Born in 1859, Yuan Shikai was a typical second-generation official. Yuan Shikai’s uncle, Yuan Jiasan, was an important general in the Huai Army of the Qing Dynasty, and Yuan Shikai’s biological father, Yuan Baozhong, was also an official.
When Yuan Shih-kai was young, he also aspired to be a civil official. He took the imperial examinations, but failed many times.
However, there was no way out, Yuan Shikai’s (adopted) father, Yuan Baoqing, had a brother named Wu Changqing, who was a senior general in the Huai Army of the Qing Empire at that Time, and Yuan Shikai went through this back door and joined Wu Changqing in Shandong to help with military affairs.
The first opportunity of Yuan Shikai’s Life came in Korea.
In 1882, the “Imjin Incident” broke out in Joseon, and the father of Joseon’s King Lee Hee, Lee Yesung, planned to seize power, and civil unrest broke out in Joseon. In the process of pacifying the matter, Yuan Shikai acted smartly and made many achievements and came to the fore.
In 1884, The Japanese Empire supported Kim Ok-gyun, a member of the Kaehwa Party of Korea, to launch the “Kashin Coup” to seize the power of the Joseon royal Family and establish a new pro-Japanese Korea. The Japanese resentment against Yuan Shih-k’ai was already buried because of this case.
Yuan Shikai’s position in Joseon rose to the level of a commercial representative of the Qing Empire in Joseon after he succeeded in defeating the Kashin Coup, during which time he brought back three wives from Joseon: Li, Jin and Min. (Yuan Shikai had one wife and nine concubines, three of whom were Korean women)
After the First Sino-Japanese War, Yuan Shikai was recommended by the court ministers and sent to Tianjin to train the new Beiyang army, which was fully modeled on the German army and was quite successful.
After the death of Li Hongzhang in 1901, Yuan Shikai succeeded Li Hongzhang as the governor of Zhili, during which he made a lot of achievements, but the good times did not last long. In 1908, Empress Dowager Cixi and Guangxu Emperor died one after another, Pu Yi succeeded to the throne and Pu Yi’s father, Zai Feng, was regent, Zai Feng was always dissatisfied with Yuan Shikai and dismissed him from his post.
Yuan Shikai knew that he had met a low point in his life, so he simply returned to his Home in Henan to live in seclusion, but he set up a radio station at home to control the Beiyang New Army, and the Beiyang New Army he trained were all people he had promoted and trained, and the Chinese ruled by “righteousness”, even though he was not in the army, the Beiyang New Army was still surnamed Even though they were not in the army, the Beiyang New Army was still surnamed “Yuan”, not “Aisinjueluo”.
On October 10, 1911, the Wuchang Uprising broke out, the court ordered the Manchu nobleman, Minister of War Yinchang rate of the new army of the North Pacific to the south to quell the rebellion, but the new army of the North Pacific, after all, Yuan Shikai’s troops, they do not listen to Yinchang’s call, go one step, stop three steps, so, Yikuang as the representative of the dynasty: the situation, non-Yuan Shikai to save the Bureau.
So, the Qing court quickly organized the cabinet, and Yuan Shikai as the cabinet premier minister, when the Beiyang New Army and the revolutionary army were in a stalemate, the revolutionary party did not have enough military funds to attack the Beiyang New Army, and the Beiyang New Army also to the court to “military pay is empty” as the reason, do not move, when the community, including the revolutionary party, loudly appealed to Yuan Shikai The situation was resolved peacefully, and the position of the provisional president of the Republic of China was left vacant.
Yuan Shikai followed the trend, he got the “preferential treatment of the Qing dynasty conditions” to the revolutionary party, and through the Manchu imperial family to do the ideological work of Empress Dowager Longyu, but also ordered the generals of the Beiyang New Army to call the Qing court, appealing to the Qing court to abdicate, the Empress Dowager Longyu in the case of internal and external attack, despair at the situation, had to announce the abdication, 268 years after the entry of the Qing Empire, collapsed.
In February 1915, the Japanese government proposed the Twenty-one Articles to Yuan Shikai’s Beiyang government to expand its colonial power in China. After sending the Japanese representatives away, Yuan Shikai was furious and immediately convened a military conference to seriously discuss the issue of war with Japan, but the main military generals present said: If we go to war with Japan, there is only one result: quick defeat.
So, Yuan Shikai used the old trick of “using barbarians to control barbarians” and secretly sent a copy of Japan’s proposed “Article 21” to the British Embassy in China, which was published by the media and public opinion was in uproar.
We have many historical writers who say that “Yuan Shikai signed the Twenty-One Articles in exchange for Japan’s support for his claim to the throne”. The truth is that the Japanese representative Hioki said to Yuan Shikai that if you signed the “Article 21”, we in Japan could help you “ban” the revolutionary party of Sun Yat-sen’s faction operating in Japan.
However, Japan never said that it supported Yuan Shikai’s claim to the throne; on the contrary, during Yuan Shikai’s preparation for his claim to the throne, representatives of the Japanese government came to Beijing at least twice to meet with representatives of the Beiyang government to advise Yuan Shikai not to claim the throne.
Contrary to many people’s impressions, the real Cai E in fact took the lead in signing and advising Yuan Shih-k’ai to call himself an emperor. To be clearer, it was Cai E who encouraged Yuan Shih-k’ai to call himself an emperor beforehand, and it was Cai E who raised his flag against Yuan Shih-k’ai afterwards on the grounds that he opposed the imperial system.
Historical figures and events are never as simple as the people know them to be.
On June 6, 1916, Yuan Shikai died of uremia at the age of 57.
Epilogue 1: After Yuan Shikai’s death, the Chinese Communist Party‘s defense forces, led by the North Pacific, lost their core and disobeyed each other, splitting into multiple factions and frequently breaking out into civil wars, the so-called “warlord chaos“.
Epilogue 2: After Yuan Shikai’s death, his crippled (leg broken in a horse fall) eldest son Yuan Keding lived in seclusion in the German Concession in Tianjin and died in mainland China in 1958 at the age of 80.
Epilogue 3: After the death of Yuan Shikai, his second son, Yuan Kewen (born to Kim, a Korean woman, his third concubine), stayed away from politics, recited poetry and had many concubines, and became famous for his debauchery.
Epilogue 4: In 1957, one of Yuan Shikai’s grandsons, Yuan Jiacheng, filled out the college entrance examinations, and in the column of family origin, he wrote: Grandfather, Yuan Shikai, a Northern Warlord. He was not accepted.
Epilogue 5: In the 1960s, after the Four Clean-up Campaigns, Yuan Shikai’s grandson, Yuan Jiacheng, signed and agreed to give up sixteen sets of Yuan’s ancestral properties to the state after the authorities did their thinking.
Epilogue 6: Another grandson of Yuan Shikai, Yuan Jiaxi, was discriminated against by society because of his “bad family background” and later suffered from mental illness.
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