Chapter 249: No choice.

  Chapter 242: No Choice

The issue of future naval development strategy, Franz did not immediately make a decision, it will have to wait until the end of the Near East war.

But the funding for the navy to build ironclad ships, he still approved it with alacrity. In any case, buying the honor of the world’s first ironclad ship with a few million guilders, the political gain alone was enough to pay back the money.

The new Holy Roman Empire had just been established, and the government needed good news to cheer people up. A few million guilders to build a warship to buy a wave of national pride was much better than engaging in face-saving projects.

Global cruise this will not be able to be carried out in a short period of time, at least a fleet of iron armor fleet, in order to be able to play a shocking effect.

Franz is not a loser, before the first ironclad ship comes out to prove its superiority, he is unlikely to get a bunch of them out at once.

When the first generation of ironclad ships came out, the shipyards accumulated experience, and it would be good to upgrade the technology later.

As for the performance of the early ironclad, Franz is not worried at all, the big deal is that the future upgrades and modifications, sold to the Americans during the Civil War.

Not only the Americans, there are many international big customers, the Russians are a potential big customer, although a little poor.

But Franz is not worried, the big thing is to fool the Russians in the future, to save money on the grounds that the two countries together to engage in naval research and development.

The French did it before WWI, and then they dragged the Russians into the pit with them. Everyone else was blowing up dreadnoughts, and they were the only two countries that didn’t react and built a bunch of warships that could be decommissioned before they were even in service.

Then the honor of the “first ironclad” is even more important, the brand effect is the basis for selling at a good price.

Every technological innovation is half a step ahead of others, will naturally leave the outside world a concept of technology is very impressive.

Don’t think that politicians are so professional, in fact, this group of people are mostly asses can make a decision with a pat on the head. The first thing they weigh is the benefits, and the second is the impression.

This ordinary commodity sales, the same, there is a brand plus the product sells out the price is always higher, and no brand goods can only be sold at the price of ground floor goods.

Military products obviously can not be sold at the price of the stall goods, if so do it would be a big loss.

Now Austria sold to the Russian weapons, are pre-war prices on the international market did not rise, but the same net profit will not be less than 30 percent, the arms market profits can be seen on the general.

……

Balkan Peninsula, since the Paris Conference of Britain, France and Austria on the Greek issue reached agreement, the allied forces naturally withdrew from the Kingdom of Greece.

There is still a Montenegrin principality next door that needs to be taken care of by them, so Oliver has no time to continue to play with the Greeks. Anyway, under the principle of unanimity among the big powers, the Greeks had no choice.

Accepting the conditions is a semi-colonial and semi-capitalist country, and under the mutual restraint of the big countries, the Greek Kingdom can still preserve its territory without worrying about the survival of the country; if it rejects the demands of various countries, it will immediately become history.

After drying up the Greeks, the morale of the allied forces finally recovered. Both the British army and the Sardinian army did not take the Duchy of Montenegro into consideration, but the Ottoman army often fought with Montenegro, and knew that it was a tough piece of bone.

Major General Oliver was very dissatisfied with the Ottomans’ dragging their feet. No now it was Lieutenant General Oliver, having just won a battle, he was naturally promoted and got the position of commander of the expeditionary force.

Had to once again lament the importance of the background, compared to other British generals, Oliver less than forty years old mixed to the position of Lieutenant General of the Army, enough to make a lot of people sweat.

Liaison officer Amedeo Biawati said with dissatisfaction, “Your Excellency the Commander, the Ottomans have rejected our request for a joint expedition on the grounds that we need to liquidate the rebellion to recover the lost territory.”

In his opinion, now that everyone was helping the Ottomans fight the war, none of them, the allies, had dropped the ball, and the Ottoman army had actually backed down first.

However, there was no way for him to blame the Ottoman government, because in the previous meeting, Britain and France had directly pitted the main force of the Ottoman army.

In order to appease the Ottomans, the two governments made a promise that they could stay out of the later battles.

Oliver thought about it and said, “Forget it, a mere Montenegrin principality is not worth mentioning at all, and it doesn’t matter whether the Ottomans participate in the next battles or not.”

Said this Oliver but the bottom line is full of energy, the attack on Greece British troops did not have any losses, plus the Sardinian Kingdom’s army, now there are 65,000 people.

On the other hand, how many troops did the enemy have? Even if the Duchy of Montenegro in the newly occupied areas of the frantic recruitment, but unfortunately by the Ottomans first searched once, the young and strong have long been left very few.

Even if even the captives of the same clan are organized, the Kingdom of Montenegro is barely able to come up with 40,000 troops, how much combat power is still unknown.

Oliver is very confident that this group of people who have just come together, want to block their heavy siege, it is simply a fool’s errand.

Less a group of Ottoman cannon fodder, Oliver does not care. As a high-ranking officer, Lieutenant General Oliver still know understand politics.

Now the London government is hoping that the Ottoman Empire can retain a certain amount of strength, and can continue to help guard the Black Sea portals after the war.

The strength of the Russians they had already seen, the London government did not want another Near East war, they had lost confidence in defeating the Russians.

Even if they won in the Balkans, and in the Crimea, it still wouldn’t kill the Russians. It’s not like they could afford the losses by continuing the offensive into Russia itself.

Against this background, it was natural to find a way to utilize diplomacy. Although the Ottoman Empire was corrupt, it was precisely because of this corruption that the government in London was relieved to let them hold on to the golden waterways.

This requires the Sudanese government to restore its strength as soon as possible, which is obviously very difficult. A Near East war was fought, and the entire Balkan Peninsula was smashed.

Since the Ottomans were unwilling to participate in the later battles, Lieutenant General Oliver could not force them, didn’t he see that the French were defending Constantinople alone?

Now the losses are so heavy, did not even say anything to ask the allies to help. Of course, this does not exclude the factor that the French are afraid of being pitched by their teammates.

Big countries still need credibility, since made a promise, must fulfill it. If you break the contract three times, everyone will not play with you, even the British Empire can not stand ah!

Without any hesitation, Lieutenant General Oliver led the British-Saudi Arabia allied forces to kill towards the Albanian region, and the big battle was about to start.

……

The Duchy of Montenegro panicked at the onslaught of the allied forces. Unlike the Ottomans they often fought, without the fear of the British Montenegro Duchy is still very scrupulous.

The sparrow is small, but it has all its organs.

The various departments of the Montenegrin government are still perfect, fully proving that they are a country, not a cottage.

Danilo I said solemnly, ”Gentlemen, the Near East War has progressed to this point, and the developments on the battlefield have completely exceeded our control.

After a bitter battle, we managed to take the fortress of Shkodra, capture half of Albania, and gained our coveted access to the sea.

Behind this brilliant result, we also paid a heavy price, nearly four thousand warriors fell on the battlefield, the war emptied our treasury, and now owe Austria a huge foreign debt.

Strategically, we have gotten everything we wanted, and the Duchy of Montenegro is tired and doesn’t have the strength to keep fighting.

Now we all need to think about how we can eat the land we already control.”

Apparently, Danilo I’s desire to fight had run out and wanted to fall on his sword.

There was no way around it, the Black Mountain Duchy’s capital was too small, and having captured several times the amount of land than the mainland in one go, they had long exceeded their limits.

For other countries, losing 4,000 men might be a number, for the Duchy of Montenegro, it was a great loss of vitality, almost to the point where families were wearing mourning.

Even if they knew that the enemy was coming to attack, now they could only passively defend. Playing too much in the previous period, took a lot of the capital in, now Danilo I dare not continue to play.

Prime Minister and part-time Foreign Minister Claude Drellich analyzed, ”Grand Duke, wanting to swallow the territories we have occupied will not be possible unless the Russians are able to win this war.

However, judging from the current situation, the winner of this war is still uncertain.

Britain and France have the upper hand on the Crimean Peninsula, yet they are unable to defeat Russia in a short period of time; the Russians have the upper hand on the Balkan Peninsula, yet they are slow to capture Constantinople.

If the Russians lose the war, then we are in big trouble and will certainly be subject to enemy retaliation after the war.

I’m afraid we won’t be able to withstand the enemy’s counterattacks with our own strength alone.”

Milkov, Commander-in-Chief and Minister of War of the Principality of Montenegro, said, “There is no need to wait for later, according to the intelligence we have received, the enemy is already on their way, and it won’t take more than a week for the great war to break out.

Those losers in Greece were boasting about dividing Albania with us before, but they didn’t realize that they were actually so unbeatable that they didn’t even have the ability to deplete the enemy’s forces.

Immediately we are going to face an attack by 65,000 Anglo-Saxon allied forces, the gap between the enemy’s and our strengths is too great, this war has something to fight for.”

Despite the hint of retribution, there were a few more leaps of faith from Mirkov when he said this. Scared of the British, but not intimidated by Britain.

In order to get access to the sea, to change the situation of the Montenegrin Duchy of poverty, they struggled for several generations, naturally, it is impossible to be afraid of the enemy’s strong strength, and then give up the benefits of the hand to hand.

Danilo I asked, “Is it possible to solve the problem by diplomatic means?”

As a pacifist, he truly did not want to fight on. The Duchy of Montenegro couldn’t fight on either, as a small country they could only reckless a wave, now that this stream was over, it was natural to take a break.

“Your Majesty, I’m afraid this won’t work. Although Britain and France have sent people to contact us, they don’t have much sincerity.

Not only do they demand that we join the allied forces and declare war on the Russians, but after the war we will have to spit out the majority of the gains we’ve gained now.” Prime Minister and part-time Foreign Minister Claude Dreilich replied

Negotiating terms also depended on strength, no matter how brightly the Montenegrin army performed on the battlefield, it could not hide the fact that they were not strong enough. Without strength, it’s naturally impossible for Britain and France to offer a big price.

Moreover, jumping back is also a price to pay. The Russians are not soft, now the situation on the battlefield is just a stalemate, has not been divided into winners and losers, in case of standing on the wrong side that will really be finished.

(End of chapter)