In later generations, this is an important area for the power game of many great powers, because its location is quite important, a Black Sea, connecting the entire Middle East, Eastern Europe, Central Europe, the Mediterranean, and the Jingzhou region of the Central Plains continent, extending in all directions, is a battleground for soldiers.

Therefore, most of the armies of the Tang Dynasty westward are concentrated in this area, and they will concentrate on building a naval army and a fleet.

With the familiarity of Xue Li and Xi Junmai with Sun Xiangfu, they don't need to do some polite face-saving work, the rest of the mission, naturally have sergeant arrangements, rest barracks food, etc., have already been prepared, Sun Xiangfu's residence is by the accompanying Li Xiangdie's Yao Hongsleeve to sort out Zhang Luo, he himself only needs to be in the camp tent and concentrate on discussing business.

"Young Master Sun, the general's intention to build a dock and assemble a steamship in such a hurry is to allow us to establish absolute military superiority in the Black Sea region as soon as possible, please take a look."

Xue Li used the indicator stick to point out to Sun Xiangfu all the cities on the sand table, the cities of the Byzantine Empire on the Black Sea coast, and the military strength arranged, and Sun Xiangfu, who was familiar with this thing, immediately understood the meaning.

As long as the Tang Dynasty gives full play to the advantages of its naval army in the Black Sea, then many important cities of the Byzantine Empire, and even their capital Constantinople, may be directly bombarded by the new artillery of the Tang Dynasty, and there is no possibility of counterattack at all.

In addition, Sun Xiangfu also noticed that the south of the sand table, that is, the Middle East, has now been planted with the banner of the Tang Army, that is to say, in the past few months, Hou Junji has successfully taken over all the territory of Persia, turning the Caspian Sea into the inland sea of the Tang Dynasty, and the Great Food Empire, in the later Iran, Iraq to Turkey, the line is fully connected, thousands of miles.

Earlier, it was this defense line of thousands of miles that dragged down the Persian Sassanid Empire.

Because, Da Shi is a nomadic alliance empire, they are like the northern nomads of the Tang Dynasty before, they can wantonly launch an attack anywhere, suddenly, as a defensive side, the Persians have to defend the entire line, and its military consumption is huge, which is not at all borne by the Persians.

However, there is no such problem in the Tang Dynasty, as long as the big cannibals, who are mainly cold weapons, dare to appear within the scope of the Tang army's telescope, they may be devastated, as for military spending.

Datang basically won't have such worries now, because, just the output of the Anxi Dadu Protectorate has now been expanded into eight towns and thirty-six states, which is enough to support the food and drink of hundreds of thousands of troops, if necessary, Datang can even transfer hundreds of thousands of war horses to arm all soldiers into mobile troops that can be attracted at high speed, and enter the territory of Dashi to fight, if they dare to provoke the Tang army, then, they may not even run away, even if hundreds of thousands of troops are dispatched, Datang can also fight on horseback, or even one person with three horses, Drive them out of the grassland like rabbits.

Under the absolute superiority of force, Datang chose not to start a war, mainly because the problems of folk religion and culture of these two countries are difficult to deal with, and ruling this region by force will only make it a bottomless pit that consumes Datang's national strength.

In the past five years, Datang has not increased its troops significantly, and the territory is too large, and there is no million-level army scattered out, stationed in various places, it will not have any effect.

Now, Hou Junji has established the entire defense line of the Byzantine Empire and the Great Food Empire, so slowly digesting the territory of South Asia, consolidating his rule over the Middle East, and increasing the number of troops stationed in the places is what he has to do, hundreds of thousands of troops, distributed in thousands of miles, and half of the Black Sea circle, relatively speaking, it is too sparse.

Therefore, during Sun Xiangfu's visit to the Byzantine Empire, Datang even had to give some food, clothing, medicine and other assistance to Dashi, so that they could maintain stability and accept goodwill from Datang.

An alliance empire of nomads with a population of more than 10 million, judging from the current situation, it is very difficult for anyone to take over the governance of it, and it can only be used in many ways, and the effect of driving tigers and wolves will be better, of course, for Datang, it should be to drive dogs and rabbits, because Datang himself is a tiger.

After Sun Xiangfu looked at the sand table as a whole, he smiled and said, "Are you telling me that our military has made all preparations, just wait for me to send an envoy to establish a local public opinion base, and you will act?" ”

When Xue Li heard this, he also smiled and said, "Just to let you know the latest situation, don't be afraid of Heraclius tricks, their borders are mostly facing the sea, as long as we go to the sea, there will be retreats everywhere." ”

After saying this, Xue Li also pointed to the edge of the Mediterranean Sea above, where Datang's naval fleet had established a number of island military bases as early as two years ago, and they could be notified by carrier pigeons at any time to meet them along the designated coast.

Sun Xiangfu smiled after reading it, "You can rest assured!" Heraclius was not such a stupid person, and when you go to Byzantium, you should not put on a fierce appearance, but show affinity, and do your best to eliminate their hostility and wariness towards us, so that the people will like us, and this is the purpose of our trip. ”

"Affinity? Who thinks I have this thing but my daughters-in-law? Xi Junmai touched his bearded chin and said.

Sun Xiangfu glanced at his current rough appearance, it is true, but he smiled again, "You can't rely on your face to eat, just rely on physical strength, rely on action, our mission this time is to lead the people over there to farm, you have been in Anxitun for so many years, these jobs should also be done!" ”

Hearing this, Xi Junmai looked up at the sky, with a look of lovelessness, obviously he had practiced a peerless martial arts, but he had to farm all day long, and after planting the fields of the Tang Dynasty, he had to go abroad to farm, I was really born useless!

However, Xue Li, who thought a little more than he thought, was a little puzzled, "However, we have helped the Byzantium increase their productivity and strengthen their national strength, won't it make it more difficult for us to rule them." ”

Sun Xiangfu smiled and said, "That's not how the accounts are calculated, we have never been at war with the Byzantine Empire!" Moreover, we have always maintained trade with them, and have friendly relations, and have borrowed a lot of money from them to turn over the domestic economy. ”

Hearing this, Xue Li's eyes suddenly lit up, and he understood a little.

The Byzantine Empire, with a population of more than 40 million, has never been the object of the Tang Dynasty's conquest by force, and the Great Food is the ultimate opponent selected by the Tang Dynasty, and before that, the role played by the Great Food should be the assistant who pushed Byzantium to the Tang Dynasty.

Therefore, Sun Xiangfu's visit to Byzantium this time is really to help Byzantium develop and win the hearts of the people, these years, the Byzantine students who have returned from studying in Chang'an have begun to help Sun Xiangfu advocate momentum in China, and Li Shimin has already completed these strategic designs.

Thinking of this, Xue Li's whole person was relaxed.

Because, Sun Xiangfu is too important to the Tang Dynasty, he can't tolerate the slightest damage, and only takes 3,000 people to protect him in and out of an empire with more than a million troops, which makes him feel more pressure than a mountain, after all, the Tang Dynasty has incorporated a number of Byzantine vassal states, and after a large area of border with it, although the two countries have not gone to war, they are also in a state of mutual vigilance in the Cold War.

After settling down, Sun Xiangfu did not rush to set off, but made some plans for the agricultural area near Itier City, which is a plain area with abundant water and grass, and it is a bit wasteful just for grazing.

Because, Sun Xiangfu knows that in the era of non-science and technology, only agriculture can make a nation settle down, and nomads must rely on farming people to live a better life, so that they can continue to live in a nomadic way, after all, it is an unstable factor.

The Khazar Khanate in this area, after the merger of the Ozgu State and the Pevineg Kingdom into the Tang Dynasty, merged together the nomadic area, which was not even less than the original Xue Yantuo, which included all the countries between the Caspian Sea and the Black Sea in later generations, as well as half of Ukraine, and part of the territory of Russia, at least as big as the two states of the Tang Dynasty.

Promote the transformation of the local people to an agricultural society, in order to make the local area more stable, the current here, but too much like Xue Yantuo more than ten years ago, civilization compared to the current Tang Dynasty, a lot behind.

Regardless of that era, advanced civilization can quickly influence backward civilization, after a busy life, Sun Xiangfu left some agricultural students in the local area to continue to follow up the development of farming, and he himself led the team to the dock location of the Black Han Side, where Feng Zhidai had already received a group of envoys from the Byzantine Empire.

"Heraclius is going to bring hundreds of thousands of Byzantine people to a grand welcome ceremony for me?" After hearing the envoy explain the meaning of the future in pure Chinese, Sun Xiangfu, who was in Feng Zhidai's military tent, looked at the envoy named Tukel with some surprise.

"Yes, however, in our Byzantine Empire, the level of this kind of ceremony must not be compared with the Tang Empire, that is, His Majesty will personally accompany you, ride a float through the streets, watch the dances of the people along the street, and then in the palace, with the highest standard banquet, you are invited to eat." Tukel has some inferiority complex.

Unlike when the Tang Dynasty held a sports conference, tens of thousands of singers and dancers were often summoned to create a top-level audio-visual feast, the Byzantine Empire was able to gather hundreds of thousands of people to the streets of Constantinople without chaos, which was already quite difficult, mainly because Heracliu, who had been to the Tang Dynasty several times, was afraid of embarrassment, so he forced the organization and spent a lot of money.

Of course, there are also reasons for the promotion of those international students who have returned from studying in the Tang Dynasty and have now formed a large political force in the Byzantine Empire.

In a better manner, entering the Byzantine Empire is naturally what Sun Xiangfu wants, so he also arranged for people to make some preparations according to Heraclius's intentions, and the mission of more than 10,000 people requisitioned a lot of materials along the way, and they were sent to those magnates of the Byzantine Empire, and it was in vain, and it should appear in the hands of the common people.

In mid-July, eight steamers, dozens of wooden hydro steamers, and nearly a hundred cargo galleons collected locally set out in the port of Sevas in the direction of Constantinople.

The first time I got on a steamer, Tukel felt very magical, this ship with no sails at all, no need for livestock to pull the gear disc, just one or two hours, those sailboats were thrown out of sight, this may be the gap between the Byzantine Empire and the Tang Dynasty!

Fortunately, he is now a member of the Tang Dynasty, and I hope that Byzantium can really start to be included in the Tang Dynasty in three to five years, as Lord Qu Tu said.