Chapter 561： Navy arrives

Chapter 561 The Navy Arrives

The press conference was very unpleasant. Of course, this unpleasantness was only for Japan. The reporters were very excited about digging up a lot of news materials, especially since this diplomatic incident was an international event.

The Japanese originally wanted to play a role in East Africa and gain international sympathy, but they suddenly got themselves involved. Tsarist Russia is naturally at odds with Japan, especially when there are still disputes between the two countries in Northeast Asia.

This made one of Japan's two strategies against East Africa fail. It could only rely on its own strength to confront East Africa and force East Africa out of the Southern Ryukyu Islands. Now the Japanese even regret the dispute with the Far Eastern Empire on the Ryukyu Islands. This South The Ryukyu Islands might as well be in the hands of the Far Eastern Empire to reassure Japan!

Zhuhai Commercial District.

“There will be warships docking here in the past few days. Our port must serve as a pre-war command post to fully cooperate with the country in attacking the Japanese aggressors in the eastern seas and safeguard the interests of East African countries.”

Because the Southern Ryukyu Islands are underdeveloped, sparsely populated, and have backward infrastructure, they do not have the ability to support large-scale wars.

Therefore, the Zhuhai Trade Zone, backed by the Far East Empire, became the temporary command base of the East African Navy. Here the East African Navy can fully mobilize the resources that can be utilized in the Far East. Compared with the Huaihai Economic Zone, the strength of the Zhuhai Trade Zone is much inferior, but this location It is the closest to the Southern Ryukyu Islands and can support the frontline battlefield at any time.

Moreover, the areas surrounding the Zhuhai Commercial District are areas with developed commerce, where most material problems can be solved as long as you have money.

Of course, another reason is that local telegraphs can contact the East African mainland at any time, which plays a significant role in East Africa's ability to grasp the war situation.

Three o'clock in the afternoon.

The small East African fleet officially arrived in Zhuhai, with a total of three ironclads, two wooden sailing steamships, five armored gunboats, and other ships carrying supplies, a total of twelve.

The gunboat is called a mosquito ship in the current Beiyang Navy. It is the main combat ship of the Beiyang Navy. In the East African Navy, it can only serve as an auxiliary combat ship. Although it is said to be a mosquito ship, its actual displacement can reach about a thousand tons, which is larger than an ironclad ship. It is much smaller and is called a small ironclad.

So this kind of small ironclad ship is definitely not as powerful as a real ironclad ship, but it is still a level stronger than a traditional wooden sail warship.

The strength of such a fleet in the Far East cannot be underestimated. Except for the Far East and Japan, other countries are not even qualified to compare, and this fleet is about a quarter of the strength of the East African Navy. This is the top ten navies in the world. strength.

“General Glaish! Welcome to the Zhuhai Trade Zone. In accordance with local requirements, we will fully cooperate with the navy in the next period of time.”

"How is the waters of the Southern Ryukyu Islands now? Is the construction going smoothly?" Glaish asked directly.

“General, the current construction progress of the Southern Ryukyu Islands is still relatively slow. It can even be said that it is just about to start, and the situation is not very good!”

Glaish asked: "Why? What difficulties did you encounter?"

"General, it's like this. The area of ​​the Southern Ryukyu Islands is not small, and the distance between the main islands in the archipelago is still very large, so it is difficult to communicate with each other. It also means that the construction project will be twice as difficult. If It’s just one island, and we can use a combination of equipment and fortifications, but the dispersed nature of the Southern Ryukyu Islands means that we must set up the same configuration on each island.”

Glaish is right if he thinks about it carefully. East Africa's demand for the Southern Ryukyu Islands is to occupy all of them. No island is left to other forces. Each of these isolated islands requires a set of facilities. The person in charge of Zhuhai Commercial Zone continued: "The shortage of labor is also a big factor, and it can even be said to be the main factor. Although the Southern Ryukyu Islands are also lacking in other things, we can ship there from the mainland and the Far East, but the population is No, we have counted more than 17,300 people in the entire Southern Ryukyu Islands. These people are not even comparable to the number of black people working on any project in Africa. This does not include the elderly, weak, women, children and those with malnutrition. people."

Although the black people in East Africa are backward, they are much richer than the islanders in the Pacific. Firstly, they have a small population, and secondly, they are rich in products. They live by hunting and have plenty of meat.

Like Japan, even having enough rice is a luxury. Many people have no choice but to join the army in order to eat polished rice. The people in the Southern Ryukyu Islands are poorer than Japan. In this way, they have to pay heavy taxes to the Ryukyu Kingdom every year, a large part of which Part of it was handed over to Japan, so the islanders of the Southern Ryukyu Islands hate Japan very much. This is also an important reason why Japan annexed the Ryukyu Kingdom but did not take over the Southern Ryukyu Islands.

In comparison, the Far Eastern Empire seems amiable. After all, as the nominal suzerainty, the Far Eastern Empire is more respectable than Japan. Japan even exploits extremely poor places like the Southern Ryukyu Islands, so it is naturally unpopular.

East Africa naturally has other plans to rule Ryukyu, which is to immigrate all the local people to East Africa and completely turn the Southern Ryukyu Islands into a solid military fortress in the Pacific.

As for farming in the Southern Ryukyu Islands, if it is to provide convenience for the troops such as vegetables and fruits, it is okay to say that food crops are not going to be planted anyway, and they will all be turned into vegetable fields, orchards and small pastures to meet the diversified needs of the local garrison. The food can be brought directly from the mainland.

East Africa needs immigrants, and every one of the island countries in the Pacific is not the poorest, only poorer. Keeping them there will take up resources, and it will be difficult to create value. Of course, the island of Nauru is a place where God will provide food for you. The islands are an exception.

Islands generally have little economic value, which is why colonial countries avoid many islands in the Pacific. In the previous life, Germany occupied a bunch of islands in the Pacific as colonies, which was basically no different from "poverty alleviation."

For example, the German colony on the island of Papua New Guinea is still using the airports, farms, roads and other infrastructure left by Germany in the last century into the 21st century.

The mineral resources of Nauru Island itself are also the result of hundreds of millions of years of accumulation by those birds. In the industrial era, they could not withstand more than ten years of development, and the resources were increasingly depleted.

“General Glaish, in addition to these objective reasons, the factor that hinders us from developing the Southern Ryukyu Islands is the destruction of the Japanese.”

“Hmm! The Japanese navy is dispatched?”

"That's not true, but Japan dispatched many fishing boats to harass our transport ships in the waters of the Southern Ryukyu Islands. For more than ten days before you came, they had been preventing our ships from landing in the relevant waters. Fortunately, we were on the islands before. We have enough materials and supplies. If you arrive a month later, the garrison on the island will have no choice but to compromise and withdraw."

“Approximately how many ships do they have? What is their strength?”

"About a hundred ships pass through the Miyako Strait from the Northern Ryukyu Islands every day, and then compete with our ships in the name of fishing. Although we have more big ships, if there are too many ants, they can kill an elephant. They can't afford to lose those It’s a small sampan, but our fleet cannot stay adrift on the sea.”

“Well, don’t worry. When my troops get familiar with the environment, we will cut off the Miyako Strait. If the Japanese persist in their evil intentions, then we will counterattack the Japanese merchant ships in the Far East waters. Let’s see who can’t hold on first!”

(End of this chapter)