New Shun 1730

When a country is reduced to "fighting for the sake of fighting", it proves that there are huge problems with the decision-making institutions of this country.

Kang Budai actually agrees with Anthony's statement about the "buffer zone". In the case of the Netherlands, it is indeed difficult to deal with the huge cultural advantage of France.

If you oppose France, your country will be destroyed.

If you do not oppose France, the "world" will be destroyed.

During the years he was in the Netherlands, he often read the comments of the cultural elites of the Netherlands. In order to prevent the cultural invasion and erosion of France, the elites of the Netherlands have even gone crazy and come up with the rhetoric of "etiquette is most suitable for slavery".

However, the Netherlands did it by itself. It could have led the new cultural system of the industrial and commercial era with extremely developed handicrafts and extremely developed commerce, and become the leader of this new era of culture.

But the Netherlands' own commerce killed its own industry, so it can't blame the invasion of the classical aristocratic court culture of France.

Of course, in addition to culture, we must also consider France's controlled economy, trade policy, and France's own overseas trade issues. If France could take the Austrian Netherlands and directly threaten the Netherlands, the French would definitely side with France in trade. It is impossible for internationalism to stop developing trade and give it all to the Netherlands.

So although he satirized the Netherlands, he agreed with the strategy of the Netherlands to ensure a buffer zone in the early stage.

However, as the saying goes, the Dutch's previous inertia caused them to do something like trying to find a sword on a boat, which made the Netherlands gain nothing in this war except failure.

While the British were eating Canada and India, the Netherlands had to stare at the French invasion at their doorstep.

Anthony, who was standing by, sighed sincerely after being choked by Kang Budia and was silent for a while, "This is a different time. It's not just about strategy, it's also about justice."

"The Marquis you are loyal to, to some extent, should be the one who understands the Netherlands best. Because his approach is the same as ours."

"When the Spaniards and Portuguese monopolized the trade in Asia and America, what we Dutch liked to say most was free trade, freedom of navigation, natural law, and the ocean belongs to all mankind."

"But after we got the monopoly of Southeast Asia, what we opposed most was the school of maritime law derived from free trade, freedom of navigation and natural law."

"The Marquis you are loyal to has always advocated free trade and freedom of navigation. But when your country took over Southeast Asia, didn't you also start to oppose free trade and navigation? Is it free? "

"So, can you say that your country has now taken over Southeast Asia, so was it wrong for the Marquis to shout for free trade and freedom of navigation? Was it stupid? It can be said that shouting for free trade and freedom of navigation at the beginning created the basis for the smuggling of Southeast Asian countries in the future, so shouldn't he have come to Amsterdam to talk about free trade? "

"The flagship of the merchant ship of the trade company that your country cooperated with Sweden is called the Free Trade. When it is now cruising in Southeast Asia where your country strictly prohibits free trade, don't you think this is a great irony? "

"It's just a different time. You can't use the current situation to blame past decisions. "

If Liu Yu were here, he would shamelessly make a patch: the Nanyang countries pay tribute, vassalage is tribute, and tribute is a higher-level form of vassalage. In this way, Nanyang is territorial waters, not high seas, how can it be free to navigate and trade at will?

Kang Budai felt that he was in an unofficial capacity and did not need to use diplomatic language, so he smiled and said, "Your Excellency the Grand Speaker can think this way, and you are a person who can communicate. I just sighed that when the First Emperor expected eternal life, he certainly did not expect to die in the second generation. The empire is not eternal, and power is not eternal."

"Since Your Excellency the Grand Speaker knows that things are different now, some things are easier to say."

Hearing that Kang Budai was going to take the initiative to say something real, Anthony hurriedly asked, "What is your country's attitude towards the Netherlands and the war between France and the Netherlands?"

"For your country, you have already taken everything you can get. Whether you sign a treaty or not, we are powerless to take back India, Ceylon and Southeast Asia. And with your country's diplomatic attitude, even if the Netherlands does not recognize it, Russia, France, Prussia and other countries will recognize your occupation of those places."

"To For Europeans, the war is not over yet. "

"But for your country, the war is over."

"You have already driven away our merchants in Japan, just like the French treated us in Seville; now you are seizing our colonies, just like we treated the Portuguese."

"Neither you nor I have official status, so there is no need to talk too much diplomatic rhetoric, such as justice, legality, etc. Since we can treat the Portuguese in that way, you can certainly treat us in the same way. If we can't beat them, we admit defeat."

"I don't think it's worth it for you to continue fighting over Taiwan and Zhoushan during the Ming Dynasty. If your decision-makers are really fanatical, irrational, and true patriots who don't consider their interests, then the first place to start the war should not be Batavia, but the Philippines."

At this point, it is actually both an admission of defeat and a confession of weakness.

The Netherlands is now completely unable to retake Southeast Asia. Even if some Dutch people may have such delusions, Anthony, who has really been to Dashun, will never think so.

For an expedition across continents, with the current level of technology, 2,000 people would be the limit, and sending more than 2,000 people at one time would be a disaster. Britain's failure in America this time well confirmed this point.

Including the Philippines, where the British seemed to have won, if Dashun had not opened up the port to supply supplies and provide sailors, it would have been a disaster. The development of Dashun's navy in recent years allowed the British to obtain cables and canvas in Lingdingyang. , ship repairmen, sailing wine, gunpowder, voyage sailors and other urgently needed supplies are quickly replenished, plus the sky-defying black technology H2 navigation clock on the Centurion.

Looking at East and Southeast Asia, Dashun is the only country with such supplementary capabilities. Going to war with it means that there will be no supply opportunities. Not just any port can collect all the supplies needed by the navy.

The Dutch's 2000 maximum delivery capacity can be used to deliver food to Dashun.

What he means is: you have got everything you can get, and you can't get anything you can't get. In this case, why do you refuse peace talks with the Netherlands? What do you want? You don’t really want to fully support French hegemony, do you?

But the key point is to fully support France's hegemony. At this time, it seems that apart from "retaliation for Taiwan and Zhoushan", there is really no other benefit to Dashun.

And this reason, in Anthony's opinion, is too nonsense.

In his opinion, Liu Yu engaged in the Ceylon Trojan Horse Scheme, and at least 30,000 to 50,000 Nanyang Chinese died during the migration. He didn't care about the deaths of these 30,000 to 50,000 people. How could he care about something that happened more than a hundred years ago?

Kang Buyao naturally heard the implication of his words and thought, no, it is not the case. There is one more thing we want, but you haven't given it yet.

"Your Excellency, the Great Speaker, the Chinese court has its own reasons for considering this. Indeed, it is not any of the reasons you mentioned."

"However, we do not consider the purpose of the Celestial Empire now. As the former Grand Speaker, as the helmsman of the Dutch ship and the driver of this sea carriage, I would like to ask you, if the crisis in the Netherlands is resolved this time, what will you do? What does the future hold for the Netherlands?”

"Just like during the War of the Spanish Succession, based on the national strength at that time, there were prospects for the lowlands and Spanish colonial trade. Although it failed, as you said, these prospects did match the national strength at that time. ”

"And now? As it stands now, if the Netherlands escapes this crisis, with its current national strength and situation, what is your outlook for the future of the Netherlands?"

He asked this question because he wanted to lead the question to the issue of "the future of the Netherlands lies in the Fourth Anglo-Dutch War".

However, this question made Anthony smile bitterly.

After a long time, he squeezed out a sentence from his obscure and stiff smile.

"The Netherlands...has no future."

"Regents, parliamentarians, Orangemen, all factions have the most basic consensus: the future of the Netherlands lies in first solving the problem of centralization and truly integrating the seven provinces into one."

"But the issue of proportional taxation in each province has been held for two years, and nothing has been resolved; before the East India Company went bankrupt, the two provinces of Zeeland and Amsterdam were fighting internally to compete for shares..."

"The Netherlands has a small population, a small land area, and financial returns are higher than factory investment. We are aware of all these problems."

Having said this, he raised his eyes and looked at Kang Busao, and said with a wry smile: "We are not fools. There are no fools who can climb to the position of the Great Speaker."

“However, between seeing problems and achieving the future, there is the most important ‘problem solving’.”

"The path of the Netherlands is, firstly, centralization, and secondly, commerce."

"Without centralization, we will not be able to gain trade rights. We will be unable to compete with Britain and France. We will be suppressed by the Navigation Regulations and France's high tariffs. But the reality that we do not centralize power makes it impossible for us to assemble a navy to protect our trade. ”

"Without commerce, the Netherlands has no other way out. The handicraft industry is limited by population and resources. It cannot compete with Britain and France. Even Prussia and Russia will surpass us. They can only rely on commerce and trade."

"Centralization of power is what all business oligarchs hate most. Business oligarchs oppose centralization of power, but they control business."

"Business oligarchs are opposed to centralization of power; they support the development of commercial trade, but how can we develop competition without centralization of power?"

"Capital will even flee to the UK. The purpose of centralization is to develop commercial trade, but even the capital to develop commercial trade has been scared away. What's the use of centralization?"

"You cannot fight wars for the sake of fighting. You cannot centralize power for the sake of centralizing power."

"You have to know that it is of no use for the Marquis to shout for free trade in Amsterdam. What is really useful is your country's battleships and marines. Without them, there would be no free trade. And they need a centralized government , a government that can mobilize national resources.”

"This is an unsolvable problem. If it can be solved, my predecessors - including the previous Grand Speakers and several strong men from the Orange family, they are all better than me. If they can't solve it, how can I solve it? "

"So, the Netherlands has no future. It can only slowly decay."

"At least one person in the history of the Netherlands had the opportunity to do what Cromwell and Louis XIV did. But he failed. Now that the country is far less powerful than before and surrounded by powerful enemies, there is even less chance. ”

"We are not stupid enough to think that diplomacy can solve all problems. You have to know that the Netherlands' golden age was also achieved through the fleet, not diplomacy. It's just that now we have no warships, and only diplomacy is left. We can only deceive ourselves that diplomacy can solve all problems, because if we don't even believe in it ourselves, how can others believe it?"