Some people say that Japan's offer to return Ryukyu was rejected by Li Hongzhang. What is the truth?

Because Japan only offered to return one third of Ryukyu at that time, Li Hongzhang refused, because the Beiyang Army was established in the Qing Dynasty, and Li Hongzhang was confident to defeat Japan and then let them return the complete Ryukyu.

Ryukyu Kingdom belonged to our vassal state in the Ming Dynasty. At that time, Zhu Yuanzhang paid more attention to Ryukyu Kingdom, so he sent many Han people to Ryukyu Kingdom to guide its development. Because many Han Chinese were sent here in the Ming Dynasty, Liguo Liu was also practicing Confucian culture and receiving Confucian civilization education. Locals also use Chinese characters to learn China culture.

However, after the Meiji Restoration, Japan's national strength continued to rise, so the idea of annexing Ryukyu came into being. At first, Japan invaded Ryukyu and made Ryukyu bow to Japan. Ryukyu has low national strength and limited ability, so it can only pay tribute to Japan. Later, Japan developed better and stronger. They were not satisfied, but turned Ryukyu into a vassal state and began to plan annexation. After that, they sent people to manage the country, planned the place to the scope of their own country, and made laws for it. It can be said that Ryukyu Kingdom has become a county town in Japan. From then on, Ryukyu Kingdom was completely out of China's sphere of influence.

Although the Qing government at that time strongly opposed it, because of its low national strength, it could only watch Japan take Ryukyu away. Now is also a very regrettable thing. 1888, the Qing government established the Beiyang army, which is known as the strongest navy in Asia. Therefore, these actions of the Qing Dynasty put some pressure on Japan, so they proposed to return some Ryukyu. But at that time, Li Hongzhang felt that he had such a powerful beiyang fleet that he would surely defeat the Japanese and let them return the complete Ryukyu at that time.

But is the fact really what Li Hongzhang thinks? Not exactly. In the Sino-Japanese War, beiyang fleet was completely annihilated and lost. Therefore, in the end, not only did Ryukyu not be recovered, but even one third of Ryukyu promised by Japan was gone. All this stems from Li Hongzhang's blind confidence in Beiyang Army and his firm belief that Beiyang Navy will win. Only after this war, Li Hongzhang's position kept declining, and his image in people's minds began to plummet. This shows that you should never be blind and confident at any time.