Chapter 513 Weihai Weiqian (I)

The wind is calm and the waves are calm, and the current Bohai Sea is like the situation in Northeast Asia. At least on the surface, it seems to be very calm, there are no 'waves', but who can guarantee that this calm will last?

Although the "Northeast Asia crisis" caused by Japan's brazen establishment of the "Kwantung Agency" has finally eased through the mediation and mediation of Britain, the United States, and other European and American powers, China and Japan have each taken a step back, and the tense military confrontation has been lifted, as long as Japan continues to stretch its tentacles to Northeast Asia, there will be no real lasting peace in Northeast Asia.

Now in the Bohai Bay, the sea surface is sparkling, several steamers are lined up in a column, from north to south, the steamer is hung with the rice flag, the destination is Weihaiwei, including five merchant ships, two cruisers.

Now that the fleet was not far from Weihaiwei, the steamers had slowed down and sounded their whistles to signal the pilots in the harbor to enter the harbor as soon as possible.

Weihaiwei is located in the northern part of Shandong. At the mouth of the Bohai Bay, which used to be the port where the Beiyang Naval Division of the Qing Dynasty was stationed, and the Lushun Military Port in the north of the Bohai Bay formed a horn in the south and the north, jointly defending the 'gate' of Beijing and Tianjin, this conservative coastal defense idea was eventually proved to be a failure, and the collapse of the Beiyang Naval Division announced the temporary demise of the "maritime dream" of a mainland nation, and since then, China's coastal defense has basically not been talked about, there is no sea defense, this is the current situation of coastal defense in this oriental country.

Without coastal defense, there is no way to defend national sovereignty and territorial integrity, the defeat of the Sino-Japanese First Sino-Japanese War made the great powers see China's weakness, so the weak 'meat' was eaten by force, the fleet of Tsarist Russia quickly occupied the port of Arthur, under the pretext of "helping China spy on the Japanese navy", but no matter how kind the wolf's eyes were, it was a wolf after all, and even the dim-witted Manchu court could see this, so when the British government offered to help China "spy on the Russian navy", The Qing court immediately agreed, and the price was the "Weihaiwei leased land", which was once the port of berth of the Beiyang Naval Division, and became the territory of the British Navy. Together with the German sphere of influence in the southern part of Shandong, it provides a very intuitive interpretation of the situation of this weak country.

Britain's choice of Weihaiwei as a military base in North China was fully taken into account Britain's Far East strategy, and Weihaiwei could not only monitor the Beijing-Tianjin region nearby, but could also simultaneously monitor the Japanese-occupied Liaodong Peninsula and German-occupied Qingdao; as long as Britain's Far East policy of uniting Japan to resist Germany and Japan to contain Russia remained unchanged, Weihaiwei would be of decisive strategic significance.

It was for this reason that Weihaiwei had to serve the global strategy of the British government, and now it has been used by the British government as a "transit point for refugees" to receive Korean anti-Japanese elements who had been transferred from northeastern China and exiles who did not want to live under the control of the Japanese colonial authorities in Korea.

Now, the five British merchant ships heading to Weihaiwei were on a paramilitary mission to transport Koreans, while the two British cruisers were escort ships, and their port of departure was not the Japanese-occupied Lushun, but the Qinhuangdao coal port, not far south of Shanhaiguan.

The five merchant ships carried more than 10,000 Koreans, most of whom were former anti-Japanese guerrilla fighters and officers, who had now been disarmed and were refugees in exile. The Chinese central government also did not intend to receive these foreign exiles who could not speak well, so the final destination of these Korean anti-Japanese elements was in Nanyang.

According to the written agreement reached by China, Japan, Russia, the United Kingdom, and the United States, once China agrees to prohibit its citizens from providing personnel, funds, and arms support to the anti-Japanese forces in Korea, then the British and American governments will provide shelter to the anti-Japanese exiles in Korea, and considering that China is indeed incapable of receiving such a large number of foreign exiles, the British and American governments have reluctantly agreed to transfer some of the Korean anti-Japanese exiles to various parts of the South Seas "on a voluntary basis." Some people will go to work on rubber plantations in Malaya, others will go to Manila in the Philippines to work as dock workers, and as for those who really don't want to go to the South Seas, Britain and the United States will not force them, and as for how they should be settled, that is a matter for the central government of China.

The Five-Power Agreement was a painstakingly finalized agreement, and after almost a month of sheltering the North Korean anti-Japanese fighters who had been evacuated from the Korean Peninsula to northeastern China, the first group of exiles finally set out for Weihaiwei in order to screen them, where they would choose their future paths.

The transfer of anti-Japanese exiles from Korea to Nanyang for resettlement, and the sheer number of them, is surprisingly large, and this is the most "newsworthy" event in modern human history. After all, the international community has never dealt with the refugee problem caused by the military colonization of a country in such a high-profile manner before, and perhaps this is an opportunity to promote cooperation between the governments of various countries, so as to pave the way for the settlement of international disputes through negotiation and to avoid war. Many people of insight are calling for the formation of a transnational coalition political organization to resolve conflicts between countries in a just and peaceful manner as adjudicators.

As a matter of fact, for the purpose of the resettlement, China, Japan, Russia, Britain, and the United States did set up a non-military organization with international "color" color, called the "Far East Peace Commission," with US President Taft as the honorary chairman of the committee, and Mr. Stade, the British minister to China, as the executive chairman.

In view of the increasing tensions in Europe and the imminent outbreak of war in the Balkans, in order to avoid an all-European war, the journalists from various countries covering the evacuation of exiles also focused on the "Far East Peace Commission", hoping to learn from the experience of this organization in mediating international conflicts.

As the editor-in-chief of the Far East of The Times, Mr. Morrison took matters into his own hands. He has followed up on the cross-border transfer of exiles, and now he is sitting on the foredeck of a merchant ship outside the port of Weihaiwei, sitting on a bundle of cables, carefully sorting out his interview notes.

There were a lot of people on the deck, and when they saw that they were about to arrive at the port, many Koreans who had been staying in the cabin walked out of the cabin one after another, standing on the side of the ship and looking at Weihaiweijun Port. Perhaps, they will never return to their homeland, after all, the Japanese government has officially announced the annexation of Korea, and the end of the "Northeast Asia Crisis" seems to be the official recognition of Japan's annexation of Korea by the great powers, and even China seems to have accepted the reality.

Morrison could not concentrate due to the cries on the deck, so he stopped what he was doing for a moment, put the interview notes and the pen in his briefcase, then got up from the pile of cables, carried the briefcase to the bridge, and bribed a sailor on duty with a cigar to find a corner on the bridge in order to continue his work.

It might have been quieter back in the cabin, but now that the weather is too hot and the smell is too strong, it would be better to be on the bridge, with an awning, and a group of British and Japanese officers who would have taken refuge from the noise on the deck, which would have been more convenient if Morrison wanted to interview.

But now Morrison doesn't want to interview those British officers anymore, although those British people are full of gentlemen, but they are conservative and stubborn, and they really can't dig out more useful information from their mouths, Morrison doesn't want to 'deal' with these British officers anymore, as for the Japanese officers, they are more difficult to deal with than the British officers, in Morrison's opinion, those Japanese officers are simply a group of "dumb".

Morrison even believed that the reason why these Japanese naval officers appeared on the ship was not to supervise the transfer of refugees, but to spy on the Weihaiwei military port, after all, the British navy's military port was not always willing to be opened to the outside world, even if Japan was an ally of Britain.

Because the deck is so noisy, many people who have a 'door' road regard these awnings by the bridge as a paradise. He also hid by bribing the sailors, and just as Morrison took out his interview notes from his briefcase, an officer with an oriental face also hid in this hideaway, whistling as he went, and judging by his uniform, he was neither a Japanese officer nor a British officer, but a Chinese officer.

Morrison immediately became interested in the Chinese officer, there were many officers from all over the world, but there were only a few Chinese officers, and like the Japanese officers, they did not have a good impression of European journalists, and it was rare for a Chinese officer to hang out here, Morrison decided to try his luck to see if the other party was also planning to be a "dumb man".

"Hey! Hello, Mr. Officer. Judging by your rank, you seem to be a naval lieutenant? If you were a major, you would be too young, and you would have made great achievements. ”

Morrison walked up to him, and the opening was a few words of flattery, which, combined with his fluency in Chinese, immediately made the Chinese officer feel good about him.

"That's right, I'm a major, but this navy uniform is borrowed, and I'm in the army."

The Chinese officer smiled and nodded, then removed the navy hat from his head, revealing a bare head and a scar on his forehead that was very striking.

"My name is Morrison and I'm a correspondent for The Times, I'm Australian, not British, mind you, I'm Australian." Morrison held out his hand and introduced himself.

The officer smiled faintly again, stretched out his hand, shook Morrison's hand in a friendly manner, and introduced himself.

"Hello, Mr. Morrison, my name is Jiang Yiwu, and I am currently a liaison officer of the 'Far East Peace Commission', although I am wearing a navy uniform, but I am indeed in the army, please note that I am an army officer."