Beiyang Great Era Morality Chapter (Seventy-one): Not evil villain, courteous gentleman.
In the cold spring of the six years of the Republic of China, the victory and defeat of the First World War have been known, the name of the "victorious country" is placed there, and the Beiyang Temple is naturally affected in the struggle of the great powers. At a time when the direction of the eunuch sea wind was still unclear, the fact that the ambitions of the Beiyang group were tacit was the contradiction between Duan Qirui and Li Yuanhong, so they also showed different attitudes towards declaring war on Germany. However, as Yang Zengxin said: "A few martial arts plays, literary dramas should also be performed a few times, if you perform martial arts, everyone will not want to watch it." On February 20 of that year, Feng Guozhang, the leader of the Beiyang warlords, the largest local power faction of the Beiyang warlords, set out to the north in the name of "dredging up opinions and studying the issue of Morality", and along the way, he conducted a thorough investigation of the attitude of the Beiyang warlords in the provinces along the way, and the Jinpu Road became the performance stage for the head of the "Three Governors of the Yangtze River".
Subsequently, the Anhui overseer Ni Sichong accompanied Feng Guozhang to Xuzhou, and the "Yangtze River Parade Envoy" Zhang Xun personally greeted him at the station, and the three of them held a meeting at the "Yangtze River Parade Envoy Office." Feng Guozhang set the tone that he should strictly observe neutrality on the issue of morality, which was very tacitly consistent with the opinions of Ni Sichong and Zhang Xun. When Feng Guozhang's train passed through Jinan, Zhang Huaizhi, the overseer of Shandong, also got on the train to greet him, and accompanied him to Dezhou before turning back to Jinan, needless to say that the attitude coincided with Feng Guozhang. When he arrived in Tianjin two days later, Zhu Jiabao, the directly subordinate overseer, also boarded the car to accompany Feng Guozhang to Huangcun, which was naturally also a ventilation. When Feng Guozhang entered the capital, Duan Qirui originally thought that he had another helper in advocating the declaration of war, in fact, this group of Beiyang robes did not have Duan Qirui's vision at all, and these "grass-headed kings" who looked like princes really cared about the only thing they cared about was whether the territory and people and horses where they had settled down would be damaged.
However, these are not only the small calculations of the Beiyang crowd, but also the limitations of President Li Yuanhong. Li Yuanhong and his staff team, such as Ha Hanzhang, Jin Yongyan, and others, all wanted to overthrow Duan Qirui with the help of the question of attitude toward Germany, and as to whether the declaration of war was beneficial to Beiyang, it was unwilling to think more, Li Yuanhong's limitations lay in this, and he had begun to look for a replacement for Duan Qirui, and he hoped that Wang Shizhen or Xu Shichang would succeed him as the head of the cabinet. Duan Qirui's vision, whether in the local strength faction of the Beiyang warlords or the Li Yuanhong camp, is "not about oneself and hanging high." Duan Qirui's proposed chips for participating in the war, "in addition to the withdrawal of all German reparations, postpone the payment of Gengzi reparations" and "abolish the prohibition of stationing troops within twenty miles around Tianjin", indicating that the "Tiger of Beiyang" who is just self-conscious has both a kind of confrontation with foreigners and an outstanding vision. However, Li Yuanhong's limitations and Beiyang Paoze's incomprehension made Duan Qirui struggling.
Finally, Duan Qirui and all the cabinet members asked Li Yuanhong to stamp the "renunciation case" on March 4 of that year. The result was that after a dispute, in the face of Li Yuanhong, who was like a wooden man who no longer spoke, Duan Qirui had to "half bow" and withdraw without a sound, and did not say goodbye to Li Yuanhong that night, that is, he drove to Tianjin to prepare for resignation. Li Yuanhong summoned Feng Guozhang, Wang Shizhen, and Xu Shichang to discuss countermeasures, Xu Shichang was the head of the cabinet, and Wang Shizhen was reluctant to resign from the position of army chief, and Feng Guozhang, after obtaining a promise from Li Yuanhong to make concessions, came forward to ask Duan Qirui to return to his post, and accompanied Duan Qirui to see Li Yuanhong. Duan Qirui first "bowed" to Li Yuanhong, and then sat down to seriously talk about favorable reasons, Li Yuanhong could finally listen seriously, but did not speak, this eunuch actor who was good at selling fame and reputation seemed to see through the eyes of "Duan Zhilao".