【Second Update】

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On the fifteenth day of the first lunar month, the Lunar Lantern Festival, it is still a very cold and sunny day.

Yesterday, Guangxu made a decision on the formation and training of a new-style army in all provinces across the country, and the telegraph office of the Military Aircraft Department issued a clear order to the feudal governors throughout the country, and at the same time, the premier's national affairs yamen also officially replied to the media workers of various countries the next morning, making the matter public.

When the news broke, the people of the country were excited, and people of insight published commentators' articles in newspapers in various places, praising the wisdom of the imperial court's move, and the army of the country and the DPRK will henceforth get out of the trough and be in line with the international community.

The Qing Empire's construction of a new army after the First Sino-Japanese War had long been expected by the great powers, and the nerves of the great powers would be nervous about the military reform of this old empire.

In particular, after the occupation of Korea, the land territory of the Qing Empire was already bordering the Qing Empire, and they feared that the Qing Empire would launch a retaliatory action after the establishment of a new army, and the shame of a disastrous defeat in the first snow and the first day.

However, it is useless to worry, because after the war machine of the empire is extinguished, all the funds will be diverted to stabilize the domestic economy, so it will be quite difficult to start the war machine again. It is said that the War Department can only hope that the Qing Imperial Army will not be built, and worship Aunt Amaterasu every day and curse the Qing Imperial Army to be decadent forever.

After the First Sino-Japanese War, the balance between the powers of the Far East was upset. Previously, it had always been a contradictory confrontation between the British Empire and Tsarist Russia, maintaining a delicate balance. After the Sino-Japanese War, Tsar Nicholas II came to power and continued to maintain a hostile attitude towards Great Britain, but eased tensions with Germany. The success of Germany, France and Russia in intervening to return Liao, and the retreat of the British Empire, proved that the balance of the Far East was in favor of Russia.

Based on the emergence of this situation, the British political axe felt a big headache, and the British Prime Minister Earl Rosebury instructed the new British Minister to China, Douglas, to lobby the high-ranking personnel of the Qing Empire, hoping to stabilize the Qing Empire and prevent the Qing Empire from completely falling to the side of the German, French, and Russian blocs.

At the same time, Marquis Strrigan, a Conservative and chairman of the British Joint Committee, who was inspecting Australia, was ordered to go to China to prepare for informal contacts with the top level of the Qing Empire on improving Sino-British relations, so as to win some bonus points for the Conservative Party to come to power in Britain in April.

At the same time, in order to resist the strong strength of the Russians in the Far East, the British Conservative Party planned to change its policy toward China and mediate on the 1890 incident of the Chinese and British navies "withdrawing the flag and severing diplomatic relations", hoping to restart the naval exchanges between China and Britain.

Of course, the first task of the British at the moment was to keep an eye on the Qing Empire's army reform program. For the Qing Empire, which had a large army, the army reform would be costly, and the British hoped to get a piece of the pie.

The British are worried about this big cake, and the other powers are not stupid, they all want to take a piece of the pie.

As the supporting force of the Qing Empire, Beiyang was also targeted by the powers of various countries, so as soon as the imperial court's military training plan came out, the envoys and representatives of the great powers flocked to the Governor's Mansion of Zhili in Tianjin, and handed over signs asking to meet Li Hongzhang.

Li Hongzhang was in Yanjing, and when he got up early in the morning, he received a large number of telegrams from the Yamen, the governor of Tianjin, and Li Hongzhang had to go back to work in advance, and by the way, he prepared all the needs of the new army in Zhili in advance.

The Qing Dynasty officials had no holidays, and only had 15 days off each year before and after Chinese New Year's Eve, and after the 15th day of the first month, they all had to go back to work.

After studying the matter yesterday afternoon, Wang Chenhao and Zhang Peilun gave Li Hongzhang a rough list of the funds, personnel, equipment, and venues needed for military training in Zhili.

Wang Chenhao is ready to train a new army with the scale of a reorganized division for Zhili, tentatively named Zhili to build a new army, with a total strength of 12,500 people and an annual budget of 920,000 taels of silver, and the first time to build a military needs to increase weapons and ammunition, horse baggage, training equipment and venues, as well as barracks and military expenses, this separate budget is 1.38 million taels of silver, and then counting other expenses, the total budget is 2.4 million taels of silver.

This cost is a huge expense for an agricultural country like the Qing Empire, Li Hongzhang hesitated all night last night, and finally nodded in agreement this morning.

Although the imperial court approved the training of new armies in various provinces, Li Hongzhang knew very well that the household department controlled by Weng Tonggong had no money, and even if there were, it would not be honestly allocated to the training of troops in Zhili. This money has to be raised by the subordinates themselves.

Of course, the richest force in the Qing Empire today is Zhili Beiyang, Li Hongzhang gritted his teeth and issued an order to return to the Tianjin Zhili Governor's Mansion to intercept the income from the land, grain and customs duties within the boundaries of Zhili, and be sure to make up the 2.4 million taels of military expenses first.

The silver Li Hongzhang helped Wang Chenhao to solve the problem, and there is no shortage of talents in the Beiyang Group in terms of personnel, and the remaining issues such as ordnance procurement will be decided by Wang Chenhao, and the relevant officials of the Beiyang Group will fully cooperate.

After breakfast, Li Hongzhang asked Wang Chenhao before leaving, "Does Chenhao have anything else to add?" ”

Wang Chenhao replied respectfully: "That's all for the time being!" ”

Li Hongzhang nodded, told Wang Chenhao to send a telegram to the Governor's Mansion of Zhili if he had anything to add, Wang Chenhao nodded yes, sent Li Hongzhang and Zhang Peilun to the carriage, and watched them leave Yanjing.

After Li Hongzhang and Zhang Peilun left, the entire Earl's Mansion belonged to Wang Chenhao's largest.

Staying at the door of his study, Wang Chenhao repeatedly corrected his training strategy, combined with the actual national conditions at present, and with reference to the training methods of the armies of the European powers, Wang Chenhao also incorporated the advanced military concepts and training methods of his time, and completed two sets of rules and regulations, "Records of the New Army's Military Strategy" and "Detailed Illustration of Training Methods," and made detailed regulations on the new army's battalion system, prohibitions, training rules, and laws, which were prepared to be distributed to the army in the future for officers and men to abide by.

During this period, the captain of the guard Li Guodong was also fortunate to see Wang Chenhao's two sets of military covenants, he was also born in the Huai military system, and he also got Li Hongzhang's approval to study in the Beiyang Military Academy for a year, although he only learned how to be a good bodyguard, and there were only twenty or thirty people in charge, but he learned that Wang Chenhao would train in Zhili after the army, he had a little more expectations in his heart.

It is undeniable that Li Guodong is an excellent soldier, strictly speaking, he does not want to be a guard captain for the rest of his life. In the environment of "arming and arming" everywhere in the Qing Dynasty at the moment, all men with blood surnames are looking forward to joining the army and making contributions.

This Li Guodong has been the servant of the Li Mansion since he was a child, and he naturally knows in his heart that if his new master Wang Chenhao is in charge of the army, then as his minion, Li Guodong will definitely have the opportunity to enter the army in the future to show his strength.

Every time he thought of this, Li Guodong's heart suddenly became enthusiastic, and he worked even harder when serving his master.

At four o'clock in the afternoon, Li Youyi's motorvoy successfully entered Beijing and arrived at the Earl's Palace.

After receiving the report, Wang Chenhao flew to the door, and it happened that Li Youyi got out of the car. In Li Youyi's exclamation, Wang Chenhao had already hugged her from behind.

Li Youyi exclaimed, she was really startled, and she was relieved when she saw that it was her husband. Disgusted: "Husband, you are scared to death!" ”

Wang Chenhao buried his head in the back of Li Youyi's neck and sucked for a while, saying some love words that made Li Youyi's face red.

The two are newly married Yan'er, and they have endless words.

What is the system of hugging and hugging on the street? The surrounding royal mansions and the maids of the Li Mansion were dumbfounded. The four pretty maids of the palace who accompanied Li Youyi hurriedly stepped forward to greet the lord of the family, and took the opportunity to interrupt the two of them.

"Old lady, it's cold outside, let's go inside!"

Baoqin is the original maid, and she is the biggest of the four girls, so she naturally stood up for this kind of thing.

Wang Chenhao didn't feel anything wrong, but Li Youyi was deeply constrained by feudal etiquette and religion, so she didn't dare to stay outside anymore.

"Husband, shall we go back?"

Looking at Li Youyi's nervous appearance, Wang Chenhao suddenly laughed evilly, and hugged her up violently. In Li Youyi's exclamation, Wang Chenhao laughed and quickly ran in with her, leaving only the daze of a group of maids at the door.