"Naturally, it won't be so simple, why did they start the Opium War, just for one word, money!"

"Money?" Li Ju said suspiciously. Pen % fun % Pavilion www.biquge.info

"It's for the money, it's for the money." Li Hongzhang nodded, "Our most famous in China is silk, tea and porcelain, these three things, in the West is the hottest thing, so many years, has been, foreigners come to China thousands of miles away, with real money to buy these, but we China does not need foreign things, or the degree of need is limited, in this way, most of the world's silver because of the purchase of our good things, a steady stream of China, but we did not buy their things, so the silver will stay in China forever, If you were a British and French power, would you be able to endure such a situation? ”

"Ahh Ju Couple suddenly realized, "I see! If I were England and France, I would not have been. ”

"That's the reason, so taking opium to poison us is a point, it's their vicious heart, the most important thing is to earn back the silver from us, so that their domestic silver will not flow towards our China, how the disputes will be, you all know, we have lost the war, the opium can't be stopped, and the silver will flow out in an uproar, and then the second time is the same, but also to make more money from us to go back, so that the gap is not so huge."

"So, this plan to buy warships is also to send silver to foreign countries?" Li Ju Coupling hurriedly said, "This," although she is smart and resourceful, she has never seen the unpredictable situation of the country and the country in the international community, so she heard Li Hongzhang's point of view, although she heard this before, she couldn't help but be taken aback and seemed impossible, but lowered her head and thought about it carefully, it was indeed not wrong at all, after thinking about this, Li Ju Coupling couldn't help but break out in a cold sweat, "If you stop suddenly, you will make a big mess!" ”

"That's what I said," Li Hongzhang sighed, "I don't care if I come to be this wicked person, but I'm really worried that if I stop this trade rashly, in the future, I don't have to wait for the future, the British revenge will definitely come immediately, and Germany will not be happy," Li Hongzhang put his pipe on the swing of his pipe, "Such an annual income of millions of silver, suddenly less, no matter who it is, they will not be happy, they are not rural villagers, they are not happy, just scold it, they are not happy, they are going to make trouble." ”

Li Hongzhang really had a very broad vision, and he immediately saw that the suspension of the purchase of foreign warships by the Beiyang Naval Division was not only a military problem that would cause a comparison of the naval forces of various Asian countries, but also a change in the diplomatic and political attitudes of various countries toward China, and the danger of a possible shrinking naval force was far less than the redistribution of the political forces of this country towards China!

"This matter is really too big," some fine beads of sweat appeared on Li Ju's forehead, "Father, since you know, why don't you talk to the Queen Mother?" If this matter is revealed, it will be a big storm in the blink of an eye. ”

"It's because it's a big turmoil, so I can't say anything, I can only secretly understand in my heart, this joint, do you think the queen mother doesn't know? The queen mother must know in her heart, and the meaning of this number is that it is bound to reduce foreign purchases! Otherwise, I won't let your father come out to be this wicked man, and your father will come out to be this wicked man, and there will be some room for turning around in the future. ”

In the East Warm Pavilion of the Heart Cultivation Palace, Li Hongzhang knelt down and left, and the Empress Dowager Cixi looked at Li Hongzhang's back with a smile, and said to Yan Jingming, "Do you think this Li Hongzhang will see my true intentions?" ”

"The minister thinks that he can see it," Yan Jingming said indifferently, "Li Hongzhang has been handling foreign affairs for so many years, and the things outside are the most clear, and he will not know that there is such a big gap between the silver exported and the imported." ”

The Queen Mother raised her face with a proud face, "This is no way, who calls our things, foreigners like them so much?" ”

Trade surplus, this problem, from ancient times to the present, Britain launched two opium wars in a row, the most direct fuse is, of course, the opium problem, but the most fundamental reason, in the end, is just as Li Hongzhang said, is for "money".

The most important thing is to reverse this trade deficit, the two Opium Wars, the most important thing for Britain and France to do business is to open the Chinese market, thinking of doing business with 40,000 people, all of them are crazy, but this traditional Chinese market is self-sufficient and the most exclusive, even if some business pours into China, the benefits are very limited.

China's foreign trade economy is Pixiu, all the silver is swallowed in, but the pay is very little, and China's exports of three representative things, tea, silk, porcelain, tea is grown in the soil, silk is the mulberry leaves that grow in the soil, porcelain is completely made of clay, are taken out of clay, the cost of very low cost things, put in foreign countries, dumped and swept the entire European market, especially after the Empress Dowager Cixi took office, special attention to the foreign trade of these three things, Visiting Europe in person also has the meaning of paving the way for these things, gorgeous silk, exquisite porcelain, and precious tea with a unique taste, which makes Westerners very eye-opening, and has seen the good things used in the Qing Imperial Interior, and the stalls outside are simply rough and unsightly, and the Ministry of Internal Affairs is cooperating with the largest silk seller in France, and the best silk of Jiangning, Suzhou, and Hangzhou weaving houses is transported to Europe through official merchant ships, and every time it is not supplied, this profit has long been compared to the profits of the slave trade. It's simply a book of 10,000; Westerners also gradually like to drink green tea such as Longjing Biluochun that Chinese like, you must know that these were not liked in Europe before, such new tea is auctioned at the tea association in Hangzhou in early spring every year, those foreign merchants are simply unjust to be slaughtered, silver is spent the same as life, Rao is so, shipped to the West, and there is no market.

The export goods of the Chinese market, like a bottomless black hole, sucked all the silver in the world into its belly, and the world's silver decreased, which was a fatal disaster for other countries. The lack of currency and the huge trade deficit were the fundamental reasons why Britain and France could not bear to wage war against China. (To be continued.) )