New Shun 1730

Is Russia Mongolia? Or Byzantium? Or the Western country that Peter dreamed of? In short, it is not Russia yet.

This is the historical puzzle facing Russia.

Should the East and Central Asia still be the direction of Russia's expansion?

Although Russia is still in chaos and still lacks an orderly strategic direction and diplomatic strategy, many ministers in the Russian court have begun to vaguely feel that the eastward expansion is a wrong strategy on the issue of the East and Central Asia.

In the battle north of the Altai Mountains, the Qingzhou Army after the military reform did not scare Russia, but the logistics ability of Dashun, which made Russia feel desperate, did scare Russia.

From Moscow to Yili is much closer than from Beijing to Yili.

No matter how powerful the Qingzhou Army is, and no matter how strong the combat effectiveness of the new army after the Dashun Army reform is, it is useless without logistics.

In the battle of the Altai Mountains, what the Russian elites saw was that as long as Dashun was willing, it could completely assemble a field force of 10,000 to 20,000 people on the Irtysh River, and it was enough to guarantee its logistics supply.

Of course, this costs money. But Dashun seemed to be able to afford it. At least at this time, the Chinese Empire was the most magnificent and heavy crown in the world, with the most gold and silver on it.

The previous envoys who went to China were full of praise for China's wealth, but they only saw the capital and had not even been to Suzhou and Hangzhou.

Under such circumstances, the attitude of advocating compromise and concession to Dashun gradually became the mainstream of the Russian court.

Rather than fighting a war with China and losing the Irtysh River, the Buryat Mongols, the fur trade in Kamchatka, and the Sino-Russian trade on the Selenga River that brought a lot of income to Russia every year... it is better to make concessions and give in on the issue of boundary survey in the northwest.

Dismantle a few fortresses and assign them to a buffer zone where neither side has troops stationed.

Or, the eloquent diplomat, Count Andre Ivanovich Osterman, diverted the trouble to the south and signed a Sino-Russian non-aggression treaty, leaving Dashun to toss with the Netherlands, Spain, and Japan.

Back then, Peter the Great was ambitious. He personally met with the Japanese merchant Denbei who drifted to Kamchatka, and established a Japanese language school in Russia in order to open the eastern estuary in the future and develop maritime trade with Japan.

Now, this ambition is impossible to achieve, and ambition has become a delusion of the past.

Stop the loss in time to end the Fourth Russo-Turkish War, and take advantage of Sweden's lack of preparation to preemptively attack Sweden; or put the Swedish issue aside, wait for the ally the Holy Roman Empire to defeat Turkey in the Balkan battlefield, and sign a treaty to completely obtain the right of passage to the Black Sea... On these two matters, the Russian court has not reached a consensus.

But the decision to let Count Osterman visit China as a plenipotentiary ambassador was quickly made in the chaotic court.

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In February of the Western calendar of this year, it was the time for the Dashun New Year.

When the monsoon blew, on the sea or on land in Europe, envoys from several different countries went to the same destination with different purposes.

France sent a group of excellent shipbuilding craftsmen, several civilian officials and designers from the Ministry of the Navy, to China by ship.

There, they will complete the implementation of the terms of the Sino-French secret agreement and help Dashun build the most classic French 74-gun battleship in the history of the world's sailing navy.

As long as they build it, they can obtain new rifled gun technology.

France's dream was finally placed on the European continent.

They are sure that once Dashun declares war on the Netherlands and cuts off the trade of the East India Company, France will likely take away the lowlands. Cutting off the important financial route of the Netherlands, the Netherlands will be vulnerable.

Ten Indias and ten Canadas are not as good as the lowlands that many French people dream of. For that, they can give up everything overseas.

Although the merchants do not agree, it does not matter.

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Britain purchased about 15,000 pounds of various gifts and sailed to China on a sailboat.

There, they will defend the false slander that the French will inevitably make against them, and hope to obtain the berthing rights of Dashun Port in the upcoming Anglo-Spanish War-theoretically, Dashun, as a neutral country, prohibits either Britain or Spain from berthing.

But the special status of Dashun in Asia can make international law a fart.

The British hope to fool China and allow them to stop and resupply in China during the war between Britain and Spain. It seems reasonable, but it is actually taking sides.

Because the British in Southeast Asia have long been driven away by the Dutch and have no ports. And Spain has the Philippines and does not need Dashun's ports at all.

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Portugal also sent its own delegation, but the Portuguese are very smart. They hope to reaffirm Portugal's tributary status rather than a diplomatic country.

A tributary country may still occupy Macau.

But if it becomes a diplomatic country, it is hard to say whether Dashun will drive them away. This visit of the French envoys to China brought great shock to the Portuguese. They have been dealing with China since the Ming Dynasty. The letter of the pseudo-Ming Dynasty to the Roman Catholic Church for help and baptism of the court was also delivered by the Portuguese. They never thought that one day China would actually consider the word "diplomacy".

This change made the Portuguese panic.

Dashun's ban on religion is severe. As a Catholic country, Portugal is too active in the issue of missionaries. After the Dashun regime banned religion, a large number of missionaries took refuge in Macau. Some "martyrs" continued to preach in Guangdong, Guangxi and Fujian, risking being caught and tortured by officials, which also caused Portugal some concern.

They were afraid that Dashun would vent its anger on Macau, especially Dashun's policy of opening and closing trade, which made Macau, a special existence during the Ming Dynasty's closed-door policy, extremely embarrassing.

For Dashun, trade was dispensable. Foreign trade houses in Songjiang, Ningbo, Guangdong, Fujian, and other countries no longer needed to start from Macau.

In terms of religion, Macau became a headache for Dashun. The Catholic ritual dispute had completely angered the emperor and Confucian officials of Dashun. They were not allowed to worship ancestors, the emperor, or Zhou Gong and Confucius... This was not only a declaration of war on Confucianism, but also a declaration of war on secular emperors.

Trade was dispensable, but religious headaches were prone to occur, so the Portuguese panicked.

Diplomacy or tribute?

Interests were the most important.

The Portuguese hoped to continue to maintain a tributary status and fool Dashun, because Dashun had never asked Portugal for tribute anyway.

In fact, they did not understand the meaning of a tributary state at all. Even though Macau had existed for so long, they did not know that tribute meant the same status as North Korea. The change of the Portuguese royal family was to be conferred by the Li government of Dashun. Before, they just pretended to be deaf and dumb and ignored it. If they really took it seriously, it would be a different matter.

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The Dutch did not send an envoy to China because the Netherlands was in an interregnum, with neither a king nor a ruler, and each province was independent.

However, the 17-member Gentlemen's Group of the Dutch East India Company was concerned about the diplomatic situation of Dashun. Under the influence of the letter of the Governor of Batavia, they determined that Dashun was going to go to war with Russia.

In the eyes of the 17-member Gentlemen's Group of the Dutch East India Company, this was a great opportunity.

In their instructions to the Governor of Batavia, they believed that they should seize this once-in-a-lifetime opportunity of the war between Shun and Russia, and completely solve the problem of redundant and useless Chinese in Batavia while Dashun had no time to react.

It would be best to quietly send them back to Ceylon, Ambon, Banda and other places, and let these Chinese go to Ceylon to build fortresses.

When Dashun went to war with Russia, these Chinese should be eliminated. Because the sugar trade is not profitable, these people are likely to become "unstable factors" in Batavia.

If they can be cleared in time, even if Dashun reacts in the future, it will not choose to attack Batavia. Because there are no Chinese there, and they cannot be controlled if they are conquered, and there is no possible Chinese to lead the way when Dashun attacks.

However, such instructions cannot be written too clearly. If something really happens in the future, someone has to take the blame.

So there are no clear instructions, but some obscure words are used to support the decision of the Governor of Batavia.

In particular, the suggestion of "legalization of private goods" put forward by the Governor of Batavia was praised, believing that since corruption and private goods in Batavia are inevitable, then if it is changed from illegal to legal, there will be no corruption and private goods, right?

Only in this way can the close connection between the company's Dutch employees and the Chinese be severed.

As long as private goods are illegal, smuggling and private goods are inevitable, and this will inevitably lead to connections between employees and Chinese merchants.

This is the first step to expel the Chinese.

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Naturally, the Swedes also sent their envoys.

However, for Sweden, this is not the first time that it has sent a plenipotentiary ambassador to China. In fact, as early as six or seven years ago, when Cowling established the East India Company, Sweden authorized him as a plenipotentiary ambassador for negotiations with China.

It was just for trade that time, and the trade environment of Dashun was a special free trade. There was nothing to talk about, and there was nothing to talk about.

As for the last time he went to Guangdong, he wanted to meet the emperor as a plenipotentiary ambassador? Cowling had experience working in other East India companies, and of course he knew that it was an unrealistic fantasy. Whether he could meet the governor of Guangdong was a problem.

But this time was different.

This time, he could really meet the emperor, or at least meet a high-ranking official above the level of earl.

The conspiracy in Stockholm and Gothenburg was effective. Carl Girondtborg was sure that he could take charge of the parliament. At this time, he was not the Secretary of State, so he gave Cowling, the special envoy, a negotiation bottom line that could only be authorized by the Secretary of State and the King.

And he guaranteed that when he returned to Sweden, the parliament could pass the amendment of the bill.

Bribery and lobbying may not mean the same thing, but at least Sweden at that time was similar.

The Swedes were incited to populist revenge, and the Swedish shares of the East India Company were not many.

The interests of the company may not be the interests of Sweden, but they can be pretended to be the interests of the Swedish people.

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In the vast Siberia, the Russian envoys walked.

This is not the first Russian envoy. After the Battle of Heilongjiang a few years ago, Russia sent an envoy, and Dashun also came to participate in the coronation of the Tsar.

But this time, it was a little different.

Count Osterman was not a duke, but his power was much greater than those dukes in Russia. Originally, a duke was to be sent, but now he was replaced by a count, which shows that he attached more importance to it.

Historically, when Queen Anna entrusted her orphan to others before her death, this person and her lover were present, and they could be called important ministers.

Whether it was the Westernization Party, the Conservative Party, or the German Party, they were surprisingly consistent this time.

Whether it was the trade volume on the Selenga River, the military strength of the Dashun Army after the reform, the unsuccessful war against Turkey, or the threat from Sweden...

In short, in terms of attitude towards the East, the Russians put aside party disputes and confirmed that Peter's Eastern Plan had failed.

Unlike the old Count Tolstoy who was forced to death by Liu Yu last time, this time Count Osterman did not take the blame, but went to do real diplomacy.

All parties in the Congress and the tsarina clearly authorized him to make concessions on the boundary demarcation issue in exchange for peace in the East.

An unfavorable treaty is like giving birth to a child.

The first time, there are thousands of difficulties and dangers, and it is extremely painful; the first time is raw, the second time is familiar, and the more raw, the smoother it is.

This time, there is no need to take the blame.

On the contrary, in the extremely bad diplomatic situation, if a non-aggression treaty between the two sides can be signed, even if some land is given up, it will be a huge achievement.