African Entrepreneurship Records 2

Chapter 378 Have your own way

According to the plan he designed, Samuel calmly performed surgery on the Abyssinian Empire, trying to take advantage of the split situation of the Abyssinian Empire to transfer about [-] to [-] square kilometers of land in the southeastern region from Abyssinian Empire. Pry away from the territory of the Nian Empire.

This area contains about a quarter of the high-quality arable land in Ethiopia in the past, but now it is completely undeveloped.

"General! This is a telegram from China."

The signal corps sent telegrams from the mainland by boat from Egypt to Desaix and then handed them over to Samuel.

Samuel read the telegram with a frown all the way through.

Sarpeto, the boss of Rubatino Company, noticed Samuel's expression and asked: "Your Excellency General! What order did the government give?"

Samuel shook his head and said: "That's not true, but some people in the country think that my current actions are too timid and not active enough in dealing with indigenous countries like the Abyssinian Empire."

Sarpeto was a little embarrassed. He said: "Don't they know how much military expenditure they have deducted? We spent two or three months just to ensure the food supply of the troops with limited funds, but now we are timid. !”

Samuel: "This is not a big deal. I had expected that some people in the country would be restless, especially after we won Desai City."

Although Samuel established a firm foothold in the Abyssinian Empire after occupying Desse, the large area of ​​land from the port of Assab to Desse, including the land north of the East African Rift Valley (south of which belongs to East Africa) Redava Military Town) have been included in the territory of the Kingdom of Italy. These lands are mainly deserts and a small amount of grassland, but their area has reached more than 5 square kilometers.

The current area of ​​the Kingdom of Italy is only over 20 square kilometers. The number of areas occupied by Samuel alone is enough to inspire most people, although many of them are barren land unsuitable for human habitation.

Sapeto: "It seems that they have forgotten the lessons of the Italian-Austrian War, and went to war rashly without knowing the trend of the Austro-Hungarian Empire. In the end, they encountered the elite troops of the Austro-Hungarian Empire. The Abyssinian Empire is terrible. It is not an existence that can be crushed with one blow in their eyes."

In the past few months, Sarpeto has been following Samuel, and he has gained a lot of experience. He knows how difficult it is to deal with the fighters armed with Arab doctrine, and the more backward the Arabs in the area, the more difficult it is to deal with them.Fortunately, General Samuel planned the strategy and handled it properly. He could predict the movements of the indigenous people in every decision-making step, smash the indigenous plots one by one, carry out sneak attacks, and guerrilla warfare. Samuel was unable to do anything. Instead, he lost his troops. When daylight came, Samuel The army was dispatched to encircle and suppress the villages, and even carried out extermination activities. Samuel did not care whether the resistance army was a good citizen. He only knew that the soil on which the guerrillas relied for survival was these villages rooted in the desert.

Although the Abyssinian Empire is dominated by the Orthodox Church, it must not be weak if it has been able to fight the Arabs for so many years. Even the Ottoman Empire at its peak had no way to deal with the divided Abyssinian Empire.

Samuel: "There is no other way. The news I got is that the future kingdom may send troops to attack the Abyssinian Empire from the north. They have already negotiated with Egypt, and with the guarantee of the British, they will send troops from Eritrea (Latin) , the Red Sea, as the Italians called this area, meaning the land along the Red Sea), attacked the Abyssinian Empire through the north."

Sarpeto laughed directly: "They want to attack the Tigray region directly!"

Samuel was also infected and laughed, jokingly said, "Maybe they don't even know where Tigray is."

As the core of Abyssinia, the Tigray region has always been the most economically developed and armed region of the Abyssinian Empire. The capital Axum is also located here. Johannes IV was in charge when he was the commander-in-chief of the northern fortress. Northern defense, dealing with the Egyptian army all the year round.

Therefore, Tigray concentrated a large number of the population and troops of the Abyssinian Empire. This is why Samuel avoided the richer north and placed his bets in the south.

The biggest threat to Samuel is the Kingdom of Shaoa on the south bank of Lake Tana (the largest lake in the Ethiopian plateau) in the Western Abyssinian Empire. So choose passive defense.In history, the Kingdom of Saua was originally an ally of the Kingdom of Italy. Menelik II was able to unify the country smoothly, and Italy made great efforts. In the end, Menelik II gave Italy a disastrous defeat, which made Italy lose face in Europe.

But in this plane, the Kingdom of Shaoa has no such opportunity. Italy has come to grab the land. With a clear goal, it is impossible to support its enemies.

Now the attitude of the Shoa Kingdom or Menelik II towards the Italian invaders is that I will not attack others unless they attack me.Of course, it would be even better if Italy could fight Johannes IV's northern army, and he could reap the benefits of a fisherman, and finally unify the entire Abyssinian Empire, drive the Italians out by the way, and restore the glory of the empire.

However, when Menelik II met Samuel, his plan was doomed to fail. Samuel would not fight Johannes IV foolishly. Looking at any opponent, even if you want to solve the opponent, you should adopt the method of first easy and then difficult, so his victories can find one thing in common, that is, every defeat of the Austro-Hungarian army started with the Hungarian army.

The most accessible part of the entire Abyssinian Empire is the southeast region, where the forces are mixed and there is no strong warlord, which means that there is no faction that can knead the local Abyssinians into a ball, and then cut off the local and The connection in the north was completely leaderless.

Samuel said to Sarpeto: "No matter who the kingdom wants to send to the Abyssinian Empire to get a share of the pie, we don't need to care. Since the kingdom chooses to open a new battlefield in the north, it has nothing to do with us. Contact us, we can ignore any non-local orders."

Samuel was also angry. He was very aware of the nature of those aristocratic bureaucrats, and now he felt that he was doing well after seeing some achievements.

Samuel then speculated: "The commander of the kingdom's new army must be a guy with a background. This kind of person is most likely to use chicken feathers as arrows. We'd better ignore them and find various excuses to get rid of them. Anyway, with our military strength The Abyssinian Empire, which is heavily defended in the north of Desai, is normal for not being able to get through, and the kingdom can't find any reason why we don't try our best."

Sarpeto agreed with his face. Now he agrees with Samuel 1 times because Samuel is always "right".

It can’t be said that Samuel was doing everything in his favor. He also suffered a lot during the Italian-Austrian War. He was often deceived by his immediate superiors and colleagues. The leader of the team has long since run away, and his colleagues often refuse to save him and remain motionless.

After several experiences, Samuel understood a truth, that is, you cannot believe a word of what your superiors and colleagues say. No matter how good the pie painting is, you have to find reasons to shirk it.

The consequence of this was that Samuel was very unsociable with his colleagues during the war and was not well-liked by his immediate superiors, but he also avoided being led into the pit by his pig teammates.

The strength of the troops led by Samuel was also preserved, and he could occasionally fight back against the Austro-Hungarian Empire. When the war was over, Italy searched the entire army and could only find Samuel, the only undefeated general. The noble generals could only He pinched his nose and molded Samuel into a rising star in the army. Samuel can only say that he relied entirely on the support of his peers.

So this time the kingdom opened up a new battlefield, Samuel did not intend to participate, and even Samuel was prepared to collect taxes in his own jurisdiction and recruit Italian immigrants to supplement his army.

According to his experience, if he doesn't cooperate with his colleagues, they will definitely wear small shoes for him. Although the colleagues are very good, but they have good fathers, and they are still in the same group.

In this case, I am afraid that I will never see a cent of the military expenses that have been withheld in the future. I have encountered this situation when I was in Italy. Fortunately, fighting in Italy, I can replenish troops on the spot, and I completely rely on food and grass. Donations from friendly forces in Hungary next door.

In the Abyssinian Empire, where he was unfamiliar, he still had to rely on himself. From the day Samuel rose up, he could say without any burden that his success was the result of his own hard work.

(End of this chapter)