Kishigero Bihara got up very early on this day, having served as ambassador to China for nearly four years, and perhaps because the cabinet was very satisfied with the work he had done in China, he did not change the ambassador in the four long four years. However, it is also possible that the war in Europe is not over, and the various cooperation projects between China and Japan have not yet ended, and the cabinet has a beginning and an end, hoping that he can properly complete those vital cooperation, and when the situation is settled, it will be the time when he will be transferred out of Beijing.

However, it seems that the European war affecting the Sino-Japanese joint venture will not end soon as people think, since the day before yesterday the German army miraculously captured Paris and encircled and annihilated 300,000 French troops, the war situation has begun to become confusing, and the German army with superior forces has obviously gained the initiative in the Western European battlefield, although the Entente countries have said that they want to continue the war, but once the German army wins again and France collapses, then the war may not be necessary to continue fighting.

From the perspective of Kishigero Bihara, a military layman, the most important thing for the Entente to win is to establish a new line of defense to contain the larger offensive of the German army, if this condition cannot be achieved, then the French army is likely to lose its fighting spirit in the continuous rout and gradually disintegrate, and the collapse of the French army means that the European war is completely over, and Germany finally wins, and this result is disastrous for any of the Entente countries.

"Your Excellency, the time has come." The secretary reminded Yuan that he was going to meet Yang Rui at the Prime Minister's Office so early.

"Got it." Kishigero Bihara put down the coffee in his cup. In order not to smell of coffee in his breath when he could speak, he deliberately rinsed his mouth with water before going out.

Most of the high walls, sentry posts and barracks around the eastern suburbs have been demolished, and only the Legation of the United States in the southwest corner still retains these things. To go from the embassy in China to the Prime Minister's Office, it is necessary to pass through the embassy of the United States and the military camp of the United States, and then you can pass through the chessboard street in front of the Daming Gate to reach Xicheng. Looking at the Mi soldiers on the high wall of the Mi Barracks outside the embassy area, the original currency was indescribably happy. He hoped that negotiations between China and Milan on the revision of the treaty would never be reached.

With this kind of evil taste, when Biyuan arrived at the Prime Minister's Palace, he was welcomed into the flower hall and asked to wait, and after an hour, Li Zilong, who was known as the butler outside the Prime Minister's Palace, took him to the Yin'an Palace to meet Yang Rui. After some polite courtesy, Yang Rui, who was deeply tired, greeted: "I'm sorry for keeping Your Excellency waiting." ”

"Don't dare. Can't! After smiling at Xie Zhangtai, who was sitting on the side of Yang Rui's case, Bihara Kishishigero replied very politely.

"Your and my two countries are like brothers, so there is no need to talk nonsense." Yang Rui has long been accustomed to empty vernacular, and as soon as he speaks, he is called a brother, and the Japanese are full of smiles on their faces. "Now that the war situation in Europe has changed greatly, you and we should unify our positions and unite with the outside world."

Yang Rui's words only raised his head, and Xie Jintai next to him added at the moment: "If the Entente is defeated, it will be a loss." Britain and France are the most serious, followed by the United States, and then you and China. Although it is not appropriate for them to ask for a sky-high price at this time, but after this village, there is no such shop, and I think we should think carefully about how to get more benefits while promising to fight the war. ”

After Xie Zhangtai finished speaking, he looked at the Japanese and smiled, and then said: "At least, the German New Guinea and those islands you occupy must be recognized by the Entente countries; And the steppes that we occupy on the other side of Central Asia. It should be endorsed by the Entente. ”

"Ahh Kishigero Bihara didn't want Yang Rui to come by himself yesterday, but it was actually for this matter. He glanced at Yang Rui and Xie Jintai, and said, "That's true, there is also your country's loss of territory in the northeast region, and the Entente countries should also immediately recognize it in writing." ”

The new Japan in Central Asia compensated for the Outer Northeast, and even though the land in the west was so large, Bihara still felt a little sour when he talked about the Northeast. According to the previous plans of the patriarchs. It is best to obtain the land of the Russian Far East around the Sea of Japan, and I don't want to be pulled by China, so I go thousands of miles away to make a new Japan, although the place is large, but everything is controlled by others. And I have to face the red dew, I really don't know if this business is a profit or a loss.

Seeing that the currency was originally reciprocated by mentioning the Russian Far East, Yang Rui nodded silently and said: "There are many overseas Chinese in Nanyang and other places in my country, and these overseas Chinese have also contributed a lot to the country, so those overseas Chinese in Nanyang and other places, the local white governor wants to collect a poll tax and discriminate and slaughter them, my country will not be happy; There are overseas Chinese in Nanyang, and there are also overseas Chinese in the Americas, especially in the United States, where Americans not only prohibit Chinese from entering the country, but also often discriminate against the existing Chinese in China, which is the status quo that China wants to improve; As for China's negotiations on the revision of the treaty with the United States, I need your country's full support. Finally, there is Persia, and we have helped Persia to get back such a large piece of land, and there must always be a reward, so the countries should recognize our privilege of mining and road construction in the north of Persia, and of course, we will first obtain the consent of the Persian king; ”

Yang Rui said four in one breath, although this is four, but each one weighs more than 10,000 jun, making the coin's originally huffed waist bend deeper and deeper. What is it? Because China and Japan are fraternal countries and are united in foreign affairs, as long as China needs it, it is supported by Japan, and Japan is gradually losing its diplomatic independence and slowly moving closer to China. When Britain sent a note to Japan saying that in order to urge China to send troops to Europe and to form an alliance with China, all people of insight knew very well that the hegemon of East Asia would no longer be Japan, but China, but so soon Japan's diplomacy would have to be consistent with China's, and in particular, it would stand on China's standpoint to support it in resolving the issue of overseas Chinese in Miami.

"Your Excellency, these four contemptible people will definitely convey your opinions to our Cabinet." Kishigero Bihara said stiffly.

"It's not just four." Yang Rui patted the documents on the book case and added, "This is twenty-one. He saw that Kishigero Bihara was wiping his sweat, and said with a smile: "It's all some small conditions, and it's not difficult." In the final analysis, it is still too late for our two countries to rise, and the good places have been occupied by the white race, and when it is our turn, there will be no scum left. ”

The documents in Yang Rui's hand were forwarded by Xie Zhangtai, and Kishigero Bihara glanced at them and found that as Yang Rui said, compared with the previous articles, the latter ones are not scary conditions, and most of them are supplementary terms that have not been perfected after the revision of the treaty between China and other countries last year; Then there are some overseas minerals that need to be mined by Chinese-funded institutions in countries such as Britain and France. Some of them, such as rubber and tin ore in the South Seas, and oil from Burma, were understandable to Bihara, but others, such as monazite in India and uranium in German West Africa, were unknown to him.

"Now that I understand, this document will be sent to China today." The minerals are jointly organized by China and Japan, so the other coins on the document are not only not opposed but very supportive. With such joy, he happily added: "Our country will definitely advance and retreat together with Greater China on these issues." Alignment! ”

"That's good!" Yang Rui stroked his palm and smiled, he looked at the Japanese who had been standing and bending over, and said kindly: "Your Excellency Bihara, don't stand and talk." Drink tea, drink tea, this is the new West Lake Longjing this year, come, taste it. ”

It's been talking for a while, the tea is still warm, and after Kishigero Bihara took a sip, he only called for good tea because he didn't understand it. Yang Rui smiled but did not speak. Only chatted: "It is reported that your navy has begun to build ships on a large scale......"

"Exactly." As soon as Yang Rui spoke, Yuan Yuan sat down again, looking like he was listening. "Since the financial backing of the shipping companies, the Navy has set aside Congress and started building ships on its own. However, this is only a 300 million yen shipbuilding plan, and it is not the 88th Fleet plan that the Navy has always expected. ”

With the close relations between China and Japan, the top-secret shipbuilding plans of the 86th Fleet and the 88th Fleet were also revealed by the Japanese side because of the secret agreement between the Chinese and Japanese navies and the dependence on the supply of steel for building ships by the Benxi Steel Mill. Yang Rui has no objection to Japanese man-made ships. The more ships Japan builds, the more taboo the United States becomes. The relationship between China and Japan is close. This was another layer of ploy in addition to asking the Japanese Navy to escort the merchant fleet in wartime. Don't look at the little Japanese Navy now, waiting for the battleships to be eliminated and the aircraft carriers to be in power, the Japanese Navy will become a vassal of the Chinese aircraft carrier formation.

"Are these newly built warships designed with a minimum speed of thirty knots?" Yang Rui asked with a smile, he almost said: Your ship can't be too slow, otherwise you won't be able to keep up with my aircraft carrier.

"Yes. The designers reproduced the design, and some capital ships that could not reach a speed of 30 knots for the time being also reserved for adding boilers and increasing speed in the future. Kishigero Bihara replied solemnly. He could not have imagined that Yang Rui was concerned about the speed of the design of warships, rather than the threat posed to China's coastal cities by the expansion of the Japanese navy. At this time, seeing that Yang Rui didn't mention the threat, he didn't mention it. I just remembered another thing, and immediately said: "Your Excellency, the two aircraft carriers ordered by your country will be delivered by the end of the year." ”

"It's not in the way, it's just a training ship." Yang Rui said nonchalantly. The two aircraft carriers have been under construction for more than two years, and the pace of delivery has had to be frequently delayed because of the need to transfer skilled workers to build wartime standard ships. However, since it has been decided to cancel the unequal treaty by sending troops to Europe, it is not a question of when the two aircraft carriers will be delivered. "China itself will also build four aircraft carriers of the same type of similar tonnage, and you can also inform your cabinet by the way this time."

The previous plan was for Japan to help build two, and to build one or two more by itself, plus the existing Jimmu, a maximum of five aircraft carriers. But that is based on the plan of two or three billion profits in wartime, and now that he has money in his hands, and time seems to be enough, Yang Rui doesn't mind adding two more aircraft carriers, not to mention whether the design is reasonable or not, but after these four aircraft carriers are built, from the design team to the construction team, they will tend to be qualified, and these people with experience are invaluable.

As soon as Yang Rui mentioned the four, Kishigero Bihara was taken aback, he remembered that he said before that China built two by itself, and he didn't want to double the number now, so he had to ask: "Your Excellency, are they all building that kind of aircraft carrier?" ”

"Of course!" Yang Rui nodded, "I don't like battleships, they are too heavy, too expensive and too slow." Besides, my country builds aircraft carriers, and your country builds battleships and battle cruisers. I can't help it, those elms in your navy don't have a good brain, and they don't build aircraft carriers when they die, so it's really stingy to say that they are only willing to build one and give it a try. ”

Even though the new and old admirals of the Navy jointly wrote a letter to build one or two battleships, the General Staff Naval Office was still indifferent and continued to ask the Ship Design Institute to design aircraft carriers, and to design heavy cruisers, light cruisers, destroyers, and supply ships with the aircraft carrier as the focus.

Although the two major staff officers of the navy very much agree with the operational concept of aircraft carriers, the old men and elders of the navy did not buy it, and the result of the negotiations was that the Japanese navy would build a 20,000-ton aircraft carrier and give it a try. This is already the biggest concession. You must know that at the beginning, the navy only agreed to build a small ship of more than 10,000 tons.

This is the case in the navy, but for the sake of Sino-Japanese diplomatic relations, Kishigero Bihara still stood in Yang Ruid's position with a smile on his face and said: "There are too many old people in our navy, and they will not agree with a better way of fighting until they see the actual results and suffer heavy losses." ”

Biyuan laughed at Yang Rui, but he took it seriously. He put down his teacup and sighed: "Navy ships are not used for one year or two years, but for ten or twenty years. Technological development has changed the mode of war, look at the Germans, don't they just learn from the way we dealt with the Russians in the northeast, and then they made dumplings in Paris. This is true for the Army, and it is also true for the Navy. If only the battleships were eliminated on that day......"

As soon as Yang Rui said that the battleship was eliminated, Kishigero Bihara, who was drinking tea, choked violently, and the tea coughed out of his mouth, spraying the entire placket. "What a faux pas." The Japanese stood up, and the ninja coughed and bowed.

Seeing him like this, Yang Rui smiled instead of being angry: "I know, I am not from the navy, and many people are laughing at the Chinese navy for only building aircraft carriers and not battleships...... Just said, "Okay, that's all that needs to be said." Your Excellency should go back and inform your cabinet as soon as possible. Remember, this is not me alone, it is our two countries that are knocking on the bamboo poles of Britain, France and the United States together, so don't sell your country privately. ”

"Don't dare, don't dare!" Kishigero Bihara bowed, and then he asked, "Your Excellency, can France really hold on?" ”

The Japanese have a profound meaning in saying this. Yang Rui and Xie Jintai looked at each other and smiled, "What do you want to do?" ”

"I ......" Kishigero Bihara looked at Yang Rui, and then at Xie Zhangtai, it's really hard to say it, after all, many things can only be understood and not spoken.

"Don't you, me." Yang Rui said: "If the French surrender to Germany." Then one of us will go out of the navy and the other will go out of the army, and we will give him a vote. The result, let's take a knife and cut it in half? ”

Hearing Yang Rui say halves, the Japanese were stunned and didn't nod. Yang Rui understood that he was not satisfied with the five or five accounts, so he had to say again: "You have six and four heads, South Vietnam is the essence of the land, and North Vietnam is barren mountains and mountains." ”

"Your Excellency, I will try my best to convince the cabinet on this condition, but the key to snatching Indochina is still in the navy ......" Bihara saw that Yang Rui had made concessions, and it would be very rude not to express his position. However, he was not very satisfied with this condition, so he had to push the matter to the cabinet. "I'll definitely find a way to convince them." He concluded.

"This Japanese is really greedy and not enough to swallow elephants." As soon as Kishigero Bihara left, Xie Jintai shook his head and said. "Central Asia occupies such a large piece of land, and it is not satisfied."

"No matter how large the land Japan occupies in Central Asia, it is not close to the sea, and there are mountains of gold and silver in that place, and it has to cross our way, and he can't make much money. Vietnam is a different story, with its fertile land, surrounded by the sea on three sides, and its control of shipping routes to the Indian Ocean, which is much better than North Korea, and if it were not a tiger's den, we should have taken it from France. Yang Rui said, very regretful.

"We? Grab it? Xie was surprised, and he said, "If we really want to do this, then what you say is politically incorrect." See what we've done over the years. When North Korea was defeated, not to mention helping the Koreans to restore the country, all the tens of millions of military expenses they paid for them were given to those Asian and other countries, saying that they wanted to revitalize East Asian civilization; It's the same in Central Asia, Khiva, Bukhara, and Persia, they all benefit, and we're all about to become the saviors that Westerners say. If you take down Indochina again, are you embarrassed to annex him? ”

Xie Zhangtai does not say that it is okay, but if you really want to study it in detail, China has really done some thankless things over the years, let's just say that Kazakhstan was also occupied in the name of this land as the old Mongolian land, and the foreign propaganda emphasizes that it was China that rescued the local residents from the slavery of the cruel tsar, and the mass graves dug in the province of Seven Rivers east of Lake Balkhash are the best evidence of the brutal tsar's persecution of the local natives.

"It's all this time, and it's hard to grab a lot of places." Yang Rui wiped his face, it took a lot of energy to discuss the matter with Xie Jintai in the past few days, and at the same time, how the war situation in Europe will change is also to listen to the report of the expeditionary force and the General Staff, and the two things are together. It made him very tired these days.

"What about Nanyang?" Since the topic has come to this, Xie Jintai wants to know how Yang Rui planned Nanyang in the end. "It's really hard to take it over there?"

"At present, we really can't occupy Nanyang." Yang Rui said, "The past 20 years are a time to recuperate, and the South Seas involve all the powers, even if the Philippines is not moved. The Americans will also stir things up. When we move the South Seas, it will be a time of all-out hostility with Europe and the United States, and it will really come to that day, at least 20 years later. At that time, the colonial system was about to be finished, what was still occupied? At present, the most important thing is to protect the rights and interests of overseas Chinese around the world. What is a state, isn't it a collection of people? As long as overseas Chinese are not bullied there, doesn't it mean that the country is there? I've always gotten carried away. But some people are confined to the form and do not pay attention to the deep meaning, which is really ...... Yes. ”

Yang Rui's last sentence was actually a sigh for Cai Yuanpei. The world is round, and so is the truth, but some people say that it cannot be straighter anymore, and they have to believe that democracy is good and autocracy is bad, and they do not look at the background of the times and the current situation of the country's development -- if they are ordinary people, they are just a standing committee member who can decide the lifeblood of the country and the nation. Then the result is tragic.

When the Dali Temple tried and debated, the students' criminal behavior and criminal facts were restored little by little, the brutal side of human nature was exposed little by little, and the entire social public opinion was condemning these students' progress. In fact, Cai Yuanpei didn't care about the truth at all, thinking that this was caused by the Ministry of Rites' deliberate control of public opinion, which made everyone very dissatisfied.

Xie Jintai shook his head when he thought of Cai Yuanpei's matter, but he didn't want to discuss Cai Yuanpei's matter with Yang Rui in private, so he only changed the topic and said, "It's done." Will the Japanese stand with us and demand that Britain and France do not agree to these 21 articles? ”

"Of course, they also have a lot of advantages in it, at least the German Asian colonies are occupied, and New Guinea is not small." When Yang Rui said this, he thought of the United States again. "If the British were really sensible, they would have agreed to this," he speculated. ”

"Is it actually saying that Britain will use this to instigate the contradictions between Japan and the United States, and then deepen the contradictions between us and the United States?" Xie Jintai heard the sound and knew what he meant, and asked at the moment.

"Exactly. Once the French surrender to Germany, then our three belligerents will immediately raise up another puppet government and dismember their colonies at the same time, so as long as the French have brains, they will never negotiate peace with Germany. Yang Rui said, "The victory of the war is predictable, and the benefits to us are also a lot, that is, Britain and France will drag on for another year, and the weakening will be even more severe." ”

"But the Germans occupied Paris, and the factories in the western suburbs of Paris were all returned to the Germans, and it is said that thousands of half-finished Renault light tanks were captured by them, and this war can really be over in a year?" Xie Zhangtai said with some doubts. The victory of the German army this time was entirely due to the large-scale use of armored combat vehicles, and when he saw that the intelligence said that the German army had captured thousands of French combat vehicles, even if he had always believed in Yang Rui's judgment, he was a little confused.

"The capture of those Renault vehicles was indeed an accident." Yang Rui shook his head and admitted that he had ignored this point before. He had never been to France, and he had no idea that Paris at this time was a completely industrialized city, and more than half of the military equipment and ammunition of the French army during the war were produced in the suburbs of Paris, and several automobile companies were all together. After the Germans occupied Paris, they really made a lot of money, and correspondingly, the French Army basically lost its military supply capacity after the war, and even the American artillery that relied on French artillery was also largely lacking.

At this time, the Atlantic wolves were raging, and the navies of various countries were helpless, and if it were not for the fact that the 10 million-ton merchant fleet of China and Japan could continuously transfuse blood to Britain and France from the Asia-Mediterranean route, they would have really lost blood and died. It can be said that before the large-scale launch of US merchant ships, the victory or defeat of the war was in the hands of China and Japan, and it was precisely because of this that Yang Rui dared to put forward those conditions that were not harsh. "Trust me. As long as Britain and France agree to those insignificant conditions, the Continental side will immediately launch an offensive to embolden Britain, France, the United States, and Italy. Yang Rui shook his head and said in conviction. (To be continued......)