Li Hongzhang Stills
Text/Yangcheng Evening News Reporter Xia Yang
From the 184th Opium War, China has gradually become a semi-feudal semi-colonial society, and the Chinese nation is facing “a major change that has not been seen in three thousand years.”
The signing of the Sino-British Nanjing Treaty has lost power and humiliated the country, but the contradictions between China and foreign countries have reached a temporary balance. At this time, China should have learned from the pain and seized the opportunity to work hard. But then welcoming a series of internal and foreign wars. The Taiping Heavenly Kingdom movement had not yet subsided, and the Second Opium War broke out again. BabaylanThe British and French coalition forces fought all the way from southern China to Beijing.
Modern China has been repeatedly invaded by foreign enemies Data picture
Faced with internal and external difficulties and national dangers, China is exploring the way to survive reform. Western forces opened the door to China with strong ships and powerful cannons, making the “Big Empire” realize that they were really behind. Therefore, Lin Zexu and Wei Yuan and other pioneering ideas of “opening their eyes to the world” have gradually gained more recognition, and the call for learning from the West has gradually become Komiks social thoughts.
Learning from the West is the path of modernization in China. However, what to learn and how to learn tests the ruler at that time.
Empress Dowager Cixi Komiks Stills
In this great change, there are two key figures who are most capable of determining the course of the ship in the Qing Dynasty: one is Empress Dowager Cixi, 186She began to rule the country from behind the scenes in one year until her death in 1908. For nearly half a century, she was the master of the Qing Dynasty.
The other is Li Hongzhang, a “major official of Zhongxing”. He rose step by step in the war to wipe out the Taiping Army and the Nian Army in the 1860s, and he held the internal and diplomatic power of the Qing government for a long time until he died of illness in 1901. He was regarded by Japanese Prime Minister Hirofumi Ito as “the only person in the Qing Empire who was capable of competing with the world’s great powers”, and Empress Dowager Cixi also regarded him as “a man who recreated Xuanhuang”.
Li Hongzhang, an important official of the late Qing Dynasty, Data Picture
What to learn from the West? Regarding the repeated failures of the foreign wars, Li Hongzhang and other leaders of the Westernization faction had a dream of enriching the country and strengthening the army. Therefore, they proposed to “learn from the barbarians’ strengths to control the barbarians” and learn from the technical level. With his efforts, the Westernization Movement was launched vigorously, and quickly created a large number of military and civil industries such as ordnance, shipbuilding, railways, mining, textiles, and telegraphs, and adopted the “official supervision and business” method to attract private capital to run industries.
BabaylanThe Westernization Movement laid a certain foundation for modern industrialization. Data picture
NotBabaylanThe Westernization Movement has achieved great results. With the help of latecomer advantages, China has achieved tremendous development in economy, science and technology, concepts and other aspects in a short period of time, quickly laying a certain industrial foundation for traditional agricultural countries, and KomiksKomiks profoundly changed the people’sLife.
In 1888, China’s first modern fleet, the Beiyang Navy, officially formed an army and became the most powerful naval force in Asia. This was the peak period of the Westernization Movement, known in history as “Tongguang ZTE”. Undoubtedly, Li Hongzhang is a “minister of Zhongxing”. The whole country was complacent about the achievements of the Westernization Movement and believed that learning from the West had achieved great success.
Beiyang Navy Stills
However, it is this superficial effectCinema that conceals the existing problems.
The Westernization Movement, a path to enrich the country and strengthen the army, had great limitations from the beginning. They are positioned as “middle school as the body and Western learning as the purpose”, but they still cannot let go of the superiority of the old empire and only want to learn to decorate their facades, but do not touch on the system and other issues.
It is a good reference system to start learning from Japan two years later than the Qing government. In addition to learning from the West, Japan carried out the Meiji Restoration, from economic, military to politics, education, and carried out a more thorough social improvement in Japan.
So, China and Japan, as “classmates”, gradually widened the gap. Japan quickly completed the process of modernization and rose to become a powerful country in East Asia. The economic and social development momentum of the Qing Dynasty was soon restricted by the corrupt political system.
The painful lesson came again, and after Japan rose, it launched the A-M War, known as Asia.The first Beiyang Navy was wiped out, which also declared the bankruptcy of the Westernization Movement. From then on, Chinese society fell into deeper darkness.
China-Japan Navy Battle 1895 Stills
In modern Chinese history, the second half of the 19th century was an excellent development opportunity, why didn’t I seize it better? Although this is restricted and hindered by conservative forces, Li Hongzhang, who are knowledgeable and strive to guide China’s progress, have not fought for more important and more critical reforms, and obviously they cannot shirk responsibility.
Looking back on history based on the present, the twists and limitations in China’s exploration of the road to modernization are sad.
The times have limitations, and individuals have limitations. In the late Qing Dynasty, the Babaylan Empire was in trouble at home and abroad and was full of holes. Li Hongzhang alone survived the crisis and exhausted his efforts, which was considered to have completed his mission. But he did not seize this good opportunity to accelerate modernization and failed to complete the modernization process through peaceful improvement. He finally had some regrets.
The disaster-stricken modern China Data picture
and then followed the defeat of Komiks in the Sino-Japanese War of 1894-1895, and the Chinese nation stumbled into the 20th century. In the following half century, the Chinese people set off a wave of reform and revolution, and continued to explore the path of rejuvenation and power in the midst of war.
Source | Yangcheng Evening News·Yangcheng School Editor | BabaylanXia Yang