In the twenty-eighth year of the Kangxi Dynasty (1689 AD), the Qing government and Tsarist Russia signed the Treaty of Nebuchu in Nebuchu, and the two countries established the eastern border.
The Gelbizi River, the Erguna River and the Waixing'an Ridge are the eastern borders of the two countries
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However, few people know that when the two countries first negotiated, the Qing Dynasty's minister of negotiations, Suo Ertu, proposed that "
The Lena River and lake Baikal line are the borders of the two countries
However, this proposal was immediately opposed by the Tsarist Side, because for the Tsarist Russia, this is a completely unreasonable demand, so why is it "unreasonable"? This must be said from the entire strategic layout of Tsarist Russia's external expansion at that time.
Russia's ambitions for foreign expansion can be traced back to the 15th century Muscovite Principality, when the Muscovite Principality embarked on a rapid expansion path under the leadership of The Grand Duke ivan III of Moscow, until the end of the Ming Dynasty and the beginning of the Qing Dynasty, Tsarist Russia began to enter the Siberian region to the east, and later in order to strengthen the effective control of the region, Tsarist Russia in 1632 AD, that is, the fifth year of Chongzhen in the history of our country,
A castle called Yakutsk was built on the banks of the Lena River.
It was clear that the Russians had made the city of Yakutsk a bridgehead for the next occupation of the Far East, and they sent a steady stream of supplies from Moscow to Yakutsk, confidently preparing to take over the vast no-man's land.
However, as the border continued to move eastward, the Russians encountered a formidable enemy of the Qing Dynasty.
Although the Qing Dynasty had just been unified at that time, the fanaticism of the rulers for land in the early Qing Dynasty was not inferior to that of Tsarist Russia, perhaps this was the commonality of the new regime, in short, the two sides fought over the land.
Since Tsarist Russia was a labor expedition and the Qing government was waiting for the rabbit, the outcome of the war was self-evident.
Portrait of the Kangxi Emperor
Based on the victory of this war, the Kangxi Emperor confidently sent his confidant Minister Soetu to Nebuchu to negotiate with Tsarist Russia.
The process of negotiations will not be elaborated here, in short, as stated at the beginning, Soetu's initial proposal to "take the Lena River, Baikal line as the boundary" was resolutely denied by Tsarist Russia, and the main reason for Tsarist Russia's denial was that
They used the line of the Lena River and the city of Yakutsk as bridgeheads for annexing the Far East. If Soetu's proposal had been admissible, the strategic position of the city of Yakutsk would have been completely lost, and Tsarist Russia would have lost all possibilities for the future occupation of the Far East.
Therefore, Tsarist Russia will not agree under any circumstances.
Later, for various reasons, the two sides finally determined the final eastern border between the two countries, and the determination of this border brought two more problems.
One is that through the signing of the treaty, the Qing Dynasty officially lost the Nebuchu region east of Lake Baikal, although the Qing Dynasty had not really controlled the region before this, but the first contest between the Qing and Russia based on the land struggle was won by Tsarist Russia.
The second problem is that Czarist Russia took advantage of the fact that the Qing government did not understand international rules and lacked experience in negotiations, and fraudulently agreed with the Qing government on a so-called "waiting area"
At that time, the specific signing content was as follows:
However, the division of the rivers and lands between the Xing'an Mountains and the Wudi River is still pending, and the matter must be determined only after the envoys of the two countries have returned to their own countries and have been ascertained in detail, either by sending special envoys or using a letter
At first glance, the area to be discussed by the two countries is "between the Waixing'anLing and the Wudi River", but there is a fact here, that is, "the problem of the direction of the Waixing'anling".
In fact, the Waixing'an Ridge at the source of the Wudi River is divided into north-south directions, of which the northern branch of the Waixing'an Ridge extends all the way to the Arctic Ocean, and this is also the direction of the Waixing'an Ridge recognized by the Qing government at that time, and its pending area refers to all the eastern areas of the direction, including today's Kamchatka Peninsula, while the Tsarist Russia determines the direction extending south from the source of the Wudi River, and this direction and the Wudi River and the Heilongjiang river area constitute a small and pitiful area, far less than the Qing government's identification of the to be discussed area.
Therefore, at this point, Tsarist Russia took advantage of the fact that the Qing government did not understand international rules to successfully pit the Qing government.
However, this act actually had little impact on the Qing government, because 170 years later, Tsarist Russia once again used the means of aggression to not only pocket all the areas to be discussed, but also plundered more than one million square kilometers of land of the Qing government, which is a pain that we can never erase.
Finally, I would like to say that many people firmly believe that the Sino-Russian Nebuchu Treaty is an unequal treaty because of the loss of the Nebuchu area, and Mr. Wen Yiduo also thinks so, but it should be clear that this is the first time that the Qing government signed a treaty with other countries in an equal posture, even if the treaty did not allow the Qing government to gain more benefits, but in terms of the status of negotiations and the strategic initiative obtained by the Qing government, the Sino-Russian Nebuchu Treaty is still an equal treaty.