The fall of the late Qing Dynasty was really due to the decentralization of power. Cixi was nominally the Queen Mother and Lafayette, and was worshiped by hundreds of officials. No one would dare to cause trouble until she died.
After the Gengzi Incident, Cixi declared war on all nations. As a result, Li Hongzhang, Zhang Zhidong, Liu Kunyi and others came directly to the southeast to protect themselves. In other words, they directly told the foreigners that we do not recognize the imperial court's declaration of war. If you want to fight against Beijing, Go and attack Beijing. You can’t attack us anyway.
In the end, the foreigners really agreed, and the Eight-Nation Allied Forces in the southeastern provinces did not intrude at all during the entire war. As a result, the war was completely fought in Beijing, Tianjin, and Hebei.
There are records in unofficial history that Cixi escaped from Beijing and headed west. There was no news for nearly a month. No one in the court knew whether Cixi was dead or alive.
At that time, these self-protective governors in the southeast had secretly contacted each other and wanted to recommend Li Hongzhang as president and reform the republic.
Gu Hongming even offered advice to Zhang Zhidong, asking Jiangnan to become independent, establish a country, and prepare for the Northern Expedition.
Sometimes the truth of history is hidden in unofficial history. Maybe what is recorded in unofficial history is not necessarily true, but future generations can see the unofficial history at that time, which shows that the literati who wrote unofficial history at that time represented a large part of his thoughts. The people's thoughts, his thoughts or fabricated fantasies, are what the people want to see or even desire to see.
It is precisely because the people have this desire in their hearts that they will work hard to spread it. Only in this way can the unofficial history be passed down for hundreds of years so that future generations can see it.
This is a very important circumstantial contribution of unofficial history to history. You should not ask unofficial history to be absolutely correct. Unofficial history cannot be absolutely correct, because even official history cannot do this.
However, unofficial history can be circulated for hundreds of years without being eliminated, which shows that this unofficial history represents the mainstream public opinion at that time. This is a very important circumstantial evidence for studying the trend of people's hearts in that era.
From the Southeast Mutual Protection Incident alone, we can see the decentralization of power in the late Qing Dynasty. Even Cixi's control over the late Qing Empire was unable to achieve centralized power, let alone Tongzhi, Guangxu and other sick men.
The more power is dispersed, the more serious the constraints will be! If the empire's resources cannot be pooled, of course it will be unable to carry out major projects that could reverse the fate of the country.
What is even more frightening is that the political system of the Manchu Qing Dynasty was not perfect to begin with. It was born with the gene of decentralization, and the ghost of the Eight Kings' Discussion of Government wandered in the hearts of every bannerman.
After the emperor's authority collapsed, it would be difficult to establish it again! To put it simply, the entire Eight Banners Group does not want another Kangxi, Yongzheng, or Qianlong to appear.
How dangerous and frustrating it is to work with such a powerful emperor! If I want to behead you, I can behead you. If I want to get rid of your official position, I can. Even destroying your nine tribes is just a matter of words.
When you hang out with such a master, you have to be careful about corruption. It is better to work with a cowardly and incompetent emperor. Everyone is corrupting together. Even the imperial kitchen is greedy for the emperor's money. The emperor can't do anything if he knows about it. How wonderful is this.
Therefore, Emperor Tongzhi's revival of the imperial party will definitely anger all the Eight Banners nobles!
The Eight Banners group, which is rotten to the core, is inherently opposed to centralization. This has become a 'crab bucket effect.' What is the crab bucket effect?
Even a crab fisherman on the beach carries a bucket without a lid, catches a crab and throws it in. There is no need to put a lid on it, and the crab cannot escape.
Is it because the edges of the crab bucket are smooth? Actually, no, the crab bucket is very ordinary. Any crab can easily climb up it, but don’t forget that crabs, such domineering people, don’t understand civility and courtesy.
Half of the crabs in the bucket were fighting for each other, and they were all trying to escape. One climbed up, and the other dragged his feet and walked up, and then the third one also climbed up, and finally they all fell to the bottom of the bucket.
In this way, they restrained each other, entangled each other, and made trouble for each other. As a result, the crab bucket did not need to be covered with a lid and no one was watching. Basically, even half of the crabs in the bucket could not escape.
This is the crab bucket effect, and the officialdom of the late Qing Dynasty was actually like this. The Eight Banners and Han ministers were just crabs, staring at each other like black-eyed chickens.
Let’s just talk about the 30,000 new troops in the Xishan Camp. Who gives the command? In fact, it can’t be given to anyone... Would Yixuan be happy if it was given to Yi? Are you happy to give Prince Yi a gift? Everyone thinks so, and everyone is extremely wary of outsiders.
Because the Eight Banners military group has this gene, they know very well that whoever has soldiers is the boss, the ancestor. If he has power, he will definitely bully and exploit others.
You guard me, I am afraid of you. All the courtiers are as scared as a wolf and a wolf. As a result, a strange phenomenon is caused. The Qing Dynasty, which has more than 10 million square kilometers of land, relies on the Han people for its final military strength. Beiyang came to support the scene.
After Tongzhi, the Eight Banners no longer had a strong army. In the final analysis, an important factor is that all the Eight Banners nobles sincerely hope to have a strong army, but they do not want others to have such a strong army. They all hope to have such a strong army themselves. .
The more people think this way, the greater the suspicion among people will be. The greater the suspicion, the more constraints will be imposed. The final result is that everyone thinks well, but no one can get better.
It can be seen that the roots of the demise of the late Qing Dynasty were planted as early as the early days of the founding of the People's Republic of China. The resurgence of the political ideology of the Eight Kings who competed for power and profit was an important factor in the demise of the Qing Empire.
Once you understand this, you can also understand Beiyang's failure in the Sino-Japanese War of 1894-1899. Before Sino-Japanese War, all Beiyang's applications for additional battleships, fast guns, and ammunition were rejected. Even the Beiyang Navy burned the most rubbish. Crushed coal, while the Japanese Navy burned all high-heat white coal and anthracite.
This phenomenon cannot be explained by the corruption and incompetence of the Manchu government. The fundamental reason is caused by the restrictive balance within the imperial court.
You, Li Hongzhang, have spent tens of millions of taels of silver, are you still not satisfied? Want to add more ships and artillery? Do you want to rebel? If I buy you one less warship, the other departments of the imperial court will be able to distribute millions more taels of silver.
The late Qing Dynasty was such a tangled society. On the one hand, they desperately hoped to have a strong navy, because they were afraid of being beaten by foreigners and needed some power to protect themselves.
On the other hand, they naturally did not believe in these governor generals who were armed with heavy troops. Not to mention you Han people, even the Manchus themselves became such generals, and the court was extremely afraid of them.
In fact, according to the national strength of the Qing Dynasty in the early years of Guangxu, the Manchus and Qing Dynasties only need to put aside their internal grudges and work together! Building a pure Western-style strong army of about 100,000 people is just like playing.
How much can a 100,000 pure Western-style strong army cost? For the Qing Empire, which had an area of more than 10 million square kilometers, this amount of money was just drizzle. It did not use the food and wages from Jiangnan. It was enough to raise some money and food from the three provinces of Shanxi, Shandong and Zhili.
Looking at the melee between warlords in the early years of the Republic of China, a warlord in a province can pull out hundreds of thousands of Western-style troops. Yan Xishan, the famous king of Shanxi at that time, made his fortune in Shanxi Province. At its peak, he had 400,000 troops, and at its lowest, he had an army of 100,000.
Even Yan Xishan, who was backed by a province, could pull out such a powerful army, let alone the Manchu Qing Dynasty, which had the whole country. This was enough to prove that the Manchu Qing Dynasty did not have the strength to reform, but that they did not want to change at all.
