Wild North America 1846

Chapter 841 New Situation in Eastern Europe

Richard did not stay long at the luxurious palace banquet. He showed up and had a cordial conversation with the Prime Minister and others, and then left quickly.

Prime Minister Lord Hu Yongtang and a group of military and political ministers also had no intention of attending the palace banquet. After meeting with His Majesty the Holy Emperor Taizu and receiving important oracles, they left one after another without stopping.

They have so many things going on, how can they be in the mood to play around here?
After these top figures from the empire left one by one, the originally depressing atmosphere at the palace banquet immediately became cheerful.

Ladies in beautiful Han and Tang costumes danced gracefully with noble men, and melodious music echoed in the glittering palace. This was a luxurious night banquet in a prosperous era.

Back to the harem
The palace, shaded by green trees, was deep and peaceful, with only a few huge pet beasts surrounding the dormitory. The terrifying giant eyes revealed a pale green light in the night, making people feel nervous when they saw them.

No one is allowed to enter the forbidden areas of the palace without the permission of the Holy Emperor Taizu.

It was still early when he came back, and Richard didn't feel sleepy at all, so he walked to the study without hesitation.

On the imperial desk carved from a single large board of rosewood, nine Easter eggs from the Tsarist Russian court were placed, and the enamel-colored vases and palace lanterns revealed blurred light.

Next to the palace lantern, there is a Gonggong broken jade ornament from Buzhou Mountain, which emits a dim green brilliance under the light.

Every piece of furniture in the royal study is worth tens of thousands of dollars.

Even if it is a bone china tea cup for daily use, because the bottom is engraved with the inscription "Made by the Holy Emperor", it is a prohibited item in the private market. No matter whether it is bought or sold, it will be punished with the felony of "contempt of the imperial court".

Li Chahun didn't care about these details. He walked to the dragon chair behind the imperial court and sat down. He stared at a huge globe, stretched out his hand and turned it gently before stopping.

His gaze turned from Syria to the Crimea Peninsula, and there was a hint of joy in the flicker.

Some of the sick and wounded members of the expeditionary force evacuated from Europe will be placed in Syria to recover, because the warm climate here is conducive to the recovery of health of the officers and soldiers.

The Tang Empire will have 9 land and sea bases in Syria and conduct substantial military garrison, while also opening up the immigration process to the region.

The empire has no plans to make Syria an overseas province, but it is necessary to increase the proportion of the Chinese population and gain vital influence.

This will be the bridgehead for goods from the six provinces of the Arabian Peninsula to Europe in the future. It plays an important role in the regional economic map and must be firmly grasped.

There were also some calls from local Arab tribes to establish an independent country, but they were quickly suppressed severely.

If this really happens

The empire will take the initiative to intervene in the situation in Syria, and at worst, it will divide it and separate the ports and surrounding areas on the Mediterranean Sea where the Chinese population has an important influence.

Richard has no worries about the Crimean Peninsula and eastern and southern Ukraine, which will become the first European territories to be ethnically Chinese.

The Tang Empire included this area under the direct control of overseas provinces, and would establish Crimea, Odessa and Kerch provinces respectively, and implement orderly development under military control.

Currently, 47 Tatars are being relocated from Crimea and will be gradually resettled in central Ukraine to serve as a barrier against the Russians.

The Tatars and the Russians have a feud. The Tatars are a descendant of the Mongols who originated from the Western Expeditions and are accustomed to nomadic grassland people.

From the 15th to the 18th century
The once prosperous white slave trade was mainly supplied by the Crimean Khanate steppe cavalry and the Ottoman Empire cavalry at that time. They mainly plundered and trafficked people from Tsarist Russia and Ukraine.

With the Ottoman Empire on its back, the Crimean Khanate's cavalry carried out countless plunders, causing serious disasters to the early Tsarist Russia. The two sides had a blood feud.

Moreover, the Tatars are of the Turkic language and believe in Sinaism, while the Ukrainians and Russians believe in Catholicism. The cultures, customs and beliefs of both sides are incompatible with each other, and there is a deep gap.

Tatars are a typical East Asian Mongolian race. They look more like Chinese people. If you don't speak, you can't tell the difference.

But they are aliens after all and must be expelled from the heart of the Crimean Peninsula.

Fortunately, the Tsarist Empire suffered huge casualties during World War I. Tens of millions of people were reduced due to war hunger and disease, and Ukraine was especially the hardest hit area.

There are a large number of sparsely populated or even deserted villages and towns that can be used to house Tatar immigrants.

There are still a large number of disarmed German troops and their families remaining in Ukraine today. Belarusian armed forces are rampant, as well as some Balkan ethnic groups and the old Austro-Hungarian Empire army. The situation is quite chaotic.

The new Russian regime is caught in civil strife and cannot take care of this for the time being. The German army and the Austro-Hungarian army will not surrender to the Russians and maintain a minimum degree of autonomy for the time being.

With the successive entry of British, French and Tang troops, the Greater Ukraine and Belarus regions will gradually fall into the hands of the Allied Powers.

At present, the international forces headed by Britain, France, Tang, Italy, Germany, and Austria are extremely hostile to the new Tsarist Russian regime, and have more or less sent troops to invade Tsarist Russian territory.

Thousands of British troops occupied Baku and jointly sent troops to the Caucasus with Belgium, where they were quite active.

In Siberia.

The area occupied by the Japanese army was the most extensive. The front troops reached Lake Baikal in the west. Fuso Army soldiers were stationed in all villages and towns east of Lake Baikal.

From Vladivostok to Chita, whether it was the Siberian Railway or the Eastern Railway, Fuso flags were hung at every station, and there were also some cheerful Japanese family members accompanying them.

Fuso actively supports Kolchak's White Russian Army, supports the Seminov puppet regime, and plans to connect eastern Siberia with "Manchuria, Mongolia" and North Korea to create a super colonial circle.

This is a typical example of a small Kalami trying to get on top of an elephant, covering more than 720 million square kilometers in one go, with an astonishing appetite.

Therefore, Fuso is actively increasing its troops to the north. It plans to increase the number of troops from the current 5 to more than 8 in the first half of next year, and launch a plan for Japanese immigrants to migrate north.

These tactics of external colonial expansion were all learned from the Tang Dynasty, the suzerain country, but they were learned in absurd ways.

These greedy islanders always want to eat a big fat man in one bite without fear of being stuffed to death.

Richard smiled knowingly when he thought of this. He was not in a hurry at all. After a year and a half, the ice and snow land in the north would always leave the mark of the Tang Empire.

His confidence comes from the greed of the Fuso people, from the huge White Russian opposition forces in Tsarist Russia, and from the fact that the marriage between the imperial royal family and the Tsarist Russian princess will be legitimate and legitimate, and will receive widespread international support.

With the support of the Tang Empire's strong financial strength, he is very interested in seeing what will happen here in the future?
As an East Asian island country, Fuso has a weak foundation and weak national strength. The military power it can use for external colonial expansion is limited, not endless.

An unprecedentedly fierce Russo-Japanese war that took place in the early 20th century saddled Fuso with heavy war debts and disappeared from the international stage for 15 years.

What are you doing?

In the midst of industrialization, which is desperately squeezing the people to repay debts, millions of Fusang women have even gone overseas to have sex and bring back some blood for the country.

Fusang Kingdom has poor resources and a very poor industrialization foundation. So far, its steel production has been less than 20 tons, which is only 1/63 of the Tang Empire.

This small amount of steel production still relies on coal and iron resources plundered from North Korea, and it has gone through many difficulties to form its own steel industry.

The quality of its domestically produced steel is poor, its output is low, and its unit price is high. It is far inferior to the high-quality steel imported in large quantities from the Tang Empire.

Most of the coal used for heating in Fuso in winter is imported from neighboring Beihai Province. More than [-]% of other resources needed for industrial development such as copper, iron, tin, aluminum, and oil are imported from the Tang Empire.

The lifeblood of the industrialization of the entire island country lies in the Tang Empire.

This situation

The island nation of Fuso was never able to stand upright in front of its overlord, the Tang Dynasty. Its military leader Shan Xian Youpeng once lamented: "The poverty of national resources cannot be restored by manpower. Only by hoping to get help from the overlord, can we feel that we can live with some dignity." !”

It is precisely because they are trapped in resource bottlenecks that the military and political strongmen in Fuso generally have a strong impulse to expand colonization.

It should be said that the Japanese people have such perseverance and perseverance, but it is a pity that God does not fulfill their wishes.

The Tang Empire's positioning of the Fusang Kingdom was very clear, and was personally approved by the Holy Emperor Taizu Richard; this was an unfamiliar white-eyed wolf.

Its colonial expansion strategy nakedly included Korea, Manchuria and Mongolia, as well as the Russian Central Siberia and Western Siberia.

This aroused the vigilance and dissatisfaction of the middle and high-level officials of the Datang Empire, who would often take action to beat them, which in turn deepened the distrust between the two countries.

It's like an owner taking a vicious dog for a walk on the street. The vicious dog is always trying to break free from the chain and bite pedestrians around it, making it increasingly difficult to control.

Looking back at the globe, Richard naturally lay back, leaning on the chair with his eyes closed to relax.

He is reviewing the future situation in Ukraine and considering the prospects of competition between several forces.

After Germany's defeat, the new Tsarist Russian government immediately announced the abolition of the provisions of the Brest-Litovsk Treaty and took back the ceded areas of Ukraine and Belarus, with a total area of ​​more than 330 million square kilometers.

This area caused Tsarist Russia to lose nearly 5000 million residents, and accounted for 90% of the country's coal mining, 73% of its iron ore, 54% of its industry, and 33% of its railways.

This move by the new Tsarist Russia government will inevitably lead to a war with the Tang Empire in the future, because Crimea and eastern and southern Ukraine are also included in this defeated and ceded area.

Now that people don’t admit it, the only option is to fight!

It's just that the new government of Tsarist Russia cannot spare any time now. The Belarusian rebel forces are rampant in the country, and the opposition within the party is centrifugal. It can be said that it is really struggling.

The area controlled by Tsarist Russia's new regime only accounts for a quarter of the country's area, and the rest of the area is occupied by other forces.

The biggest threat to the Soviet regime was the White Russian forces such as Kolchak's rebels and Denikin's rebels, as well as thousands of rebels, large and small.

There are more than 130 rebel groups among the Cossacks alone.

You must first settle inside
Nowadays, foreign intervention forces are a thorn in the side of Tsarist Russia's new regime, and the domestic Belarusian rebels are a real thorn in the side.

Display of current situations

Tsarist Russia will be in chaos for a few more years, so there is no need to rush to an end. Let the bullets fly for a while first.

In the Tang Empire, France actively supported the restoration of Poland and the independent establishment of Ukraine, which was specifically to create obstacles for Tsarist Russia, and would then be mentioned one by one on the agenda of the Paris Peace Conference.

Prime Minister Clemenceau of the French government suggested through secret channels to mobilize 17 to 20 divisions from the Western Front battlefield, mainly from the Tang Empire Expeditionary Force, and to cooperate with the remaining German troops stranded in Ukraine and Belarus to form an armed intervention force. Attack and destroy the new Russian regime.

Then the former princess of Tsarist Russia returned to the country to succeed to the throne and became the female tsar. This was obviously to use sweet fruits to lure the Tang Dynasty into trouble and get involved in this quagmire.

The Tang imperial government decisively rejected this tempting proposal, saying that it had no interest in sending troops to Tsarist Russia for the time being.

Please note that this "not interested at the moment" is a statement that obviously leaves room for leeway, and I believe that Britain and France will not ignore it.

The army of the new Tsarist Russian government has expanded dramatically, from 11.2 in the early days of its establishment to more than 8 at the end of August, and then to more than 86 million at the end of the year, and it is still expanding rapidly.

Although this army lacks medical treatment and weapons, and is even less equipped with weapons, after all, its numbers are there, and they are not just two or three big cats and kittens.

The best way now is to let the Belarusian forces such as Kolchak's rebels and Denikin's rebels advance first, and consume each other in the domestic chaos.

After waiting for 1 to 2 years, during the weak period of the new Tsarist Russia regime, he struck hard and established a victory in one fell swoop.

The requirements of the Tang Empire were not high, and they did not pursue the elimination of the new Tsarist Russian regime. They only required Tsarist Russia to recognize the reality of the Tang Empire's division of the Crimean Peninsula and eastern and southern Ukraine through a written treaty.

At that time, depending on the specific situation, one may need to be added;
Tsarist Russia should recognize the reality of the country's divisions, perhaps in Central Siberia, perhaps in the Caucasus. It is not yet certain where to start.

Butterfly wings have changed history a lot, but the general situation in Europe has been stubbornly preserved, except that Tsarist Russia will be much weaker than in the original historical time and space.

After the Austro-Hungarian Empire and the Ottoman Empire collapsed one after another, more than a dozen new countries became independent one after another, creating an increasingly chaotic and lively new situation, closer to the Europe that Richard was familiar with.

The three giants, British Prime Minister Lord David Lloyd George, Tang Prime Minister Lord Hu Yongtang, and French Prime Minister Clemenceau, have been confirmed;
The Ottoman Empire will be dismembered at the Paris Peace Conference, and the spheres of influence of each country will be recognized in international legal terms, including the six new provinces of the Tang Empire in the Arabian Peninsula, and the British, Tang and French co-administration of Syria.

The Paris Peace Conference was actually a conference of the victorious countries, led by Britain, France and the Tang Dynasty. These three countries would also gain the greatest benefits from it.

Tsarist Russia withdrew from World War I early, and the ownership of the Turkish Straits and Constantinople, which were originally planned to be allocated to Tsarist Russia, will surely become the focus of contention at the Paris Peace Conference.

Since dealing with the German issue after the war was a higher priority than the Ottoman Empire, related issues were debated for a long time, and could be delayed for one, two years or even longer.

Currently, in addition to the six provinces of the Arabian Peninsula acquired by the Tang Empire, there are several others.

Article 1, the Eastern Thrace region except Istanbul was ceded to Greece, and the Izmir region was subject to a referendum five years later to decide whether to join Greece.

Article 2 recognizes the independence of Armenia and annexes the Black Sea coast east of Kireson, Ayr-Sinjiang, west of Mushi, Bitlis and south of Lake Van to Armenia;
Article 3. The Strait area becomes a demilitarized zone, but the Allied Powers have the right to conduct military operations in the area. The six countries of Tang, Britain, France, Italy, Japan, and Russia formed the Strait Management Committee, which is responsible for shipping, lighthouse management and piloting in the area. matters.

Article 4: The Ottoman Empire gave up all its Asian and African possessions, and was governed by a protectorate established by Britain, Tang, and France. Among them, France obtained the Lebanon region and co-administered the Syrian region with Britain and Tang.

Britain obtained Iraq and Palestine, and the Tang Dynasty obtained Jordan, Kuwait and other six provinces on the peninsula.

Article 5 recognizes Italy’s annexation of the Dodecanese Islands (Twelve Islands). This was the condition originally promised to the Kingdom of Italy to participate in the war, and it has now been honored.

And before World War I
The Ottoman Empire had lost most of its possessions in Europe, including Greece, Serbia, Montenegro, Bulgaria, Romania and Herzegovina, as well as Algeria, Morocco, Egypt, Tunisia and most of the Arabian Peninsula in North Africa.

in the post-war treaty
It also lost Syria, Iraq, Armenia, Palestine and Lebanon, and its original land area shrank by 71%, leaving only 41 square kilometers of territory.

It would not be an exaggeration to call it a cut in half of the Ottoman Empire.

Back to Ukraine

The Tang Empire planned to support Ukraine's independence, and listed this plan alongside support for Poland's independence as one of its main demands at the Paris Peace Conference.

No matter what the future fate of this new Ukrainian country is, this friendship will be determined by Datang.

This is also an extra layer of insurance for the European regions of Tang Dynasty. Faced with the danger of invasion by Tsarist Russia at all times, Ukrainians can only cling tightly to the big thick legs of the Tang Empire and have no second choice.

Due to the differences in history, nationalities and beliefs, even if Poland is supported in its restoration, this new country will definitely be pro-British, British and French in the future. This is the nature of the womb.

Therefore, outside of Poland, the Tang Empire wanted to support a European pro-Tang regime, that is, Ukraine, and put it on the front line against Russia.

This may be the fate of Ukraine. Small and weak countries in Europe are always unable to control their own destiny and become pawns in the confrontation between big powers.

The geographical conditions of Ukraine determined that it could never escape the control of the Tang Empire.

After the Tang Empire occupied the Crimean Peninsula and the southern Ukraine area around Odessa, the planned new Ukrainian country was a landlocked country without its own outlet to the sea.

The vast and fertile black soil of the Ukrainian Great Plains is rich in agricultural products and is known as the "Granary of Europe".

But no matter how much food cannot be shipped out, it is useless. The ports along the Black Sea are the only lifeline for exporting food, and they are now firmly in the hands of the Tang Empire.

Unless Ukraine seizes these Black Sea coastal ports, it will not be able to escape the fate of being manipulated.

If you don't think about winning, think about losing first.

Richard has a complete set of careful arrangements in Eastern Europe, which can ensure the security of overseas provinces and leave sufficient back-up for counterattack.

(End of this chapter)