Chapter 295: Debt Crisis
Chapter 285: Debt Crisis
While bullying the Ottoman government, the African colonies also began to move. None of the troops needed to be mobilized from the country, this time it was just to establish a stronghold along the coast of Nigeria, the colonies had enough troops to do so.
Not everyone knew that this Great Indian Uprising would last, and it seemed to many that the British could easily extinguish this rebellion as soon as they reacted.
With this guiding principle, the Vienna government was also quick to take advantage of this opportunity to swallow the meat first.
In this era, there was a serious whitophobia among the Africans, and the Austrian army quickly defeated several indigenous tribes and established settler strongholds.
Colonel Nikos commanded, “Quickly, fortify the fortifications for me, the enemy’s counterattack is imminent.”
A young officer asked suspiciously, “Colonel, is there a need to be so careful? It’s not just an indigenous kingdom, we’ll just go up and exterminate them soon?”
Colonel Nikos glared at him and said sternly, “Abate, put away your self-righteous arrogance, any carelessness on the battlefield could lead to fatal losses.
If you still want to hang around in the army, you have to be vigilant at all times, this is the most basic quality of a soldier, if you can’t do it I can send you back to your country right now.
Are African natives easy to deal with? Haven’t you heard of the tactic of the sea of men? This is the territory of the Kingdom of Tekrul, they can gather tens of thousands of people to come and counterattack.
Don’t think they are all armed with big swords and spears, someone sold them guns a hundred years ago. Even if their weaponry is a little behind, that’s not something you can take lightly.”
Role a nobleman’s son, Abate ran to the colony just to build a career, naturally, he couldn’t just go back in disgrace.
Since Austria opened the colonization, battles with more than a thousand people had never been lost, naturally making many people think that the African natives were unbeatable.
Now hearing that the enemy was strong, Abbott was not only not intimidated, but excited.
“Powerful” is only relative, compared to the indigenous tribes, the indigenous kingdoms are naturally powerful, but compared to the European countries, even the Montenegrin Duchy is more powerful than them.
Either they have taken up hot weapons, or they are modernized armies, and they have to undergo rigorous training to be able to play their proper combat power.
Other not to mention, alone a weapon recoil, untrained people a shot, the bullet do not know where to go.
Therefore, in recent times, many ragtag armies have fought on the battlefield, only to realize that when they finally counted the casualties, they didn’t die a few deaths at all.
A big country like Austria can give each soldier a few hundred rounds of ammunition to practice marksmanship, and there is no way that the indigenous kingdoms of Africa can be so ostentatious.
Abbott lowered his head and replied, “Yes, Colonel!”
……
As it turned out, the Kingdom of Tekrul just wasn’t any efficient kingdom, completely retaining their nature. It had all been waiting for more than a month before they organized an army to arrive late.
By this time, the primary fortifications of the colonial stronghold had been completed. Colonel Nikos in the command headquarters picked up his binoculars, looked at the disorganized enemy army, and sneered to, “Garbage, always garbage!”
Seeing the enemy setting up camp, Nikos couldn’t help but admire their courage, daring to set up camp in the enemy navy’s fire coverage, he didn’t even know what to say.
Of course, the enemies of the Tecruel Kingdom were all indigenous African kingdoms that had no idea of the power of the naval artillery, and the distances at which they were encamped were determined based on past experience.
Not to mention the navy, even the heavy artillery in the army could similarly strike them. Nikos secretly regretted that he didn’t bring any heavy artillery this time, or else he wouldn’t even need to seek help from the navy.
The battle between land and navy existed in any country, and Austria was no exception. Of course this kind of conflict is mainly centered around military spending, not yet to the point where Japan’s kind of land and naval forces look at each other and lay their hands on each other.
Nikos ordered, “Abbott go inform the Navy and have them send warships over for target practice. Just tell them a bunch of idiots have come and want to serve as targets for them.”
“Yes, Colonel!” Abbott replied.
Nikos understood somewhat why a hundred or eighty colonists could defeat a country. It was completely due to ignorance, and ignorance is fearless.
He had already decided to attract as many enemy troops as he could. The more enemies there were, the more glorious his battle would be anyway.
It was a pity that the battle achievements against the African natives were worthless, otherwise defeating tens of thousands of enemy troops with a single regiment could have gone down in history.
……
Antalya.
The representatives of England, France, Austria, and the Ottomans have all arrived, and now everyone is negotiating about this conflict between Austria and the Ottoman Empire.
The Ottoman Foreign Minister, Banner Ade, said with a solemn face, “We strongly protest the Austrians’ forcible seizure of Crete, which violates the Treaty of Vienna and infringes on the sovereignty of our country.”
The Austrian representative Johannes replied calmly, “Mr. Banner Ade, please calm down. We didn’t take Crete by force, it’s just that a warship had an accident and needed to be repaired, so we borrowed it for a while.
Don’t worry, we will pay for it, we won’t borrow your land for nothing.
There is no question of violating the Treaty of Vienna, which is designed to maintain peace and stability in Europe, and which we, as a founding member, will naturally abide by.
Now we are just negotiating a deal, and we are not forcing you to cede these lands, so how can we be considered to have violated the treaty? In the end, whether it will be a success or not, we have to wait until the talks are over, so why get so excited!”
British representative Nigel asked, “Since we are negotiating a deal, now that the Ottoman Empire has rejected the deal, shouldn’t your country withdraw from Crete?”
Johannes said unhurriedly, “Of course, if the Ottoman government is unwilling to accept the deal, we naturally won’t force it.
It’s just that there are now two governments in the Ottoman Empire, and the Sultan’s government has lost the hearts of the people, so whether they can represent the will of the Ottoman people is still an unknown.
In a responsible manner, we believe it is necessary to make contact with the Holy Land government, and after understanding their position, we will then proceed to formal negotiations.”
A threat, it was a naked threat. If the deal doesn’t work, the Vienna government will not recognize the legitimacy of the Sudanese government and will instead support the Holy Land government.
This hurt Sanad, who had managed to suppress the rebel party in front of them and saw the light of victory. If the rebel party gained the support of Austria, who knows how much longer the civil war would have to be fought.
Banner Ade’s bottom of the air is not enough to rebuke: “Count Johannes, this is the Ottoman Empire’s internal affairs, you have no right to interfere!”
Johannes patiently explained: “Mr. Banner Ade please rest assured, we will not venture to interfere in your country’s internal affairs.
It’s just that your government’s approach is very worrying, we came to talk about trade with good intentions, and you refused to even talk about it, completely disregarding the friendship between the two countries, which breaks our hearts.”
Sanad replied seriously, “Your Excellency the Count, negotiations are based on the premise that both sides are voluntary. It’s not that we intentionally refuse to negotiate with your country, but right now we have no plans to sell our land.”
Johannes’ face changed and he said indifferently, “Of course we won’t force a deal, now please ask your country to immediately repay our debt of twenty-eight million divine guilders, we only accept gold and divine guilders for payment.”
Amplitude Ade was dumbfounded, when did the Ottoman Empire, owe the Austrians so much money?
“Your Excellency the Count, I would like to know when this debt arose. As far as I know, our debt to your country does not exceed two million divine guilders.”
Johannes calmly took out a document from his briefcase and handed it to Banner Ade before saying, “This is the breakdown of the debt, you can send someone to verify it.”
Scanning through it, Banner Ade revealed a bitter color, he finally understood where these debts came from. There was another kind of debt in the world, an assignment of debt.
Due to the Ottoman Empire’s financial difficulties, the Sultan’s government had declared government bankruptcy not long ago, and a lot of debts were then reneged on.
These unpayable claims were, naturally, worthless. The Vienna government wanted to acquire these claims, and naturally the debtors would not refuse.
Cabbage price is also better than blood money, no ability to collect debts from the Ottoman government debtors, can only choose to bear the pain to stop.
The Vienna government, however, has this strength, and has paid the actual action.
Debt repayment is a matter of course.
On this issue, Britain and France are not able to stop it; they are the biggest international debtors, and if those who owe debts can renege on them, they have a lot to lose.
Even though the Government of the Sudan had not reneged on their debt, they had to recognize that it was legitimate for the Government of Vienna to collect debts.
From that moment on, the conflict between the two sides was no longer a military conflict, but a door-to-door debt collection.
The British representative Nigel proposed, “Your Excellency the Count, let’s adjourn the meeting for the time being! This debt still needs to be verified, and we will wait until Mr. Amateur has cleared things up.”
Anyway, his purpose was to stall for time, as for solving the problem? Sorry, the Austrians had been planning for so long, relying on his three-inch tongue to make people give up would be too mythical. Nigel didn’t have that kind of confidence.
Johannes thought for a moment and said: “Well, we will talk again after a week, I think that such a long time, has been enough for Mr. Sanad to verify the authenticity of these debts.
However, Mr. Ader had better verify it quickly, this overdue debt will generate a huge amount of late fees every day, the longer the delay, the more disadvantageous for you.”
Mr. Banner Ade wiped the sweat from his forehead and replied with a somewhat trembling voice, “Please rest assured, Your Excellency the Count, we will verify this debt as soon as possible.”
He didn’t think that these claims were fake, since the Austrians had brought them to the negotiation table, there would definitely not be any problems, and it was impossible for Johannes to joke with the international reputation of the Vienna government.
(End of chapter)