Chapter 192: Change of nationality

  Chapter 189 Change of Nationality

On June 25, 1852, Austria once again sent troops to attack the Ottoman Empire, and within a month turned hundreds of miles in the region of Serbia and Bosnia and Herzegovina, rescued more than a million people enslaved by the Ottoman Empire, and passed the dawn of civilization to the Balkan Peninsula ……

–The above is an annual report on the work of the Austrian government

In reality the Austrian army only took over the local defense and maintained social order after the Ottoman army had withdrawn.

The Serbian region was manageable in these days, the serfs in the countryside were peaceful, and the cities, although mobs were born, were still at the stage of street thugs.

Under the iron fist of Austria, these remnants of the Ottoman Empire instantly went up in smoke. The rest seem to be peaceful and good children, of course, this is also not unrelated to the withdrawal of the Ottomans took away a large number of young and strong.

It wasn’t that the Ottomans had good intentions or that they had done something stupid. War needs a lot of cannon fodder and civilians, if you leave these young people is to capitalize on the enemy.

The two Danube duchies were a case in point, and now the Russian army had recruited at least 150,000 men from the region, who could be turned into soldiers if necessary.

Without the dedication of these people, the Russians would have had to draw their own folk from within the country, and the Tsarist government was no fool, so such a choice would naturally have been made.

Drawing too many young men out of the country would also affect production, whereas it did not matter if the minutemen were drawn in the two principalities. Here belongs to the Austrian territory, the loss of even more heavy Russians do not hurt.

The Russians didn’t care, and neither did Franz. How could Austria be set off without the atrocities of the Russian army?

Now these Romanians, who had not yet joined Austrian citizenship, were not Austrians and had not paid taxes to Austria, so naturally the Austrian government was not obliged to give them protection.

As for the resulting economic loss, it is even less worth mentioning. These areas have not been developed much at all, and the only thing that has happened is a reduction in food production.

Thick and dark thought, if these young people in the battlefield loss of heavy, the future of the Austrian rule of the local difficulty, but also down a notch.

If you want to avoid Russian conscription, joining Austrian citizenship is the only option, and the Russians will not conscript Austrians.

We all take what we need, the Russians obtained a large number of civilians, Austria also issued a lot of nationality out, collected a group of supporters, in this issue of Russia and Austria very happy cooperation.

This time, the Serbian Raiders, although the Austrian government invested a small force, but it does not mean that it does not pay attention to it. On the contrary, Franz also attaches great importance to this future source of trouble.

In order to extinguish this source of war in Europe at the source, the Austrian government has also formulated special measures.

Military control was a must, as was the cleansing of the area of Ottoman influence. For the aftermath, Franz also gave special instructions to ship over a large amount of flour and bean meal as relief food.

Belgrade’s geographical conditions were unique in the Balkans.

Located at the confluence of the Sava and Danube rivers, it is also where the Pannonian Plain and the Balkan Peninsula meet. As the point of contact between Europe and the Near East, it has long been known as the “Key to the Balkans”.

But now Belgrade’s garrison commander, Esaras Pasha, doesn’t think this key to the Balkans is a good place.

The surrounding areas have all given up, leaving him, the unlucky one, to guard this lonely city.

The idea of abandoning Belgrade and running away, this idea sprang up in his mind more than once, but Aesaras Pasha didn’t dare to pay the action.

Abdul Mejid I had given him deadly orders to hold the city, the gateway to the Balkans, and lay the groundwork for a future Ottoman counteroffensive.

To counter-attack Serbia, Esaras Pasha was spiteful. If the Ottoman Empire had this strength, this war would not have come to this point.

The person who came up with this idea was obviously trying to trap him. As the loser of the political struggle, Esaras Pasha was prepared, as early as the beginning of the Near East approach, he submitted his resignation, which was rejected.

Now in front of him there are only two ways, either to hold Belgrade, or to die in battle to kill. The rest of the road he did not dare to choose, die him a better than the death of the whole family.

Unless the Ottoman Empire won the war, then finding someone to move around and send a few more gifts would solve the problem.

In the opinion of Esaras Pasha, the chances of that were infinitely zero. If you can’t win this war you need a scapegoat, and a loser in a political struggle like him is just right.

“Send someone to scout out what the enemy is up to, why hasn’t they launched an attack in so long?” Esaras Pasha ordered

Three days before, the Austrian army had surrounded Belgrade, and apart from a few routine artillery shots every day, there had been no more movement.

This unusual move naturally aroused Aesaras Pasha’s vigilance. No matter how careful he was, the enemy just did not come to the attack. His series of preparations were naturally all to no avail.

Esaras was anxious, and Lieutenant General Fislav outside the city was even more anxious. Bringing a bunch of reservists to the battlefield was fine, the enemy was even trashier anyway.

But the orders from headquarters wanted him to keep the casualties down to less than a thousand, which made it difficult for him. In front of the Ottoman army withdrew and took over the place directly basically without any casualties, now attacking Belgrade can’t be also without paying a price ah?

The political mind of Lieutenant General Fislav knew that the government was not enthusiastic about the war, even the order to attack Belgrade was only four words – see what happens.

The fact that the bigwigs up there were doing this obviously had something to do with politics. The Russo-Austrian alliance, which was no longer a secret, was the subject of many different opinions about the content of the pact.

Fislav guessed that the country did not want the Russians to conquer Constantinople, but also limited by the covenant had to support the Russians to fight, in this case the Austrian army to play sauce on the past.

But for them, the soldiers, it is tragic. No war, no war credit. This kind of one shot, accept the ground child credit, can only be regarded as hard work, and the promotion is not enough.

Fislav asked: ”Belgrade’s topographic map is here, and the enemy is not a fool, the defense is quite tight.

Does anyone have a way to take the city without paying large casualties?”

A young officer leapt to his feet and said, “Your Excellency the Commander, I don’t have a good solution, but I do have two stupid ones, should we try them?”

Fislav revealed a delighted smile and said, “Vasim, as long as we can take Belgrade with lower casualties, that’s a good solution!”

“Yes, Commander!”

“Belgrade is located at the junction of the Tisza and Danube tributaries, we can capture the city by building a dam to store water in the upstream area and using a water attack.

However, Belgrade is located in the Pannonian Plain, and it is difficult to estimate how much damage a water attack on the city would cause.

The second way is to drive the people into the city. Belgrade’s defenders include many locals. We can drive the families of the soldiers, and those who favor the Ottoman Empire, to the city of Belgrade.

If the defenders let them into the city, these people will increase their food consumption; if the defenders refuse to let them into the city, then drive these people to attack the city with wooden sticks and consume the enemy’s ammunition.

But the consequences of doing so are too great, and we must seal them after the battle.” Vasim said

The crowd sucked in a breath of cold air, the solution was a good one, it was just a little too poisonous.

Attacking the city with heavy water has too large an impact, and the losses are uncontrollable; driving the people into the city and sealing up after the battle is actually killing people to silence them, only when all these parties are dead can the impact be minimized.

After hesitating for a long time, Fislav slowly said: “Ask for help from the country, let the government send water experts over, we want to flood Belgrade.

Even if we drive the people to attack the city, the country has also mobilized a large amount of disaster relief food over, if we wreak havoc on the people, who will this food be used to relieve?”

Flooding the city Feislav dared to do, driving people to attack the city he still can’t get down this cruel heart, domestic relief food is just an excuse.

Now the Serbian region of the young and strong, are taken away by the Ottomans, want to arm the cannon fodder to attack the city can not do.

With the remaining old, weak and sick, these people have no value of armed, with wooden sticks to attack the city this is not let them die? True as Wassim said, can only consume the enemy’s ammunition.

God knows how many men had to die before the enemy’s ammunition could be depleted. If we really do it, after the war in the Serbian region, there are going to be a lot of unmanned villages and towns.

After the capture of Belgrade, there will have to be a great extermination, and it will be difficult to end it without killing the Danube to change its color, I am afraid.

There will certainly be no living people in Belgrade, and none of the captured cannon fodder will survive. Fislav is not a butcher, and can not do this kind of thing.

Vasim’s proposal seemed normal in this day and age, when the Americans were slaughtering Indians, the British were killing in Australia and New Zealand, and the Qing government in the Far East was engaged in a murderous contest with the Taiping Heavenly Kingdom.

The main protagonists in this war, the Hairy Bear and the Ottomans, were also killers, and killing good men was one of their main sources of military credit.

The transit of their armies often resulted in the creation of uninhabited villages. The Ottoman army also made an outstanding contribution to the Ottoman Empire, which had such a large territory and was still able to control the population growth very well.

The Austrian army, after being purged in the era when the world was as black as a crow, was simply a stream of clean water. In the Near East War, it was known as the first in military discipline.

Pros and cons, Fislav did not drive the people to attack the city, the Austrian government also transported a large number of relief food, Serbian region soon stabilized.

Despite the scarcity of young and strong, the Austrian government took the food for work, recruiting the local old and sick to repair roads and restore transportation.

Those who excelled in the construction process were eligible to apply for Austrian citizenship. Only after receiving Austrian citizenship were they eligible to become officials.

At this time, the Ottomans ran away, the original ruling class is finished, the social order reshuffle, the local still need a lot of officials.

Speculators naturally scrambled to apply for Austrian membership, after all, this was the best opportunity to change class.

Not to mention now, even before the people with Austrian citizenship, arrived here are more respected, the Ottoman government officials are equally afraid of causing diplomatic strife.

People are blind followers, and when they see others join, they naturally follow the trend.

I don’t know when the news started to spread that by joining the Austrian nationality, the serfs could all get the status of freemen, and then it went crazy.

From Bosnia-Herzegovina to Serbia to the two Danube Valley principalities, many populations scrambled to be the first to want to join Austrian citizenship, and most of them were serfs.

But by this time, the restrictive threshold came out. To join Austrian citizenship, one must first learn the Austrian language.

This did not scare them, anyway, as long as the application, the Austrian government will send language teachers to teach, after learning the daily language, you can become a member of Austria.

The local officials copied the Austrian land redemption policy, and regardless of the opinions of the land owners, they forced them to buy the land.

Even if they have opinions, it is useless, their land ownership is certified by the Ottoman Empire, and Austria has nothing to do with it, people are not in the even if the land is ownerless.

As for the Austrian government’s practice is not legal, this issue is no one to consider so much, anyway, now here is the Austrian people say.

Interest is always the best weapon, Austria did not get the sovereignty of these lands, but on the contrary, the local people first turned into Austrians.

If Austria can rule for two or three years, the local mainstream population have joined the Austrian nationality, then the latter things will be interesting.

One day the Sudanese government recovered these lands through negotiation, sent officials over to receive them, and then suddenly realized that this piece of their own land was actually full of foreigners, I wonder what they would think.

(End of chapter)