On March 10, 1912, Yuan Shikai became the Provisional Grand President of China in Beijing. In July 1913, he defeated the Southern Revolutionary Party group led by Sun Yat-sen and Huang Xing. There is no one in the world who can compete with him.
After that, he began to continuously expand his power. He amended the Election Law to be re-elected for life and to appoint an heir, whose power was close to that of the emperor. By the end of 1915, he simply became emperor.
Why did so many people oppose Yuan Shikai as soon as he became emperor?In fact, at that time in the world, monarchies were very common, such as Britain, Germany, Japan, etc., all had emperors or kings, and it was not too much to be an emperor. In particular, the Chinese monarchy has been in place for 2,000 years, and the republic has only been in place for four years. At the time of the French Revolution, Napoleon was also proclaimed emperor, but he was embraced. Why did Yuan Shikai fail?This is because he has made several serious mistakes before and offended many people.
* In the early years, there were three major forces in China, namely the Beiyang faction, the revolutionary party, and the progressive party.
The Beiyang system is the Beiyang Group led by Yuan Shikai, and the revolutionary party is the Kuomintang led by Sun Yat-sen and Huang Xing. The Progressive Party developed from the constitutionalist faction in the late Qing Dynasty, and its representative figures include Liang Qichao, Li Yuanhong, Cai Yi and others.
But Yuan Shikai offended all these three forces!In this case, how can he become an emperor?
Through the war of 1913, Yuan Shikai defeated Sun Yat-sen, Huang Xing and other revolutionary party groups. In the course of the struggle against the Kuomintang, the Progressives supported Yuan Shikai and made a lot of efforts.
On July 31, 1913, Yuan Shikai appointed Xiong Xiling, the leader of the Progressive Party, as the premier. Of the nine cabinet ministers, four are Progressives and five are from the Beiyang. Liang Qichao served as the chief justice officer.
But Yuan Shikai didn't really want to reuse Xiong Xiling, Liang Qichao, etc., he just used them. After using it, he continued to crowd out the Progressives. These people had no real power and were ostracized, and a few months later, Xiong Xiling, Liang Qichao and others resigned. Yuan Shikai had a falling out with the Progressives.
How did Yuan Shikai offend the Beiyang Department?In fact, he did not offend all the Beiyang departments, but offended Duan Qirui, Feng Guozhang and other Beiyang veterans who held military power.
Duan Qirui can be said to be Yuan Shikai's number one henchman, he serves as the army chief and holds military power. In 1913, Yuan Shikai defeated the Kuomintang, and the so-called "all the birds are gone, the good bow is hidden, the cunning rabbit is dead, and the lackeys are cooked", and Yuan began to weaken Duan Qirui's military power. Of course, Duan Qirui is not honest, and when he was the army chief, he formed a lot of parties for personal gain. Yuan Shikai also set up a command office to weaken the authority of the War Department and concentrate military power in his own hands.
Yuan Shikai also began to focus on training his son Yuan Keding and letting him control the army. Yuan Shikai organized and trained a model army, and newly organized into three divisions, with Yuan Keding's cronies serving as division commanders.
Duan Qirui and other Beiyang generals had a fierce conflict with their son's brother Yuan Keding. In the end, Duan said that he was recuperating from illness, and Wang Shizhen served as the Minister of War. Yuan Shikai also sent people to investigate the corruption of Xu Shuzheng, the vice minister of the army, and removed him from his post in order to completely purge Duan Qirui's power.
For another henchman, Feng Guozhang, Yuan Shikai also began to distance himself and be on guard. For such a major event as becoming the emperor, Yuan Shikai did not tell Feng at all in the early stage. Yuan Shikai has begun to establish a new core team, such as Duan Qirui, Feng Guozhang, etc., all of whom will be excluded. On December 18, 1915, Yuan Shikai appointed Feng Guozhang as chief of staff, tried to transfer him out of Jiangsu, and sent henchmen to Nanjing to spy on Feng Guozhang. But Feng Guozhang had long joined forces with Liang Qichao and other progressive parties and was ready to oppose Yuan together.
In 1915, Yuan Shikai began to plot to become emperor. On the surface, the revolutionary party has been defeated, Duan Qirui, Feng Guozhang and other Beiyang veterans have succumbed, and Liang Qichao, Cai Yi and other progressives have been squeezed out, but they are actually extremely dissatisfied with Yuan Shikai.
In the end, when he became emperor, internal and external enemies united to bring down Yuan Shikai.
The Yunnan Patriotic War at the end of 1915 was jointly initiated by the Progressive Party members such as Cai Yi and Liang Qichao, as well as the Revolutionary Party such as Li Liejun. This is an external adversary. Within the Beiyang Department, Feng Guozhang secretly contacted Liang Qichao and the Revolutionary Party to prepare to cooperate with the operation. Duan Qirui took advantage of Yuan Shikai's crisis to force him to hand over power.
In the end, Yuan Shikai gave up his claim to be emperor, and after the continuous betrayal of his subordinates, he died in agony.
Yuan Shikai made a serious mistake, that is, his position was not so stable, and he prematurely excluded the constitutionalists and Beiyang elders and cultivated his own new private forces (Yuan Keding, Wang Shizhen, Xu Shichang, etc.), but put himself in a dangerous situation. In the end, the matter of becoming emperor gave political enemies from all walks of life an excuse to raise troops. Even if he were not emperor, his reign would not be stable.