In the eleventh year of the new Qin, 1888 in the Western calendar, the last year of the second cabinet's term. It's here in the blink of an eye!

From 1885 to 1888, China's development was very good and smooth in the past three years. The country's railways have exceeded 30,000 kilometers, the steel output has exceeded 4 million tons, and the country's fiscal revenue has reached 41 billion. China's annual income of 34 billion yuan in 1884 can be increased from 41 billion yuan to the current 41 billion yuan, which is more difficult than raising 20 billion yuan to 34 billion yuan.

Coupled with the profits of state-owned enterprises, China has begun to repay part of its national debt, while continuing to increase investment in education and health care.

The European and American powers have also walked out of the economic trough of the previous few years and once again ushered in a wave of economic and industrial development peaks. Because of the application of electricity, a new energy source, this is known as the second industrial revolution in history, marking the world has entered the electric age.

And China, with the patent of alternating current, not only completely caught up with this wave of industrial development, but also made a lot of money from it. Nikolai. Tesla was thus made a viscount by Liu Xian, although it could not be hereditary. Tesla, with the identity of a viscount, also successfully found a family affair among a group of nobles in the court, as for how he was placed in the blonde beauty at the beginning, Liu Xian didn't have the heart to care.

China has never recognized polygamy, but it does recognize 'wives and concubines' and 'equal wives'!

Railways in Xinjiang, Inner Mongolia and Northeast China are all open. Over the course of six years, millions of migrants moved from the interior to the northwest, north, and north-east frontiers. At the same time, the entire Wehrmacht was expanded to 1.2 million, and the cavalry was expanded to 10 cavalry divisions, with a total strength of 250,000.

The development of the eastern half of the island of New Guinea is also beginning to bear fruit. The Japanese brigade there exterminated at least 50,000 natives in the past three years. Since last year. The General Staff adjusted the structure of the Japanese brigades and regiments, and the troops of the six brigades were withdrawn and entered East Borneo.

The infantry was fully re-equipped with small-caliber rifles. Each squad was equipped with semi-automatic rifles, and the army was also fully equipped with new water-cooled heavy machine guns. In addition, the artillery unit appeared with eight rocket artillery, although it was still very primitive and backward. The army has also added new armored trains and train guns, but the transportation capacity of the troops has not improved much, and it is still mule and horse!

With the support of abundant funds, the kinetic energy of the gasoline engine is certainly rising in a straight line, but the maximum power can only reach 10 horsepower. It is naturally enough to only make a family car, but to make buses and trucks that Liu Siam needs. It's still far from what it requires.

So now the Wehrmacht is still mule-horse.

The navy, in the past three years, has not added any main ironclad ships, the North and South Ocean Fleets have only added two domestically produced armored cruisers, with a tonnage of between 3500~4000 tons, and then a number of transport ships and many small destroyers, torpedo boats, gunboats, and patrol boats. This kind of behavior makes the British very reassuring! They see this as an outward manifestation of China's national strategy!

In the past few years, China has strengthened its army building and neglected its navy, which is to make clear to outsiders, especially to itself, China's attitude -- its biggest enemy and target is still Russia.

Liu Xian naturally did not take the initiative to tell the British. China has been able to produce its own cannons with a caliber of more than 300mm with a diameter of 35 times the diameter. The large-caliber naval guns, which had been a source of grief for the Chinese Navy a few years ago, and the large-caliber coastal defense artillery, which had been a headache for the coastal defense forces, have now made a breakthrough in China.

After the close cooperation between the Chinese military industry and Krupp, all problems were solved. The Germans really gave a pair of wings to the development of Chinese artillery.

Nanyang, Japan, and Indochina have also been stable in the past three years. Spain too. The Dutch, too, did not dare to squeak in the face of China. In the past few years, a large amount of money from Nanyang has been used every year to purchase treasury bonds issued by Huaxia Bank. Because the motherland is strong. The Chinese people in Nanyang really felt this power, this kind of protection. There is no need to advertise it at all. To go to the bitter heart, the Nanyang Chinese returned to the embrace of the mainland.

A lot of young people in Nanyang. After completing their studies, they also returned to China one after another.

If five years ago, there was still some estrangement between the Chinese people in Nanyang, but now whether it is public opinion or official propaganda, both sides are one family.

In particular, the Yellow River, the Yangtze River, and the Pearl River all received extensive rainfall last summer, and although the river channels had been consolidated and dredged and the embankments had been reinforced, there were still breaches in a few places. Nearly one million people have been affected! As a result, the Chinese in Nanyang took the initiative to launch a fundraising campaign and donated more than 300 million yuan to China in two months, as well as a batch of food, medicine and clothing.

Even Liu Xian, who had always been attached to the Nanyang Chinese in his heart and had a heart to make use of it, also felt that the Nanyang Chinese were really good. There were so many estrangements and disgusting in the previous life, it can only be said that creation makes people. The position is different.,How about Nayuki.。

If it weren't for Russia's actions in Central Asia and Siberia, Liu Xian would not know how comfortable he would have been in the past three years.

The French economy began to recover in 1884, and Russia was once again supplied with blood, and began to build its own railways in Central Asia and Siberia, which were naturally easy to build. It took the Russians only two years to build the railway to Andijan. As for the Trans-Siberian Railway, it has only seen a beginning, and it has not even reached the Ob River.

At the same time, a large number of Russian troops gathered in Central Asia and the region west of the Ural Mountains. Especially in the early summer of this year, the Russian army of one army was stationed in Kokand, and if it were not for the fact that the strength of the Xinjiang Military Region had also increased greatly in the past three years, Wang Guosheng would have two cavalry divisions and an integrated infantry division, plus an independent brigade and three local regiments, and it is estimated that he would soon be in an emergency with Beijing.

Anyway, the clarion call for the third war between China and Russia is approaching. In this battle, Liu Xian will go out in person!

Mao'er Hutong, Beijing, Li Mansion.

Li Hongzhang, Guo Songtao, Yan Jingming, Shen Baozhen, Liu Changyou, Pan Zuyin, Chen Baozhen and other central ministers of the old school were all gathered in one place. Fan Debang is about to retire, the second cabinet is about to come to an end, and the competition between Li Hongzhang and Li Ying and Zhang Shouyan has also reached a white-hot level.

What should I do to be able to suppress Li Ying and Zhang Shouyan? Li Hongzhang's city is so deep that he can't hold his breath now.

Li Ying is not worried. This person has just entered the central government, and the cabinet ranks low, and he has limited control over the local area. It is not difficult for Shaoquan to overwhelm it. It was Zhang Cifu who was embarrassed. This man has a deep foundation, outstanding ability, and is extremely trusted by the emperor. It may be difficult to suppress his limelight if he only works practical matters. ”

Liu Changyou stopped here as he spoke. He really couldn't think of what way to deal with Zhang Shouyan. This person was the emperor's minister at the beginning of the family, and he has had an inseparable and intimate connection with the emperor for a long time, and this friendship is much more than a simple kinship. He is not strong, he can reconcile the opinions of various departments, he can calm people's hearts, and his official voice is also very good.

"Unless we fight now, the possibility of Brother Shaoquan ...... Not high! ”

It was another shameless party, and when Shen Baozhen said goodbye, he whispered in Li Hongzhang's ear in a low voice.

War! War!

In Shen Baozhen's eyes, only now, only when the third Sino-Russian war breaks out this year, can Li Hongzhang compete for the throne of Shoufu have hope. Otherwise, Zhang Shouyan's ascension to the third cabinet is almost a certainty! The ministers didn't know that Liu Xian had plans to drive the expedition in person. I thought that this time China and Russia fought again, and it was still the same as last time, with the cabinet sitting in the center, dispatching materials from afar to support all the needs of the army.

Half of Li Hongzhang's great fame was obtained by developing foreign affairs, and the other half was obtained by pacifying the Taiping Heavenly Kingdom. Although he was not a famous general, during the war, the people's trust in Li Hongzhang was definitely greater than their trust in Zhang Shouyan. Zhang Shouyan's biggest drawback is that he is too clean with the army!

Moreover, his gentle and elegant external image will also make the government and the opposition uneasy about him, the wartime prime minister.

Although Shen Baozhen is one of the representatives of the old school, he is not the core of the Xianghuai lineage. He attended two such gatherings today, but he didn't say a word. This time, he was able to say this sentence before parting, which made Li Hongzhang's heart stop violently. Then came the joy of the heart!

Is Shen Baozhen's method good? Good! This is almost the only possibility for Li Hongzhang to turn the tables. But when such an idea came out of Shen Baozhen's mouth, does it mean that Shen Baozhen wants to fully fall to Li Hongzhang and his family in the battle for the first assistant in the second half of the year?

Since Shen Guifen completely withdrew from government affairs, there has been a lot of turmoil in the cabinet, and Shen Baozhen has been adjusted to the position of the number one leader of the Ministry of Civil Affairs. But his weight in the cabinet is really not light. If he can get Shen Baozhen's full support, Li Hongzhang will definitely add a heavy-level chip to himself, not to mention that he has an extra chance of winning.

South Africa at the same time.

It's the middle of summer in China, and it's the cold winter of the year in South Africa.

The gold mines in the White Water Ridge were exposed last year. Not the prospector who discovered the Teresa gold mine in that primordial plane, but an ordinary white European adventurer. The man, Harry, intended to trek through the watershed area, and found a golden stone outcropping from the ground in the mountains north of the site of what would become Johannesburg, a natural dog's head gold of considerable purity. After the discovery of the nugget, Harry himself, after being ecstatic, immediately ran back to Pretoria in the Transvaal Republic with the dog's head gold, and reported the discovery to the official authorities in Pretoria, as is customary, in the hope of obtaining a "gold mine finder's title certificate" that would be tax-free. But the Baishui Ridge area is owned by China.

Immediately after this situation was exposed, China issued a stern warning. The Koland Basin is still like a piece of fat that flows like oil, attracting gold diggers from all over the world. And with the discovery of huge gold mines in the Rand Basin, it is impossible for China to cover up all the news, and the Baishui Ridge area is also coveted by hyenas from all over the world. (To be continued......)