Although Zhao Dongyun has not yet officially held a ceremony to become president, according to the current republican constitution, since Wang Yingkai resigned as president, Zhao Dongyun, vice president, will automatically succeed him as president, and there is no need to conduct the so-called congressional election in accordance with the constitution.

After Zhao Dongyun succeeded to the presidency, he would definitely set up a new cabinet belonging to the Soviet Union, and the cabinet candidates for the heads of various ministries would be easy to handle.

However, only this cabinet premier is not easy to handle, the previous three eastern provincial government affairs yuan did not set up the post of president, and Zhao Dongyun vertically managed the ministries, but the current cabinet can not do this, Zhao Dongyun can not continue to serve as the prime minister of the cabinet as the president.

At present, there are not many people in the Soviet civil official system under Zhao Dongyun who are qualified to serve as prime ministers, Xiong Xiling is one, and Zhao E is also one.

In addition, the selection of the prime minister of the cabinet should not only take into account the Soviet system, but also the rest of the Beiyang system.

In addition to the Su faction headed by Zhao Dongyun, the direct line headed by the former Wang Yingkai, and the major warlord factions headed by Duan Qirui and Wang Shizhen, there are also a large number of neutral civilian officials.

Most of these people are Yuan Shikai's staff and high-level civil officials in the northern provinces, such as Zhao Bingjun, Tang Shaoyi, Zhou Xuexi, Lu Weixiang, Lin Zhaonian and other members of the first cabinet.

Wang Yingkai wanted to win them over when he became president, and the same Zhao Dongyun now became the president, so he also had to win them over!

The most direct purpose of wooing them is not to value their ability, but that these people actually represent the civilian class of the huge Beiyang system.

Although there are major factions in the Beiyang system, the major factions are mainly based on the major warlords, that is, the division between generals, and most of the civilian officials are neutral people, except for the civil officials directly under the command of the major warlords.

And based on the huge political influence of these people, Zhao Dongyun must also take them into account when considering the candidates for the new cabinet.

After all, Zhao Dongyun did not say that he overthrew the Beiyang system and moved to the central government, he just drove Wang Yingkai out of power and won the position of the Beiyang boss.

He can't push these influential people out of one go, let them work for Duan Qirui and Wang Shizhen, or even the Southern Federation.

And among these people, there are many people who are qualified to be prime ministers and ministers of various ministries! For example, Tang Shaoyi, he was the Minister of Finance of the first cabinet before, and he was also highly qualified in Beiyang, but he was much better than Xiong Xiling and Zhao E.

It's just that Zhao Dongyun considers that today's republican constitution is a responsible cabinet system, which means that the president he is the same as Wang Yingkai's era, he has only a false name, but no real power, and Zhao Dongyun doesn't like this, and it is inappropriate to change the constitution rashly, and the only way is to put the cabinet under his own complete control.

For this reason, Zhao Dongyun also didn't care about the qualifications or abilities of Xiong Xiling under his command, he directly promoted him to be the new prime minister of the cabinet, and the candidates of each ministry also appointed Soviet officials as much as possible, and only a small number of other neutral officials were selected.

On July 17, Zhao Dongyun was sworn in as the second president of the Republic of China in Beijing, and in addition to many important officials in Beiyang, there were also ministers from various countries, and the attendance of ministers from various countries was also a kind of recognition of the legitimacy of Zhao Dongyun's president.

After the founding of the Republic of China last year, all countries have not formally recognized the northern republican government as the sole legitimate government of China, but the countries have said that the civil war between the north and the south was a civil war in China, and they have recognized the northern republican government as one of the groups in the Chinese civil war and have limited diplomatic contacts.

And Zhao Dongyun also knew that before he completely eliminated the Southern Federation, he didn't want the foreign powers to recognize his republican government as the only legitimate government of China, but now the ministers of various countries attended his oath-taking ceremony, which also represented their recognition that they had inherited Wang Yingkai's legitimacy and regarded themselves as one of the parties in the Chinese civil war.

After the inauguration ceremony, Zhao Dongyun formed the second cabinet dominated by the Soviet Union!

The prime minister of the cabinet is Xiong Xiling, this person can be regarded as a hard worker, from the establishment of Huludao Industrial Zone to the general office of the financial and political bureau, especially when he was in charge of the political situation, he supported the expansion of the Feng army in the midst of thousands of difficulties, otherwise the financial resources of the three eastern provinces would not be able to expand from the current scale of the Feng army.

In addition to the prime minister, Zhao Dongyun also set up a special post of vice premier and invited Tang Shaoyi to serve as vice premier.

Among the cabinet ministries, the most important is the Ministry of Finance, and the Minister of Finance is Zhou Xuexi, the God of Wealth of the Beiyang System, and Zhou Ziqi, the former mayor of Yingkou City, was transferred to the vice minister of Finance.

The second is the Ministry of Industry and Commerce, with Zhao E as the chief minister and Zhu Qiling as the deputy director.

The general director of the Ministry of Communications is Shi Zhaoji, the former vice minister of the Ministry of Communications of the first cabinet, and the deputy minister is Chen Shaochang, the former general office of the transportation bureaus of the three eastern provinces.

The Ministry of Foreign Affairs is Lu Weixiang, the former Minister of Foreign Affairs of the first cabinet, to be honest, in the huge contemporary China, apart from him, you really can't find a second qualified Minister of Foreign Affairs, and the second minister is Song Xiaolian, the former Foreign Affairs Office of the three eastern provinces.

The general director of the Ministry of Education is Xu Hongbao, and the deputy minister is Xie Yinchang.

The chief of the Ministry of Justice is Lin Shaonian, an old fritter in the officialdom.

The general director of the Ministry of Agriculture and Forestry is Chen Zhenxian, the former general office of the Agriculture and Forestry Bureau of the three eastern provinces.

The Chief of the Navy is still Liu Guanxiong, the Chief of the Navy in the first cabinet.

As for the War Department, this department was a fictitious organization in the first cabinet and had no real power, Zhao Dongyun still nominated these two people to serve as the general and deputy director of the War Department respectively out of order to ease the relationship between Duan Qirui, Wang Shizhen and others.

Although he changed the patrol police department to the police department and appointed Wang Zhixin as the chief of the police.

A new Ministry of the Interior was established, and Zhu Jiabao was appointed as the chief minister and Zhao Bingjun as the deputy minister.

The above is the list of the chiefs of the ministries of the second cabinet, and looking at this list, you will find that many of them are still old Beiyang civil officials of the neutral faction, that is, Tang Shaoyi, Zhou Xuexi and others, but there are more people from the Soviet family, and most of them are in important positions, such as Prime Minister Xiong Xiling, Zhao E of the Ministry of Industry and Commerce, Wang Zhixin of the Ministry of Police, Xu Hongbao of the Ministry of Education, Chen Zhenxian of the Ministry of Agriculture and Forestry, and Zhu Jiabao of the Ministry of Internal Affairs.

To put it bluntly, in addition to the Soviet-born officials who occupied the majority of the second cabinet, the only powerful position of the old Beiyang faction was Zhou Xuexi of the Ministry of Finance.

And using Zhou Xuexi as the Minister of Finance also has Zhao Dongyun's own considerations, first of all, Zhou Xuexi is really good at playing the economy, he was Beiyang's money bag in the Yuan Shikai era, and he was still Beiyang's money bag in the Wang Yingkai era, and Zhao Dongyun became the president, there is no reason why he has to use his so-called cronies.

Moreover, the personal relationship between Zhou Xuexi and Zhao Dongyun has always been not shallow, and the political influence of Zhou Xuexi's father and son is relatively large, so he continued to use Zhou Xuexi.

After the second cabinet was reorganized, Zhao Dongyun reorganized the original army headquarters of the three eastern provinces into the general headquarters of the Republic of China, which was directly under the jurisdiction of the president and had the command of the domestic navy and army.

And Zhao Dongyun also has no shame, and even concurrently serves as the 'Generalissimo of the Republic of China on land and sea' as the president, and his intention to completely control military power is basically known to passers-by.

But how does Zhao Dongyun play in Jingshi, and others really don't care about him, why? Because no one among the Beiyang generals has announced the legitimacy of recognizing Zhao Dongyun's succession as president, Duan Qirui and Wang Shizhen have both issued telegrams before not recognizing Zhao Dongyun.

Now that Fengjun is still fighting with several companies in the South and Beiyang, naturally don't expect Duan Qirui and Wang Shizhen to obediently send congratulatory telegrams or the like.

Although Wang Yingkai has fallen into the wilderness, the anti-Zhao alliance still exists, Duan Qirui and Zhang Huaizhi's troops have already gone north to Shandong, and Wang Shizhen has once again transferred troops from Hubei to Shijiazhuang, no matter how you look at it, it doesn't look like the war is over.

But among these people, there is one person who is caught in the middle, and that is Wang Zhanyuan!

After Wang Zhanyuan broke out of Bazhou, he began to return south to Shandong, but before he could walk dozens of kilometers, there was news that Wang Yingkai was electrified to go to the field, and then the 11th Division, the 12th Division, and even Lu Yongxiang's 1st Division also surrendered to Zhao Dongyun one after another, and he Wang Zhanyuan didn't know where to go for a while!

Take refuge in Zhao Dongyun? To be honest, he didn't want to!

Although he and Zhao Dongyun and other Fengjun generals can't talk about deep hatred, the relationship is not much better, and he still remembers the days when he was placed under house arrest by Zhao Dongyun in Jinzhou last year.

As for joining Duan Qirui and Wang Shizhen to continue to fight with Zhao Dongyun, he is also unwilling!

Why, because he is different from Duan Qirui, Wang Zhanyuan is not a local warlord, he does not control the territory of a province under his hands, even if he was stationed in Shandong before, he could not interfere in Shandong, this Shandong is still Zhang Huaizhi's territory strictly speaking, and Shandong's taxes in the first half of the year were taken away by Zhang Huaizhi.

If he takes refuge in Duan Qirui, he may become weaker and weaker if he has no territory in his hands, and it is estimated that he will become a bald commander after the seventh division is exhausted.

Wang Zhanyuan, who was caught in the middle, was ruthless, and he didn't care about the overall situation of the republic, the situation in Zhili, he led the army all the way south, as for whether to go to Shandong or run to Nanzhili or Henan in the future, look at the situation in the future, in short, he doesn't care about the battle situation in Zhili.

Wang Zhanyuan patted his ass and left, and the last obstacle that prevented the Feng army from completely controlling Zhili disappeared, so Zhao Dongyun just took the oath of office as president, that is, he appointed Xu Bangjie as the commander of the Second Army, and the third and tenth divisions marched south to Cangzhou and Dezhou and marched into Shandong.

On the other hand, he ordered Meng Enyuan's First Army to continue southward, reinforce the Shijiazhuang line, and move south along the Jinghan Railway, where the First Army currently has 8,000 remnants of the First Division, the Ninth Division, the Fourth Mixed Brigade, and the Second Cavalry Brigade that has arrived in Shijiazhuang, as well as an independent heavy artillery battalion and an independent mortar battalion.

After the two armies went south, the Feng army did not sit idle, but continued to mobilize troops!

The First Division of the Army of the Three Eastern Provinces was changed to the 13th Division of the Central Army, and the First Mixed Brigade and the Second Mixed Brigade of the Army of the Three Eastern Provinces were renamed the Ninth Mixed Brigade of the Central Army and the 10th Mixed Brigade of the Central Army, completing the transformation from the provincial army to the Central Army.

The remnants of the 11th Division and the 12th Division of Toucheng were combined together and reorganized into the 11th Division, while the number of the 12th Division was temporarily left blank.

The 13th Division, the 9th Mixed Brigade, and the 10th Mixed Brigade are all units that are strictly lacking in formation, and although the reorganized 11th Division has 6,000 or 7,000 men, it is very difficult to achieve full strength.

However, once the above plans are completed, then the Feng army will be able to usher in a new peak of army expansion, and there will be two more divisions and two brigades, or at least more than 50,000 troops.

In addition to the reorganization and expansion of the regular troops, Zhao Dongyun also incorporated the provincial army, patrol battalions, and other troops that were originally directly under the province, and then reorganized them into several patrol regiments, which will be stationed in various places and used for tasks such as suppressing local areas and suppressing bandits and reassuring the people.

Almost the entire end of July, the Feng army spent in this atmosphere of large-scale southward movement and expansion, and as time passed, Duan Qirui and Zhang Huaizhi's troops finally made contact with the Feng army's second army in Shandong and launched a battle for Shandong!