The Ministry of Foreign Affairs building in the New Capital stood amidst a desolate landscape; only a residential area near the Ministry was brightly lit. Across from the residential area, two commercial buildings had also opened for business. In a café on the second floor of one of them, Yan Huiqing sat by the window with the special envoy dispatched by French President Gaston Doumergue.

Although called a café, it also served meals like steak. Yan Huiqing saw Minister de Broglie, the French President's special envoy, looking out the window, and did not disturb this celebrity from a French princely family as he took in the novelty. After all, such a desolate capital was likely unique in the world at this moment. If Yan Huiqing saw such a strange sight in another country, he would also study it very seriously.

After watching for a moment, Minister de Broglie withdrew his gaze and asked, "I see very excellent urban planning here; the spirit is very grand."

Yan Huiqing smiled, "I heard that your family has very excellent scientific scholars. I wonder which members of your family are masters of architecture?"

"My family has many masters studying medieval history, but no masters of architecture yet. However, we in France have a great many masters of architecture," Minister de Broglie answered.

Yan Huiqing did not pick up on this thread. Friendly exchange was completely different from hiring French architects for urban construction, so he continued to lower his head and eat his steak. Minister de Broglie asked: "Mr. Minister, I will convey Chairman He's views on peace to our Mr. President. In this part, do you have anything else to add?"

Minister de Broglie, the special envoy of the French President, came to China for two things. Establishing Sino-French diplomatic relations was naturally the most important content. Now, rumors had already been heard inside the French Parliament that the current government wanted to recognize the He Rui government. Up to now, no firm opponents had appeared. So once this proposal was delivered to Parliament, it should be able to pass.

The other matter was to pass on French President Gaston Doumergue's peace initiative to the He Rui government. He Rui had already expressed his appreciation for the French side's peace propositions to Minister de Broglie. To put it more bluntly, He Rui acknowledged that France was qualified to mediate the Sino-British war.

This was a huge goodwill gesture expressed by the He Rui government to the French government. If countries like Belgium or Spain proposed 'mediation', the Chinese government would only state, "We have noted the xxx government's call for peace. The Chinese government has always loved peace, and we are happy to see calls for peace internationally. However, the British government's various crimes in Myanmar must be reckoned with."

The British government would likely make a similar statement, but it was more likely that the British government would ignore it completely. After all, those who want to persuade a fight must have their own status of strength. Countries like Belgium and Spain had absolutely no strength to influence Europe, so on what basis could they pop up to participate in 'peace' actions?

Since Minister de Broglie wanted to finalize things one last time, Yan Huiqing stated immediately, "China has always been committed to peace, and this war is also for the sake of peace. I think the French government should have a deep understanding of this."

These were official words, but also the truth. Minister de Broglie nodded in agreement. If China wanted to acquire colonies, it could completely march south to attack the French colony of Indochina. The difficulty of seizing Indochina was much smaller than fighting in Myanmar. If China really wanted to fight a war for hegemony with Britain, after seizing Myanmar, it should continue to attack India without stopping. If Britain lost India, the British Empire would become an ordinary European power.

Since China did neither, and consistently demanded to resolve the issue of establishing diplomatic relations with Britain, its strategic goal of pursuing peace was self-evident. Precisely because the French upper echelons all understood this, and the French side also roughly determined that the British upper echelons also understood this and had the willingness to accept it, did they come out to be this peace mediator.

Seeing that Minister de Broglie expressed his attitude, Yan Huiqing continued: "Peace is peace, armistice is armistice. What we pursue is peace. We are not afraid of Britain using an armistice as an excuse to stall for time and prepare for the next military offensive."

Hearing this, Minister de Broglie couldn't help but laugh out loud. Although the diplomatic circles of various countries considered Yan Huiqing a mild person, it was inevitable that he would have some nationalist sentiments. After all, a few years ago, Yan Huiqing was still excluded from negotiations at various international conferences. Humans, after all, always have a breath they want to fight for.

Fortunately, Yan Huiqing did not keep expressing nationalist sentiments continuously. He just said this one sentence and stopped. At this time, there was not much steak left. Yan Huiqing finished the beef, lifted his coffee cup to take a sip, and then continued: "Minister de Broglie, will the signing of various treaties between China and France proceed simultaneously with the establishment of diplomatic relations, or will it begin very soon after?"

Generally speaking, treaties including politics, economics, security, and immigration would only begin to be signed after two countries formally established diplomatic relations. Unless the two countries encountered some matters where time was tight and the task heavy would they proceed simultaneously. The diplomatic circle valued appropriateness in doing things. Proceeding with these contents simultaneously would present a risk: if the personnel from both sides responsible for specific work had disagreements during discussions, it might affect the progress of establishing diplomatic relations. It might even cause the establishment of relations to stagnate or even regress.

Minister de Broglie naturally knew of this. However, the current government also needed a political achievement at this time to boost its prestige. After various choices, Sino-French diplomatic relations were undoubtedly the safest choice. Moreover, after Sino-French diplomatic relations were established, France could formally mediate the Sino-British conflict. Since the end of the Napoleonic Wars, Britain had always won its foreign wars; this was the first time it encountered a situation where it could not go on fighting.

Any French government that took this 'First Blood' against Britain in 200 years could gain unprecedented achievements in domestic politics and international prestige. No politician or statesman would be willing to give up this opportunity. This was also the reason why the current French government was willing to take a little risk to push for diplomatic relations.

The French President's special envoy, Minister de Broglie, soon left the New Capital, taking a special plane of China Airlines again. With the experience of Chinese Minister of Commerce Morrison flying back to China from Europe, the plane took off from Zhengzhou and headed all the way north, entering the Soviet Union, passing through Germany, and flying back to Paris. Flying thousands of kilometers, the Chinese twin-engine civil airliner did not experience any malfunctions, making Minister de Broglie greatly appreciate the strength of Chinese aviation.

On July 3, 1926, before France had completely resolved the economic disputes arising from the end of China's unification war, the French government announced, "At the invitation of the Chinese government, the French Foreign Minister will visit China."

After the British government learned the news, they had the feeling that the other boot had finally dropped. Learning the news that the French Foreign Minister was actually taking a Chinese plane to China, some personnel within the British government naturally gave birth to the expectation that the plane would have an accident. However, their expectation did not become reality. On July 10, the French Foreign Minister and his party arrived smoothly in the Chinese capital.

On July 15, the French government announced an invitation for Chinese Foreign Minister Yan Huiqing to visit France. On July 20, the French Foreign Minister led his team back to Paris. On July 25, the diplomatic team led by Republic of China Foreign Minister Yan Huiqing arrived in Paris.

On July 28, immediately after Yan Huiqing led his team to France, the French Parliament voted and passed the proposal for Sino-French diplomatic relations with a high number of votes.

On July 30, the Chinese government stated that diplomatic relations would be formally established in the Capital on August 6.

Government officials of the two countries shuttled back and forth between the two countries so frequently, following formal procedures. After all, both China and France were great powers. No matter how urgent, not a single necessary procedure could be missing, nor could they be simplified.

On August 6, the exhausted French Foreign Minister had someone apply makeup for him, wanting to show his best state in the films and photos taken at the signing venue. The proud French nation must appear in the images in its best appearance.

On August 7, the second day after the establishment of Sino-French diplomatic relations, British newspapers immediately published views on this matter: "Fight into Zhengzhou, capture He Rui alive." "Lock He Rui in a cage and send him to India to be paraded through the streets."

On August 9, He Rui also published an article titled "Carry Victory to the End". In the article, He Rui wrote impassionedly: '...The British bandit gang is a grasshopper after the autumn harvest; they won't be hopping for many more days. China pursues justice and peace and is receiving the support of righteous forces from all countries in the world. Victory will ultimately belong to us. However long the British bandit gang wants to fight, we will fight the British bandit gang for that long! However long the Baldwin government wants to fight us, we will fight the Baldwin government for that long!

...We will liberate the entire India from British colonial rule. In accordance with China's cultural tradition of "reviving the perished and restoring the broken lines of succession", we will restore the various states of India that possess long histories. We absolutely cannot let the Indian people continue to suffer. The light of civilization and justice will surely shine on the land of India, dispelling the dark rule of Britain for the past 200 years...'

Everyone was a thousand-year-old fox; this *Liaozhai* (charade) had to be played out. At a high-level meeting of the Chinese government, He Rui stated very happily, "If the British government wants face, and if they accepted French peace without saying anything, wouldn't it become a case where the French government can make decisions for Britain? It is the same for us. It is precisely because we look forward to peace that we must give France space to intervene..."

Although the members of the He Rui government were all very young—at least as high-level government officials—even the 40-year-old Zhao Tianlin was excessively young for a minister. Although the young core government officials might not necessarily like playing *Liaozhai*, they also knew that they had to play it out.

Sure enough, on August 13, French President Gaston Doumergue formally issued an appeal, "The war between China and Britain has greatly affected world peace. The French government will dispatch special envoys to visit China and Britain to mediate the war and restore peace."

He Rui handed this matter over to Yan Huiqing to handle. Judging from Yan Huiqing's performance up to now, he was competent for this job. Just as He Rui continued to focus his attention on domestic economic construction and asked his secretary to call Wu Youping over, Zhao Tianlin called, saying there was a semi-academic matter he wanted to chat with He Rui about.

There was a big gap between official business and academics. He Rui would also discuss academic issues with Zhao Tianlin, but for the past year or so, the two had no time to talk about academic issues. Since Zhao Tianlin's attitude was clear, He Rui left a little time for Zhao Tianlin before dragging Wu Youping over for a lecture.

After Zhao Tianlin entered He Rui's office, he first looked at the surrounding secretaries but did not speak. The secretaries were busy, and at this time they all looked at He Rui. Seeing He Rui nod, the secretaries all withdrew.

Without wasting words, Zhao Tianlin pulled up a chair and sat opposite He Rui, "Chairman, after we liberate the India region in the future, are we going to dismember it?"

He Rui was stunned, and frowned rarely. There were very few comrades in the party who truly held the concept of liberating the globe with communism, but such comrades with an internationalist view were few. Just as Wu Youping hinted that Zhong Yifu did not want to give up Myanmar which was already in hand, at that time Wu Youping felt Zhong Yifu had some communist concepts. He Rui felt that based on his understanding of Zhong Yifu, this guy was about the same as most other comrades who graduated from the Beiyang Military Academy; he probably combined China's concept of 'benevolent governance' and wanted to be a 'good imperialist'.

To put it bluntly, even for intellectuals with a strong sense of justice like Zhao Tianlin, the proportion of imperialist thinking in their thoughts made He Rui not very optimistic.

But among the comrades, one who could understand the necessity of 'dismembering India' at the current stage would be a true talent.

He Rui felt that he indeed believed in communism, and one of the foundations of communism was historical materialism. India's development in another spacetime proved that India had no way to break through from a pre-modern state on its own; heavy historical baggage prevented India from becoming a modern state.

If India was forcibly rubbed into one country after being liberated, heaven knows what India would produce. Only by dismembering India could the reactionary forces of India be weakened, thereby solving the social development problems of various regions one by one.

Although He Rui was not sure if the person who proposed 'liberating the India region' and 'dismembering India' had the same judgment of the future as himself, a person who could propose such a clear view indeed needed to be met.

"Who proposed it?" He Rui asked.

"It was Professor Li," Zhao Tianlin answered.