A selection of events from today in history (11.2).
Monument to the Chinese Workers in France
Date: November 2, 1988
Purpose: To commemorate the Chinese laborers who crossed the ocean to the European battlefield during the First World War to engage in wartime engineering.
Background: The outbreak of the First World War, Britain, France and other young adults suffered a large number of casualties, making it difficult to continue to maintain the battle, in order to alleviate this situation, from May 1916, from China's Hebei, Shandong and other places successively recruited laborers to Europe, to provide them with field logistics services, mainly engaged in digging trenches, transporting arms, building roads and bridges, etc. For the Republic of China at that time, the entry into the war was an opportunity to join the new world order and become a modern power. At that time, China was weak and did not have the strength to participate in the war directly, and there were many voices opposing participation in the war at that time, and at the same time, Japan strongly opposed China's participation in the war, so it implemented the flexible decision of "replacing soldiers with work" and participated in the Allies of World War I.
Later: In the summer of 1915, Liang Shiyi began to implement the "work for soldiers" plan, first through the minister in Britain to sell the plan to the British government, but because the British began to have fewer casualties and were not eager for logistical support, and feared that China had improved China's status by entering the war, it was rejected by the British government. Liang Shiyi turned to France to propose the plan, and France, unlike the British, quickly agreed to the plan and sent retired Major Tao Lude to form a recruitment group to rush to China. At that time, because China was still a neutral country, so the plan could only be carried out in the name of the people, Liang Shiyi set up the "Huimin Company" to be responsible for labor recruitment, on May 14, 1916, Huimin Company and Tao Lude recruitment team, signed a recruitment contract and began to recruit workers in Shandong Hebei and other places to start recruiting workers to Be transported to France, the other side of the British in the summer of 1916 in the Somme River Battle of 220,000 casualties, serious injuries, there was a serious shortage of labor, in the time of life and death, the British had to change their original intentions and began to recruit Chinese workers. In the end, France recruited 40,000 Chinese workers in China and about 100,000 in Britain.
Significance: Although in the end, the Chinese workers suffered heavy casualties, only about 20,000 people died and were unaccounted for in the British and French armies. However, the strategy of "substituting work for soldiers" is of epoch-making significance: 1. It showed the world China's desire and ability to participate in international affairs, and won a place to speak for the post-war Paris Peace Conference. 2. After participating in the war and winning the war, the national self-confidence of the Chinese was increased, and the returned Chinese workers brought new ideas and new technologies to China at that time. 3. Triggered the "May Fourth Movement" that later changed China's destiny.