Britain and France owe a total of 2.14 billion pounds of debt to the United States and 1.14 billion pounds of debt to China, and these debts are very important to China and the United States.

This is the reason why China and the United States must unite to demand that countries stop the naval race, in short, the demand of China and the United States is "stop building ships, pay back the money first."

On the other side, Imperial Prime Minister Ouyang Geng and British Prime Minister Lloyd. George also held a meeting between the Chinese and British prime ministers in Singapore, and both sides were sincere in dealing with the Hong Kong issue thoroughly, and at the same time made final consultations on the demarcation of the spheres of influence of the two major empires of China and Britain, so as to stop the current trend of fierce confrontation between China and Britain. However, if the British Empire continues to maintain its arrogant disregard for China's strength and still vainly attempt to occupy the whole of Asia and even the interests of China's surrounding regions, this kind of mutually harmful situation between China and Britain will continue to expand endlessly.

After taking advantage of the opportunity of World War I to support the reading power of Afghanistan, China advocated a policy of "free Asia" against the British Empire, calling on Britain to recognize the reading power of Saudi Arabia, Burma, Malaya, and India, restore the freedom of Asia, and refrain from exploiting and enslaving the Asian people.

In retaliation, Britain secretly contacted religious leaders in Tibet and Tajikistan and supported the infiltration of the Far East through Sakhalin, and changed from deliberate delay to malicious retaliation on the Hong Kong issue in an attempt to strengthen the garrison in Hong Kong.

Behind this series of events was the upsurge of the anti-war movement in Britain and the rapid decline in the support of the coalition cabinet, on the contrary, the expansion of the anti-British wave in China, with large-scale mass anti-British demonstrations all over the country, the establishment of the Opium War Memorial in Guangzhou, and the establishment of the Eight-Nation Allied Invasion of China Memorial Hall in Tianjin and Yanjing, all of which were directed at the British Empire, most of the British commercial establishments in China had come to a standstill, and almost all British-funded banks in China were forced to suspend business due to the run.

World politics after the First World War is so complex and dark that it is still fraught with the danger of a new world war.

World politics is always dark.

The British Empire was Prime Minister Lloyd's. Under George's leadership, although it only continued the traditional policy of the British Empire, this backward foreign policy not only failed to maintain the world hegemony of the British Empire, but further intensified the contradictions between China and the United States at the same time, and the contradictions between Britain, France, and Britain and Italy were also expanding, and the entire international world was in an embarrassing situation of being isolated and challenged.

The China-UK-Macao Conference and the UK-US-China Franco-Italian Washington Conference were held at the same time under this specific historical condition.

…… In March 1922, the countries basically reached a consensus to stop the current naval competition, Britain and the United States said that China, France and Italy should divide the total tonnage standard of capital ships according to the principle of 10:10:7:5:5:3, and the total tonnage division standard of aircraft carriers was roughly the same, but China and France had the right to maintain 70% of the level relative to Britain and France.

In the fierce contest between China, Britain, and the United States, the displacement tonnage of cruisers was set at 10,000 tons or less, and the caliber of the main guns should not exceed 8 inches, and if the main guns exceeded 6 inches, they belonged to heavy cruisers, below this standard belonged to light cruisers, and cruisers with main guns higher than 8 inches were all classified as capital ships.

Due to the British and the British stern opposition to the restriction of the total tonnage of the cruisers of the two countries, the meeting failed to reach a limit on the total number of light and heavy cruisers, and China's initial demand was to maintain the standard of the total tonnage of the Japanese navy, but under the opposition of the British and the Japanese, in the end, as a compromise, China and France maintained the treaty on the limitation of the total displacement of 265,000 tons of capital ships in an alliance posture.

Since the Macao Conference and the Washington Conference were held at the same time, on the other side of the Pacific Ocean, Britain had actually made very huge concessions, and Britain not only recognized in principle China's territorial sovereignty over Tibetan Province and its interests in Kashmir and Central and West Asia, but also agreed to China's demands on the demarcation line between northern Burma and southern Tibet and its jurisdiction over the Andaman Islands.

In addition, China and Britain negotiated a settlement of the debt problem in Macao, and China and Britain re-signed the Sino-British Treaty of Friendship and Commerce, and China's claims against Britain would gradually be transformed into investments in the British Empire and its colonies, and Britain would guarantee the security and stability of these investments.

As a final concession, China pledged to assist the British Empire in maintaining stability and peace in the world, to refrain from practical support for the policy of "Free Asia," and to recognize Britain's privileged status quo in the world on the basis of Britain's recognition of China's equally privileged position in Asia.

In short, it is in the interests of small countries to be sacrificed.

As a result of the acquisition of all the disputed areas in the negotiations on the demarcation of northern Burma, the empire added 128,000 square kilometers of territory from northern Burma and northwestern India, bordered India in the southwest of the Savage Mountains region, and after the occupation of eastern Burma, it also officially owned the border area with Thailand, providing a foothold of 22,000 square kilometers for the empire to intervene in Thailand by land.

Coupled with the Empire's previous secret treaty with France, the Empire greatly advanced 27,000 square kilometers in the disputed territory of North Vietnam, owned the territorial rights of the entire Lang Son City, and took Vietnam's Kam Phu County as the dividing line, demarcated the territorial line to Gou Shu Island, occupied the entire Zilong Bay, and occupied almost all the strategic advantages of Vietnam.

Through the demarcation negotiations between Laos and Vietnam, the empire continued to assign the entire Song Dynasty to Laos in the mountains and the Zhongliao Plateau, using Laos to further occupy the geographical advantage of the war against Vietnam.

After the Washington Treaty, the actual territorial territory of the empire should have been between 19 million and 19.05 million square kilometers, even considering that the empire recognized the southern part of Sakhalin and the Kuril Islands as part of the treaty, but at this time the empire had no intention of officially announcing this fact.

The empire's ambitions are endless, and not publishing data in absolute terms is also conducive to the further expansion of the empire, constantly controlling and encroaching on peripheral strategic areas, strengthening the ability to protect national defense on the basis of maintaining overall territorial stability, and the ability to deter small neighboring states.

On March 3, 1922, Britain, the United States, China, France, and Italy formally concluded the Treaty of Washington.

A month earlier, Song Biao and Empress Shu Xuan had left the United States for a state visit to Mexico and Central and South America, and after visiting New Zealand and Australia, they finally returned to China on March 27, 1922.

It is very difficult to evaluate the current "Washington Treaty," and although China says that Britain and the United States have made a lot of concessions to each other, there is one very important result, that is, Britain, France, and Italy must unconditionally repay the insurance debts within the Entente countries, and calculate the total amount of debts and interest in gold, and this alone is enough to show that China and the United States are the victors of the Washington Conference.

Since the conclusion of the Washington and Macao meetings, Song Biao has been thinking about China's new future, and how China will develop in the future in order to continue to forge ahead, to be able to cope with the most hostile external environment, and to be able to restrict the expansionism of the Chinese navy.

After returning to Yanjing at the end of the visit, Song Biao rested in the Central Palace of the Imperial Court for about a month, silently thinking about the new situation and environment of the world and the future of the Chinese Empire.

At the end of April 1922, Song Biao decided to continue in the summer to Lushan to hold a national symposium on scientific and technological research, university education, and the 201 project in China.

After a long period of thinking for a month, Song Biao became more and more soberly aware that the Chinese Empire had developed to a high point at this stage, and the only way out for further development was to strengthen investment in education and scientific and technological research, so that China could change from a world science and technology introduction country to a research and development country.

While the General Administration of the Imperial Court was actively making arrangements and preparations for this summer's Lushan Conference, Vice Admiral Masamu Akiyama, the newly appointed Vice Minister of the Navy, came to apologize to the emperor on behalf of the Admiralty of Yuzaburo Kato.

This is how the Kato Yuzaburo incident was described, and they had no desire to reflect at all, and even expressed their happiness with Kato Yuzaburo in front of the Chinese emperor directly expressing the word "Shina"; the people and military and political circles were full of inexplicable admiration for the Minister of the Navy, Yuzaburo Kato, and did not care at all about the feelings of the Chinese.

Song Biao did not inquire about the matter for a long time, but kept handing over the matter to the Imperial Cabinet for disposal, and when he heard that Akiyama Shinyuki was coming, he asked Jiang Zuobin to communicate with the Secretariat that morning, and reported to him all kinds of information about this matter from the media and political circles.

At this time, Chen Qimei had gone to Shanxi Province to serve as the director of the Department of Agriculture, and Yuan Jinkai was also transferred to the post of chief of the Imperial Police.

Zhang Binglin is obviously not very suitable for the work of the chief of the inner court, and Song Biao has always asked Wang Zhaoming to handle various affairs during this trip, and after a close inspection in the United States, he has decided to transfer Gu Weijun, who had just become minister to the United States last year, back to China to take over Chen Qimei's work.

Considering that Gu Weijun was Tang Shaoyi's son-in-law, Song Biao also hoped that this was an arrangement to finally ease his relationship with Tang Shaoyi, so as to show that he still trusted Tang Shaoyi and Tang officials.

After Song Biao arrived at his office in the morning, as soon as he sat down to drink tea, Wang Zhaoming couldn't wait to submit a thick stack of editing summary reports with about dozens of pages.

Speaking of which, Wang Zhaoming's career is not as smooth as Chen Qimei's, which shows that Wang Zhaoming is still not shrewd enough, although he is the most powerful pen of the imperial party, he has not grasped his future.

Fortunately, his long-term experience as vice chairman and propaganda minister in the Guangfu Party is also a very beautiful resume, coupled with his important confidant as the emperor, he easily defeated many other candidates to replace Yuan Jinkai as the next chief of the inner court.

Song Biao can roughly observe that Wang Zhaoming didn't sleep all night last night, and he was personally in charge of this urgent summary report, and his eyes were very dark, at this point, he was not as good as Chen Qimei, if it was Chen Qimei, he would have arranged for others to do this work in advance to deal with the emperor's possible needs at any time, or take the initiative to submit it to the emperor.

Of course, this is also related to Chen Qimei's mentality of taking the initiative to fight for his career, as well as his experience of accompanying the emperor for a long time.

Song Biao did not rush to let Wang Zhaoming leave, but asked him to accompany him to stand next to his desk, personally flip through this summary report, and comprehensively sort out the various reactions that have been aroused since the "Sino-Diplomatic Incident."

Song Biao didn't think this was a very tricky matter, so he didn't pay too much attention to it, for him, there was always a chance to teach him a thorough lesson, and as an emperor, he couldn't afford to rush to the diplomatic front line and repeat the mistakes of Kaiser Wilhelm II.

But after he read all the information in this book, he couldn't help but feel uncontrollable anger.

The use of the disparaging title of "Shina" in front of him was originally wrong with Yuzaburo Kato, Minister of the Navy, and if he was sensible, he should immediately apologize for it, or even make a comprehensive rectification, at least in the official document of the political axe, which stipulates that this title should not be used.

However, both the political axe and the society refused to admit their mistakes and apologize, but China's demand for an apology was disrespectful and contemptuous of the Great Empire, and according to their own logic, what kind of words they used to profuse "China" was their freedom, and they insisted that "China" was a transliteration of the Sanskrit word "Shina", that is, the word "Shina" was the source and standard translation of "China".

The main reasons for refusing to use the word "China" are: first, it is said that there is a region of China; Second, the Chinese "zhong" represents the meaning of the surrounding four yi, and using the Chinese name "zhina" is equivalent to admitting that it is originally a country of yi; Third, "Zhina" is precisely such an intention, in a vain attempt to make Yue himself admit that he is a country; Fourth, "Zhina" in Sanskrit is the meaning of wisdom, there is no contempt, only the use of the folk word "Zhina pig" belongs to the contempt.

As a result, he refused to admit that the use of "Shina" against the Emperor was a contemptuous term, nor did he admit that the Minister of the Navy, Yuzaburo Kato, had made a mistake in diplomacy, but in the press reports and public remarks, he clearly took pleasure in this and regarded Yuzaburo Kato as a national hero, saying that only the Minister of the Navy, who had an absolutely superior position over "Shina," could use such a title in such a formal and public manner.

After reading all the information related to this in this section compiled by Wang Zhaoming, Song Biao quickly threw the summary report back to him and asked, "Have you not been aware of this matter?" ”

Wang Zhaoming was very frightened and defended: "Your Majesty has been accompanying the emperor to visit various countries recently, and the itinerary is in a hurry, ignoring this matter, and hoping that the emperor will forgive the sin." ”

Song Biao's face was very ugly and he was silent for a moment, and then he asked Wang Zhaoming: "Then tell me what is going on now?" ”

Wang Zhaoming replied: "Let's not talk about the real reaction of the Japanese side, but only that the fact that the Japanese sent Vice Minister of the Navy Akiyama to come and apologize only on behalf of the Admiralty shows that the political axe of the Japanese government does not admit this diplomatic mistake, which means that the political axe will not make any changes at all, and will continue to use the word 'Shina' against our country." ”

Wang Zhaoming lived in Yueben for seven years, and during this period, he also studied at Yueben University of Law and Politics, and had close contacts with Yueben politicians, so he knew Yueben very well.

Song Biao continued to ask him: "Then what do you think is the reason for this matter?" ”

Wang Zhaoming pondered for a moment and replied: "The root cause of this matter stems from the awakening and spread of nationalism, and it is the political needs of this country that eventually form the stubborn disease of today. According to His Majesty's research, in the Chinese view of history, the Manchu regime has always been classified as the kind of colonial rule of the Mongol Golden Horde over the Han Dynasty, and the Manchus are called the Qing people, and we Han people are called the Chinese people. However, since the First Sino-Japanese War, and especially after the Russo-Japanese War, there has been a clear discriminatory use of this term in the country, and even major newspapers such as the Korean Shimbun and the Tokyo Yomiuri Shimbun have openly used the title of 'Shina pig'. After the success of the Liberation Revolution, with the overthrow of the Manchu rule by the Empire, there was a view in the political and sociological circles that China could not inherit the Manchu Dynasty, but was limited to the Guannai region, including Mongolia, Xinjiang Province, Gansu, Ningxia, Tibetan Province, Guangxi, Yunnan and other places, all of which belonged to colonial rule and had no territorial rights, especially on the Taiwan issue. Therefore, the insistence on using the word "China" in China is precisely to make it clear throughout the country that China is an evil and ignorant country and forcibly occupy the territory of other countries and nations. ”

Song Biao's long-term impression that Wang Zhaoming has always been a person who is more pro-Yue and Zhiyue, and after hearing these words, he still admits that Wang Zhaoming is at least very sober in his understanding of the Yue book, and his research is quite in-depth.

He bowed his head slightly and said, "Go ahead." ”

Wang Zhaoming nodded in acknowledgement, and continued: "To sum up, it has always been a diplomatic strategy towards our country, that is, it recognizes our country's territory on the surface, and completely denies all this at home, from the political axe to the people. Although his support for the Manchu Sect and Socialist Party was relatively limited, there has been a popular view in the country this year, that is, with the spread of the modern national spirit, the imperial colonial rule over Mongolia, Xinjiang, Tibet, Manchuria, and other places will definitely come to an end, and China will be divided into several countries, and that it is the responsibility and opportunity to maintain its special influence over the Far East, Northeast China, and Mongolia. With regard to the investigation conducted by the State Intelligence Administration, in the past few years, he has also been supporting some special people in China to propagate the theory of national statehood, taking advantage of China's policy of freedom of speech to trumpeting that China should not exercise colonial rule in Xinjiang Province, Tibet Province, and other places, and secretly sending spies to contact the religious and local leaders of many ethnic minorities to support and propagate national reading power. ”

Only then did Song Biao reply: "You have studied it very thoroughly, so it is a very complicated and cunning thing, and only you politicians who are really familiar with it and are always vigilant can understand their true thoughts." If you look at it, how should you deal with this? ”

Wang Zhaoming pondered for a moment, and said: "Your Majesty's humble opinion, this matter should be divided into two aspects, in the short term, the inner court should not come forward to communicate with the Admiralty, the cabinet can accept the apology of the Admiralty, but ask this apology to be made public, if it is not made public, the cabinet refuses to accept this apology, but it is not suitable to be too rigid, after all, the matter of the naval competition has just stopped, and there is no need for the empire to stimulate the ship to continue to start building ships again, resulting in the deterioration of the international environment." Generally speaking, the empire still needs a peaceful environment more, and it needs Britain, France, Italy and other countries to pay off their debts first, after all, these debts are too many and too important to the empire. In the long run, the empire still needs to be prepared, and since it has adopted such a vicious and despicable policy, our country can also adopt a similar policy, maintaining a diplomatic posture of peace, and constantly promoting long-term counter-preparation internally. International contradictions are a very important force, which can arouse the patriotic enthusiasm of the people, and can also alleviate and cover up some domestic contradictions, so that the country is more cohesive. Of course, we should keep our proportions in check, not too much, to the extent that they cannot get out of control, and we should not get too involved in de jure territorial disputes. ”

Song Biao nodded slightly, feeling that over the years, Wang Zhaoming's progress is still obvious, and now he can be regarded as a cult talent, but there are some defects in his innate surname that are not strong enough and too powerful.

He and Wang Zhaoming instructed: "You can draw up a decision-making bill for the inner court and transfer it to the cabinet for disposal, I think Akiyama Shinyuki is definitely not here to apologize this time, maybe there are still some complicated things, and there is always a mentality of wanting to continue to take advantage, let the cabinet deal with it carefully." ”

Wang Zhaoming said yes.

Song Biao's worries about Akiyama Shinyuki and Saimoto in his heart were very objective, in the Washington Conference, Saiben was the craziest country, and his wanton construction of ships would force the United States, and the United States would continue to provoke Britain in competition, Britain would increase its naval budget, and France and Italy would increase it, and this would become an uncontrollable situation.

Neither China nor the United States wants such a situation to erupt, after all, the top priority is to recover the huge loans from World War I.

It is precisely on this basis that China and the United States have made great concessions to the Philippines, Guam, and other places, and China has recognized the territorial rights of the southern part of Sakhalin and the Kuril Islands, and has promised not to maintain naval bases in Vladivostok, the Korean Peninsula, the Far East, Taiwan, and the Western Ryukyus, and the United States has promised not to set up naval bases in the Philippines and Guam, thus giving up control over most of the Pacific Ocean.

Is this so satisfied?

Apparently not, at this time, Yuben has always had two wishes, the first is to sign a new trade treaty with China, to open a channel for Yuben's capital and products to enter the Chinese market, and at this stage, the empire continues to increase the level of tariffs, while continuing to establish a low-tariff policy for some of each other's products through bilateral trade negotiations and treaties of reciprocal countries, and this policy is extremely unfavorable to Yueben; The second is the desire to get Central New Guinea.

Central New Guinea is the former German New Guinea, which is roughly the same as the British New Guinea occupied and transferred to Australia in terms of area, located in the east and north of the entire Papua New Guinea, including New Britain Island, New McClaburg and the Balmath Islands, and it is interesting that Papua's main copper and gold resources are almost concentrated in the Central New Guinea region, and there is also a good oil exploration base, due to the advantage of geographical distribution, it also occupies an absolute dominant position in the competition for surrounding fishery resources.

The scale of the empire's investment in gold and copper mines here was mainly inherited from Germany, and since then it has been commissioned by China International Trust Corporation to continue to expand the scale, with the deepening of exploration work, as well as the increase of workers and power facilities, the empire's annual copper concentrate production has increased to 250,000 tons, and the annual gold production has reached 8.5 tons.

The logic of this is that they were the main naval forces in World War I, and they did not receive proper compensation and victory compensation, which was indeed unanimously responded to in Britain, the United States and France, including Anglo-American France, which intended to act as a coordinator to coordinate and divide the dispute between China and German New Guinea, but this request was always directly rejected by the Empire.

Persistently believing that it was their right to fight for this colony, during the Paris Peace Conference, he failed to convince other countries to support their demands, but during the Washington Conference, out of the need for compromise, all countries also wanted to divide German New Guinea equally.

On the one hand, it is said to be compromised, and on the other hand, the great powers are worried about the empire and suppressive mentality, trying to use the capital to give a certain degree of containment.

So, rather than sending Rear Admiral Mayuki Akiyama to apologize to China, it is better to say that they plan to reap hundreds of millions of pounds worth of long-term tangible gains from China with an apology.

Song Biao knew very well that this time he was generally full of confidence in sending Akiyama Shin to the battle, trying to persuade him to give up the interests of German New Guinea with the favor card, and it was precisely for this reason that Song Biao had no plan to meet with Akiyama Shinyuki, and he asked Wang Zhaoming to convey his opinion to the cabinet, and his opinion was also very simple - solemn negotiations, never conceding the slightest actual interests.

Song Biao doesn't really care, as long as the Soviet Union and Germany don't provoke him, he won't take the initiative to make enemies with the Soviet Union and Germany, but it's different for the Soviet Union, sooner or later there will be a real Pacific naval war between China and China, which is inevitable, and how many deep hatreds and old hatreds can be settled together.

(To be continued)