"Oh my God...... Is this true? Can't believe it! ”

In an office at the British Embassy in Portugal, Warbol was stunned and incoherent with a cigar in one hand and a telegram he had just arrived in the other. Pen × fun × Pavilion www. ｂｉｑｕｇｅ。 ｉｎｆｏ

Outside the window, the coup t'état of the Portuguese army has taken full control of the capital, Lisbon, and announced that a provisional council of military personnel will take over the state power, but the whole of Portugal is not immediately placed under the jurisdiction of this group of soldiers. Just a few hours earlier, Warbol had received an update from the British Foreign Office that only the Lisbon garrison and some of the troops in the southern provinces of Portugal had been involved in the coup, and that most of the Portuguese troops had not moved or telegraphed to announce their political positions. It was clear that the situation in Portugal was at a very delicate stage, but it was not fortunate that the German navy was involved in the name of protecting the diaspora, and some 300 marines landed in Lisbon and, together with the Portuguese troops who participated in the coup, took control of the port and the surrounding coastal fortifications.

In response to the actions of the Germans in Portugal, the British and American governments had formally lodged the most serious protest to Germany through diplomatic channels, demanding the immediate withdrawal of German troops and the dispatch of their respective fleets to Portuguese waters. Based on this information, Warbol felt that the situation here was still for the better, but the telegram that had just been delivered to him was like a bolt from the blue: the Spanish army, which was holding military exercises on the border between Portugal and Spain, had crossed the border into Portugal in the name of helping to stabilize the situation in the neighboring country!

After losing its maritime hegemony, the Spanish Empire gradually declined, and the Spanish-American War brought back to its original shape the tiger that had long lost its fangs and claws, so in a series of international affairs later, Spain was always put in a dispensable position by the great powers, and even after the outbreak of the Great War, Britain and France did not take the unclear Bourbon dynasty seriously, and turned a blind eye to its superficial neutrality and secret cooperation with Germany. During the post-war Portuguese crisis, the German government actively courted Spain, but the rulers of Madrid were frightened by the threat of the United States and Britain to withdraw their investment and cut off trade.

The telegram received by Warbol referred to the time when the Spanish troops had crossed the border, more than five hours after he received the telegram. The retired British ambassador quickly calmed down, although Portugal was in the same decay as Spain, but those century-old border fortifications were not weathered to the point of falling down at the slightest push, and the Portuguese border guards equipped with British weapons were the most elite military force in the country, even if they were not as numerous as the Spanish troops who crossed the border, it should not be a problem to rely on the fortresses to resist for a while, not to mention that the Spanish troops did not really have the courage to fire at the Portuguese army - their role was probably to give the Portuguese coup troops a strong momentum.

Like most British officials, Warbol has apparently lacked attention to the situation in Spain in recent years. If they had taken a closer look at the economic and social conditions in Spain, it would have been easy to see that in the decade after the end of the war, the country had undergone some changes under the rule of the young King Alfonso XIII. After the conclusion of economic and trade alliances with Ireland and Austria-Hungary, Spain's economy struggled out of a long period of slump, foreign trade continued to grow, factories in Madrid and Valencia began to replace old steam engines with more efficient internal combustion engines, and heavy industry, mainly metallurgical casting, grew on a certain scale with the promotion of foreign capital. With the improvement of the domestic economy, the employment and treatment of grassroots workers have improved, the class contradictions have eased slightly, the situation of social unrest has been improved, and the rule of the royal family and the government has been consolidated.

On the other hand, the military operation against Spanish Morocco in 1914 once again exposed the deadly problems of insufficient training of conscripts in the Spanish army, low combat effectiveness, outdated cavalry and artillery tactics, and aging equipment, and also made the Spanish army leaders realize the key role of infantry in mountain warfare. In addition, the repression of the local tribes of Spanish Morocco trained a group of talented young officers for the Spanish army, who later broadened their horizons in military exchanges with Germany and Ireland. As a result of the facilitating effect of this new force, the face of the Spanish army gradually changed. By 1926, the Spanish army was still lagging behind the great powers in terms of equipment, but it undoubtedly reflected the positive changes that had taken place in the Spanish Empire.

While the British ambassador to Portugal, Walbor, and his colleagues were watching the situation with anxiety and anxiety, the Spanish army, modeled after the German standing army, was advancing with unprecedented determination to the cities and transportation hubs of the northern, western and southern provinces of Portugal, and the flashy Spanish cavalry played a good role of reconnaissance and deterrence, and the Portuguese soldiers were disturbed by the news of the military coup d'état in the capital and the fall of the republican government, and heard that the Spanish army had come to help the old king Manuel II to recover, Many were shaken, surrendering the fortresses they were defending without firing a shot, or watching the Spanish army roar past them.

In this way, the crucial two days that would determine the fate of Portugal were spent in the midst of the earth-shattering military adventures of Germany and Spain and the inaction of the Portuguese, the British fleet rushing from Gibraltar to Lisbon was blocked by the Atlantic detachment that the Germans had deployed in advance, the American fleet that had left in a hurry was still thousands of nautical miles away, and the Spanish planes were flying freely over Portugal, monitoring the Portuguese army, and throwing leaflets everywhere, while the American and British planes were faced with the dilemma of not being able to land at Portuguese airports.

As the citywide lockdown of Lisbon was lifted three days after the coup, Warbol drove through the streets to understand that the British business in Portugal had failed, and that no shrewd politician could change the situation.

On this day, the German Crown Prince William the Younger and important military and political officials arrived in Lisbon, where Germany, Portugal, and Spain signed a military alliance agreement, which meant that Portugal and Spain, two Western European countries that had long been neutral, joined the Allied camp on the same day. Spain promised that all soldiers entering Portugal would be withdrawn within the stipulated time and compensate for the losses caused to Portugal during the entry, and Germany promised and quickly fulfilled the economic and military aid given to the Portuguese military junta, and all Portugal had to do was to establish a joint defense system with Germany and Spain.

Just a few hours after the signing of the military alliance agreement, the German task force with the battle cruisers "Mackensen", "Prince Frederick" and "Frederick-Karl" and the aircraft carriers "Zeppelin" and "Hubert" arrived in the Azores. After tense negotiations between the two sides, the Portuguese governor and commander of the garrison chose to compromise. The German fleet sailed into Porto Sangra Heroísmo under the guns of the fortress on the island of Terceira, and more than 2,000 German marines quickly landed to take control of the administrative premises and important facilities of the capital of the Azores, and tried to take over the coastal fort there, but failed to do so due to the tough resistance of the Portuguese garrison, and a small number of German officers were allowed to enter the fort to supervise the Portuguese army from any action against the German fleet or to destroy themselves militarily.

As expected by international observers, with the landing of German troops in the Azores, the US and British governments immediately put forward an ultimatum to the German government on the grounds that Germany interfered in the internal affairs of Portugal, seriously undermined the international order, and threatened the personal and property safety of American and British nationals, demanding that the German government withdraw all the troops landing within 24 hours, otherwise it would take severe punishment by severing diplomatic relations and freezing German assets, and reserve the right to take further action. Having already taken the lead, how could the Germans give in to their opponents at a critical moment? The German government ignored the US-British ultimatum, ships carrying a large number of German marines and engineering troops arrived in the Azores one after another, and the Germans also sent senior military officials of the Portuguese military government to Serat Island in a hurry, where a legal transfer of power was carried out with the military and political officials appointed by the Portuguese Republic, and there was no internal resistance to the stationing of German troops.

The last fluttering flag of the Portuguese Republic in the Azores was lowered before the sun set into the sea, and in this twilight, which made many people cry, a huge fleet appeared in the waters of the Azores, its strength was not comparable to the reconnaissance fleet that had been investigating the situation in the vicinity two days before, but basically included the essence of the American Atlantic Fleet and the British Ocean Fleet. Although the U.S. and British navies responded as quickly as they could, the situation changed beyond their expectations, with four Colorado-class battleships with "super turtle shells" slowing down the entire fleet, and the heads of state delaying them by a precious day. At present, all the military fortifications on the island of Serrat are in the hands of the Germans, the only airfield on the island is parked with fighter planes and torpedo planes brought in from old aircraft carriers, the German task force with limited strength has been strengthened by battleship formations, and it has the confidence to rely on coastal defense fortifications and land-based fighters to confront the main fleet of the United States and Britain, and there are still a considerable number of German submarines active in the nearby waters. In the event of a war, even if the US and British navies do not spare their old capital, they may not be able to gnaw this hard bone, but if the British Home Fleet and the Gibraltar Fleet join the battle for the Azores before the German Navy collapses, the situation may change unpredictably. Because the two British fleets had the most powerful battleships of the era, the Britannia-class battleships with a full load displacement of more than 50,000 tons, and the Brilliant-class heavy aircraft carriers that could carry more than 70 carrier-based aircraft.

Britain's Britannia-class, Germany's Deutschland-class, America's South Dakota-class, and Japan's Kaga-class are known as the most powerful naval capital ships of this era, with a standard displacement of more than 40,000 tons, equipped with 10 to 12 16-inch guns, and each has its own strengths and weaknesses in firepower, protection, speed, and fire control. Due to the influence of national strength and strategy, Japan only started construction of two Kaga-class and two upgraded ships, and the Americans seemed to sense the imminent atmosphere of war and built six in one go, but in the fall of 1926, only one each in South Dakota in the United States and Kaga in Japan was completed and put into service. The British Britannica and German Deutschlands were slightly inferior in tonnage to the much later South Dakota and Kaga designs, but by this time three Great Britain and four Germans had already entered service, and they were formed into combat power correspondingly earlier than the new capital ships of the U.S. and Japanese navies. According to common sense, if a naval battle breaks out at this time, it should be them who should play the leading role.

(End of chapter)