China's huge size, large population, and long historical heritage mean that China is not destined to always be a second- or third-rate commodity. As long as it finds the right path, the power that China can unleash is absolutely amazing, and Chinese civilization
It is a system of its own and is richer than the Western Christian world combined. If China rises, it will threaten the fundamental interests of the Western world.
Li Zongwu has been in Europe for so long, and he has also felt the West's fear of China. Although the concept of white supremacy in this era is deeply rooted in the hearts of the people, and Western politicians are also eyeing the top, there are still a considerable number of outstanding politicians who regard China as a potentially huge country.
Threat. Although the main tasks of all countries are to divide the spoils and contain Soviet Russia, Britain and France have recalled all military technical personnel in China and decisively terminated all technical cooperation. For this reason, they did not hesitate to pay China huge liquidated damages.
It is to prevent the rise of China's power.
Li Zongwu shared the observed situation with Gu Weijun and others. Gu Weijun and others also woke up and had a new understanding of the current situation. Britain and France were too seriously consumed in the war, and their world hegemony had been shaken.
Yu fell, so they will definitely suppress Germany and the United States. This is the same attitude towards China, because once China rises, it will be a fatal blow to the colonial order all over the world. At the same time, Russia also needs to be contained.
In total, there are too many things that Britain and France need to do, but the fatal thing is that the power in their hands is too weak, their hearts are as high as the sky, and their lives are as thin as paper. What is even worse is that the two countries are still full of contradictions.
Gu Weijun thought of this and asked Li Zongwu: "Mr. Li, do you think we can unite with the United States? At most, we can exchange some commercial interests. As long as the United States can stand on our side, things will be easy to handle!"
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Li Zongwu still shook his head: "Although the United States has proposed the so-called principle of self-determination of colonial nations, it is just a lie. The United States is also dissatisfied with the rise of the Southwest. After all, after the rise of new industrial zones, the sales of American goods will inevitably
Being affected, they cannot plunder China's resources as they please, so I don't think the Americans can count on it!"
After Li Zongwu finished speaking, Gu Weijun, Lu Zhengxiang and others were dumbfounded. Sure enough, as Qiao Yu said before coming, don't expect to get anything from the peace conference. Lu Zhengxiang stayed for a long time and asked, "Mr. Li, according to what you said, we
How can you take back your own power? Is there any justice in this world?"
"Minister Lu, why do you always want to ask the great powers to give us alms to us? Our power was lost after the defeat. If we want to get it back, we have to rely on fists. Negotiations can never solve the problem.
, Our main task now is to transport all the skilled workers back as soon as possible, transport the machinery and equipment back, and send back the experts hired from various countries. This is the basis for our next step in developing industry and strong national defense. When we have trained millions of
When we have a strong army, even if the great powers don’t give it to us, we will take it back!”
Li Zongwu understood Qiao Yu's policy of building industry more and more. To make iron, you must be hard-working. Now the standard for measuring national strength is war, and what supports the victory of war is industrial strength. Simply put, it is how much steel and coal you can produce.
How much oil can be used to build many aircraft and cannons? The basis of everything is the industrial system. This is something that cannot be exchanged for a lot of money.
Although Li Zongwu held the high position of Minister of Foreign Affairs of Southwest China and was one of China's representatives participating in the Paris Peace Conference, since Li Zongwu saw the virtues of the great powers, he had no hope for this peace conference. His main tasks were two
First of all, they have to pay the bills. Britain and France still owe Southwest a large amount of payment for goods and liquidated damages, which must be repaid.
Of course, Britain and France are unwilling to give real money to China, but they cannot refuse, because Britain and France have a bigger creditor, that is, the United States. If they refuse now, Britain and France will lose their national credibility, and what will happen next
The most important thing is the collapse of the economy. You must know that Americans still hold a lot of bonds in their hands.
The current method for Britain and France to repay their debts is to use factories to repay debts. The French army has already entered Germany, began to dismantle a large number of industrial equipment, and then reimbursed these equipment to China. Although these equipment are not the most advanced, they are very important to China.
It is said to be very good, although China has suffered a little loss in terms of price. The old equipment is basically sold as the price of new equipment, but there are some things that money cannot buy.
In addition to asking for debts, people are being kidnapped everywhere. Several empires in Europe have collapsed. Since the war between Britain and France ended, a large number of military industrialists and drug dealers have naturally lost their jobs. The United States and Japan are now falling into post-war depression. Even if they can
When recruiting talents, we will only recruit high-end ones, unlike China, which only requires those with some special skills. Therefore, the sea route from Europe to Asia is not much worse than during the war.
There were more than 3,000 military technicians recruited from the Austro-Hungarian Empire alone, and more than 1,000 experts from Germany. There were also many from Britain and France. A large number of personnel and equipment were transported to China, including Guangdong and Guangxi in the southwest.
It's as if every industry has taken a powerful tonic pill, and the original weak links are rapidly improving.
The two lakes have also been included in this development plan by Qiao Yu. Wuchang, Changsha and other places have also become busy construction sites. A new round of land-centered reforms implemented by Qiao Yu has begun, starting from the most economically developed east
Starting from Sichuan, various places began to redeem the land of landlords one after another. This kind of reform action that touches the fundamentals of China for thousands of years has attracted much attention from the beginning. The reform in the nearby areas has not received any resistance.
, Landowners and farmers are very welcome. Landlords seem to be prosperous, but in fact most small landowners have to work in the fields themselves, and they may work harder than tenant farmers. It is still too difficult to get rich from land, which is far less than that of industry and commerce.
It's easy. There have long been many flexible landlords who sold their land and got capital to open factories. These people all made a fortune by taking advantage of the East Wind of World War I. They were much more prosperous than in the old days.
, and it’s so much easier.
The redemption that has started now is equivalent to giving all landowners the opportunity to enter industry and commerce. Those with a little ambition accepted it and began to transform from landlords to capitalists. Of course, there are more landowners who choose to continue to operate the land. Their knowledge
They are still much stronger than farmers, and almost all of them have become major shareholders of farms. After the system change, these people are also forced to find ways to lead their farms to obtain greater profits.
During the First World War, Sichuan's urbanization process was rapid, and the city's population expanded more than three times. As the population increased, the need for food and various agricultural products increased. Therefore, most of the farms after the transformation began to engage in breeding and plant fruit trees.
Vegetables and farms that continue to grow grain have been transformed into positions that provide feed for breeding farms. The redemption process is actually a process of capital transfer from the government to farmers and landlords. After various farms develop, the corresponding agricultural products
The number of people needed for processing and sales has increased, various small factories have increased, and self-employed people have also increased crazily.
This change has prompted more people to move to cities. Farms far away from cities have to face labor shortages due to the flow of people to cities. Therefore, they have to purchase more agricultural machinery and rely on
The power of machinery makes up for the lack of labor, and with the development of the agricultural broom industry, farmers can finally see money in their hands, and their consumption power has also increased, and the original problem of overcapacity in the Southwest has also been alleviated.
A new industrial relationship is being nurtured on the land of Dongchuan. Ancient China is also undergoing rapid transformation. Although China is nurturing huge power, it will take time to complete this evolution after all. China still does not have much in the world.
The status is worth mentioning.
At this time, Gu Weijun was having a heated debate with representatives of the great powers at the Paris Peace Conference. Li Zongwu also participated in the peace conference on behalf of Southwest China. The Paris Peace Conference was destined to not be an unreasonable place from the day it was held. The United States, Britain, France,
On ri, a total of ten political leaders and foreign ministers from the five Italian countries formed a ten-person meeting, which had the decisive power. The Chinese representatives immediately raised objections to this ten-person meeting. China's contribution to the Allied Powers was definitely second to Japan and Italy.
It is almost on par with the United States.
Apart from the Battle of Qingdao, Japan did not take many actions. Although it also dispatched navy and labor, it was far less than the scale of China. Italy had no other role except to sell cover. The two countries could squeeze out
It is unjustifiable that China should not be allowed to participate in the supreme meeting.
Lu Zhengxiang and Gu Weijun immediately demanded that China should be given at least one spot in the ten-person meeting. Britain and France also knew that they were a bit unscrupulous, but they were absolutely unwilling to give China a chance, so they encouraged Japan to intervene and interfere without being squeezed out.
When entering the Supreme Council, China also suffered a disadvantage when allocating plenipotentiaries. Each of the five major countries had five places. China, Brazil, Serbia and Belgium ranked second, with only three places. In fact, in real history, China was ranked second.
They didn't make it through, and became the third class. Like the new Poland, they only had two places.
The Paris Peace Conference perfectly explained what it means for a weak country to have no diplomacy. At this time, Gu Weijun was debating the privileges of the great powers in China and the Qingdao issue.
"During this tragic war that affected the entire world, a total of 1.4 million Chinese workers crossed the ocean and came to Europe to work for the Allied Powers. A total of 7,320 Chinese workers died from air raids and diseases.
: The number of troops provided by China exceeded 150,000, and 34,635 soldiers were sacrificed. At the same time, China also provided 10 million tons of various materials to the Allied Powers, and this does not include the amount given to Russia.
In part, China's contribution to the Allied Powers is obvious to all. It can be said that China has made great contributions for the sake of international justice, regardless of its own difficulties. However, when it came time to distribute the results of the war, the Allied Powers did not give up their privileges in China and continued to ride.
In the eyes of the Chinese people, how can such actions declare international justice and comfort those Chinese who have sacrificed their blood and sweat for the Allies!"
What Gu Weijun listed were all irrefutable facts. The Allied Powers could only bow their heads and remain silent. However, no one agreed with the Chinese representative's speech. Gu Weijun's voice became louder and louder, "Germany, as a defeated country, naturally occupied the Chinese land before the war."
It should be returned. Jiaozhou Bay should belong to China and cannot be handed over to the Japanese side without reason. Shandong is the hometown of the Chinese saint Confucius, just like Jerusalem is the hometown of the Western saint Jesus. China must not lose Shandong, just like