"The reason for failure is to take it by oneself!" The Sino-Japanese Naval Battle of 1894-1895 was completely defeated. Liang Qichao commented that he pointed the finger at Li Hongzhang, believing that Li Hongzhang could not be blamed. In 1896, Li Hongzhang and Tsarist Russia sig

"So because of failure, it is your own choice!"

China-Japan Navy Battle , the Qing government failed in a complete manner, Liang Qichao commented in this way, he pointed the finger at Li Hongzhang , thinking that Li Hongzhang could not be blamed.

1896, Li Hongzhang and Tsarist Russia signed the "Secret Agreement between China and Russia", and gave all the three northeastern provinces to Tsarist Russia. The angry and helpless emperor Guangxu slapped the case and exclaimed: "It is to sell it to the Russians in one fell swoop!"

5 Five years later, Li Hongzhang and Eight-Nation Alliance signed the "Historical Treaty ", which attracted people across the country to scold him, and they all called him a traitor and an imperialist lackey.

Li Hongzhang spent his life in grief and anger and scolding the people of the whole country. As an important official in the late Qing Dynasty, he saw this giant ship falling down little by little, and finally destroyed with this giant ship.

After Li Hongzhang's death, the debate between later generations over his merits and demerits did not stop. Some say that to a certain extent, he alone struggled to support the building of the generals, promoted the Westernization Movement, and proposed to use barbarians to control barbarians, which often preserved the face of the Qing government.

Some people also say that Li Hongzhang is greedy and has no backbone to avoid war and seek peace. He signed many treaties that are powerless and humiliating.

However, regardless of Li Hongzhang's merits and demerits, he has put forward many insightful opinions in his decades of political career, especially his grasp of the overall situation, which is quite unique.

For example, more than a hundred years ago, Li Hongzhang issued a warning: If China wants no future troubles, it is necessary to destroy its country first.

At that time, most people did not pay attention to the country mentioned by Li Hongzhang, so that in the past hundred years since then, our country suffered a lot.

It can be said that Li Hongzhang has been guarding against this country throughout his life, and his heart is even more filled with fear. This sentence was exchanged for humiliation and blood.

So, which country is Li Hongzhang talking about? Why did he make such a deafening warning?

Let’s review that history together.

The decline of late Qing Dynasty and the standout Li Hongzhang

The Qing Dynasty Since its establishment, under the efforts of Kangxi and Yongzheng , it once presented a prosperous scene from all directions to celebrate, creating Kangxi .

However, since the Qianlong period, it has gradually become blindly arrogant and stubborn, calling itself "the country of Tianfu". Not only that, Emperor Qianlong promoted literary inquisition and pursued a policy of closing the country. Only an external trade port was retained on the vast coastline.

Compared with the self-indulgent degeneration of the Qing government, various Western countries are vigorously carrying out the industrial revolution , and social thoughts and science and technology have undergone complete progress.

European and American countries not only have extremely prosperous economies, but also greatly enhanced their military strength. Therefore, predatory Western countries began to extend the claws of invasion to the eastern sleeping lion of the Qing Dynasty.

First, Britain sent a large amount of opium to the Qing Dynasty, which not only seized a lot of capital, but also eroded and paralyzed people's spirit. Many royal nobles even lost their fighting spirit and were addicted to the intoxication brought by opium all day long.

After encountering boycotts from Lin Zexu and other knowledgeable people, the British army launched the Opium War . At this time, the Qing government had already been unable to make ends meet, and most of the weapons were still backward cold weapons, and they had no resistance in front of the British army with strong ships and powerful guns, and were vulnerable.

The door that had been closed for hundreds of years collapsed, and since then, China has begun the process of semi-colonial and semi-feudal society.

However, until the outbreak of the Second Opium War of , the corrupt Qing government still did not realize the seriousness of the matter. The aggressive invaders are never satisfied. After tasting the sweetness, they launched the Opium War again.

Only then did the Qing government gradually realize that if it is not self-reliant, it will inevitably perish.

Against this background, Li Hongzhang, Zuo Zongtang and others launched the Westernization Movement, attempting to make the Qing Dynasty stronger again by "learning the strengths of the barbarians to control the barbarians".

It is undeniable that the Westernization Movement has indeed played a certain positive role by exporting talents and introducing Western technology. However, with the outbreak of Sino-Japanese War of 1894-1895, the Beiyang Navy was wiped out, causing the efforts of Li Hongzhang and others to be wasted.

It was also from that time that Li Hongzhang gradually entered the core of the power of the Qing government and was highly valued by Empress Dowager Cixi.

To a certain extent, Li Hongzhang chose that era, and that era also chose Li Hongzhang.

When Li Hongzhang was 17 years old, it happened to be in 1840. Several British cannons opened the door of the Qing government. Li Hongzhang was the scholar who passed the exam that year.

Li Hongzhang's father was a Beijing official with a small official position. From the beginning, he strongly hoped that his son could enter the officialdom and enter politics, so he tried his best to cultivate Li Hongzhang. After passing the scholarship exam at

, his father immediately took Li Hongzhang to Beijing to take the provincial examination and successfully passed the imperial examination. Immediately afterwards, he continued to recommend officials from his hometown in Anhui to Li Hongzhang, and then asked him to prepare for the imperial examination with all his might.

I thought that the smart and studious Li Hongzhang could stand out in the imperial examination, but Li Hongzhang failed to perform well and failed the exam.

In desperation, under the arrangement of his father, Li Hongzhang entered the military camp of Zeng Guofan and to train, hoping that he would overtake in the military camp.

Coincidentally, at this time, Taiping Heavenly Kingdom movement broke out. As soon as Li Hongzhang entered the military camp, he followed Zeng Guofan to fight.

It was during the battle with the Taiping Heavenly Kingdom that Li Hongzhang showed his superman military talent and was deeply loved by Zeng Guofan.

Under Zeng Guofan's teaching and support, Li Hongzhang achieved major victories one by one and defeated the Taiping Heavenly Kingdom in one fell swoop. Li Hongzhang, who had made great contributions, quickly stood out and was constantly valued by the court. In just a few years, he became the governor of Huguang .

At this time, Li Hongzhang was just 44 years old and became a rank-up official, but his career had not yet reached its peak. After that, his official position became higher and higher, and gradually entered the core of power in the Qing Dynasty.

However, Li Hongzhang did not have the slightest sense of gain in life, but instead became more and more difficult. A series of major events that followed gradually pushed him to the forefront of the historical stage, and even became the spokesperson of the Qing Dynasty for a time, and eventually led him into the abyss of no return.

The greed of the Japanese

1870, a major event that shocked China and the world occurred in Tianjin. At that time, the French Catholic Church promisingly prosecuted, arousing strong opposition from the people, and then conflicts caused bloodshed.

After a time, seven countries led by France asked the Qing government for explanation and mobilized a large number of warships to Dagukou for force threats.

There was a military threat from the great powers outside, and the masses did kill and injured several foreign Catholic personnel. Zeng Guofan, who was in charge of this matter, could only use his own people to calm down.

After a time, Zeng Guofan executed more than a dozen ordinary people who were causing trouble and compensated 500,000 taels of silver to the seven powerful countries respectively.

This way of handling the Qing government caused public grievances. He could not control the situation and could only retreat behind the scenes and pushed Li Hongzhang to the front. After Li Hongzhang mediation, the compensation was finally reduced to 400,000 taels, and the people who caused trouble were appeased.

After this incident, the Qing government saw Li Hongzhang's foreign affairs coordination ability, so he further reused him and made him the Governor of Zhili and the Minister of Commerce of Beiyang.

Although this foreign-related incident was successfully dealt with, people saw the weakness in the hearts of the Qing government and Li Hongzhang.

It is also because of this that 33 months after Tianjin lesson plan, the Japanese actually sent envoys to the Qing Dynasty to enjoy the same treatment as Western powers in the Qing Dynasty.

Their shamelessness was naturally rejected by the Qing government. The Japanese were unwilling to give up and had already figured out Li Hongzhang's weak and fearful character from various channels, so the Japanese envoy directly found Li Hongzhang to threaten him and tempted him.

Unexpectedly, the Japanese envoy convinced Li Hongzhang without any effort. Li Hongzhang submitted a memorial to the Qing government the next day: "Japan is only three agendas away from Jiangsu and Zhejiang, and is proficient in Chinese characters. Its military and armor is better than that of the countries in the East Island. It can be connected to foreign aid, so do not let the Westerners become foreign governments."

At this time, Li Hongzhang actually wanted to unite Japan to deal with the Western powers. Under the impetus of Li Hongzhang's self-indulgent, he finally successfully signed the Sino-Japanese Trade Treaty with Japan.

At this time, Li Hongzhang had not realized that his behavior had led the wolf into the house. In 1874, Japan launched a war of aggression against Taiwan and successfully occupied Taiwan. Taiwan, which Kangxi recaptured by the whole country, was easily occupied by the ambitious Japan.

But Li Hongzhang was still dreaming of the Sino-Japanese alliance, and even kept persuading the Qing government not to carry out easily with Japan, and asked the Taiwan defense army to "only set up camp and train themselves, and not start a war and start a quarrel."

This is not counting. Li Hongzhang actually presided over the signing of the "Beijing Special Article" with Japan that was humiliating.

In Li Hongzhang's eyes, giving Taiwan to Japan can make Japan and the Qing government stand together, and have an allied army when facing Western powers, so as not to be attacked from both sides.

But Li Hongzhang underestimated Japan, their ambition was by no means just occupying Taiwan. Five years later, Japan launched another war to invade Ryukyu and directly took Ryukyu for its own possession. Until now, Ryukyu, which is now Okinawa Prefecture, Japan, is still in the hands of the Japanese.

In this regard, Li Hongzhang still chose to calm down and did not even dare to say a tough word. When the coastal provinces wanted to send troops to retake Ryukyu, Li Hongzhang even helped the Japanese. In the court, he made such a big statement, "Japan despises China, so bear with it... China is vast and rich in resources, but it can last for a long time and not worry about winning."

Li Hongzhang's assassination

Japan's ambitions are getting bigger and bigger, and they begin to plan greater aggression, but Li Hongzhang is still illusory.

Just before Japan launched the Sino-Japanese War of 1894-1895, many coastal officials had already seen the danger and reported to the Qing government to fight back. However, Li Hongzhang, who controlled the military and diplomatic power, still adhered to the principle of "win without fighting, only good plans are the only way to make good plans." To put it nicely, the statement of

is to retreat to advance, but in fact, Li Hongzhang is selling his country to protect himself, for fear of causing trouble.

blindly retreating can only make the jackal gain more and more. In 1894, Japan launched the Sino-Japanese War of 1894, and the Qing government was defeated in a mess. Japan had the capital to negotiate terms with the Qing government. Therefore, under the leadership of the Japanese, the negotiation intention was put forward.

This kind of negotiation after the defeat is nothing more than how to compensate. Li Hongzhang didn't want to be a sinner, so he coordinated to let the German Decuilin go to Japan for negotiations on his behalf. Unexpectedly, the Japanese didn't even want to see this German.

After the German was disappointed, in February 1895, the Qing government sent two more ministers to Japan for negotiations, but they couldn't make the decision and returned in disappointment.

The Japanese also saw through the Qing government's still a bit of luck, so they launched another war against Weihaiwei and soon won the victory.

In this way, the Qing government had no hope anymore and could only send Li Hongzhang to Japan to mediate personally.

Li Hongzhang doesn't want to go, but he must go. The Japanese tried their best to provoke a war, but they simply wanted to pay compensation and cede land. Moreover, they must have spoken out loud. Whoever negotiated would inevitably become a "traitor". Therefore, all the civil and military ministers of the court retreated.

On March 19 that year, Li Hongzhang led a group of senators and counselors to Japan and began negotiations. It was this negotiation that made Li Hongzhang truly alert and gained a deep understanding of Japan.

At the beginning of the negotiations, the Japanese made things difficult for them and kept raising the negotiation price. They not only demanded the occupation of Tianjin, Shanhaiguan and other places, but also demanded that the Qing army be disarmed and bear the Japanese military expenditure.

Such conditions were like a loud slap in the face and even more on the Qing government's face.No matter how weak Li Hongzhang was, he would never dare to agree to such unreasonable conditions from the Japanese, so he proposed to suspend negotiations and request instructions from the Qing government.

Li Hongzhang urgently reported the conditions of the Japanese to the Qing government through a telegram. As expected, Emperor Guangxu was furious after receiving the telegram. However, Guangxu could not make the decision at this time and still needed to ask Empress Dowager Cixi. Unexpectedly, Empress Dowager Cixi came and remained silent.

In desperation, Li Hongzhang could only test the Japanese bottom line little by little. At the beginning, I rejected the unreasonable request from the Japanese and adopted the procrastination tactic, and it would be a day to delay.

However, in order to force Li Hongzhang to submit, the Japanese actually directed and acted as a "assassination" drama. That day, Li Hongzhang had just come out of the negotiation site and was suddenly shot and assassinated.

The bullet did not hit Li Hongzhang's vital point, but only caused minor injuries on his left cheekbones. Even so, Li Hongzhang's face was still bleeding.

After the assassination, the Japanese quickly executed the murderer on the surface and properly arranged for Li Hongzhang to heal. But the negotiation conditions did not make any concessions, but instead put further pressure on Li Hongzhang.

As expected, Li Hongzhang and the Qing government finally couldn't control it anymore. After Emperor Guangxu made the instructions that "the original Hope will benefit from one point, and if there is no way to make a deal with it, I will respect the previous order to make a contract with it", on April 17 of the same year, Li Hongzhang was forced to sign the " Treaty of Shimonoseki " with the Japanese, ceding Liaodong Peninsula , Taiwan Island and Penghu Islands to Japan, and compensate Japan for 200 million taels of military expenditure. The signing of the Treaty of Shimonoseki, with bloody lessons and the result of the cedes of large tracts of land, declared the complete failure of his policy of "using barbarians to control barbarians". This time, Li Hongzhang finally woke up from his past fantasy of Japan.

Therefore, after signing the Treaty of Shimonoseki, Li Hongzhang once gritted his teeth and said: If China wants no future troubles, it is necessary to destroy its country first. The country here naturally refers to Japan.

But Li Hongzhang's awakening was too late. Not only did it wipe out the entire army of Beiyang Navy, but it also cedes the land for compensation, which made the Qing Dynasty lose face.

Soon, Li Hongzhang began to become a "thief" and "lack dog" in the national population.

Liang Qichao scolded Li Hongzhang in pain, "The reason for failure is that he takes it himself!" He criticized her bluntly for having always had fantasies about Japan and was tolerant in the face of shameless blackmail.

The people of Liaodong heard the news of the signing of the Shimonoseki Treaty, and many people cried bitterly, "I was so angry that I was in a state of revenge." The people of Taiwan collectively issued a manifesto to attack Li Hongzhang, saying that he was "shamed, stolen the country and regained his position, and offended the ancestors of heaven and earth."

Although Li Hongzhang was shot in Japan, he knew he had no face to see others. He did not even go to the court when he returned to his country, and hid at home to avoid the limelight.

Li Hongzhang's merits and demerits controversy

The signing of the Treaty of Shimonoseki sets a very bad precedent, allowing Western powers to fully understand the weakness and incompetence of the Qing government. Five years later, in 1900, the Eight-Nation Alliance directly launched a joint war of aggression to divide China and forced the Qing government to sign the "Xin Chou Treaty" that was powerless and humiliating, including the wolf-like ambition Japan.

Japan, which has tasted the sweetness again and again, has expanded its ambitions and has made excessive demands. First, the Russo-Japanese War of was launched in 1904, and in 1931, the war of aggression against China began.

All of this is the sequelae brought by the Treaty of Shimonoseki.

But even so, Li Hongzhang and the late Qing government still did not wake up completely. After their disillusionment with Japan was shattered, they began to hug Tsarist Russia again.

What Li Hongzhang thought was that the ambitions of the Japanese also threatened the interests of Tsarist Russia, so he fantasized about using the power of Tsarist Russia to restrict Japan's ever-inflating ambitions.

However, Tsarist Russia cannot get up early without profit. Their condition for helping the Qing government was to obtain the right to build roads and mines in the Northeast. The Qing government naturally agreed readily that losing some minerals is more cost-effective than ceding land.

So, Tsarist Russia began to put pressure on Japan and joined forces with Germany and France to force Japan to return the Liaodong Peninsula to the Qing government.

Li Hongzhang saw that his strategy was successful, regained his confidence and was proud, and further put forward the proposal to the court to "alien Russia and reject Japan". The foolish Empress Dowager Cixi was also happy that the situation improved. Not only did Li Hongzhang let go, but he also sent him to sign the Sino-Russian Secret Agreement with Tsarist Russia for his plenipotentiary representative.

On the surface, the Sino-Russian Secret Agreement provided a protective umbrella for the security of the Qing government, but this was just the wishful thinking of the Qing government. Tsarist Russia is more aggressive and greedy than Japan.

After obtaining the rights to build roads and open mining in the Northeast, , he shamelessly made requests to "leas" the territory of the Qing government. The Qing government refused all the unreasonable requests from Tsarist Russia.

As a result, it triggered a craze for the Western powers to divide China, and they followed Russia's example of "leasing" land from the Qing government. At this point, the great country has completely become a semi-colonial country.

Looking back on a series of major events before, many of them have the shadow of Li Hongzhang. Therefore, until now, people have more criticized Li Hongzhang.

Whether facing Japan or Tsarist Russia, Li Hongzhang showed a cowardly and bloodless side. Facing the threat of the great powers, he did not even dare to say a tough word.

During his political career, he signed hundreds of unequal treaties that were humiliating and humiliating on behalf of the Qing government. Although behind it is Empress Dowager Cixi and the Qing government, what people see is Li Hongzhang's unblocked concessions and compromises.

In September 1901, after the invasion of the Eight-Nation Alliance, Li Hongzhang signed the last "Xin Chou Treaty" that made the Qing Dynasty look completely disgusted. Two months later, on November 7, he died in depression amidst scolding.

At that time, the Eight-Nation Alliance was still shamelessly entangling the Qing government. Li Hongzhang's death made Empress Dowager Cixi at a loss and expressed her feelings that "The overall situation is not decided, and if there is an accident, no one will share the burden!"

In the eyes of many historians, Li Hongzhang not only sells the country for glory, but also uses his position to embezzle and make money. Although the Qing government continued to cede land and pay compensation for the last few decades, and there was no silver in the treasury, Li Hongzhang personally had a inheritance of nearly 40 million taels of silver.

Where does this money come from? According to historians' research, most of them were corrupt when he presided over the Westernization Movement, so that some people criticized Li Hongzhang for being "the prime minister Hefei is thin in the world."

However, many people also believe that Li Hongzhang is not so unbearable. He worked hard to preserve the Qing government, and also promoted many reforms and promoted social progress and development.

For example, when dealing with the Taiping Heavenly Kingdom, Li Hongzhang formed the " Huai Army ", which is a unit different from the Qing army in the past. Many people even believe that the "Huai Army" has the prototype of a modern army in terms of management system and combat training.

In addition, although the Beiyang Navy he formed was wiped out in the Sino-Japanese War of 1894-1895, this navy is the most powerful naval force in Asia, providing many references for China's future naval construction.

In addition, the machine manufacturing bureau, telegraph bureau, translation museum created by Li Hongzhang himself, and sending overseas students to international students are pioneers, greatly promoting China's modernization process.

It is precisely because of this that after Li Hongzhang's death, Empress Dowager Cixi was grateful for his contribution to the Qing government, posthumously awarded him the title, and buried him with glory. After his death, he was in peace and was dragged by a tomb and corpse

After Li Hongzhang died, he was buried in his hometown Huainan, Anhui according to his last wishes. However, this powerful figure still has no peace after his death.

1958, the local construction factory needed a large-scale land acquisition, and Li Hongzhang's cemetery happened to be within the scope of the land acquisition. Just at this moment, someone suggested that Li Hongzhang was a "traitor" and should dig out Li Hongzhang's cemetery and sell the burial objects inside to confiscate.

After obtaining approval, the local people began to organize people to excavate his tomb. However, Li Hongzhang's cemetery is particularly strong, and the tomb chamber is made of refractory bricks imported from the UK.

In desperation, people used more than a dozen kilograms of explosives to explode the tomb chamber.Open Li Hongzhang's tomb, which store the coffin of Li Hongzhang and his wife Li Xiaolian. People found that Li Hongzhang's cemetery was not as luxurious as imagined, only very simple burial objects.

next to Li Hongzhang's corpse, there is only a picture of his eyes, used pocket watches, crutches, and seven gold coins placed in the shape of Beidou Seven Stars . The only valuable thing is a sword he treasured in the past.

. His wife Zhao Xiaolian had two objects shaped like gold bricks next to her. After inspection, people found that they were only two copper bricks.

Those crazy people did not find valuable burial objects. In order to vent their dissatisfaction with Li Hongzhang's behavior of selling his country and seeking honor, after looting his cemetery, they actually tied his bones to a tractor and dragged them onto the streets and paraded in the streets.

When Li Hongzhang made a bold statement about "competing for strengths and weaknesses with the world", he never expected that he would be trampled on by a group of people after his death.

Finally, Li Hongzhang's corpse was crushed and dispersed, mixed into the dust and soil, and could never be found again.