As we all know, our country is vast, with 9.6 million square kilometers of land. However, many people may not know that if it were not for the appearance of one person more than 100 years ago, our country might not even have 8 million square kilometers of territory left.
Who is this true hero who guards the territory?What else did he do at that time that was commendable?
Executioner "Agub.
Before answering these questions, let's talk about the crisis that China faced in Xinjiang at that time. In 1867, the Agub armed forces began to invade the Shache and Hotan regions of Xinjiang, where they established the "Zhedeshar" khanate, calling themselves Bitiao Khan.
At the same time, in order to win the support of Britain and Russia, Agub began to collude with them and signed a large number of unequal treaties. During this period, Tsarist Russia brazenly invaded the Ili region under the guise of "helping China recover its territory".
When Britain and Russia began to intervene, Agub became even bolder. In 1870, with the support of Britain and Russia, Aqubai invaded and occupied Turpan and Urumqi in Xinjiang, and once ruled most of Xinjiang.
Queen Victoria of England at the time even wrote a personal letter sending cordial greetings to the new regime in Aghub. At this moment, the fate of the people of Xinjiang is already sealed.
Since Aqubai ruled Xinjiang, the people of Xinjiang have been in dire straits. Because the Agubai group often requisitioned and killed many people in Xinjiang, he was also nicknamed "the executioner" by the locals.
In the process of ruling Xinjiang, Aqubai carried out a lot of construction projects and built an extremely luxurious palace for himself. At the same time, he also sent his subordinates to kidnap more than 600 beauties of different nationalities from all over Xinjiang and put them in his harem.
Sometimes, when Agubai was marching and fighting, he would take all these concubines with him, and when he was interested, he would give one of them a random reward to his subordinates. It can be said that Aqubai at that time was no different from a tyrant.
In addition, Acuba was an avid slave owner. It is said that he alone owned more than 3,000 slaves. Slaves flourished in his hands, and the furthest slaves were sold to Turkey by Agub. It can be seen that the life of the people in Xinjiang at that time was miserable.
The battle between coastal defense and fortress defense.
In the face of this situation, the Manchu ** saw it in his eyes and remembered it in his heart. For this reason, the imperial court launched a battle for coastal defense and fortress defense. At that time, Zuo Zongtang advocated blockade defense. After all, Xinjiang is too important for our country. Li Hongzhang and others advocated coastal defense, and even said that they would abandon Xinjiang.
Regarding Li Hongzhang's remarks, the tough guy Zuo Zongtang was completely angry. I saw him angrily yelling at Li Hongzhang in the courtroom: "You don't want 1.6 million square kilometers of land?"Isn't this the land of your Li Zhongtang family?”
In order to convince the Qing court, Zuo Zongtang pointed out that Xinjiang is as important to our country as a shield. Once Xinjiang is lost, Longyou and Mongolia will not be able to keep it. If Longyou and Mongolia are lost, the Beijing division will not be able to keep it!
As soon as these words came out, the whole room was shocked. It just so happened that the Empress Dowager Cixi at that time was also a reasonable person. So the Empress Dowager Cixi, after some consideration, agreed to Zuo Zongtang's proposal to expedition to Xinjiang.
Hu Xueyan's help.
In the first year of Guangxu, that is, in 1875, the Qing Dynasty granted Zuo Zongtang the post of minister and had full authority to supervise the recovery of Xinjiang. After Zuo Zongtang received the appointment, he was impassioned and was bound to eliminate the Agubana clique in one fell swoop.
However, after taking office, Zuo Zongtang was shocked by the predicament in front of him. He checked the military expenditure in the northwest region and found that the imperial court owed 21 million taels of military expenses in the northwest region, so that the troops in the northwest region were exhausted.
This time, the imperial court allocated only five million taels of military funds to Zuo Zongtang. This was completely insufficient for the Western Expedition, so Zuo Zongtang looked sad about it.
At this critical moment, he thought of his little friend Hu Xueyan. As the boss of the Jiangsu and Zhejiang consortium and the richest man in the country, Hu Xueyan must be very rich. So Zuo Zongtang directly borrowed 18 million taels from Hu Xueyan to solve his urgent need.
During this period, Hu Xueyan also relied on his personal connections to purchase a large number of mountain guns and rear-loading guns from the Roosevelt family in the United States to expand Zuo Zongtang's armament. In this way, a long-prepared battle to regain Xinjiang began.
In the process, Zuo Zongtang wanted to raise more food. He also ordered his subordinates to build water conservancy and reclaim farmland in Hami and other places, so as to maximize the local agricultural productivity.
The battle officially began.
When the soldiers are strong and the food and grass are sufficient, the battle officially begins. In April of the second year of Guangxu, Zuo Zongtang personally visited Suzhou (now Jiuquan, Gansu) and began to fully command the campaign to recover Xinjiang.
He sent Jin Shun, Liu Jintang and other generals to attack Turpan from Suzhou in several directions. Under the pressure of the Western Expeditionary Army, the forces of the Agubana group were defeated one after another. Finally, in October, the generals of the Western Expeditionary Army gathered in Urumqi.
After the pacification of northern Xinjiang, the next step is southern Xinjiang. In March of the third year of Guangxu, Zuo Zongtang once again commanded the army, and the troops attacked Dabancheng, Turpan, and Tuoxun in three ways. They are destined to fight to the end with Aguba. In less than half a month, the Western Expeditionary Army conquered these three cities and annihilated more than 10,000 people of the Akuba group.
Faced with such a battle situation, Agubai was restless. It was also at this time that civil strife broke out in the Agubana bloc, and generals from all walks of life fought each other. Seeing this, Agubai realized that the general trend had turned, so he committed suicide by taking poison.
Of course, some historians believe that Agub's death was not a suicide. In a fit of rage, he beat his subordinates and suffered a stroke. How exactly Agubai died is up for debate.
Outrage against the British.
After Agub's death, the entire group collapsed, and the remaining troops fled south. His son, Berke Huri, inherited the throne immediately after burying him. Of course, at this time, the Aguba-Cuba bloc was already in decline, and there was even a situation of brotherhood.
At that time, Berkhuri's younger brother Aqim was dissatisfied with Berkhuri's rule and competed with him for the throne. Zuo Zongtang saw this opportunity and massively increased his troops in southern Xinjiang, intending to expel him from the country.
And then at this very moment, the British suddenly came and intervened. In order to prevent the previous treaty from being torn up, the British forced Zuo Zongtang and demanded that he cede the Kashgar region to the Agub group.
Faced with the demands of the British, Zuo Zongtang was furious. He said angrily: "Why didn't the British cut a piece of land from India and give it to someone else?."So Zuo Zongtang was full of anger and launched an attack on Kashgar.
Soon after, Hookbury was defeated by the Western Expeditionary Army. At this time, the enslaved Kyrgyz people also rose up and joined the Western Expeditionary Army to fight against Huckerbury. So far, the war to liberate Xinjiang has been completely victorious.
Recapture Ili from Tsarist Russia.
Of course, at this time, there is actually another problem that has not been solved, and that is the Ili problem. At that time, in order to win the support of the Russians, the Agub regime directly ceded Ili to Russia. Now, with the fall of the Agubai regime, it is only natural that Yili wants to reclaim it.
After learning of Zuo Zongtang's intentions, in order to ensure the annexation of the Ili region, Tsarist Russia quickly colluded with the Qing court and secretly signed the Treaty of Livadia. According to this treaty, our country can only recover the city of Ili. As for most of Ili, it was all owned by Tsarist Russia.
When Zuo Zongtang saw the treaty, he was immediately furious. Over the next few days, he repeatedly wrote to the Qing court, denouncing the dangers of the treaty and saying that the Ili region must be recovered. After all, I, Zuo Zongtang, a tough guy, can't do such a thing as betraying the motherland.
In the end, under pressure from Zuo Zongtang, the Qing court could only refuse to recognize the treaty and intended to negotiate with Tsarist Russia again. This time, Zuo Zongtang sent Zeng Jize, the second son of Zeng Guofan, to negotiate with the ** people.
During the negotiations, Zuo Zongtang was still stepping up preparations for military operations and preparing to retake Ili by force. Once Zeng Jize's negotiations failed, the Western Expeditionary Army immediately marched into Ili to expel the Tsarist army. In this way, Zuo Zongtang, who was nearly 70 years old, carried the coffin on his back, crossed thousands of miles of Gobi and desert, and marched to Yili.
When Tsarist Russia saw the menacing Zuo Zongtang, he was naturally afraid. Therefore, a number of diplomats were sent to Beijing to conduct unilateral negotiations with the Qing court.
A few days later, Qing ** summoned Zuo Zongtang back to Beijing for "special reasons". Faced with the twelve gold medals sent by the Qing court, Zuo Zongtang had no choice but to leave Xinjiang. At this point, the operation of the Western Expeditionary Army to recover Ili came to an end.
Later, I learned that at that time, Russia had signed the Sino-Russian Ili Treaty with the Qing court. According to the terms of the treaty, most of Ili is owned by our country. 70,000 square kilometers of land north of the Ili River were owned by Tsarist Russia.
Faced with such conditions, the weak Qing ** immediately accepted it, so he urgently transferred Zuo Zongtang back to the capital to prevent him from sabotaging the plan of the Manchu **.
Of course, by this time, Zuo Zongtang's task of recovering Xinjiang had been basically completed.
From the first year of Guangxu to the third year of Guangxu, in three years, Zuo Zongtang recovered 90% of the territory of Xinjiang and saved more than 1.6 million square kilometers of land for China. For this honor, there are only eight words that can be worthy of Zuo Zongtang, that is, "merit is in the present, and benefit is in the future".
Conclusion. In general, Zuo Zongtang's achievements in recovering Xinjiang are definitely of epoch-making significance. Without Xinjiang, China would lose not only rich mineral resources, but also a shield for national defense.
Once Xinjiang is lost and other countries take action, the threat from the West will immediately spread to Shaanxi. This is almost unimaginable for the defense and security of our country. It can be said that Zuo Zongtang spent his life guarding the 10,000-year foundation of China.