After meeting Zhang Kangren, Song Biao deliberately left him for a light meal at night, and then continued to wait for Gu Weijun's news in Yangshan Hall.

Gu Weijun went to see Sen Ke in the afternoon, and Song Biao didn't know what the final result would be.

At 9 o'clock in the evening, when Empress Shu sent a maid to persuade Song Biao to rest early, Gu Weijun hurriedly returned from the Consulate General in Shanghai.

Unconsciously, he is also just at the time of knowing the destiny of heaven, middle-aged and elegant, solemn and calm, as an official of the inner court, he and cabinet officials are different, usually have to wear a dress, this dress is also a new thing of reformism, round stand-up collar, front chest and two sleeves are made of Shu embroidery process, embroidered with traditional lines of sinuous traditional ornamentation, with ink style plum blossom and cloud pattern as the theme, blue and white lines on a black background.

Entering the study room of Yangshan Hall, Gu Weijun bowed to the emperor and said, "Your Majesty has seen the emperor." ”

Seeing him coming, Song Biao waved his hand to let the young maid go down, and then asked Gu Weijun to sit down, and said, "How did you talk to Yue Ben over there?" ”

Gu Weijun pondered for a moment with a steady expression, and then replied: "Returning to the emperor, although it is expected to be difficult, the conditions proposed by Mr. Sen Ke, the deputy minister of foreign affairs, are indeed too bizarre, and his subordinates try their best to explain and persuade him, but the effect is not good. Judging from the current negotiations, His Majesty thinks that this country and nation have been kidnapped by some special and arrogant interest group, and are moving towards an even more dangerous level. Even if Japan pays a significant price and reaches an agreement to stop the race to a certain extent, it will eventually face more provocations. ”

Song Biao bowed slightly, he knew that Gu Weijun was a smart and steady and introverted person, and he also had a wonderful talent that others did not have, genius was always omnipresent, this person was the kind of person with a high IQ and emotional intelligence, who was good at restraint, and knew when and where to burst out his strength in a clever way.

Very nice talent.

Since Song Biao became emperor, he has used four chiefs of the inner court, each with its own characteristics, Yuan Jinkai is a master of judging the situation; Chen Qi is determined first, always has perfect preparations, and is good at grasping the key points and making precise shots, and can allocate thousands of catties in four or two; Wang Zhao's inscriptions are brilliant, and he has always had a set of special skills that others do not possess in carrying out propaganda work, and he has also deeply studied the issues of nationality, religion, and various isms. Gu Weijun is shrewd and introverted, and there is no lack of alertness in his stability.

Song Biao thought for a moment, believing that Gu Weijun must have been seriously provoked and threatened by Sen Ke in the Imperial Mansion, so he asked him, "What did the deputy minister of foreign affairs of the Great Imperial Empire say?" ”

Gu Weijun replied in an orderly manner: "Returning to the emperor, His Majesty made it clear that Yue Ben was facing a relatively serious financial crisis, and China said that there was no serious military conflict between the two countries, and hoped that Yue Ben and China would suspend the current arms race, live in peace, solve problems through consultation and negotiation as much as possible, and make concessions to each other." Mr. Sen Ke probably realized that we were wrong, or judged that there was other conspiracy behind our unprovoked concession, in short, he immediately put forward four requirements to us without thinking, the first is that the scale of China's existing naval cruisers must be maintained at 7 percent, and the excess part must be completely dismantled within this year, and China's coast guard can only operate in coastal waters, and the total tonnage shall not exceed 30,000 tons; Second, in view of the irreparable national losses caused by the increase in military spending in order to maintain national security, and the apparent equal respect of our country for the Great Empire, we must return the Western Ryukyu Islands ceded by the Chinese and Xinhai Wars, and promise not to retain the fleet base in the Pacific Ocean, withdraw the naval detachment in Semarang, Indonesia, and abolish the naval bases in New Caledonia and Bosnia; Third, in order to maintain permanent peace, the military expenditure of the Chinese Navy should not exceed the capital of the Chinese Navy for a permanent time, and the total military expenditure of the Chinese National Defense Forces should not be higher than 1.4 times the cost of the Chinese National Defense Forces, and the two sides should jointly undertake to disarm and maintain an equal number of aircraft; and fourth, China should open the traditional Manchuria region in the northeast and the Far East to the capital. ”

"Oh?"

Song Biao was also a little surprised, and asked Gu Weijun, "Are there such harsh conditions?" Can you still talk about it now? ”

Gu Weijun said: "Where the holy order is, we must do our best, under the advice and persuasion of his subordinates, Mr. Sen Ke believes that the first and fourth articles can be subtracted from a part of the requirements, and the first and fourth articles are the rights that can not be conceded by the book, and the second and third articles can be negotiated. ”

Song Biao sneered and asked Gu Weijun, "What do you think?" ”

Gu Weijun thought for a moment and replied: "Your Majesty thinks that there are some special and powerful forces in the country that do not intend to make any concessions at all, and they put their own interests above the entire Chinese state and nation, and this is the main factor that the Chinese and Chinese problems cannot be solved for a long time. Looking at the whole story, the army and capital are no longer serving the state, but are above the state, forming a monopoly force combining the military and the chaebol, and Mr. Sen Ke is undoubtedly the representative of it. Although His Majesty thought that the pressure of the current financial crisis was very great, and that the conditions were ripe for China to finally reach a de-escalation of the military competition, and that it was indeed more likely that a treaty could be reached to ease the situation, in the long run, it was true that all problems between China and China could only be resolved through war. Or, as the emperor said, the problem is that the interests of some people are higher than the whole country, and politicians no longer have the overall view of the big picture that they used to have in the days of Hirobumi Ito. ”

Song Biao thought for a moment and sighed: "Yes, as you said, even if a relief agreement is reached, it lacks practical significance. At this stage, most countries and nations need a strong adversary to remain united, just as we need to maintain a long-term anti-Soviet propaganda, and we do this precisely because we need to guard against the Soviet Union launching a war to regain lost territory, and even if the Soviet Union launched such a war, strong national anti-Soviet sentiment will ensure that we will launch a full-scale counterattack with some kind of righteous posture and not from the position of an aggressor country. Propaganda is the only way to expand the toughness against China and obtain more benefits, don't the politicians and soldiers in this book know how strong the current Chinese empire really is? They obviously knew, but only they knew what they thought and how they profited from it. ”

Gu Weijun said: "Your Majesty is really lamenting for such a country and such a political axe. ”

Song Biao replied, "Who said it wasn't? If we are sure that we cannot reach an optimistic agreement, we might as well publish the whole process publicly, so that the media can report it at any time, and Suo will use this country as a way to unite the people, although it is not the main enemy on the road to the rise of the empire. ”

Gu Weijun seemed to have some concerns, and thought for a moment before saying: "Your Majesty, your subordinates think that the current policy of the Imperial Court seems to be to pull the two alliances of Britain and China and France into a fierce confrontation or even war at the same time, in order to achieve their goals, but what their goals are, our country seems to have a more comprehensive and clear understanding." ”

Song Biao thought for a moment and said: "The goal of this is Southeast Asia, the Philippines, Malay, Indonesia, and Papua are all their goals, but how to seize it in the end depends on the development of the situation, which goal suddenly becomes more realistic, which goal they will strive for, and we need to curb this expansion to avoid the further expansion of the strength of the capital." ”

Gu Weijun said: "Therefore, the current policy should be to fish in troubled waters, deliberately using the threat of our navy to create an international camp confrontation and draw Britain in, in order to have a chance to occupy a place." ”

Song Biao sighed.

He felt that it was not worth it, the empire was no longer the empire of the past, and he was not at all a competitor that the empire needed to focus on, but he was taking advantage of the rise of the empire to try to draw Britain and the United States and other countries into this competition, not only to contain China, but also to seek the most beneficial interests from it.

This situation is suddenly very similar to the relationship between China and China a century later.

Just as the empire skillfully exploited the threat of the Soviet Union to the world and Europe to reduce the worries and countermeasures of Britain and the United States against the empire, each country is striving for the most advantageous situation for its own country, but in this world where power is right, such use will eventually turn into a brutal war.

Poor world.

Song Biao sighed like this, and instructed Gu Weijun: "No matter what, you still have to do what you should do your best, you continue to contact for a period of time, and arrange for him to come to see me at the appropriate time." If it is really impossible to reach a pact of relief that will benefit both countries, it is better to take full advantage of the greed of the Zoben! ”

Gu Weijun nodded yes, and then said goodbye and left.

In his opinion, the threat of the book is simply insignificant, and it needs to be dealt with calmly, and there is no need to further intensify the matter, let alone destroy the great process of the great recovery revolution of the Chinese nation.

The real greatest threat to the empire today comes from the Great Depression that preceded the collapse of the gold standard and the world economic crisis, which this time will be unprecedented.

Song Biao's consistent style is that when something is objectively unavoidable, he will ask for a surname to let it happen, and even for the sake of maximizing national interests, he does not hesitate to toss this matter more violently.

For this kind of collapse of the gold standard, Song Biao has been thinking more about how to maximize national interests in the past few days, and his answer can only be that Suo will worsen the situation and completely hit the order of the whole world.

After the Spring Festival, Shanghai ushered in a night rain, dripping with the moisture of the ocean, Song Biao was so silent alone in Yangshan Hall thinking about the future of the Chinese Empire, the rain outside fell into the pond, Lin Lin sprinkled, very crisp.

Until late at night, Song Biao also summoned the newly promoted first-class chamberlain Fu Yisheng (Fu Zuoyi) to his office and instructed some of the latest decisions, even after Fu Yisheng left, he still did not go back to rest.

The night in Shanghai is so cold and lonely, it is the spring rain as soft as oil, which reflects the loneliness and perseverance in Song Biao's heart more and more, he is plain and tenacious and looks at everything in front of him, the truth of killing a thousand enemies and hurting himself eight hundred is really correct, and it can never be avoided.

At this moment, Song Biao had already thought very clearly, he not only wanted to ensure that China's rise was not affected by the capital, but also punished the capital within the scope of his remaining strength, and did not give the capital a chance to expand, and his determination would not be changed on this point.

Since the confrontation and conflict between China and China in the Pacific Ocean is unavoidable, he will magnify the problem and force him to dance in heavy shackles.

The empire's military spending is still very large, and if it does not even need basic national defense for the sake of development, such development is also the most vulnerable.

……

In the following days, Gu Weijun had been secretly negotiating with Sen Ke, the vice minister of foreign affairs, and Sen Ke also knew that the Chinese emperor was in Shanghai, and he was actually negotiating with the Chinese emperor, but it was precisely because of this that Sen Ke became more and more tough, leaving little room for China at all, as if it was not only the capital that had military superiority, but also the one who had absolute financial advantage.

At this time, Song Biao, who was in Shanghai, understood more and more clearly that his efforts to ease the Sino-Chinese competition were in vain, and as long as he was still on the road of chaebol militarism, he would not give up his ambition to use the British-Chinese alliance to unscrupulously pursue huge profits.

Even so, Song Biao agreed to meet with the foreign minister of the country, who is known for being a hardliner on China.

In the morning, Song Biao watched the bamboo forest and rockery scenery by the pond in the green wave corridor of Sansui Hall, sat on the rattan chair in the corridor, arranged a delicate tea table beside him, placed a stack of raw peanuts and almonds, and brewed a pot of oolong tea at will.

On the tea table, there is a cabinet radio produced by the Shanghai Jiangnan Electronics Company, which plays the opera program of the China Broadcasting Corporation, and plays the Kunqu opera "Liang Shanbo and Zhu Yingtai".

China's home appliance industry was born by following and emulating the United States, from the earliest radios to washing machines, to air conditioners and new rice cookers, at the end of last year, the first TV was also born in Yanjing Great Wall Electronics Company, which was first produced for supporting radar engineering and radio telescopes, and the technical engineer responsible for developing the TV was Russian Vladimir. Sforrogin, because of some technical flaws, later also bought out the American Ferro. Patents of Farnsworth.

The empire in the electronics industry is dominated by Yanjing's Great Wall Electronics, Shanghai's Jiangnan Electronics and Northeast Shenzhou Electronics Company, because the technology is developed and introduced by the Central Electronics Research Institute, and the three companies have been authorized to do so, but in the end, who will become the overlord of China's TV industry, it depends on their own creation.

The music on the radio is very moving, and in this spring in the south of the Yangtze River, it seems more and more affectionate.

It was listening to such music that Song Biao also found a rare trace of comfort and tranquility in these days, lit a Yuxi cigar for himself, and enjoyed the morning of spring in the south of the Yangtze River.

Just in the most beautiful moment, Fu Yisheng came over, told Song Biao, and soon left, and when Fu Yisheng came back, he had already invited a not tall official wearing a Western-style black dress.

Song Biao sometimes wonders how he grew taller later, in his images over the years, except for Akiyama Shinyuki, he has hardly seen many tall people, most of them are very short.

He originally thought that the foreign vice minister of Mori Ke's hardline against China would definitely be the same as Yuzaburo Kato, who was respectful on the surface, but in fact arrogant and rude, and the result was also a bit unexpected.

Sen Ke followed Fu Yisheng all the way very respectfully, bowed deeply, and emphasized in the familiarity of the Northeast accent: "It is said that Sen Ke, the Vice Minister of Foreign Affairs, will see His Majesty the Great Emperor Hua. ”

Sen Ke probably didn't expect that Emperor Hua would receive him in such a friendly and approachable way, and there was some indescribable excitement and excitement in his heart, his face was flushed, and he seemed to have a lot to say, and he seemed extremely restrained.

Song Biao didn't have much hope for the reception of him, and usually asked Fu Yisheng to sit at the tea table, and asked the waiter to prepare a pot of the same oolong tea.

After sitting down, Sen Ke seemed even more excited, and couldn't wait to be grateful: "Being summoned by His Majesty the Emperor Hua is really the greatest honor in this life, and being able to meet Your Majesty, the greatest emperor in Chinese history, has become more and more aware of what a great era he lives in, and there is no doubt that this is the glory of the whole of Asia." ”

"Oh?"

Song Biao was very skeptical of the sincerity of his words, and he had no intention of wasting time with him politely, so he said: "I have heard about the negotiation between Chief Gu and you, and it is obviously not optimistic, so I hope that you will personally express the requirements of your own country, and I hope you can understand that although Chief Gu is my special envoy, he said no, there is still room for coordination between the two countries, but if I directly say no, then it can really only end here." ”

Sen Ke immediately replied: "Your Majesty, Emperor Hua, I understand very well that when China said that the two countries stopped the military competition at the present stage, our country also had this intention, but it was impossible to determine the sincerity and true strategic intention of the Chinese side. China and Ben are both the most powerful modern countries in Asia, and we have the right to share in this huge world, China is on land, and China is on the sea, which is the best situation between the two countries, but in the past few years, China has been trying to expand its navy and occupy the maritime interests that should belong to our country, which is really not appropriate and inappropriate. If the following statement is correct, the First World War broke out precisely because Britain's maritime interests were encroached upon by Germany, which was originally a land power. Your Majesty, as the greatest emperor in the history of China and Asia, you put yourself in the shoes of China, China already has the superiority of the army and air force, and has half of Asia's land territory and colonies, and it has to compete with China for these small islands in the ocean, which are insignificant to China. Just as China does not blindly pursue the hegemony of the army and air force and hegemony on the Asian continent, our country very much hopes that China will be able to restrain its expansion attempts in the Pacific and Southeast Asian waters, and only by mutual restraint and humility can China and the two Asian powers coexist? ”

Song Biao bowed slightly, and said: "What you said is very reasonable, it is true that China and China need to be humble to each other, but you should not forget that China's maritime territory is much larger than that of China, and with the development of economic and trade relations between China and foreign countries, we also need more fleets to maintain national interests." In Asia, we can maintain a humble attitude of mutual coexistence towards the country, but we cannot say that Japan cannot even develop its economy, trade, and interests in South America, Africa, and the Middle East. Just because you don't have the ability to extend your interests to the region doesn't mean we don't! ”

Sen Ke replied: "Your Majesty Emperor Hua, "Sima Fa" said that although the country is big, the belligerent will die. China is indeed very large, and there are also many internal problems, and in this respect it is far inferior to China, which is very small, but the will of the people is firm and united, and there is absolutely no tendency towards division and autonomy, but your country is different. Expansion for the sake of expansion, your country will definitely offend many powerful countries in Britain and the United States, and the gains outweigh the losses, so it is better to keep to the status quo and seek stability as the country's best policy. ”

Song Biao said: "Although the country is big, the belligerent will die; Although the world is safe, forgetting the war will be dangerous. This is the best policy for governing the country and securing the country. We have studied the question of how China is going to govern in depth than you, so you don't need to use this as a reason here. ”

Sen Ke replied: "There are many ancient Chinese philosophers, and there are endless famous sayings and aphorisms, which are admirable. ”

Song Biao smiled and exclaimed, "Interesting, well, it is indeed a bystander, and the authorities are fascinated, just as we can see the problems of the book, and the book can also see our problems." If I have to be reasonable, maybe I can't explain it in four or five days, I have always dealt with things simply and clearly, the financial situation of the Chinese navy is not very good, and the basic construction of China's navy has reached a suitable stage, and it is meaningless to expand it any longer, unless it continues to be threatened by the navy. If you think it's an opportune time to stop the race, we'll stop and slow down the pace of shipbuilding. Generally speaking, China does not have the idea of absolutely striving for superiority in the navy, and it is enough to maintain 70% of the capital ship in the field of capital ships, and at the same time have a sufficient number of cruisers to maintain and protect overseas interests and safeguard the international economic and trade relations of the empire. If we have to compete, our country can only accompany us to the end, but there are many things that I know, but you don't know, so I hope that I will not continue to provoke on this issue, which is a good thing for China, you can alleviate the financial crisis, and we can also govern the country with peace of mind and turn our energy back to the army. ”

Sen Ke immediately replied: "I want to correct one point, the whole country thinks that our country is facing a serious financial crisis, but in fact this is absolutely not the case, and our country's current financial situation is very good. ”

Song Biao didn't argue with him either, and said, "If you think the financial situation is good, then it's fine, I don't have any interest in this." There are some things that only I know, and you don't, and this is my kind advice to you. If the two sides can make a certain degree of concession and suspend the current competition, then China can hold formal negotiations. If we stubbornly hope that Japan will maintain its status as a weak naval power and insist that we withdraw from some of our basic interests in the Pacific, then there is really no need to talk about this matter. This is an era of power, and it is difficult to implement the principles of Confucianism in the whole world, so I will just say a basic situation here, you don't have to refuse in one go, just bring my meaning back to Prime Minister Tanaka. ”

Sen Ke was cautious and said, "Please tell your majesty clearly!" ”

Song Biao said: "My method is very simple, either we will take a step back and reach an agreement, or I will compete with you. If Ben insists on continuing to do low-level competition on a pointless warship like a cruiser, I'm happy to use this pointless attrition to toss with you. You think that the present stage is a competition, but that is really wrong, the real competition is that if you build a cruiser, we will build two cruisers and four submarines, and if you build one submarine, we will build four more submarines. Now it is not a competition at all, but we build ships according to the needs of our country, and if the expansion of your navy exceeds our expectations, then we can only really engage in this large-scale competition, and when this situation is fierce to a certain extent, we will naturally withdraw from the Washington Treaty and directly engage in a battleship race with you. ”

When he said this, Song Biao asked the waiter to come over with a wooden plate, put the leftover cigars on the wooden plate, and said to Sen Ke: "The environment here is good, you can do it yourself, I have said everything I should say." I am kind to tell each other, and I am willing to live in peace with him, but if you can't listen to him, and if you don't want to make peace, then I can't do anything. You should probably understand, or perhaps let the military department understand, that the last thing I fear in this day and age is war. ”

After saying this, Song Biao also sighed with a sigh, and seemed to get up a little sadly, and he didn't need to ask about the rest of the matter.

If he was willing to make peace, he was very happy, and at this stage he could deal with the coming world economic crisis with peace of mind, and if the talks were not proper, it didn't matter, what else is there to be afraid of in China today?

It's just that at the same time, it is always a difficult job to balance facing the provocation of Xiao Yuben and resisting the Great Depression.

Just before Song Biao met with Sen Ke, the vice minister of foreign affairs, he had ordered the Admiralty to reformulate the plan to build 12 additional 10,000-ton cruisers from 1928 to 1929.

During this period, the Imperial Navy had abandoned plans to build pocket battleships, and by comparing the Weihai-class, Fushun-class, and Xilingol-class cruisers, the Imperial Admiralty decided to build Changchun-class cruisers on the basis of the Xilingol-class cruisers.

This class of cruisers is an improved model of pocket combat cruisers, which ensures that the whole ship has the defensive effect of 8-inch guns through the area defense design structure, uses 12 6-inch main guns and a large number of secondary guns to enhance fire output, and has 4 37mm wheel-barreled anti-aircraft guns and 6 25mm single-barreled anti-aircraft guns in the air.

The standard displacement of the Changchun-class cruiser is 9450 tons, the displacement has not changed significantly compared with the Xilin Gol class, the armor defense effect has been reduced, and the mechanical fire control system and two seaplanes for anti-submarine reconnaissance have been added, and the number of anti-aircraft and high-speed cannons has increased significantly to strengthen the short-range and air defense, but the plan to modify the larger caliber main gun has not been considered in the establishment, and its speed can reach 33 knots as the standard configuration of the aircraft carrier fleet.

With the radar project nearing success, the Changchun-class cruiser will be the first warship in the Imperial Navy to add a radar system, and this will be the most important secret.

In fact, it is precisely because of the long-term confrontation with the Navy, as well as the long-term test of aircraft carrier operations, that the Imperial Navy has made up its mind to focus its navy on aircraft carriers. There are indeed many problems with aircraft carriers at this stage, but with the gradual breakthrough in the fields of radar, blocking locks, dive bombers, and torpedo bombers, the empire has given priority to solving a key problem of aircraft carriers as the core of the fleet through a large number of aircraft carrier tests and air force superiority, that is, how to make aircraft carriers really effective in sinking opponents in war.

For this, the Empire paid the price of two old battleships imported from France before World War I, which were considered by Admiral Cheng Biguang to be the best transitional battleships between battleships and dreadnoughts, which became the test targets of two experimental aircraft carriers, and the results proved that the dive torpedo bombers had the ability to destroy the battleships.

The test results further show that if this mode of warfare is popularized, once the navies of various countries increase the high-speed guns against the air and the sea, the survivability of the torpedo bombers will be very pitiful, even if the protection capability of the torpedo bombers is greatly increased, the effect will not be much better, and the only solution is to keep enough pilot reserves, because the aircraft are cheaper than training pilots, and the Imperial Air Force field provides a very feasible plan - the Imperial Air Force will transform the old aircraft from World War I into trainer aircraft.

To this end, the Imperial Navy set up a large and secret naval pilot training base in Guangxi, and at the same time increased plans to build a fourth aircraft carrier, which will be a new and epoch-making aircraft carrier.

The Empire seems to be perfectly interpreting to the world what it means to be "last to come, first to come".

In a meeting with Sen Ke, vice minister of foreign affairs, Song Biao said, "There are some things that only I know, but you don't know," and he was already warning Sen Ke, the vice minister of foreign affairs of the militarist faction, but such a warning did not have any effect at all.

(To be continued)