Spy Wars: Red Shopkeeper

Chapter 223 Traitor
"What's wrong? Why are you so angry?" Chen Bijun came out of the room.

Because she is a woman, she did not participate in such formal negotiation occasions.

"Is it because the negotiations didn't go well?"

"See for yourself!" Wang Ni said irritably, "These two idiots are going to ruin us!"

Gao Zhongwu took out the document outline and handed it to Chen Bijun.

Chen Bijun took the book and began to read it. As she read, her brows furrowed, and the more she read, the deeper her furrows became.

After reading it, he said, "How could the Japanese do something like this?"

After speaking, he looked around, but no one offered an opinion; they either didn't know what to say or were uninterested.

Chen Bijun looked at Minister Zhou, "Fo Hai, what do you think of this matter?"

Minister Zhou shook his head and sat down on the sofa without saying a word.

Seeing that Minister Zhou remained silent, Chen Bijun then looked at Gao Zhongwu and the other man, asking, "Did you raise any issues with the Japanese on the spot?"

“He did mention it.” Gao Zhongwu said in a low voice, “Minister Zhou took a look at the document and then slammed it on the table. His intentions were quite clear.”

"What's the use of showing your intentions!" Wang Ni was furious when he heard him speak, glaring at him and cursing, "How could you two be so useless as to know nothing about such a big thing!"

"Alright." Chen Bijun patted his back to comfort him. "Sit down and let's discuss it."

"What's there to discuss? Pack your things, buy plane tickets, and go back!" Wang Ni glared at Chen Bijun. "The Japanese clearly don't want to talk, and we won't sign. Staying here to eat Japanese food? Is Japanese food even good?"

“There’s no rush.” Chen Bijun didn’t argue with Wang Ni. She comforted him and told the others to sit down, “You all sit down and discuss how to handle this matter.”

"You can talk if you want! I won't talk!" Wang refused to sit down. "If we can negotiate on these terms, wouldn't I really become a Japanese lackey? Wouldn't I really become a traitor? If I signed this kind of document and the whole world found out, my lifelong reputation as a member of the Wang family would be ruined. How could I face people after that?"

"Sit down first. There are still things to deal with. Let's talk. Here, have some tea first."

Chen Bijun pressed him down to sit.

Wang Ni refused to sit down, his temper flaring. He said, utterly bewildered, "What's there to resolve? Just go back. Is this the kind of thing we need to discuss?"

"Are you never going to talk about it again?"

"If the Japanese have this attitude, what's the point of talking?"

"What about the new government? Are we abandoning it?"

"What do you want? To become a traitor?"

Don't you think so?

Chen Bijun's voice suddenly grew louder, and a question she asked silenced Wang Ni, leaving him only in disbelief and dumbfounded.

Chen Bijun said seriously, "From the moment we went to Hanoi, we were already seen as traitors by the world. Don't you realize that now?"

"I am not a traitor!"

“You’re a traitor! You’re a traitor, we’re all traitors! Anyone who associates with the Japanese is a traitor! Ask them!” Chen Bijun pointed at Gao Zhongwu and Mei Siping. “Ask them if they know they’re traitors!”

Wang glanced at them and shouted at Chen Bijun, "We are not traitors! We became traitors for the sake of peaceful nation-building, and to save 400 million people!"

"Saving the people is also treason!" Chen Bijun declared definitively. "Why can't saving the people be considered treason? We are building a peaceful nation, but until this is accomplished, we are traitors."

You shouldn't expect anyone to understand you, or to understand or approve of the 400 million people you mentioned!

In their hearts, we only have one identity: traitors, traitors who conspired with the Japanese to sell out their country!
You said you'd rather be like Goujian, enduring hardship and biding your time, than let the Japanese take over your territory!

"I admit to conspiring!"
With a weak nation and treacherous officials in power, we can only feign ignorance towards the Japanese. I understand this perfectly well!
I am willing to endure the infamy for this!

But look at this document.

Wang Zhaoming grabbed the document, flipped to the page filled with advisors, and slammed his hand on the paper, demanding, "Look at this! Look carefully! Everything requires Japanese approval. If such a government is established, is it a Japanese government or my government, Wang Zhaoming's government?"
King Goujian of Yue was able to endure hardship and humiliation because he still had his own troops, waiting for the opportune moment to strike and kill the enemy!
I can endure the infamy, I can bear the label of traitor, but only if I have soldiers! Soldiers for Goujian's revenge!

But what about us? If we agree to this document, what will we use to build up our strength?

Military power, financial power, personnel power? All of these will be under the supervision of the Japanese. We need their approval for everything we do. How can we possibly achieve our goals?
We may not be able to defeat the Japanese, but what we want is cooperation, not to be their colony!

"How do you know you definitely can't finish if you don't do it?" Chen Bijun retorted. "Don't say that the conditions offered by the Japanese are negotiable. We haven't signed anything yet, so can't we talk? Negotiation is negotiation."

Even if this is the final draft.

"If the Japanese send advisors to China, in Nanjing and Shanghai, does that mean we're destined to have no way to build up our strength?"

"How can we accumulate savings? Didn't you see that everything requires the Japanese's approval?"

"It all depends on human effort!"

He's just an advisor, but everyone else in the government is on our side. If the Japanese want to be advisors, can he possibly advise them all?

"How long will that take? What if we fail? Will we really become traitors?"

"Failure would be easy. If you fail, would you still be called a traitor? If you fail, you've helped China preserve its seeds, and China hasn't perished."

"You can't expect to fail before you've even tried. Why don't you ask Goujian what he would have done if he had failed?"
It took Goujian more than ten years to succeed, while we've only had half a year at most. Do you know what will happen in the next ten years?
You said you'd wait for the wind to rise, then strike and kill the enemy!
Can't we wait for this opportunity?

You can't wait that long?
You spent several years fighting against Chiang Kai-shek as vice president, and now that you can be president, why can't you fight against the Japanese?

If you give up now, yes, we can go back without signing the agreement.

Why go back?
Go back to the controlled areas, kneel down before Chiang Kai-shek, and ask him for a vice president position?

Even if you were to swallow your pride and kneel before him, would Chiang Kai-shek grant you that honor? He would be overjoyed to receive you, and even happier once you knelt down. He would agree to give you a vice president position, then have reporters take photos of you and publish them on the front page of every newspaper, with the title "Wang Zhaoming's Confession to Chiang Kai-shek!"
Chiang Kai-shek has the support of the people; if you, Wang Jingwei, have the nerve to be the vice president, then you can continue to be one!

"I'm going back to being an ordinary citizen!"

"The Japanese will never treat you as an ordinary citizen! The whole world knows about your statements made in Shanghai. As long as you live, the Japanese will use your name to do everything for you!"

"I won't stay in the Japanese-occupied zone; I'll go to Hong Kong, I'll go abroad!"

"Then you are still a traitor. You are already a traitor today. You will still be a traitor if you go abroad. Moreover, you will be a traitor who will never have a chance to turn things around!"

Chiang Kai-shek will not let you go, the Military Intelligence Bureau will not let you go, all of China will not let you go, and even the Japanese will not let you go. You, us, and all those who followed us will die! Your whole family will die!

Are you willing to die? Are you content with this? You, Wang Jingwei, are a genius, why should you be subordinate to Chiang Kai-shek?

If you quit now, Chiang Kai-shek will laugh himself to death.

If Chiang Kai-shek were ever beaten so badly by the Japanese that he turned around and negotiated peace with them, you'd be laughing all the more.

We put you aside being a mascot of the Nationalist government in Chongqing, a vice president who was well-fed and cared for, and then you came to Shanghai, mingled with the Japanese, and came back with the label of traitor. Well, you found it too troublesome and ran away.

I can still vividly picture Chiang Kai-shek's laughing face when he found out about this.

Wang Ni fell silent.

"Sit down first. There are still things to deal with. Let's talk. Come, have some tea to calm your mind."

Chen Bijun pressed him down to sit, and then sat down herself, calming everyone down before asking the question.

"Fo Hai, what do you think of this matter? Why did the Japanese change their attitude so quickly?"

Minister Zhou frowned and sighed deeply: "Looking back now, the Japanese were luring us into their trap step by step, and their attitude has probably never changed."

“How come you see?”

“Look, at the beginning, the military sent Takeo Imai to contact us and promised to let Mr. Wang come out and establish a peaceful country. They said they didn’t want reparations or land, and that they would withdraw their troops in two years.”

Then they lured us to Hanoi.

He had just arrived in Hanoi and issued a statement that Konoe had stepped down. The Japanese then started talking about wanting Manchuria and Inner Mongolia, saying it was to defend against Soviet Russia.

We've been at odds for so long, and haven't agreed yet. If it weren't for the assassination attempt, we probably wouldn't have come to Shanghai anytime soon.

I'm starting to suspect that the assassination attempt was carried out by the Military Intelligence Bureau; it seems more like the Japanese did it to force us to come to Shanghai.

These words struck a chord with Wang Ni. If he hadn't been assassinated at home and lost his secretary, he wouldn't have rushed to Shanghai, and the Japanese wouldn't have thought it would be so easy for them to come.

Minister Zhou continued, “We agreed when we came to Shanghai, thinking it was over, but now we’ve come to Japan and they want to supervise our new government and have advisory rights.”

Step by step, they are testing our bottom line, crossing it. Doesn't it seem like this was all pre-planned? Perhaps this has always been the Japanese's goal.

Wang Ni, who was already wavering, asked upon hearing this, "Do you also think we shouldn't agree?"

Minister Zhou glanced at him, thought for a moment, and said, "I think we can still talk about it."

As Bijun said, what can we do if we don't talk about it now?
We've done the propaganda; your Greater East Asia Co-Prosperity Sphere theory has spread all over the world through newspapers and radio. Is Sino-Japanese friendship really going to turn so so after we go back?

The recruitment has been completed, and the talk of establishing a new government has been made. Some people have already arrived in Shanghai, and some are on their way. If we say that the new government will not be established, what will happen to these people?
Invitations to the Sixth Congress have already been sent out. Now, many people from Shanghai have set off to various places to find people to bring back to attend the Sixth Congress. So, will the Sixth Congress still be held? If we don't hold it, will the Japanese kill all these people?
Now that things have come to this, we're in a bind.

Only by negotiating with the Japanese, obtaining favorable terms, and establishing a new government can we at least save the people in the occupied territories from dying in the war. Even if we bear the infamy, we will have a clear conscience.

"It's all your fault!" Wang Ni was furious when he thought about it and yelled at Gao Zhongwu and Mei Siping.

If the negotiators hadn't failed to understand the Japanese intentions, he wouldn't have ended up in such a predicament!

"Do you think we should talk?" Wang Ni asked Chen Bijun.

Chen Bijun nodded, "I would rather die as the wife of a traitorous CEO than as the wife of an ordinary traitor."

Wang Ni looked at Minister Zhou, "You also think we should talk?"

Minister Zhou nodded: "We must talk."

The most important thing is the opinions of these two people.

It's still not too late for him to leave Japan. As long as he hasn't signed the documents, everything can be null and void.

He knew that what the Japanese wanted was his influence and appeal.

As long as he doesn't sign, the Japanese won't succeed.

But if he didn't sign, the memory of Chiang Kai-shek's ridicule would still fill him with anger.

And what about their personal safety in the future?
It's hard to ride a tiger.

“Then let’s talk.” Wang Ni looked at Gao Zhongwu and Mei Siping. “Don’t take the initiative to talk. First, reject it completely. We can’t let the Japanese think we are easy to talk to anymore.”

We must fight for every right we can obtain.

The Japanese asked for a lot, so we gave them a lot in return, whether it was money or equipment.

And that advisory system—we can't agree to it entirely, otherwise how will we get things done in the future? We must strive to gain some initiative.

You two need to know your limits and not disappoint me again.

(End of this chapter)