Volume 2: The crown and the hat are all over the capital, and the spirit is full of energy and enter the foggy city Chapter 151 Reading Notes
Subtitle of this chapter: Just a reminder, this chapter only contains practical information and personal thoughts, and does not advance the plot.
Herbert Clark Hoover published an autobiography in 1924 called Years of Adventure, 1874-1920.
As the title suggests, this memoir mainly records his life experiences from birth to his participation in the Versailles Peace Conference. The title is also a true portrayal of his first half of life.
Born in 1874, Hoover was only 25 years old when he arrived in Tianjin, China. He even gave himself a Chinese name, Hu Hua. At that time, he was an engineer for the famous British mining company Bewick & Morin.
His annual salary was over $20,000, which was definitely a high salary at the time. Don't forget, Roosevelt only received $5,000 a year as Under Secretary of the Navy.
Yin Chuisi heard that just three years later, in 1902, when Hu Hua left China, he had already amassed a huge fortune of 4 million US dollars.
Of course, his memoirs downplayed the case of loss of state-owned assets in the Qing Dynasty.
But then again, they are extorting money based on their own abilities... well, it's the money they earn. Who told me that the Qing Dynasty is so useless??
But if you read the memoir "The Age of Adventure", readers like Yuan Hongjian a hundred years later will find that Hoover is indeed a keen political observer..
First of all, he had a certain awe for the land of Seris and the people on it.
He wrote in the book: "No matter how rich a person's experience is, no matter how profound his understanding of the government and people of this country is, he cannot make arbitrary comments on a nation with a history of 3,000 years and a population of 400 million. In my opinion, I have an enduring admiration for the Chinese people."
"About 10% of the Chinese population . They have high intellectual capabilities, are thoughtful, and have a strong sense of morality. Their culture is the oldest and most complete in the world. Chinese civilization has produced rich achievements in art, literature, and philosophy."
It is very rare for a white Westerner in the early twentieth century to say such words.
Secondly, his understanding of Seres society was even more correct than that of some Seres.
He realized, "China's number one resource and technology is agriculture. ... For three thousand years, hundreds of millions of farmers have diligently cultivated the land. What an amazing phenomenon! The weight of grain produced per acre of land may exceed that of anywhere else in the world."
Well, Hoover can be said to have the same view as the Hero of the Demonic Descendants on this point. You know, when the comrades of the Heroic Devil Descendants were still diligently thinking about imitating the October Revolution to occupy the big cities, he had already sneered at this and earnestly persuaded his comrades to take root in the countryside.
By the time of the Liberation War, Chuanlin Beitui still didn't understand this. Why was his army, boasting an absolute military advantage of 4 million men, constantly being overwhelmed by a bandit army of 1.2 million men armed with millet and rifles? The most fundamental reason was that the Nationalist government, occupying the major cities, lacked control over the country's greatest productive force: agriculture.
So it is not surprising that the Cannon Party’s finances collapsed in the end. It would be surprising if it did not collapse.
Hoover also concluded , "Some peculiarities in the Chinese mind make them ill-suited to Western methods of government... The most basic form of organization in China is subcontracting. Even within the government, for a thousand years, the governor-general had to pay a certain amount of money annually to the monarch, and the judicial system maintained order. The governor-general subcontracted responsibilities to the next level of local governors, who in turn subcontracted to smaller local governments. Each level of officials, when paying taxes, would have a large tax surplus. Often, this excess tax would be collected by private individuals, meaning the embezzlement of public funds... Even the Chinese army was managed on a subcontracting basis."
Taking the KMT and the CCP as an example, before the "KMT-CCP" achieved "annihilation of 100 million enemies and a stronghold on Taiwan," they still relied on landlords for grain and military leaders for fighting. Meanwhile, the other side had already established economic roots in the countryside during the War of Resistance Against Japanese Aggression, and in military terms, they established "branch branches at the company level" as early as the Sanwan Reorganization period.
Finally, although he also found it difficult to break free from the limitations of his time, he still had racist stereotypes about the Seres, such as saying that "the Chinese mind lacks mechanical thinking compared to peoples of European origin."
But he was right in some observations: "Until a few years ago, the Chinese could not be said to have any national spirit. In fact, they did not have the strong emotion that we call patriotism."
This isn't to disparage the Seres of a century ago, but modern nationalism isn't inherent. Without the crisis of national extinction, the Chinese nation wouldn't necessarily have had the unwavering resolve to become stronger at all costs.
This is why our Master Yuan did not try to prevent the outbreak of the Anti-Japanese War. He only hoped that fewer people would die in China, and that more people would die in any foreign country, no matter which country.
Hoover also had his own views on China's democratization: "With 90% of the population illiterate and the people living in extremely low standards, this idea (democracy) is impossible to achieve. However, Chinese intellectuals may have some idealistic fantasies, believing that some kind of democratic oligarchy can be established in China."
"Democracy is a Western concept, and its implementation requires the establishment of a management mechanism that we apply to production and distribution. My concern is that any true democracy in China will fail in its management."
Management first, then democracy. It’s such a simple truth, but so many people still don’t understand it a hundred years later.
Fortunately, the situation that Hoover worried about did not happen in Seris, but it was vividly reflected in several of our next-door neighbors.
At the end of Chapter 6 of his memoir, “An Engineer’s Life in China,” he issued a warning: “But everything I have said is not to denigrate this great nation. It is only to serve as a warning to Westerners that China will not be Westernized.”
Well, such a man with a keen vision and adventurous spirit did not have a good reputation in later generations. The reason is naturally because his performance during the Great Depression was really poor.
However, he really can't be blamed for this matter. If he and Coolidge had switched places, it would definitely have been the "Hoover Prosperity."
So, a person's destiny, while certainly dependent on personal struggle, also needs to take into account the course of history...
"Pika Pika."
