He said with pity: "The Grand Duke is dignified and determined, and he has been removed from the army for many years, who will the emperor send to be the commander-in-chief of the front?" ”

"I heard that the emperor is going to be the commander-in-chief."

Witt was shocked: "This must not be." ”

"For what?"

"If you think about it, when someone else is a commander, the war is unfavorable, and you can also put all the fault on him, remove him from his post and investigate it, and divert the resentment of the people. If the emperor himself is the commander and loses the battle, won't he be responsible for himself? The resentment of the people cannot be transferred, and it is all attributed to the emperor alone. Whoever came up with this bad idea, it should be killed, it should be killed! ”

Sazonov hesitated for a while, and reluctantly spoke: "Empress." Of course, as previously said, the Empress listened to Rasputin. ”

Werther paused for a long time and sighed: "Don't mention this." Is there any good news on the battlefield? ”

Sazonov spread his hands: "It's all bad news, the Northwestern Front was driven out of East Prussia by the Germans, the Southwestern Front spit out the Pzheshmir fortress that was about to be eaten again, Warsaw was in danger, Gilinsky sent three telegrams to the emperor in one night, there was not enough ammunition, there was not enough ammunition, there was still not enough ammunition. To the south, the Black Sea Fleet suffered, the Turks took out one of our battleships, Romania rejected our proposal, Bulgaria was ready to move, the Serbs depleted their veterans, and the Anglo-French postponed the Dardanelles operation—"

"Didn't win the battle in the Caucasus?"

"For the time being, Turkestan was in a mess by the Chinese, the base camp had no reserves on hand, and had to increase troops from the Caucasus, and the Turks had ample time to recover their army. The attacks of the Chinese in the back make us very passive, I am not a soldier. But I know that in the west we use more than 80 divisions against the German-Austrian 110 divisions, and in the east we can only use against the Chinese 50 divisions. The armored forces, which had been put together with great difficulty, were again crushed in Ulan-Ude...... I really don't know what to do if Lu Dao continues like this. ”

Witt laughed: "Even you are shaken? ”

"It's not vacillation, it's sanity." Sazonov argued.

"Yes, sanity, the most lacking thing in this country is sanity. A British diplomat once told me bluntly that, in his opinion, everyone in Russia is a bit crazy. He called it the so-called Slavic charm – half nothing, half idleness, plus a flash of brain. Werther held out his finger and tapped his temple.

"Explosion?" Sazonov narrowed his eyes in bewilderment.

"Yes, the explosion, it is the explosion that dragged us into this useless war - you know, I have always been against being an enemy of Germany. Ten years ago I understood that what the Chinese want is all our Asian territory, no, not only ours. There are also English and French lands. American—they want to build a great empire of Asia from the Mediterranean to the Pacific, and they will do whatever it takes to do so. Only when the entire Western world world unites can it be possible to extinguish this crazy yellow peril and maintain the order of this world world with Christian civilization as the center. ”

Sazonov waved his hand: "As far as I know, the emperor did not want to be an enemy of Germany, but it was the German emperor who betrayed us, reversed his promise, and extended his hand to Constantinople, which we are determined to win, and the emperor joined the entente in anger." ”

Witt shook his head again and again: "It is we who have been blinded by ambition and the situation has changed. The Chinese are already capable of slaughtering our Asian territories. Are the Balkans and Turkey really more important than all of our Asian territories? I don't believe it, I'd rather have the Balkans and Turkey in possession than see half of the Emperor's double-headed eagle cut off. Friendly with Germany and Austria. Although it could not get the Balkans and Turkey, it could keep its Asian territory alive and be the enemy of Germany and Austria. China will inevitably take advantage of the opportunity to make a move, and our country will inevitably suffer from enemies on both sides, such a simple way

Why can't you listen to it? ”

Sazonov thought for a moment and twisted his beard and said: "Because the vast majority of people believe that the European war will be won or lost in six to eight weeks, and during this period, even if China invades, it will not take much advantage. How many people would have thought that this war would be fought in the second year? Gilinsky said that one or two fortresses can make thousands of yellow monkeys bleed, and wouldn't building a few more fortresses in Turkestan and Siberia solve the problem? What he said still makes sense...... Also, it is precisely because of the defeat in the last war that the emperor does not want to be ashamed of the first battle, and the generals are even more eager to try-"

—

Witte raised his hand tremblingly and said: "Okay, okay, I don't blame the emperor, the situation has deteriorated to this point, and there is nothing to pursue, I don't believe that Russia with 160 million people can be easily conquered." Did the imperial court have any countermeasures? ”

A cold glint flashed in Sazonov's eyes: "It's very simple, the west is burning in the east." ”

"Burn?"

"Yes, burn, burn Siberia and Turkestan into a sea of fire, not a single village or town, not a single barn, the railroad tracks are stripped off, the bridges are blown up, the army is burned and withdrawn, every few hundred kilometers is withdrawn, relying on a fortress position to resist for a while, exchanging space for time, so that the enemy seems to be marching in a desert with thousands of miles of uninhabited deserts, and every grain of wheat must be transported from the rear of thousands of kilometers-"

Witt nodded approvingly: "Yes, that's how Kutuzov dealt with Napoleon." ”

Sazonov spread his hands with a wry smile: "But now is not the era of Kutuzov, the croppers are not as obedient as when they were serfs, look at those peasant councilors in the Dumari, what kind of virtue they have, they are all working the land, the emperor is about to be mad by them." Especially the descendants of bandits, exiles and fugitive serfs in the east are not a good thing, the 1905 revolution was the first to be stirred up by those people, and wherever the government supports the land, they must rebel, and divide the land from the village community to the individual, what a good thing, they want to riot - foolish people! Mobocracy! Livestock! Hopeless! The garrison in the east was recruited from among these people, and if you think about it, these selfish scum who have no loyalty to the emperor and the government, want them to set fire to their homes, can they be willing? ”

"So, they're still willing to defend their homeland."

"The problem is that we can't even guarantee ammunition for the main battlefield, so how can we have the spare strength to support the battlefield in the far east. Guess what War Minister Sukhhomlinov said? Sabres, flagpole spears, and bayonets are everything in war, as was the case in the wars of the past, and the wars are still like this, and everything else is crooked, and I have not read a military manual for twenty-five years. It is precisely because of such a wise Secretary of War that we have not built a new arsenal for three years, and before the outbreak of war, the War Department had not even used up the government's funds for the production of munitions, so now our army is out of shells. The emperor wanted to get angry at this time, but he was Rasputin's man, and Rasputin told the queen, and the queen told the emperor again, and there was nothing wrong, and he was still sitting there - I couldn't believe it was true. I really regret that I didn't push that demon monk into the Gulf of Finland...... You don't know it, but His Excellency the Prime Minister actually hates Rasputin, and I dare say he is a true patriot—"

Witt's heart trembled, and he vaguely guessed Sazonov's intention.

"I heard you wrote a memoir?"

A dog is a dog, and if he doesn't bite, it doesn't mean that he has lost his dogness.

Witt smiled coldly: "Where did you hear about it, there is no such thing. ”

Suddenly, a fine snow fell outside the window.

Winter in St. Petersburg is still a long time to come.