The loss of Canton closed the last door to the world for the Manchus, and after all five treaty ports south of the Yangtze River were occupied by the Taiping army, the Manchus urgently needed to open another window. Xiao Yungui was very curious about what kind of price Song Qingyun would offer to Lie Weilian, or what the Manchu Qing could satisfy the United States.

The current history has been changed beyond recognition by the four, and it seems that they do not have the advantage of foresight, but there is one thing that they already have, and that is prediction. The reason why history is a discipline is that people can remind future generations not to make the same mistakes by understanding what happened in history, and at the same time, people who are proficient in history often have more accurate predictions about the laws of the development of things.

After the Manchu Qing Dynasty, the thousand-year-old country ushered in unprecedented changes, the invasion of the feudal agricultural country by the capitalist countries, this proposition had no historical experience to learn from before the Manchu Dynasty, so even if Zeng Guofan, Zuo Zongtang and other famous ministers in history were crossing the river by feeling the stones, but their reform was not successful. Subsequently, it took the Chinese nation more than 150 years to completely solve this proposition, so all four of them have a certain amount of historical experience, and they will avoid making the mistakes made by their predecessors.

Xiao Yungui listened to Lie Weilian's chatter and fell into deep thought, and he began to empathize, if he was Song Qingyun in the face of the current aggressive situation of the Taiping Heavenly Kingdom, what would she do? It is a must that several ports in the north will be opened as treaty ports!

The Manchu economy was already in trouble, and the gold and customs duties became the mainstays. The treaty port can drive commerce and trade, and Song Qingyun will definitely not only do business with Lao Maozi in the north, and Lao Maozi's business is not easy to do. The opening of treaty ports would continue to sustain the Manchu economy. Only with money and food can the war continue.

Then there is the introduction of foreign forces to intervene in the civil war, and historical experience has proved that once the great powers are able to free up their hands, they are very willing to meddle in the affairs of other countries, and they did this during the civil war between the North and the South of the United States. Xiao Yungui somewhat understood Song Qingyun's sinister intentions, she wanted to muddy the waters. The United States intervened to mediate and resume negotiations, and Britain and France continued to trade with the Manchus in the north. I believe that Britain and France will still agree, after all, they need trade, especially since the British want to continue their opium business.

Continue to trade in cooperation with the Great Powers. The Manchu Qing Dynasty can still continue to obtain advanced technology and foreign guns and artillery, Xiao Yungui knows very well what kind of miracles can be made by using the great powers as a traverser, maybe the Song and Lu who broke the jar did not hesitate to sell more national interests to achieve this goal.

After Lie Weilian finished speaking, Xiao Yungui's contemplation also ended. He didn't listen to Lie Weilian's nonsense at all. He briefly expressed his opinion, "If your country wants to get out of the current predicament, what you need to do is not to find another dumping ground for goods, you must know that the British really play a leading role in the Far Eastern market." I believe that what your country needs to adjust is its own economic system, as far as this king knows, your country has a plantation economy in the south, and an industrial and commercial economy in the north. There are many bankrupt enterprises in the north, and even the prices of agricultural products in the south are constantly being hit. But the economy of the South made heavy use of cheap labor, that is, black slaves, so their losses would be relatively small. If your country wants to revive its economy, in addition to strengthening its own construction, it needs a large number of cheap labor and raw material sources, and the south has plantations and cheap labor, which is exactly what the north needs. If your country had not straightened out its economic structure and strengthened its competitiveness in its own commodities, it would not have been able to compete with the British. After all, it's impossible for this king not to buy high-quality and cheap goods here, and run to sell higher-priced products. ”

Lev Weilian is a lawyer by training, and he is not very good at economic problems, but his predecessor, Minister Mailian, told him when he handed over his post that at this moment, the United States really does not have the ability to dominate the Far East market, and all the United States can do is to follow in the footsteps of Britain and France, get some of the same treatment from the two countries, and do not need to deliberately try to change anything.

Xiao Yungui still smiled and said: "Mr. Minister, commerce and trade under the rule of the Taiping Heavenly Kingdom are open and fair, as you said, we do have plans to build railways in Jiangxi, Guangdong, Fujian and other places, but our bidding and capital introduction are all open, and we will not take sides." ”

Lev sighed, although he didn't know much about the economy, he also knew that under completely fair conditions, the United States would not be able to compete with Britain, a country known as the world's factory, in terms of technology and product quality. It seems that his hopes can only be pinned on the Manchus in the north, and if the United States can take advantage of the war between Britain and France and the Manchus, and take the lead in opening the market in the north, it may be beneficial to the United States.

Xiao Yungui's refusal was not helpless, he could also agree to the Americans' requests, but he did not like the feeling of being threatened, and at the same time, offending Britain and France because of the United States, which was not a cost-effective thing in itself. At this time, the United States was only a second-rate country, and a civil war would break out in three years at most, and the Manchus would not have too many opportunities to take advantage of the United States.

However, Xiao Yungui still promised to continue to increase the amount of investment in the United States, and continue to save American enterprises and factories, of course, this guy is happy to do this, taking advantage of the collapse and bankruptcy of a large number of American enterprises and factories, and buying shares to pick up garbage This is a matter of course to do, these factories and enterprises can continue to make a lot of war money in the future civil war between the North and the South, why not?

At the same time, Xiao Yungui also agreed to his request to open the US consulate in Tianjing, and at the same time, the United States also agreed to set up consulates of the Taiping Heavenly Kingdom in San Francisco, that is, San Francisco and Washington, and the diplomatic relations between the two sides became closer.

After sending Lie Weilian away, Xiao Yungui began to consider whether to sabotage the Manchu negotiations that had been planned for a long time again, but after he calculated and found that if he used the same conspiracy again, he might be exposed, and the Manchus were unlikely to make the same mistake again. Do you want to write a sincere letter to remind Song Qingyun and Lu Sixuan that they should put the overall situation of the country first, don't be a sinner for the ages, and betray the interests of the country for their own selfish desires?

Thinking of this, Xiao Yungui instantly extinguished this thought, and now he wantonly opened a commercial port in the occupied area of the Taiping Heavenly Kingdom. Wantonly absorbing foreign capital for the construction and development of railways, minerals, and so on, is this considered a betrayal of national interests? Moreover, he recognized all the provisions of the "Treaty of Nanjing", which in itself was a kind of betrayal in disguise.

After the capture of Guangzhou. Li Xiucheng once went to the Kowloon Peninsula to overlook Hong Kong Island, although Hong Kong Island at this time had a good fleet protection, but the army was very small, only 2,000 marines guarded, Li Xiucheng wanted to recover here, and the General Staff even carried out a deduction to recover Hong Kong Island. But in the end, Xiao Yungui called a timeout, and the time had not come.

It was not possible to recover Hong Kong. It also represents Xiao Yungui's acquiescence to the previous treaty, and in a sense, he is no different from the Manchu Qing. If you are not strong enough to keep your own things, you will naturally be robbed by others. Therefore, Xiao Yungui felt that it would not work to persuade Song and Lu from the perspective of the country's general interests, and it was just self-inflicted humiliation.

Can Song Qingyun's plan be realized? Xiao Yungui felt that there were still some blockages. These obstacles came from the conservative forces of the Manchus. The Manchus were different from the Taiping Heavenly Kingdom. The Taiping Heavenly Kingdom was a completely new regime, and the class he united was the gentry, merchants, and other strata who were bullied by the bureaucracy, and the class that Song Qingyun maintained her rule was precisely the bureaucratic and aristocratic group, so it was unlikely that she would be able to convince those diehards so easily. Xiao Yungui didn't make any big arrangements with a hint of comfort, but just ordered Bai Zetang's forces in Jiangbei to send out some rumors, spread rumors, and say that the Manchus planned to make peace with foreigners and betray the country's ugly face, maybe this could create some trouble for Song Qingyun.

A few days later. The arrival of the fleet returning from the United States, a large number of cheap equipment and machines purchased by Hu Xueyan arrived. There are also hundreds of skilled American workers, technicians, engineers, and more. Xiao Yungui did not know what they were capable of, but he accepted them anyway, and these planes, equipment, and personnel were scattered and arranged to go to three shipyards, and then he set his sights on the battle in Guangdong.

Li Xiucheng began to shrink his forces after receiving the report of Zhang Wenxiang's attack setback, but the premise for him to withdraw his troops from the east was to solve the last Qing army that was holding on to Chaozhou, Li Tingyu's Qing army!

Li Tingyu is also a veteran who will never give up after repeated defeats, and he also won the trust of the Manchu Qing Dynasty, especially after the Empress Dowager Cixi came to power, she even reinstated Li Tingyu to his official post. Previously, due to the loss of most of the territory of Fujian, Li Tingyu was dismissed and retained by the Manchu Qing Dynasty, which means that Li Tingyu led the Qing army to fight against the Taiping army at the junction of Guangdong and Fujian for more than a year.

Originally, Li Tingyu was going to be beheaded, Qing Law, the official who lost his land died, there were many pieces of impeachment of Li Tingyu at that time, Xianfeng was furious when he was still there, and planned to punish him heavily, but Xingzhen, who accompanied the driver to review the recital, said to him, "The emperor killed Li Tingyu, who else can lead the army to resist Fujian Changmao?" Moreover, most of Li Tingyu's soldiers and horses are now self-run regimental exercises, so he sent one person to go, and this army of soldiers and horses was scattered overnight. ”

To put it bluntly, this army is a regimental training horse run by Li Tingyu from raising money and food, not to mention what the consequences will be if he kills Li Tingyu, even if he can kill him, who can take over? So Xianfeng suddenly realized, and Xingzhen smiled and wrote a sentence on each impeachment note, which was considered an approval. This sentence is written: "If the criminal minister is asked, what if the secretary goes to Fujian to lead the army? So, no one played again. But Su Shun still tried his best to dismiss the public and give Li Tingyu a dismissal and retention, Su Shun's reason at that time was also very simple, if the ministers would lose their land, the court would not have any punishment too unreasonable, so in the end, Li Tingyu led the troops in vain, which had little impact on him, and this army was actually just his private regiment training horses.

After Xingzhen came to power, she immediately used Li Tingyu's meritorious service in resisting Changmao and restored Li Tingyu's official position, which certainly bought people's hearts and made Li Tingyu even more desperate. The Taiping army attacked Guangdong, Wang Yide guarded Meizhou, Li Tingyu guarded Chaozhou, and finally Meizhou fell, Wang Yide committed suicide, and all the states and counties in eastern Guangdong were lost, but Li Tingyu was still stubbornly trapped in the lonely city of Chaozhou, like a nail, he refused to be pulled out lightly.

Therefore, if the Taiping army in the east of Guangdong wants to shrink its forces and advance westward, the first thing is to solve this nasty nail, and it is an old nail! (To be continued......)