Rise of Australia

Chapter 981 The Well-fed and the Starving

Regarding the part about Germany ceding territory, we have to mention the remaining territory of Germany after World War I.

As a country that had already been ceded after World War I, the land that Germany could continue to cede was very limited.

And when it comes down to it, among the three countries of Britain, France and Australia, there is only one country that can effectively annex German land, and that is France, which is eager to try.

Britain and Australasia do not directly border Germany, so even if they took over German land, they would be destined to not be able to turn it into their own territory.

In order to prevent the French from gaining too much advantage, Britain and Australasia reached an agreement that the total land area ceded by Germany should not exceed 15% of Germany's existing homeland. At the same time, garrisons should be the main force to effectively deal with the possibility of revenge after Germany recovers.

The first thing Germany needed to do was to cede land.

The Free City of Danzig and the East Prussia region will be directly incorporated into Poland. Poland will establish a royal government and become the most powerful country in Central Europe.

All land north of the Kiel Canal was ceded to Denmark, and the Kiel Canal was jointly managed by Britain, France and Australia.

Saarbrücken, north of Alsace and Lorraine, was ceded to France, the only land France was able to obtain after the war.

Silesia between Bohemia and Poland was under the trusteeship of the Polish government for 20 years. After 20 years, a referendum was held to decide whether the entire Silesia region should stay or go.

In addition to the ceded lands, the whole of Germany will be divided into three parts and garrisons will be stationed by Britain, France and Australia.

There is considerable controversy regarding the regions and specific distribution of garrisons of various countries.

The remaining German territory is still vast. Whoever can control the larger and more economically developed areas will be able to gain more benefits in this war.

When it comes to this struggle for interests, Britain, France and Australia are not giving in at all.

At this time, no one cared about the tacit understanding of fighting side by side in the war. The diplomatic representatives of the three parties had only one idea, which was to try their best to gain more benefits for their countries.

The first is the proposal put forward by Australasia, which is roughly based on several rivers within Germany.

The land west of the Elbe River and north of Nuremberg was the Australian occupied zone, all German territory east of the Elbe River was the British occupied zone, and the land south of Frankfurt and east of the Rhine River was the French occupied zone.

Such a distribution would assign the three important areas of the Ruhr, Berlin and Munich to the three countries respectively, and would also enable Australasia to occupy the Ruhr area.

But Britain and France clearly do not agree with such a proposal.

The French, in particular, were also eyeing the Ruhr area and did not accept occupying only Munich and southern Germany.

Although the British accepted the division of Western Australia and Eastern England, they would have preferred that the boundary between the two countries' occupation zones be the Weser River rather than the Elbe River which was further east.

The Weser River and the Elbe River are both rivers that flow from south to north in Germany, but the Elbe River is located on the line from Hamburg to Magdeburg, which is quite close to Berlin.

The Weser River is located in the central and western part of Germany. The coastal cities are Bremen and Erfurt, which are obviously closer to the Ruhr area in the west.

The dispute between Britain and Australasia over the demarcation line between the two countries' occupation zones is actually a struggle over the Central German region, that is, the area from Hanover to Magdeburg.

This part of the region includes Hanover, Thuringia, most of Saxony and Magdeburg, with a total population of more than 1000 million. This is also the reason why Britain and Australasia are competing for it. Whoever can control this region with a population of tens of millions can naturally squeeze out more benefits.

The French also have big appetites.

The French wanted to occupy the Moselland region south of the Rhineland, which was north of the Alsace-Lorraine region, as well as all of southern Germany and the Frankfurt region.

The only response from Australasia was to laugh at the French for their naivety.

The real reason why the British allowed Australasia to occupy a large amount of German land, including the Ruhr area, was that they could not prevent Australasia from occupying these areas, and secondly, they understood that even if Australasia occupied these areas, it would be destined to be unable to annex them.

Moreover, Australasia cannot have too profound an impact on Europe, as Britain remains the hegemon of Europe.

But France is different. If France occupied such a vast territory, would it resist the temptation to become the hegemon of Europe?

The German lands that the French wanted to occupy had a German population of over 2000 million, and the Moselland and Fuerteventura regions bordered directly on Alsace.

Given the British character, there was no way the British government would agree to let France occupy so many areas.

In addition, France's strength has long been weakened. Although France can be regarded as a great power at present, there is already a huge gap between it and Britain and Australia.

Whether it was Britain or Australasia that opposed it, or both countries opposed it, France would not be able to obtain such a vast area.

This also means that when it comes to the division of occupation zones among countries, it is only necessary to resolve the dispute between Britain and Australasia.

In the end, Australasia chose to back down.

In fact, it is not a concession. After all, Australasia has already taken great advantage in Northern Europe and the Baltic Sea, and concessions in the small-populated Hanover and Thuringia regions will not affect Australasia's strategic deployment in Europe.

After several days of discussion, the situation of the three countries occupying Germany was officially formed.

France occupied the German region east of the Rhine and south of Frankfurt, of which Saarbrücken was ceded directly to France, and other areas were occupied militarily in the form of garrisons until it was ensured that Germany would not launch another war.

The land on both sides of the Rhine and west of the Weser River was occupied by the Australasian military. However, the Australasian diplomatic representatives also gained military control of Bremen through their efforts, so it can't be said that they lost out.

A large area of ​​German territory east of the Weser River was occupied by the British, including the German capital Berlin.

However, the military occupation of Britain, France and Australia will not interfere in the internal affairs of Germany, but will supervise Germany's military power.

Moreover, the three powers had the priority to dispose of German property in their respective occupied areas. The specific amount of reparations paid by the German government and the property to be transferred would be determined according to the specific scale of reparations agreed upon by the subsequent conference.

In general, Britain, France and Australia all benefited from this conference, and Germany also avoided the possibility of its own country falling apart.

There is only one country that suffered the most losses, and that is Russia. Britain, France, and Australia have clearly become another interest group, which has completely excluded Russia from the pie-sharing group. Russia will not be able to obtain any other results of the war except for the compensation.

(End of this chapter)