Reborn as King of South America

Chapter 297 Manifest Destiny
The induction ceremony for new officials was coming to an end. More than 300 young officials held their certificates of appointment in their hands, sat upright and dignified in the square, and looked intently at Li Mingyuan standing in the center of the podium.

"My fellow students, our country is still young, and the infrastructure for higher education is weak. It is not easy for you to stand out from hundreds of thousands of young people across the country."

After opening with an affirmation of the efforts made by the young people in the audience to become government officials, Li Mingyuan introduced the current world situation to them as usual.

“Ever since the British fleet landed at the mouth of the Yangtze River and defeated the Qing Dynasty, the dominance of the Far East China region has gradually fallen into the hands of Western powers, and the Central Plains region’s status as the Celestial Empire that had lasted for thousands of years has also been overthrown.

The countries in Southeast Asia, the Malay Peninsula, and Indonesia were all occupied and infiltrated by Britain, France, and the Netherlands.

Outside of the European continent, the countries and territories in other parts of the world have almost been divided up.
The remaining areas are also being divided up, conquered, and settled. Think of the prosperous scenes of the Han and Tang dynasties when all nations came to pay tribute, and the magnificent sentiments of the Han soldiers who expanded the territory and stained the battlefields with blood. But now, the Western Regions, Northeast China, Southern Xinjiang and other places have become foreign territories, and the soldiers buried on the frontier have become wandering ghosts!
Why? Because the imperial court was corrupt, confined to a corner of the ancient land in the Far East, closed its borders and enjoyed exploiting its own people!

It has been more than 240 years since the end of the Ming Dynasty. It coincides with the invasion of white barbarians and the decline of the Chinese mainland. At this critical moment of national destruction, we overseas Chinese should strive to strengthen ourselves in adversity and work hard to rebuild the national spirit, transform the national character, and build a rich and powerful Han country in South America! "

Speech-making and incitement are essential qualities for a national leader. Li Mingyuan tried to impress the young people below with sincere words.

"The 1879th century was an era of transition from the old to the new, an era of colonialism in its infancy, when weak countries were occupied by powerful countries, and decadent and declining countries were controlled by powerful countries. In the Far East, Japan's Meiji Restoration was launched only ten years ago, but such a small country that had not yet completed industrialization officially annexed the Ryukyu Kingdom in April 4, changed Ryukyu to Okinawa Prefecture, appointed Naoki Nabeshima as the first governor of Okinawa Prefecture, and forced the Ryukyu King to move to Japan by force. On the other hand, when the Qing court was carrying out the Westernization Movement, the Eight Banners nobles and local governors and ministers undermined each other, and there were countless people who used Westernization to plunder the people's interests.

The Westernization Reform was launched more than ten years ago, five years earlier than Japan. However, when Japan sent troops to Taiwan in 1874 and annexed Ryukyu in April 1879, no one in the Qing court dared to speak out for war!

The majority of Han Chinese are Chinese who immigrated from the mainland. When analyzing the world situation, it is inevitable to involve the Far East Central Plains region.

“Wherever the sea passes, there are overseas Chinese! No one is willing to leave their homeland and come overseas to make a living, but the Qing court is corrupt and incompetent. Even the scholars and candidates with honors are oppressed and insulted by the Eight Banners nobles. Therefore, the Chinese who left their homeland can only unite and gather everyone’s strength together to fight with the white devils and local natives, and use knives and swords to seize the land where overseas Chinese live!”…………

Li Mingyuan stood on the podium and spoke continuously for twenty minutes. Half of the time was spent on introducing the history of colonial expansion of European powers, and the rest of the time was mainly used to explain an idea to the young officials: the Qing court was corrupt and backward, and its rule was brutal. The rule of the Eight Banners nobles would inevitably collapse within thirty years; overseas Chinese could only have a long-term future if they united under the Han ruling group headed by Li Mingyuan.

Moving to South America, still harboring illusions about the official rule of the Central Plains, or hoping for a lucky break and planning to break away from the Han Kingdom and join the Qing court, would not only be counterproductive, but would also lead to the scorn of all overseas Chinese and the attack of the Han government.

After the speech, Li Mingyuan personally met with more than a dozen representatives of newly recruited officials. After a brief exchange with each of them, he left the venue under the protection of the security forces.

The next day, extensive reports on the inauguration ceremony of young officials appeared in newspapers in Chang'an (Cordoba), Songjiang (Buenos Aires), Xinjing (Porto Alegre) and other local Han newspapers.

"Reform the system and strengthen the country through education!"

The "Education Morning Post" reprinted a passage from Li Mingyuan's speech, and then linked the newly appointed young officials with the development of local education in the Han Dynasty, emphasizing Li Mingyuan's emphasis on national education and the remarkable achievements of ten years of education construction.

"Continue to deepen the reform of the official selection system and provide the country with excellent grassroots officials." "Daily Minutes" is an official media affiliated with the Central Ministry of Rites. Its reporting style is orthodox, and its reporting content tends to focus on the reform of the grassroots officials' appointment system.

"In this era of great contention and expansion, the Han people are destined to rebuild the country!" Unlike the official media under the jurisdiction of government agencies, which each focus on their own reports, the Qingjun Newspaper, the official newspaper of the National Defense Force Headquarters, opened with a magnificent report: "The destiny of heaven is clear, and the fate of the country lies with the Han people. In this turbulent era of three thousand years, we, the sons of the Han family, should forge ahead, strike hard at the white Western barbarians, defend the 30,000 miles of land under our feet, and create a great cause unprecedented in China! …………"

A week later, a column about the Han Kingdom appeared in the latest issue of the New York Times: "The poor Argentines have lost their land and wealth, and the barbaric yellow people are standing on the corpses of the white people and laughing and celebrating. May God bless the Argentines to get rid of the clutches of the yellow people as soon as possible..."

Because of the influence of white discrimination against Chinese workers in the United States, the Han Dynasty's occupation of Argentina had a greater impact on them. Private newspapers took advantage of the narrow-minded and vengeful mentality of the lower-class white people and spread a large number of speeches about the threat of yellow people to white people in an attempt to increase newspaper sales and social influence. The upper-class monopoly capitalists in the United States, especially large farmers and textile factory owners, were taking advantage of the blockade of the Han Dynasty to sell grain, livestock, agricultural products, textile products and other industrial and agricultural products at high prices. They had no intention of joining the ranks of the middle and lower-class white people and joining the ranks of inciting the government to go to war with the Han Dynasty.

Agriculture is the foundation of a country's economic rise. According to statistics, from 1870 to 1879, the cultivated land area of ​​the Han Dynasty increased fivefold, from 5 million mu to 1600 million mu.
Especially during the period from 1875 to 1879, the reclamation of the wheat belt and corn belt increased wheat production by nearly 2.4 times, corn production by about 3.5 times, and the development of the humid areas in northern Argentina increased rice production by about 4 times. At the same time, because there are vast natural pastures in the La Plata region and grass and corn can be planted on large areas of arable land as feed, the animal husbandry of the Han Dynasty developed very rapidly. Correspondingly, light industrial enterprises such as slaughtering, meat canning, and agricultural product processing and manufacturing enterprises received strong support from the government in the past ten years and gradually grew into pillar technology industries. Since 1878, the total output value of local agricultural, animal husbandry products and agricultural product processing production enterprises has surpassed textile enterprises, becoming the first industrial industry in the production value of the Han Dynasty.

The development of local agricultural production strongly supported and promoted the development of industrial production and expanded the domestic market. The industrial layout of the Han Dynasty first started with agricultural product processing and wool textile industry. The agricultural product processing and cotton textile industry first cultivated a group of grassroots industrial technical talents for the local area. Secondly, the funds earned from the export of agricultural products and wool textiles eased the government's financial tension in developing core heavy industries.

The United States also started out relying on agricultural products. Throughout the entire 19th century, agricultural product production and processing provided the most extensive fiscal revenue for the United States. It was not until the last decade of the 19th century that industrial output value surpassed agricultural products and agricultural product processing to become the pillar industry of the United States.

The local agriculture of the Han Dynasty adopts a production model based mainly on family farms. On average, each family has 200 to 300 acres of agricultural land, and the agricultural products produced are generally 20% to 30% higher than those of American farmers.

The land in the La Plata Plain is more fertile than that in the United States, and the diligence of the Chinese is unmatched by that of American farmers. Therefore, in the export competition of agricultural products, Chinese products have a significant price advantage.

Before Britain blockaded Han's maritime transportation, among the American countries, Brazil was in constant civil unrest and its agricultural product exports were severely weakened. Taking this opportunity, Han's agricultural product exports surpassed Brazil and became the second largest food exporter in North and South America, second only to the United States.

The United States was focusing on farming and development, and was limited by its military strength. It had neither the ability nor the willingness to attack the Han Kingdom across the ocean. Britain sent a fleet to blockade the Han Kingdom. Although this helped the United States, the voices of opposition in the country also grew louder.

At that time, the yield of one acre of arable land was only more than 300 kilograms. The cost of transporting grain from Britain's colonies such as India was higher than purchasing it from South and North America.

Moreover, the daily expenses of the ocean-going fleet's overseas expeditions that lasted three or four months also gave the British government a headache.

British Prime Minister Gladstone did not want Britain to be involved in a protracted war, and at the beginning of the war he disagreed with using force to resolve the Argentine dispute. After the ocean-going fleet set out for Argentina, Gordon's troops failed to achieve the strategic goal of rescuing the Argentine government. Not only was Gordon's own telegram requesting military support rejected, but the British troops landing on the coast of Argentina were also forcibly ordered by the London government to withdraw to Brazil.

Armed intervention failed and the maritime blockade was futile. On July 7, with the support of Prime Minister Gladstone, British Defense Secretary Sir Hartington proposed to abandon the strategy of maritime blockade of Han State to prevent Han State from making a desperate move and joining Paraguay to attack Brazil.

It has to be said that the situation in South America in 1879 was extremely chaotic. In the Pacific coastal area, Chile, Bolivia and Peru were still at war. China and Chile were confronting each other in Puerto Montt in the south, and Paraguay stood behind Bolivia and Peru to support the two countries in their war against Chile.

On the eastern Atlantic front, the Han regular army was divided into two parts. One was deployed in various parts of Argentina to deter local white people, and the other was deployed on the border with Brazil to contain part of the Brazilian government's regular army and support the black riots in Brazil.

Continuous war and unrest are the true portrayal of South America. As for Paraguay, the restless King Lopez Jr. of Paraguay is about to add fuel to the tense situation in South America.

Thanks to classmates Molu Xiaowei, Zhemubul and Fengkong Xiaoying for their tips and support!
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(End of this chapter)