Chapter 932 French and Spanish Ambassadors
Hans Layton’s idea was first reported to the Hanseatic Provincial Government in the New Hamburg Port City, then to the central government, and finally reached Ernst’s hands.
Sweite, who has served as the director of the National Planning Economic Commission, reported the plans of the Maputo Municipal Government to Ernst and asked: "Your Highness, what attitude should we take towards the Maputo matter? ”
Ernst: “This matter is indeed very controversial, but although Hans Layton’s idea does not conform to the understanding of most people in the East African environment, in my opinion This is a good thing. It is very meaningful to give full play to the initiative of local governments based on government plans."
After thinking for a while, Ernst said: "On this matter. We will not deal with the matter for the time being. We will look at the effect first. After Hans Leiden’s term is up, we will look at the specific effect. If the effect is good, we will expand the scope and implement it in the entire Hanseatic Province.”
Thinking nodded and said: "Understood, His Highness means to use Maputo City as an experimental field."
"Yes, we have our own national conditions in East Africa. East Africa is a complex country, and the economy The structure is different from that of most countries in the world, so if we want to develop stably and sustainably, we must continue to try and make mistakes, and then correct our system problems. No country’s system is perfect in the current environment. We need to What is important is to grasp the balance according to the times. "
These words, Ernst said not only to Sweet, but also to himself. As the actual ruler of East Africa, the monarchy is a black system. It is impossible for the royal family to give up, but it is impossible for East Africa to completely govern the country according to the autocratic monarchy system. In that case, the royal family will inevitably be liquidated in the future, so balancing the balance between the royal family and the East African system is also an important goal of Ernst.
The world is either black or white, but no one can say clearly what is black and white. We can only say that there is white in black, and black in white. Only by mastering the elite of "mud" can the East African royal family follow this And continue to exist.
In fact, what Ernst is considering is the ideological issue of East Africa's future. This ideology cannot be extreme. After all, in their view, the monarch is dispensable. In this case, it is better to muddy the water. In this way, everyone is inseparable under the cover of night.
……
February 17, 1898.
While East Africa is busy with economic transformation, the world situation is not calm. The East African government, which originally thought that it would not have any major interactions with Spain after the purchase of Mindanao, was unexpectedly dragged into the vortex by France today. among.
"The French Ambassador to East Africa, Gleide, and the Spanish Ambassador to East Africa, William, requested to meet with His Highness."
If it were only the French, then Ernst did not know that France had come this time. What abacus, but with the Spaniards and this delicate timing, Ernst already had a plan in mind.
"Let them wait in the living room for a while!" Ernst ordered.
Before Ernst's arrival, Glade and William were communicating.
"Ambassador William, this time the Americans obviously deliberately created a dispute. We are definitely on your side regarding your country's experience. But among the major countries in the world, we are the only one in France who cannot do this. Several other countries are also relatively ambiguous about the attitude of the U.S. government, so we must win over allies as much as possible so that Spain will not fall into a passive situation. "
William believed deeply in what Glade said. , he complimented: "France has always been our best partner in Spain. We support France in the European order, but the attitude of the East African government..."
Grade said: "Don't worry about this. "As a monarchy, as long as we convince the Hechingen royal family, it won't be a problem." In fact, William also understood this. Although Spain is also a monarchy, the Spanish royal family obviously does not have the power of the Hechingen royal family. And what worries him most is not actually the relationship between Spain and East Africa, but that he thinks the French are unreliable as lobbyists.
After all, I don’t usually see how good the relationship between France and East Africa is, and the Hechingen royal family belongs to a branch of the Hohenzollern family. The relationship between the German royal family and the Hechingen royal family...
Of course, even if he thinks so in his heart, William will not say it out loud, because Spain is really desperate this time, and the only one who can help Spain tide over the difficulties is France.
This is actually easy to understand. The current world situation is actually dominated by several great powers. When Japan has not yet matured, there is no doubt that the great powers in the world at this stage are Britain, France, Russia, Germany, Austria, the United States, West and East Africa are eight countries, and these eight countries basically dominate the changes in the international situation. As for Italy and Portugal in their previous lives, they have been completely eliminated.
As a big country, East Africa has become one of the great powers that can dominate the world. In fact, it was also affected by the South African War. After the South African War, East Africa's international status rose rapidly. In fact, under the British Thanks to the promotion, the current military strength of East Africa is even higher than that of "Spain" and "Austro-Hungary".
As for Spain, which has become the goalkeeper of the great powers, there is no dispute about this. After all, they cannot achieve the same strong record as East Africa in the South African War. Not to mention the United Kingdom, Portugal alone, a country that has been kicked out of the ranks of great powers, is not It's easy to deal with. As a neighbor of the Iberian Peninsula, Spain understands Portugal better.
In fact, if East Africa had not appeared, Portugal would not have ended in disgrace. East Africa stepped on Portugal to get to the top, and now Spain is also facing the same situation, that is, the Americans also want to step on Spain to get to the top.
However, in the face of the aggressiveness of the United States, Spain lacks confidence. After the development of the U.S. Navy in recent years, it has surpassed the Spanish Navy.
Although there is not much difference between the two in terms of scale, Spanish weapons are outdated and the performance of many warships is no longer enough to compete with rising stars like the U.S. Navy.
Of course, it is not impossible to defeat the strong with the weak, just like the Austro-Hungarian Navy was in this situation during the Battle of Lisa, but it achieved a comeback by relying on the quality of its personnel.
Spain naturally does not have such ambitions. They only hope that their country can achieve the same record as the East African Navy and the British Royal Navy in the South African Naval Battle.
Of course, this does not represent the position of most people in Spain, because now Spain does not want to go to war with the United States. In fact, the United States has been the aggressive party for decades and has been provoking Spain in the hope of squeezing out Spanish power. Caribbean Sea.
Or because of the location issue, just like the South African War, why did East Africa have the confidence to go to war with two powers at the same time? The main reason is that the location of East Africa destined the two countries to be unable to deal with East Africa with all their strength.
The United States has the same calculation. It is impossible for the Spaniards to defeat themselves "on the doorstep of the United States." If there is a war between the two, the advantage will be on the United States from the beginning.
The Spanish government also knows this, so they are afraid of war. This has led the Spanish government to place more hope on the international community to mediate the conflicts between the two countries.
Now the Spanish government has only attracted one supporter, and that is the French government. However, no matter how powerful the French government is, it is impossible for the French government to directly intervene in the conflicts between the United States and Spain. After all, the United States does not seem to be easy to mess with.
Of course, it would be best if the United States and Spain could not go to war because of this, so the French government needs to increase its bargaining chips, but it has tested the attitudes of various countries in Europe. The situation is very delicate. In this case , France turned its attention to the major countries outside Europe, and the only major powers outside Europe were East Africa and the United States.
(End of this chapter)