Section XXIX: Diplomatic Negotiations

Beijing is still in chaos, and it's even more chaotic than ever. Pen | fun | pavilion www. ｂｉｑｕｇｅ。 ｉｎｆｏ

Because of the deaths of Cixi and Guangxu, many of the children of the Eight Banners went crazy.

In fact, most of the children of the Eight Banners, especially the lower-class Eight Banners, have lived a very difficult life.

The so-called hardcore crops, after the depreciation of silver to less than half of the value of the Kangqian period, it was not easy to make a living.

After the Wuxu Reform, the imperial court deducted money and grain again and again, and their lives could not go on, so the Wuxu Reform Law was resolutely opposed by the conservatives, in fact, to a large extent, it was because Guangxu and Kang Youwei did not get the support of other forces that the wave of people rashly offended the Eight Banners forces.

Although life is hard, Cixi and Guangxu are here, and they can still have some hope. But these two people died suddenly, and according to the understanding of the Chinese, China is almost a dead country. For a while, thousands of poor children of the Eight Banners suddenly saw no hope, and the destitute people were very crazy in despair.

That night, the children of the Eight Banners frantically went to the camp of the Eight-Nation Alliance to set fire, and then the sneak attack that had disappeared began again, and for a time the robbery of the Eight-Nation Alliance was suppressed, and once again began to put out fires everywhere in the city and suppress the riots.

After the violent attack began, it quickly changed its taste, all kinds of cows, ghosts, snakes, and gods, what little hooligans, little gangsters, all ran out, and the riot evolved from targeting the Eight-Nation Coalition Army into a full-scale robbery, and the palace and other official properties had already been looted by the Eight-Nation Alliance, and the eyes of these low-level bao people were eyed at the slightly more solid rich households, and even on the poor people's homes.

Tensions in the city, coupled with persistent hunger, have driven refugees to flee the city, and Beijing has become almost a hell.

The German command issued a ban on the movement of all soldiers at night, the prohibition of acting alone, and so on.

Yang Chao didn't dare to go out casually, even if he was in Dongjiaomin Lane, he couldn't go out alone.

Formal negotiations began in September.

Li Hongzhang really made the same mistake again, and began to engage in tandem in private, and had private contacts with various countries.

But in the end, there was still no way to bypass the British to set up those few articles for him, the first to apologize, and the second to pay reparations.

It is already unexpected not to be able to cut the land, Cixi caused such a big mess, and it is a miracle that she can not lose the land, the purpose of Li Hongzhang's tandem is to reduce the compensation, after all, the foreigners want too much.

Li Hongzhang also achieved some results, at least convincing the Americans, who appealed that the reparations would not exceed the Chinese government's ability to compensate, so that their finances would be bankrupt and their independence would be affected. The United States first proposed that the total amount of reparations should not exceed 200 million US dollars, and later proposed that it should not exceed 40 million pounds.

It's not enough, and the Americans don't count it.

The Russians resolutely blocked the progress of the peace talks and demanded a billion dollars in compensation; The Germans also demanded a high level of reparations, believing that they could not pay less than the five billion francs that the French had compensated them that year, worth 700 million taels of silver.

On the one hand, the Russians obstructed the progress of the negotiations, and on the other hand, they actively launched the Northeast Offensive, which they occupied from Qiqihar to Shenyang and other large cities, and actively eliminated the resistance forces, and carried out one massacre after another in the Northeast, such as the Hailanpao Massacre.

The military action of the Russians caused unanimous protests from various countries, and at the same time accelerated the concessions on the issue of reparations.

The British took out customs data and asked countries to formulate compensation requirements according to the capacity of customs.

It adds up to more than 460 million taels of silver, and the British subtracted a fraction of a whole number, which is 450 million taels of silver.

But the Russians still disagreed, they decided that the Chinese could compensate more, and also wooed the Germans to ask for more, after all, Germany had a dead minister. But the diplomacy of the Russians was too tender in front of the British, and the Germans sided with the British, preferring less money and ending the war as soon as possible, while the Russians ate too fat. At the same time, he expressed concern about the Northeast issue.

450 million taels, this is the number, the British say that one cent cannot be more, but not one point less.

All that the countries could negotiate was the question of proportional distribution, with the Germans demanding the most division on the grounds that they had suffered a lot of losses, and the Russians demanding a large part of the division on the grounds that they had sent the most troops.

In order to get the Russians to sign early, the British made concessions and persuaded Germany to agree to the largest amount of reparations to be given to Russia, and in the end Russia ranked first with 28.97%, Germany with 20.02%, France with 15.75% ranked third, and Britain with 11.25% only ranked fourth.

On the contrary, Japan accounted for the fifth place with 7.73% of the reparations, higher than the United States' 7.32%, while other countries Italy shared 5.91%, Belgium shared 1.89%, and the rest of the countries and regions accounted for less than 1%.

It stands to reason that the Japanese contributed the most to the attack on Beijing, but this is not really compensated according to the losses, but is distributed according to who is more difficult to entangle, so the Russians who do not want to stop the war will get the most, as for the real contribution, although they sent the most troops, but the Russian soldiers are in the northeast to conquer the city for themselves, not only did not contribute to the attack on Beijing, but let all countries do not want to see it, rather they do not send these troops.

It was talked about until mid-October, and finally reached an agreement, but it would take some time to sign, and he would preside over the signing after the arrival of the commander-in-chief of the coalition forces, German Field Marshal Waldsee, which was regarded as taking care of the face of the Germans.

During this time, Yang Chao was not idle, inspecting and interviewing around the city of Beijing.

"With this thing, you should be able to recover some losses, right? Now there is a lack of a leader. ”

Yang Chao was holding a thick copy of the materials that he had been interviewing victims in Beijing in the past few days, including the clerks of various yamen, the descendants of the royal palace, and the homes of those who had been looted, and even spent money to buy a large number of photos taken by foreigners.

A diplomatic agreement had been reached, and Yang Chao's stay in Beijing had no effect, and he planned to return to Shandong.

At the same time, he persuaded the German commander Bauer to allow Yang Chao to bring a group of Huayong Company soldiers' families back to Qingdao, and allowed some Huayong Company soldiers to escort them to the port of Tianjin, and then take the German cruiser to the south.

Yang Chao's statement is that when the German army withdraws from Beijing, if the army is followed by a large number of women and children, it will be detrimental to the image of the German army, and when Marshal Wadsey comes, I don't know what attitude will be towards the image of the German army.

Bauer was also worried about leaving a bad impression in front of Wadsey, who for various reasons, never accepted the robbery, and historically, after he arrived in Beijing, he firmly denied that the German army had participated in the robbery, at least thinking that after he arrived in Beijing, the German army never looted again, but the fact is that the German army has always been the most fierce in robbery.

At least it shows that Wadsey is a person who wants to be faced, so he will not accept robbery, especially the barbaric act of robbing people.

So Bauer had to wipe his ass clean before Wadsey arrived.

Therefore, let Yang Chao take these people back, he thought it was necessary, and actively cooperated, and even the warship was contacted by him.

On the wharf of Tianjin port, Hua Yonglian soldiers and their daughters-in-law were reluctant, for more than a month, they were familiar with each other, what is the ban on contact, no one takes it seriously, so they secretly carry out certain activities in private, in fact, it has not been broken, Yang Chao suspects that there must be a girl pregnant with a child now, because the boat vomited too much.