducing Chinese workers from Peru and reached agreements with the authorities of the United States, Canada, and Australia on the repatriation of Chinese workers.
The Rio Grande do Sul government has successively appointed Huang Shengui, Huang Liangpu, and Long Xingbang as immigration representatives in the United States, Canada, and Australia, with full responsibility for the immigration affairs of local Chinese workers.
Huang Liangpu is the nephew of Huang Shengui's same clan among the three, after Huang Shengui stayed in the United States, he recommended Huang Liangpu to Wang Youtian as the immigration representative of Rio Gran do Sul in Canada, Wang Youtian reported to the local government and was approved by Li Mingyuan, and Huang Liangpu quickly opened up the situation with the foundation laid by Huang Shengui in Canada, and sent the first batch of 2,000 Chinese laborers to Rio Gran do Sul in February 1870. Although the number of Chinese in Canada is not as large as the number of Chinese in the United States and the mainland, because Canada is closer to South America, the cost of obtaining immigration from Canada is much lower than that of immigrating directly from the mainland.
Long Hongbang is the leader of a Chinese gang in New South Wales, Australia, with deep prestige in the local area, and is very respected by Chinese workers, and Long Hongbang himself is extremely disgusted with the Manchu government, and continued to propagate anti-Qing ideas after going abroad, and later led his subordinates Zhong Shao, Xue Yizhong and others to establish an anti-Qing revolutionary organization, and was the first overseas Chinese to engage in revolutionary work.
When the representative of Rio Grande do Sul found Long Hongbang, Long Hongbang was discussing with his subordinates Zhong Shao, Xue Yizhong and others to protest against the anti-Chinese policy promulgated by the Australian government, and the representative of Rio Grande do Sul promised to properly resettle Chinese workers, and the act of dividing land for each Chinese worker really moved Long Hongbang, after the two sides got along for more than half a month, he saw with his own eyes that Rio Gran do Sul and the Australian government reached an agreement on the resettlement of Chinese workers, and Long Hongbang decisively led his subordinates to join Rio Gran do Sul and became the head of the Chinese workers in Rio Gran do Sul in Australia.
Four days after the outbreak of the Franco-Prussian War, Li Mingyuan personally issued a general mobilization order, calling all the garrison troops and reserve militia to the vicinity of Xinjing, and a week later, the 80,000 troops who had completed the assembly and organization began to advance to northern Argentina in batches, and another 10,000 regular troops and 20,000 garrisons were stationed in the border area of Santa Catarima to guard against the threat of the Brazilian army.
On 2 August, before the Franco-Prussian War was decided, the first large-scale encounter between Argentina and the Wehrmacht took place, in which 4,000 Argentine encirclement troops engaged 10,000 Wehrmacht vanguards, and two hours after the engagement, the Wehrmacht follow-up troops arrived on the battlefield and quickly wiped out 4,000 Argentine troops.
When the news of the annihilation of 4,000 Argentine troops reached Buenos Aires, the Argentine president, furious, declared war on Rio Gran do Sul, and three days later, Uruguay, forced by the Argentine government, also declared war on Rio Gran do Sul.
On 7 August, a coalition of 60,000 Argentine and 10,000 Uruguayan troops marched toward the northern provinces, and the war began to slide in an uncontrollable direction.
The Argentine government's response exceeded Li Mingyuan's expectations, and after receiving a total of 70,000 troops from Argentina and Uruguay to go to the front, Li Mingyuan quickly adjusted his deployment, expanded the scope of mobilization under the manpower requirements to ensure the minimum operation of Rio Grande do Sul, and recruited all the 100,000 Chinese laborers who had emigrated in the past year into the local army to serve as territorial defense tasks, and at the same time put the second-line troops freed from the local defense tasks into the border area between Rio Grande do Sul and Uruguay. Prevent Argentine and Uruguayan forces from launching flanking attacks from southern Rio Gran do Sul.
On August 12, when the Wehrmacht and Argentine troops were at a stalemate on the front line, the Brazilian Empire suddenly announced a strike against the aggression of Rio Grande do Sul, and a day later, the Brazilian army in Curitiba launched a fierce attack on Dongsheng County (Joinvia), and in three days, the Brazilian army successively broke through the outer positions of Dongsheng County and the first and second lines of defense, and the vanguard approached the core area of Dongsheng County, And it poses a great threat to the Dongsheng County Naval Base.
Once the Brazilian army breaks through the defense of the Wehrmacht and occupies Dongsheng County, then there will be only one barrier between Dongsheng County and Xinjing (Florianópolis), while the Brazilian Navy can cross Xinghe County and threaten the security of Xinjing from the sea.
When a telegram from the defenders of Dongsheng County for help reached Xinjing, Li Mingyuan, despite the opposition of many generals, insisted on transferring 8,000 troops responsible for the security of Xinjing to the front line, leaving only 2,000 field troops and 7,000 temporarily formed Chinese workers to defend Xinjing.
The 8,000 Field Army was Li Mingyuan's last strategic reserve, and after sending the 8,000 Army, Li Mingyuan stayed at the headquarters of the National Defense Army without leaving the army, always paying attention to the situation on the front line.
At the end of August, reinforcements arrived in Dongsheng County to resist the attack of the Brazilian army, and on August 27, López Jr., Kingdom of Paraguay, issued a painless proclamation to persuade Rio Gran do Sul, Argentina, Brazil, and Uruguay to stop the war and settle the dispute through negotiations.
On 29 August, a major battle broke out between the main force of the Wehrmacht Navy and the Brazilian Navy off the coast of Dongsheng County, with two of the five main ironclad ships of the Wehrmacht sinking and one seriously damaged, and six sail warships being sunk, and three warships purchased by the Brazilian Navy from France and the United States broke down frequently during the battle, and were finally sunk by the Wehrmacht, leaving only two ironclad ships that successfully escaped from the battlefield, and the sail warships were completely lost.
The Battle of Dongsheng was an important turning point in the war, as the Wehrmacht Navy defeated the Imperial Brazilian Navy at the cost of nearly half of the main force loss, destroying the Brazilian Navy's ability to threaten the rear of the Wehrmacht from the sea, and creating an opportunity for the defenders of Dongsheng County to hold out until the main force won the decisive battle.
The victory at the Battle of Dongsheng eased the Wehrmacht's predicament, and on August 31, 1870, the sudden appearance of a force of 10,000 men behind the main Argentine force heralded the dawn of victory.
The 10,000 Wehrmacht troops used newly produced bicycles as a means of transportation to make a detour for more than 800 miles in a week, occupying in one fell swoop the supply base set up by the Argentine troops in the rear and blocking the path for the Argentine troops to retreat.
On September 1, 1870, Argentina sent 20,000 troops from the front to attack, and the rear was occupied and reinforced, but the supply base was repulsed by 10,000 Wehrmacht.
On September 2, 1870, the French emperor on the European continent formally surrendered to the Prussian army, and five days later, the main forces of Argentina and Uruguay, which had been cut off from ammunition and logistical supplies, were completely defeated under the all-out attack of the Wehrmacht, and two days later, the commander of the Argentine coalition surrendered, and the Wehrmacht won a decisive victory of destroying 10,000 enemies and capturing 50,000.
After annihilating the main Argentine forces, the Wehrmacht swept all the way south, not only occupying all the five northern Argentine provinces demarcated by Li Mingyuan, but also occupying about two-fifths of the land in the provinces of Santiago del Estero and Santa Fe.
Had it not been for the dispersion of forces, the Wehrmacht would have been able to reach the Argentine capital.
After the end of the decisive battle, the balance of victory quickly shifted to the side of the Wehrmacht, and López Jr. saw the opportunity to quickly join the battlefield, on the one hand, he sent troops to occupy the Argentine province of Misiones, and on the other hand, launched a surprise attack on the Brazilian army in the name of the local Brazilian army breaking the peace agreement, and within a month, occupied the empty Brazilian state of Mato Grosso do Sul, so that López Jr. had to withdraw the army attacking Rio Gran do Sul to the country to prepare for further attacks by the Paraguayan army.
The South American War, which took place in 1870, was chaotic due to the drastic changes in the European landscape and the successive accession of Brazil, Paraguay, Peru, Bolivia and other countries.
After the annihilation of the main Argentine army, the Argentine president was executed by angry military figures, and the remnants of Urquiza, Ferner, and the Argentine president quickly fell into a struggle for control of the central government after the Wehrmacht stopped in the northern part of the province of Santa Fe after a brief period of peace, while Uruguay was occupied by the Wehrmacht because of the defeat in the war, and the white people of the country fled elsewhere for fear of the IDF attack.
The Wehrmacht needed time to digest the newly occupied territory, and the various forces in Argentina had not yet completed the unification of their forces, so although the two forces were still at war, neither side was willing to expend its forces to continue the war, so the war between the Wehrmacht and Argentina became a sit-in mode, with the armies of both sides stationed in the areas under their control, and there were no large-scale engagements except for the occasional skirmishes.
Although the war against Argentina that Li Mingyuan decided to launch was victorious, it was victorious in the end, expanding the area controlled by the Wehrmacht from 403,000 square kilometers before the war to 1,117,000 square kilometers, and becoming an important territorial power in South America. There are a total of more than 200,000 whites on the newly annexed six northern provinces of Argentina, 50,000 square kilometers of land in Santa Fe Province and 60,000 square kilometers of land in Uruguay, and with the expansion of Rio Grande do Sul's power, it is easy to attract British interference if it adopts a blind expulsion policy. The policy of boiling frogs in warm water solves the white problem.