Rise of the 1630s South America

Chapter 1478 The way to get out

"French King Louis has left the Southern Netherlands and returned to Saint-Germain. It is said that he is secretly planning with his close ministers how to better capture the entire Franche-Comté region." Amsterdam's East Bank Commercial House (also an embassy) Inside, Li Qing, the plenipotentiary diplomatic envoy, was talking about the situation here to Major Jiang Yaohui, the commander-in-chief of the Spanish Temporary Task Force who came over in the starry night: "Mons has already surrendered, and Brussels can't hold out for a few days, so Louis returned to Paris with peace of mind. Start to set your sights on the Franche-Comté region, which is very important to the Kingdom of France."

Speaking of this, perhaps because he was worried that Major Jiang Yaohui would not be able to understand, he explained the current situation in these areas in detail. Of course, many news were also relayed by "sources" from the United Provinces.

To put it simply, the military operation to attack Franche-Comté—although it has not yet officially started, but [-] French army soldiers have assembled at the border—was planned by the famous Prince of Condé.This nobleman who was "forgiven" by King Louis of France and returned from Spain seemed a little jealous of his old opponent Marshal Turenne (Condé was defeated in the Franco-Spanish War) for capturing the southern Netherlands, so he planned to use Fewer troops, less time, and less cost to occupy Franche-Comté in order to restore his impression in Louis' mind.

Moreover, as a nobleman who has been in and out of the court all year round, Prince Kong Dai is also very familiar with intrigues and tricks.This time, it is said that he sent people to contact many senior military and political officials, including the Governor of Franche-Comté, the Marquis Ienne (although it was the news of the Dutch, but it is not credible), Xu said that the senior official Houlu intends to pull them to the side of France.

Prince Condé is very confident, and feels that with such a combination of military and political means, it should be easy to occupy the Franche-Comté area, and only need to use a small number of troops, which is smaller than the large battle in the Southern Netherlands Many, even smaller than the army (which also had tens of thousands of people) that attacked the junction of West and France in the south.

However, King Louis of France seems not very satisfied with Prince Condé's plan. He plans to mobilize troops from the south and the southern Netherlands, and then recruit some troops in the country, gather 20 people, and sweep the entire Franchecon with the momentum of Mount Tai. Thailand, the Principality of Lorraine, Strasbourg, Luxembourg and other places, not the Franche-Comté originally planned by Prince Condé—what he wanted was a major advance of the entire eastern border, and he did not hesitate to spend 20 yuan for this army.

After talking about this, Li Qing took a few sips of tea, then sighed and said: "Now you also know that it is impossible for the French to stop. They have paid so much and mobilized so many troops , if you are frightened by a fleet of yours and withdraw your troops, it will be the biggest joke in history. Louis's self-esteem does not allow him to do so. Moreover, the French do not accept any coercion. I passed the words through my Dutch friends and were accepted by them He refused mercilessly. I heard that Louis even laughed at a "small country" in the New World like our east coast for daring to stop his hegemony, and he will definitely repay him severely in the future. Although these Dutch people hesitated and didn't speak very well It’s clear, but I can still guess the general meaning. This time the troops were dispatched, which basically offended the French…”

In fact, to a certain extent, the people on the east coast are indeed playing "a bit big", that is, the expected purpose of using naval guns to break into France in exchange for commercial benefits seems to be impossible to achieve in the short term, because the French king A man with too much self-esteem.He was extremely ashamed of the pagan fleet on the east coast ravaging his coastline, so he refused to make any peace talks with them, and he only wanted to expand the war to achieve his own goals. This made the people on the east coast feel a little embarrassed, because they are now Everything seems to be an act of harming others and not benefiting oneself.

Even the Spaniards who begged them to send troops didn't benefit much!Because they wrongly underestimated the importance of overseas colonies to the Kingdom of France, they also underestimated Louis XIV’s determination to acquire the above-mentioned areas, and they even underestimated their own resistance—the war has only started for a few months , they lost the southern Netherlands and parts of the Pyrenees, and it looked like Franche-Comté and other places would also lose, which put them in an extremely difficult situation.

What's even more frightening is that the army of the Kingdom of Spain was defeated by Portugal just once, and more than 2 people were wiped out.Although Portugal was guided by thousands of British Republican soldiers and hundreds of French Huguenot non-commissioned officers, it is surprising that Spain lost so badly, because they had just flown to Madrid just before the defeat. Reported marching speed.Now it seems that the so-called rapid march is mostly just an old trick of luring the enemy deep and closing the door to beat the dog, but the low-quality Castilian Legion really can't do it, and it is also very speechless.

"The Kingdom of Spain is already so virtuous, do you expect the French to stop?" Li Qing put down her teacup, frowned and said, "Now Leopold of Austria has an ambiguous attitude, Portugal's confidence is soaring, and England and the United Provinces can't smoke." At the beginning, Sweden and France are separated by Germany, and almost no one can come out to stop France. Oh, yes, those Italian states are strongly opposed to France's annexation of the above-mentioned areas, because many of them are rotten in Spain They suck blood on their bodies, and they don’t want to see a vigorous and powerful France controlling them, so they all support Spain, but how many people listen to their words? Even now they seem to be recovering Even the republic of Genoa, which has lost its youth, cannot fall into the eyes of Louis XIV."

"So how do we get out of this war? Taking advantage of the French has proven to be a big miscalculation, so how do we decently end the state of war with the French and then go home and get what we deserve? You know, even if the French coastline is completely smashed, it will not do us any good. On the contrary, it will greatly offend the French, and our future trade with Europe will be worrying. You know, King Louis X Fourth, after having this unforgettable experience, how can he know whether he will increase his investment in the construction of the navy again, so as to seek revenge on us in the future, so as to avenge his shame? I think with this person's personality, there is still such a It's possible, so how to get out is the most important thing for us now, right? We really don't need to think too much about the situation of the Spaniards..." Major Jiang Yaohui lit a cigarette for himself, and said to Li Qing: " It is impossible for the fleet to stay around France for a long time, our weak homeland also needs the protection of the navy, and the trade line is even more precarious at the moment, it is time to withdraw, anyway, we cannot get more benefits."

Major Jiang Yaohui bluntly said that the previous plan to open up the French market was a "miscalculation", which made Li Qing a little embarrassed.However, as a diplomat, he is very thick-skinned. He cleared his throat and said, "It still depends on the Spanish side. As far as the war is going at this stage, it is actually not appropriate for our country to withdraw, because this Obviously it will damage our country's international reputation, so it is not advisable to make peace with France alone. However, it is possible to reach some tacit agreement with the French and maintain a state of low-intensity war, but I can't guarantee that this will work , France is much more unpredictable than England and the Netherlands, because Louis XIV can decide all affairs in this country with one word, unlike countries with the system of England and the Netherlands, there are traces to follow."

"If we want to get us out smoothly, now it seems that countries like England, the United Provinces, and Austria have to go ahead. At that time, it will be harmless for us to withdraw." Li Qing continued: "But the most The most important thing is to let Britain and the Netherlands stop the war quickly, anyway, they are a little bit unable to fight. Of course, the British don’t talk about it. There is no money to go to sea, and the fiasco on the Thames River and the London plague has accelerated this process; the United Provinces seem to be in good spirits now, but only they know the pain. Gein has almost hundreds of ships in the war so far It was captured by the British, and hundreds of ships were burned and sunk. This is a loss to the sea, not to mention the huge sums of money allocated to support the navy for many years, which has caused domestic businessmen to boil. They also urgently need to stabilize the domestic situation, so Both sides actually have a need for a truce. It just so happens that England and the United Provinces should be extremely vigilant now that something like this happened in France. Therefore, this war should not last long, and the envoy of King Charles of England should be killed soon. Received by Speaker DeWitt."

"Then please worry about this matter. Our country may also be able to contribute to the negotiation between Britain and the Netherlands. This is good for everyone. In addition, regarding the matter between Spain and Portugal, our department will stop at the port of Bilbao During the supply, an envoy from the Queen Mother of Spain came to ask if they could help mediate a truce, and it seems that the Spaniards are going to accept the reality and assume the Kingdom of Portugal as an independent country.” Major Jiang Yaohui also laughed in a low voice. Laughing, he said, "This is also forced by the situation. Louis XIV's stick has affected how much the European situation has been affected."

"I can save this matter. I will leave for Madrid in a while. You will send one or two warships to escort me. The outside is not peaceful now. A merchant ship has already missed the schedule and failed to reach Amsterdam. I guess they got caught by them off the coast of France. Oh, what a trouble!" Li Qing waved her hand and said, "I will go to Madrid to mediate."

Major Jiang Yaohui returned to the port of Dover by boat after receiving a letter of approval from Li Qing that was not a letter of approval.At this time, the fleet commanded by Major Ston had just returned triumphantly from the coast of France. In addition to capturing seven or eight merchant ships and fishing boats, this time they successfully went ashore to plunder and robbed a lot of property.

In the past, he, Jiang, is still very concerned about these things, but now his mind is basically how to get the East Bank out of this war quickly, so he talks about it to the people below I don't have much interest in bullying the French who "have no defense at sea".Therefore, after spending several days processing the loot, the people on the east coast purchased a large amount of supplies at the port of Dover, and then left the pier in a hurry, heading for the port of Bilbao in Spain.

On August 8, the entire fleet arrived at the port of Bilbao without incident—and shelled the mouth of the Gironde River once in the middle to vent their anger at the disappearance of a merchant ship on the east coast—after a discussion between Jiang and Si , decided to load the army troops (more than 11 people, led by Lieutenant Minamijiro) who had been waiting in Bilbao for a long time, and send them to the French North American colonies.After all, they have been in Europe with the ship for so long, and it is shameful to go back without firing a single shot. It is better to send them to attack the colony of the French. Anyway, they are all from the army if they die, and the navy will not shed a tear!

And after the army left—Major Ston took away four warships and three auxiliary ships—Major Jiang Yaohui continued to wander around the coast of France with the large fleet, seemingly extremely bored.At the same time, a series of diplomatic actions are also being carried out with the active efforts of Special Envoy Li Qing. Businessmen from Genoa, Tuscany, Milan, Parma, Lucca and other places jointly formed a consortium. Under the recommendation of the Spanish government, they met with the Spaniards and said that they could consider sending a sum of money to the Kingdom of Spain to improve their poor financial situation.The premise is that the Kingdom of Spain conducts peace talks with Portugal as soon as possible, and at the same time promises never to cede its territory in Italy, that is, the vast territory including Milan, Naples, and Sicily, lest the French justifiably extend their tentacles into the wealthy Italian regions.These Italians have had enough of the suffering of the arrogant French. They still remember the tens of thousands of French troops pouring into northern Italy.

In addition, the results of Gao Wengang, the ambassador to the Ottomans on the east coast who had been active in Istanbul for a long time, also began to appear. The Ottoman Empire seized a lot of people in Smyrna and Thessaloniki on the grounds that the French army was helping the Venetians against the Ottomans in Crete. Some French merchant ships loaded with Levantine goods were also detained in French merchant houses in Athens, Athens and other places, and the French suffered heavy losses for a while.Their representatives in Ottoman moved around after hearing the bad news, but what they got in return was cold rejection and ridicule. This made Gao Wengang a little amused to himself: just because of your French king who likes to mess around for fame, this time in Ottoman is very popular. It's not easy to go, not to mention the confiscated goods of your shops or ships have already entered the pockets of many big men. Do you still expect them to spit out the fat they ate?Hehe, don't be so naive, Frenchman, who told you to make enemies everywhere, now you can take care of everything yourself.

The days passed like this day by day, the French were preparing for a bigger offensive, the British and the Dutch speeded up the peace talks, the Spaniards were ready to recognize the independence of the Portuguese as soon as possible under Li Qing's persuasion, and the people on the east bank The fleet continued to play soy sauce off the coast of France-the situation in Europe is almost the same...

(End of this chapter)