The Historical Achievements of the Boxer Movement

The greatest achievement of the Boxer Rebellion should be that it shattered the imperialists' arrogant plan to carve up China, so that the powers failed to turn China into its colony.

Although the climax of the Boxer Rebellion lasted only three months, it finally failed under the betrayal of the Qing government and the suppression of reactionary forces at home and abroad, but its great achievements were obvious to all. To sum up, its achievements are as follows: it prevented the imperialist powers from dividing up China, preserved China's centuries-old culture, prevented the possible outbreak of imperialist war, and promoted the awakening of the broad masses of people in China, becoming "one of the cornerstones of the great victory of the China people fifty years later". These achievements are mainly in China; However, some of them also involve the world and have world historical significance:

And prevented the imperialist powers from dividing up China.

The Boxer Rebellion prevented the imperialist powers from dividing China through the heroic fighting of the Boxer Rebellion and the alleviation of the three carving-up crises. The relief of these three carve-up crises is:1the first relief of the carve-up crisis formed by the allied declaration on June 20, 900; On July 3, the second relief of the divide-and-conquer crisis formed by the American "john hay ultimatum"; The Third Mitigation of the Divide-and-conquer Crisis Formed by the Agreement of 65438+ 10/6 between Britain and Germany. The process of three detentes, from the so-called limited military action to "territorial and administrative integrity" and from "benefit sharing" to "gaining territorial interests" without taking advantage of the situation in China, became more specific and clear each time, and some imperialist robbers who had territorial ambitions and tried to fish in troubled waters finally failed to achieve their goals. Therefore, by alleviating the three carve-up crises in the Boxer Movement, the imperialist powers were prevented from carving up China.

The Boxer Rebellion attacked the imperialist aggressors with its heroic fighting spirit, making them afraid to do whatever they want, and had to stop urgently to stop their crime of partition and rule. Only relying on justice instead of heroic fighting to achieve this cause will eventually be empty talk and accomplish nothing. The imperialist powers will never stop their crazy crimes because they plunder the injustice of the colonies; Why else have many parts of the world become their colonies? This so-called "terrible truth" is common in world history.

The Boxer Rebellion was able to prevent the great powers from dividing up China because it was a national uprising movement and a national democratic revolutionary movement. This movement cannot be suppressed by the military forces of imperialism and feudalism. The history of China people's struggle against foreign church aggression for decades proves that it flourished after repeated repression. "wildfire never quite consumes them, the spring breeze is blowing high" precisely because it has the nature of the national democratic revolutionary movement. On this basis, the boxer movement developed, and its nature became more obvious and its scale was much larger.

Preserved the culture and civilization of China.

Since the Boxer Rebellion prevented the imperialist powers from dividing up China, it correspondingly preserved China's centuries-old culture and enabled the ancient Chinese civilization to survive in the era of the largest territorial plunder in world history. China's long-standing culture and civilization have been preserved, which is the direct result of China not being carved up politically by imperialist powers.

The development of world culture and civilization has always influenced, infiltrated and supplemented each other. Needless to say, because the modern western industrial revolution did not spread to China, China fell behind in cultural development. However, it can absorb advanced western culture and catch up. Catch up. Just as the compass, papermaking, printing and gunpowder, four great inventions representing China culture, once helped to end the "dark ages" in medieval Europe, China culture and civilization are likely to make great contributions to world culture and civilization in the future. In the Boxer Rebellion, the heroic Boxer Rebellion dared to face the "challenge" of the imperialist powers called "Eight-Nation Alliance" and made a "response", regarding the so-called Chinese nation as "an uncivilized group", "a group of lifeless people" and "a group of sick people in East Asia without national aspirations", and regarded China as "a hopeless patient". It has been swept away, which proves that the Chinese nation is "a nation with glorious revolutionary tradition and excellent historical heritage" and "China is one of the earliest civilized countries in the world", and its culture is not aging, but has strong vitality. "Without challenges, there will be no spark of creation". The response of the Boxer Rebellion to the challenge of imperialism to carve up China proved that China's culture and civilization had its survival value and strength, and China's century-old culture and civilization were thus preserved, and the achievements of the Boxer Rebellion were immortal.

Including a possible imperialist war.

If the Boxer Rebellion, which broke out in an all-round way in 1900, once prevented the imperialist powers from carving up China, in a sense, it correspondingly prevented the possible outbreak of the imperialist war launched by the imperialist powers to carve up China's territory. If the Boxer Rebellion never stopped the great powers from carving up China, then the two imperialist countries, Japan and Russia, spared no expense to compete for the sphere of influence in northeast China. However, the imperialist war that took place at this time is probably not a Russo-Japanese war, but a British-Russian war. It is also possible that more than two countries participated in the imperialist war. Of course, there is also the possibility that the imperialist powers can carve up China peacefully through consultation, although this possibility is difficult to realize.

Awakening of national consciousness

The Boxer Rebellion marks the awakening of China's national consciousness in the modern sense and is the origin of modern nationalism in China. O 'Frye demonstrated the Boxer Rebellion in the article "Financial Control of China by the Great Powers". He said: "As for the reasons for its rise, Lawton quoted a notice issued by Yu Dongcheng, the leader of the Boxer Rebellion, which said:' If foreigners plunder China people's land, food and clothes through trade and missionary work, they will not only slander our sacred religion, but also poison us with opium and insult us with lewdness. Since Daoguang, he has occupied our land and cheated us of our money; Treat our children as food and our debts as a mountain base; Burn our palaces and destroy our country; Occupy Shanghai, ravage Taiwan Province Province, force JIAOZHOU, and try to carve up China. "As can be seen from this notice, although the rise of the Boxer Rebellion first occurred in fantasy, it is obviously the awakening of the national spirit. In a letter to John Hayward, William W. Rockhill, the US special envoy to China, said: "Sir Hurd believes that the Boxer Rebellion is a patriotic movement for China to get rid of the shackles of foreigners and strive for national liberation. "The enthusiasm and energy shown by the Boxer Movement made Eight-Nation Alliance's commander and German general Vadexi deeply feel:" China people are full of infinite vitality. ""No matter Europe, America and, they have no brain power or physical strength to rule a quarter of the creatures in the world! " (But in 1903, there was another carve-up crisis around the Northeast: "Because Russia occupied the sky, countries should implement a carve-up policy.") The British philosopher Russell also said in The Question of China that once the enthusiasm of timid and gentle China people is aroused, they may become the most reckless gamblers in the world. The comments in People's Republic of China (PRC)'s history books after 1949 obviously have Mao Zedong's personal color: the failure of the Boxer Rebellion against imperialist aggression proved that there would be no victory of the people's revolution without correct guiding ideology.

The Boxer Movement in the late Qing Dynasty, the May 4th Movement against Article 21 and the May 30th Movement of the Republic of China were the three major mass nationalist movements against imperialist aggression in modern China. The May 4th Movement was mainly an anti-imperialist political sovereignty aggression, while the Boxer Movement and the May 30th Movement were anti-imperialist political, economic and cultural aggression movements, which lasted longer and had a far-reaching impact.