Rise of Empires: Spain.

Chapter 300: The Berlin Conference was brought forward
On the day after British Prime Minister Gladstone met with the Portuguese ambassador, the British ambassador to Spain urgently requested a meeting with King Carlo of Spain to discuss the Portuguese colonial affairs.

Rather than communication, it is more about the UK's accountability for Spain's attitude.

Yes, accountability.

Although the British ambassador's attitude was not as arrogant as when facing Portugal, he also expressed his tough side.

The British ambassador said a lot of things, the general meaning of which was that the Cairo-Cape Town line was Britain's most important colonial plan in Africa, and no country was allowed to interfere or sabotage it.

What this means is that if Spain decides to side with Portugal and sabotage Britain's colonial plans, there will most likely be a war between Spain and Britain.

Carlo certainly did not accept the British's threatening attitude. Although the British were indeed powerful, they were nothing to be afraid of for Spain.

Spain now has the confidence to turn the table with other powers, and no power wants to completely break off relations with Spain.

After all, there are many great powers on the European continent. A war with Spain would only cause serious damage, and the other great powers would be the ones to benefit.

After learning that Carlo would not make any concessions on this matter, the British ambassador's face showed a hint of dissatisfaction and indignation.

In his opinion, as the most powerful country in the world, the British Empire had to give some face to Spain even though it was a great power.

However, Carlo was the King of Spain after all. Even though the other party was already on the opposite side of the British government, the British ambassador did not dare to provoke Carlo in any behavior or words.

The royal family and the government represent different things in Europe. To challenge the government is just a competition at the national level, but to challenge the king is to stand against the monarchy.

The European royal families are closely connected, and they are all one family. Except for special circumstances, they are willing to maintain a superficially harmonious relationship.

The British ambassador left the Spanish royal palace with a look of dissatisfaction on his face, and the British government received the news later.

On the Spanish side, Carlo was also preparing to counter the diplomatic pressure from the British government.

Carlo did not intend to let Spain bear such pressure alone, but planned to bring in Italy and Austria-Hungary.

Carlo's idea was very simple, which was to see whether the British had the courage to force Spain to the German side.

At worst, Carlo could just announce his joining of the Triple Alliance and form a super military bloc of the four great powers of Germany, Austria, Italy and Spain.

This powerful lineup has the opportunity to defeat the Franco-Russian Alliance even if it faces the latter.

After all, Russia currently has too many problems. Rashly participating in such a super war between multiple superpowers will only cause Russia's domestic problems to explode sooner.

Without Russia, France alone could not withstand the siege of the four major powers.

Germany, Italy and Spain can attack France from three directions. The Austro-Hungarian army can support Spain and Italy, while involving a large number of French troops to defend the southern border.

As long as Austria-Hungary, Italy and Spain can share half of the French army, Germany will be able to easily occupy Paris with the remaining half of the French army at lightning speed.

This is also the reason why Carlo was not afraid of Britain when he planned Portugal. Because Britain did not intend to directly interfere in the European situation at this time, the regional balance policy led by Britain determined that Britain could not accept Spain joining Germany, which also meant that Britain could not completely turn against Spain.

Although they would not completely fall out, there was still room for negotiation. Spain had the support of Austria-Hungary and Italy, so it was not afraid of Britain in diplomatic negotiations.

Moreover, before the diplomatic negotiations, Carlo's goal had basically been achieved. As long as the relationship between the British and Portuguese governments and the Portuguese people's trust in the government and the royal family were alienated, the possibility of Spain annexing Portugal in the future would be greatly increased.

After Carlo contacted the royal families of Austria-Hungary and Italy in the name of the royal family, both Franz Joseph I and Umberto I expressed their support for Carlo.

The reason why the two countries agreed to support Spain was not only because they wanted to win Spain over to join the Triple Alliance, but also because of the two governments' respective plans.

The Austro-Hungarian Empire had no plans to colonize Africa, but they needed to contend with Russia later on. For the Austro-Hungarian Empire, every additional ally it had would increase its chances of winning against Russia.

As for Italy, they had a plan to colonize Africa. The Tunisian colony gave Italy a good start and also allowed the Italian government to see the benefits of colonizing Africa.

Italy could earn a lot of income by developing agriculture. The richer the government's finances, the smoother the military expansion planned by Umberto I would be.

After Tunisia, the Italian government set its sights on two more regions, namely Libya in North Africa and the Abyssinian Empire in East Africa.

One thing these two colonies had in common was that they were located on the periphery of British colonies.

Italy wanted to occupy these two colonies, and it was inevitable to face pressure from the British government. This is why Umberto I chose to support Carlo, because he also needed the support of the Spanish government in the same situation.

The situation suddenly became very difficult for the British government. It would have been fine if there was only one Spain, so the British government was not afraid.

But as news of frequent meetings between the Spanish royal family and the Austro-Hungarian and Italian royal families came, the British government also understood that these two countries had chosen to stand behind Spain.

At this time, Prime Minister Gladstone finally felt what the Portuguese government had felt a few days ago. He was in a state of neither advancement nor retreat, which was quite uncomfortable.

These lands west of Mozambique must be occupied. It is related to Britain's Cairo-Cape Town connection, and Britain will never allow the plan to be disrupted by other countries.

But at the same time, they could not completely break off relations with Spain and the Austro-Hungarian Empire and Italy behind it. Originally, everyone only supported Spain in diplomacy. If Britain broke off relations with it, the two countries would have to go to war with Britain even if they did not want to.

Once the war breaks out, it will not be such a simple matter. Russia has always had a grudge against Britain, and facing such a great opportunity, it will definitely stir up trouble in Central Asia and West Asia.

The conflicts between France and the British were also considerable. Not only did they not take advantage of the British's misfortune, they certainly wanted to seize colonies while the British were too busy to take care of other things.

Even if Britain could eventually win the war, it would suffer the most losses. For this reason, after learning that both Austria-Hungary and Italy had expressed their support for Spain, the negotiations between Britain and Spain had come to a standstill.

On March 1884, 3, at the invitation of the British government, German Chancellor Bismarck sent telegrams to Spain, Austria-Hungary, Italy, Britain, Portugal and other countries, inviting them to send representatives to attend the conference held in Berlin to resolve the disputes among countries over land conflicts in southern Congo.

No one, including Britain and Spain, intends to completely break off relations.

This also led to the fact that after German Prime Minister Bismarck sent out a telegram of invitation, various countries nodded in agreement to send representatives to attend the meeting, giving Prime Minister Bismarck enough face.

At the beginning, only a few countries involved in the dispute planned to attend the meeting. After discussions among various countries, it was decided to invite more European countries to participate in the meeting to avoid similar conflicts.

Because the main purpose of this conference was to define the scope of each country's colonization in Africa, this resulted in the number of countries that eventually participated in the conference being reduced to 15, and all of these 15 countries were European countries that had the ability to colonize Africa.

As for the remaining countries that do not have the ability to colonize Africa, they are naturally not eligible to participate in this conference. To put it bluntly, this conference was just held by the major powers to balance their own contradictions.

Small countries originally had no say, but they were allowed to participate in order to avoid things like Portugal from happening.

Thanks to Carlo's intervention, the Berlin Conference was held several years earlier.

However, this is not a bad thing for Spain. By participating in the division of Africa earlier, Spain can get more fertile land.

Of course, Spain's colonies in Africa were destined not to be too large. Apart from the West African colonies, other colonies would not expand much.

The current African colonies mainly serve as production sites for raw materials and carry out some agricultural development work.

The local natives basically would not buy European industrial products, and they could not afford them at all. This also resulted in the fact that the African colonies had basically no ability to dump industrial products, which did not help much in increasing the industrial output value in Spain.

If we really want to talk about the market for industrial products, we have to find ways in Asia and America. The countries in these places are more developed, and even if they are not colonies, they can still sell industrial products.

Although 15 countries participated in the Berlin Conference, the countries that actually had the final say were only the seven major powers of Britain, France, Germany, Austria, Italy and Spain.

Even though countries like the Netherlands, Belgium and Portugal also participated in the conference, they would be lucky enough to have a say, let alone ensure that their existing colonial outposts would not be seized by the great powers.

After all, this is not an era of civilization. It is an era where the strong prey on the weak and those who lag behind will be beaten.

Even though European countries pretend to be civilized and friendly beacons of humanity, when they discover huge benefits, their true nature will be exposed.

As a famous collection museum in the UK, the British Museum houses collections from all over the world. These collections were not bought by the British, but were forcibly snatched from countries around the world by means of aggression.

Among the more than 200 countries in the world, there are only a handful of countries that have not been colonized or invaded by Britain.

Even Spain was invaded by Britain. This also shows the nature of European countries. They have no mercy on the weak.

On the Spanish side, the representatives attending the conference were Secretary of State for Colonial Affairs William and Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs Carell.

The previous Foreign Secretary, Marquis Afton, retired honorably after serving in four cabinet governments (including an interim cabinet). He also acquired large tracts of fertile land with his accumulated merits and successfully made his family one of the top aristocratic families in Spain.

His successor Carrel was also a Spanish nobleman, but his title was not as prominent as that of the Marquis of Everton.

The current Foreign Minister Carrel comes from a small family in southern Spain. His father was a count, but for various reasons his title was stripped away by the former Queen Isabel and he became a baron, the lowest level of the nobility.

This also caused Carrel's family to never recover from it. If the revolution had not broken out and made Carlo the King of Spain, Carrel's family would probably have completely declined and eventually become ordinary people with only noble titles.

Before Karel and Wilhelm went to Berlin, Carlo had summoned them and told them what they should do in the meeting.

For Carlo, the two most basic goals have been achieved. The relationship between Britain and Portugal has been damaged, and the Portuguese are full of dissatisfaction and doubts about their own government.

Unless Austria-Hungary and Italy were willing to go to war with Britain, Spain alone would not be able to prevent Britain from occupying land in southern Congo.

But then again, letting the British occupy this land might not necessarily be a bad thing.

Whenever the Portuguese mention the land in southern Congo, they will think of this day, and how the British stood over their heads, arrogantly blocked their colonial merger plans, and seized the land that should have belonged to Portugal into their own hands.

Carlo was willing to make concessions in southern Congo if the British were willing to pay more to compensate Spain.

After all, Spain also has the ability to colonize the land in southern Congo. As long as the British are unwilling to break off relations with Spain, they must consider the consequences of Spain forcibly competing with them for colonies.

The Berlin Conference was held to resolve contradictions and conflicts among the great powers. The British representatives must have taken this into consideration and made more concessions to Spain in other areas.

Carlo no longer had much in mind for land in Africa. The only land he wanted was Morocco, which the British were not willing to give to Spain. This meant that if Carlo wanted land, he could only look further afield to Asia, such as the Middle East.

Spain had already occupied the Sultanate of Muscat, and further north were the truce states, which later became the United Arab Emirates.

Like Oman, the UAE is also a desert. Oman has a small area of ​​land in the north that is mountainous and plain, but the vast majority of the UAE is desert and not suitable for living.

This also means that Spain may be able to obtain the truce states through this conference and merge them with the Omani colony to establish a larger colony.

Although this colony seems to be of little use now, once oil is discovered in the Middle East in the future, the value of the oil alone will be enough to make Spain a fortune.

This is also the reason why Carlo values ​​the Middle East. After all, oil is something that really makes money, and oil in this era will not breed the US military.

(End of this chapter)