Xue Fucheng wrote the manuscript, read it carefully, and felt that there was indeed no easier word, so he handed it over to Li Hongzhang to watch. Pen fun and pavilion www.biquge.info

"Uncle Yun's wonderful pen can really do what I want in my heart." After reading this article entitled "Coastal Defense Planning," Li Hongzhang stroked his hands and admired it.

In this article of tens of thousands of words, Xue Fucheng followed Li Hongzhang's vision and drew a grand blueprint. It not only formulated a general strategy for building the army and strengthening itself, but also laid the foundation for realizing its own political propositions in the future.

"Come on! Come! Uncle Yun, let's have a drink and celebrate! Li Hongzhang said happily and called the servant to prepare wine and food.

Li Hongzhang knew that no matter who those princes and nobles in the capital and the ministers of military aircraft were, they couldn't come up with such a comprehensive solution!

And Xue Fucheng followed his own meaning and wrote this article in a simple and understandable way, as long as he is a person who is coarse and well-versed, he can understand it after reading it.

The reason why this is the case, Li Hongzhang's purpose is to make the two women who live in the deep palace fully understand what he is talking about!

For this reason, how can he, who is not good at drinking, unintentionally "float a big white"?

"Hehe, I don't know if Lin Kunyu will write such words." Xue Fucheng said with a smile.

At this time, Xue Fucheng wanted to know in his heart that if Lin Yizhe came to write such an article, would he also use such an easy-to-understand method.

"Lin Kunyu will definitely write like this, but although his writing is wonderful, it is not as clever as Shu Yun." Li Hongzhang said with a smile.

Not long after, the servant brought a pot of warm wine, several plates of tea, and a plate of snacks, and Li Hongzhang beckoned Xue Fucheng to drink it in pairs.

Beijing's Erguotou was mellow and spicy, and after a few bottles of wine entered his throat, Li Hongzhang fell into contemplation again.

He knew very well that of course there would be objections from the DPRK to this. For this reason, he also wrote a sincere private letter to Wenxiang, the minister of military aircraft, and Shi Wenxiang, another powerful figure in the prime minister's yamen, in addition to Prince Gong, saying that he "did what he did and did not hide himself" to show his loyalty to the monarch and the country.

He is also speculating that there will definitely be people in the DPRK and China who will jump out against him. Whose mouth will this "cross-examination" come from?

"Your Excellency is worried that there will be a crowd in the DPRK and China, right?" Xue Fucheng put down his wine glass and asked with a smile.

"I don't take the ridicule of the DPRK and China to heart. Those who are worried about my heart are in the frontier and not in the pivot. Li Hongzhang sighed, "If my guess is right, he will definitely oppose it." ”

"Those who are worried about adults, Zuo Ji Gaoye." Xue Fucheng listened to Li Hongzhang's words, and immediately understood who this "he" Li Hongzhang was talking about.

The "he" Li Hongzhang said was none other than Zuo Zongtang, the governor of Shaanxi and Gansu, who was ordered by Qin to lead a large army in the northwest border!

In Xue Fucheng's impression, since the death of Zeng Guofan and Hu Linyi, among the capable ministers of the Qing Dynasty, only Zuo Zongtang and Li Hongzhang remained. Compared with Li Hongzhang, Zuo Zongtang seems to be more than capable of prestige and achievement.

Zeng, Zuo, and Li were once known in the world. Zeng Guofan is a senior figure in age and merit, and the prominence of Zuo and Li also depends on Zeng Guofan's support. However, Zuo Zongtang is a person with an upright temperament, a temperament like fire, and he is arrogant and arrogant, and he is arrogant, and he doesn't even pay attention to Zeng Guofan on weekdays, and he is ruthless, and his children's in-laws and life-saving benefactor Guo Songtao have all been impeached by him, let alone Li Hongzhang? !

Zuo Zongtang is arrogant, arrogant, and domineering, so that Zhuge Liang can boast of himself, known as "Jinliang" or "Lao Liang", and all this is also based on his actual achievements. Xue Fucheng also admitted in his heart that not to mention the merit of "suppressing the hair and flattening the twist", in terms of the rectification of coastal defense, Zuo Zongtang can also be called one of the earliest and most courageous people to practice the coastal defense problem during the Xianfeng and Tongzhi years.

"The steamer is a sharp weapon in naval warfare, and every time the islanders are proud of me, they must imitate it to prevent foreign thieves. The wisdom of Middle-earth is not inferior to that of the Westerners, and if you pay attention to imitation, you will naturally become more and more refined...... Ten years later, I will also respond to what others have relied on. …… Since the use of troops at sea, the steamers and warships of Taixi countries have reached Tianjin directly, and the fence has become a fictitious one, and the stars are soaring, and there is no way to deserve it, and the ministers foolishly think that they want to prevent the harm of the sea and collect their benefits, and they must rectify the sailors; If you want to rectify the sailors, you must set up a bureau to supervise the construction of ships. Tessie is clever, and China doesn't have to rest on its laurels. Tessie has it, but China can't be proud of it. ”

The words that Zuo Zongtang said back then now sound quite loud.

When Zuo Zongtang was the governor of Fujian and Zhejiang, he made every effort to advocate the Fujian Shipbuilding Bureau, and carried out the manufacture of steamships and the cultivation of modern military and diplomatic talents. Fujian Shipbuilding, the birthplace of China's modern military industry, gradually developed under the preparation of Zuo Zongtang's "day and night zoning, exhausted and exhausted". However, just when Fujian's shipbuilding career was in full swing, the military situation in the northwest interrupted Zuo Zongtang's career. In the fifth year of Tongzhi (1866), Zuo Zongtang was ordered to leave the southeast coast and enter Shaanxi to preside over the military. After receiving the edict, he looked at the Mawei shipyard under construction, and said to his subordinates anxiously: This time, "Traveling thousands of miles to the west, there is no other relationship, but this has not been completed, and I am afraid that it will not be finalized at this time, so I am anxious!" When he visited Lin Zexu's son-in-law Shen Baozhen Ding Wei was at home and did not care about political affairs, Zuo Zongtang immediately raised Shen Baozhen to the imperial court, and Zuo Zongtang said in the excerpt of recommending Shen Baozhen: Shen Baozhen "has always been serious in his work, and he is also fair and honest", and asked the imperial court to take Shen Baozhen as the minister of shipping to take over his unfinished business. This "Zhuge of this world" even followed the example of Uncle Liu Huang of the Later Han Dynasty, and did not hesitate to "look at the thatched house three times", saying that Shen Baozhen, who was disheartened and unhappy, went out of the mountain and presided over the overall situation of the shipyard.

But who would have thought that just a few years later, Zuo Zongtang's attitude towards the shipmaster and Shen Baozhen would take a sharp turn for the worse?

In fact, not only the shipbuilding bureau, but also China's coastal defense cause was also regarded as revenge by Zuo Zongtang!

Li Hongzhang had already predicted that in this "great plan for coastal defense," Zuo Zongtang would definitely resolutely advocate "blocking defense" and wantonly obstructing "coastal defense"!

Zuo Zongtang has been in office for two years since he entered Shaanxi to the twelfth year of Tongzhi (1873). The people of the time commented on his merits as "suppressing the flattening of the return, trying to make the army real, raising the aftermath, cleaning up the officials, and caring for the people's livelihood". And he himself also called himself "wearing old fur, living in a felt tent, sleeping in a hu bed, drinking ice and lying in snow, and being exhausted".

Guan Long Xinping, Zuo Zongtang began to prepare for the invasion of Xinjiang again.

As early as the beginning of 1865, Aguba, the military leader of the Central Asian state of Kokand, took advantage of the anti-Qing armed rebellion in Xinjiang and relied on the support of Britain to invade Xinjiang and establish a so-called "Zhedeshar Khanate" in an attempt to completely separate Xinjiang from the Chinese territory. And Russia also seized the opportunity to forcibly occupy Ili and other places under the pretext of "recovering on behalf of China". And 10 years later, in 1875, after the pacification of Shaanxi and Gansu, Zuo Zongtang suddenly advocated-for-tat, led troops into Xinjiang, completely quelled the rebellion, and recovered Xinjiang.

Zuo Zongtang's words were fierce to play the imperial court: "I am in Dingding, Yandu, Mongolia, and the north of the Ministry of Sanitation, and there has been no beacon alarm for more than 100 years...... The situation is very different from the past. The Russians are expanding their territory day by day, from west to east for more than 10,000 miles, connecting with our northern border, and only the middle section is covered by the Mongolian department. The salary should be far away, and the curve should be the first, especially for those who are not prepared. ”

The reason why Zuo Zongtang is so active in asking for the recovery of Xinjiang is that he has done nothing else, in order to achieve a lifetime of fame and completely overwhelm Zeng Guofan!

Xue Fucheng believes that Zuo Zongtang's biggest weakness is his obsession with "striving for merit". For Zuo Zongtang, merit is more important than everything. Proving that he is the most capable person in the world, or in other words, proving that others are not as good as himself is the first driving force in his heart. With "Today's Brightness", his understanding of Zhuge Liang seems to be limited to his "three-point world" work, rather than his mental skills.

In February of the third year of Xianfeng, Zuo Zongtang's troops occupied Hangzhou, and he was crowned the prince because of his merits. Around this time, Zeng Guofan said in a twist and turn that his army "cleared the south". Shennan belongs to Zhejiang, and after Zuo Zongtang read it, his first reaction was that Zeng Guofan was competing with him for merit, and he moved to consult Zeng's family to make a big crusade. In fact, as long as you read it carefully, you will know that the Nan mentioned by Zeng Guofan refers to the Nanxiang of She County, which is in Anhui, not competing with Zuo. Zeng Guofan then "reinstated the consultation and ridiculed". This incident was a joke for a while.

The dispute between the Young Heavenly King that led to the final break between Zeng and Zuo was actually a struggle between Zuo Zongtang and Zeng Guofan. And this way of fighting for merit was repeated again after the battle of "flat twisting".

The battle of "Ping Twist" was led by Li Hongzhang, with Zuo Zongtang commanding the Chu army to cooperate. After the end of the war, the Huai army naturally took the lead. But Zuo Zongtang was not convinced, "I don't take it as a matter of course that the Huai Army annihilates the thieves, and search in many ways", and wants to catch Li Hongzhang's handle. The symbol of the pacification of the Twisted Army was that its commander Zhang Zongyu committed suicide by throwing himself into the river, but the problem was that although some people saw Zhang Zongyu throwing himself into the river, Zhang Zongyu's body was never recovered. Zuo Zongtang therefore suspected that Zhang Zongyu might have escaped, so he repeated the old trick and ordered his subordinates to quietly go out to search and arrest, and he must get Zhang Zongyu's whereabouts as soon as possible. Zuo Zongtang's approach angered Li Hongzhang, who sent a letter to Zeng Guofan, scolding Zuo Zongtang for being Cao Cao, saying: "The destruction of Zhang Twist this time is a combination of time, place, and reality, and only Zuo Gonggong will be able to do it to the end." Concealing his true colors, he is revealed here, and I don't know why Hu Wenzhong (Hu Linyi) pushed it as promised that day. ”

And this time, just when Zuo Zongtang was determined to fight in Xinjiang and was ready to play the last big scene of his life, the war broke out in the southeast sea and Xinjiang, and the Japanese invasion of Taiwan occurred.

What made Zuo Zongtang feel intolerable was that Lin Yizhe, with the support and help of Shen Baozhen and Li Hongzhang, stood out in this sea and land war, and not only became a rare "capable member" of the Qing Dynasty's "civil and military all-rounder", but the aura imposed on Lin Yizhe by the Battle of Taiwan actually overshadowed himself!

Although Zuo Zongtang has always paid attention to coastal defense, but now he wants to enter Xinjiang and achieve a new "great cause", of course he will not sit idly by and watch the imperial court make a strategic choice of "supporting the east and turning the west"!