The news of George V's critical illness soon spread to the rest of Europe.

While the British tried to block the news, George V had not been seen in public for a long time, and it was difficult not to arouse suspicion in other countries.

After all, George V is 70 years old, and in the final analysis, such an age has indeed reached the point of running out of oil lamps.

Unlike the British government, which is more concerned about the succession to the throne, the rest of Europe at this time is thinking about whether the change of the British throne will have a significant impact on the next European situation.

Among them, the more concerned about this issue are naturally the ambitious German Empire and the Kingdom of Italy.

These two ultra-nationalist states, dressed in monarchical vests, have no longer resisted the urge to expand.

After careful consideration by Germany and Italy, they believed that during the period between George V's critical illness and Crown Prince Edward's accession to the throne, the British would not be too involved in the situation and affairs in Europe.

Even, if Germany and Italy were to do something about the succession to the throne of the British, the British would be too busy with the crisis of the throne to have time for anything else.

However, Germany and Italy decided to leave other countries, including Britain and Australasia, with little energy to deal with Europe, just in case.

The best way to contain Australasia is naturally to let the island countries create some friction with Australasia at the border to attract Australasia's attention.

The islanders weren't going to do that. After being promised a large amount of material aid by Germany and Italy, especially in the field of industrial equipment, the island nation changed its mind very consciously.

As a result, the three great powers of the Triple Alliance began to act at the same time, and their ambitions for expansion and their desire for more land area could no longer be suppressed.

For Germany, the best target for expansion was the Austrian Empire. Within the Austrian Empire there was a large number of South Germans, a population of the same roots as Germany.

Moreover, the Austrian region of the Austrian Empire and the Czechoslovakia region were both quite good in terms of industrial scale.

If the Austrian Empire were annexed, the German Empire would have reached a level of industrial scale comparable to that of the British Empire, and its population would be completely separated from that of Britain and France, making it a more powerful country than Germany before World War I.

Unfortunately, if the Austrian Empire had to be annexed, Germany and Italy might face more than just France and Austria, and the British would never have allowed the Germans to do so.

There was no choice but to settle for the next best thing, and the target was Poland, which was strategically important.

Originally, the German government wanted to divide Poland together with Russia to the east.

However, after several unsuccessful contacts with the Russian government, and after the signing of anti-Russian agreements with the island states and Italy, Germany abandoned its plan to win over Russia and annex Poland.

For Germany, Poland is just a medium-sized country in Central Europe.

The German ruler once proudly declared in the Reichstag that it would take only a month for the German army to crush Poland.

As a result of the widespread exclusion of dissidents, the current rulers of Germany have achieved complete control over Germany.

In the current Germany, Italy and island countries, we can see the more extreme blind cult of personality.

This allowed the armies of the three countries to achieve a high degree of loyalty to their rulers, not only strengthening the combat effectiveness of the armies, but also consolidating the respective power and status of the rulers of the three countries.

Why not choose the Low Countries as the target of aggression, but Poland, which has a larger population and a stronger army?

Most importantly, Poland is located between Germany and Russia, and to the south is Austria's Czechoslovakia.

To the north of Poland is the Baltic Sea, which is extremely rich in mineral resources. Metallurgical, chemical, machine-building and shipbuilding processes are quite well developed, which is a huge complement to Germany, which has not yet thoroughly perfected its industry.

Secondly, in the event of the occupation of all of Poland, Germany would have a huge logistics base. The entire Polish plain could be used as a grain growing area and pasture for Germany, providing Germany with a large amount of grain and meat every year, as well as fresh dairy products.

After the settlement of Poland, Germany had no rivals in the whole of Eastern Europe, except for Russia, which was low-key and had no statement.

This was extremely advantageous to Germany's plans to attack Western Europe. With the food and mineral resources that Poland provides every year, even if it is consumed in a competition, it will not be afraid of France in a short time.

For the occupation of Poland, Germany and Italy planned in great detail.

Although Italy could not annex Polish territory, Germany made concessions to Austria and was willing to allow Italy to annex more Austrian territory and control the Kingdom of Yugoslavia in the Balkans after the occupation of the Austrian Empire.

At a meeting between Germany and Italy, the parties made detailed plans for an attack on Poland. The German and Italian governments agreed that they would have three months to be ready for an attack on Poland and to prepare for possible action by the French and Austrian empires.

There are still many differences between this world and history. So far, Germany has not made any territorial expansion, other than recovering the Rhineland Demilitarized Zone.

Because no military action was launched against the Austrian Empire, the attitude of Britain and France towards Germany at this time was mainly appeasement.

This also made it easier for Germany to plan for the territory of Poland. The true ambitions of Germany had not yet been exposed, and the people of England and France had not yet seen the true purpose of the Germans.

According to the agreement reached between the German and Italian governments, after three months of preparation, the two sides would launch an attack on Poland on October 15, 1935.

If, before that, the Poles were willing to back down, preparations for war could be canceled. But if either side of Britain and France decided to maintain Poland's independence, Germany and Italy would prepare a super-war to force Britain and France to back down.

On July 21, 1935, at the regular session of the German Reichstag, the German ruler gave a splendid speech for two hours.

The German ruler recalls the once vast territory of the German Empire and argues that Danzig was at all times a legitimate German territory and that Danzig's sovereignty could not be violated by any country.

Seeing that the response to the speech was good, the German rulers took the opportunity to reiterate the fact that Poland had occupied German territory after World War I.

The transfer of national hatred to Poland greatly increased the Germans' desire for war against Poland.

The speech was not public, but in the form of breaking news, which quickly spread throughout Europe.

Before Poland could make a statement, in a media interview the next day, the German government openly stated that Germany would take back Danzig's sovereignty by force at all costs and would defend all of Germany's legitimate territories to the death.

The German government's statement quickly caused tensions across Europe. Poland, in particular, is very jealous of its neighbors.

The Polish government was quick to respond. The Poles said that both the Polish-controlled Free City of Danzig and the annexed German territories had been ceded to Poland by Germany in atonement for the guilt of the previous European war.

The Germans' vain attempt to recover Danzig and the territory was not only a provocation to the majesty of the Polish government, but also a provocation to the Allies' trial of Germany's crimes.

The Polish government rightly stated that the Poles would never forget Germany's sins in the last European war, and would never accept Germany's demand for the return of territory.

At this time, Poland was still imagining the Great Polonism that it had put forward more than a decade earlier. After taking control of the Kingdom of Lithuania from Russia, the self-confidence of the Poles had increased indefinitely.

Although facing the world's largest army power before World War I, Germany was not as strong as the Poles imagined.

What's more, as early as after Poland's independence, it reached cooperation with many European powers, including Britain and France.

Treaties between Poland and the European powers, including the Franco-Polish Mutual Assistance Treaty, the Anglo-Polish Mutual Assistance Agreement, the Polish-Russian Treaty, etc.

Sitting on the backing of Britain and France, the Poles had no idea of retreating from Germany. After the Germans frequently moved troops to the German-Polish border, the Poles announced an expansion and mobilized most of their troops to the border with Germany.

Well, Europe is no longer covered with the fog of war, but the flames of war have been ignited.

Seeing that a war was very likely to break out between the two sides, France, which had nothing to do with this conflict, panicked.

For France, a possible war between Germany and Poland would actually push France into the abyss.

If France does not help Poland, Germany after the annexation of Poland will completely surpass France in terms of comprehensive strength, and match or even surpass the former German Empire.

But if France had helped Poland, a large-scale war with the Germans at this time was not what the French wanted.

What's worse is that Germany was not just an ally of Italy at this time. The Nationalist Army, which had already gained the upper hand in the Spanish Civil War, and the island nations in the Far East, were also allies of the Germans.

At this time, only the Austrian Empire was the only country that explicitly supported France, and the two countries of France and Austria together were only a slight balance of power with Germany and Italy.

Even if they were able to defeat the Germans in the end, the French would definitely have to face no less than the casualties of the last world war.

In just over 20 years, it has experienced two huge casualties, which is a heavy loss that the French government simply cannot afford, and it is also a terrible experience that the French people simply do not want to repeat.

For the sake of its own security, the French government decided to make certain concessions to the resolutely uncompromising Poland.

In the eyes of the French Nationalists, Germany's territorial claims to Poland were justified. Just as France was desperate for the cession of Alsace and Lorraine after the Franco-Prussian War, the powerful Germans were not so over-the-top in their desire to regain Danzig and other territories that had been ceded out.

The French decided to transfer sovereignty over the republic to Germany, even if the Germans had not yet made territorial claims to the French-controlled republic, which had once been part of Germany.

If a small amount of territory can be exchanged for a long period of peace, it is a good thing for the current French government to solve its own big troubles.

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(End of chapter)