"We have taken over Pernambuco, and all the sugar plantations in Brazil and the sugar mills in the cities are in our hands, so that we can escape the control of the Dutch and make more profits. Not to mention that we now have the upper hand on the battlefield, and if we blockade the coast of Recife, the Dutch will not be able to get enough supplies, then sooner or later we will make a breakthrough on the battlefield and win all the qiē. Vieira, the sugar tycoon, suddenly retorted, "To borrow a phrase that you people on the East Coast often say, the winner takes all, isn't it?" ”

Joao. Fernandez. Vieira's words elicited a chorus of Portuguese echoes, which made Gaumo smile coldly. The Portuguese were so carried away by the successive victories that they wanted to completely drive the Dutch out of Brazil and dominate the vast land.

It is no wonder who has allowed the Dutch West India Company to grow bigger and bigger over the years, so much so that they now have neither the energy, nor the financial resources, nor the resources to maintain Brazil. You know, they owned half of Brazil in their heyday, but since the Portuguese became independent from Spain, their good days have come to an end.

First the Dutch themselves began to cut their funds to die, then the encroachment on the land of Portuguese immigrants to the Dutch immigrants, and then the forced implementation of Dutch education, the exclusion of Catholicism, the increase in taxes, and a series of other things that were particularly disgusting to the early Portuguese immigrants, all of which made the Portuguese in the Dutch-occupied area want to return to the command of King Joao.

And after the outbreak of an epidemic that weakened the Dutch, the idea was quickly put into action: Joao. Fernandez. Vieira, a sugar tycoon living in Recife, began to liaise with the Portuguese authorities and organized an armed rebellion. to overthrow the Dutch.

After the outbreak of the uprising. The cowardly Brazilian colonial authorities waited for a long time. After confirming that the Dutch invaders had been exhausted by the insurrection of armed insurrection, they began to intervene directly in the battlefield at the behest of their own country, sending military instructors, weapons and ammunition to the rebels, and finally organizing a small army from Europe to fight directly - but the main forces fighting the Dutch were always tame Indians and blacks.

As the battle dragged on, the Dutch had less and less territory, and now only this small piece of coastal land in General Pernambuco's territory remained, and most of the rest had been occupied by the Portuguese. However, this last small area was not so easy to gnaw on, starting with the Dutch shrinking the defence. was able to move the limited forces back to concentrate on the defense; secondly, they also built a large number of strong defenses nearby, which the Portuguese could not recover in a short period of time (with the addition of a large number of east coast artillery, these defenses can be said to be more powerful); Historically, the Portuguese had defeated the Dutch with their fleets from home, blockaded the entire coast of General Pernambuco's territory, and then attacked on land for several months before forcing the Dutch to surrender.

But now that the Dutch had placed a large number of artillery on the east coast, and all kinds of supplies were kept in place by the ships on the east coast, and the morale and confidence of the defenders were much stronger than at the same time in history, the Portuguese wanted to crush the Dutch army and recover Pernambuco in a short time. It is unlikely.

"There will be no winners, and the Dutch army outside Recife and Olinda is ready for it. Their supplies are abundant and their morale is high, and they are not something that anyone can defeat lightly. After considering his words, he finally decided to give the Portuguese some cruelty, lest they still have some unrealistic luck: "In addition, our government has decided to send some naval vessels into the Gulf of Recife to maintain local security and order and protect the lives and property of our merchants. ”

As soon as Gaumo said this, it caused a commotion among the Portuguese. Almeida tried to come forward and say something, but was stopped by an enraged Vieira. Now that the people on the East Coast are clearly trying to pull the shelf, what can you do? Who doesn't know that the Republic of the East has always had only three or five merchants in Recife, and the property is even more lackluster, but people are so willful, that is, to sail warships into Recife to assist the Dutch in defense, what can you do? Due to the geography of Recife, once such ships, armed with a large number of long-barreled guns, were brought in, the land offensive became much more difficult.

But it's good for the East Coasters to do this. In Europe in this era, due to Portugal's weakened national strength, the Dutch, Spaniards, and British would slap their faces if they wanted to, and they didn't even bother to find a reason, and they didn't worry about the Portuguese taking revenge for personal gain, which can be described as very arrogant. This East Coaster seems to have a little more face, and he will find a bad excuse to protect the expatriate, but no matter how gentleman he is, he is still a robber, this will never change, the East Coast people are determined to intervene in the situation in Brazil, so the Portuguese have to think carefully about how to deal with it - if nothing else, they should first "invite away" the East Coast warship that is wandering off the coast of Brazil, right?

Now that the main fleet of the mainland has not yet arrived, the strength of the fleet at the disposal of the Brazilian colonial authorities is not enough to challenge the maritime supremacy of the people on the east coast in the region, and it is likely that they will have to work more at the diplomatic level to break the military blockade imposed by the navy on the east coast in the name of detecting smuggling and catching pirates. Otherwise, many towns along the coast of Brazil will not be able to receive supplies and immigrants from the Old Continent, and the special goods produced by the towns (wood, dyes, tobacco, cocoa, cotton, leather, sugar, etc.) will not be able to be transported back to the Old World for cash, and the entire Portuguese Brazilian economic system will have some problems in the functioning, which the money-hungry merchants and haciendas cannot bear.

"Doesn't your government take into account the feelings of His Majesty King Joao? To be honest, these years of economic and trade exchanges have established a deep relationship between us. I remember that in the first difficult moments, it was your selfless sale of us large quantities of cheap muskets, armour, and cannons that enabled us to withstand the ferocious onslaught of the Dutch West India Company, and gradually counterattack after gaining a foothold, recovering a great deal of lost territory. We could have been friends forever, but now you're betraying your friends, please stop hurting your friends......" Seeing that Gaumo had already let out harsh words, Blanco stepped forward after making eye contact with Vieira, and played the emotional card from another angle, as if trying to convince the East Coasters not to get involved in this war in this way.

"Our government has our own considerations." Gao Mo replied, he was full of confidence, he no longer had the "calcium deficiency disease" (army language) of fifteen years ago, and his words were also hard: "Moreover, since you stopped the trade between Brazil and the East Coast for no reason, the friendship has come to an end. I do not intend to argue here about who is right and who is wrong between the two sides, but I will only say that our navy will continue to seize smugglers and catch pirates in the vicinity for a long time, and as for when it ends, it depends on when normal trade between Brazil and the east coast will resume. ”

Gao Mo felt that what he said was really unlevel, Nima originally wanted to find some high-sounding words to decorate the façade, but he didn't expect to end up directly saying his intentions with such threatening words, which was a little cheap. However, this is not a big deal, the Portuguese should now be aware of the intention of the East Coast Fleet to blockade their coast, as for how they respond, it is their own business.

Although the east coast is very uncomfortable with the cut off ship materials and cotton, this is not insurmountable, the cotton produced on the east coast plus the part exported by New China, has accounted for forty percent of the total annual cotton demand, plus the cotton produced in Florida, Georgia, and the West Indies (which can only be bought at a high price) and part of the stock, it can almost withstand a period of time, and during this time, they have a hundred ways to force the Portuguese to comply.

Although it has entered late autumn, many Portuguese people in the room still sweat slightly on their foreheads, and the atmosphere in the room is a little solemn. The Portuguese were very angry, they wanted to accuse the people of the east coast of favoring the Dutch, and they wanted to say that they were arrogant and unscrupulous in blockading the colony of an empire with supreme glory, but after a thousand words rushed to their throats, they were swallowed hard, so they were not aggrieved!

The shape is stronger than people! As soon as the East Coast Fleet arrived, immigrants from the Old World could not enter, all kinds of materials from the Old World (including vital weapons and ammunition) could not enter, and all kinds of priceless specialties of the New World could not be transported. Even the possibility of famine in some towns that were not self-sufficient in food (due to the low development process by land and poor transportation conditions, so they relied on sea) undoubtedly greatly undermined the confidence and will of the Portuguese.

"Why don't you wait for the arrival of the main fleet from Lisbon? Now let's let the people on the east coast take a step forward, let them withdraw the damned warships, and fully restore Brazil's foreign traffic first, otherwise this long-term blockade will sooner or later have big problems. "There are already people who are thinking about what to do, and Vieira, the rich sugar tycoon, is one of them.

Gaumo sat comfortably in his chair and looked at the Portuguese with a blank expression. He felt that the Portuguese were frightened by the decisive action of the East Coast Navy, and they originally only wanted to cut off trade as a protest, but who would have thought that the reaction of the East Coast would be so violent, and it would be difficult for them to ride their horses. But now is the time for them to make a choice, is it a temporary reconciliation, or a full-scale confrontation that leads all the way to the dark? The decision doesn't seem difficult to make. (To be continued......)