Chapter 714: The Rise of the Hawks

For the sake of Yi Xun's insightful letter, the imperial court also held a cabinet meeting, thus giving birth to a faction that almost killed Yi Xun. Among the participants in the discussion were the scholar Wu Ren, who had always hated foreign affairs, Zhu Fengbiao, the secretary of the Ministry of Officials, Ruichang, the secretary of the Criminal Department, and Zeng Guofan, the governor of Zhili, who was reporting on his duties in Beijing at that time.

What is intriguing is that after some discussion, everyone recommended Zeng Guofan to draft an opinion on Yi Xun. This fold represents the position of the conservative forces in the DPRK and China, and at the same time, the article was written by Zeng Guofan, which shows that Zeng Guofan did not have much objection to Yiyun's proposition. Zeng Guofan, who has always been open-minded and active in foreign affairs, is still hostile to foreigners in his heart, otherwise he would not have agreed with the whole story of the attempt to expel foreigners. In the midst of great changes unseen in thousands of years, Zeng Guofan, as a typical representative of scholars, has huge contrasts, contradictions and entanglements in his life and work. Zeng Guofan's advocacy of taking the middle school as the body, learning from the West as the use, and mastering the skills of the master to control the country, almost split this great sage. A year later, the Tianjin teaching case completely tore his thoughts and actions into two extremes that could not be bridged at all.

After the Qing court responded to Yiyun's performance in the form of cabinet reconsideration, there was no response. However, its symbolic meaning is actually real, this is the first public "sword" of Yixun's conservative stance, and it has received the support of many important ministers, and the conservative forces in the court have finally found a leader from the imperial family. In addition, the hawks with a conservative stance and a hard-line attitude have gradually taken shape, and once there is a major change in Chinese and Western affairs, the eagle will immediately spread its wings and attack. The Tianjin lesson plan became an opportunity, and the hawks flapped their wings and made Yixin embarrassed.

Soon after the Tianjin case broke out, Ding Richang, then governor of Jiangsu, wrote to Yixin several times in secret to express his views on the Tianjin case. Ding Zhongcheng agreed with Zeng Guofan's view that "China's strength is now inadequate, and there is only one way to seek peace." It should be said that Ding Richang's viewpoint is very much in line with Yixin's thinking on handling the Tianjin incident. In addition, Ding Richang also foresaw that around this case, there would definitely be opposition voices in the court, so Ding Li advised the decision-making level headed by Yi Xin that "the situation is urgent now, and the garrison is indispensable. This statement can be said to be heartfelt, and the prediction is very accurate. Unsurprisingly, the arguments in favor of a tough foreign policy soon became loud and filled the Privy Court.

Differences in political views are not terrible, but what is terrible is that there are cold private opinions poured by old grudges and interests. However, the vanguard of the first cannon of this temple battle was two Han military aircraft: Li Hongzao and Shen Guifen. Li Hongzao was originally very close to Wu Ren, Xu Tong and others, and because of the previous Tongwenguan turmoil and Ding Wei's love incident, he had an old grudge with Yixin Group, so it is reasonable for him to refute it, and there is no need to say more. Compared with Li Hongzao, who is a scholar, Shen Guifen served as the governor of Shanxi in Tongzhi for three years. In the sixth year of Tongzhi, Shen went straight to the military plane, and concurrently served as the secretary of the Ministry of War, and was favored by Yixin because of his talent in handling foreign affairs, and was called into the prime minister's yamen to be entrusted with the important task of being the minister. In a few years, Shen occupied the two major positions of the military aircraft and the prime minister's yamen, and became the leader of the Beijing officials of the southern faction.

The confrontation between Li and Shen Chaotang stemmed from the excerpt presented by Yushi Jiahu to question the strategy of the Prime Minister's Yamen in favoring foreigners. At the time of the court discussion, Li Hongzao, Shen Guifen, and Baojun had a heated debate around this fold. Li Hongzao thinks that what Jia Hu said is very reasonable, and there should be a clear edict to supervise him, but Baojun and Shen Guifen disagreed. The Empress Dowager of the Two Palaces, who was quite indignant and youthful, agreed with Li Hongzao's point of view, so she issued a decree. How could Bao Jun and Shen Guifen give up, and insisted that "the people of Tianjin killed the French for no reason, and they used the excuse to loot", provoking the second round of debate. Since Bao Jun and Shen Guifen are allies in the same trench, and there is a big tree of Prince Gong Yixin behind him, Li Hongzao charges and fights alone, which makes people seem unwise, and will only make his situation more and more isolated. However, the more isolated it is, the more beneficial it is to Li Hongzao. On the one hand, it seems that such a struggle at any cost can accumulate one's reputation and capital in the clear stream, and secondly, only in this way can the support of hawks such as Yi Xun be aroused.

As expected by the Li family, the next day Yi Xun folded up to discuss the Jinmen case, and the two palaces also found Yi Xin for this letter. It can be seen that the political views of the two sides are very different, and there will be a fierce battle in the temple. In the afternoon, the kings, the ministers of military aircraft, the ministers of the imperial court, and the ministers of the prime minister Yamen were summoned together to the Xinuan Pavilion of the Qianqing Palace. The Queen Mother of the Two Palaces also came to the momentum, and even the curtain in front of her was removed, and she asked about the situation in Tianjin over and over again. The seventh master Yiyun with ulterior motives and the fifth master who has always been partial to the people also said, and they opened their throats and talked in the vernacular. The fifth master still understands people, and he also knows Zeng Guofan's last resort, but he insists that the people's will is the foundation of the country, and Zeng Guofan's strategy will greatly disappoint the people's support, so it must not be feasible. The sixth master took advantage of the situation to add fuel to the fire, saying that he must conform to the will of the people, and Zhang Guangzao and Liu Jie in Tianjin are not guilty, and Chen Guorui is also a loyal and brave general. Moreover, Yi Xun believes that the appearance of the words "Tianjin troublemakers and enemies of the Qing Dynasty" in the note of the Prime Minister Yamen is really out of line with the dignity of the Celestial Empire. In the face of the really confused brother and the younger brother who pretended to understand, the sixth master Yixin could only persist and swear to support Zeng Guofan.

The hawkish ministers were aggressive, and Bao Jun, Dong Sui and other Yixin sworn parties were naturally not to be outdone, and immediately started a big debate. But after a long time of arguing, it will inevitably turn sour, and the dignified and important ministers of the Qing Dynasty began to "invade each other", and the debate became a scolding on the street. Seeing that the two sides were arguing, the queen mother of the two palaces had to come forward to persuade her, and threw out a cruel sentence: "Yi people are my feud, if you can come up with a strategy to destroy Yi, although the two of us are willing to die, and the emperor is young, everything should be considered in the long run." However, Wu Ren and the others still did not give up, believing that Zhang Guangzao and Liu Jie were good officials, so they should not be guilty, and Rui Chang and Zhu Fengbiao also followed in unison.

Seeing that the princes and important ministers were making trouble, Dong Sui had no choice but to use the "dragging knife strategy" and asked everyone: "At this time, I don't know what the situation in Tianjin is, how can I ask questions back and forth?" "Yi Xun is not good at training, he is not weak politically, he doesn't accept this set at all, and continues to question," the extreme theory is unprepared, so the four words "nothing can be done" are used to blame the matter. From Gengshen to ten years, what are you prepared for? Moreover, if the wording of Lunyin is out of place, the ministers should still correct it. "I scrapped Dong Sui's drag knife plan at once. Since he did not have an advantage on the scene and was unable to recover it for the time being, King Gong had to make a compromise and temporarily agreed to the requests of Yiyun and other hawks.

Standing on the moral high ground, it is difficult to refute the Qingliu at all, the fifth master of the chivalrous king and the seventh master of the little smart are noble, and they are not easy to cook, so the Gongwang group has to break the rest of the important ministers one by one. The first one is to take Li Hongzao's sacrificial flag. Three days later, the Military Aircraft Department had a long discussion, and the people of King Gong's faction surrounded Li Hongzao, refuted it in turn, and held a criticism meeting, almost making Li Hongzao mentally ill if he didn't do it. Half a month later, the people of King Gong's faction aimed at U Ren, but they still used the crowd to bully the widows, and the angry U Ren rolled his eyes, and another hawk was stabbed. As a result, in dealing with foreign-related affairs, Gongwang Group won another narrow victory.

Although he was not overpowered by the sixth brother in the Jinmen incident, he only gained some right to speak, but Yixun's wrestling this time was not without gain. It was precisely because of the encouragement of the words and deeds of the King of Alcohol County that a large number of diehards came out, and they believed that in the future, there would eventually be a main peak in the royal clan that was worth following, and they all became fans of the Emperor, and the hawkish forces further strengthened. The people, who had been scolding Prince Gong for a long time, praised the young Seventh Master one after another, and regarded him as the hope of the future of the Qing Dynasty. Zeng Guofan lost half of his life because of the Tianjin teaching case, but Yiyun became the expectation of everyone because of this turmoil.

The fledgling Yiyun is not only not the opponent of the sixth brother, but his strength is not broad enough. After this incident, he was extremely indignant, and resigned from all the missions in a negative anger on the grounds that "the ministers in the affairs should learn from the work of bending and distorting the heart", so he was ashamed to be in the company of his fellow soldiers. Although he won the applause of the indignant youth, praising him for his Wei and Jin style, it was also far away from the rights he longed for. At this moment, Cixi saw the weakness of her brother-in-law's straightforwardness and vigor and the lack of depth in the city, and was determined to give power, control it for herself, and compete with King Gong. not only came forward to persuade his brother-in-law to come back, but also promised to be promoted to the title of Prince Alcohol when he was in Tongzhi. Then Cixi returned to the palace with a smile, ready to watch a good show of sibling fighting begin.

Yi Xin's deliberate willfulness made him gain fame and fortune, which further hit Yi Xin's reputation and laid a foundation for himself to go further in the future. But Yi Xun's heart is also a little uneasy, his hawkish expansion is too fast, although he has not yet grasped the power, but the scale is so large that he is afraid of the leading big brother. Yixin's King Gong faction is already strong, but compared to the hawks, it is still a bit petty, that is, it still holds real power for the time being. The hawks have comprehensively surpassed the King Gong faction in terms of numbers, prestige, and distribution. Yiyun not only has the capital to compete with his sixth brother, but even the queen mother of the two palaces has to weigh his energy. That is, Yi Xun's past performance was too unbearable, otherwise he should study the aftermath now. The power he wielded was already too great, huge enough to threaten anyone, and if he had been a little stronger, Cixi and Yi Xin would have joined forces to clean him up. Fortunately, Yiyun is notoriously incompetent and mediocre, and this time he escaped and gave him a chance to be used by Cixi.

There is no shortage of angry young people in China at any time, but the number of angry young people is limited after all, and Yi Xun can fan so many people at once, and there are some greasy things behind him that he doesn't know. Some people want to speak through his mouth, some people want to borrow his hands to do things, and these people also take a fancy to Yiyun's incompetence. It's a pity that what Yixun's ability is is an unknown puzzle that no one knows.