Yuan Shikai

This was the state of China in 1914 when the war started in Europe.

It was a young republic led by Yuan Shikai, a political and military veteran with many Western-educated Chinese connections who, he believed, would help build a new China.

In the 1890s, Shikai had commanded the Pacification Army, a unit of around 5,000 men who trained and operated under German military rules outlined in the translation of the Introductory Manual of the German Army.

The military connections between China and Germany were strong, although they soured after Jiaozhou Bay and Tsingtao were seized by the Germans.

Horse racing, fancy dress balls, caviar and flowing champagne were all part of the Chinese diplomatic, business and colonial experience.

With official diplomatic recognition, China could declare itself neutral in August 1914.

Even so, Yuan Shikai secretly offered the British 50,000 soldiers to capture the German colony of Tsingtao.

The offer was refused as Japan was invited by the British to take the territory with the token presence of the South Wales Borderers, as we've heard in a previous episode.

the Confucian reformers, all of this leads inexorably, not inevitably, but inexorably towards a breaking point, which comes in 1911, when the revolutionary forces under the nominal leadership of Sun Yat-sen, Sun Zhongshan, who you have pictured over here, they managed to get a number of military folks stationed in Wuhan, is in central China, and they stage a coup.

led by this general, Yuan Shikai, whom you have pictured right there next to Sun Yat-sen.

I've labeled him as the Chinese emperor just because he at some point betrays this movement and then essentially declares himself the new emperor of China.

It doesn't last very long, but it's a comic moment, perhaps.

In eighteen ninety-eight, Zhang Boju was born into a powerful family in central China's Henan province.

Through adoption into the household of Zhang Jianfang, a prominent official closely associated with Yuan Shikai, an important politician and militarist in China's modern history, he inherited access to wealth, influence, and social prestige.

His family expected him to follow a traditional path into government or military service.

Like many young men of China's elite during the early twentieth century, he received both classical and modern education and briefly served in the military as well as sometimes mixing with those in political circles.

He was their George Washington, and he faced that criticism.

Or even in China in the early 20th century when they had their revolution, and one of their strongmen, Yuan Shikai found himself emperor.

All of these men face comparisons to Washington.

And what that shows is that Washington became the standard of leadership and specifically Republican statesmanship.

The complications arrived almost immediately.

Sun Yat-sen lacked the military power to hold the republic together, and within months he had negotiated a deal with Yuan Shikai, a former Qing military commander with real troops and real institutional support, who became president in his place.

Yuan Shikai was not particularly interested in republican ideals.

The revolution had toppled the dynasty without yet building anything solid enough to fill the space it left.

Mao recognized this.

The first United Front, as it was called, created a strange double life for men like Mao.

He worked within Kuomintang institutions at one point, running its propaganda department in Canton, while simultaneously maintaining his Communist Party work.

The two organizations shared goals in the short term, ending the rule of the warlords who had divided China among themselves since the collapse of Yuan Shikai's government and reducing foreign imperial power.

One day in September 1898, this lady firmly seated herself in her sedan chair and ordered her eunuchs to carry her down to the Imperial Palace.

There, with the aid of a treasonous general, Yuan Shikai by name, she seized the emperor, made him acknowledge her as regent, executed his liberal advisors, canceled his reform edicts, and set her face against all innovation and all European influence.

In particular, an imperial decree of December 18th, 1898, announced that no more railway projects would be entertained for the present by the Chinese government.

The reform movement was nipped in the bud.

Revolution broke out in the Yangtze Valley and spread throughout the southern provinces.

An exiled radical, Sun Yat-sen, was brought back to be president of the revolutionary government.

Against the revolutionists, the imperial government sent an army under the ablest of its generals, Yuan Shikai, the man who had betrayed Guangzhou in 1898.

And Yuan, instead of giving battle, came to a friendly agreement with the revolutionists whereby the emperor was to be dethroned, a republic established, and himself elected as president.

Immediately upon landing on the shores of China, arrangements are made with the nearest viceroy or governor to receive their obedience to Qing Sheng'an, to worship the Emperor of Peace, a Taotai being considered too low a rank for such an honor.

As soon as we arrived, Yuan Shikai, who was then viceroy of Zhili Province at Tianjin, sent an official to my father to prepare the time and place for this function, which is an extremely pretty one.

When arrangements had been made, both my father and Yuan Shikai dressed in their full ceremonial robes, which is the dragon long robe with a reddish-black three-quarter-length coat over it, Chao Zhu, amber beads, hat with peacock feather, and red coral button, and repaired at once to the Wan Shou Gong, Ten Thousand Years Palace, which is especially built for functions of this kind, where they were met by a large number of officials of the lower grades.

At the back center of this temple, or palace, stands a very long, narrow table on which are placed the tablets of the emperor and empress dowager, on which is written, Wan sui wan sui wan wan sui, ten thousand years' time, ten thousand years' time, ten thousand ten thousand years.

The viceroy, or in this case Yuan Shikai, and the other officials arrived first.

Yuan stood at the left side of this table, and the others arranged themselves in two diminishing lines starting from the front corners of the table.

Soon afterward, my father came and knelt directly in front of the center of the table and said, Aha Qing Sheng'an, your servant gives you greeting.

She was in favor of establishing schools for the education of young girls, as only very few could even read or write their own language, and she suggested that I should speak to Her Majesty about it at the first opportunity.