The Ming Dynasty did not revolutionize

Chapter 358 The True and False Sultan and the Balkans
Ottoman Sultan Selim III did not want to accept the reality that he was trapped in a jar, but reality continued to roll forward regardless of his will.

After three consecutive days of screening, most of the refugees in Hagia Sophia had completed identity registration, and the number of remaining refugees was decreasing.

Selim and his companions had no way to hide in the back and had to be exposed in front of the Ming officers.

Selim III was struggling to decide who should go out first to be questioned and registered, and see if he could get away with it.

The Ming officers on the opposite side had already discovered these few special people among the dwindling number of refugees.

Just as Selim and the Grand Vizier had discussed before, although the low-ranking officers of the Ming Dynasty at the scene did not know who Selim and others were, at least with a little observation they could tell that they were definitely not ordinary people.

So the officer in charge of the registration on the spot directly ordered the soldiers guarding the surrounding area to come forward and call Selim and his party over to answer his questions directly.

Faced with the Ming soldiers running towards them with guns in hand, Selim and his group were extremely nervous. It all depended on this chance for them to escape from Constantinople.

Fortunately, there is no need to conceal the nervousness itself. Even ordinary citizens of Constantinople would certainly be nervous when facing the rifles of the Ming occupation forces.

The Grand Vizier had the most experience and was now the calmest. He introduced the situation of his group as an old butler.

The Grand Vizier had actually prepared identities for his group in advance. They were all members and former retainers of an old noble family that he had recently convicted.

Nominally a noble, he was recently demoted to a commoner. He has not yet fully adapted to commoner life and does not look like a commoner.

The most crucial idea is that since they were criminals of the former Ottoman court, they were naturally in a hostile relationship with the Sultan and the court. According to the principle that the enemy of my enemy is my ally, they were more likely to gain the trust of the Ming people.

Everything the Grand Vizier made up was true, and the family he pretended to be did exist, but they had been secretly executed by the Grand Vizier.

If it was the Russians who occupied Constantinople, the Grand Vizier was confident that there was a high probability that his fake identity could be concealed, but he had no confidence when facing the Ming people.

After listening to the explanation of the old butler played by the Grand Vizier, the officers of the Ming Dynasty continued to look at the group of people with doubt.

After the investigation, he arranged for people to find the surrendered Ottoman officials and court servants to help them determine whether what the old butler said was true or false.

At the same time, I also picked the youngest child at the scene and another middle-aged man who looked rather stupid.

He and his deputy took the two of them to a corner of the hall of the Hagia Sophia and asked them questions individually, and evaluated the credibility of the "old butler's" report based on their answers.

Firstly, children speak without restraint. Even if they are willing to lie, they are usually not too careful in what they say and do, and are more likely to reveal secrets than adults.

At the same time, the multiple parties involved were isolated from each other and questioned individually to confirm whether the old housekeeper's words were made up on the spot.

After asking a few questions, the two officers discovered that the child's answer was like "reciting a text", trying hard to recall and recite what others had taught him.

It doesn't seem like he's introducing his family situation to others at all.

The officers immediately determined that the words of the so-called old butler might not have been made up on the spot, but were specially made up in advance not long ago.

The Ming military officer in charge of the Hagia Sophia Temple immediately ordered the Grand Vizier and his entourage to be arrested and imprisoned, pending further confirmation of their more specific identities.

In the hall of the Temple of the Virgin, Ottoman Sultan Selim III looked at the actions of the Ming people and immediately became anxious.

The key point is that not long after, soldiers from the Ming Dynasty suddenly ran over, grabbed the people around him, and wanted to tie up their hands and feet.

Two soldiers also went to capture Selim III himself.

Selim III was extremely desperate, thinking that the Ming people had completely seen through his identity and that he had no way to escape.

In this completely hopeless situation, Selim III let go and made a decision in an instant:

"Even if I am caught, even if I die, I must use my true identity as the name."

So Selim III suddenly shouted:

"I am the Ottoman Sultan Selikul III. I want to see your generals and the emperor of your Ming Dynasty!"

The soldiers and officers at the scene were visibly stunned.

The lower-level soldiers and officers had no idea about the real or fake Ottoman Sultan, and their nominal goal of screening Constantinople was to look for suspicious individuals.

When Selim III announced his identity, the low-level soldiers and officers at the scene instinctively did not believe it.

After all, the Ming Dynasty had captured the Ottoman Sultan alive, and the Sultan formally surrendered to the Ming Dynasty with his property and was granted the title of Byzantine Duke of the Ming Dynasty.

This duke still lives next to the royal palace, and from time to time he signs some notices to cooperate with the Ming army in taking over local Ottoman institutions.

So these soldiers subconsciously thought that Selim III at the scene was a mentally ill person who was deliberately trying to attract attention.

However, even if a madman is just trying to attract attention, if he pretends to be the Ottoman Sultan, he must be arrested immediately.

So the soldiers did not stop their actions. Two soldiers grabbed Selim III's arms, flipped him behind his back, held him down and tied him up with a rope.

The soldiers were rather rough, and Selim III cried out in pain:

"What are you doing! Even if I surrender, I am still the monarch of a country. You are committing a crime by doing this to me!"

The soldiers and officers at the scene ignored him and even rolled up a ball of waste cloth to stuff his mouth with, while reporting to Tian Yiming using a makeshift battlefield telephone.

Tian Yimingke was shocked when he heard the report.

Tian Yi knew that the Sultan in the palace was a fake, but the Sultan found in the Hagia Sophia this time might be the real one.

Tian Yiming and Nelson initially guessed that the Ottoman Sultan was most likely still in the city, so they conducted a loose investigation on the outside but a tight one on the inside.

Tian Yiming felt that as long as he slowly turned Constantinople over, he would be able to find the Ottoman Sultan and his entourage sooner or later. He just didn't expect the result to come so soon.

Tian Yiming immediately arranged for people to pick up Selim III and his entourage, and asked personnel from the Ming Dynasty's Honglu Temple and Western Factory who had been to the Ottoman Empire, as well as officials and servants of the original Ottoman court to confirm his identity.

Selim III was soon sent to Tian Yiming. The former Ottoman officials around Tian Yiming recognized at a glance that the Selim in front of them was the real Sultan.

Officials from the Honglu Temple and the Western Factory of the Ming Dynasty also gave a positive response, saying that they had indeed captured the real Sultan.

Tian Yiming was overjoyed and subconsciously prepared to replace the real Sultan to cooperate with the work, but he quickly gave up the idea.

Tian Yiming first arranged personnel to settle Selim and his party, and at the same time reported the situation to the Ming Emperor in Shuntian Prefecture.

By the way, I would like to ask the emperor how to deal with these two sultans, one real and one fake, and who should be executed and who should live.

When Zhu Jianxuan of Shuntian Prefecture received the report, his subconscious reaction was to replace the fake Sultan with the real one.

But after a little consideration, I changed my mind.

When the real Sultan is in your hands, it doesn’t matter whether the one you use is real or fake.

I just want to use the name of Sudan.

Even in the current situation, the real Sultan may not be better than the fake Sultan.

The real Sultan went from being the monarch of a world power to a landless noble under house arrest, and he must have felt a strong sense of grief and resentment. If I gave him the title of Duke of Byzantium, he would not feel lucky, but might even feel resentful.

He might not be willing to actively cooperate with the Ming Dynasty in taking over the Ottoman Empire, and might even try to secretly hinder it.

The fake Sultan was the opposite. He went directly from a low-level bureaucrat to a top aristocrat.

As nobles of the Ming Dynasty, enjoying the support from the local people, most of them would feel very fortunate and satisfied, and would naturally be willing to cooperate with the Ming Dynasty.

The key point is that he knows that he is fake and he dare not do anything wrong or cause trouble.

He will definitely be more cautious in doing things than the real Sultan.

Zhu Jianxuan thought about it seriously for a while and finally approved Tian Yiming's request on how to deal with the real and fake Sultan.

"The Sultan who has become the Duke of Byzantium in the Ming Dynasty will continue to be the Sultan and the Duke of Byzantium.

"The man who claimed to be the Sultan found in the Temple of the Holy Maiden was sentenced to life imprisonment and labor camp for impersonating the Ottoman Sultan."

Zhu Jianxuan was not prepared to severely punish the fake Sultan, nor was he prepared to kill the real Sultan immediately.

The title of Ottoman Sultan was useful until the Ming Dynasty had complete control over the Ottoman territories.

The Ottoman core, including the real Sultan, was the driving force behind the fake Sultan's cautiousness and obedience to the Ming Dynasty.

The fake Sultan is a puppet, and the real Sultan is the counterweight below.

So both sultans were kept.

After receiving the reply and reading it carefully, Tian Yiming was obviously surprised.

"Take the fake as real? Take the real as fake?"

After thinking about it for a while, Tian Yiming roughly understood Zhu Jianxuan's intention.

Then he did as Zhu Jianxuan instructed. First, he sentenced the real Sultan to re-education through labor on the charge of impersonating the Sultan.

Selim III, who was already under control in the Governor's Office of the Arabian War Zone, listened to the follow-up arrangements announced by the Ming military officers. His expression of despair that had already made him ready to die collapsed again.

"How is that possible? What do you mean? My crime is impersonating the Sultan?
"That is impossible because I am the real Sultan.

"Is there something wrong with you? The one you caught before was the fake one!"

The Ming officer in charge of the interrogation said directly to the officer in charge of the custody:

"This guy might be completely crazy. Don't worry about what he continues to shout about. Just pull her out and continue working."

Selim III was sent to a labor camp in despair and despair.

Work with other ordinary workers to clean up the city's building debris that collapsed during the bombing.

Tian Yiming cooperated with Nelson and Karl to expand the occupation area from the coast to the land, with the Sea of ​​Marmara and the Aegean Sea as the center.

After seeing the Sultan's order documents, the defenders in most places chose to surrender directly.

The few that resisted stubbornly could not withstand the attack of the Ming Air Force and would soon be occupied by the subsequent Ming Army.

Archduke Karl led the armies of the Austrian and Italian states and fought deep into the Balkan Peninsula.

The spread of nationalism and enlightenment ideas made the Balkan nations restless.

Ottoman rule in the Balkans was already unstable.

In the original history, the Greek independence movement broke out six years later in 1821, and then officially broke away from the Ottoman Empire and became independent.

In addition, the Ali Dynasty of Egypt became de facto independent in 1805.

The full decline of the Ottoman Empire began.

Archduke Karl, one of the more capable noble generals in Europe, now leads an army of hundreds of thousands gathered from European countries, as well as the support of 100,000 main Ming troops.

The Ottoman army was no match for this team, and now no one in the Balkans could stop its momentum to move eastward and southward.

In addition, Nelson and Tian Yiming made a big move in the Aegean Sea, which directly dealt a heavy blow to the Ottoman Empire.

The Ottoman capital, Sultan, Grand Vizier, and royal palace were all destroyed by them.

The defenders in the Balkans lost their support and even lost orders and information from their superiors, and could only fight on their own in their own defense areas.

Archduke Karl's troops further expanded their advantage over the Ottoman defenders, and they advanced with unstoppable force, rapidly expanding their occupied areas within the former Ottoman territory.

On the other hand, the same war began on the same day in Poland and Russia in northern Europe.

During this Eurasian war, the command posts of each war zone of the Ming Dynasty had communication teams, which used radio to exchange information and share their strategies at any time.

Nelson was going to steal Istanbul from the Ottoman Empire and take over the Baltic Sea. Admiral Qiu Lianggong could not help but make a similar choice.

With the cooperation of the army and air force in the Eastern European theater under the command of Napoleon, the first attack was launched on the Russian capital St. Petersburg.

The Ming army had complete control of the sea and air on the battlefield, and the attack was also full of surprise.

The Russians in the city were also frightened by the bombs and planes falling from the sky.

However, compared to Istanbul, the bay where St. Petersburg is located is wider and more suitable for direct naval attacks from the open sea.

St. Petersburg is also closer to the Polish border than Austria and Crete are to Istanbul.

There is a large land border between Russia and Poland, and the border area does not have plateaus like Anatolia, but rather the endless East European plains.

Once the battle between the two sides begins, they can fight directly on the plains without being unable to deploy their troops like they did against the Ottomans.

Such a special geopolitical environment made the Russians highly vigilant about war, and Russian Tsar Alexander reacted much faster than Selim of the Ottoman Empire.

Three days ago, after Alexander received the ultimatum from the Ming Dynasty, although he did not escape immediately, he started packing up right away.

The naval battle had just begun when Alexander confirmed that the Ming warships had entered the bay and had begun shelling the port of St. Petersburg.

He decisively abandoned the city and fled, heading directly to Moscow under the escort of the Russian army.

But the fact that he wanted to go to Moscow was common knowledge, including Napoleon, the King of Poland in the Ming Dynasty who was sitting opposite him.

At the same time as the naval attack on St. Petersburg began, Napoleon also officially launched an attack on Russia.

(End of this chapter)