By February 1904, the situation in the Far East had become even more confusing, and the entire Far East was enveloped in the crisis of war.

The protagonists of the crisis are, of course, the hegemon of the Far East, the Tsarist Empire and the emerging island states.

As a newly emerging nation, the island nation has gained considerable land in a series of wars and events, and has also greatly expanded its army.

However, the mineral resources of the island countries are very scarce, and the small Korean Peninsula cannot make up for the shortage of resources in the island countries.

Although the island nation and Australia have signed a treaty on the import of mineral resources, this comes at a cost of at least twice the market price in exchange for valuable mineral resources.

This is a big burden for the island countries, which are already not well funded, and in addition to the large amount of loans from the British Empire and the United States, the high interest rates and fiscal deficits have gradually made the islands' finances unsustainable.

They naturally set their sights on the northern part of the Korean Peninsula, the vast trade land with a large number of mineral resources, and the three eastern provinces.

The land has an abundant population, a large amount of cultivable land, and is rich in mineral resources.

More importantly, because of the connection to the Korean Peninsula, the mineral resources here can be quickly transported to the mainland of the island country through the ports of the Korean Peninsula, which is far more convenient and cheaper than importing mineral resources from Australia.

But there is a problem, this land valued by the island nation has been occupied by the Tsarist Empire several years ago.

As the overlord of the Far East, it is naturally impossible for the Tsarist Empire to give up this land, after all, the Yellow Russia plan of the Tsarist Empire is also well known.

Would a hunter who is dying of starvation, facing a prey-rich hunting area on his doorstep, give up hunting because he has strong guards?

Apparently not, because if he didn't do anything, he would starve to death, and even the most powerful enemy would have to fight hard in the face of the threat of death.

If nothing is done, the current finances will be enough to bring down the entire country, the dream of revival will be shattered, and the decades of efforts of the entire country, from the emperor to the common people, will be nullified.

Will the islanders accept such an ending? It is impossible to accept. What's more, before the Korean Peninsula was acquired, the island nation fought a war that gambled on its national fortunes.

It is precisely because of this war that the island country has obtained the Korean Peninsula, a land with good resources, and the rise of the island country has achieved the first step.

Since August of the previous year, the island countries have made formal representations to the Tsarist Empire in an attempt to divide their interests in the Far East.

What the island states put forward was to demand that the Russian Empire recognize that the island countries had superior interests in Korea, while the island countries only recognized that the Russian Empire had special interests in the Manchuria Railway.

This is equivalent to letting the Tsarist Empire cede Korea on the premise of not gaining anything, and the Tsarist Empire will naturally not agree.

The negotiations lasted for six months, and the islands tried to divide their interests in the Far East with the Russian Empire in a peaceful way, but finally found that this plan was not feasible, so they resolutely and decisively abandoned this plan.

On February 6, 1904, the island nation unilaterally sent a note to the Tsarist Empire, announcing the suspension of negotiations between the two countries and the severance of diplomatic relations with the Tsarist Empire.

At this point, war between the two countries is inevitable, and the termination of the negotiations actually means that the negotiations will be opened in a more arbitrary way.

Sure enough, two days later, the island's navy attacked the fleet of the Tsarist Empire stationed in the port of Arthur without declaring war, and the war that decided the hegemony of the Far East broke out.

At this time, the referendum in New Zealand was still going on, and Arthur naturally did not express any opinion on the situation in the Far East, but only asked both the Australian and New Zealand governments to issue a neutral statement, declaring that Australia and New Zealand were both neutral in this war.

However, Arthur still asked the military factory to contact the Russian Empire and the island countries as soon as possible, asking if they needed to buy more weapons and equipment, and Australia could work overtime to produce and deliver them to them as quickly as possible.

After all, the declaration of neutrality does not mean that the arms trade cannot be carried out, and the United States is not like this, in the early stage, it was neutral and sold arms to make a fortune, and in the later stage, when the situation was clear, it directly joined in, and obtained the high status of the victorious country at the minimum cost.

Compared to the very determined island nations, the Tsarist Russian Empire did not agree in this hegemonic crisis.

The attitude of the Tsarist Empire can be divided into two factions, one is the main faction of the Minister of Finance and the Minister of Foreign Affairs, who saw the crisis in the domestic and international situation of the Tsarist Empire and advised Tsar Nicholas II not to start a war lightly.

The suggestion of the Lords and Peacemakers was that some concessions should be made in exchange for peace for a short time. At the same time, it strengthened its economic plunder and war preparations for the Far East, and waited until the Trans-Siberian Railway was fully opened, on the premise of solving the transportation problems in the Far East, and after the completion of the outer fortress near the port of Arthur, and then waiting for the opportunity to fight a decisive battle with the island countries.

In fact, the Lords and Peacers are not simply Lords and Peacers, and their purpose in advocating a short-term peace is only for a better war, which is also the tradition of the Russians, and they are not afraid of war.

The other faction was the main battle faction represented by the Imperial Minister, the Minister of the Interior, and the Governor of the Far East.

This group of people are extremely fanatical chauvinists, imperialist adventurers. They were very confident in the military power of the Russian Empire, and at the same time looked down on the island nation, which was just rising.

They believed that the army of the Tsarist Empire could easily annihilate the enemy from the island nation with only a small mobilization.

And such a hearty victory can also allow the Tsarist Russian Empire to calm the revolutionary crisis at home, and on the basis of the outside of the soil, it can also be said to be able to kill two birds with one stone.

In fact, this idea is also due to the fact that the current wave of revolution in the Tsarist Empire is becoming more and more intense, and the top leaders of the Tsarist Empire are already trying to find ways to calm the crisis from other aspects.

But the Tsarist Empire was an autocratic state, and the tsar had full power. All decisions had to be made by Tsar Nicholas II.

It's just that when Tsar Nicholas II was still the crown prince, he was ordered by the then Tsar Alexander III to travel abroad and visit some countries by the way.

Nicholas II passed through Greece, Egypt, India, the island states and the Qing kingdom before returning from Far Eastern Siberia.

This made Nicholas II the first of all the emperors of the Russian Empire to visit Asia.

It's just that this trip to Asia is not very good, and it also makes Nicholas II very hateful and hostile to the island country.

In 1891, Crown Prince Nikolai of the Russian Empire arrived on the island with more than 30 people, including his friend Prince Georgi of Greece.

At that time, the island country was still a weak and small country, and the visit of Crown Prince Nicholas also made the island country government fully welcome.

In order to ensure the personal safety of Crown Prince Nikolai, the government of the island country has vowed to take care of everything, on the one hand, it has strengthened its police force, taken strict precautions, and strived to be foolproof.

On the other hand, the foreign minister of the island country at that time, Aoki Shuzo, also agreed with the ambassador of the Tsarist Russian Empire to the island country that in the event of an assassination, he would be sentenced to death in accordance with the crime of inflicting harm on the royal family in the criminal law, and there would be no condon.

But the unexpected came so suddenly. On May 11, 1891, Crown Prince Nicholas was assassinated by Tsuda Sanzo, a policeman in charge of guarding Crown Prince Nicholas's security, while visiting the capital of the city.

In the end, the assassination was unsuccessful, and although Crown Prince Nikolai was stabbed twice, his life was not in danger.

It's just that in this way, the relationship between the Tsarist Russian Empire and the island countries has dropped to a freezing point, and Nicholas II has no favorability towards the island countries because of this incident, and even has an extremely hateful and hateful attitude.

How should such a person who hates and hates the island nation react when he hears that the island nation is going to compete with the Tsarist Empire for hegemony in the Far East?

Is it angry and shouting that these yellow-skinned monkeys deserve to die, or calmly thinking about the opinions of the Lord and the faction?

In fact, Nicholas II both, he had two schools of thought, knowing that the current preparations of the Tsarist Empire were not sufficient, and he wanted to postpone the war.

But Nicholas II was also convinced that the best way to maintain hegemony was to maintain hegemony by forceful means, and he felt that the best way to postpone the war was to take strong measures, and that concessions would always lead to new concessions.

This may seem like a contradictory idea, but in fact, it supports the hardliners' claims.

It is true that the Tsarist Empire was not fully prepared, and the Tsarist army in the Far East was less than 100,000 men, and even fewer were equipped with new weapons.

Although a batch of weapons and equipment was purchased from Australia, more than half of this weapons and equipment were allocated to European armies, and only about a third of the garrisons in the Far East were able to be allocated.

The entire Far Eastern Army of the Tsarist Empire probably had less than two hundred artillery pieces, twenty heavy machine guns and a combat army of more than 90,000 men.

In terms of navy, although the navy of the Tsarist Empire had more than 200 warships, the Pacific Fleet, which could really be used for operations in the Far East, only had more than 60 warships.

On the island side, the navy already has more than 80 warships with a total tonnage of more than 270,000 tons.

Most of the main warships are new warships built in the United Kingdom, with uniform specifications and good performance.

One battleship ordered from Australia was not completed and therefore is not included in the statistics.

In terms of the army, the island nation has more than 210,000 soldiers, more than 1,000 artillery pieces, and more than 50 heavy machine guns that can be used to fight outside the mainland.

Judging from the pure data, only in the Far East, the Tsarist Russian Empire was already at a complete disadvantage, and the navy was barely balanced, and the number of troops and equipment was completely inferior to that of the island countries.

It's just that the arrogant government of the Tsarist Empire simply believes that the island countries dare not offend the powerful Tsarist Empire at all, and they think that as long as the Tsarist Empire shows its tough side, the people of the island country will obediently compromise.

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