"Shell reloaded!"

"Aim at the target point, prepare, release!"

Rumble...... With a loud bang, billowing black smoke erupted from the barrel, and the huge recoil caused the cannon to shake directly from the ground and detach from the ground, stirring up a puff of dust, and the target set up on the bank of the Farr River that had been temporarily built out of earth was instantly blown apart.

But this is not the end of it, the third brigade is equipped with a total of eleven artillery pieces, which is all the belongings of the entire 511 division, as the first artillery fires, the other artillery also fire at the destroyed target in turn, and begins to knead on its corpse, and when the sand and dust passes, the original pile of earth and rocks more than one meter high completely becomes a deep pit.

"The 3rd Cavalry Company is attacking!"

More than two hundred war horses galloped on the open field, and as the speed gradually increased, the cavalry took out the Dreiser carbine, quickly completed the ammunition filling on horseback, and then drove the war horse to stop sharply, aim, and shoot in the direction of the Far, the action was done in one go, without a pause.

Subsequently, the various units of the 3rd Brigade carried out a series of tactical demonstrations, advanced, retreated, and counterattacked in accordance with the reverie deployed by the pre-war headquarters, and the various units cooperated with each other, showing the coordination ability between the various units of the 3rd Brigade.

The British, Boers and natives on the other side of the river have been watching the show that the Kingdom of East Africa has prepared for them.

British mine owners stood from a distance with binoculars and watched and discussed the significance of the exercise in the Kingdom of East Africa.

“Oh， my God！ The Germans are demonstrating against us! ”

"But you have to admit that they did appear to be a well-trained army on the surface, and it is no wonder that the Germans were able to quickly complete their attacks on many parts of South Africa and eventually emerge victorious."

"If it weren't for the yellow men in the German army, I would have suspected that these Germans were the Prussian Army disguised as the army of the Kingdom of East Africa and fought against the Boers and the Zulu Kingdom."

"Gentlemen, what should we do now? Does the Kingdom of East Africa really have the intention to attack the Kimberley? ”

"We must not allow the Germans to cross the river, but who can stop the Germans? Their military strength is not trivial, even if they really let the Royal Navy of Cape Town go inland, I am afraid that the Germans will not have the slightest way. ”

"In this case, we can only force Cape Town to negotiate with the Germans, not to mention that if a war breaks out, my mine cannot be stopped for a day, which means that it will make a lot less money, and if the result is very bad, maybe we will lose all our money, and once the war starts, it is not certain who will end up with the ownership of the Kimberley."

"If this is India, then I believe that the empire will not be afraid of any challenge, but the Cape Town colony is not comparable to India, even Canada, Australia, our population is too small."

"And the terrain of Cape Town is not conducive to the defense of our army, if it is the east, it is better to say, where can the army be landed with the help of the port, but Kimberley is in the hinterland of the South African highlands, even if the army comes from the east, everything is late."

The terrain of the Cape Colony was indeed unfriendly, especially to the British, because the edge of the South African plateau was a large cliff two thousand kilometers long.

(Picture)

This special geographical structure is similar to the Brazilian shield, and the situation is a little better than Brazil, because the South African highlands have a longer history, after hundreds of millions of years of historical development, some areas along the coast have been eroded by seawater, rivers, rain, and wind for a long time, and some narrow plains have slowly formed, and Cape Town (city) is built on such plains.

The Drakensian Mountains to the east are part of this great cliff, but the Drakensnes Mountains have many gaps and a number of excellent ports, so the traffic is still in the past.

Cape Town (city) to the inland situation is indescribable, not only the topographical limitations, its north and the South African plateau junction part is still very arid large Karoo Basin, belongs to the semi-desert arid climate region, precipitation between 100 mm and 400 mm, extremely unstable, rain lack years even more arid than the Kalahari Desert, almost no population, can only graze some goats and sheep, but because of the existence of the South African cliff, so that the rivers here can accept the replenishment of mountain water, Limited irrigated agricultural land can be developed along the river.

(Picture)

All in all, it is extremely difficult for the Cape Town colony to develop inland, while East Africa is the opposite, East Africa is expanding from the interior to the coast, and the East African Plateau and the South African Plateau are almost connected, without much terrain obstruction, so Cape Town can only watch East Africa expand inland, there is no way, but the fundamental reason is that Cape Town is too small to support more troops and explore the inland areas.

"The worst thing right now is that the Germans and we are just across the river, and the Kimberley mine is the most valuable piece of the cake in all of South Africa, and we can't afford to lose the Kimberley."

"We have to unite and make an agreement between Cape Town and East Africa, the loss of some worthless land is not a big deal, although the area of Grigualand is large, it is invalid land, there is no population, the climatic conditions are not good, it doesn't matter if it is ceded to the Kingdom of East Africa, as long as the Kingdom of East Africa promises never to have thoughts about the Kimberley, I think for the sake of our common interests, this is understandable."

His words struck the approval of the Kimberley mine owners, who so far had more than 30 companies developing diamonds worth about £350,000 and were the largest source of tax revenue in the Cape Town colony.

But this is only the limit of the mine owners, far from the limit of the Kimberley mining area, with the increase in investment, the production of kimberlite diamonds is increased exponentially, buried in the ground are all spent in vain, the mine owners and enterprises relying on diamonds, the most lacking is manpower, the current Kimberley mining area has less than 10,000 people, seriously limiting the development of the Kimberley.

As long as the population increases, how much diamond can be developed in the Kimberley mining area? Millions of pounds, even tens of millions of pounds.

In contrast, at the beginning of the 19th century, the total annual income of Britain was 230 million pounds, and the income of the nobility was 3.1 million pounds, and the value of the kimberley was self-evident, so the kimberley could not afford to lose, and the business owners and mine owners in the Kimberley region would not choose to go to war with the East African kingdom for their own interests.

Soon, Henry Buckley, the governor of Cape Town, received a letter from the British nobles and big capitalists behind the Kimberley mines, which roughly meant: "Ensure the safety of the diamond mining area, as for the Republic of Grigualand, throw it away, otherwise you, the governor, will do it, and hurry up to negotiate peace with the East African kingdom to avoid expanding the conflict." ”

This made Henry Barkley very depressed, and he wrote in his diary: "For the sake of immediate interests, the politicians and capitalists of London do not realize in the slightest what it means for Britain to give up on the kingdom of East Africa!" If the kingdom of East Africa is allowed to gain a foothold in South Africa, Cape Town will become a vassal of Cape Town in the future, if not annexed, and it seems to me only a matter of time, and within fifty years the seeds they have planted will bear fruit......"

Subsequently, the colony of Cape Town signed a non-aggression pact with East Africa, which stated that the Kingdom of East Africa must cease all military operations in South Africa and pledged never to invade the territory of the colony of Cape Town, which was bounded by the Orange River.

After the agreement was signed, the East African Army on the border had to be withdrawn, and only a small number of border troops were allowed to exist, as was the case in the Cape Town colony.

Finally, in the case of the Republic of Grigualand, it was purchased at the expense of the Kingdom of East Africa as compensation for the colony of Cape Town. Financing the purchase of the Republic of Grigualand was a matter of face, and East Africa paid a symbolic £3,000.

The inhabitants of the Republic of Grigualand were sent to the Cape Town colony by East Africa to provide labor for the Kimberley mining area.

(End of chapter)