Chapter 804 803 [Shanxi Laocai]
"Hello, Minister Kong!"
"Hello Mr. Zhou!"
At the farewell party of the special envoy, Zhou Hexuan and Kong Xiangxi shook hands warmly, with smiles on their faces and no contradiction at all.
There are 12 official members of the mission this time. Kong Xiangxi serves as the special envoy, Chen Shaokuan and Zhou Hexuan serve as deputy envoys, Weng Wenhao serves as the secretary-general, and the rest are officials of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs. Of course, the actual number of people traveling must be more than this. Kong Xiangxi’s wife, eldest daughter, and second son will all go, plus reporters and attachés, there will be more than 30 people.
"Hello, Mr. Zhou!" Navy Minister Chen Shaokuan took the initiative to come over and say hello.
Zhou Hexuan shook hands quickly and said with a smile: "Minister Chen, I heard that we are going to take a warship over?"
Chen Shaokuan smiled bitterly and shook his head: "I was originally going to take the warship, but it has been cancelled. There were two countries that failed to make good contacts along the way."
A warship's long voyage involves too much. It must be replenished along the way and may also pass through the territorial waters of other countries. If two or three countries are unwilling to cooperate, then the long voyage of warships will become a joke. At this time, China obviously does not have such a big international reputation.
Zhou Hexuan comforted him and said: "The country is poor and weak, so it can only be like this. One day it will get better, and then the Chinese navy can go to any sea area in the world."
"I hope, I can't see it anyway." Chen Shaokuan's tone was waning.
Such words obviously should not come from the mouth of the Navy Minister. Even if he thinks so in his heart, he cannot say it directly. It can be seen that Chen Shaokuan is really confused and lost. He can't see the future of the Chinese Navy at all, and he doesn't even bother to say a few words.
Just a few years ago, Chen Shaokuan was still very ambitious and wanted to build a "world-leading" navy. However, the hammer of reality hit him hard on the head.
First of all, there are internal problems in the navy. Factional struggles are serious. Not to mention Chen Shaokuan, even Chang Kaishen has no way to do anything.
By 1937, the Chinese Navy had four major factions—
First, the Fujian faction headed by Chen Shaokuan accounts for two-thirds of the total navy. These Fujian officers were domineering, corrupt and intertwined. Chen Shaokuan once couldn't stand it and stipulated that when captains went to the naval academy to study, they could only use less than 20% of the public funds of the warships under their control for activity expenses. As a result, more than 20 captains rebelled and filed a complaint with Chiang Kai-shek, saying that Chen Shaokuan should not hire Japanese as teachers. Chen Shaokuan was so angry that he resigned directly.
Second, there is the Northeast Department under Zhang Xueliang, which has very strong combat effectiveness and weapons and equipment. The Northeast Navy has been defecting to the Central Committee for several years, but it is not obedient at all. It treats Chen Shaokuan's orders as far as it can and only listens to the commands of Chang Kaishen and Zhang Xueliang.
Third, there is the so-called Guangdong clique, most of whom surrendered to the central government after pacifying Guangdong and Guangxi. The Guangdong Navy is mainly composed of small ships. In Chen Shaokuan's view, they are just a bunch of bumpkins, and they are still stubborn bumpkins and do not take the Ministry of Navy seriously at all.
The fourth is the lightning system that emerged during the Anti-Japanese War, coming from the Huangpu Military Academy in the Navy, the lightning school founded by Chiang Kai-shek. At this time, the lightning department was still very immature, and students who had just graduated could only become low-level officers. But these are the direct descendants of Chiang Kai-shek, they represent the future of the Navy, and they are not in the same pot as Chen Shaokuan.
With such a large number of factions, Chen Shaokuan was completely unable to use his hands and feet, and even he himself was forced to get involved in factional struggles. As the leader of the Fujian faction, Chen Shaokuan needs to use the Fujian faction as a bargaining chip to suppress other factions and make them obedient. The Fujian officers used this as a bargaining chip to put pressure on Chen Shaokuan and seek more benefits and benefits. At the same time, the Fujian, Northeast, and Guangdong navies were deeply afraid of the young and energetic Lightning Clan, and the three factions worked together in a tacit understanding to suppress the development of Lightning Clan officers.
It is normal for the navy to have factions, but if factional struggles affect the normal development of the navy, it is really too much.
Over time, Chen Shaokuan himself became a faction master. After he led the naval uprising and surrendered to the Communist Party, he still played the old trick of "non-Fujian people cannot be captains."
Lao Jiang couldn't stand the chaos in the navy, so he frantically developed and trained new people in the lightning system. Until the early days of the Anti-Japanese War, the Northeast, Fujian and Guangdong departments suffered heavy losses in the battle. Chiang Kai-shek took the opportunity to make a major change in the navy, and young officers from the Lightning Department quickly took over.
In addition to factional struggles, the Chinese navy is more serious about its lack of military spending. The navy is a money-burning service. If you don't have money, you can't develop it. At the beginning of the Northern Expedition, Chiang Kai-shek shouted the slogan of building a first-class navy. As a result, in the past ten years, there have not been a few new ships.
A clever woman cannot make a meal without rice, not to mention that Chen Shaokuan is not a clever woman, he is just a well-behaved housewife.
Here, the author reminds me of a joke about the two legendary arms of the 20th century: the Soviet Navy went ashore and the Chinese Army went to sea.
Well, we shouldn’t joke about the seniors of the People’s Liberation Army Navy…
In addition to the special envoys, more than 200 people including Song Meiling, Song Ailing, Song Ziwen, He Yingqin, Wang Zhengting and Xu Shiying attended the meeting. Song Ziwen and Wang Zhengting were old acquaintances, and they came over to say hello to Zhou Hexuan. Soon after, Song Meiling also joined the chat.
Finally, the farewell party officially began, and Chang Kaishen took the stage to deliver a speech. After talking a lot of nonsense, he said: "Envoy Conte has devoted his whole life to the country over the past few years and has made contributions to all aspects of industry, finance and economy, especially in finance. He is the first person since the Republic of China to represent the country this time in the UK. I am attending the coronation ceremony of the King of England and will be leaving the country soon. I would like to express my special farewell!"
Hearing Chang Kaishen's praise of Kong Xiangxi as the person with the greatest financial achievements since the Republic of China, Zhou Hexuan couldn't help but turn to look at Song Ziwen.
Song Ziwen was seen with a sneer on his face, and the sarcasm on his face was not concealed at all.
Chang Kaishen added: "I would also like to mention Deputy Envoy Zhou in particular. Deputy Envoy Zhou is well-known at home and abroad. He has also devoted all his efforts to Sichuan disaster relief and is a rare talent for the Republic of China. In addition, Deputy Envoy Zhou is also a British hero. As a close friend of King George VI, he will participate in the coronation of the British King this time, and Deputy Ambassador Zhou needs to do more to help China and the United Kingdom forge a profound international friendship."
After the speech, there was another ceremony for awarding medals and letters of appointment. All official members of the special envoy will receive a letter of appointment and medals.
Originally, the medal awarded this time was of commemorative significance and was just an ordinary special commemorative medal.
After Kong Xiangxi got the commemorative medal, he felt very boring, so he quietly approached Chiang Kai-shek and asked Chiang Kai-shek to award him the highest civilian medal so that he could wear it when he went to London to increase the dignity of his special envoy. Chiang Kai-shek then said to He Lian, the director of the Executive Yuan's Administrative Affairs Division who was sitting next to him: "Where is the chief, please take care of me and award Dr. Kong a medal. Caiyu, Qingyun or Zhongshan medals are all acceptable, but the highest level is required."
Any medal awarded by the Nanjing National Government needs to be proposed and approved at an Executive Yuan meeting, and then sent to Chairman Lin Sen to be awarded by the head of state Lin Sen personally, or by Lin Sen dispatching specialized personnel to issue it.
But Chang Kaishen issued the order, and He Lian had to notify the relevant departments overnight to deliver the medal to Kong Xiangxi before the mission set off.
Just like what Zhou Hexuan got before, Kong Xiangxi got the first-class Qing Yunzhang this time. It's just that one was awarded by Chiang Kai-shek on his own initiative, and the other was begged from Chiang Kai-shek himself.
Zhou Hexuan finally saw the style of the old Shanxi rich man. Not only did Kong Xiangxi seek medals from Chiang Kai-shek, but his children also visited the UK together and asked Chiang Kai-shek for a quota at the farewell party (Song Ailing, as the wife of the special envoy, had a quota). It is: to open the eyes of juniors.
Taking his children abroad is nothing. If Kong Xiangxi pays for it himself, he can just go with the ship. But he insists on getting an official place in the group, and all the expenses are spent on public funds, which is simply unacceptable.
A finance minister and a big capitalist actually saves money for his children to go abroad. The more money he has, the stingier he becomes!
Regarding this behavior, Song Ziwen complained to Zhou Hexuan after the meeting, ridiculing Kong Xiangxi as "China's contemporary Grandet".
Zhou Hexuan laughed loudly and walked out of the venue with Song Ziwen.
The Yangtze Hotel is on Baoshan Street, and the Song Ziwen Residence is on Jilongshan. They are not far from each other and are both located in Xuanwu District.
Seeing Song Ziwen inviting Zhou Hexuan into the car, the members of the Black Dragon Society who were in charge of watching were dumbfounded. Because they were in the dark, they didn't see clearly whose car Zhou Hexuan got into, and they didn't know whether to carry out the plan.
The leader of the Black Dragon Society was afraid of causing trouble, so he had to change the time of the assassination and decided to wait until tomorrow morning.
What the hell is this?
The plan changed again and again, causing the assassins to squat on the street for several hours in the cold wind. When they got home at night, they immediately caught colds and fevers.