In the late Qing Dynasty, there were four famous ministers of Zhongxing, of which Zuo Zongtang was generally the most highly regarded and was revered as "Zuo Gong", and the reason for this was that Zuo Zongtang still recovered Xinjiang and preserved a large part of China's territory in the context of the weakening of the Qing Dynasty. Zuo Zongtang's exploits deserve to be recorded in history, but in the late Qing Dynasty, there was actually another person who pacified Tibet and recovered no less land than Zuo Zongtang, but his evaluation in history was very low. This person is Zhao Erfeng.
Zhao Erfeng belongs to the type of late master, he came from the Shuxiang Mendi family, his father was a jinshi during the Daoguang years, and three of the four brothers were admitted to the jinshi, but Zhao Erfeng repeatedly failed to do so, and finally could only donate an official.
However, the repeated failures of the imperial examination do not mean that a person does not have real talent and hard work, Zhao Erfeng relied on the donation as an official, originally a kind of person who was discriminated against in the official field, but he relied on his ability to make great achievements in the position of Zhi County and County Ling, and was appreciated by Xi Liang, the governor of Shanxi, and has since made steady progress.
Xi Liang was transferred to Henan and let Zhao Erfeng follow him, and later he was transferred to the governor of Sichuan, and then let Zhao Erfeng follow him into Sichuan, and it was this decision that gave Zhao Erfeng the opportunity to show his grand ambitions.
In May 1905, three years after Zhao Erfeng entered Sichuan, Feng Quan, the Qing Dynasty minister in Tibet, was killed, and a rebellion was set off by local toastmasters. Zhao Erfeng was ordered to be transferred to Jianchang Province and ordered to quell the local rebellion. This task was not simple, the situation in Tibet at that time was very complicated, the Qing government's handling of Tibet affairs intensified the contradictions, and the British took the opportunity to get involved in it, instigating the relations between Tibet and the Qing government, resulting in the danger of Tibet's independence.
Zhao Erfeng's repeated failure to enter the army may be related to his personality, he has always been martial in his work, advocating the use of force to solve problems. Therefore, after Zhao Erfeng arrived, he immediately recruited Xiang Yong to organize an army and began to suppress the rebellious Tusi in Litang, successfully quelling the rebellion in the Xikang area.
Zhao Erfeng was promoted to the post of Minister of Border Affairs of Sichuan and Yunnan with this merit, and presided over the policy of land reform and return to the Xikang region. This policy was that the central government strengthened its rule over Tibet, which could greatly weaken the power of local toastmasters, so Xikang's large and small toastmasters rose up against the Qing government by force. Zhao Erfeng did not give a crap, during his several years in office, he fought almost every day, and the Tusi forces led by Mingzheng, Dege, Batang, Litang and other places were destroyed by him, and even the living Buddha of Qamdo was abolished. In this process, Zhao Erfeng was also rude to the qing government officials who had derelicted their duties, and as long as they obstructed the return of the land to the stream, they were all expelled from Tibet.
Under the iron fist of Zhao Erfeng, the rebel forces in Tibet were severely damaged and were unable to independent Tibet from China. The Qing government attached great importance to Zhao Erfeng's merits, Sichuan and Yunnan were adjacent to Tibet, and border defense was important, so it established the Sichuan-Yunnan Border Special Administrative Region, and took Zhao Erfeng as the minister of border affairs. After Xi Liang left office in 1907, Zhao Erfeng acted as the governor of Sichuan.
Soon after, the imperial court transferred Zhao Erfeng's brother Zhao Erxun to be the governor of Sichuan and Zhao Erfeng as the minister stationed in Tibet, formally putting him in charge of the Qing government's handling of Tibet affairs, and concurrently serving as the minister of border affairs. The Zhao family has two governors, and they are both stationed in the southwest, saying that they are the kings of the southwest is not an exaggeration at all.
However, Zhao Erfeng did not have the slightest intention of establishing himself as king, and since he became the minister stationed in Tibet, he has focused on two major tasks: suppressing the rebels and stabilizing Tibet. The former was resolved with an iron fist, Zhao Erfeng mobilized troops, from outside Tibet all the way to Lhasa, drove the Dalai Lama to British India, if it were not for the Qing government's fear of intensifying contradictions, Zhao Erfeng had the idea of pacifying all of Tibet.
Although Zhao Erfeng advocated force, he repeatedly fought wars during his tenure, destroyed many temples, and stained his hands with blood, but he was not a puppet who only knew how to kill. In fact, Zhao Erfeng knew how to govern very well, and after he eliminated the most popular toastmasters, he immediately intimidated the rest of the toastmasters by force and let them establish counties and counties, while Zhao Erfeng adopted a gentle policy toward the lower-class people and slaves. "Ula" is the serf labor in Tibet, is the heaviest burden of the local people, Zhao Erfeng after entering Tibet implemented the Ula reform, promulgated a new charter, to a certain extent to safeguard the interests of the common people, reduce the burden of the Tibetan people. With a big stick and a sweet date, Zhao Erfeng divided the rebellious Tibetan toast and the Tibetan people, winning the support of the lower classes for the Qing government. It was Zhao Erfeng's efforts that the rebellion in Tibet could be resolved thunderously, and the British conspiracy was bankrupt. Zhao Erfeng's credit is not smaller than Zuo Zongtang's.
Zhao Erfeng's prestige in Tibet, Sichuan and other places was very high, but unfortunately, he took on the role of the Qing government in suppressing the revolutionary masses in the "Baolu Movement". After Zhao Erxun was transferred to the governorship of the three eastern provinces, Zhao Erfeng succeeded his brother as the governor of Sichuan. Soon after Zhao Erfeng took office, the road protection movement occurred, and the Qing government sold the railway to the imperialist powers in the name of railway state ownership, which aroused the dissatisfaction of progressives and the people, and a huge wave of road protection appeared in Sichuan Province. Zhao Erfeng believed that it was very normal for the people to fight for the road, and it was possible to mediate from it, but the Qing government ordered Zhao Erfeng to suppress it immediately. Faced with a crucial choice in history, Zhao Erfeng chose to be loyal to the Qing government and shot at the patriotic masses, which eventually led to the Chengdu Massacre.
Zhao Erfeng's move gave him the name of "Zhao Butcher", and the Qing government was also very dissatisfied with Zhao Erfeng because the Sichuan Road Preservation Movement became the fuse of the Xinhai Revolution, and removed him from his post as governor of Sichuan.
Zhao Erfeng had the opportunity to enjoy his old age in peace, but he was involved in the army mutiny, which brought himself the disaster of killing. After the Wuchang Uprising broke out, Sichuan established a military government to break away from the Beijing government and declare independence. However, the situation in Sichuan was not stable, and on December 6, 1911, the army suddenly mutinied, and Zhao Erfeng was very prestigious, and was elected by the gentry and posted a notice in the name of the governor to calm the hearts of the army. However, this move caused dissatisfaction among the military minister Yin Changheng, who suspected that the army mutiny was related to Zhao Erfeng, and worried that Zhao Erfeng threatened his position, so he arrested Zhao Erfeng overnight and executed him in the imperial city of Mingyuanlou.
In this way, Zhao Erfeng became the only Qing governor killed in the Xinhai Revolution. Zhao Erfeng's evaluation has always been controversial, some people think that he is the pillar of the country to recover the land and settle the country, and some people think that he is the ruler who slaughters the people. It can only be said that Zhao Erfeng was not transferred to the governor of Sichuan, but changed places, perhaps he could also become a hero admired by the world like Zuo Zongtang, rather than a butcher with a stigma.
Resources:
Draft History of the Qing Dynasty