"It's only more than 80 million kilometers, which is really a bit unexpected, and it seems that the visual error is indeed a bit big." Ernst muttered to himself as he looked at the remarked East African coastline.

Ernst had not noticed it before, but now he thoroughly understood the geographical gap between East Africa and those maritime powers.

Comparing the coastline of the Far Eastern Empire in the future, we can clearly see the disadvantages of East Africa, but before that, because the coastline of East Africa was not complete, Ernst did not notice this problem.

There is no doubt that East Africa should have a longer coastline than most countries in the world if it is only a two-ocean country, but this is not the case.

For example, the Far Eastern Empire is a typical Pacific country, and the straight-line span between the northern and southern seaports (only the mainland part, and excluding the outer northeast), that is, the straight-line distance from Jinzhou to Xuwengang is about 2,600 kilometers.

In East Africa, there are more than 3,700 kilometers from the northernmost port city of Mogadishu to the southernmost port of New Hamburg (Port Richard).

However, the coastline of the Far Eastern Empire directly exceeded 18,000 kilometers, while the coastline of the Indian Ocean coast in East Africa was only about 5,000 kilometers, and the coastline of East Africa was only more than 8,000 kilometers long.

In other words, East Africa, which has two oceanic coasts, has less than half the coastline of the Far Eastern Empire, which has only the Pacific coast.

This also shows that East Africa's coastline is too straight and lacks the characteristics of good ports, similar to India, which faces the sea on two sides (or three), but has a coastline of just over 5,000 kilometers.

The problem, however, is that India has less than 3 million square kilometres of land and more than four times the size of East Africa.

As a result, East Africa is quite asymmetrical in size and coastline, with many small countries having longer coastlines than East Africa, including Norway and the Netherlands (including the East Indies colonies).

In fact, we can also refer to the country of Canada, which has the longest coastline in the world, more than 200,000 kilometers, which is much more exaggerated than the world's largest country, Tsarist Russia.

However, Canada's coastline is too low in gold, mostly located in the middle and high latitudes, and there are many bays and islands, the most typical of which is Hudson Bay in the northeast.

On the other hand, East Africa has less coastline but a slightly higher gold content, but the scarcity of natural harbors is a hard flaw, and there are currently only four ports on the west coast that can be used for economic development.

They are Cabinda, Luanda, Benguela and the port of Walvis Bay in South West Africa.

The situation on the east coast is slightly better, but not much stronger, for example, the Somali region of East Africa has 1,600 kilometers of coastline, but the only available ports are Mogadishu and Kismayo.

Among the world's continents, there is no shortage of good ports in Europe, although Asia is the most numerous, but the territory is huge, there are also large landlocked countries, the distribution of ports is not uniform, the Far Eastern Empire is one of the leaders.

"Now it seems that although we have seized the high-quality coastline of the Atlantic coast, the length of our coastline is not the highest in the world, especially among large countries of the same level." Ernst said, looking at the map.

The areas that can be compared with East Africa are Tsarist Russia, the Far Eastern Empire, Canada, the United States, Australia, and Brazil.

However, their coastline is only Brazil, which does not exceed 10,000, but Brazil only has a coastline along the Atlantic Ocean, which is only about 1,000 kilometers less than that of East Africa.

In previous lives, East Africa had the fifteenth longest coastline (mainland only) in the world, behind Mexico (9,330 km) and Italy (7,600 km).

Of course, there is no need for East Africa to be presumptuous, and the sea conditions in East Africa cannot be judged only by the length of the coastline, but also by the best in the world.

The mere fact that the two oceans are facing is enough to make people envious, jealous and hateful, for example, the coastline of Germany is actually not short, about 3,000 kilometers.

Today's Germany is not the castrated version of the previous life after World War II, East Prussia is still in hand, so the coastline is longer than in the previous life, about a third of East Africa.

However, the German navy was trapped in the Baltic Sea, very aggrieved, and so was Austria-Hungary, with more than 1,800 kilometers of coastline in Croatia alone, and about 3,000 kilometers in Slovenia including Venice, but also in the Adriatic Sea.

Therefore, the coastline advantage of East Africa is also very obvious, which was reflected in the naval battle of East Britain, in addition to the fact that the Somali region is not easy to defend, with the help of maritime talent, East Africa can maneuver with the British Navy.

At present, the shortcoming of East Africa is the lack of islands in the Indian Ocean region as a strategic fulcrum, so that East Africa's national security can be further improved.

However, at present, the main islands in the Indian Ocean have been controlled by Britain and France, and in East Africa, in addition to the offshore islands, there is only one Comoros archipelago barely enough to see.

Witt analyzed on the side: "His Royal Highness, the length of the coastline is too affected by the coastal terrain, which cannot be changed for us, but after our country seized Angola, it has basically made up for the disadvantages in the ocean, and in the future, the port infrastructure on the west coast will be replenished, and our merchant ships and navy can basically sail in the Indian Ocean and the Atlantic Ocean unimpeded." ”

"Well, that's right, but we should act now, not wait until the future, now the ports of Luanda, Benguela and other ports can be expanded and developed, and the two places will be back in operation first." Pointing to the map of Angola, Ernst said: "Although we have seized the land of Angola, our rule is not stable, so we should give priority to these key coastal towns on the west coast, and then slowly digest the inland areas." ”

"In the future, Cabinda, Luanda should be comparable to Dar es Salaam and Mombasa, so the development of these two places will take precedence over the rest of Angola."

"As for the interior of Angola, let's get the railway authorities moving and build two railways first, one from the city of Mangu (a city in western Zambia) to the Luanda region and one from Lubumbashi to the Cabinda region."

These are actually the two options for the western part of the Central Railway, and there is actually a third option, which is the Benguela Railway Project, but the most important priority in East Africa now is to consolidate East African domination in Angola, especially Cabinda, the starting point of the west coast.

After the occupation of Mozambique, East Africa was not worried about the security of Mozambique, which was surrounded by East Africa on three sides, and after falling into the hands of East Africa, it could not run away if it wanted to.

Of course, in Ernst's plan, Cabinda's status was elevated indefinitely, and in fact Cabinda was only a small town on the border of Angola that the Portuguese did not pay much attention to.

But Ernst is well aware of the potential of Cabinda, the most oil-rich region in East Africa, and a single place that can solve the energy security problems of East Africa for nearly a hundred years.

This is not an exaggeration, as in the next 20 century, East Africa will be able to meet most of its needs as long as it can make effective use of Cabinda's oil resources.

However, it is impossible for East Africa to rely only on the oil resources of Cabinda, and there will be no shortage of exploration in other areas within the territory.

East Africa has a natural advantage in this regard, the world's oil is mainly distributed in the Middle East, and there is no such blocked passage between East Africa and the Middle East as Malacca or the Suez Canal.

Moreover, aside from the Middle East, the oil resources of North Africa and West Africa are not bad, and these two places, in the future, the East African Navy will start from the west coast and can go directly to the Gulf of Guinea in West Africa, and North Africa is directly connected to the East African land.

(End of chapter)