The festive atmosphere of the presidential re-election celebration has not completely dissipated, the colorful flags decorated on Chang'an Avenue are still fluttering in the cold wind, and the Republic has ushered in the New Year's Day of 1917. The square in the center of the capital has been under martial law as always, and this has not surprised the citizens and foreigners living in Beijing, because since the establishment of the Mengshan Army, a ceremony to lay flowers and pay tribute to the Unknown Soldier Monument has been held in the square on the first day of the Western New Year, attended by high-ranking officials at or above the ministerial level of the Republic in Beijing and representatives from all walks of life.

The calendar is a big problem. The Republic of China adopted the Western calendar, and there was a fierce debate about this at the beginning, but the final result was that the Chinese and Western calendars coexisted, with the officialdom using the Western calendar and the folk using the lunar calendar. In the second year of the founding of the People's Republic of China, the national statutory holidays promulgated by the Government Council are also mixed with Chinese and Western calendars, such as the Lunar New Year, Lantern Festival, Qingming Festival, Dragon Boat Festival, Mid-Autumn Festival, and Chongyang Festival, and other special anniversaries such as National Day, National Assembly Founding Day and New Year's Day are also listed as public holidays, but the Western calendar is adopted.

Journalists don't care about holidays, and there seem to be more news clues on holidays. Zhang Yuanzhe, a veteran reporter at the state-run Zhonghua Daily, has never had the concept of a day off. On New Year's Day, he drove to the square early, parked his private car in the parking lot in front of the gate of the police department adjacent to the square, and entered the heavily guarded square with the Class A pass he held. And he praised it in his heart. Lao Hou, dressed in a blue cotton coat, sat on a stacked military blanket and took a nap, while Xiaobai rubbed his hands and walked back and forth to resist the cold of the early morning.

Lao Hou is the chief photographer of the newspaper, and his photography skills are absolutely first-class. On such an occasion, it is natural for Lao Hou to go out. Nowadays, the news is booming, and new newspapers have sprung up in the capital, and the General Administration of Press and Publication, adhering to the general principle of press freedom, does not openly take care of the Chung Hwa Pao, which is widely regarded as the first mouthpiece of the government. On occasions like this, whoever comes early occupies a good seat, and there is no other way to find a good seat where you can take a panoramic view. Early admission is possible. Zhang Yuanzhe estimated that Lao Hou and Xiaobai did not go home at all. I put the machine here last night, and the blanket is the best proof of this.

Zhang Yuanzhe, who is also the deputy editor-in-chief of "Zhonghua Daily", has always been in charge of writing and does not need to take pictures. He nodded to Xiaobai, who was looking at him but didn't dare to come over, and then came to the side to talk with Lieutenant Colonel Chi Yue, the chief reporter of the "National Defense Daily" who greeted him. Lieutenant Colonel Chi Yue, who joined the Mengshan Army in 1909, had a strong Cantonese accent. Talking is laborious.

Zhang Yuanzhe is here today to find inspiration. The President's Office was not satisfied with the New Year's message of the Chung Hwa Pao. But it was sent for trial late. It's too late to make major structural changes. Only a few paragraphs of praise were deleted, and they were signed and stamped back. The attitude of the information department made the newspaper very nervous, especially Zhang Yuanzhe, who drafted the dedication. The New Year's message of Zhonghua Bao is regarded as a bellwether for politics, and this year is a special day. President Long Da was re-elected without any suspense, and Zhang Yuanzhe came up with the dedication of less than 2,000 words after figuring out the speech at the inauguration ceremony of President Long Da, but it did not meet the wishes of the presidential office. Because of time constraints, it was too late to rewrite and re-examine, and the newspaper decided to arrange a remedial article on the front page tomorrow, which would still be written by Zhang Yuanzhe. In order to write this article well, Zhang Yuanzhe decided to come to the memorial site to find inspiration, and the best case is that President Long Da will give a speech, so that he will catch something that he has overlooked.

Zhang Yuanzhe believes that the New Year's message is a serious understanding of the goals and tasks of the president's inaugural speech for the next term. President Longdae's speech to the National Assembly was not very long, but he basically wrote it down, went back and checked the shorthand records with his colleagues in detail, and studied the revised draft sent by the Secretariat of the Presidential Office before he began to write his own article. The president's speech was divided into two parts, one part was a review of his first term, and he did not talk much about his achievements, but talked about many problems, such as the establishment of the government, the work style of officials, and the problem of corruption in certain fields, especially the improvement of the people's livelihood. Of course, he also devoted a considerable amount of space to industrial construction, national defense, and foreign affairs. The second part is a brief exposition of his second commitment, clearly pointing out that he will make achievements in achieving world peace, building a clean and efficient government, and improving the quality of life of the people, and clearly stated that he will double the national income statistics in 1916, and take care of low-income groups and remote areas of ethnic minorities under the premise of equitable development...... The signal released by the president's speech is very clear: the country will enter a period of peacebuilding, and the focus will shift from war to peacebuilding, which is favored by the overwhelming majority of people, so the president's speech won thunderous applause from the congressmen and non-voting delegates.

In his inaugural speech, the president also talked about the reorganization of government agencies, which of course was of principle, that is, the setup and functions of government agencies in the founding period no longer suited the existing shape of the country, and it was necessary to make adaptive adjustments. This is an extremely important signal that will concern everyone in the upper echelons of the republic. Zhang Yuanzhe hopes to see some clues at the memorial ceremony, one of Zhang Yuanzhe's tasks at the memorial site is to focus on the big people who participate in the memorial service, and can always see some clues of the political climate from the appearance and absence of characters on some occasions, which is a kind of ability that Zhang Yuanzhe himself figured out.

"What is dude thinking?" Chi Yue, who still couldn't hide his literati temperament, asked with a smile, "The New Year's Day speech was written by my brother, right?" It's majestic and exciting. ”

"I'm ashamed, I'm ashamed, it's not worth mentioning compared to your newspaper's 'Passing on the Good News of the Military Flag', and swallowing thousands of miles like a tiger is a portrayal of Xiongwen. Ha ha. ”

"That's the light of the expeditionary force's successive victories! Compared with the soldiers of the expeditionary force outside the Yangwei region who climbed the ice and lay on the snow, we are really ashamed of the pen-swinging stick. By the way, I have been approved to go to Russia......"

"Ah, that's enviable. When you leave, my brother will definitely do it for you. ”

"You're welcome, you don't have to do it, I'll leave tomorrow. This time, there were many colleagues who went to Russia, and then there was a condolence group. It was also organized by the Ministry of National Defense, and I took the mission to go, the 12th Army made a name for itself in the San River, and produced several heroes, and Director Zhang asked to sort out a group of propaganda articles with ordinary soldiers as the protagonists, and the task was arduous. ”

Zhang Yuanzhe knew that the director Zhang in the mouth of Lieutenant Colonel Chi Yue was Zhang Ziyu, director of the "National Defense Daily".

"I am even more ashamed to say that. Now the whole country is paying attention to the Russian war, and this time you won't be famous and won't be able to. ”

The square was lively, and representatives from all walks of life in the capital entered one after another under their own banners. There was a burst of frolic sounds in the phalanx of college students, which was the most energetic group. Where they appear. Everywhere there was laughter, even on the occasion of the solemn commemoration of the Unknown Soldier. But no one came to stop them, from the victory in the war against Japan to the Wehrmacht's war in Europe. Popular sentiment has risen to an unprecedented height. It's not so much a tribute to the unknown martyrs who died in battle. It's better to say that it's an act of showing off force.

Victory in Europe. The voices that have always existed in the country accusing the government of being reckless in military force have been completely suppressed, as evidenced by the fact that the newspapers of several small opposition parties are not selling well. Tianjin's "Ta Kung Pao" was originally a highly influential newspaper, and its circulation was not inferior to that of "Zhonghua Bao". If you exclude the number of subscriptions from government agencies, "Chung Hwa Pao" is actually inferior to "Ta Kung Pao". However, it was precisely because Ta Kung Pao published an article questioning the dispatch of troops to Russia a year ago that the newspaper was strongly protested, and the number of subscriptions for the new year dropped sharply, forcing Ta Kung Pao to republish articles in support of the government's entry into the war in order to salvage its impact. A friend of the General Administration of Press and Publication once told him that the news is not easy to do now, public opinion is increasingly hijacking the news, and the freedom of the press advocated by the government has become an empty phrase.

After the Battle of Bodong, the students of the capital university held a celebration parade again, it is said that there are a large number of college students who have signed up to join the army, the Ministry of National Defense and the Ministry of Culture and Education jointly held a symposium on current affairs of teachers and students of the capital colleges and universities at Peking University, the president and the prime minister came to the scene and answered more than a dozen questions raised by the students, President Long Qian, who was wearing military uniforms, rejected the students' desire to join the army and fight, and put forward several requirements for the students with high patriotic enthusiasm, and clearly asked them to devote themselves to the country's economic construction and build a prosperous, strong, democratic, Civilized New China and study and work hard.

Thinking of the president's inaugural speech, Zhang Yuanzhe clearly felt that the president was cooling down the feverish atmosphere of war and turning more of his direction back to economic construction. Suddenly, Zhang Yuanzhe realized the reason why his New Year's message was dissatisfied with the presidential office -- it did not match the tone set by the president! The President admitted that there have been many problems in the work of the government, the construction of democracy, and the people's livelihood since the founding of the People's Republic of China, but the New Year's message continued the tune of singing praises in the past, but made a beautiful vision for the future and avoided the content of improving the work of the government......

Long Qian was the "Founding Emperor". In China's long history, the vast majority of the founding emperors were the makers of new rules, which seemed somewhat unusual to others. The question of the number of terms of the presidential inauguration is absolutely out of place in Zhang Yuanzhe's view, but this is what makes Long Qian special. He is not afraid of criticism from others, because he has the capital to deal with criticism. He is not afraid to expose his mistakes, because he has more impressive achievements...... On that special occasion, the president demonstrated his determination to eliminate malpractices and rectify the rule of officials and enrich the people's livelihood in the next term.

Thinking about this section, Zhang Yuanzhe relaxed instead. The dedication to style was not a mistake of principle, the problem was that it did not follow the president's train of thought. It's easy now, let's organize a few articles that are in line with the president's heart...... After the memorial service, he should go and consult the woman who is regarded by officialdom as the president's confidant......

At 8:30 a.m., the president and the speakers of the two houses of Congress led a group of high-ranking officials from the antique parliament building on the east side of the square into the square, the noisy square was quiet, and the 28 salutes placed on the south side of the Monument to the Unknown Soldier began to roar, and the memorial ceremony officially began.

The host was Mr. Hong Yuecheng, President of the Senate, and the memorial was read out by Prime Minister Fang Shengyuan, who already spoke standard Mandarin and basically couldn't hear the Fujian accent. Zhang Yuanzhe didn't care much about this kind of official-style article, but focused on President Long Da, who was standing in the front row wearing a military uniform without a military rank mark, and from his position, you can clearly see the high-ranking officials around President Long Qian, the left side of the president are civilian officials in civilian clothes, and the right side is the generals in straight military uniforms. The order is important and indicates the position in the arena of state power. Standing in the first row today in addition to the two houses of parliament and the head of the government affairs are all soldiers, this is determined by the nature of the memorial ceremony, Zhang Yuanzhe did not study the generals, but paid attention to the president's left hand of the civilian team, sure enough, in the discovery of a few unfamiliar figures at the same time, there are really fewer people in the attendance, such as the Minister of Police Chen Chao did not attend the ceremony, in the past, his position was very "high", after the Minister of Culture and Education, the Minister of Industry, but now I can't see the old man who holds the power of the police...... Rumours that Minister Chan will no longer serve as a member of the new government appear to be true, and the list of members of the new government should be announced soon.

Lieutenant Colonel Ikegoshi's concern was about the generals. He suddenly discovered that a general had been inserted between the Minister of Defense, Marshal Feng Guozhu, and the Chief of the General Staff, General Situ Jun. He was taken aback, there were only a few generals in the Wehrmacht, and he immediately concluded that the general who was ranked before the chief of the General Staff was General Ye Yanbing, who was removed from his post and recalled!

It's a big discovery. Recently, there has been a lot of discussion about General Ye in the officialdom of the capital, saying that General Ye Yanbing's disobedience angered Russia and other countries of the Entente and led to the defeat of the Russian army in Poland. That was why the President dismissed his deputy commander-in-chief of the expeditionary force. This incident caused a great uproar within the military and even more caused a diplomatic storm. Chi Yue's position can hear a lot of rumors that cannot be heard outside, for example, the president is very dissatisfied with General Ye who has returned to Beijing, since General Ye returned to Beijing, the president has not even summoned him, this is absolutely unreasonable, and there are rumors in the Ministry of Foreign Affairs that the president is under pressure from the allies and will severely deal with General Ye Yanbing. Indeed, Admiral Ye Yanbing now has no position and has become an idler.

Military circles speculate about General Ye's appointment after returning to China, and there are different opinions, most of them believe that General Ye will be the commander of a certain large military region, such as the Northwest Military Region. After all, Admiral Ye won a great victory in Romania, had field exploits, and was related to the president, so it was impossible to abandon it. It was also said that General Ye would take over the current post of Feng Marshal and take charge of the personnel of the National Defense Forces, on the grounds that the President had criticized the work of the Ministry of Defense several times, and it seemed that the President was dissatisfied with Feng Shuai. And Feng Shuai did have rumors that he asked to go down and lead the troops...... Now that Admiral Ye is standing in front of Chief Situ, the rumors that Admiral Ye will be idle must be rumors......

A lot of people wanted to hear the president's speech, but they didn't. According to the usual procedure, after the president led the civil and military officials of the republic to bow three times to the monument and circumambulate for a week, the main procedure of the ceremony ended, and Lieutenant Colonel Chi Yue saw the president and Admiral Ye Yanbing shaking hands and talking, and then left the square side by side, and the last doubt in his heart was finally dispelled. (To be continued......)