The northern suburbs of Potsdam, Germany, Sanssouci Palace Chinese Building. "It seems that little Nikolai has made a big fall in the Far East this time." The German monarch, the supreme Wilhelm II, gloated at Tirpitz and Moltke in front of him. The defeat of the Russians in the Far East made the monarch quite comfortable, which meant that if Germany and its old enemy France went to war, then the pressure on Russia in the East would be much less, and it also meant that the chances of taking control of the Baltic Sea were greater, after all, the Russian Far East fleet suffered heavy losses, and Russia had to mobilize fleets from the Baltic Sea in order to make up for the losses.

"That's right, under Your Majesty, the Russians have invested more than 100,000 troops in the Far East, and there are nearly 7 times the army's recruits and logistics personnel to provide support, and more importantly, this sudden war in the Far East has consumed Russia's already small money, and now Russia is very weak." Moltke complimented.

"What about the Navy? Tirpitz, don't you have anything to comment on? Wilhelm II asked.

"The performance of the Beiyang Navy is much stronger than that of the Army, this strength is not only reflected in the quality of the warships and officers and soldiers, but also in the overall operation of the Navy, in fact, at the beginning, the strength of the Russian Far East Fleet is not much inferior, 3 battleships, 3 armored cruisers (the Prince is classified as a cruiser), 4 Azov-type cruisers, if you fight hard, Beiyang will inevitably pay a great price, but Beiyang cleverly uses the Japanese landing force as bait, Successfully set up an ambush for the Far Eastern Fleet and took the lead in a series of battles that followed. In the end, the Russian Far East Fleet was almost completely annihilated at a very small cost, and only 3 warships remained in the military port to survive. The future hegemon of the Far Eastern Oceans has actually appeared, and it is not the Russians. And not the British, but this imminent great power and its navy. Tirpitz said with a little admiration.

"In other words, you think Beiyang and that General Xu can help us solve that big trouble in the east?" Wilhelm II said with some excitement.

"Now Beiyang can only defeat Russia that is not fully prepared, and the quality of the Beiyang Navy and Army is indeed very high, no less than the standards of European powers, especially the navy. But the size of the Beiyang army was still too small. It is okay to simply deal with a limited war, but if a full-scale war breaks out, Russia can rely on its strong national strength and absolutely superior army to crush the elite but too small army of Beiyang! Moltke explained.

"It seems. If we want to use Beiyang's hand to solve the trouble in the east, we still need to give Beiyang some support, but now that Beiyang and Britain have a very close relationship, it is difficult for me to decide. "Although Wilhelm II did not want war with England from the bottom of his heart. But the growing relationship between Britain and Germany forced Wilhelm to consider the relationship between Germany and the British allies.

"In fact, the alliance between Britain and Beiyang is based on a common deal against the Russians." Bernhardt said. "Britain did not want Russian expansion in the Far East. At the same time, they also did not want Beiyang to be too strong, so while Britain supported Beiyang against Russia, it was also supporting Japan in order to contain Beiyang in the future. And Beiyang knows this, so while relying on the funds provided by the United Kingdom, it is also handing an olive branch to our country, Italy and even the United States. ”

"That is, if the Russians lose the ability to continue to dominate the Far East, the great power in the Far East and Britain will part ways?" Wilhelm II said.

This is an inevitable trend, and when the country established by Beiyang becomes stronger, he will certainly not be satisfied with his control of the Far East. The powerful enemy in the north has been defeated, and the rich Southeast Asia will be his next target. And here is the traditional range of power in Britain and France. More importantly, truly powerful nations will never be willing to accept the unequal treaties that the British government has imposed on them. The contrast between the two sides is inevitable! Bernhardt said with certainty.

"Perhaps our relations with Beiyang can go further, at least at this stage, there is no competition between us and Beiyang, who can order large quantities of surplus products from Germany and can supply the Reich with all kinds of resources, especially rare metals. Although Germany has abundant coal and iron resources, you know that some non-ferrous metals are still very lacking. And when Beiyang is really strong, their conflict with the British will also help the empire share the pressure. Bernhardt saw William's face slightly moved, and hurriedly continued.

"The more friends in this world, the better, especially when there is no conflict of interest, the British Empire can dominate the ocean of the world for hundreds of years, not only by strong ships and cannons, nor just naval geniuses like Nelson and Drake, superb political and diplomatic means are the foundation of the British Empire's strength. And what Germany lacks most now is friends, please look at the map, since the end of the Franco-Prussian War, France has been our old enemy. Since the French president's visit to Russia, our army has been under the attack of the two major European powers, and its limited forces and resources have been forced to be distributed to the eastern and western fronts. Bernhardt suddenly noticed that little Moltke next to him was watching him. This is old and confused, there are experts in the army, what are I doing here. Bernhardt smiled bitterly.

"Your Majesty, you should know what kind of enemy we are facing, France has the second largest colony in the world, and in Africa alone, France has more than 10 million square kilometers of land, and what about Russia? It is the largest country in the world, they have abundant material resources, France is a country that lends capital and has a lot of money, and Russia has the cheapest manpower, these two countries are too powerful together! And now Britain is becoming more and more estranged from our country. Moltke wiped the cold sweat from his head and continued: "No matter how powerful an empire is, it cannot challenge Britain, France, and Russia at the same time, and our ally Austria-Hungary can even take care of the internal affairs of Austria and Hungary. The combat effectiveness will not be very high. ”

"In addition to the countries that General Moltke Jr. just mentioned, Italy is also an object that can be fought over. Although Italy is not very strong, but its army only uses to defend the northern Alps, Italy can invest a lot of resources in naval construction, and from the current situation, the warships provided by Italian shipyards are quite good, Britain is a country based on sea power, if the German fleet, the Italian fleet and the Austro-Hungarian fleet can be united, it is also a strong pressure on Britain, if in a special period of time in the future, Britain and the countries established in the North Ocean conflict, Then the seemingly powerful British fleet will be broken up into several sub-fleets of limited strength, and then our high seas fleet will have a chance. Tirpitz also helped beat the side drums.

"So you mean that the Empire should strengthen its support for the Beiyang and establish a relationship of quasi-allies? And for Italy? Should we try to woo in? Wilhelm II said with some hesitation. For the former, Wilhelm II did not mind establishing friendly relations with a rising Far Eastern power, but for the latter, Wilhelm II still took into account the reaction of Austria-Hungary, after all, the relationship between Austria-Hungary and the Kingdom of Italy was very bad, and the dissolution of the Three Emperors Alliance was largely due to the conflict between Austria-Hungary and the Russian Empire in the Balkans, and Germany chose Austria-Hungary over Russia, and similarly, there is now considerable discord between Italy and Austria-Hungary. This made Wilhelm II hesitate.

"Without the help of the German Empire, the Habsburgs were simply not capable of fighting Russia, so in the face of the demands of the German Empire, Austria-Hungary could only accept, because only we could help them against the Russians, and the contradictions between Austria-Hungary and Russia were irreconcilable, but not with Italy. I think they'll make the right choice. Bernhardt said carefully.

"It's a big plan and we need to think about it. Although I did not really want to fight Uncle Edward, the interests of my country and my responsibilities forced me to prepare for the worst. William's words expressed his heart, he just wanted to make the British respect Germany's rights and demands through strong force, not really on a par with the British!

At the same time, France, as a hostile power adjacent to Germany, was not at all concerned about the defeat of the Russians: "Russia's expansion in the Far East has been blocked, so the next step should be to turn to the West, right?" "We need the Russians to create pressure on Germany's eastern borders, not to take the money provided by us French to expand their territory on the other side of the world." This is the voice of French politics.

"We cannot harm our national interests because of the selfish demands of the Russians. Our factories need a huge market in the Far East, and we need a lot of money in our hands and new projects to invest in. "This is the voice of a French businessman.

In the face of these voices, the French government also had to reconsider its relationship with Beiyang, after all, no one could get along with money, let alone with the winner, the winner is always worthy of respect and friendship, and for the loser, even as an ally, the French did not want to invest their precious funds in the bottomless pit of the Far Eastern battlefield.

Soon, the French ambassador to Russia euphemistically expressed France's hope that Russia would end the senseless war in the Far East as soon as possible and redeploy its forces in the Balkans, because taking advantage of the opportunity of Russia's use of troops in the Far East, Austria-Hungary was already a little ready to move against the Balkans!

"In the whole world, there is no great power that supports our plans in the Far East, and we are alone." The Russian ambassador to France said this, and, unfortunately, the ambassador was quite right!

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