Joey is now a regular visitor to his father's study, and basically every day after dinner, the crown prince has to take time out to care about Joey's homework and tutoring for the day. In addition, if something big happens, the crown prince would like to hear some unique views from Joey.

On Thursday of the third week of April, Joy heard two latest news from his father's study, both from the Foreign Office from Count Bernhardt-Ernst von Blo, Secretary of State for the Reich Foreign Office,

News one, the new chairman of the Russian Council of Ministers of the Reich, General Pyotr Shuvalov, and the Grand Duke of Moscow, Sergei Alexandrovich, will visit Germany in early May.

News 2: Minister Maximilien Augustus Scipio von Barand sent back to China five things about the Qing Dynasty, the Minister of the German Empire in the Qing Dynasty and the head of the Legation of various countries in Peking, the first two of which were telegrams taken through diplomatic channels:

1. Qing Guo implored the ministers of various countries, especially the head of the diplomatic missions of various countries in Beijing, the German minister Barland, to come forward to preside over the international justice judgment on the Ryukyu conflict between the Qing and Japanese countries;

2. The Qing Dynasty will send a special envoy to Russia to discuss the conflict between the Qing and Russia on the conflict in Central Asia. The Ambassador's ship was expected to disembark in Hamburg in June, passing through Berlin to Moscow, where it was hoped that the Imperial Foreign Office would come forward to receive it;

The last three are via private telegraph:

3. Li Hongzhang, Minister of Beiyang, asked various countries about the current situation and purchase of new fast guns;

4. Li Hongzhang, Minister of Beiyang, inquired about the purchase of railway equipment from various countries;

5. Li Hongzhang, Minister of Beiyang, was advised by the Briton Hurd to send people to Britain to purchase warships.

Each of these two pieces of news made Joey want to laugh.

For the first piece of news, when he heard that the Grand Duke of Moscow Sergei Aleksandrovich was going to visit, Joey knew that this was his brother's rival in love who was going to come to Berlin in person, ready to stage the rhythm of the dragon robbing the princess and the knight fighting the dragon with William.

"Hehe, this Grand Duke Sergei is really an idiot for Elizabeth, is this preparing to go out in person? Personally sent to the door to compete with William, let me think about what two men would do for the love of a woman? Want to come to a duel? I really don't know whether to live or die! Joey sneered in his heart.

For the second piece of news, the feeling for Joey is that this is the rhythm of sending big business to the door!

"Haha, I want a new fast gun, in this world, when it comes to the rate of fire of the rifle, who can be faster than the Lee Enfield I brought in advance?! Buying railway equipment, this is better, my father and Uncle Hermann have begun to prepare for the construction of the American Railroad Bidding Committee, and the business of the Qing Kingdom has been sent to the door again, and it seems that the good fortune of the German steel industry is coming. Joey smirked again.

"It is also necessary to buy warships from the British, and it must be admitted that the best warships now are indeed .....built by the British, well, it seems that this business can only be done by the British." Joey shook his head, and was about to throw in the towel when he suddenly remembered the model of the Frederick III he had made two days earlier when he welcomed his engineering teacher, Mr. Barnaby.

"The Frederick III class and the Brandenburg class were both designed for the results of the Sino-Japanese naval battle, and I have the impression that several warships of the Qing navy seem to have been purchased from Germany. Yes, it was purchased from Germany! Oh my! Could it be that this business of the Qing Kingdom to buy warships was also given to me?! ”

"But what did Germany do to get this deal?!" Joey began to pac non-stop.

Crown Prince Frederick happily sat behind the desk, put his feet on each other and tilted them on the table, exhaled happily, and watched his little son keep thinking in circles, and then silently hehe, "There is a smart son, and his own father is labor-saving, waiting for Jojo to come up with an idea, he just needs to find faults." ”

"Well, in two days, when Hermann settles all his personal affairs and returns to Berlin from Magdeburg as Deputy Minister of Economics, let him also enjoy the pleasure of thinking about his godson and enjoying his godfather." Crown Prince Frederick thought happily.

Not long after, the crown princess also quietly walked into her husband's study, watching her youngest son spinning in circles in her husband's office, while her husband was comfortably cross-legged, looking at the newspaper of the day relaxing his spirits, and couldn't help but feel disgusted The crown prince was on the foot of the desk, and asked in a low voice, "What strange question did you give Qiaoqiao again?" ”

"The Russians still don't give up, and they want to fight Elizabeth's idea again, and Jojo is helping his eldest brother come up with an idea." The crown prince smiled apologetically and said casually.

"Aren't the Hesses still dead? For the sake of my dead sister, and for Elizabeth's sake as a good girl who deserves to be loved, I didn't care about Ernst's rudeness, so should they not give up? Crown Princess Victoria's tone became a little cold.

"Vikki, things are not what you think, Sergei is just a representative of the imperial family, accompanying General Shuvalov to visit Germany, the key to this visit is, according to the speculation of the Prime Minister, it should be for the Triple Alliance." The crown prince explained.

"Fritz, you believe in that Chancellor?"

"Vicky, you know, the Prime Minister has always been at odds with you and me, but one thing you have to admit is that he hasn't been affected by political disagreements over how to do business. So far, he's been a very gentleman and we've worked well together. ”

Crown Prince Frederick grabbed the hand of the crown princess and said softly, "Vikki, please rest assured, I have a large number of friends in the German business circles, and if anyone has some bad thoughts about me, someone will tell me." My most important task now is to push forward the economic transformation in Germany, and as long as this change is fruitful, no one can kick me out of the center of the German political scene again. ”

The crown princess gently brushed her hand through her husband's hair, smiled knowingly and stopped talking, and the warm atmosphere permeated the study.

The warmth of the room was soon interrupted by Joey, who was free from his contemplation, who grabbed a piece of chalk, turned to the blackboard on the wooden shelf of the crown prince's office, and began to paint, and a slightly complicated map of the relationship between the countries was displayed in front of the crown prince and his wife.

Seven countries are depicted on it, Germany, Austria-Hungary, Russia, Great Britain, France, Qing and Japan. The relations between countries that have been and will take place are connected and marked with chalk, and the most connected and marked between Germany, Russia, the Qing Dynasty, France, and Great Britain are the most numerous.

After Joey finished drawing, he pointed to the complicated state relations on the blackboard and asked before he began to tell the crown prince about the business opportunities he thought might exist.

"Dad, do you think Sir Barland's news is reliable?"

Before the crown prince could answer, the crown princess first stopped with a black face, "Qiaoqiao, how can you call Dad, where is your father old!" ”

"Ahh And the crown prince hurriedly reassured his wife who had a temper when he heard the word "old" recently, and signaled Joey to pay attention to his speech, and his mother was present today.

In fact, half of the reason for Princess Victoria was that she was dissatisfied with Joey's aggressive attitude towards her father.

Fortunately, after Joey gasped for breath, he said with a smile in a proper attitude, "Mom is right, Dad is very young." Young Daddy, is Lord Lord Barland reliable? ”

The crown prince smiled and waved his hand, tossed Joey's sycophant aside, and said, "Mark's father, Infantry General Heinrich von Barland, has been an old subordinate of my regiment during the Prussian-Austro-Prussian war, and I saved Mark's life when I was in the second corps. Although Mark had been an envoy to Germany in East Asia since '61, we had always maintained a correspondence. ”

"The news of Qing Guo's purchase of guns, railways, and warships was given to me privately by Barand after he knew that I was the Minister of Economy, and there will be no problem." The crown prince affirmed.

Joey nodded and said, "Dad, all the business opportunities I am looking forward to and striving for now are based on the fact that Qingguo's procurement intelligence is true. ”

"If it is true that Qing Guo purchased new fast guns, then it is necessary to judge how large the purchase volume of Qing Guo is, if it is only a few hundred or thousand, then it is not worth our attention, but if it is a purchase of tens of thousands, it will be a big business. But wouldn't it be a big deal? ”

Joy pointed to the word news on the blackboard and said, "There are two very interesting messages from Sir Barland, one is that he wants him to mediate the contradictions between the Qing and Japan and preside over justice, and the other is that the Qing envoy is going from Berlin to Moscow to discuss the conflict in Central Asia. This shows that the Qing Dynasty at least had contradictions with Japan and Russia. ”

"Joey, not only that, but the Prime Minister gave me a private message that the French are increasing their troops in Annam, and it is said that they will also have a conflict with the Qing State." The crown prince interjected and added.

"Ah, there are contradictions with France and Russia, the two European powers? Plus a small Asian country..... Oh, what a country of courage! Joey shook his head. It is really an incredible and magical country, even Germany is so strong that it does not dare to easily clash with Russia and France at the same time.

"Since Qingguo is a country full of courage, and it is also very rich. And now France and Russia are either the most important enemies of Germany, or the most important potential enemies, and adhering to the principle that the enemy of the enemy is a friend, we want to support a rich friend, the Qing country. Joey gave the first point.

"Jojo, we're talking about business opportunities, not war." The crown prince said with a frown.

"We're going to sell war!" When Joey said this sentence heroically, he was lucky to see his mother's blackened face, and quickly changed his words, "This is not right, Germany's mission is to make peace!" ”

"Germany's mission is to make peace, to create a peace with a balance of power, to help the weak to be armed enough to resist the bullying of the strong, and never allow the strong to bully the weak, so we want to help the weak but full of courage to fight against the two behemoths of Russia and France."

Joey secretly wiped the sweat from his palms, and said in his heart, "The same thing, from a different angle, is so full of a sense of justice, look, Mom, uh, Mom is not angry anymore..."

"Making Peace?!" The crown prince looked at his wife beside him, nodded and said, "Qiaoqiao's statement is good, but how to make peace." ”

"First of all, Sir Barand must uphold justice for the Qing Kingdom, and criticize Japan from the standpoint of the Qing Kingdom, simply put, it doesn't matter who is right and who is wrong between them, we all insist that the Qing Kingdom is right."

Joy carefully recalled a phrase often propagated by Germany in his previous life, and added, "It is better to let the German Foreign Office, and it is really not possible to let Sir Barand tell the Qing that the territories they dispute with Japan have been an inseparable part of the Qing State since ancient times, and we support the Qing State's position of safeguarding territorial integrity." ”

"Not only against the Qing Dynasty, but if we can, we should shout to the whole world that Germany opposes any country or government that attempts to unilaterally change its territorial area under the existing circumstances, and that Germany supports the determination of all countries and governments to safeguard their territorial integrity. Germany is the defender of world peace. ”

"Secondly, it is to let Sir Barand provoke, uh, no, on the premise of upholding international justice, to issue a warning to the weak Qing State that the wolves are coming, warning that if the Qing Kingdom is not armed immediately, it will be the prey of the wolves!"

"And Germany, as the peacekeeper of the weak in the world, is willing to provide them with strong weapons and equipment support, and let the weak firmly believe that having German weapons is the only condition for them to protect themselves in this cannibalistic world!"

"We're just going to create panic, oh, that's not right, we're going to create anxiety, or rather, to sell anxiety to the weak, so that they think about war anxiety and create a strong demand for German products." Joey said with a dance, taking out the market theory of his previous life, where there is no demand to create demand.

"Defenders of world peace?! Trafficking in war anxiety?! The crown prince pondered these two words carefully, and always felt that they were full of conspiracy, "The standard of world peace is to maintain the weak, and the way to maintain the weak is to arm the weak, which seems to make some sense." If the weak do not know how to arm themselves, then create war anxiety for them? There is also the role ......of Germany as a defender, which means that Germany wants to sell weapons to the weak. ”

While the crown prince was still trying to think about Joey's words.

"Joey, you're stirring up war." The crown princess retorted quickly.

"Mother, if a weak man holds a weapon in the jungle full of wild beasts, is he protecting himself, and Germany is saving his life as the weapon provider of this weak man." Joey quibbled.

"Vicky, let's hear from Joey first." The crown prince mediated with the mud as he motioned for Joey to continue.

"Dad, where is Henry's Globetrotting Fleet now?" Joey abruptly jumps the question to another aspect.

"Henry's telegram yesterday said that they had just anchored from Buenos Aires and were going to Auckland, New Zealand." The crown princess was very clear about her second son's every move, and immediately answered for her husband.

"I remember that Henry sailed around the world in ports with Japan and Qing Kingdom, right, Mom?"

"Yes, to Yokohama and Nagasaki in Japan, and Tianjin and Shanghai in the Qing Kingdom." The crown princess nodded and said.

"I have the impression that Henry's fleet on this global voyage is called the Grand Fleet, right?"

"Well, it's the Grand Fleet, and the formation of this expeditionary fleet is basically made up of the best of the German Navy, with the SMS Kaiser as the flagship, and the SMS Preussen, SMS Friedrich der Grosse, SMS Deutschland, SMS Hansa, and SMS Sachsen, There was also a large fleet of several coal carriers. The crown prince said.

Then the crown prince added, "The commander of the fleet is Rear Admiral Ernst Otto von Dietrich. (Historically famous 1878-1879, the German Navy's two-year tour fleet around the world.) ）

"Mom, when did Henry arrive in Qingguo?" Joey asked again.

"According to the fleet sailing plan that Henry said before, it is expected to arrive in Hong Kong in early June." The crown princess replied.

"The Grand Fleet needs to be repaired in Hong Kong, including overhauling the boilers and cleaning the bottom of the ship, and it is estimated that it will stay for about a month, and then go to Tianjin, which is estimated to be in early July. Joey, what exactly do you want to ask? The crown prince finally couldn't stand Joey's jumping thinking and interjected.

Joey nodded, calculated the time, and said to the crown prince, "Dad, the last and most important thing is that Henry's large fleet is in China, and I need them to stay in China for a while to cooperate with Sir Barland. ”

"You need the cooperation of the Grand Fleet, you want to show off your force to Japan?" The crown prince asked in surprise.

"Dad, this is not a show of force, it is a defense of peace." Joy hurriedly explained, "When Sir Barland mediates peace in East Asia, he needs a strong force to support his diplomatic actions, and all parties must listen to Sir Barland's peace plan, and only our Grand Fleet can do this." ”

"It's 45,000 tons of peace, and if the Kaiser Wilhelm hadn't been injured in the impact, it's 56,000 tons." Joey muttered to himself.

"Interesting, Joey, what do you mean by using the German fleet to fight for the Qing people? No, no, no, this can't, whether it's me or the prime minister, you can't pass that level. The crown prince shook his head in disagreement with Joey's idea.

"Dad, it's not for the Qing people to fight, if a war really breaks out, we just have to stand by and never participate, the lives of the Germans can only be sacrificed to defend Germany, and they will never die for these irrelevant countries." Joey hurriedly explained.

"I just need the Grand Fleet to sail around the world as planned, just let Admiral Dietrich stay in Tianjin for a few more days, show our ironclad ships to the Qing people, show Germany's shipbuilding strength, and by the way, be silent and not respond to any questions from the press, please leave all external propaganda to Sir Barland, with Sir Barland's rich diplomatic experience in East Asia, he absolutely knows how to use this German naval force."

"The Imperial Navy will never go to war?!"

"Never!" Joey replied in the affirmative.