In China in 1943, in addition to the Anti-Japanese War, there was another war without gunpowder, which was the battle between Britain and the United States for cultural influence on China.
Last year, U.S. Special Envoy Fairbank called Roosevelt, hoping that the U.S. government would enhance Sino-U.S. cultural relations, conduct scientific research on Chinese education, and send American scholars to Chinese universities for exchanges, etc., and received Roosevelt's full support. As for helping Chinese scholars solve their life problems
Difficulties are just part of Fairbank's plan.
Before Fairbank proposed this plan, Burfield, the cultural counselor of the British Embassy, was already working on it. This was the main reason why Roosevelt expressed his support for Fairbank.
Now, the British have directly established the Sino-British Science Cooperation Center, which has greatly strengthened Britain's cultural influence on China. Fairbank was even more unsatisfied. Only a week after the Sino-British Science Cooperation Center was officially established, he suggested to the U.S. Ambassador to China Goss
Action Kuai was authorized by the U.S. government to invite a large number of Chinese scholars for exchange activities in the United States.
There are six scholars in the first batch invited to the United States, namely Jin Yuelin, Fei Xiaotong, Cai Qiao, Liu Naicheng, Zhang Qiyun and Xiao Zuoliang. Among them, Jin Yuelin is a philosopher, Fei Xiaotong is a historian, Cai Qiao is a physiologist, and Liu Naicheng
He is a jurist, Zhang Qiyun is a geographer, and Xiao Zuoliang is a political scientist, covering all aspects of Chinese academic circles.
This cultural influence strategy was planned for the long term and later expanded to the field of culture and art. For example, the fourth batch of invited scholars included writer Lao She, playwright Cao Yu, cartoonist Ye Qianyu, dancer Dai Ailian and other nine people.
The Americans even included the Communist Party in the invitation list. The Communist Party planned to send four scholars to the United States, but due to various complicated reasons, the trip was not successful in the end.
Zhou Hexuan was not among those invited because he himself had done various exchanges in the United States before, and Roosevelt did not need to spend that unjust money.
Although Chang Kaishen did not agree to Fairbank's payment of living expenses to Chinese professors, he attached great importance to Fairbank's invitation to Chinese scholars to visit the United States. He put his secretary Chen Brai in charge of this matter and solemnly visited the invited scholars for five days.
Training. The content of the training is very simple, it is to teach scholars basic diplomatic etiquette, and stipulate that things that harm China's image cannot be said, things that harm China's image cannot be done, etc.
At the end of the training, Chang Kaishen personally hosted a banquet for the six scholars and presented them with signed photos of himself.
In July, Fairbank brought the first group of visiting scholars to the United States to gather at the Zhou Mansion.
Zhou Hexuan was naturally entertained by good wine and good food, and spent two days discussing with these scholars.
Fairbank said: "The Sino-US scholar exchange program is to strengthen mutual understanding between China and the United States in the field of culture and science and technology. Most Americans now don't know much about China, and some Americans even think that Chinese people still have braids. We
The first step in the exchange plan is to let the United States understand China. Here, I would like to choose Mr. Zhou's "The Fifteen Years of Wanli" as one of the books for exchanges between Chinese and American scholars."
"Of course, no problem. I will let Michael Lauer Books publish the English version, and I have already done the translation of the manuscript." Zhou Hexuan said.
Fei Xiaotong suddenly said: "Mr. Zhou, I have some crude opinions on "The Fifteenth Year of Wanli"."
Zhou Hexuan said: "Please speak."
"With all due respect, your masterpiece focuses too much on the civil service system and ignores the impact of local autonomy on Zhang Juzheng's reforms," Fei Xiaotong added, "Of course, this is just my humble opinion. Mr. Zhou does not need to
Too concerned."
Zhou Hexuan smiled and said: "Local autonomy in the Ming Dynasty was also a subsidiary product of the civil service system, right?"
Fei Xiaotong shook his head and said: "The local autonomy of the Ming Dynasty is of course related to the civil service system, but it was not spawned by the civil service system. In fact, in the early years of the Ming Dynasty, the imperial power could be sent to counties and rural areas. According to Zhu Yuanzhang's
The idea is that the local government carries out land tax and labor service according to the Lijia household system. Most of the land tax is handed over to the central government, and a small part is left to the local government. In the early Ming Dynasty, the local government had relatively loose power, and the power of the local gentry
It’s much smaller.”
"Please continue." Zhou Hexuan listened carefully. He had not read all history books.
Fei Xiaotong continued: "The local governments in the early Ming Dynasty had power and money, so they could do many things, such as water conservancy, education, transportation, charity, public security, etc. Due to the increasing seriousness of land annexation, the tax revenue that local governments could receive
Less and less, when there is no money, they can only give up some of their rights and functions, and turn to the power of the squire clan to undertake local public affairs. This method saves local government money and trouble, so it actively recognizes and encourages the squire clan.
Taking over the control and management of grassroots society, even the government has to rely on the gentry to collect taxes."
"That's it." Zhou Hexuan suddenly understood.
Fei Xiaotong added: "In fact, Zhang Juzheng did not originate the 'One Whip Method', but because local taxation was too complex, the county governments in the south made spontaneous adjustments according to the actual situation. Zhang Juzheng summarized this tax adjustment method as a nationwide
system. It can be seen that many capable local officials at that time still wanted to take back the power of grassroots management. Zhang Juzheng's reforms were not unsupported, but his reform methods were too radical, causing a collective backlash from officials and gentry.
"
"Thank you for your advice. I am going to revise "The Fifteenth Year of Wanli" and the revised version will be published in a few months." Zhou Hexuan said.
Fei Xiaotong did not expect Zhou Hexuan to accept the objections so humbly. He quickly said: "There is no need to modify it. There are no major mistakes in Mr. Zhou's original work, just a few omissions."
"If you can change it, change it. You are talking about a big problem." Zhou Hexuan has changed Huang Renyu's original version a lot, but historians still pointed out the shortcomings.
Zhang Qiyun praised: "Mr. Zhou is worthy of being a master, and his rigorous academic attitude is a role model for us."
Zhang Qiyun is the founder of "human geography" and "historical geography" in China. He studied under the masters of philosophy Liu Boming, geography master Zhu Kezhen, and history master Liu Yizheng. Therefore, he also has high attainments in philosophy and history, and is proficient in Tibetan Buddhism.
studies, Manchu studies, Mongolian studies and other minority studies.
The geography textbook when Zhou Weilie was in high school was edited by Zhang Qiyun. He also edited the high school physics textbook with Dai Yungui, and the high school English textbook with Lin Yutang. These three textbooks were used by most high schools in China during the Anti-Japanese War.
At the beginning of 1949, Chang Kaishen didn't know where to go and asked Zhang Qiyun for advice.
Zhang Qiyun hesitated for a long time and finally said: "The best policy is to retreat to Taiwan!"
Chang Kaishen was shocked and immediately called Zhang Qiyun into the secret room for a detailed discussion.
Before that, Chang Kaishen had three choices, namely to retreat to the southwest, Hainan or Taiwan. Most of the KMT's bureaucrats and generals tended to retreat to the southwest. The bottom line was to stay in Sichuan, clinging to the advantages of mountains and rivers and waiting for good opportunities.
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In fact, this is easy to understand. The Japanese invaders were so powerful that they could not invade Sichuan, and the Communist Party would certainly not be able to do it either. This is what the officials of the National Government thought. At worst, they would rule the "Bashu Kingdom" in the future.
Only Zhang Qiyun urged Chang Kaishen to retreat to Taiwan and analyzed the consequences of various options in detail. Chang Kaishen was convinced by Zhang Qiyun on the spot.
Because of his meritorious advice, Zhang Qiyun rose to prominence after Chiang Kai-shek's withdrawal from Taiwan. He successively served as the director of the secretarial group of the President's Office of the Kuomintang in the Taiwan authorities, the director of the Central Propaganda Department of the Kuomintang, and the minister of education. Before that, Zhang Qiyun was just a national.
He is only a specially appointed professor from the government's Ministry of Education.
Without Zhang Qiyun's advice, Chiang Kai-shek would probably have been entrenched in Sichuan and resisted, and there would have been no cross-strait issues.