Chapter 1255 Seeing is believing
fair play? Ricardo is not a three-year-old child, so naturally he will not believe what Roger calls "fairness". There is only one kind of fairness in this era, and that is whoever is stronger has the final say. Everything else is nonsense. Of course he hopes to monopolize Haihan's resources, but the Dutch obviously will not sit back and watch such a situation happen. Roger arranged this occasion for the two parties to meet, obviously to use their competitive relationship to gain more resources for Haihan. Benefit.
But even if he knew Roger's plan, Ricardo had no better way to deal with it. Now he was begging Haihan to do something. In this passive position, he had no choice but to agree first. If there was a slight hesitation at this juncture, Roger might fall to the Dutch side.
Can't lose! Ricardo secretly held his breath, no matter what the Dutch's true purpose of coming here was, he must try his best to prevent them from succeeding. Even if Haihan did not continue to use force against Johor in the end, the Dutch could not be allowed to intervene to disrupt the situation. Especially in the areas near Johor, the Dutch must not be allowed to set foot in order to avoid affecting the security of Malacca City.
Roger was worried that he wouldn't be able to greet him by himself, so he specially called Tan Juren over the next day. Although Tan Juren's English is not as fluent as Roger, a Chinese who has lived abroad all year round, it is basically enough to deal with Ricardo and Philip who also speak broken English.
"I know how to speak in official terms, but how are you going to arrange these two families?" Tan Juren didn't know much about Roger's plan, so he naturally wanted to get some ideas first.
Roger smiled and said: "They all want to get benefits from us. It's not that easy. Let's see what kind of conditions they can come up with first! Remember, we have the initiative now, and you don't have to say anything they say." Don’t rush to express your position, just act according to the situation.”
After hearing this, Tan Juren couldn't help but laugh and said: "You are eating up the family before you eat at the family below! The blackmail between Johor and the United Kingdom has not been nailed down yet, and you are planning to drag Portugal and the Netherlands into the water!"
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Roger immediately denied: "I didn't drag them into this, they all came to us by smelling the smell. Since they want to get benefits from us so much, of course they have to show some sincerity first."
When Tan Juren heard this, his heart was filled with confusion. This does not require any specific plan, just finding ways to deal with it is enough. The Portuguese and Dutch are here to hug you, but whether you can hug them or not depends on the actual benefits they provide.
The two envoys arrived at Roger's official residence almost at the same time. When they looked at each other, it seemed that faint sparks of electricity could be seen in the air. However, in front of officials from Haihan, the two men still had to pretend to continue to play the role of civilized gentlemen, but they secretly cursed each other bloody. The so-called smile on the face and MMP in the heart is roughly like this.
However, when the two people heard Roger introduce Tan Juren's identity, they immediately turned their attention to the newly appointed chief executive. They have been dealing with Roger for a long time, and they know each other well. It is difficult to convince this determined Haihan officer. However, the new chief executive may not know the local situation and the international situation that well, but he can try to win over the relationship. A good impression may promote some future cooperation.
So the two of them rushed to praise Tan Juren for being young and promising, and that Xingdao had a bright future. Tan Juren has lived for so long from before time travel to after time travel, and he has never been praised so hard by a foreigner. Even if he can only understand part of it in a vague way, he can't help but feel a little elated at this moment. It was Roger who coughed lightly next to him that made him suddenly come back from his intoxicated state and realize that the business flattery of these two guys was not sincere, but was mostly just to flatter themselves.
Tan Juren also coughed twice and said: "Then let me introduce today's arrangements to you two. First, let's take a look at the seizures in this battle. If you have any items that you are interested in, you can bid for them. Then we will go Take a tour of the prison camp, where you can see the two senior officers who led the invasion, one of whom is British."
After hearing these words, both of their eyes lit up. Their interest in trophies was actually average. The British-made muskets were not much better than the weapons made in their own country. If the price was more favorable, they could buy it with their eyes closed. For a sum of money, you can make some profit by selling it back to the merchant ship captains or local indigenous people. But now there was suddenly a competitor, so he couldn't fall behind others. Even if he didn't make any money, he still had to bite the bullet and accept the goods.
Of course, what they were really interested in was seeing the prisoners of war. This was the most direct and effective way to verify the results of Haihan's battle. Others can fake it, but prisoners of war certainly cannot fake it. Especially the Portuguese Ricardo, who has had many years of dealings with the locals, can recognize the appearance and dress of the Johor warriors at a glance. Even if the Haihan people want to find someone to disguise themselves, they will definitely not be able to hide it from his eyes. As for the British, it is easier to tell the difference. As long as you have a few casual conversations, you can tell the authenticity from the accent.
From the number of captured prisoners of war and the rank of officers, it is not difficult to infer the scale of the joint troop dispatch between Johor and the British. From this, we can also judge more information, such as the extent of the determination of the British and Johor to occupy Sing Tao. , as well as the current combat capabilities of the Haihan Army and so on. These first-hand intelligence materials are very important, and you may not be able to buy them even with money outside.
Soon they saw the weapons collected in the Battle of Star Island in a temporary armory converted from a cowshed. Although they had heard from Roger before, he said that there were thousands of matchlock rifles captured this time. There were so many rifles, but when they saw so many rifles stacked together, the visual impact was still quite large. A few soldiers opened the covered oilcloth, revealing rifles stacked layer by layer underneath, piled up like a hill.
"You two can take out a few and check the quality." Roger introduced confidently from the side.
Ricardo and Philip looked at each other and each stepped forward to inspect the rifles. Although they are all merchants, maritime merchants are also more or less equipped with weapons. They are no strangers to the structure and use of these matchlock guns. The wear and tear on the butt, trigger, hammer and other parts are very serious. It's easy to tell how good it is. Judging from the results of random inspections, Roger was indeed not bragging. The quality of these rifles was indeed very new. Most of them were new guns that had just been installed in the army and had not been used a few times. The marks of the British domestic arsenal were clearly visible on the butts. Mark, it seems that the British and the Johor people have indeed spent a lot of money this time. Since most of them were new guns, the two envoys were mostly relieved. They were originally worried that Haihan would buy some junk goods to make money, but it seemed that they were a little too worried. These rifles are of the same standard, complete with spare parts and ammunition. It would be a pity to resell them. They can be kept for personal use. That is to say, the Haihan people are wealthy and can make more powerful weapons themselves, so they don't take these brand-new weapons seriously and just treat them as useless.
In addition to rifles, there are also many other spears, machetes, and metal armors, but these things are not so attractive. The two of them picked for a while, but only settled on some armors with better workmanship, not even one-tenth of the total. And they don't really want to spend money to buy the remaining rags. But Roger probably doesn't care about this. If no one buys it, then at most some of the better quality weapons will be left to arm the militia, and the rest will basically be used to make farm tools and kitchen utensils.
The two people usually select suitable weapons and equipment while estimating the number of weapons piled here. In addition to thousands of rifles, the remaining weapons are almost enough to equip an army of thousands of people. It is roughly estimated that the coalition troops defeated by Haihan were at least about 2,000 people. For a country like Johor that is not too strong in military strength, it is very likely that it is already the elite of a country's army.
In fact, it is not difficult to estimate how long it will take to train a thousand-man musketeer force and how much money will be invested. Ricardo knew the situation in Johor relatively better. He believed that with Johor's existing national strength, forming such an army would probably require emptying the national treasury. The facts were similar to his estimate. Johor not only emptied the national treasury, but also owed the British a debt that needed to be repaid in installments.
Of course, this battle was so completely defeated that the newly minted musketry army was completely wiped out in the first battle. The weapon victory theory, military superiority, and tactical superiority that the British boasted were completely not reflected. In this kind of situation, Under such circumstances, it is not certain whether Johor will still be willing to fulfill the contract and pay the remaining amount to it. After all, the two parties agreed that after occupying Star Island, they would use the right to use Star Island to offset part of the debt. Now that the goal has not been achieved, the payment progress will naturally stop.
It was naturally difficult for the two envoys to deduce the details of these behind-the-scenes transactions from the seized weapons. However, the magnitude of the bargaining chips invested by Britain and Johor in this operation was already clear after looking at this temporary armory.
Roger then quoted a rough price, which was not outrageous and was a bit lower than the cost of shipping weapons from China. The situation of mutual price competition did not occur at this time, because the number of weapons was indeed a bit too much. After they bought them back, even if they were installed in the existing troops, there would still be a lot more. Besides, raising the price was just giving money to Haihan in vain, so the two envoys had a tacit understanding and did not add drama to themselves, so they divided the seized rifles, mainly rifles, in half according to Roger's quotation.
However, when they came to Xingdao this time, they never thought about spending anything, so the cash they brought with them was definitely not enough. At the moment, they could only write down an IOU first and bring the money to settle later. In this kind of official-to-official transaction, Roger didn't have to worry about them not paying back the money they owed. After receiving the IOU, he asked his subordinates to arrange migrant workers to transport the weapons to the port for loading as soon as possible.
Then finally came the highlight they were looking forward to, visiting the temporary prisoner of war camp set up by Haihan on the island. The two were taken to the plains north of the immigrant village, and then they saw the prisoner of war camp surrounded by an iron fence. This prisoner-of-war camp didn't even have a wall, and it looked really simple. However, there didn't seem to be as many prisoners of war in the camp as Roger had advertised, and it was far from the number they had previously estimated.
"Most of the prisoners of war are currently working on various construction sites. Those who stay in the camp are those responsible for cleaning and building infrastructure projects." Tan Juren explained to them the scene in front of them in a timely manner: "For example, building roads in the east These people are all prisoners of war.”
The two of them looked in the direction pointed by Tan Juren, and sure enough they saw a large group of people busy building roads not far to the east, as many as two to three hundred people. This road starts from outside the immigrant village and leads to the north, but there is a wasteland two miles away. I don't know the significance of building such a road specifically.
Ricardo raised this question to Tan Juren and received an answer quickly. During this battle, Haihan's troops moved back and forth between the north and south of the island. Because there was no road, the march was quite difficult. Roger planned to build a road leading to the north of the island and set up a permanent outpost at the northern strait. Beware of military threats from north of the Channel. Of course, this road does not only have such a function. In the future, the resettlement and agricultural development on the island will naturally be deployed with this north-south avenue as the central axis, so as to make full use of the traffic function of this road.
Originally, the construction of this road was expected to be postponed for one or two years, but so much free labor was sent at this juncture. After discussing with Tan Juren, Luo Jie decided to implement the infrastructure project ahead of schedule and take advantage of the opportunity. When available, you can repair as much as you can.
Ricardo was able to basically determine their identities by looking at the clothes on these prisoners. They were indeed dressed in Johor Army uniforms. Judging from the dejected look of these guys, it doesn't look like they are pretending, and the people directing the labor of these prisoners of war are obviously several Johor officers. It seems that Haihan really made the best use of his resources and directly recruited him as a foreman.
"Why don't you see the British?" Philip asked with concern after looking around but not seeing the target he cared about.
"The British are all senior officers in this coalition. A total of thirteen people were captured by us. However, due to their special status, they were not locked up with these ordinary prisoners of war." Tan Juren understood what the other party meant. The answer was immediately given: "If you want to see the British, we can go now."
(End of chapter)