In the hearts of most businessmen, they actually hope that there will be such an organization that has fair business conduct codes within, and everyone will compete fairly, which will reduce many troubles in business; while they are united to the outside world, suppress external forces and malicious competition, so that business will be much easier in the future. Moreover, the East China government has accumulated enough reputation in recent years, acts fairly, acts with words, is clean and honest, and has excellent efficiency. Therefore, they have led to the establishment of such an organization, and the merchants can be convinced. Moreover, since the establishment of the Shanghai New District, several small business conflicts with foreign businesses have also occurred, and they all ended with a step back, which also made the merchants see that foreigners really dare not provoke overseas Chinese.

However, businessmen with a net worth of more than 100,000 yuan are all shrewd people. Of course, they are not fooled by a few words. Although the proposal of the East China government does have great appeal to them, they still have many concerns. First of all, Chinese businessmen have always distrust the government. Although the East China government is expected to be popular, it has been established for a short time and its reputation is high, but its foundation is still somewhat insufficient. Some time ago, a newspaper maliciously evaluated the East China government by "Duke Zhou was afraid of rumors, and Wang Mang respected the wise and became the scholars of the times", which also aroused some resonance.

The merchants may not really believe that the current East China government is Wang Mang who was respectful to the wise and polite. However, it is inevitable that they have any concerns. After all, the distrust of the merchants in the government cannot be reversed in a few years. Once the Military Supply Federation was established, fairness may be guaranteed during the Liaodong war, but no one can say whether they can maintain such a humble attitude after the war is over. It is difficult to guarantee that the East China government will not use the Military Supply Federation as its own tool. What's more, now

Everyone knows that the East China government is unwilling to live under the Qing court for a long time. In fact, they now call themselves independent governments and compete with the Qing court. Therefore, there will be a war sooner or later. Some people have predicted that if the East China government defeats Japan in Liaodong and Russia, the next step is to start an army to attack the Qing court. Although most people will bet on the East China government and the Qing court, when the two sides have not completely broken up, most businessmen will not easily take sides.

Some businessmen are well aware of the principle of "no free lunch in the world". Don't think that joining the military supply federation will have so many benefits, but while enjoying rights, they must bear corresponding obligations. For example, the Military supply federation really conflicts with foreign merchants, and both parties may deliberately lower the price and run the other party, or intentionally raise the price to buy the goods needed by the other party. In this way, they will inevitably suffer considerable losses. Moreover, when the business war is really fierce, it is no different from the war. Both sides will do everything they can, and it is not impossible to even cause death. Merchants naturally hope to enjoy the benefits of joining the club, but are unwilling to bear the price of joining the club.

Of course, if the benefits outweigh the costs, it is feasible. But no one can calculate it now. After joining the association, whether it is more or more good or more expensive, some businessmen have thought about not visiting and waiting for a while to see what happens after the Military Supply Association is operating, and then decide whether to join. However, this idea was immediately denied because everything comes first and then arrives. If the Military Supply Association is really working well, those who join first will naturally enjoy more benefits, and those who join later may have to bear more obligations.

In fact, if someone else made this suggestion, even if the Qing government came forward, the merchants would not be so entangled. To be cautious, let’s take a look, the Qing court did not show any eagles. After all, in the eyes of merchants, the Qing court had basically no credit, but the East China government was different. The East China government had a strong credibility. Moreover, in recent years, the merchants who cooperated with the East China government have basically made money, and some made a lot of money. Therefore, what if this is a good opportunity, it would be a pity to miss it. So the merchants talked about each other, wanted to agree, but were hesitant.

This situation was also expected by Li Songchen, so he said: "Today I am just a stimulus. We will never force it to join or not. In addition, if you are unsure of it now, you can go back and consider a few days before making a decision."

At this time, Zhang Zhenxun stood up and said, "I don't need to think about it. As long as it is established, I am the first to join."

Li Songchen nodded and was about to speak, but Sheng Xuanhuai also stood up and said, "As long as it is beneficial to the Liaodong war, I have no credit, so I am willing to join the Military Supply Association."

Zhang Zhenxun looked at Sheng Xuanhuai and was very surprised. It turned out that he thought that Zhang Jian and Zheng Yingguan might follow his footsteps and announced their joining, but he was not optimistic about Sheng Xuanhuai at all. However, he did not expect that Sheng Xuanhuai would follow him and proactively announce his participation in the Military Supply Association.

In fact, even Li Songchen was very surprised. It was reasonable for Zhang Zhenxun to join the Military Supply Federation. He did not expect Sheng Xuanhuai to join. When the Shanghai New District was first established, Sheng Xuanhuai was deeply hostile to the East China government because the East China government's operations in Shanghai harmed a lot of Sheng Xuanhuai's interests. Although Sheng Xuanhuai did not become enemies with the East China government, he had investments in Qingdao and Shanghai New Districts. In addition, Li Hongzhang's investment in the East China government was also handed over to Sheng Xuanhuai for management. Therefore, Sheng Xuanhuai is now a big investor of the East China government, but the relationship between Sheng Xuanhuai and the East China government has always been neither salty nor weak, not as close as Zhang Zhenxun.

There is also a process for Sheng Xuanhuai's attitude towards the East China government. It is an unstoppable trend for the East China government to fully intervene in the business world of Shanghai, so Sheng Xuanhuai could only accept it. Moreover, when Li Hongzhang was alive, he advised Sheng Xuanhuai not to oppose overseas Chinese. Sheng Xuanhuai changed his hostile attitude towards the East China government and instead cooperated. The East China government did not care about Sheng Xuanhuai's attitude change. As long as he was investing, he welcomed him with both hands. Moreover, Sheng Xuanhuai had a huge reputation and influence in the Chinese business world. His investment in Qingdao could also increase the reputation of the East China government.

However, after setting up a factory in Qingdao, Sheng Xuanhuai discovered that the management level of the East China government was indeed far better than that of the Qing court. Sheng Xuanhuai was essentially a businessman, so he naturally wanted to have a good business environment. Therefore, his attitude towards the East China government also changed greatly. Moreover, after the East China government protected overseas Chinese in Java, Sheng Xuanhuai was quite touched. After all, Sheng Xuanhuai was also a Chinese, and of course he did not want to see the Chinese be bullied. He had to admit that the only people who can protect the Chinese are really unreliable.

Of course, it was Yuan Shikai who prompted Sheng Xuanhuai to decide to completely turn to the East China government. It turned out that when Li Hongzhang was alive, Sheng Xuanhuai and Yuan Shikai had a good relationship. The two were once so good that they were brothers, but after Li Hongzhang's death, Yuan Shikai immediately turned against him and suggested to the Qing court that the Telegraph Bureau and the Steel Merchants Bureau would be reclaimed from the court and the Beiyang was in charge.

The Telegraph Bureau and the Shipbuilding Merchants Group are the two most profitable companies under Sheng Xuanhuai. Although they have been impacted by the East China government, they can still maintain profitability. However, although these two companies are operated by Sheng Xuanhuai, they are in nature supervised and commercial offices, and are jointly owned by the government and the private sector. Although the government does not occupy a large part of the shares, the private sector is all stocks, so the government holds the most shares, which leaves a backup for the government to take back the two companies. When Li Hongzhang was alive, Sheng Xuanhuai was naturally not worried, but now Li Hongzhang is gone, Yuan Shikai immediately seized this backup and attacked Sheng Xuanhuai.

Yuan Shikai had his own difficulties in doing this. Yuan Shikai has always regarded the Beiyang New Army as his own private army. To maintain the loyalty of the Beiyang New Army to him, he must ensure that the military pay is paid in place, and also purchase weapons and military supplies. Although the court has a fixed amount of money for the Beiyang New Army, the money comes out of the Ministry of Revenue, everyone takes care of it, and plucks the feathers by passing by, and finally falls into Yuan Shikai's hands. It would be good if half of it could be. Naturally, Yuan Shikai can only pay for the shortage.

However, in the past, when Yuan Shikai was training troops at the right small station, there were only 7,000 troops. Moreover, the new defeat in the Sino-Japanese War of 1894-1895 was urgently expected to train a new army, so the new army was also sufficient, so Yuan Shikai did not need to pay much. Now the Beiyang New Army has expanded to 6 towns. Except for the first town, the other five towns are led by Yuan Shikai's confidants, so naturally they all have to take charge of Yuan Shikai.

However, the army of the five towns had a total of 560,000 people. Even though Yuan Shikai had a wealth of 100 million yuan, he could not fill this bottomless pit. Moreover, he needed a lot of money to manage the country. So Yuan Shikai also considered that he had to master a stable source of wealth to ensure his great achievements. Therefore, Yuan Shikai focused his attention on Sheng Xuanhuai and wanted to snatch the Telegraph Bureau and the Steel Merchants Bureau from Sheng Xuanhuai.

On the surface, Yuan Shikai was fighting for the interests of the Qing court and completely acquired the two most profitable enterprises as the court. However, once the recovery was successful, Yuan Shikai planned to elect his own people to take over. In recent years, Yuan Shikai not only made great achievements in military training, but also had a good Westernization work. Now Yanran has become the number one Westernization worker of the Qing court, and the Qing court will basically not oppose the candidates elected by Yuan Shikai. In this way, the Telegraph Bureau and the Shipbuilding Merchants Bureau will actually fall into Yuan Shikai's hands.
Chapter completed!