The corrupt and incompetent late Qing Dynasty created a century of humiliation in China, and those hundreds of unequal treaties have put China on the road of land-cutting indemnities since then, and China has become the sick man of East Asia in the eyes of Western powers who can wantonly plunder and oppress. In 1912, the Qing Dynasty was finally overthrown by the force of the Xinhai Revolution, and after that, the issue of war reparations in unequal treaties gradually faded out of the historical stage.
Therefore, many readers have raised the question of who should be responsible for the war reparations of the Western powers after the fall of the Qing Dynasty. Why didn't any of them come to collect the debt at that time???????
The government of the late Qing Dynasty signed unequal treaties
In fact, the war reparations owed by the Qing Dynasty to the Western powers were not written off because of the establishment of the Republic of China government. At that time, China was in the midst of internal and external troubles, and in order to gain the recognition and support of the Western powers, the Republic of China government chose to accept the war reparations debts left over from the Qing Dynasty. In the "Letter of the Great President to Friends", Sun Yat-sen clearly informed the Western powers: "The treaties concluded between the Manchu Qing government and all countries are valid in the Republic of China, and the treaty period expires", so since the abdication of the Qing Emperor, the war reparations will continue to be compensated by the Republic of China government.
Signed the Treaty of Maguan
However, war reparations are definitely astronomical for the Republic of China government. According to statistics, from the beginning of 1842 to the fall of the Qing Dynasty in 1911, the war reparations owed by the Qing Dynasty were about 1.267 billion taels of silver, which did not include the interest on the reparations. The series of messes left by the late Qing government made the newly appointed Republic of China government helpless, after all, the total amount of reparations was too staggering, and the level of revenue of the Republic of China government at that time was simply difficult to pay so much war reparations. The ancients often said: "Man is a knife trick, I am a fish meat", according to the development of events, since the financial situation of the Republic of China government is weak, why have we not heard of the Western powers asking the Republic of China government for reparations?
Signing of the Treaty of Gengzi
This is because the Government of the Republic of China has not paid off these war reparations and the interest on the reparations in full, and between the Western powers and the Government of the Republic of China, with the help of various reasons, many debts have been forgiven, for example, the US Government, in order to cultivate pro-American factions in the Republic of China government and establish its own good image, took the initiative to return more than 24 million taels of silver in the "Gengzi Treaty", so that the Republic of China Government used this fund to refund the construction of Yanjing, Tsinghua University, Union Hospital and many other famous schools and hospitals, and funded Chinese students to study in the United States and France. During world war I, in order to gain China's support, Britain agreed to hold china off paying reparations for 5 years; then Britain refunded part of the reparations in 1931; French reparations continued until 1947.
The government of the Republic of China was established
In addition, China relied on the superiority of the war countries in World War I to cancel the war reparations against the warring states of Germany and Austria-Hungary. At the outbreak of World War I in 1917, China declared war on Germany and its allied Austro-Hungarian Empire and stopped paying war reparations to both countries. After the end of World War I, Germany officially renounced the Gengzi reparations signed with the Qing government in 1917; austria-Hungary split into Austria and Hungary after the end of World War I, which announced their renunciations in 1919 and 1920, respectively. After the outbreak of the October Revolution, Russia renounced China's war reparations against Tsarist Russia in 1920.
Former site of the National Government
The above countries can also be regarded as leaving some affection for the Republic of China government, the most shameless of which is Japan. While many countries announced the cessation of war reparations in unequal treaties, Japan continued to demand reparations from the government of the Republic of China on the pretext of using reparations to develop Chinese culture and education. However, the fact is that Japan used this reparation to develop its domestic military and economy, and it was not until 1939, that is, the 9th year of the Japanese-Kosovar war of aggression against China, and the third year of the outbreak of the all-out War of Resistance, that the Republic of China government stopped paying reparations to Japan.
Of course, in addition to the reparations that were cut for various reasons, some of the reparations were still under way, and the plundering of China by the great powers did not decrease with the demise of the Qing Dynasty, but intensified. During the Republic of China period, almost all the warlord forces had the support of the great powers, and the great powers firmly controlled China's economy through arms trafficking, controlling customs, salt, railways, and even taxes.