[I wish you all a happy Dragon Boat Festival! 】

In the first decade of the twentieth century, the economic aggregate of the Chinese Empire once again surpassed that of the United States and regained the first place in the world. It is heartening to see the ancient Eastern Empire regain its position after fifteen years since it was overtaken by the United States in 1895.

However, economic aggregate and industrial capacity are two different concepts. At least the current economic aggregate of the Chinese Empire has regained the first place in the world, but the overall industrial capacity is still inferior to that of the United States and Germany, ranking third in the world.

Although the industrialization process of the Chinese Empire was very fast, the industrial accumulation time of the Chinese Empire was too short compared with the industrial accumulation of decades and hundreds of years in Europe and the United States. Just like the race run, European and American boxers run slowly, but they have already run a long distance, although the boxers of the Chinese Empire run fast, but from the starting point, it will take a certain amount of time to catch up with the European and American fighters in front.

In fiscal year 1910, the National Assembly of the Chinese Empire issued a white paper on the estimation of industrial strength of countries around the world, which served as a reference standard for evaluating the overall strength of the Chinese Empire and set a comparison for future economic development work.

The white paper was formulated mainly with reference to the economic data released by the political axes of European and American countries, as well as the information obtained by the Chinese Empire through special channels.

The United States remains the country with the world's largest industrial GDP. In 1909, the United States produced $13.014 billion in industrial production, Germany $9.219 billion, the Chinese Empire $8.856 billion, Britain $7.723 billion, France $4.532 billion, Russia $2.122 billion, Italy $1.017 billion, and $986 million.

Among them, the Chinese Empire's industrial production grew the fastest, soaring at an average annual rate of 20% from 1900 onwards. This is due to the large-scale industrial construction of the Chinese Empire and the extensive practical application of high-tech technology, and of course, the Chinese Empire's war of foreign colonial plundering is also a booster, and its role is immeasurable.

Britain's industrial production fell sharply because Britain was hit hard in the Sino-British War and the Eight-Nation Coalition War of Aggression against Britain, and its strength was only at the level of industry in 1905, which was five years backwards.

Another thing that is growing rapidly is the book. Although Benben was heavily damaged by the Chinese Empire, its economy had collapsed at that time. However, the all-out political, economic, and military confrontation between China and the United States has led the United States to vigorously support the economy, which has led to extremely rapid economic growth over the past 10 years.

However, the lack of resources, the lack of raw materials and commodity dumping markets in overseas colonies, and the strong growth of the industrial strength of the Chinese Empire had a huge squeezing force on the industry, so although the industry developed rapidly, the total value was not high. Of course, the $986 million industrial production value of the Chinese Empire is nothing, but in the eyes of the Emperor himself, this achievement is enormous.

As the main criterion for measuring the industrial capacity of an industrial country, the annual output of steel and coal is still the Chinese Empire's white paper, which also published the steel and coal production of the world's major industrial countries in 1909.

In 1909, the total steel output of the United States was 26.51 million tons, ranking first in the world. The total steel output of the Chinese Empire is 25.3 million tons, ranking second in the world. Germany ranks third in the world with 13.7 million tons. The latter were 6.48 million tons for Britain, 3.44 million tons for Tsarist Russia, 3.41 million tons for France, 1.22 million tons for Italy, 460,000 tons for Austria-Hungary, and 160,000 tons for Ben.

In terms of coal production, the United States remains in first place with 620 million tons. The Chinese Empire came in second place with 540 million tons. Germany is third with 330 million tonnes. It was followed by France with 230 million tons, Britain with 170 million tons, and Russia with 120 million tons.

Since 1907, due to the wide application of internal combustion engines, from vehicles on land, to warships in the ocean, to airplanes in the air, the large-scale use of petrochemical products has stimulated the large-scale production and sales of oil, so a new generation of industrial power standards with petroleum and petrochemical industry as the standard has been introduced.

In the index of industrial power of the Chinese Empire, oil production is also included in the standard.

In 1909, the United States produced 100 million barrels of crude oil, ranking first in the world, Russia produced 30 million barrels of crude oil, ranked second, Britain (colony) crude oil production of 9 million barrels, ranked third, the others were France 1.1 million barrels, Persia 900,000 barrels, and other countries less than 50,000 barrels.

The United States, Russia, and the United Kingdom are major oil producers, and their oil is mainly used for export. Among them, the Chinese Empire is the world's largest oil importer, importing 40 million barrels of crude oil per year, mainly from the United States.

Of course, this is only on the surface. In fact, the Chinese Empire is plundering American oil, because all the oil imported by the Chinese Empire from the United States comes from the Chinese-funded oil companies established by the Chinese Empire after the American enclosure, and although the Chinese Empire has also proved some large oil reserves, all of them have been sealed after being discovered, and the imperial government has not approved the exploitation, and only allows the establishment of relevant petrochemical plants.

The main reason for such a decision is that the Chinese Empire does not have many domestic oil reserves, and it can be said that it is an oil-poor country in the world. Moreover, oil is deeply buried, it is not easy to extract, and the cost of self-exploitation is much higher than the cost of extracting it abroad.

In addition, the Chinese Empire sold oil in the United States twice in a row, which led to the emergence of a large number of oil extraction companies in the United States, resulting in the flooding of oil exploitation in the United States, and the price of crude oil was very low. However, the Chinese Empire retained the exploitation rights of 12 large oil fields in the United States without selling them, and the cost of self-exploitation was low, and oil was continuously exported to China, so there was no need to exploit the oil resources that were not rich in China. Of course, oil is not yet widely used and has not yet reached the dominant position to replace coal, so it is even less necessary.

Since 1901, when the Chinese Emperor Wang Chenhao ascended the throne, the Chinese Empire was officially proclaimed. The establishment of this empire marked the final completion of the unification of China. After the reunification of China, capitalism developed rapidly, due to the elimination of the political semi-colonial and semi-feudal system, the unification of centralized power, the expulsion of foreign forces, and the promotion of the formation of a unified domestic market; The billions of war reparations seized from Russia, Britain, and Britain, and the huge amount of oil funds "looted" from the United States were used to develop domestic light and heavy industries, especially military industries; The six major industrial bases in China have been established one after another, constituting a comprehensive development base for heavy industry and light industry; The construction of the national railway and highway network has been completed, forming a strong industrial transportation capacity and promoting economic development; The industrial revolution of the Chinese Empire was relatively late, and it was easy to accept advanced scientific and technological achievements of foreign countries; Under the wise guidance of Emperor Wang Chenhao, the Chinese Empire achieved great success in developing the industrial development model with the characteristics of the Chinese Empire by combining the American resource industry model and the German science and technology industry model.

Thus, in the last five years of the 19th century, after the rapid completion of the industrial revolution in the Chinese Empire, by the first decade of the twentieth century, the capitalist industry of the Chinese Empire developed by leaps and bounds. Between 1895 and 1910, steel production increased from less than 10,000 tons to 25.3 million tons; Coal production increased from 3.1 million tonnes to 540 million tonnes, and railway lines increased from about 100 km to 420,000 km. The metallurgical forging industry, the machine manufacturing industry, the shipbuilding industry, the electrical industry, the petrochemical industry, the ore mining industry, and the textile production industry have all developed rapidly. At the beginning of the 20th century, the Chinese Empire surpassed Britain and France in terms of industrial production, leaping to third place in the world.

The development of capitalist industry in the Chinese Empire and the world economic and financial crisis of 1906 accelerated the formation of monopolies. In 1895, there was one monopoly group in the Chinese Empire (Wang Chenhao's Beiyang Heavy Industry Group), which increased to 20 in 1900 (after Wang Chenhao ascended the throne, in order to entrap his subordinates, he distributed part of the Beiyang Group's industries to his henchmen), about 1,250 in 1905, and 6,600 in 1910. Monopolies controlled industrial production and formed the basis of the economic life of the Chinese Empire. At the beginning of the 20th century, the Zhili Coal Company monopolized half of the country's coal production; Imperial Iron & Steel Group (Zhili Iron & Steel Company) controls 99% of all of China's steel-producing industries; In terms of military industry, Beiyang Ordnance Heavy Industry occupies a dominant position. In the new industrial sectors, such as chemicals, electrical appliances, optics and precision instruments, monopolies were run from the very beginning. With the development of industrial monopolies, bank capital was rapidly concentrated, and 40 banks in Yanjing controlled 83% of the country's capital. Bank capital was combined with industrial capital to form financial capital. For example, Emperor Wang Chenhao's Bank of China (Bank of America) has a capital of 4.2 billion dragon coins and controls more than 14,200 industrial enterprises. The formation of monopoly capital in the Chinese Empire marked its entry into the imperialist stage.

However, with a land area of 63.3 million square kilometers and overseas territories, a population of 432 million, and a strong domestic market, the Chinese Empire does not need to expand externally for the time being.

The Chinese Empire was very calm and bored to develop its economy, and Wang Chenhao waited for a world war to break out in Europe, and that was the time for the Chinese Empire to quickly seize the center of the world economy.

Obviously, the foreign policy of the Chinese empire towards Europe and the United States accelerated the outbreak of great war in Europe.

With the advent of the Triple Alliance and the Triple Entente, the era of the balance of power in Europe since the Vienna Peace Conference has officially come to an end, and a new era of alliance has dawned. On the surface, this change seems to be moving towards a kind of equilibrium, but in fact international peace is walking a dangerous tightrope, and one careless person may fall into the abyss.

International relations from 1905 to 1910 had a tinge of thrilling, with each crisis planting the seeds of suspicion and resentment that made war more likely.

Two Moroccan crises erupted in North Africa, each of which showed the audacity of the German rulers and the lack of planning. Germany was always aiming to threaten and strike at France, and France, supported by Britain and Russia, was no longer the lamb it once was. In the two crises, despite Germany's repeated confrontation and murderous intentions, the second crisis was a direct demonstration by the German navy, but this was pushed back by France, which was almost unthinkable in the Bismarck era. In the second Moroccan crisis, Britain showed an attitude of not hesitating to fight Germany, which caused the anger of the whole Germans to reach the extreme. In an interview with the British press, the Kaiser said: "Most Germans are against the British. At this point, it seems that it is no longer a rhetorical statement, but a little conservative. And Britain did not seriously deal with Germany as a mere imaginary enemy, but as a real enemy. In 1906 the British and French military personnel had begun to study the possibility of cooperation in the war against Germany, and at the same time, the German General Staff was also working on the famous Schlieffen Plan.

It can be said that both the Central Powers and the Entente have been preparing for the possibility of a major war between the two sides, but neither side realizes that once a major war breaks out between the two major military blocs, the scale and time will be far beyond their imagination. British military strategists believed that half a year of war time was enough for Europe to reshuffle the cards, and German military strategists also agreed with this, and also believed that it would not take more than a year at most, and Germany would knock France down and force France to cede land and pay reparations again.

Both sides believed that if the arms race between the Allies and the Entente continued, a major war would inevitably break out in the next decade, but they also did not anticipate that the time for a major war between the two sides was approaching.

At the beginning of the 20th century, the European continent was full of mountains and rains, and the contradictions between the great powers and between the great powers and their colonies were deepening and the struggles were intensifying.

In the Balkans, many contradictions converge and struggle here, and a little spark is enough to detonate.

However, Wang Chenhao, the emperor of the Chinese Empire, was tired of this kind of thing, fanning the flames everywhere and creating contradictions between the great powers. Wang Chenhao was not sure that World War I would break out in 1914, but he could create the conditions for World War I to break out. Therefore, the political axe of the Chinese empire under the leadership of Wang Chenhao planted bombs for the European powers in the Suez Canal, the Balkan Peninsula, and the Moroccan region of North Africa.

Wang Chenhao was well aware that since the imperialist powers had a major interest in the Balkans, their intervention in the war was inevitable. The intervention in the war would inevitably lead to further intensification of the contradictions between the European powers, so Wang Chenhao also easily connected the fuse for the First World War.

As early as 1907, Thessaloniki became the center of the activities of the Young Turks, and the Association for the Advancement of Unity actively established branches throughout Macedonia, paying special attention to the development of organizations among the young officers of the local garrison, and proceeding to create partisan units in the countryside. At the end of December of the same year, representatives of the Riza faction's Association for the Advancement of Unification, Prince Sabahedin's Union of Personal Initiative and Local Decentralization, and the Armenian Dashnak Society held a joint meeting in Paris and decided to adopt various means, including armed struggle, to fundamentally change the existing system and establish a parliamentary system.

Behind them, in addition to the shadow of Britain, France and Russia, the Chinese Empire participated in it for the first time.

It turned out that in order to obtain the oil-producing areas of Kuwait and Iraq controlled by the Turkish Empire, the Chinese Empire repeatedly asked the Turkish government to allow the Chinese Empire to lease ports in the Gulf region near Kuwait and Iraq, but each time the Turkish Empire politely refused.

Therefore, the Chinese Empire was very dissatisfied with Abdulhamid II of Turkey. One of the factors that was exported to the most advanced battleships of the Greek Navy was the expression of dissatisfaction with the Turkish Empire.

However, Abdulhamid II never left himself at the mercy of the Chinese Empire like an obedient child, so the Chinese Empire decided to install a new Turkish regime in order to achieve the strategic goal of occupying Kuwait and Iraq.

Of course, the Chinese Empire took a fancy to the huge oil resources of Kuwait and Iraq. Kuwait, in particular, is at the lowest point of the Gulf oil region, where all the oil flows, and as long as there is a drop of oil left in the Middle East, it is also in Kuwait.

With the continuous increase in global oil demand and the continuous decline in Sino-US relations, the United States has tightened its supervision of the Chinese Empire's oil companies in the United States, and has established trade barriers against China because of the trade deficit with China, imposing 200% tariffs. Part of the Sino-American trade war was oil, and in order not to cut off oil supplies from the United States during the war, the Chinese Empire decided to take control of the rich oil in the Middle East and the Gulf. The Persian Empire was destroyed by Russia, and the Chinese Empire did not want to conflict with Russia for the time being, so it became necessary to bully Turkey.

With the secret support of the Chinese Empire, on July 3, 1908, Major Niazibeyi, the head of the Reinne organization of the Unification and Progressive Association, led 550 men to the mountain and first declared his opposition to the Sultan's political axe and foreign partition plots with the call of "freedom, equality, fraternity, and justice". A few days later, Enverpasha, who had gone underground, was supported by a large number of weapons and funds from the Chinese Empire, and declared an uprising.

The uprising quickly swept through many units of the 3rd and 2nd Army Corps stationed in Macedonia, and soon the Association for the Advancement of Unity became the real master of the entire Macedonian region.

On July 20, the Muslim inhabitants of Monastia revolted; On the 23rd, the rebel army marched into Thessaloniki, announced the restoration of the 1876 constitution, and telegraphed the Sultan to restore the constitution within a time limit, otherwise it would march into Istanbul. Abdulhamid II felt that the tide had turned, and was forced to announce the restoration of the constitution and the reconvening of parliament on the 24th.

The initial victory of the revolution gave the people great hope. However, the Young Turks believed that the revolutionary goal had been achieved and were content with the position of "overseers" of the political axe. The Sultan and his political axe are unharmed, creating a situation in which two regimes coexist.

The programme drawn up by the Young Turks after the revolution only put forward political demands such as the defence of the constitutional form of government, the expansion of parliamentary powers, the limitation of the privileges of the Sultan, the equality of all Ottomans before the law, and the economic demands of the development of commerce, industry, and agriculture, but did not put forward a practical programme for the tasks of the anti-feudal and anti-imperialist struggle facing the revolution.

In early October 1908, the Austrian political axe announced the annexation of Bosnia and Herzegovina, further shaking the prestige of the Young Turks. The activities of the feudal religious comprador forces in China have become more and more rampant. Sabah al-Din's Liberal Party and the Muslim League formed a political alliance against the United Progressive Association, which led to the counter-revolution of April 13, 1909.

In the early hours of April 13, some soldiers of the First Legion, loyal to the capital of the Sudan, rebelled. They gathered at Hagia Sophia, the seat of parliament, and were joined by religious scholars and students along the way. The rebels demanded the expulsion of the Speaker and the banning of the Association for the Advancement of Unity.

Sultan Abdulhamid II immediately complied with the rebels' demands, removed the prime minister, and ordered the governors of the provinces to protect the Shari'a.

The Association for the Advancement of Unification in Thessaloniki immediately appealed to the Chinese Empire for help.

On the 20th, the Marine Corps of the Mediterranean Fleet of the Chinese Empire, on the pretext of protecting the Chinese nationals in Turkey, dispatched a marine brigade to land on the Turkish mainland. The troops under the command of Sefkat Pasha formed the "Action Army" and arrived in Istanbul on 23 April.

With the help of the Imperial Chinese Marine Brigade, the Young Revolutionary Army took control of the city on the 26th and suppressed the rebellion.

On April 27, the Young Turks deposed Abdulhamid II through parliament and replaced his brother Mohammed? Reished was the Sultan and was for Muhammad V.

The deposition of Abdulhamid II marked the end of the Turkish Revolution. From then on, the Young Turks came to power and pursued a policy of [***] and centralization, which led to the abandonment of the revolution halfway.

The Chinese Empire, as a meritorious man, restarted negotiations with the Turkish government to lease the Kuwaiti region and buy all the oil exploration rights in the Iraqi region. Due to the turbulence of the Turkish political axe, without the support of the Chinese Empire, the youth faction could not stand at all, and the Austro-Hungarian Empire continued to encroach on Turkish territory, and countries such as the Balkan countries, Italy and Russia also eyed Turkey, and at the same time, Turkey's economy was sluggish, and the new political axe needed a huge amount of money to maintain the country's survival, so Mohammed V finally signed the Kuwait Lend-Lease Treaty and the Middle-Turkish Iraq Zone Oil Exploration Treaty.

On June 3, 1910, the Chinese Empire leased Kuwait for 99 years for 20 million dragon dollars and obtained the right to exploit all underground oil in Iraq. As a special administrative region of the Turkish Empire, the chief executive of Kuwait is required to obtain the consent of the Chinese Empire, and the Chinese Empire can station no more than 3,000 military and police personnel in the concession area, and the lease area is implemented in accordance with the laws and regulations formulated by the Chinese Empire, and the Turks need to abide by it unconditionally.

In this way, the Chinese Empire succeeded in acquiring all of Kuwait, and then built a naval base in the Gulf of Kuwait to control oil exploration and transportation in the Persian Gulf region. At the same time, the oil resources in Iraq were also owned by the Chinese Empire, and a large number of Chinese Empire's oil companies re-exploited and shipped crude oil to the country. Since then, the Chinese Empire has not worried that its oil resources will be controlled by the United States, and it has one more bargaining chip in political negotiations with the United States.

In 1910, when the news reached the Balkans that the Chinese Empire was building the world's most advanced and powerful superbow battleship for the Greek Navy, it finally caused the balance of power in the region to be thrown out of balance, and the "Balkan Alliance" composed of Bulgaria, Serbia, Greece and Menegro opposed the control and suppression of the Ottoman Empire.

Originally, the Super God Bow battleship built by the Chinese Empire for the Greek Navy would not be able to enter service with the Greek Navy in two years, and the Greek Navy was not yet an opponent of the Turkish Navy. However, at this time, a revolution broke out in Turkey, and the new Turkish political axe was unstable and the military spirit was fluctuating.

Thus, the turmoil of the Turkish Empire gave the Balkan alliance a chance. After secret consultations between several countries, it was decided to declare war on the Turkish Empire.

The Balkan Peninsula, located between the Mediterranean Sea and the Black Sea, has been the scar of numerous wars throughout history. At the beginning of the 20th century, the Ottoman Empire, which originated in western Asia, still controlled large swathes of the Balkan countries in southeastern Europe, and the Albanian people, who had been fighting tenaciously for 400 years, had yet to read; The Serb, Bulgarian, and Greek peoples in Macedonia and Thrace were also subjected to feudal oppression and religious persecution by the Ottoman Empire.

In March 1911, Serbia and Bulgaria signed a treaty of alliance against Turkey. In May, Greece and Bulgaria entered into an alliance, and Negoro of Mongolia also joined in August. In this way, an anti-Turkish alliance of four Balkan countries was formed, and it was decided to take advantage of the Italo-Turkish war to launch a war against Turkey. But the European powers were not willing to allow the Balkan people to take their own destiny into their own hands, and they each intervened with aggressive and expansionist ambitions.

On October 8, 1911, Negora first declared war on the Ottoman Empire, and Bulgaria, Serbia, and Greece also issued ultimatums to the Ottoman Empire on October 17 and 18, demanding that the Turkish army withdraw from the Balkans and give autonomy to all ethnic groups.

The Ottoman political axe rejected this request and began to mobilize the army. This constitutes a direct pretext for the Balkan Union's declaration of war against Turkey.

On the 18th, Bulgaria, Serbia, and Greece also took military action against Turkey. The Balkan Confederation countries outnumbered the Ottomans in terms of the number of men and the quality of their weapons, especially in the quality of artillery and the combat training of their armies. The morale of the armies of these countries, encouraged by the goals of the national liberation struggle, is high. The Bulgarian army formed the main group in three army groups in the Istanbul direction. The main forces of Serbia (three army groups) against the group of Ottoman troops in Macedonia. The Greek armies of Visalia and Epirus prepared against the armies of Thessaloniki and Yanina, respectively. The Greek Navy was ready to take action against the Ottoman Navy, guaranteeing the allied supremacy in the Mediterranean. The task of the Negro army was to fight in Macedonia in coordination with the Serbian army. The Allies formed an encirclement posture against the Turkish army, preparing to crush the enemy before Ottoman reinforcements arrived.

On 22 October, the Negoro army of Men, together with the 20,000-strong Serbian Ibar troops, attacked the Turkish forces in northern Thrace and northern Albania, and the Bulgarian army crossed the border and advanced southward. The Army, located on the right flank of the Defenders' group, repelled the upper army. The 1st and 3rd Armies of the Bulgarian Army, which were fighting on the left flank, after repeatedly repelling the Turkish army, routed the 3rd Turkish Army near Kirk-Kilishe (Lozegrad) on October 22~24 and began to advance southward. From 29 October to 3 November, heavy fighting took place in Lulé Burgaz, and the Turkish Fourth Army was routed. The Turkish army retreated in a hurry.

On October 24, the Serbian army groups launched a general offensive, and the Turkish army groups in Macedonia were crushed. In southern Macedonia, the Greek army won a victory near Yenige on 1 and 2 November and launched an attack on Thessaloniki, and the defenders of the city surrendered on 9 November.

The Greek Navy blocked the Turkish Navy's exit from the Dardanelles Strait and carried out a campaign to seize the islands of the Aegean Sea. On November 28, Albania announced the reading power. But the next few Allied military victories did not serve the interests of some of the great powers. While Russia is supporting the Balkan countries, it is also worried that the arrival of the Bulgarian army in Istanbul will not be conducive to solving the problem of the Black Sea straits. Germany and Austria-Hungary, believing that Serbia and Greece were on the side of the Entente and therefore did not want them to be strong, saw Turkey as their potential ally and tried to prevent the fall of the Ottoman Empire.

Under pressure from the major powers, in December 1911, the Ottoman Empire signed an armistice with Bulgaria and Serbia.

On January 23, 1912, a coup d'état took place in the Ottoman Empire, and the New Axe (Young Turks) refused to accept the terms of the peace treaty. On 3 February, the Balkan Confederation countries resumed their war. After several successive defeats, the Ottoman Empire signed a second armistice in April. The First Balkan War ended with the signing of the London Peace Treaty. Under this treaty, the Ottoman Empire lost almost all of its territory in Europe. The aspirations of the peoples of the Balkans to be freed from the oppression of the Ottoman Empire were realized.

From June 29 to August 10, 1912, the Second Balkan War was fought with Bulgaria on one side and Serbia, Greece, Romania, Montenegro and the Ottoman Empire on the other. It was the result of the intensification of contradictions between the original allies in the First Balkan War, and Serbia, having lost its access to the Adriatic Sea, demanded reparations from Macedonia. Greece also wanted to expand its territory at the expense of Bulgaria (which had already recovered most of its lands by then). Romania made territorial claims to Dobroga to Bulgaria.

At the instigation of the Austro-German League, Bulgaria launched a military operation on the night of June 29, 1912, against the Serbian and Greek armies in Macedonia. The offensive of the Bulgarian armies was blocked, and the Cypriots counterattacked, breaking through the positions of the Bulgarian Fourth Army. The fighting continued until 6 July, when the Bulgarian forces were forced to retreat.

On the 10th, Romania went to war against Bulgaria and met no resistance. 21 On the 21st, the Ottoman Empire tore up the Treaty of London, fought against the Bulgarian army, and occupied Edirne. Bulgaria, threatened with total defeat, surrendered on the 29th. Under the 1912 Peace Treaty of Bucharest, Bulgaria lost not only most of the territory it had recovered, but also the southern part of Dobroga. The Peace of Constantinople signed by Bulgaria and Turkey in 1912 forced Bulgaria to return Edirne.

The result of the Second Balkan War was the realignment of forces in the Balkans: Romania broke away from the Triple Alliance of 1882 and moved closer to the Entente, and Bulgaria joined the German-Austrian Alliance. The Kingdom of Serbia in Yugoslavia nearly doubled its territory like a thorn in the side of Austria, and in the summer of 1912 Austria secretly suggested to its allies that measures should be taken to contain Serbia. However, Germany and Italy refused to act. All these have exacerbated regional contradictions.

The Balkan Wars led to a further intensification of international contradictions and accelerated the outbreak of World War I. The contradictions between the Balkan countries in the post-war period also deepened, providing an opportunity for the imperialist powers to continue to intervene in and control the Balkans, and laying the fuse for the imperialist world war. After the Balkan War, the imperialist countries intensified their arms race, recruited a large number of soldiers, developed and produced all kinds of new weapons, and increased their military spending by a large margin.

By the eve of the First World War, the German-Austrian budget amounted to 14 billion marks, and the Entente budget reached 4.76 billion marks. The two major military blocs each held a military meeting to discuss and formulate operational plans in an effort to strike first. The Chief of the German General Staff, Moltke, once said: "We are ready, for us the sooner the war is better." "The big war is on the verge of breaking out.

During the Balkan Wars, the Chinese Empire maintained strict neutrality, and the naval base in Cyprus became a distribution center for arms exports to the Balkan War countries.

The two conflicts in the Balkans have exacerbated already tense situations and made the Balkan powder keg, which has long been restless, worthy of its name. In 1908 Austria-Hungary saw the revolution in Turkey as an opportunity to annex Persia and Herzegovina. This aroused strong resentment from Serbia, which regarded these two places as its own territory, and Russia, which was behind Serbia. The Tsarist axe was forced by war. But on this issue, Berlin and Vienna showed a high degree of unanimity. Germany sent a very tough statement to Russia expressing its support for Austria-Hungary, and at the same time saying that part of the Austro-Hungarian army had entered a "state of emergency", and finally Russia retreated. This result not only angered Serbia, but the Tsarist also vowed not to be humiliated again.

At this time, the military expenditure of the Entente was far inferior to that of the Central Powers, and both Russia and Britain were severely damaged by the Chinese Empire, and they could not be relieved in a short time, and France could not compete with Germany at all, so the Entente could only adopt insidious means, that is, to divide and disintegrate the Allied bloc.

Due to the iron-clad relationship between Germany and Austria, the Entente could not get a wedge and had to take Italy.

At the end of the 19th century and the beginning of the 20th century, the competition for North Africa by the European powers became more and more acute. Italy attempted to seize the Turkish provinces of Tripolitania and Cyrenaica (present-day Libya) as a base for expansion in North Africa.

Italy's intentions had been guessed by the Entente years earlier, when Italy and Russia had reached a secret agreement and the two sides had agreed on the Turkish question. Italy supported Russian power in the Persian Gulf and the Black Sea, while Russia supported Italian expansion in North Africa.

The Anglo-French-Russian Entente then decided to give Italy some advantage on this issue, allowing Italy to attack Turkey. Because Turkey was very close to Germany, the Entente wanted to fight among themselves, so as to break Turkey's desire to join the Central Powers. At the same time, it is also beneficial to Italy in the hope that Italy can join the side of the Entente, at least it can maintain neutrality when the two major military blocs fight.

So Britain, France, and Russia sent a note to Italy, expressing their attitude. For the sake of immediate interests, the Italians reached the "Marseille Secret Agreement" with Britain, France and Russia, promising for the first time that Italy would not enter the war if the Central Powers unjustly invaded the side of the Entente.

Britain, France, and Russia were greatly pleased with this, which showed that their plan of discord had succeeded. With this commitment from Italy, the power of the Entente did not increase, but the power of the Central Powers was weakened.

Tripolitania and Cyrenaica in North Africa are deserts of limited economic value but strategically important. It confronts Sicily and controls the narrower seas of the central Mediterranean. In 1881, during the partition of the Ottoman Empire's possession of North Africa, Algeria (which France began to invade in 1830 and gradually reduced it to colonies) and Tunisia (1881) became French protectorates, so that the titular Ottoman possessions in North Africa were also owned by the Western colonists, and France was prepared to annex the Turkish (Ottoman) provinces of Tripolitania and Cyrenaica. This attempt was opposed by the European powers, especially Italy, which had long wanted to establish a colony in North Africa. To this end, Italy actively engaged in political and diplomatic activities, reached agreements and tacit understandings with the great powers (the Triple Alliance between Germany and Austria) and recognized Italian interests in North Africa. In preparation for the annexation of the provinces of Tripolitania and Cyrenaica, Italy continued to emigrate and send merchants to the two places from 1880 to 1909, purchase land, and actively expand its power. sending naval officers to change into fishermen's clothes and carry out coastal surveys in the name of fishing for sponges off the coast of Tripolitania; He instructed Italian Catholic priests to go deep into the interior to collect intelligence in the name of missionary work.

Drawing lessons from its crushing defeat in Ethiopia in 1896, Italy is constantly spying on the timing of its choice.

In September 1909, taking advantage of the turbulent international situation and the serious difficulties of Turkey, Italy decided to send a naval fleet to Tripolitania and make territorial claims against the country. After being refused, an ultimatum was issued on the 28th on the grounds that the local Italians had been harmed, and on the 29th, war was declared on Turkey, and the war broke out by shelling Tripoli and Homs from the sea.

The Turkish army in Tripolitania and Cyrenaica had only one division of about 7,000 men, while Italy mobilized 90,000 troops and imposed a naval blockade on Turkey to prevent it from sending reinforcements. On the 29th~30th, the Italian Navy shelled the coastal city of Preveza (now part of Greece) in the Epirus region of Turkey and sank several torpedo boats. Three days later, the naval landing force shelled and occupied Tripoli and Tubrug.

On the 11th, the Italian army (about 35,000 men, 72 artillery pieces, commanded by C. Caneva) entered Tripoli and landed at Homs, Drna and Benghazi, and occupied important coastal cities in Libya by the end of the month, but was met with strong resistance from Arab tribal troops and Arab volunteers from Egypt, Tunisia and other places, and the offensive into the hinterland was slow.

In May 1910, the Italian army (100,000 men, 35 aircraft, and 9 airships) launched a large-scale offensive and the navy occupied the Zozecanissos Islands.

In October, Turkey's domestic political instability and the outbreak of the Balkan War forced it to sue for peace.

On the 18th, the two sides signed the Treaty of Lausanne, and Tripolitania and Cyrenaica became Italian colonies. Turkey relinquished its sovereignty over Tripoli and Cyrenaica, restored their former names Libya, and recognized Italy's continued possession of the Zozecanissos Islands.

Since the reason why Italy joined the Central Powers was the conflict with the French colony in Tripoli, now Italy has truly occupied the region, and France has also expressed its support, and the contradictions between the two sides have been eliminated immediately. Britain was also very generous, saying that it would not pursue Italy's participation in the Eight-Nation Alliance's war of aggression against Britain, and was willing to return Italian Somalia to Italy. In this way, the contradictions between Italy and the Entente were dissolved. In turn, the Italian navy could not hold off the threat of the British and French navies in the Mediterranean, and it was impossible to count on the German and Austro-Hungarian navies, so the Italian political axe began to tilt over the side of the Entente.

(To be continued)