Wang Jing trotted all the way to Yu Kun's side, and Yu Kun couldn't help but smile dumbly when he looked at the disheveled Wang Jing. Wang Jing couldn't care about his current image, and asked impatiently, "Commander Yu, you said we have arrived?" True or fake? ”

"See for yourself!" Yu Kun smiled and handed the binoculars in his hand to Wang Jing, raised his hand and pointed to the sea in the distance.

Wang Jing hurriedly took the telescope and looked into the distance, and after looking at it for a while, Wang Jing's old face drooped again, and the smile on the corner of his mouth instantly turned into a wry smile, "Are you sure you're not mistaken?" We've come all the way here just for these little islands? Wang Jing asked in disbelief.

"You can't go wrong!" Yu Kun said affirmatively, "It looks small now, it's because the distance is still far away, in fact, these islands are not too small." Based on my experience and the information I have so far, I can conclude that these islands in front of me are the Ryukyu Islands! Seeing that Wang Jing still didn't believe it too much, Yu Kun reaffirmed very strictly.

"When I heard about the Ryukyu Kingdom, I thought it was a big place! These islands alone can also be called a country. Wang Jing said with a disappointed face.

"Well~! This Ryukyu Kingdom is indeed not big, but this Ryukyu king has been officially canonized by the emperors of the Ming and Qing dynasties, although it is a bit unworthy of the name of the kingdom, but it is indeed a country. Yu Kun said with a smile.

"No wonder it's so light that the little devil was destroyed!" Wang Jing pursed his lips and said, "Just a few broken islands are also worth thinking about?" ”

"You don't understand this, this Ryukyu is my subject country of China after all. How can you cheapen the little devil for nothing! The marshal is mainly worried that after the peace talks, the two countries will really strike the war and truce, what if the little devil refuses to give us the Ryukyus? So, let's take it first! Yu Kun explained with a smile.

In 1372 A.D. (the fifth year of Hongwu Taizu of the Ming Dynasty), the Ming government sent Yang Dai as an envoy to the three kingdoms of Ryukyu and canonized the kings of the three kingdoms of Ryukyu respectively. A few years later, in 1429, the king of Zhongshan, Shangpazhi, destroyed the other two countries and made Shuri Castle the capital. Establishment of a unified Ryukyu Kingdom. Still paying tribute to China, the king of Zhongshan was canonized as the king of the Ryukyus by the Ming government. Since then, the Ryukyu Kingdom has been paying tribute every other year in accordance with the Ming Dynasty's code system, and the courtiers have been observed.

After the Qing army entered the customs. The Ryukyu Kingdom sent an envoy to request canonization. He was canonized by the Qing Dynasty emperor as the King of Zhongshan in the Ryukyus. Later, he was renamed King of the Ryukyus. In the following hundreds of years, the Ryukyus continued to send envoys to pay tribute, and successive new kings of the Ryukyus had to send envoys to ask for the title when they ascended the throne. It never stops.

As early as the Ming Dynasty, Japan had its eye on the Ryukyu Kingdom. In 1609, the Japanese warlord Toyotomi Hideyoshi led an army to invade Korea and sent the Shimazu clan, a prince of the Satsuma domain, to extort money from the Ryukyus, but the Ryukyu king refused. The Shimazu clan then led an army to attack the Ryukyus, captured the Ryukyu king Shōning, and forced him to write an oath to send 8,000 koku of grain to the Satsuma clan every year. Japan regarded its historical aggression as a "tribute" and proved that the Ryukyus had always been a "vassal" of Japan. Since then, the Ryukyus have entered the period of "one country, two genera". In the early days, Japan had been asking the Ryukyus to conceal from China that they had paid tribute to Japan. Later, due to the weakening of the national power, the Qing Dynasty was too busy to take care of itself, and although it was known but "did not ask about it", it never officially recognized the Ryukyus as a subject state of Japan.

In October 1872, taking advantage of the Meiji Emperor's personal administration, Kagoshima Prefecture adhered to the will of the Meiji government and ordered the Ryukyu prince Ie and others to enter the palace to worship. Ie and the others set off by boat from Kagoshima, arriving first in Shinagawa and then entering the palace to worship. At that time, the Ryukyu greeting sheet was written as "Ryukyu King Shotai", but the Japanese Ministry of Foreign Affairs took the liberty of removing the name of the country and changed it to "Ryukyu Shotai". Emperor Meiji issued an edict that the Ryukyu royal family was "elevated to the rank of Ryukyu feudal lord and the Chinese clan." The following year, an edict was issued ordering the Ryukyus to be under the jurisdiction of the Ministry of Internal Affairs, and the taxes were handed over to the Ministry of Finance, bringing them into the orbit of Japan's internal affairs, but this was not approved by the Ryukyu State.

In 1875, Japan sent troops to the Ryukyus and ordered the Ryukyus to honor the Meiji era of Japan and no longer pay tribute to the Qing government. Seeing that the shape was not good, the Ryukyu Kingdom complained to the Qing government, the suzerain, and sent Shang Dehong to China for help. After Shang Dehong arrived in Fuzhou, he explained the matter to He Jing, the governor of Fujian and Zhejiang, and Ding Richang, the governor of Fujian, and told them to report to the Qing court. But the Qing government didn't take this matter to heart at all, and just gave an order to He Ruzhang, the minister stationed in Japan, and ordered him to investigate the matter. In fact, at that time, Japan had only more than 30,000 standing army members, 4,000 navy personnel, and 15 warships, and many of them were damaged and could not go to sea. Although He Ruzhang did his best in this matter, because the Qing court paid too much attention to reasonableness and did not show off force in a timely manner when negotiating with Japan, Japan found out the cowardly nature of the Qing government and intensified its efforts.

In April 1878, the Japanese government brazenly decided to abolish Ryukyu as a county. Although the Ryukyus were not willing to die in the country, they were limited by the weakness of the country and were unable to resist the Japanese army. The Japanese government ordered the Ryukyu King Shōtai to come to Tokyo to wait for the disposition. At that time, he was seriously ill, so he sent Wang Shizi to Tokyo and personally begged the Japanese government to postpone the king's trip to Japan, as a plan to delay the army. At this time, the Ryukyus were bent on hoping that the Qing government would be able to save them from fire and water. On August 30, the Japanese government, amid He Ruzhang's chatter and negotiations in accordance with the will of the Qing government, officially announced that the Ryukyus would be changed to counties, and that the relations between the Ryukyus and China would be handled by the Japanese Ministry of Foreign Affairs, and that the Ryukyus had finally not escaped the fate of being annexed by Japan.

In March 1880, Japan formally submitted to the Qing government the proposal of "dividing the islands and revising the treaty", that is, the northern and central islands of the Ryukyu Islands were under Japanese administration; The southern islands of the Ryukyu Islands, such as Miyakojima and Yaeyama, were under the jurisdiction of the Qing government. In exchange, China should revise the Japan-Shin Trade Treaty to allow Japan to enjoy most-favored-nation status. Accordingly, Shen Guifen, the prime minister of the Qing government, and other ministers negotiated with the Japanese representatives, and on October 28, 1880, the Ryukyu Treaty and the Discretionary Clause were initialed.

This "island division and treaty amendment" case aroused controversy within the Qing government. The Qing government appointed Li Hongzhang as the original person who negotiated the treaty, and he was familiar with the situation in Japan, so he was asked to coordinate the overall situation. Li Hongzhang said: "If the Japanese people ask for more, they will suffer greatly if they are allowed, and if they refuse, they will make more enemies. The Qing government finally adopted Li Hongzhang's proposal and ignored the case of "dividing the island and changing the treaty."

However, Li Hongzhang's policy of "delaying one law," that is, "delaying," could neither nor could prevent Japan from annexing the entire Ryukyu Islands, and as a result, the Chinese side gained nothing on the Ryukyu issue, and at the same time, it was tantamount to acquiescing in Japan's occupation of the Ryukyus, thus depriving China of an important passage from the East China Sea to the Pacific Ocean. (To be continued......)