Australian Storm 1876

   Chapter 674

In Li Fushou's hands, there is also a secret letter sent by the governor of Guangdong and Guangxi, Gu Yanchuan. Now that the Political Intelligence Bureau collects intelligence on the mainland of China and professional intelligence interpretation, it will send an attachment to the Guangzhou government. Therefore, Gu Yanchuan is familiar with the international community. The attitudes of the great powers and the extreme danger of the Fusang nation in the full preparation of the war, have a clear understanding of the current situation.

  In the secret letter;

  Master Gu Yanchuan expressed his extreme disappointment with the court. He was not the only one who had written to the court before, and there were more than 10 other ministers who had written to the court, asking the court to pay attention to the danger of Fusang and step into the vortex of the Korean peninsula easily.

  Xiangzhuang dance sword, intended for Peigong.

Anyone with a discerning eye can see that the ambitions of the Fusang country’s wolves are clearly revealed. The so-called "Dongxue Party Uprising" in North Korea is nothing more than a peasant uprising.

  Once the Qing army stepped into North Korea to participate in the encirclement and suppression of the peasant uprising, if Fusang also sent troops at the same time, the possibility of a direct war between the two countries was extremely high, which can be said to be more than 90%.

The imperial court’s response was disappointing. In addition to reprimanding the governor of Guangdong and Guangxi, Gu Yanchuan, Emperor Guangxu reprimanded the ministers such as Shen Baozhen, governor of Liangjiang, and Liu Mingchuan, governor of Taiwan, who wrote the letter. Er Xiaobang does not think of Japanese people."

  At the critical juncture when the nation is expanding its armaments and the danger of war is approaching.

On the contrary, the Qing Dynasty relaxed its national defense construction. On the grounds of financial constraints, it cut its military budget and misappropriated gardens. From 1888, it stopped purchasing warships. In 1891, it stopped allocating the navy's equipment and ammunition funds. In 1894, the danger was in sight, and it still did not allocate funds for purchases. ammunition.

  So Gu Yanchuan said at the end of the secret letter;

  I see that the court is hard to return, and the building will be overwhelmed. If Yuanding does not want to seek the Central Plains, it should not be too deeply involved. Gaiying Yuanding is the fortune of millions of people, and the mountains and rivers will change color when they move. Don’t be careful.

  Nowadays, nothing is worse than nothing.

  Look at the changing situation, who is responsible for the ups and downs?

  My Gu clan has been favored by the emperor for a long time, and should be a minister. If the situation collapses in the Qing and Japan, the Guangxi and Guangxi will not be immune to it. The only way out is in Yuanding.

  Yuanding as a wall view, think of it as Austrian aid, don’t forget it.

  In the Southwest, I have recently ordered Liu Yongfu, the black flag army, to return to Guangzhou, and plan to have another appointment. The veteran Feng Zicai was very old, and he was given a generous reward and compassion for his disarming and returning to the field.

  The military power in the northern area of ​​Vietnam is concentrated in Zhiwen nephew, which can be cheaply engaged.

  Zhiwen Nephew, with the assistance of Australian instructors, reorganized the Black Flag Army in accordance with the new military system, and eliminated more than half of the green camps. Thousands of student soldiers have been replenished, and the green camps have been reorganized. They are undergoing intense training.

  According to the Australian military system

  After retraining in the northern region of Vietnam, the 4th division will be able to obtain elite troops. Each division has 8,000 staff and a total of 32,000. They are all equipped with cutting-edge guns and approximately 14,500 old and weak green camps have been eliminated. There should be no problem facing the French soldiers.

   2 Auxiliary Divisions, each division has more than 5,500 staff, a total of 11,000 people.

  In order to complete this compilation, Zhiwen Nephew raised 1.1 million taels of silver in Guangdong and Guangxi, guaranteed by Gu's Commercial Bank and Huitong Bank Guangzhou Branch, with an annual interest of 7%.

  ...

  Writing a lot of secret letters, it can be seen that Gu Yanchuan is extremely dependent on this son-in-law who made him shine, and even considering the overturning of the building, some of the Gu family members moved to Australia to develop in order to avoid being scrambled.

  Li Fushou knew that this view was too pessimistic. With the small body of Fusang Country, he was unable to swallow thousands of miles of Shenzhou in one mouthful.

  He considered it, and summoned Li Sizhong, the new deputy secretary-general of the Royal Secretariat, and dictated a secret letter and handed it out.

  In addition, there are two ships of ammunition equipment, which will be sent to Guangzhou Port in the near future.

  After the Civil War

  With the large number of soldiers retiring, a large number of materials such as advanced rifles, barrel retreat artillery, infantry equipment, tents, etc., equipped by the Ocean Kingdom have been sealed and stored to cope with large-scale wars that may occur in the future.

Today, the Ocean Kingdom’s infantry front-line field divisions have a strength of about 110,000, plus more than 10,000 auxiliary forces. They are distributed in various regions of the kingdom and overseas states, from the easternmost Kingdom of Hawaii, the Shangri-La Island in the South Pacific, and Borneo. , The Kingdom of Ryukyu in East Asia, mainland Australia and Mozambique in Africa, of which there are about 50,000 native Australian troops in six divisions, plus an artillery division and 20,400 imperial guards (including 3,600 deployed in the Ryukyu Kingdom). The combined strength is less than 80,000.

  Compared with Fusang Country, this army force seems to be a bit disadvantaged.

until now

  Fusang has established an army with 63,000 standing troops and 230,000 reserve troops, including 6 field divisions and 1 guard division, a total of 7 active divisions and 18 reserve divisions.

  Fuso’s reserve divisions have a very high level of combat readiness, and they are all organized separately for each area. The advantage of this is that they are relatively close and can be assembled quickly.

  Because the soldiers are all from the native land and many people are familiar with them, they have a strong will to fight and can desperately rescue friendly neighbors in danger.

  As of early 1894

The Fuso Navy has 32 warships and 24 torpedo boats, with a total displacement of 72,000 tons. At this point, the naval power is far from enough in front of the Ocean Kingdom, but its strength has surpassed the Beiyang Navy.

  In the Civil War

The number of infantry recruited by the Ocean Kingdom once reached an astonishing scale of 630,000, and the corresponding weapons reserves were quite large. Except for some of the wear and tear, most of the other weapons and equipment were sealed and stored in the warehouse after they were inspected intact.

As for the infantry weapons of the Southern Army of different models, more than half of them were damaged in the war. The remaining hundreds of thousands of rifles and hundreds of artillery pieces, except for some of the high-quality ones, are sealed and stored in warehouses. Most of the others are bought and half given away. Lost.

  The southern states are flooded with hares. A large part of them are bought by ranchers, and some are equipped with militia organizations in overseas states, such as Shangri-La Island, Mozambique and Hawaii. The remaining 20,000 relatively good rifles were given to the Qing Dynasty as a gift of promotion, and 20,000 guns were provided to the Government of Guangdong and Guangxi to equip the new army.

Now the two ships are the last remaining supplies. There are more than 10,000 rifles, more than 70 retreat artillery, more than 2,000 tents, tens of thousands of military uniforms, equipment, kettles, etc., all packed and sent to Guangzhou. Materials used to support Vietnam's troubles.

  To deal with these trivial matters, Li Fushou recruited the Foreign Minister Viscount Tang Zhaoyi. He needs to have a clearer understanding of the attitudes of European and American powers towards the current possible war in East Asia.

   Viscount Tang Zhaoyi said;

  "Your Majesty, judging from the fact that the ministers heard, saw, and received information from foreign missions, the situation is not optimistic. The European and American companies are more likely to have a good mood.

  Among them, Britain’s attitude is the most positive and may make subversive actions.

  The United Kingdom and the Fuso country are negotiating a new version of the "Japan-UK Treaty on Commerce and Navigation," and the terms are close to being reached. It is estimated that the new treaty will be formally signed no earlier than July and no later than August, according to sources;

  In the new version of the treaty, the United Kingdom gave up its colonial rights such as concessions and consular jurisdiction, agreed to Japan to increase import tariffs on British goods, made huge concessions in all aspects, and signed a trade treaty with Fuso on an equal relationship.

  This sends out a very bad signal that London attaches great importance to the relationship with Tokyo, and has begun to treat Fuso Country with an equal attitude, deliberately pushing it to the top.

  Firstly, to counteract the forces of the Northern Crimes of Tsarist Russia, secondly to be used as a pioneer to test the power of the Qing Dynasty, thirdly to balance the rising regional hegemony of the Ocean Kingdom, and fourthly to deliberately expand the Fuso country market.

   Judging from recent developments in the United States, although it keeps saying that it is necessary to maintain a neutral stance, the language tends to be very obvious and its attitude is extremely ambiguous. This may be a negative effect of the Hawaii incident.

Under the command of Wilhelm II, the German Empire turned to abandon the former Prime Minister Bismarck’s policy of focusing on Europe. Instead, it pursued colonies under the sun in the world. It actively sought possible colonies in Africa, East Asia, and the South Pacific, showing that Aggressive offensive posture.

Considering the close relationship between Britain and Germany (only by blood), it is impossible for William II to oppose the British East Asian policy, because Queen Victoria is the grandmother of William II, and Prince Edward VII of the United Kingdom is his uncle. From any point of view, the German Empire would not oppose Britain's East Asia policy, but followed closely.

After more than 20 years of rapid industrial development, the unified German Empire has emerged as the second largest economic power in the world after the United Kingdom (the United States only surpassed the United Kingdom in industrial output value in 1894, not GDP exceeded the United Kingdom). After years of rest and recuperation , Began to show a hideous aggressive face to the outside world.

  In the dispute between the two powers in East Asia, who is the weak and the one who is unlucky will be shattered by the African hyenas that will follow.

  Because of the interests and expansion needs of the Indo-China Peninsula, the colonial power France is very happy to see Japan and the Qing dying at both ends. Therefore, it is very strange that the East Asian policy is consistent with the British, that is, waiting for things to evolve.

  The most important role is Tsarist Russia. As the current Tsar is seriously ill in bed, he may soon die. Therefore, the Tsarist side has no clear attitude. They are busy with court battles, and for the time being, they are not able to intervene in the East Asian situation.

  After analysis by the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, we believe that the Russian side is also happy to see both sides suffer from the conflict between Japan and the Qing, so as to reap the benefits of the fisherman.

  In addition, Italy and Austro-Hungary are all concerned about the situation in East Asia. Like the African vultures, they are standard opportunists, ready to share the leftovers in this feast.

  Your Majesty, the world's powers are already eyeing the Qing Dynasty. If anyone interrupts them to share the feast at this time, it will directly harm the interests of European and American powers, and then they are the enemies of the world. "

After a few words, he fell into a long silence.

  Thinking of the current dangerous situation in the Qing Dynasty, it really makes people feel chilly in the back but there is nothing to do.

Frowning and thinking about it for a while, Li Fushou said helplessly; "Well, continue to keep a high degree of concern about the situation in East Asia, and report any new situations immediately. In addition, an infantry regiment will be added to the Ryukyu Marine Police District to prevent Fuso from grazing grass. Fighting rabbits, and then annihilating the Ryukyu Kingdom once you change hands, you will lose a lot."

   "The ministers and others will follow the order."

  (End of this chapter)