Chapter 227

However, the brave Hunan army, which had dominated China and fought all over the world (narrowly referring to China), was seriously aged, and its guns were more backward than those of the Huai army, and its combat effectiveness was not as good as before.

On January 17, 1895, the Qing army made four unsuccessful attempts to regain Haicheng. On February 28, the Japanese launched a counteroffensive and pursued from Haicheng on multiple roads. On March 4, the Japanese army inflicted heavy losses on the main force of the Hunan army at Niuzhuang, occupied Yingkou on the 7th, and captured Tianzhuangtai on the 9th, and the Hunan army was defeated on the east bank of the Liao River.

After losing the first battle, Liu Kunyi was planning a counterattack, but the Qing court sent Li Hongzhang to sign the "Treaty of Shimonoseki" with Japan. Liu Kunyi "played three times, and was unable to return to the sky." Filled with indignation, every inch of heart is like a knot".

Although the situation is bad, Liu Kunyi does not think that the situation cannot be reversed.

At that time, he strategically put forward the policy of a protracted war against Japan.

In the telegram of the "Military Affairs Office of the Sending Office", he immediately expressed his strong opposition to the "Treaty of Shimonoseki": "Although Kun Yi has not been fully informed of the new treaty, it is difficult to allow the concession of land and indemnity at present, and the future troubles are even more unimaginable. ”

Then, through the analysis of the current situation, he put forward the key points of the war: "The only thing that is to break the war, distract and storm the attack, and take the protection of Gyeonggi and the consolidation of Liao and Shen as the first priority."

"In case of a tight situation in Gyeonggi, Kun Yi will dispatch a strong team and quickly enter the defense to ensure safety. ”

He analyzed the war situation, which was very beneficial to the Chinese side: "But the Japanese slaves came from afar, and they were in the form of host and guest. Recently, it has been reported that most of the new soldiers are old and weak, and their salaries are not continued. I must fight hard and perseverance, otherwise the high base and deep ditch will be strictly guarded. How can they stay for a long time? When they are exhausted, they will make their own plans to turn around. ”

He weighed the pros and cons and put forward an important policy for restraining Japan: "In addition, if the army is used for two years, the salary required is not more than tens of millions, which is less than half of the indemnity, and the more it will be spent. The word 'long-lasting' is really essential for the present system."

In the end, he expressed his determination to fight the Japanese invaders to the end: "As soon as the generals heard of the peace treaty, they were filled with indignation, and they wanted to fight to the death." Kun's position is in the army, and the sect is closed, but he can only do his best to fight the war, and he doesn't dare to know"!

It can be said that the policy of protracted war put forward by him is practical and feasible, because China is far from being comparable to small Japan because of its vast land and vast population, and how can a small state destroy China by force.

As long as China adopts a protracted war, strengthens its determination to resist Japan, launches a popular war of resistance, and constantly consumes the enemy's vital forces in battle, then small Japan can only lose in the end.

Moreover, at that time, little Japan was far less arrogant than it was back then, and it did not try to destroy China at all, but was just a robber who wanted to extort a sum of money.

It is a pity that the lord and faction led by Cixi Lao Qianpo and Prince Gong Yi were timid, and finally signed the "Treaty of Shimonoseki" that humiliated the country.

However, Liu Kunyi's idea of protracted war still has a huge influence in modern history, and it also played a guiding role in the subsequent War of Resistance Against Japan.

Later, the guiding programs of the Anti-Japanese War period, such as "On Protracted War" and "Accumulating Small Victories for Big Victories, Exchanging Space for Time", were also influenced by Liu Kunyi's protracted war thinking to a certain extent.

Hong Tian thought of Liu Kunyi's suggestion in his previous life, and he also let out a light sigh.

Like Liu Changyou's preemptive strike, Liu Kunyi's protracted war against Japan was also a good opportunity missed by the Manchu Qing Dynasty, and a protracted war against Japan was more realistic than a preemptive strike.

At the time of the First Sino-Japanese War, the gap between China's army and the small Japanese army was not too big, and it was far less serious than in the War of Resistance against Japan.

Moreover, before receiving the reparations, the finances of small Japan were almost exhausted, and as long as the Manchu Qing Dynasty lasted for a year and a half, I am afraid that Japan would collapse first.

It's a pity that the Manchu Qing Dynasty has always been the Manchu Qing Dynasty, backward and rotten to an unimaginable level.

In the past, Hongtian didn't understand why the Manchus would choose to admit defeat and pay reparations, but at this time, as a monarch, he had already seen that the Manchus actually knew that Japan could not destroy them, so they did not regard Japan as a danger to their henchmen, and they did not feel dangerous to pay compensation for land cedes.

What they are really worried about is the people below, because they are the ones who may destroy the Manchus, once a protracted war against Japan is carried out, the people will be miserable, and they will naturally blame the Manchus, I am afraid that when the Manchus are not dead in the hands of Little Japan, they will die first in the hands of the people.

Hong Tian can only be helpless about this, the feudal rulers are all to maintain their own rule as the first priority, as for other things will be put in a secondary position.

Hong Tian took this as a warning, and there was a belief in his heart that for the sake of all the people, the position of the emperor was nothing.

With a sigh of relief, a smile appeared on his face, the surrender of a character like Liu Kunyi was definitely a great blessing for the Taiping Heavenly Kingdom.

However, Liu Kunyi had not publicly surrendered at this time, because Liu Kunyi was worried that after he announced his surrender to the Taiping Heavenly Kingdom, he would be attacked by the British army.

Hong Kong is very close to Guangzhou, where the governor of Liangguang is stationed, and if the British expeditionary force attacks Guangzhou, Liu Kunyi is not sure that it will be able to defend it, so Liu Kunyi does not dare to express his position openly at all, but quietly sends people north to explain his position.

If Hong Tian ordered him to surrender openly, Liu Kunyi would not refuse, but he said that he would not take his soldiers to defend Guangzhou, feeling that this was just a sacrifice in vain, and he was only willing to drag the British army in the way of guerrilla warfare, try to consume the strength of the British army, and wait for the assistance of the main force of the Taiping army.

Is there a protracted war against Britain?

After Hong Tian learned about Liu Kunyi's suggestion, the corners of his mouth twitched, he didn't expect Liu Kunyi to have the thinking of protracted war at this time, it seems that he is really extraordinary!

Hong Tian also knew the situation, so he naturally understood Liu Kunyi very much, and allowed him not to publicly attach himself for the time being, but he had already ordered the Taiping army to quietly go south to Liangguang, and the target was naturally the British army.

For the British, Hong Tian was polite at all, after this big victory, Hong Tian naturally would not stop, because a mere defeat was not enough to make the British compromise, only a bigger blow could make Britain dare not invade China again, and Hong Kong is obviously a weak link in the British.

The army is weak and close to the mainland, and the Taiping army can easily pose a threat to it, so Hong Tian was ready to attack it as soon as possible.

Hong Tian was still a little worried at first, because the navy of the Taiping Heavenly Kingdom was too weak, and when he attacked Hong Kong, he was afraid that he would be blocked by the British navy.

At this time, Hong Kong was far less big than later generations, although after the Second Opium War, Kowloon was occupied, but it was still much smaller than later Hong Kong.

Although the Taiping Army was capable of capturing Kowloon, Hong Kong Island was uncertain, and without the support of the navy, the task would be extremely arduous.

However, now the situation is very different, the British expeditionary force was destroyed, and the naval fleet fell into the hands of Hong Tian, the British invasion fleet that gathered the Pacific Fleet and the Indian Ocean Fleet, was a fairly large fleet, with both first- and second-class warships, and the acquisition of this fleet gave the Taiping Army a maritime advantage in capturing Hong Kong.

You must know that the left-behind fleet in Hong Kong is extremely weak, not to mention this fleet, and even the warships captured by Hong Tian before can't resist it.

Recovering Hong Kong, Hong Tian felt a trembling in his heart when he thought about it, although he had recovered the British Concession before, but the concession still nominally belonged to China, but Hong Kong Island was different, this was a place occupied by the British, and it had become the territory of the British Empire.

National War!

Hong Tian is going to really fight the national war and fight for the Chinese nation!

He already had a complete plan in his mind, if he had not been confident of defeating the British, but now he had a glimmer of hope.

However, fighting with Britain is an extremely dangerous thing, Hong Tian has no bottom, the current strength of the Taiping Heavenly Kingdom, compared to the United Kingdom, is far worse, although the Taiping Heavenly Kingdom's industry has started, but Hong Tianzhen does not know when it will be able to catch up with the United Kingdom, a backward agricultural country against an advanced industrialized country, how it looks like an egg hitting a stone.

Hong Tian put Britain aside for the time being, and looked at the interior of China, his eyes full of light.

The unexpected collapse of the Manchu Qing Dynasty changed the whole of China, and now he has directly governed the Huzhou Prefecture of Jiangsu, Hunan, Hubei, Anhui, Henan, Jiangxi, Shandong, Zhili and Zhejiang, and has more than eight provinces.

Zhili and Shandong, which he recently sent troops to take over, have now basically completed control.

And because of the surrender of Luo Bingzhang, Zhang Liangji, Liu Kunyi, and Zuo Zongtang, the ruling area of the Taiping Heavenly Kingdom has become even larger.

The eight provinces of Sichuan, Shaanxi, Yunnan, Guizhou, Guangdong (including Hainan at this time), Guangxi, Zhejiang, and Fujian (including Taiwan at this time) were nominally Hongtian's territory.

In addition, Liu Changyou is in the eastern Liaoning region all the way like a bamboo, the latest news is that Shenyang, the capital of Fengtian Province, has been broken by Liu Changyou's ministry, and the three eastern provinces are rumoring, and it is estimated that the entire Liaoning Province is now the world of Liu Changyou's ministry.

Liu Changyou marched so quickly, Hong Tian was surprised, but thinking about it, the main force of the Manchu Qing Dynasty had already been killed and wounded, and even nearly half of the Manchu people were killed, and Shenyang, the old Manchu capital, was naturally easily destroyed.

In addition, Hong Tian also heard that Liu Changyou had recruited many Han people who had secretly broken into the Northeast along the way, which made the team continue to grow, and it was also because of these Han people who knew the local area that the war went so smoothly.

Although the Manchus ordered the blockade of the three eastern provinces and forbade the Han people to enter them, this was simply impossible to achieve, just as the mainlanders smuggled into Hong Kong in later generations, the West Berliners climbed over the wall to East Berlin, and the Mexicans risked their lives to cross the power grid into the United States.

The Han people under the rule of the Manchu Qing Dynasty lived a very hard life, and there were many people who had no means of living, especially in the later period, when the land annexation became more and more serious, and the poor people could hardly survive, otherwise there would be so many peasant uprisings.

The people in the south rebelled if they couldn't survive, the Taiping Heavenly Kingdom uprising, the Twisting Army uprising, the Heaven and Earth Rebellion, the Dali Du Wenxiu uprising, the Xiaodaohui uprising, and other uprisings were all like this, the Manchu Qing Dynasty did not give the people a way to live, so they naturally had to risk their lives to kill a way out.

If you don't oppose death, you may not die, so how can the people not rebel? Even if the chance is slim, it is still a way to live, at least you can live longer than not rebelling.

However, this is only the south, the northerners still have a way to live, the blockade of the three eastern provinces is one of them, the three eastern provinces have few people, sometimes thousands of miles of no people, but the land is extremely fertile, as long as you smuggle over, to the remote place, whether it is farming, fishing and hunting can survive.

Therefore, many Han people in the north are smuggling, which is also the reason why the south is full of smoke and the north is relatively calm.

In addition to Fengtian being captured by Liu Changyou, Shanxi also became the nominal territory of the Taiping Army under the blow of the Han army in the Central Plains, and even Shanxi was easier to fight than Fengtian, after all, there were Manchurians in Liaoning, and it was considered that there were people who resisted.

It directly governs the eight provinces of Jiangsu, Anhui, Henan, Shandong, Zhili, Hubei, Hunan and Jiangxi, and nominally also rules the eight provinces of Sichuan, Shaanxi, Yunnan, Guizhou, Guangxi, Guangdong, Zhejiang, Fujian, Shanxi and Fengtian, a total of 16 provinces!

With the exception of the more barren northern and northwestern regions, the Taiping Heavenly Kingdom had basically completed its nominal unification.

Moreover, Jilin, Heilongjiang, Inner and Outer Mongolia, Gansu, Xinjiang, Qinghai, and Tibet, after the fall of the Manchu Dynasty, were leaderless, and these areas were sparsely populated, insufficient, and extremely backward, and it was impossible to resist the attack of the Taiping army.

Hong Tian was confident that he would unify China, and his only fear was that these places would be invaded by Western powers before they were captured by the Taiping Heavenly Kingdom.

Tsarist Russia in the north always threatens Northeast China, Outer Mongolia, and Xinjiang, and Tibet is also under the watchful eye of the British, and once they seize these places, it will cause great trouble.

Britain is okay to say, anyway, they have already made a bad deal, and they can just take it back, but Hong Tian is unwilling to easily offend the Russians.

Now that it has fought with the world's number one power, if it conflicts with the giant Russia again, then the rule that the Taiping Heavenly Kingdom has just established will be really dangerous.

This is not that Hong Tian is afraid of Russia, compared to Britain, Hong Tian is even more fearless of Russia, Russia is much more backward than Britain, although the Russian navy is stronger than the Taiping Heavenly Kingdom, but relatively speaking, it is still relatively easy to deal with, and although the army is huge, but the strength is limited, the Taiping Army is not comparable to now, but it can still barely cope.

This is, of course, because Russia's military strength is mainly in Europe, and now it is not the period of the Russo-Japanese War in the future, and there is no shadow of the Trans-Siberian Railway, and the Russian troops in the Far East are very small, only 10,000 people, and they are scattered all over the country, although there are more in Central Asia, but it is also extremely limited, and tens of thousands of soldiers and horses can be mobilized.

And in Europe, the deployment of troops will take a long time, not to mention, because of the long distance and harsh environment, and the number cannot be large.

Hong Tian has hundreds of thousands of soldiers and horses under his command, and there will definitely be more in the future, so he is not afraid of the Russians attacking at all, but he is worried that starting a war with Britain and Russia at the same time will be detrimental to the development of the Taiping Heavenly Kingdom, which is now rising.

The Taiping Heavenly Kingdom was developing, and it was quite fast.

From an agrarian country to an industrial country.

The Westernization movement has been carried out on a large scale, and with the full support of Hong Tian, the Westernists can be said to be thriving, and the so-called conservatives are not a threat to the Westernists at all under the strong suppression of Hong Tian.

At present, the factional disputes in the Taiping Heavenly Kingdom are mainly internal disputes among the Westernists, between the Westernization faction of Li Hongzhang and others, and the local faction of Zeng Guofan and others.

The Westernizers continued to introduce foreign technology and capital, while the localists continued to imitate and innovate.

Not to mention the steamship, the Yellow Bird became a beginning, and since then it has been out of control, and there have been many large shipyards on the southeast coast, but most of them belong to the Westernization faction, with foreign technology and financial support, which is more advantageous than the local faction that is being explored.

The telegraph and the railroad were both in their infancy, and most of the credit for their rapid development was due to the Westernizers, because they had a strong backer - the Americans.

The civil war in the United States is still ongoing, and even if the civil war ends, it will take time to recover, and the American market is in a cold state for a short period of time, making it unsuitable for large-scale investment.

However, the abundant funds in the United States could not get to the right place for investment early, and now that the Taiping Heavenly Kingdom began to develop on a large scale, American businessmen immediately heard about it.

Most of the other countries were on the sidelines about the Taiping Heavenly Kingdom, which was at war with the British, but the Americans were not all like that, and some adventurous Americans chose to invest in the Taiping Heavenly Kingdom, hoping to make a lot of money from it.

Hong Tian welcomed this, because it was extremely beneficial to the developing Taiping Heavenly Kingdom, and he was also quite wary that the Americans were too powerful, and their strength was not in the military, but in the ideology.

At a time when the European powers were still focusing on armed aggression, the Americans had evolved into an era dominated by economic aggression, and although a large part of this was due to the fact that the United States was not strong militarily, it was obviously a more sophisticated method, and the rewards were even more astonishing.

It is clear that the Americans were more popular with the Taiping Heavenly Kingdom than the European powers that directly launched military aggression, and the Chinese were keen to cooperate and trade with the Americans, calling them friendly Yiren.

Hong Tian did not want the United States to grow up like this, but he had to accept this reality, the Taiping Heavenly Kingdom was too weak, and to develop at this time, the technology and capital of the Americans were extremely important help, so Hong Tian watched with worry as the Americans made a lot of money and sought various benefits from China, but could not stop it, but encouraged it.

"I'm not going to let you grow up. Hong Tian secretly said in his heart, he knows the potential of the Americans, once he is given enough time to develop, it will definitely become a big obstacle for him to establish a peaceful country!

If the Taiping Heavenly Kingdom was now a great power, Hong Tian would definitely secretly support the South of the United States and let the civil war in the United States continue further, and it would be better to dismember the United States and divide it into North and South without reunification.

However, in the case of the current Taiping Heavenly Kingdom, this is simply impossible, and he will exhaust his efforts to deal with the British, and intervening in the United States can really only exist in fantasy.

Despite all his reluctance, the American investment was accepted, and the technology and funds provided by the United States also played an extremely important role in the early development of the Taiping Heavenly Kingdom.

However, the corresponding Hong Tian also gave up part of his rights, there is no free lunch in this world, and the help of the Americans is naturally not unconditional.

The shares of the railroad and the telegraph were split equally between China and the United States, and although the final say belonged to the Taiping Heavenly Kingdom, the Americans had the right to supervise it.

In addition, the United States also has the right to cooperate with the Taiping Heavenly Kingdom in the development of minerals along the railway.

As for other tariffs and so on, in the previous treaties signed between the United States and the Manchu Qing Dynasty, the rights seized by the United States were basically retained, and what Hong Tian won was the abolition of consular jurisdiction and other fundamental rights and interests.

In this regard, Hong Tian could only sigh lightly, not that he wanted to betray the country, but that he had to sell the country and give up so many rights and interests, he just wanted to make China stronger, otherwise China would continue to lag behind, and in the end it would only continue to be invaded by foreign powers.

The Taiping Heavenly Kingdom is developing, and Hong Tian clearly feels that this is not only improving economically, but also in all aspects, but it is still far from the world, and it will take a long time to catch up.

Compared with economic development, Hong Tian paid more attention to the reunification of China, and after taking control of Zhili and Shandong, Guangdong, Guangxi, Zhejiang, Fujian, Sichuan, Guizhou, Yunnan, Jiangxi, and Fengtian provinces should send troops to really control them one by one, and this was definitely an arduous task.

He believed that once he controlled these areas, the strength of the Taiping Heavenly Kingdom would swell again, and the number of troops would definitely exceed one million, and then Hongtian would really have the strength to call out the foreign powers.

Of course, in fact, the war with the British is still going on, and it is getting more and more intense.

......

And in the midst of the hustle and bustle, the time entered 1865.

The year 1865, like 1864, was of great significance to China and the world.

At the beginning of the year, the countries of Europe and the United States had not yet recovered from the festive atmosphere of the New Year when they received shocking news.

This news came from far away in the Far East, when the war between the Taiping Heavenly Kingdom and the British, who had gained control of China, took an unexpected turn.

The British are defeated!

The expeditionary force is destroyed!

British Hong Kong and British Malaya were attacked. Hong Kong and Singapore were attacked by the Taiping Navy, the British Pacific Fleet was destroyed, Hong Kong had fallen, and the British troops in Singapore and the Malay Peninsula were being attacked by the Taiping landing force.