My Apprenticeship to Uncle Jiu: I Was a Warlord in the Republic of China

Chapter 367: Do you want me to chase after that old witch Cixi?

So he smiled hypocritically and replied, "Mr. Jack, you are too polite. I heard that you and Ying won a great victory in India and killed that damn devil Edward. This is something we should congratulate!"

Afterwards, the two of them exchanged some meaningless pleasantries. After Jiang Li invited him to the conference room, Jack Thomas finally stated his purpose.

"The situation is like this, Commander Jiang. Thanks to your reminder, His Majesty the King learned the true identity of Edward and eliminated him in time."

"Here, on behalf of His Majesty the Emperor of the British Empire, King George V, I would like to express my highest gratitude to you!"

"In addition, I also brought a trade request that is beneficial to both of us. I hope Commander Jiang can consider it!"

As he said that, he took a document from his assistant, stood up and handed it to Jiang Li with both hands.

After taking the document and taking a look at it, Jiang Li narrowed his eyes immediately. It turned out that although the things written on the document were messy, they were all very ordinary little things, and he didn't even bother to take them seriously.

This included a large number of weapons and equipment seized by Britain from the battlefield in India.

Including some light and heavy machine guns, some military trucks, and a large number of light weapons and matching ammunition.

He did want these heavy weapons, but the price was not much cheaper than new ones. If he bought them, he would be a sucker, but if he didn't buy them, he would offend Dai Ying.

Jiang Li had no choice but to cry poor, "Mr. Jack, you should already know that I recently fought a big battle in Hubei."

"Although we did capture some things, my soldiers suffered heavy losses due to the barrier of the Yangtze River. In this battle alone, our combined casualties were close to 150,000!"

"Later, we had another war in the grain-producing area of ​​Jianghan Plain. Both sides suffered heavy casualties again. The most important thing was that the local agricultural production suffered heavy losses because of this war!"

"So this time, in addition to providing pensions to the soldiers who died in battle, we will also reward the soldiers who have made meritorious contributions, and we will also repair the damaged farmland and rescue the farmers who have been affected."

"Now I really don't have the money to buy these weapons and equipment anymore. I hope Mr. Jack can tell His Majesty the truth. It's not that I don't want to accept the trade, but I really don't have the money and can't afford it!"

Jack Thomas was not too surprised when he heard this. He knew too well how expensive war was, so he took out this old arms list just as a test. The real trade request was still to come!

So he stated very formally that he knew how expensive fighting was, and then showed great understanding towards Jiang Li.

Then he took out another trade list, "So in order to help Commander Jiang overcome the difficulties, we Daiying also prepared another list!"

Then he handed it to Jiang Li.

When he took the list again, he saw a long list of mineral products, including a product called high-quality war horses.

In fact, Jiang Li could still accept all of these, but behind these goods, there were a lot of additional conditions, including agreed tariffs, judicial autonomy, free trade, and land leasing.

These things may seem to make sense, but if you really analyze them one by one, they are bullshit.

The so-called agreed tariff is to force Jiang Li to accept extremely low tariff rates through unequal treaties, which makes it impossible for Jiang Li to effectively protect its national industry through tariff policies.

This allows goods with English labels to flood into the market at low prices, impacting local industries and directly sucking their blood.

Judicial autonomy means that when it comes to trade disputes, British merchants are under the rule of England and are not subject to the laws enacted by England.

Instead, the case was judged by his own consul, which seriously undermined his judicial sovereignty and meant that British merchants lacked effective legal constraints in their trade.

The so-called free trade is even more familiar to everyone. They asked Jiang Li not to hinder the free trade between the two sides for any reason.

This allows Daiying to rely on its strong industrial production capacity and low production costs to dump large quantities of goods to all the territories under Jiang Li's command, thereby suppressing the development space of China's local industry.

The most crucial thing is that they actually demanded land leasing, which means ceding land in Jiangli so that Daiying can station troops there and set up factories, banks, police stations, courts, churches, etc.

This allows them to directly control Jiang Li’s economic lifeline while expanding their influence in China.

Moreover, this system has been implemented in Guangzhou for a long time. Not only Britain, but also some other powers have implemented this system in Guangzhou.

This is why Jiang Liming occupied all of Guangdong a long time ago, but did not use Guangzhou as his capital.

That's entirely because the powerful countries are rampant in Guangzhou now. It's no exaggeration to say that it's a place of chaos. If I go to Guangzhou, I might offend those powerful countries, which would restrict my development.

Once he really signed this agreement, his reputation would rival that of Empress Dowager Cixi.

And now they actually set their sights on his other cities, which made Jiang Li furious.

But the situation was stronger than the person, and he didn't have the strength to challenge Dai Ying yet, so he could only force a smile and said to Jack:

"Mr. Jack, you may not know that I have seriously studied your advanced Western system. I agree with what you call democracy, and I hate dictatorship!"

"So I have always implemented a parliamentary system. All political and military affairs must be decided after consultation with officials from relevant departments. So I may not be able to sign this agreement directly for the time being!"

"But in fact, I also want to establish deeper trade relations with the British Empire, so I will fully support you and let those officials agree to let me sign this agreement."

Jiang Li, who was originally gritting his teeth, showed a smile from the heart when he talked about the latter part.

As long as I delay for three to five months, it will be you, the diplomat, who will be anxious. And if you fail to complete the task by then, it will have nothing to do with me.

After all, I fully support you. It's just that other officials disagree. There's nothing I can do. The worst that can happen is that I can dismiss those who disagree in public and transfer them elsewhere.

Jack Thomas was a little surprised to hear Jiang Li's words, and immediately expressed his doubts, "Dear Commander Jiang, I don't think I have heard of this before I came here. What kind of democratic meeting system do you have here?"

Jiang Li said naturally, "Mr. Jack, you don't know!"