China is a vast territory, located in eastern Asia, on the western coast of the Pacific Ocean, with a long coastline. The long-term historical development made the feudal dynasty form a national defense strategy of emphasizing land and light sea, and China's feudal rulers did not have a sense of crisis, thinking that as long as the ship was closed and the sea was prohibited, the sea frontier could be protected until the Qing Dynasty evolved into a national defense strategy that closed the country.
After the outbreak of the Opium War, the Qing government's traditional national defense strategy of emphasizing the northwest over the southeast was broken. With the deepening of Western colonial aggression, by the 1870s, the Qing government was encroached upon by Tsarist Russia and Japan in the northwest frontier and the southeast sea frontier, respectively, and the national defense crisis was deepening.
(1) The problem of Tsarist Russia's occupation of the northwest frontier has increased
Xinjiang, the northwestern region of the Qing Dynasty, bordered by Tsarist Russia, India and other countries, was a barrier to defend the interior of the Qing Dynasty, but it has also been an eventful place since the founding of the country. After the Second Opium War, Russia invaded and occupied a large area of northeastern China through the Treaty of Yaohun and the Treaty of Beijing, but it was still not satisfied, and once again turned its greedy eyes to northwest China.
At that time, after controlling India, the British urgently needed to expand their influence in China, put pressure on the Qing government to obtain more interests in exchange chips, and had long coveted China's northwest frontier.
The Qing government realized the serious situation in the northwest frontier and that compromise and concessions were bound to be fruitless, so on the one hand it ordered Prime Minister Yamen to negotiate with the new Russian envoy in China, and on the other hand, it ordered the Governor of Shaanxi and Gansu to reorganize the army and take force. Just as the Qing government was preparing for a large army to march west to recover Xinjiang, Japan invaded Taiwan, the situation in the southeastern sea frontier deteriorated, and the coastal defense crisis reappeared.
(2) Japan's coveting of Taiwan's maritime frontier is grim
In 1874, Japan began an invasion of Taiwan under the pretext that Ryukyu sailors were killed by local natives in Taiwan. In April of the same year, Japan gathered a fleet of 5 warships and 13 transport ships with a total of more than 3,600 people and began to invade Taiwan. The Qing government issued a note through diplomatic means, severely condemning the aggression of the Japanese army and actively preparing for a military counterattack.
With the unfolding of Shen Baozhen's military deployment and the resolute resistance of the Taiwan people to the Japanese army's aggressive behavior, the Invading Japanese Army fell into a dilemma and was difficult to ride the tiger. At this time, however, the Qing government's attitude changed from active preparation for war to compromise, disregarding the military superiority it had already achieved in Taiwan and wanting to condescend to negotiate peace with Japan.
In 1874, the Qing government signed the Beijing Treaty with Japan, compensating Japan with 500,000 taels of silver. After the signing of the Sino-Japanese "Beijing Treaty," Premier Yamen lamented in his recital:
"Those who are untamed by a small country and are helpless to prepare for the throne, and the views of the Western countries change, and those who are frequently seen but have not seen."
(3) Under the internal and external troubles, the financial crisis emerged
From the beginning of the Opium War, the continuous internal and external wars consumed a large amount of manpower, material and financial resources of the Qing government, and shook the economic foundation of the Qing government. Huge military expenditures and huge war reparations made the Qing government's financial situation face the dilemma of left and right, the financial revenue and expenditure of the household department were impermanent, the balance of fiscal revenue and expenditure was broken, and the crisis gradually emerged.
Each has its own opinion: "coastal defense" and "cypriot defense" are more important than the other
At the time of the financial crisis, the northwest frontier and the southeast sea frontier were facing a huge crisis at the same time, and the Qing government triggered a dispute between coastal defense and Cypriot defense with "raising wages" as the fuse, the essence of which was the weighing of the importance of coastal defense and the debate on the tilt of national resources in the case of limited financial resources.
The Haiphong faction believes that in modern times, the great powers have all come from the sea, and the southeast coast is the root cause of the invasion of China by the great powers. The northwest frontier has always been attached importance to by the Qing government, and our side is generally in a proactive position, so it advocates abandoning the military operation to recover Xinjiang and investing limited financial resources in the construction of the navy.
The Cypriot defense faction believes that after the end of the Second Opium War, there will be no major problems in the southeast sea frontier in a short period of time, and although Japan is eyeing Taiwan as a tiger, its wings are not yet strong and its strength is not good. In the northwest frontier, Tsarist Russia plundered large areas of land, so recovering lost land was the most urgent task. Ding Baozhen, the inspector of Shandong, believes that "the disease of all countries, the disease of the four strands, the disease of the long and light, the disease of the Russians, the disease of the heart, the disease of the near and serious."
Both the "Coastal Defense Faction" and the "Cypriot Defense Faction" tried their best to prove themselves correct, but they could not convince each other, and the dispute reached an impasse. Proceeding from the overall situation, Zuo Zongtang stepped forward and put forward the viewpoint of attaching equal importance to the defense of the sea: "It is appropriate to plan for stealing and maintaining current affairs, and it is advisable to determine the plan for not planning, and the east is coastal defense, and the west is the defense of the sea, and the two are equally important." ”
The dust has settled: the formation of a dual strategic center with equal emphasis on coastal defense
Zuo Zongtang's viewpoint of taking into account both coastal defenses was in line with the current situation and had the vision of the overall situation, and moreover, the Qing government had set an impartial policy before making plans, and finally made up its mind after weighing the pros and cons, and finally adopted Zuo Zongtang's suggestion of attaching equal importance to coastal defense.
Under the strategy of attaching equal importance to the defense of haisai, the Qing government ordered Zuo Zongtang to supervise the military affairs of Xinjiang and make every effort to recover the lost land. On the other hand, coastal defense was gradually put on the agenda, and the Qing court adopted the policy of zoning fortification and dividing the oceans according to the actual situation of China's maritime frontiers, and Shen Baozhen and Li Hongzhang respectively supervised the coastal defense affairs of the southern and northern oceans.
As a country with both land and sea, China has had a dual threat from the sea and land since ancient times, and is facing the double difficulty of strategic choice. In the 1870s, when the financial crisis was gradually formed, the Qing government's northwest frontier and the southeast sea frontier simultaneously broke out of crisis, and the strategy of attaching equal importance to coastal defense at that time, although it maintained the national territorial sovereignty under the condition of insufficient economic strength at that time, it was tantamount to drinking and quenching thirst.