Before Seward could speak, Stanton said: "General Scott, it's just an enemy army, even if it's a special forces force you mentioned, it's only nearly 10,000 troops, it's a big deal, send 230,000 troops to meet it." At present, the headache is actually the army of the Chinese Empire that is swimming upstream from the Mississippi River. This is the main force of the enemy army! ”

As soon as Stanton finished speaking, Seward's personal assistant pushed the door in and handed Seward two telegrams in his hand: "Mr. President, urgent telegrams from Wisconsin and Illinois. ”

Seward chuckled in his heart, took the telegram and looked at it, and his face suddenly changed greatly. He handed the telegram to Stanton: "Look at it, Mr. Stanton, and look at the destruction caused by this group of special forces of less than 10,000 men." ”

When Stanton saw it, he was stunned.

The telegram was much more detailed than the previous military intelligence cables, and it was no longer a few sentences, and it was clear that the people who sent the telegrams seemed to be filled with a certain emotion, which made these two telegrams extremely difficult.

Wisconsin's telegram roughly meant that the enemy army finally found out the intelligence of the enemy: the enemy army was called the "Erye Special Division" for the Chinese Empire, with a total of about 10,000 people, all of them strong and strong, and their marksmanship was extremely accurate, and they were simply war machines, and the 30,000 militia in Wisconsin were divided and surrounded by it, with thousands of dead and wounded, and the rest were scattered, while the enemy army did not suffer many casualties. The enemy first captured the towns of Madison and Milwaukee in southern Wisconsin, and despite the fact that there were still many civilians in the city, they directly ordered them to set fire, and many civilians and Union soldiers were killed.

The enemy then left Wisconsin and entered Illinois along the shores of Lake Michigan.

The Illinois telegram was shocking. A major general of the regular army stationed in Illinois sent a telegram asking for help, claiming that he had encountered a group of butchers, tens of thousands of demons, and the enemy troops who were going south along the railroad from the town of Milwaukee all the way south, destroying a large section of the railroad every one or two miles, and burning down all the town's stations, small town business districts, factories, etc. Within twenty or thirty miles into Illinois, nearly 3,000 militiamen and more than 2,000 civilians were killed by the army.

Stanton was trembling with anger, he slammed the table and said loudly, "Are the federal troops in these two states eating!" Are McDowell and Anderson both stupid? ”

This is really a slap in the face. He Stanton just said that there were no more than 10,000 enemy troops, and it would be better to send 20,000 or 30,000 troops to encircle and annihilate them, but he didn't expect that as soon as he finished speaking, he heard that this enemy army had defeated the 30,000 militia assembled in Wisconsin in one fell swoop, and there were not many casualties. Moreover, this enemy army crisscrossed Wisconsin and Illinois, burning and looting along the way, destroying villages and towns, making the army of the American Federation and him as the Secretary of War a joke.

Treasury Secretary Samon Chase said anxiously: "Not good! In this way, the current march route of this enemy army is directly to Chicago. Today, Chicago is a major city and agricultural hub in Illinois, with a population of 110,000, a transportation hub for canals and railroads, and numerous factories built on the raw materials in the surrounding area. If Chicago were to be destroyed by the other side, the losses would be great. ”

Stanton's face finally changed dramatically, Chicago is now one of the largest cities in the Midwest of the United States, where many capitalists and bankers have invested in factories and railroads, and there are more than 100,000 people, if it is destroyed, the whole of America will be shaken, and his entire secretary of war will be implicated.

And Seward's mouth was full of bitterness.

He knew that when this enemy army broke through Chicago, or destroyed Chicago again, the big capitalists and bankers of the American Union would definitely not be able to bear such losses, and for them, they did not care about revenge or American glory and so on, they only cared about their own interests, so they would put pressure on the federal government to either send troops to destroy all enemy troops, or make peace talks to stop the war and destruction, so as to reduce the losses.

And in this way, he would have an excuse to make an armistice with the Chinese Empire. Thinking of this, Seward, who was originally sad about the destroyed and captured American towns, also began to feel relaxed, and it seemed that Chicago was not so uncomfortable with the imminent destruction.

Seward ignored Stanton and said directly to Treasury Secretary Chase and Army Commander-in-Chief Scott: "The enemy's sabotage must be stopped. How many more troops do we have to mobilize to encircle and annihilate this enemy army, and how long can we wage a large-scale war? ”

Scott replied: "In the entire American Federation, there are now 340,000 volunteers and about 520,000 militiamen, but these militias have not been trained, and they can't even get together muskets. Wisconsin's 30,000 militia were quickly routed by this enemy force for this reason. More than half of the volunteers were deployed along the borders of Kentucky, Ohio, Pennsylvania, and Maryland to fend off the Confederate forces that had resumed the offensive there, and 100,000 troops were transferred to the confluence of the Ohio and Mississippi rivers in southern Illinois, where they were preparing to stop the 40,000 infantry and a naval fleet of the Chinese Empire advancing northward along the Mississippi River.

There are only 40,000 volunteers who can be mobilized, and we can go to Chicago to encircle and annihilate this part of the army, but I am afraid that the other side will not make direct contact with our army, and with their marching speed, we will not be able to catch up except for cavalry.

The biggest problem lies in military spending. Not to mention the cavalry, we even have great difficulty in paying the infantry, let alone the pensions of the soldiers who were killed and wounded in battle. Also, what to do with the 40,000 soldiers captured in Fort Dyers, our envoy went to contact, and the commander of the Chinese Empire surnamed Peng offered 80 million US dollars in war compensation and ransom before he was willing to release. And this issue cannot be postponed any longer, Mr. President, the families of these soldiers are ready to come to Philadelphia to rally and march. ”

Chase also smiled wryly: "The finances of the American Federation have collapsed. Due to the civil strife in Britain, the demand for trade decreased, and after the United States declared war on the Chinese Empire, the Chinese Empire also closed the trade routes with the Union on the surface, and the taxes and duties generated by trade were greatly reduced. And the rest of the war, all kinds of tax revenues have been hit. Finances were financed by borrowing from bankers and merchants in the northern states, with high interest rates.

A total of $300 million in debts issued last year has not been repaid even with interest, and in only four months this year, another $100 million in treasury bonds were issued, and we originally wanted to issue another $150 million, but with the defeat in the war, those bankers have recently begun to prevaricate and reject it, and are no longer willing to subscribe for bonds, but urge us to repay last year's interest. But now that the continuous combat is consumed, where is the surplus funds in the treasury to pay interest, let alone the ransom of the 40,000 captured soldiers proposed by General Scott just now!

Today, the federal government can only raise some money to keep afloat by selling land and minerals, mortgaging the federal government's tariffs and taxes ten years later, and selling the right to use and manage the railroads and canals. ”

Seward knew that the federal government was almost on the verge of bankruptcy, and if it weren't for Chase's hard work, he would have gone bankrupt. Thinking of the mess he had taken over, Seward had a headache.

California and other western regions were occupied by the Chinese Emperor's ** team, and the gold produced in the western region was cut off, which made the financial difficulties of the American Federation even more. Fortunately, if it weren't for the discovery of oil wells in Pennsylvania, some businessmen would have made a lot of money from mining oil to process it into lighting oil, making Pennsylvania's land and mine prices skyrocket, making up for some of the damage, and even the salaries of federal government officials would have been a problem.

"So, without financial support, it is difficult to even start a war now?" Westward Road.

The crowd fell silent.