With regard to the Italian question, the negotiations between the three countries went surprisingly smoothly, and in the final analysis it was up to each taking what he wanted, and because of the rise of Bulgaria, the proximity of the Bulgarian protectors to each other made the British feel the crisis, and they had to make concessions in order to maintain their transcendent position in the Mediterranean.

But Ferdinand did not arrive to rejoice, the Salentina Peninsula was just a windfall, and if not Sicily, then the Salentina Peninsula would not be of much significance.

There is no way to control the Mediterranean, and the Adriatic Sea alone is not worth the effort of Bulgaria, so should it be returned to the Italians?

After thinking about it, Ferdinand finally found that if he took the Salentina Peninsula, he could extort some money from the Italians at most, and the strategic position was not so important, and the economic value could not develop tourism in this era, right?

"Your Majesty, why don't you exchange colonies on the Persian Gulf coast with the British! Now many ports along the Persian Gulf coast are under the influence of the British, and our navy's access to the Indian Ocean is still restricted! Admiral Minister Petrov proposed

Ferdinand smiled slightly, Petrov's proposal was very constructive, now is a good time to pick up the leaks!

In terms of economic value, the whole Arabian Peninsula is now no match for Sicily; In terms of strategic value, the Persian Gulf in this era was not a strategic location, and the two were not comparable.

But for Bulgaria, it now has a certain strategic value, which helps Bulgaria to strengthen its control over the Arabian Peninsula.

At most, the British will suspect that Bulgaria wants to expand into the Persian region, but this is not their core interest either, as long as Bulgaria is not excessive, the two sides can still divide the Persian region!

Ferdinand thought for a while and said: "Well, let's exchange the colonies along the Persian Gulf coast with the British, except for the Bab el-Mandeb Strait, which is forbidden for the British, this time we will simply annex all the Arabian Peninsula, and let the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and the British demarcate their respective spheres of influence in the Persian region!" ”

Even if you want to pick up the leaks, you have to do a whole set of plays, the Persian region actually has some value, of course, this era is only agricultural value.

But this is still not enough, if the conditions are too low, it is estimated that with John Bull's feces and urine, it is estimated that they will still be suspicious!

After a pause, Ferdinand added: "Plus that we want the Italians to pay off the debts owed to the British, and to tell the English that we urgently need money, so that they must not hinder the consortia at home from buying the war reparations we have obtained!" ”

Well, as long as the British consortium really wants to buy it, then it is estimated that Bulgaria does not need to take the initiative to propose it, and there is a way for the government to agree.

As for whether the British would oppose the Bulgarian navy's entry into the Indian Ocean, Ferdinand was not worried at all, as long as they did not follow the example of the Germans and the Americans, it didn't matter where you could run the bulls.

What can really make them jealous is that there is strength to threaten their world hegemony, and it is obvious that Bulgaria in this era does not have this strength!

The Bulgarian navy was divided into two, which was also a matter of no choice, and after the war, Bulgaria still had such a large fleet in the Mediterranean, not only John Bull was uncomfortable, but even the French would feel the pressure.

In this case, either the ship will be dismantled, or the fleet will be dispersed, reducing the strength of the Bulgarian Navy in the Mediterranean!

Ferdinand, who knew it well, naturally chose to divide his troops, and in the era of sea power, there was no strong navy, how could Bulgaria's interests overseas be guaranteed?

With the strength of Bulgaria's six dreadnoughts, it is among the top five in the world, only Britain, the United States, Japan, and France, and the naval strength of Japan, France, and Bulgaria during this period is still very close, and it has not yet opened up the distance!

The "84 Plan" formulated by the Japanese in 1915 has just begun, and as for the "86 Plan" and "88 Plan" that followed, there are no plans yet, and the Japanese Navy has just begun.

The tonnage of the French Navy is indeed very large, but the number of capital ships is not large, and there are too many old ships, and now they are about to face large-scale decommissioning, so their naval strength is not very good in this period!

……

Receiving the telegram from home, Konstantin was not in a good mood, and once the Bulgarian Navy entered the Indian Ocean, the government's previous plan to reduce the military spending of the Navy was not so easy to complete.

During the war, Bulgaria's military budget was just no budget, and when there was no money anyway, it reached out to the government, and as soon as the war ended, this kind of good thing would naturally end!

If nothing else, the Army's military spending in the coming year may be cut by more than 95 percent, and the Navy will also be cut by 890 percent, and it is estimated that it will be able to cut 670 percent now.

In Konstantin's view, this is that Ferdinand does not want the government to reduce military spending too much, so he will inevitably cut the budgets of other departments, and as the boss of the government, he is naturally in a bad mood.

No matter what mood he is in, what needs to be done must be done, and it must be done beautifully! It's not so easy to be an errand boy under Ferdinand!

In contrast, Metyev's mood is much better, the government budget has little to do with the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, and their funds have always been guaranteed anyway.

The Navy has entered the Indian Ocean, and the importance of their Ministry of Foreign Affairs will only increase, not decrease, and even the international affairs that the Ministry of Foreign Affairs will have to deal with in the future will be greatly increased!

To put it simply, before the world war, the Bulgarian Ministry of Foreign Affairs was only active in the foreign affairs of the countries bordering the Mediterranean, and now it is estimated that they are present in most of the foreign affairs of the world.

……

Negotiations on the Italian issue have started again, and now the biggest issue is the issue of reparations, the amount of reparations paid by the three countries together is as high as 7 billion pounds, and it is obvious that the Italians cannot afford to pay compensation.

Even if it is cut in half, Konstantin doubts that the Italians will be able to pay it off, and if they don't have money, they can pay off their debts in kind, but unfortunately the Italians have a really thin foundation, calculated with a compensation of 7 billion, calculated at an international interest rate of 5%, and the annual interest is 350 million pounds, which is seven times the financial revenue of Italy at its peak!

Lloyd-George said very responsibly: "Ladies and gentlemen, Italy's current population is probably less than 35 million, and if it is calculated at 7 billion pounds, each person will have to bear a huge debt of 200 pounds, based on their pre-war national income (note: Italy's gross national income in 1913 was 4 billion US dollars, about 822 million pounds), or they will work without food or drink for 8.5 years!"

Economic experts have calculated that even if their economy recovers to pre-war levels, Italians will not be able to afford to repay more than £210 million a year!

And we also have to accept the repayment in kind, otherwise the figure will be even lower, so we must reduce the amount of the reparation, otherwise we will find that the account cannot be paid off, and the Italians will probably have to play dead again! ”

The meeting fell silent, and Konstantin broke the silence: "In that case, then we will waive their interest, and let the Italians pay us 200 million pounds in cash or the equivalent amount of goods every year, and they will be able to pay off their debts in 35 years!"

If there is a default in the middle of the process, or if the repayment is deliberately defaulted, it will be calculated according to the overdue calculation of five ten-thousandths of the total compensation per day, so that everyone does not have a headache! ”

Well, Konstantin's proposal is no different from the reduction of the amount of reparations, in fact, if the interest is calculated, this amount of reparations is only equivalent to more than two billion pounds!

French President Poincaré said with some hesitation: "Isn't this not good, it seems that the number is too big, it is better to reduce the amount of reparations for the Italians to 2.8 billion pounds, calculated according to the monthly interest rate of 4.5 thousandths!"

If it is overdue, it will be calculated according to one thousandth per day, so that it looks like the number is better, and everyone will still distribute it according to their respective shares! ”

Konstantin gasped, worthy of being born in a usury empire, according to this figure, Italians have to pay 12.6 million pounds of interest every month, and 151.2 million pounds of interest every year, God knows that the Italians will be able to pay it off in the year of the monkey!

If you can't pay it monthly, this interest will be even more terrifying!

No one can refuse in the face of interests! Even if the British wanted to preserve Italy's strength as much as possible, when it came to their own interests, all this was thrown out of the clouds!

"It's a good proposal, we've cut the Italians by 60% of their war reparations, and that's enough for the world to see our benevolent side!" Lloyd George said with dignity

Konstantin just nodded in agreement, and suddenly found that compared to the old empire, he was still too young, and he dared to believe that John Bull would give up his interests for the sake of the Italians!

After a pause, Poincaré spoke: "The Italians still have some colonies to offset the reparations, we should give them an estimate, and then decide who wants them!" ”

Neither Constantine nor Lloyd George had an opinion, the Italians did not have a high colonial economic and strategic value, and no one had much interest in fighting for it, so they simply valued the war reparations.

Konstantin thought for a while and said: "Let's just value this kind of colony that has little strategic value, we will all evaluate it, and whoever has the highest price will pay for them back!"

Anyway, in the first few years, the Allies will have to restore their economy, their ability to pay is limited, and it would be good to use this money to repay the war reparations of our three countries! ”

That's right, it's the Three Kingdoms, Konstantin so lightly erased the qualifications of other countries to divide the colonies, and everyone's interests are the same on this point, and Britain and France will naturally not oppose this proposal.

Lloyd-George thought for a moment and said: "For the sake of fairness, everyone wrote the answer directly on paper, and then everyone made it public, and took the lead in declaring that no one can go back on the bid!" ”

"Good!" Everyone said in unison

Konstantin had a headache, the Italian colony was Somalia, and it was only half of it, and the north was already John Bull's sphere of influence as early as 1887.

Half of Somalia is simply tasteless for Bulgaria, and it is a pity to abandon it!

After much hesitation, Konstantin wrote a random number that he thought was appropriate, and then looked at the other two.

Lloyd-George and Poincaré have long written the answer, as old colonial empires, they are more professional in the valuation of colonies!

Poincaré smiled and said, "Since everyone has written it, let's show it together!" ”

After saying that, he picked up his notebook, on which he wrote a big 35 million in red pen, but unfortunately the final unit was francs!

Lloyd-George also showed his notebook, and the figure given on it was 1.41 million, but fortunately his unit was pounds.

Konstantin was a little dumbfounded, looking at the British and French bids, he knew that he was at a loss, half of Somalia was not worth so much money, no matter what, there was no regret about selling the medicine here, and he also showed his offer of 3 million pounds!

Don't think it's a low price, the point is that the population of Italian Somalia at this time was less than a million, the economy was in shambles, and after deducting administrative expenses, the colony's fiscal surplus seemed to have been negative.

Even if you count the bonuses brought by resources and the market, you still lose money! If you want to develop Somalia, Bulgaria will have to invest a lot of money, and obviously it will not be able to do it in the short term!

Lloyd-George gloated: "Congratulations, Mr. Konstantin, from now on Somalia is yours!" ”

Konstantin was in a very depressed mood now, and he decided to go back and find a professional to evaluate all the colonies of the Allies, so as to save this kind of oolong joke!

However, Konstantin still smiled and said: "This is thanks to the two of you for your intention, and after the negotiation is over, how about we settle the account unified?" ”

Poincaré agreed: "Well, this is just the beginning, a million pounds, a small problem for all of us!" ”

It is considered to have relieved Konstantin, yes, Bulgaria quoted 3 million pounds, but after deducting its share of the reparation, the actual amount that needs to be paid is only 1.714 million pounds, which is not too much of a loss.

Konstantin took over the topic: "Okay, let's move on to the next item, let's deal with the Italians first, they also have two dreadnoughts and a bunch of small warships, let's divide them first!" ”

Everyone was very interested in the warships of the Italians, but soon John Niu chose to give up, and he suddenly realized that if they participated in the division of the Italian navy, it did not mean that Bulgaria and France were also qualified to divide the German navy!

Lloyd-George said very calmly: "We did not fight with the Italian Navy, so we will not participate in the distribution of the family left by the Italian Navy!" ”

Poincaré smiled and said, "We are all allies, so why share each other?" Let's distribute it together! ”

It's a pity that Lloyd-Georges looks like a decent gentleman, that is, he bites to death and distributes according to contributions, and they do not participate in the distribution if they do not fight the Italian Navy!

Seeing that he was not fooled, only the two countries were left to participate in the distribution, and the Italian Navy now left two dreadnoughts, two former dreadnoughts, five cruisers, and six destroyers.

Bulgaria also does not have much demand for these warships, and if it takes too much, it will consume valuable military spending, Konstantin asked directly: "Why don't we two families get half of it, and how about the 1.07 million pounds of colonial subsidies we should pay to your country be wiped out?" ”

Poincaré secretly calculated that if it was distributed according to the degree of contribution, it was the Bulgarians who hit the Italian Navy hard, and they would definitely take the lion's share, and the expectation in his heart was that the two sides would be divided four or six points, and now the two sides would divide it evenly, even if they compensated the Bulgarians more than one million pounds, they still did not suffer.

So Poincaré replied cheerfully: "Well, the Italian navy will be divided equally!" ”

……