How did Lake Balkhash, once a Chinese territory, end up in Kazakhstan?

There is a wonderful lake in the world. What is magical about it is that half of the lake is saltwater and half is freshwater. The colors of the eastern and western sections are also different. This lake is Lake Balkhash.

Lake Balkhash is located in the southeast of Kazakhstan. It was called Yi Bohai in ancient China. It covers an area of ??nearly 20,000 square kilometers and is the fourth longest lake in the world. Lake Balkhash was the natural dividing line between China and Central Asia in ancient times and once belonged to Chinese territory. But just like Lake Baikal, it is completely separated from China and we can only look at the "lake" and sigh.

So how did Lake Balkhash reach Kazakhstan step by step?

From the Western Han Dynasty until the mid-19th century, it was under the jurisdiction of the Western Regions Protectorate of the Han Dynasty and was under the jurisdiction of the Central Government of the Han Dynasty. In the Tang Dynasty, it was placed under the management of the Anxi Protectorate. But in fact, for a long time in history, the central government had only nominal jurisdiction over this place and had no actual jurisdiction.

In the Qing Dynasty, especially after Qianlong destroyed the Jungar Khanate, this area was managed by General Ili. After the Kazakhs surrendered to the Qing Dynasty, they became border residents of the Qing Dynasty. After Russia conquered the Kazakh Khanate, it did not stop its aggression. Taking advantage of the Second Opium War, it forced the Qing government to sign the "Treaty of Demarcation of the Northwest Boundary" and occupied 440,000 square meters east and south of Lake Balkhash. kilometers of land, China's northwest border was forced to retreat southward. From here on, Lake Balkhash has nothing to do with us anymore.

Originally, this area was assigned to Tsarist Russia, but after the October Revolution, Soviet Russia established several autonomous republics in various ethnic areas in the areas originally ruled by Tsarist Russia. The later Soviet Union was actually composed of 15 The Kazakhs never dreamed that they would be able to restore their country. Although it still belonged to the Soviet Union in name, after all, the power was in the hands of the Kazakhs.

Because of the ulterior motives of the Soviet Union, it actually gave Kazakhstan such a large area. It originally thought that it could control this place well, but who would have thought that the Soviet Union would disintegrate overnight. Discard troops.

But Kazakhstan got a big deal. In this way, Lake Balkhash belongs to Kazakhstan from now on.