As Governor Cohen feared, the identity of the Dutch often became an obstacle to obtaining intelligence information at such times, which had little to do with the efforts of the intelligence services led by Henk, and because of the differences in race and culture, it was impossible for the Chinese to give them complete trust, just as they could not fully trust the Chinese. ↖ ↖ The top ↖ is a small ↖ story, and these news that are spread by word of mouth in the Chinese circle are naturally difficult to flow into the ears of the Dutch high-level.

With the increase in the number of Daming maritime merchants who have been to Sanya year by year, the development of Haihan in the past two years is no secret, and it has also spread to Batavia through various channels. Su Keyi's job is to deal with Daming maritime merchants, and he naturally heard a lot of relevant information, intentionally or unintentionally. The Dutch, the high-level officials of the East India Company, who usually had direct contact with the Ming maritime merchants, even if they met, were only to discuss trade matters, and their friendship was far from the Cheng dù of talking about these anecdotes.

Su Keyi looked at the stunned appearance of the two, and didn't bother to explain the reason in detail, so he continued: "Legend has it that when the Haihan people arrived in Sanya at the beginning of the seventh year of the Apocalypse, there were only a few hundred, and they relied on constantly engulfing the local and foreign population of Qiongzhou to strengthen themselves. Within a 100-mile radius of Sanya alone, it is said that 60,000 or 70,000 people are working day and night. In Annam, Guangdong and other places, there are coastal areas controlled by the Haihan Dynasty, and the population under their jurisdiction is by no means a small number. The Haihan people's needs for population seemed to be endless, and it was difficult for the Ming and Annam alone to meet them, so the Portuguese were required to continuously traffic Kunlun slaves from Kunlun Prefecture. ”

"You also said before that there are at least 100,000 people under Haihan's rule, so how many people are there on this Qiongzhou Island?" Van Longen asked.

"There should be 200,000, but the exact number is not clear. Qiongzhou was originally the capital city and Danzhou in the north is the place where the population is concentrated, and the Haihan people settled in the south before they managed Sanya into the most prosperous area on the island. There are also tens of thousands of Li and Miao mountain people, who live in the mountains and forests in the center of the island all year round. Su Keyi explained.

"That's a lot!" Van Longen's heart became even heavier when he heard the answer. Although the East India Company claimed to have tens of thousands of employees, it was scattered throughout the colonies of the Far East, and did not have a relatively concentrated sphere of influence like Qiongzhou. The indigenous people in Southeast Asia are naturally lazy and not as hardworking as the Chinese, and production and construction projects that require a large number of laborers, such as agriculture and infrastructure, are often slow due to low labor efficiency. It is almost impossible to build a prosperous port city like Sanya in more than four years like the Haihan people in Southeast Asia. In Van Longen's view, Batavia has been a city for more than ten years, but the city and port may not be as decent as Sanya.

However, the city of Batavia is much larger than the Victory Fort at the foot of this mountain, of course, this is also understandable, the pure Haihan people who came across the sea are said to be only a few hundred, how can they have the ability to build a big city on their own in the early stage. Moreover, it is said that there are extremely powerful coastal fortifications built on the coast near this Shengli Port, and the Haihan people do not need to build a fortified city to ensure their safety. However, when it comes to maritime trade, Sanya has a geographical advantage that Batavia does not have, that is, it is very close to Annam and Daming, and naturally has two markets with huge potential, and the Haihan people are also of Chinese descent, so there is no obstacle to trade with Daming, and there is no need to entrust intermediaries to trade in the form of smuggling like the East India Company.

It is reasonable to say that it is not necessary to win the war by using force, and the trade sanctions are not what people want, and the development potential seems to be at a disadvantage. Only then did he realize that this errand was completely different from what he had planned before he set off, and before he set off, he only thought that this mission might be dangerous, but now it seemed that there would be no problem with his personal safety, and the content of the negotiations was completely deadlocked.

Cohen had set them a baseline that could not be changed before they set off, but he failed to give them any trump card that could really threaten Haihan, which created an extremely passive situation for their negotiation process. Obviously, the Haihan people will not take the initiative to give in in this situation, and although the negotiations have only been going on for half a day, the Dutch delegation seems to have reached the point where the skills of the donkey are exhausted.

"If we can't think of a quid pro quo that will make the Haihan people nervous, then we will probably have to return in vain. Van Longen scratched his head and thought for a long time, but in the end he could only come up with such a helpless answer.

At the same time, Schneider and Gu Kai were happily describing today's negotiation process to several other executive committee members. The fact that the Dutch sent an envoy to the door to seek negotiations was basically expected by the Executive Committee. At that time, the Executive Committee sent people south to submit diplomatic letters to the East India Company, and the Executive Committee did have the idea of provoking the other side, and if the Dutch were very uncalm and wanted to take military action against the Ambuna Islands and even Sanya, then Haihan could take advantage of this opportunity to teach the Dutch another lesson, and there would be more reasons to take further action in the future. However, the Dutch did not seem to have recovered from the successive defeats, and did not rush to send troops again, but chose to take the Wendou route and sent an embassy to negotiate with Haihan.

However, this method is nothing new in the eyes of the Executive Committee, which is nothing more than an attempt to delay time through negotiations, and the quid pro quo that they can propose in the course of negotiations is even weaker. Schneider and Gu Kai had almost not used their real skills, and they had already sprayed the Dutch envoy to the point that they couldn't distinguish between the southeast and the northwest.

"The two Dutchmen were clearly not professionals in the field of diplomacy, and they probably did not even have an outline for negotiations. Schneider commented unceremoniously: "It's not that I'm proud, let me talk to Gu Kai and them today, in fact, it's really a bit of a knife to kill chickens." ”

"It's okay for Xiaobao to come forward and talk to them. Gu Kai also made no secret of his attitude: "It is indeed a waste of our time to talk with this kind of layman. ”

"This is all based on the fact that we can win against them, if we lose in Fujian, guess what kind of face they will be?" Yan Chujie smiled: "So don't take all the credit from the two of you, our military also has a share!"

"Negotiating with the Dutch, you can really put it aside for a while. Tao Donglai, who had just entered the conference room, raised the text in his hand: "Qiao Zhiya sent a telegram back from Changhua, and the steel mill over there is about to be put into operation, and asked if we should go over to hold a ribbon-cutting ceremony." ”

Haihan started the construction project from Changhua to Shilu in June 1629, building a freight railway from Changhua Port to the inland Shilu mining area, and began to build a coal-iron composite industrial base in Changhua at the same time. During these two years, Haihan successively mobilized more than 6,000 immigrants to settle in the local area, and also changed the main place of service of prisoners of war to Shilu, and after nearly 10,000 people worked for more than 20 months, the freight track of Changhua - Shilu was opened to traffic, Shilu iron ore was put into mining, and the last link of the steel smelter was finally declared operational. The metal ore transported from the deep mountains of Shiroku will meet with the coal transported from the Black Earth Port of Annam in Changhua to produce a large amount of steel needed to build a modern industrial system.

Of course, in terms of the production conditions of this century, even if Changhua is named as a "coal-iron composite industrial base", the actual production capacity is far from being compared with the small iron and steel enterprises that were forcibly shut down and transferred before the crossing. However, in this era, it is relatively bright, and after the completion of several phases of the planned project in a few years, Changhua alone will produce more steel than all the countries in the Far East combined.

In addition to the big day of the anniversary, Qiao Zhiya has basically not returned to Sanya, at least two-thirds of the time in the year is spent on the field construction site, and he is really worthy of hard work. Of course, the treatment given to him by the executive committee has also improved a lot compared to before, Qiao Zhiya can be said to be a real emperor in the local area, and he can directly make decisions on big and small things, and his power is not as good as that of the chief political officials in Danzhou and Qiongzhou. Moreover, due to the special nature of the local industry, it is no longer administratively under the jurisdiction of any existing state capital, but is a real area directly under the jurisdiction of the Executive Committee.

"Such a big thing must go to someone. Gu Kai took the lead in expressing his opinion: "Qiao Zhiya has really worked hard outside in the past few years, and the executive committee sent representatives to attend the ribbon-cutting ceremony, which is also an affirmation of his work." ”

"Then you can go for it. Tao Donglai immediately ordered: "I just heard you say that the negotiation is not passionate, so put aside the matter at hand and go to Changhua." The ribbon will be cut next week, and you will leave tomorrow and the day after tomorrow, and the time is exactly the same. ”

"I ...... I have other things on hand!" Gu Kaike was reluctant to go on a business trip to Changhua, and there seemed to be no other characteristics in the local area except for the soot on his face.

"Don't push back the tasks assigned to you by the organization!" Tao Donglai put the telegram in front of him: "It's so decided, you go back and let the shipping department arrange the shipping schedule for you, don't miss the time." ”

"That'...... Well, I'm going to make it this hard. Gu Kai shook his head and reluctantly took the errand.

So when the Dutch continued to negotiate the next day, they found that the Haihan people present had changed the lineup, and Gu Kai, who came forward the day before, was gone, and was replaced by Yu Xiaobao, the young man who dealt with him a few days ago.

Schneider and Yu Xiaobao have known each other for a long time, and there is a friendship between the two of them. When the Guangzhou Office was established, Yu Xiaobao followed Schneider to Guangzhou and began his career. In the past two or three years, the small follower from the fishing village has been in charge all the way, and then transferred back to Shengli Port to join the Youth League as a backbone, and the future is bright. A few days ago, several members of the executive committee were already discussing letting him enter the foreign affairs department for exercise, and then the Dutch delegation came to the door, which happened to give Yu Xiaobao a chance.

In this negotiation with the Dutch mission, Haihan did not think about really negotiating a specific result, and like the other party, he also had the intention of delaying time, so he let Yu Xiaobao take Gu Kai's place, and almost no one objected - anyway, with Schneider watching, there would be no big incident. So Yu Xiaobao, who had just turned 20, became the youngest naturalized diplomat in the history of the Haihan Dynasty.

Yu Xiaobao had dealt with these people a few days ago, so he couldn't talk about any nervousness, but his English level still stopped nono, he nodded yes and shook his head, and at the level of go, he definitely couldn't communicate directly with the two Dutchmen, so he could only turn to the second best thing and talk to Su Keyi, who could speak Chinese. In this way, the negotiation method became a 180-degree turn from the first day, and Su Keyi replaced the two Dutch as negotiators.

"Brother Baishuo is polite!" Yu Xiaobao still relied on the traditional etiquette as soon as he came up, and greeted Su Keyi.

Su Keyi also watched the negotiation process between the two Dutchmen and the other party yesterday, and today he saw that the opposite side was changed, and he had already planned to change the way to win over the relationship, so as not to be too stiff to talk, so he smiled and responded: "Brother Yu doesn't need to see too much, you and I are both Chinese, and it is fate to be able to meet here in this way today, I am a few years older than you, if you don't dislike it, you can call me Brother Su." ”

Before Su Keyi's trick to pull the relationship was responded to by Yu Xiaobao, Schneider coughed dryly next to him and said: "Say strict, this is a negotiation between countries, what everyone wants to talk about is state affairs, and it is a very strict matter, so there is no need to win over personal relations like this, right?"

Su Keyi is usually a person who can speak well, how could he stop there, and when he heard the words, he continued: "Mr. Shi's words are wrong, I and Brother Yu hit it off at first sight, what's the harm in making friends? This is like a shopping mall, opponents on the field, friends off the field, each is the same thing." ”

Schneider said in his heart that you still want to talk about me, but it is too easy to think about it, and said with a smile at the moment: "The relationship is not clear, you want to make friends with Xiaobao, then okay, I will sort out the relationship first." Xiaobao, what is the relationship between you and me?"

Yu Xiaobao followed Schneider for a long time, so he naturally heard the song and knew what he meant, and hurriedly responded respectfully: "On official affairs, it should be the relationship between superiors and subordinates, and on private affairs, it should be the relationship between master and apprentice." ”

Schneider nodded, turned to Su Keyi and said: "If you want to make friends with Xiaobao, you can also make friends, then the relationship still has to be sorted out, I am his master, you have to call me Uncle in terms of seniority, what do you think?"