1932: Playing with the Japanese Communist Party with a doll

The answer is beans of different colors, each color of bean represents a candidate, and then by counting the number of beans, you will know how many votes there are.

There was no other way. Most of the people were illiterate, so they had to resort to this method. While carrying out publicity in the early stages, they also hung signs on the scene and posted a few staff members there to explain:

Yellow beans represent "Zhang Xueliang", mung beans represent "Chiang Kai-shek", red beans represent "CCP", black beans represent "Fujiwara Kanezane", white beans represent "Yan Xishan", and green beans represent "Song Zheyuan".

In fact, everyone knows that most people only cast four kinds of beans: yellow, green, red, and black. The others are all just there to make up the numbers. Even if someone casts for others, there won't be many.

The observers sent by Zhang Xueliang recorded the voting results they saw and went back to report after 5 p.m.

Soon, the headquarters received the full picture information

As expected, most of the Peking celebrities and college students at the front of the line received soybeans, and only a small number of people received red beans, green beans or black beans, and then solemnly put their "votes" into the "ballot box".

After the ordinary people who had just come to watch the fun confirmed that they really had the right to vote, they also became interested and chattered for a while. Most people still chose yellow beans, and only a few chose black beans.

In short, the vast majority of people in the six inner city districts chose soybeans, and at least half of the people in the five outer city districts also chose soybeans.

This is completely understandable.

The inner city district was the one that had the closest contact with Zhang Xueliang, was the most famous among the wealthy and famous, was the most heavily guarded, and was also the district that suffered the least damage in the recent riots;

Zhang Xueliang rarely went to the outer city area, where the middle class, ordinary civilians and the poor were relatively poor and suffered the heaviest losses in the recent riots.

Even so, as mentioned before, ordinary people don't have much choice. Instead of waiting for an unknown force to treat them well, it's better to just make do with what they have now. What else can they do?

Anyway, the Northeast Army usually just gave people food and drink without paying and harassed women, but they did not kill or burn people easily, which was indeed the "style of a royal army."

"Okay, okay!"

Cheers broke out again and again in the headquarters.

The overall situation has been decided. It seems that the overall situation has been decided!

In Peking, our Northeast Army still has to rule the country!

However, Zhang Xueliang and others overlooked one thing:

There are still 8 districts in the suburbs of Peking where the results are yet to come out!

Well, it’s not that Zhang Xueliang and his group forgot, but because most of the people in the suburbs are illiterate peasants, and there aren’t many people. Even if they voted, how could they possibly influence the overall situation?!

At that time, there were about 150 million people in Peking. Although the inner and outer cities had about 100 million people, it is impossible that all 50 people in the outer city voted, and none of them voted for Zhang Xueliang, right?

This is indeed true when analyzing from the data, but some things are just fucking "anti-data".

Because he did not pay much attention to the suburbs, Zhang Xueliang did not send any special observers, but many of the supervisors and referendum staff on site were also his people. They watched the beans being taken away and thrown into the box, and they broke out in a cold sweat.

Black beans, black beans, black beans, black beans...why are they all black beans!!!

Are these people crazy?

Japanese who surrendered to the Northeast??

Seeing that the black beans in the "bean storage box" were getting less and less and even not enough, but there were still so many people queuing up, each of them coming for the black beans, and some even brought their own black beans, Zhang Xueliang's people felt very desperate.

Could it be that Beiping is really going to change hands in this way?

Democracy, democracy, this slogan has been shouted for decades, but whether in China or the world, very few can truly practice it.

Zhang Xueliang only knew that Fujiwara no Kanezane implemented many "benevolent policies" after taking over the Northeast, but he was very vague about where the "benevolence" of these benevolent policies lay and who they benefited from.

Therefore, he did not know that Fujiwara no Kanemitsu was much more popular in rural areas of Northeast China than in urban areas.

Divide the fields, mountains, houses, gold and silver, livestock, and production tools; build roads; fight against bandits and local tyrants; provide medical care and education.

Even the Red Army couldn't do what he did!

Because Fujiwara no Kanezane said at the beginning that the Northeast does not need the existence of any landlords, so the attitude towards landlords can be summed up in one word:

Kill kill kill kill kill kill!

Have any “good landlords” or “kind landlords” died unjustly?

Definitely!

And there might be quite a few!

But he was a "Japanese royal family" who did not need to rely on Chinese landlords to rule Northeast China. He was even a "foreigner". Why did he care whether the landlords cursed him or praised him?

He only needs to care about whether the officers and soldiers under his command, who are children of farmers and workers, are happy or not!

The extermination of landlords and the steady implementation of numerous people-friendly policies resulted in the complete liberation of farmers and rural areas and unprecedented good days for farmers in Northeast China.

"Hit the roe deer with a stick, scoop the fish with a ladle, and the pheasant flies into the rice pot" has really become a reality.

It is no exaggeration to say that the lives of farmers in Northeast China are now better than those of farmers in a certain period of "three increases and five unifications, and pulling cattle and stealing houses" a few decades later.

After all, there's no such thing as a "fine for having more children than allowed." The only "agricultural tax" is the 15% rent. Cunning farmers even underreport their output from time to time, and no one from above investigates. So, life must be pretty good, right?

Ordinary farmers, especially the former poor tenant farmers, almost every household enshrines the tablet of "Hachimangu Kanezane-oh" and wishes him a long life every day.

Out of simple gratitude and their own interests, everyone truly loved and respected the foreign ruler.

What happens outside the Great Wall will in turn affect what happens inside the Great Wall.

Before the "September 918th Incident", there was already a lot of exchanges between the people inside and outside the Great Wall. After the "Battle of Rehe", Fujiwara no Kanezane forced Zhang Xueliang to open the border, which led to closer exchanges and contacts between the two sides.

Under the influence of the infiltration of a large number of intelligence personnel and the propaganda of the self-motivated patriots, true and false news from outside the Great Wall continued to flow into the Great Wall. In addition to disrupting the morale of the Northeast Army, it also disturbed the hearts of the farmers near Peking:

We're not far from the Northeast!

Why can they live such a good life while we have to suffer from hunger and even have no food to eat after paying rent and taxes?

Not to mention that many farmers in the Northeast are related to the people near Peking, so the "sense of unfairness" is even more obvious.

Those who are bold and proactive had already fled to the Northeast in the previous wave of "immigration". Some of them even took time to come back to pick up their wives and children and show off a bit, making the rest of the people even more envious.

Originally, these people could only bite their fingers and envy, but who would have thought that with so many bad things happening in Peking, Zhang Xueliang would suddenly come up with the idea of ​​a "national referendum"?

You know, at the request of Fujiwara no Kanezane, after more than a year of development, almost every town and village around Peiping has at least one intelligence officer from the Ministry of Internal Affairs stationed there.

Although their control over the countryside is certainly not as strong as that of the CCP in Northeast China and the areas where they established their bases in history, and they cannot easily stage a "rural encirclement of the cities" strategy, at least they can follow orders and encourage the peasants to vote in black beans!

Are local landlords objecting or causing trouble?

Haha, comrades from the KGB’s Peking Branch, it’s your turn to perform.

Therefore, under the instigation of some people, the farmers who learned that they could make Fujiwara no Kanezane the ruler of Peking by "throwing beans" rushed to the polling stations in various villages to vote.

These behind-the-scenes manipulations were unknown to the general public. The referendum committee members, watching the "catastrophic collapse" unfold before their eyes, were devastated and wanted to take all the soybeans out of the storage bins and dump them all into the "ballot box."

But they dare not!

In order to ensure "fairness, justice and openness," Zhang Xueliang invited not only the referendum committee staff but also many Peking celebrities and university students to supervise the process.

There was really no other way. They could only try to interrupt the voting by saying, "It's getting dark and the voting must end," and "We have to go back to count the results." But how could the farmers, who had seen a glimmer of hope, agree to this?

Not only do the farmers disagree, but the third-party supervisors also disagree!

So, since the situation is not favorable to you, Zhang Xueliang, you're planning to resort to some cunning tactics?

Are you just pretending to be democratic?

票!

If you have the guts, just kill us all. Otherwise, why don't you allow us to continue voting?

Under the instigation of certain people, the anger of the farmers and the urging of the supervisors, the staff of the referendum committee could only be forced to stay where they were and let the voting continue until it really got dark and no one came to vote.

Perhaps because it was dark, they felt that the harvest in the box was all black beans...

482 Referendum is a mess

the Hangover.

Zhang Xueliang, who had originally promised his generals that "I would never drink alcohol in my life until the Northeast was recovered", eventually broke his oath.

During this period... no, these past few months... no, since the "918 Incident", he hasn't received any good news. The mental pressure has been so great that his addiction to drugs has become more and more serious;

His decision to hold a referendum this time was influenced not only by the US President's visit to China, communism, and other political considerations, but also by a certain temper tantrum and a desperate attempt to break the jar.

Anyway, I'm already like this, so I can do whatever I want!

So, when the rare "good news" came out, he also let himself go completely, got drunk, and even had a drug-fueled party.

It was not until after noon the next day that Marshal Zhang woke up with a tired look on his face, hugging the two prostitutes he had hired, and happily waited at home for the voting results of the next day.

He had made preparations long ago. If he found that something was wrong, he would ask his confidants Yan Baohang, Pan Wenyu and others to organize trustworthy soldiers to disguise themselves as ordinary people and go to various polling stations to vote for soybeans repeatedly.

However, judging by the voting results on the first day, this dishonorable tactic, which would ruin his reputation if discovered, is probably not necessary.

Such a big event as the "Peking Referendum" certainly cannot be completed in one day - it will officially start on the 24th, last for a total of 7 days, and completely end on April 30th. The official total statistics and announcement of the final results will be made on May 1st.

In addition, although it is said that "all people" are voting, it is actually impossible to achieve "all people". Even if so many people are willing to vote, Beijing does not have such strong organizational power.

Zhang Xueliang and others estimated that it would be good if 10 to 20 people would eventually participate in the voting, and it was even certain that there would be many who voted repeatedly.

But so what?

Even if there is, you can't find it!

So why, on the second day, was Marshal Zhang still unaware of the dire conditions at the polling stations in the suburbs?

The reason is that the referendum committee staff were extremely anxious and dared not leave the scene because they were supervising each other.

The so-called "referendum" was actually not unfamiliar to the people of Beijing. If you think about it for a moment, you will know that it is just an expanded version of the "Congressional Voting"!

However, because Peking had previously witnessed the shameful and nationwide scandal of "Cao Kun's vote-buying," when Zhang Xueliang proposed a referendum this time, all sectors of Peking worked together to take precautions.

For example, Lu Shuren's younger brother Zhou Zuoren publicly proposed that "in order to ensure fairness and justice, a joint supervision group composed of people from all walks of life in Peking must be established to monitor the ballot boxes and staff 24 hours a day."

There were many similar suggestions. The final result was not completely flawless, but Marshal Zhang and his staff, who did not think they would lose and therefore did not intend to deliberately exploit loopholes, could not find any of them, let alone those rough generals.

As for the Communists under Marshal Zhang, such as Pan Wenyu, although he found many problems, he did not raise them because the "observation order" of the Party Central Committee was there.

Therefore, there were no Zhang Xueliang "observers" at the suburban polling stations, and the staff involved in voting management couldn't even get out, so how could they report the situation?!

When Marshal Zhang saw the favorable voting results in the city, didn't he think the outcome was decided?

suburbs?

what?

What is a suburb?

"Send someone..."

After washing up, Zhang Xueliang, looking very happy, was about to send someone to inquire about the voting situation today when Yan Baohang rushed in:

"Han Gong! The Central Army has entered Fujian! Situ Fei, Mao Weishou, and others have sent a telegram to surrender to Chiang Kai-shek!

The gate to northern Fujian has been opened! The 19th Route Army is finished!

"ah??!!

Like almost everyone who heard the news, Zhang Xueliang was stunned and speechless, and the thought came to his mind, "When did Chiang Kai-shek become so powerful?"

He executed Jiang Xiaoxian and held the referendum, largely because he saw the Shanghai Uprising, the Fujian and Guangdong Rebellion, and Chiang Kai-shek was already deeply mired in the quagmire of Jiangsu and Zhejiang.

Now, Chiang Kai-shek actually broke through the northern Fujian gate, which everyone thought was the most heavily defended, in just one day. Will the Central Army turn around and deal with me in a few days?

Thus, Zhang Xueliang was instantly drawn to this sudden and completely unexpected event, coupled with the big job that a certain Northeastern King had done on the sea in Quanzhou, the result was:

For the next six days, Zhang Xueliang, his team, and even most of the military and political personnel in Peking were completely focused on Fujian.

Peking referendum?

Oops, put it aside!

How could such a sure-win matter be as important as the Fujian War, a major military and national event that could influence China's future?

If the people above have this attitude, the people below will naturally follow suit.

After two days of observation, the observers in the city found that most of the money was from soybeans, so they began to slack off. They would clock in in the morning and immediately go out to eat, drink, gamble, and go back in the evening to report that "the advantage is mine".

As for the polling stations in the suburbs, when the staff saw that no one cared about them, they gave up their little ideas and honestly poured out more and more black beans from the boxes, counted them, sent them out, and then collected them back.

Repeat voting?

Campaigning for votes?

Statistical error?

Just turn a blind eye. If the higher-ups don't care, anyone who cares about these things is a fool!

In this way, 1933 passed April and arrived at May 1st.

At this time, the overall situation in Fujian had been decided. Under the deterrence of a naval force's exercises, the main force of Chiang Kai-shek's army and the remnants of the 19th Route Army were forced to stop and confront each other near Quanzhou, unable to fight or surrender.