Rise of Australia

Chapter 411 Landing in the Persian Gulf

Arthur's action was very fast. On July 1915, 7, the Aviation Research Office split the aircraft and aviation businesses, and all industries related to aircraft research and development and manufacturing were transferred to the new factory, the Royal Aircraft Manufacturing Factory.

Konstantin Tsiolkovsky also successfully became an astronaut and rocket expert at the Institute of Aeronautics, responsible for theoretical research on aerospace and rockets.

Even Arthur encouraged Tsiolkovsky to recruit well-known aviation experts from Russia and other places to work in Australasia, and Arthur would give more lucrative positions and rewards.

Spaceflight and rocket development in Australasia will also take the lead from the aeronautical laboratory.

However, whether it is space travel or rockets, it will not be a scientific research project that will produce results in a short period of time.

Including the nuclear weapons that Arthur had thought about for a long time, the research time of these things is calculated in decades, and it is enough for Arthur to have a clue before World War II.

The most important task for Australasia at present is to win this war and earn more benefits in this war. It is best to establish Australasia's status as the fourth power behind Britain, France, and the United States after World War I.

As for surpassing Britain, France and the United States, before Britain and France lose most of their colonies, and before the United States officially enters the war and is defeated by the coalition forces, it is not very likely to achieve it.

Leaving Britain and France aside, they are old colonial powers after all.The United States also has extensive land and a larger population. Its industry and economy far surpass that of Australasia, which is not yet something that Australasia can easily surpass.

The only way to quickly surpass the United States during World War I was for the Americans to go crazy and directly support Germany and join the Allies.

With the joint efforts of the five major powers of Britain, France, Russia, Australia and Italy, even if the United States joins the Allies in the future, it will definitely not be the opponent of the Allies.

This is for sure, and to blame can only be blamed on the fact that the military strength of the Americans is not too strong, and more of its role in Germany is to transport resources.

However, Germany's geographical location was severely restricted. The North Sea and the Mediterranean Sea leading to the Allied Powers had already been jointly blocked by the fleets of the Allied Powers.

Turning our attention back to the war in Europe, on the Balkan front, after the fall of Constantinople, the defeat of the Ottoman Empire has become inevitable.

It is worth noting that the large area of ​​hills and plains west of Constantinople was an important grain-producing area of ​​the Ottoman Empire.

However, this area was the fastest to fall in the war, which also led to the insufficient food production of the Ottoman Empire, especially when the war accelerated consumption.

Coupled with the fact that the troops of the Allied Powers landed on the border of the Ottoman Empire, the Ottoman Empire faced a very serious crisis.

The army lacks weapons and ammunition, the people lack food and clothing, and everyone lacks medical supplies. This has caused the Ottoman Empire to collapse internally. It depends on when the heavy blows of the Allied Powers made its appearance collapse.

Commander Martin has an advance order from Arthur, and he is not very interested in attacking the Asia Minor peninsula.

After leaving a part of the Balkan army to fight in Asia Minor, Commander Martin led an Australasian expeditionary force of less than [-] to go south along the Suez Canal, intending to land near the Persian Gulf and open up a new battlefield.

In later generations, it is well known that the Middle East is the place with the largest oil reserves in the world, and the place with the largest oil reserves in the Middle East is the coast of the Persian Gulf.

It is no exaggeration to say that Iran, Iraq, Kuwait, Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates, Bahrain, Qatar and other Persian Gulf countries along the coast of the Persian Gulf account for more than half of the world's oil reserves, and their annual output value is as high as one-third of the world's total oil production.

In this area, the United Kingdom only occupied the truce states (UAE) and the protectorate of Bahrain, Kuwait, and Qatar.Saudi Arabia, Iraq and other regions are still under the rule of local indigenous people or Ottomans.

More importantly, the number of British troops in this area is not large, and the British offensive is mainly concentrated in Egypt.

This also means that Australasia can completely select suitable land from this area to occupy, as long as Britain, France and Russia agree, they can also obtain the sovereignty of this land after the war.

In fact, the only difficulty was to obtain the consent of the British.It is too far away from the Russians, and with the good relations between Russia and Australasia, it is unlikely that the Russians will interfere.

As for the French, what they thought about during the war was how to defeat the Germans, and what they thought about after the war was how to weaken the Germans, and they were not very interested in a certain colony in the inconspicuous Middle East.

As for Italy, the last great power of the Allied Powers, his opinion is not important, and I believe Britain, France and Russia will feel the same way.

It is no wonder that the four major powers of the Allied Powers underestimated Italy. The Austro-Hungarian Empire only deployed 50 troops on the border with Italy, and [-] Italian troops have not yet crossed the border. This is enough to prove the incompetence of the Italian army.

For the structure of the entire Allied Powers, the current number of navies is sufficient, what is lacking is countries that can fight against Germany and the Austro-Hungarian Empire on land.

Obviously, Italy is not.Even Britain and France originally had the idea of ​​letting Italy send troops to support the German-French border, but after frequent reports of Italy's defeat, they immediately dispelled this idea.

The Italian army is tantamount to adding chaos. This is the consensus reached by the British and French commanders after looking at each other.

Although this does not represent the combat effectiveness of some elite Italian troops, the overall combat effectiveness of the Italian army is indeed very poor, and it should be regarded as the worst among all European powers.

Although it is possible for Britain to prevent Australasia from obtaining new colonies in the Middle East, it should not be too strong.

Oil has indeed been discovered in the Middle East, and it was the Iranian region that discovered oil fields in the Suleiman area of ​​Muscat, while no valuable large oil fields were found in the lands controlled by the Ottoman Empire and Britain.

The discovery of large oil fields will have to wait until the 30s, nearly 20 years at the earliest.

In addition, this land is relatively far away from the Suez Canal, and also has a certain distance from India, so it will not endanger Britain's vital Mediterranean routes, the Suez Canal, the Indian Ocean, and India.

For the British, India and the Suez Canal are the most important, and the importance of other areas is not so high.

It only needs to make certain concessions in terms of other interests, such as the distribution of German warships after the war, and the British will not prevent Australasia from expanding in the Middle East if they want to.

The direction of the expansion along the Persian Gulf coast planned by Arthur is initially set as the line along the Persian Gulf coast of Iraq and Saudi Arabia, and at the same time try his best to win over Qatar.

This area has a large amount of oil reserves, and is close to the Persian Gulf, so it is better to transport oil by sea.

Both the coast of Iraq and the coast of the Persian Gulf in Saudi Arabia have large oil reserves, and they are currently under the control of the local indigenous people or the Ottoman Empire, which is completely soft.

Qatar, the only special point, was claimed by the United Kingdom, but it really fell into the hands of the British after the defeat of the Ottoman Empire in World War I in history.

The area of ​​Qatar is not large, and if part of the benefits are transferred, it should be exchanged from the British.

As for Kuwait and the United Arab Emirates, which the British Empire has already controlled, Arthur has no intention of breaking relations with the United Kingdom for the time being. The British Empire is not yet something that Australasia can afford to offend.

It was also under Arthur's order that Commander Martin led the Australasian Expeditionary Force to land from the coast of the Persian Gulf with a clear goal, all the way north, intending to break through from the Saudi region to the Iraq region.

At present, there are wars all over the Ottoman Empire. The Iraqi region is considered one of the few grain-producing areas of the Ottoman Empire, which is very important to the Ottoman Empire.

Once the Mesopotamian Plains in Iraq fall, the Ottoman Empire will face a more serious food crisis. If it does not surrender, the famine will be enough to cause civil strife in the Ottoman Empire.

Although launching a battle will cause the indigenous people in this region of the Middle East to suffer from the harm of the war, and even be affected by the war, resulting in a large number of deaths.

But for Mr. Martin, the interests of the country are above all else.Not to mention sacrificing some natives in the Middle East, Mr. Martin is even willing to sacrifice himself when necessary.

On July 1915, 7, the Australasian Expeditionary Force officially landed near Qatar.

It is worth mentioning that at this time, Qatar and the Saudi region are still connected, and the Qatar region is a peninsula, not an island.

As for why there is a river between Qatar and Saudi Arabia in later generations, you have to ask the Saudi government at that time.

At this time, the Rashid Emir State controlled Qatar and part of the Saudi region. This area was the Emir State established by the Rashid family on the Arabian Peninsula under the rule of the Ottoman Empire.

Simply put, the Rashid Emir State is the running dog of the Ottoman Empire.

The combat effectiveness of the Ottoman army was in a mess, let alone an indigenous country like Rashid Emir.

When tens of thousands of indigenous soldiers encountered the Australasian Expeditionary Force, they would be defeated at the first touch, and they were defeated as soon as they came into contact.

Where have they seen the Australasian army fighting in such a tyrannical way? The bullets and shells seemed to be free of money, which not only brought huge physical casualties to the Rashid indigenous soldiers, but also brought them a major blow to their souls.

Their army was made of paper, unable to withstand the charge of the Australasian army.

On July 7, the Australasian army entered Saudi Arabia from the Qatar region and marched along the coast of the Persian Gulf to the Mesopotamian plains.

There is good news for the Rashid Emir country. Most of the Persian Gulf coast is under the rule of the Ottoman Empire, and their army finally does not have to face enemies like the Australasian Expeditionary Force.

But it was not so good for the Ottoman Empire. The Australasian army was like a death-defying god, rushing towards itself in mighty strength.

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(End of this chapter)