In the telegram sent by Yang Yuanzhao, the ambassador to Germany, he personally presented his case to Kaiser Wilhelm II, requesting the purchase of prisoners of war and engineering and technical personnel, the more the better, and the northwest could pay a certain amount of cash in exchange for this. This is a novel statement, according to the Northwest, the sovereignty of prisoners of war and engineering personnel is still in the hands of Germany, the Northwest can be responsible for the transportation costs, pay the use fees to Germany on a quarterly basis, the jurisdiction and accommodation are borne by the Northwest, and the casualties caused will also be compensated according to certain specifications, which is equivalent to saying that Germany has made a steady business, and the contract period of the prisoners of war is 2 years, and they can be considered to renew or return the prisoners of war in accordance with Germany's requirements when they expire.

Wilhelm II saw an opportunity in the middle, an opportunity to solve the dilemma that Germany was now facing. The problem of prisoners of war is a problem that must be solved in every war, especially for the victors, it is almost impossible to have many prisoners of war who are defeated, and even if there are, both sides will return them fairly, unless they do not want to rescue the prisoners of war, so that most of the prisoners of war still fall into the hands of the victorious country.

From the beginning of the slave society, the whereabouts of prisoners of war are generally slaves, the wars of the slave era, most of them are launched for the sake of fighting for slaves and territory, in the feudal society, some become slaves, some are directly killed, and there are more soldiers who become the victors, such as when the Han Dynasty was strong, there were a group of Turkic troops, and even the Turks were attached, in short, there were many methods. But for Germany, this is not the right approach. Such a large number of prisoners of war, especially more and more in the future, is a huge pressure on Germany. Germany is a small country and does not need much coolie labor. Many prisoners of war were kept in prisoner of war camps like this.

It was not easy for everyone to eat, and it was not easy to feed so many prisoners of war. It is not easy to let go and kill, and it is also necessary to draw forces to protect, which has caused great trouble to the German military, no wonder some people have proposed to kill prisoners, they just foresee that there will be more and more prisoners of war, and if they continue to guard them like this, maybe Germany will not even have soldiers to fight. Although this is an extreme possibility. It was certainly impossible for Germany to capture prisoners until there were no soldiers available, but this represented a certain trend, compared with Britain and France, Germany's background was a little weaker, and the generals' proposal to kill prisoners was also a last resort.

On the contrary, it was the Northwest that proposed a different way to deal with prisoners of war in a different country, especially a country like China, which has a vast territory and a large population. I'm really not afraid of these prisoners of war running away. In terms of his own strength, the strength of the northwest can ensure the safety of these prisoners of war, and they will not be forcibly extorted by Britain and France, and he can completely resist the pressure of the northwest. It will not allow the prisoners of war to become the help of Britain and France. On the other hand, of course, it is the benefit, and the salary is paid quarterly. This salary is not high compared to the average salary level. However, when the number is high to a certain extent, it is very impressive. In the Northwest simple scheme. Ordinary coolies can get an income of 8-12 yuan a month, Germany is definitely impossible to give any salary to prisoners of war, and the northwest includes food and shelter, this money is equivalent to getting it in vain, as far as more than two million prisoners of war are concerned, this is almost tens of millions of dollars per month, which is enough for Germany during the war to move them.

Let the ambassador of the northwest to Berlin go back and wait for news, and the Kaiser immediately called the chief of staff of the army, the minister of the navy, and the chancellor to discuss this matter, in the opinion of Wilhelm II, this matter is very important, if it really takes shape, this money can be said to be endless, and there will be a huge amount of money every month.

Germany launched a war in Europe, after the war, Germany's every qiē was very smooth, but one thing shocked him, that is, military spending, almost far beyond imagination, to make the army move, it takes a lot of real money, which they foresaw before, but they didn't expect so much, plus although Britain and France were defeated, but there was no sign of surrender or withdrawal from the war, which also confirmed what was once confirmed, this is a protracted war.

Germany is very strong, has a strong industrial strength, in science and technology, not lost to any country, but its biggest weakness, I am afraid is time, as the 19th century to complete the unification and rise of the country, although Germany conformed to the trend, in a short period of time, became a European power, but the biggest weakness is that the rise of time is too little, the rise of time is less, so that Germany lacks enough colonies, can not support Germany's raw material consumption and product dumping, this is also Germany forcibly occupy China's Jiaozhou Bay, And spend a lot of effort to develop the root causes. In addition to the colonies, there was also a slight deficiency in accumulation, and he could only take out the corresponding part of the fiscal revenue to the maximum extent for military expenditure, and even because of the construction of the Kiel Canal, there was not enough funds, and the cost of the Kiel Canal fell on the navy, resulting in Germany's backwardness in the construction of capital ships.

On the other hand, Britain, although the financial revenue has been completely thrown away by Germany, it stands to reason that the ability to build ships should be far inferior to Germany, but with the accumulation of the British Empire for hundreds of years, including the huge resources obtained from the colonies, it is enough to support Britain to do anything, and he even in order to overwhelm Germany, within one year, started the construction of 9 capital ships, and in the second year opened a few more, just this, completely opened the difference with Germany, although it was suppressed by German pressure, it was a little uncomfortable, But if Britain really tried their best, the huge accumulation would be enough for them to make more things.

Germany was reminded by the northwest that it was preparing very early, but no matter how it prepared, it was impossible to prepare for a big war as a three, four, or even five-year war.

Wilhelm II and his ministers of civil and military affairs understood that in order to win, one of the forced France and Russia must finally admit defeat and surrender and withdraw from the war in a short period of time.

When the personnel arrived, Wilhelm II simply said the requirements of the northwest, Moltke's eyes suddenly lit up, originally because of the occupation of the area, is a little anxious, considering whether to put the personnel of the intelligence department into the occupation area, in order to resist the rising storm in the occupation area, because of the British and French promotion, armed action, black guns, suicide attacks in an endless stream, although it is not yet possible to endanger the rule of Germany, but there are already several military regions in a hurry, according to the calculation of the General Staff, To stabilize these areas, at least 300,000 to 500,000 people are needed. 、

300,000 to 500,000 people, for Germany, this is the strength of one or two front armies, even if you don't use front-line troops, it is also the core combat force, and if you transfer to those places, it is equivalent to saying that the strength of the front line will be reduced, and it is better to suppress these rebels, but if you can't suppress it, and there are fires on all sides, it will be even more troublesome.

Moltke Jr. has always wanted to come up with a way to get the best of both worlds, but there are such and such shortcomings, when he is worried, the mention of the northwest is simply too timely, unlike Wilhelm II, he has been thinking about how to solve this problem, the Belgian side, at that time, the advance was relatively fast, did not produce many killings, only wiped out a part of the Belgian army, most of them surrendered, except for a few diehards, most of the others were captured.

However, the situation in Belgium has not been stabilized at all because of the less killing, after all, it is an independent country, Belgium has a population of at least several million, when the German army occupied, except for a few people who were still working, the others were temporarily unemployed, for a short time, but for a long time, this unstable dìng factor is intensifying, and naturally there will be various resistance movements, and Britain and France took advantage of this, under the fanning of the flames, so that the resistance forces in Belgium fired.

The General Staff and the Intelligence Department have been thinking about how to restore order to Belgium, at least let everyone work, and if a government is in order, the people will do their part, which will bring huge benefits.

This is the ideal state, for the victorious country, how to deal with the occupied area, that is a complicated problem, in the Franco-Prussian War, Germany occupied the territory of France, but it also took more than ten years, or even longer, to slowly digest, until now, there are still hidden dangers. What's more, now, Belgium is only a preliminary occupation, the European war is still going on, it is impossible to continue as usual, the fact that the two sides are hostile, so that Germany can not easily believe that the Belgians, some important departments and factories, unless it is clearly controlled, otherwise, a Belgian sabotage, may cause greater losses, unless it is like now, stop and wait for the reception and sorting, which aggravates this instability.

Now the Chinese demand is tantamount to solving the big problem, the problem of unemployment, whether it is prisoners of war or workers, will be handed over to China to take care of, China will guarantee their basic personal safety, Germany does not have to feed them, and can also get the funds for the work of every prisoner of war, as for those people, they can take part of it, and let them go to the rest.

Moltke's analysis, in one sentence, made many military generals look sideways, you know, if part of the occupation area problem and the prisoner of war problem are solved, Germany can at least transfer 300,000 soldiers in Belgium to the front line, as for the French side, Germany itself is a feud, Germany and France do not want to make France submit, reduce their population, put them into prisoner of war camps, and then send them to China to work, it is a good choice. (To be continued......)