Super Dictator - Chapter 255 The Russian Conspiracy

After Chen Weiren accepted Wei Jichen’s bribe, everything was easy to say. There were not many talents in the three northeastern provinces who knew about foreign affairs. Wei Jichen could completely control the banks of the three northeastern provinces in his hands as long as he used some tricks.

In the end, the two decided to invest 7 million taels in bank investment shares. Like China Commercial Bank, they first bought half of the 3.5 million taels. Wei Jichen planned to invest 1 million taels through his Kuaima Shipping Company and 500,000 taels in his own name, leaving 1.5 million taels. Of the 1,000,000 taels, it is estimated that officials from the three eastern provinces such as Yketang’a and Changshun are interested, and the remaining 500,000 taels can be given to private merchants.

The disorder of the original coins in the three northeastern provinces is very serious. Not only are the types mixed and exchanges blocked, but the silver coins minted by the government are of low quality, excessively issued, and have poor commercial credit.

After the establishment of the Bank of the Three Eastern Provinces, currency reforms will be carried out. The banking business will include acting as an agent for the provincial treasury, issuing banknotes, as well as exchange, loans, deposits, and issuance of various bills and bonds. In fact, it is a direct reference to the business of foreign banks.

On the other hand, we can use the 1 million taels of silver in the Ministry of Household Affairs to cast a number of high-quality large and small silver coins from the three eastern provinces at the Tianjin Mint as reserves, and set up a Copper Yuan Bureau in Feng Province to be responsible for casting copper coins. Coin shop assistant product.

At the same time, the use of currency such as past furnace silver, pass code money, and Tun Tie will be restricted and gradually cancelled, and will be recovered by banks to unify the currency.

In this way, the financial chaos in the three northeastern provinces will be greatly improved, and Wei Jichen can also control the financial markets of the three northeastern provinces through banks.

In fact, Wei Jichen, Sheng Xuanhuai and others have to thank Kang Youwei, Liang Qichao and other reformists. It is they who are jumping up and down in the capital, shouting every day that if there is no reform and change, the country will perish, and the court will not agree to implement some reforms first, and of course these reforms Therefore, the economic field is the best.

Firstly, it will not threaten the rule of the Qing court, and secondly, if it is successful, it can also greatly improve the financial situation of the Qing court.

It can be said that Kang Youwei and others were like pawns, while Wei Jichen and other local officials secretly took advantage of the situation and shot the first bird. Once Kang Youwei and others violated the interests of Cixi and other die-hards, it was Kang Youwei and others who were injured. People, not Wei Jichen and others.

Just like in the original history, Zhang Zhidong, Liu Kunyi, Yuan Shikai and others all joined the Guoqiang Society, and Sheng Xuanhuai, Li Hongzhang and others also funded the Guoqiang Society. However, once these people saw that the situation was not right, Guangxu and Cixi were about to quarrel. After finishing the game, Zhang Zhidong, Liu Kunyi and others immediately quit the Qiang Society and immediately parted ways with them.

Wei Jichen is now riding on this general trend to reach the sky, because before Cixi and Guangxu had a falling out, everyone could pretend to be confused. The edicts issued by Guangxu were all approved by Cixi. Since you The old woman has agreed. If we all do what you want, are we still guilty?

So at the end of the reform process, the number of private companies increased from dozens to hundreds, the number of newspapers increased from a few to hundreds, and many new policies were implemented in various places. In the end, only a few people died. Unless they are slow to react and lose their official positions, most of them still live a happy life.

When Wei Jichen was inspecting the Land Reclamation Bureau in Gaipingdi and how the immigration work was going, General Yiketang’a of Shengjing also made some noise and issued an order to “turn private groups into public groups” and to turn thieves into good ones. , all the prefectures and prefectures in Fengtian followed his orders and began to recruit and recruit bandits.

Zhao Bingjun and others led bandits large and small to accept the recruitment, so they took the opportunity to infiltrate the local patrol and patrol teams in various state capitals.

They suddenly transformed from thieves into soldiers. They were not only responsible for public security, but also suppressed the barbarian bandits. These patrol teams were also included in Wei Jichen’s army by the system. When the barbarian bandits were wiped out, Wei Jichen would naturally earn merit points.

Russia, Moscow Royal Palace.

Tsar Nicholas II sat under the throne with an angry look on his face, and the expressions of several ministers standing below him were not very good either.

“Witt, you said that the Chinese do not agree with us building a railway in the Northeast, and the bank we were originally planning to negotiate with has also fallen through?” Nicholas II said coldly.

The Russians enlisted the French to jointly fund the establishment of Daosheng Bank, and then planned to use Daosheng Bank to borrow money from the Qing government to repay the debts, and then induced the Qing government to use millions of taels of silver from loans from France and Russia as investments. , jointly established the Sino-Russian Daosheng Bank. Of course, the Sino-Russian Daosheng Bank was nominally a Sino-Russian joint venture, but in fact it was controlled by the Russians.

Then, through the Sino-Russian Daosheng Bank, Russia has the right to collect various taxes in China, mint Chinese currency, and lay railways and wires in China.

This trick is not without its poison, which enables it to manipulate and control China’s railway construction and control China’s financial capital.

However, this move was temporarily resolved with the cooperation of Wei Jichen, Sheng Xuanhuai and others, who used China to set up its own bank and raise funds to build the railway. Therefore, the tsar was so angry.

Finance Minister Witte had to stand up and said bitterly: “Ukhtomsky, the director of Daosheng Bank, went to lobby the Qing government. Everything was going smoothly at first, and it was about to succeed. Unexpectedly, something suddenly happened later. misfortune.”

“What happened!” Nicholas II did not expect that something that was absolutely certain would change.

“The wind direction in the Qing government suddenly changed. Their officials suddenly became very wary of us Russians. They would rather borrow money from the British and Americans who stood by during the Sino-Japanese War than borrow money from Our country is borrowing money.” Witte recounted the news.

Several other ministers were thinking about the reason for this sudden change. Originally, the Qing government trusted and was very grateful to Russia for its contribution to the Liao Dynasty. It even sent news that it would unite Russia to deal with Japan.

^.^，

Of course the Russians don’t take Japan seriously, but this way they can legitimately expand their sphere of influence to the Northeast, which is exactly what they want.

Seeing that everyone was looking at him anxiously, Witte finished quickly: “After our investigation, it turned out that the reason why this incident happened was because of the strong opposition from officials in Northeast China. They wrote to the emperor of China, saying that the empire was against them. The Northeast is voyeuristic, and they say that once the empire builds a railway in the Northeast, it will seriously affect their sovereignty. “

Nicholas II and several other ministers were not worried at all when the Chinese saw through their plans.

“Is the official from the Northeast the newly appointed Mongolian general from Heilongjiang?” Nicholas II asked lightly. Heilongjiang had the largest contact area with Russia and should be the most wary of Russia. Therefore, Nicholas II Only the world has asked such a question.

“Your Majesty, it was not General Heilongjiang, but General Shengjing Yiketang’a who urged this matter. However, in this incident, there was a person who played a more important role than Yiketang’a. This person is Dingliao “The commander-in-chief of the army, Wei Jichen,” said Witte unhurriedly.

Iketanga had been a general in Heilongjiang for a long time, so the Russian Emperor and several other ministers were very familiar with him.

“Wei Jichen?” Nicholas II narrowed his eyes, a cold light flashed in his eyes.

Having ruined their long-planned plan, Nicholas II now had this name firmly in his mind.

“Yes, Your Majesty, this Wei Jichen is a tough anti-Russian. In the Liaodong area under his jurisdiction, the personnel we sent to investigate were all unconditionally expelled. He also restricted our Russian investment in Liaodong.” Foreign Minister Robanov was obviously very familiar with Wei Jichen and immediately explained.

“Why do I only know about this now!” Nicholas II asked angrily.

Robanov hurriedly explained: “Your Majesty, I didn’t expect that Wei Jichen has such great power and can influence China’s political affairs. He is just a guard general in Liaodong. I didn’t expect that he would have such influence.” His timing was very good. Because our activities in the Northeast happened to anger the local government, he joined these people to write a letter. “

Nicholas II was a man of great ambition and talent, and was somewhat moody. He liked hearing good news from his ministers and disliked hearing bad news. Therefore, Lobanov would never say anything about these situations until things were settled and he had to.

Seeing that Nicholas II’s face was about to completely sink, Lobanov gritted his teeth and told all the bad news, and continued: “Your Majesty, the Chinese are now marching towards the northern border of Mongolia along the border of Siberia. It is really dangerous to immigrate and replace the nomads with anti-Russian Chinese.”

In the Mongolian region bordering the three eastern provinces, Tsarist Russia bought a large number of Mongolian rebels. Tsarist Russia runs the Siberian region and has already penetrated into Outer Mongolia. It wants to plan the independence of Outer Mongolia. The Russians are not afraid of China sending troops, but they are afraid of China developing these areas. area, immigrated here.

As soon as Nicholas II heard this, he felt a chill all over his body, and the temperature in the palace almost dropped several degrees.

Seeing that he was about to explode, Robanov quickly said: “Your Majesty, the Imperial Far East Fleet is now anchored in Jiaozhou Bay, China. The Qing government has agreed that the Imperial Far East Fleet will go to Lushunkou for a temporary rest. At that time, General Alek can If we do something to anger Wei Jichen and trigger a conflict between the two countries, we can take the opportunity to ask the Qing government to punish Wei Jichen. “

Robanov quickly glanced at Witte secretly asking for help, and Witte stepped forward and echoed: “Your Majesty, Wei Jichen must not stay in the Northeast. This will be detrimental to our major events. It is this man who proposed to build the railway by himself. , If we can force the Qing government to transfer Wei Jichen, it would be best, but no matter what, we must not let him live and find an opportunity to kill him. “

“Kill him? How to kill him? Are we going to carry out assassinations like the Japanese?” Nicholas II asked dissatisfiedly. When he visited Japan, he was assassinated by the Japanese. He was very dissatisfied with this behavior. Some people are disgusted with it and think it is unrefined.

Robanov suggested: “Your Majesty, historical experience teaches us that the peoples of the East respect strength and might the most. Spending any suggestions and advice in front of the rulers of these peoples will not achieve the goal. For Wei Jichen, we have only one way. , that is to show our force in front of him and let him know that it is unwise to be our enemy. At the same time, everyone has flaws. We are looking for Wei Jichen’s flaws. Once we find them, we can make targeted decisions against him. With corresponding countermeasures, I don’t believe that he alone can stop the empire’s progress.”

Nicholas II said angrily: “If it doesn’t work, we will directly send troops to occupy Lushunkou. I believe that the Qing government will not dare to go to war with us for a port. By controlling Lushunkou, the empire will have a foothold in the Far East and can Gradually encroaching on China’s southern Manchuria will also greatly increase our country’s power in North Korea.”

Witte advised: “Your Majesty, this move will anger the Chinese and affect our trade with China. If the Chinese can be made to realize that they need our power to balance the power of other countries, we can easily obtain Port Arthur.”

“You mean?” Nicholas II stood up, very interested.

“Your Majesty, if the Germans occupy Jiaozhou Bay, how will the Chinese react? They will definitely ask for help from our country.” Witte said confidently.