Chapter 475 Take action
The British government is calculating the strength of East Africa. The more it calculates, the more it realizes that there is no good way to control East Africa. Although it is not large in size, it is as big as a giant if placed on one-third of an acre of Africa.
After all, except for Cape Town and North Africa, Africa can no longer find a force that can compete with East Africa in terms of white population. Moreover, the country in East Africa is still composed of Germans. Although it is not very pure, the cultural identity is naturally biased towards Germany.
What does this mean for the UK? Just one Germany is enough to cause a headache for the UK. Add the Austro-Hungarian Empire, and the influence of the Germans is enough to change the entire world. If East Africa is allowed to serve as the raw material supply base for these two industrial powers, Britain's dominance will be greatly affected. threaten.
When Benjamin thought of this, he said solemnly: "East Africa is not an ordinary country. For this kind of private colonial company that monopolizes millions of square kilometers in Africa, it has seriously damaged regional peace and stability. As the defenders of the world order, we cannot If we continue to allow East Africa to develop disorderly, we must strike hard!"
Benjamin clearly defined East Africa as a private colonial group like the British East India Company. The glory of the British East India Company was that it occupied India, but the Indian colonies were only three million square kilometers, and the East African Kingdom was indeed twice the area of India. There are more (the British government thinks so). The East African Kingdom may not have as much superior land as India, and the population is not as rich as India, but sooner or later the population of a country with such a large land area will accumulate, and it will become a force enough to influence the world pattern, let alone Affecting the world pattern, the pattern of the Western Indian Ocean has now changed.
Benjamin then said seriously: "We can look for thugs in other regions of the world to deal with potential enemies that are difficult for us to overcome and achieve strategic balance. But is there any opponent in Africa that can match East Africa?"
"Moreover, the ambitions of the East African Kingdom go far beyond that. They are still expanding. They have already appeared on the east coast of the Atlantic Ocean. Southwest Africa is about to fall into the hands of East Africa, and Africa still has a vast inland area with great potential. Now East Africa Our territory is seven million square kilometers, and tomorrow it may be tens of millions of square kilometers. Will we dominate Africa in the future?"
At this point, Benjamin himself suddenly found that he had a little fear of East Africa, but he tried to calm down.
The Chancellor of Finance said: "Your Excellency Prime Minister, maybe the situation is not as serious as we think. Although the land area of East Africa is large, I think the potential of East Africa is at most the same level as Canada and Australia. We also have colonies in Africa, and the conditions It is definitely much superior to Africa. The Gold Coast and Cape Town are both the most valuable lands in Africa. But to be honest, the importance of these two colonies to the British Empire is obviously not prominent in the entire system, especially The economic value is not very high, so if you want to develop East Africa, you can’t just have land. It is definitely difficult to develop in Africa.”
Let’s not talk about the money confiscated by the Chancellor of the Exchequer from East Africa. The main reason is that the government really has no money now. The navy, a gold-eating beast, has rising expenses every year. In addition, government expenditures are already huge during the economic crisis. Furthermore, Britain is now in South Asia. Regional expenditures take up a lot of energy. Now the Russians are becoming more and more dishonest and are showing signs of wanting to break through the blockade. Russia is not a country in East Africa where whether it can develop is questionable, but a country with real potential. Strength broke the threat of British hegemony, a threat even greater than that of the Germans.
"Now that the reform of Tsarist Russia has been completed, Alexander II is also the hero, and the threat from Tsarist Russia should obviously be put first. Although Germany is developing rapidly, the French are watching from the side, and the Austro-Hungarian Empire also has interests with Tsarist Russia. There are differences, but Tsarist Russia is obviously the biggest threat in Central Asia and the Far East, and it is even directly related to India’s security issues.”
The naval strength of East Africa is good, but the United Kingdom is completely concerned about it. The Royal Navy of India alone has the ability to tightly restrict East Africa. The situation is different for Tsarist Russia. Tsarist Russia’s strategic direction is land, and that happens to be the British weakness. .
The words of the Chancellor of Finance did not make Benjamin feel relaxed, but made him feel heavier. Tsarist Russia, the United States, Germany, half of the Far East, and barely half of East Africa. These countries have developed very well in recent years, and the corresponding maintainers of the world order are Britain and France. The right to speak is challenged.
Benjamin lamented: "With more and more competitors, the cost of maintaining the empire's status is getting higher and higher. It's really hard to do all the work!"
The topic changed: "However, the more this happens, the less we can turn a blind eye to the existence of East Africa, and we cannot add new challengers to the empire. You all need to think of a way, how can we strangle East Africa in the cradle?"
Ernst would have laughed to death if he heard this. He was right to call it the cradle. In Ernst's opinion, East Africa was indeed very fragile. However, with its secret development over the years, East Africa also had a set of capabilities to deal with crises. A giant baby. If the UK wants to completely strangle East Africa, low investment will not do. High investment must consider the risk of being stolen by other countries.
Benjamin's words made everyone a little confused. What is East Africa's weakness? Let Ernst say that it is trade. If East Africa is cut off from foreign trade, East Africa will be really uncomfortable.
But the British fell into a misunderstanding. Is there any foreign trade in East Africa? The answer is definitely yes. The problem is that the trade system in East Africa is more like an extension of the German-Austrian trade. It relies on the trade system of the two countries and is disguised as the export of German capital. Therefore, the British can feel the competition between Germany and Austria, especially German goods. I really have no feeling for East Africa.
In essence, East Africa is a colony of Germany and Austria, but this colony has its own independent ideas. Economically, East Africa has sacrificed huge profits to Germany and Austria, but these benefits are distributed through the Hechingen Consortium. , was transferred from East Africa to the Hechingen Consortium, and the Hechingen Consortium is indeed part of German capital. The wealth created by this part of capital in the German region has indeed benefited the civilians, the government, and businesses closely related to Hechingen Capital. group.
The Foreign Secretary asked in a timely manner: "East Africa is a very closed country. It is completely a puppet of Germany and Austria. It is not connected with the world market. Sometimes it is even impossible to feel the existence of East Africa as a country. They have no relationship with our country." When dealing with diplomacy, it feels like the Far Eastern Empire before we forcibly opened the country? But the rulers of East Africa are the Hechingen royal family, pure German nobles. Why do they do this? To run a colony, you must consider the cost The question is, does the royal family of Hechingen really want to establish a medieval feudal monarchy only in Africa?"
The effect of seclusion is reflected here. East Africa can peek into the world through the window, while other countries have a dark eye on East Africa. Of course, not everyone does not understand East Africa. A very small number of Austrian businessmen investing in East Africa have no idea about East Africa. They have a clear understanding, but they do not spread it everywhere because they think the economic system in East Africa is too rebellious and completely contrary to the capitalist economy. Moreover, they are also afraid that the Austrian government will imitate the same thing in East Africa. Learn from it.
The economic system in East Africa is quite complex, but the monarch is undoubtedly the biggest beneficiary in this economic system, followed by the aristocracy and bureaucratic groups in East Africa, and finally the common people, but there is no place for capitalists, and this model seems to be applied in East Africa. Not bad at all, so they tacitly refused to reveal the national conditions of East Africa. If the Habsburg family did the same thing, who would bear it! And this is not impossible, such as the nationalization of the railways in Austria-Hungary during the economic crisis.
Of course, conversely, East Africa can also be described as a medieval serfdom country. The problem is that serfdom is not what Austrian businessmen want to see, so East Africa should just play this trick on its own territory! As long as you don't go out to disturb other people, and besides, as long as you can make money by cooperating with East Africa, no one is willing to give up the benefits of eating alone.
Well, the composition of East Africa is indeed complex, including feudalism, monarchy, autocracy, serfdom, state-owned economy, collective economy, monopoly capital, everything is gathered together. This is also a helpless choice. According to the historical process, the autocratic monarch should be thrown into the garbage dump of history. But Ernst’s butt cannot be crooked, so he can only copy a little bit from other systems. In the end, East Africa will become different.
Benjamin: "If East Africa is really a closed country like the Far East, where oil and salt cannot enter, then we can only use force to solve East Africa and force them to open up!"
There is really no other way. No one knows what the ultimate aspirations of countries like East Africa are. So they can only use the Far East, which is most similar to East Africa, as an analogy. Benjamin assumes that East Africa wants to be self-sufficient like the previous Far Eastern Empire. Economic model, if you think about it, the two really have a lot in common, including racial similarities.
"But do we declare war in East Africa?"
"Of course not. We don't know the combat effectiveness of the East African army, so we can't act rashly. In this way, aren't the Portuguese colonies on both sides of East Africa? Let Portugal test the water first. If East Africa is just a show-off! Then we will dismember it. Lose."
"Your Excellency Prime Minister, the fighting power of the Portuguese... I don't know if the East African army is good, but the Portuguese must be good!"
"It doesn't matter, Portugal can't do it, why don't we still have us? Let's pull the French together, provide some support to Portugal, and arm the two Portuguese colonies! I believe the French are still capable of army training, especially last time Their defeat to the Germans allowed them to compete with the Germans in the colonies."