The Han culture is spreading strongly in Southeast Asia

Chapter 802 The Third Rome in a Dilemma

Tsarist Russia, St. Petersburg, Kazan Cathedral.

The gaunt Tsar Paul I knelt in prayer before the Kazan Cathedral, which was still under construction and resembled a large construction site. The small rug beneath his knees looked somewhat rough from long-term use.

Paul I was a devout Orthodox Christian, and the Kazan Cathedral, modeled after St. Peter's Church in St. Petersburg, was a concrete representation of his devotion to the Orthodox Church.

"The Seres are going too far! They already have such vast lands, why do they still want to fight for the land on the northern shore of the Caspian Sea!" After finishing his prayers, Paul I stood up and said, rather angrily.

This Tsar was, in fact, also a mad king.

But his madness was not like the mental breakdown of George III; rather, it was the harsh upbringing that shaped Paul I's volatile emotions and cognition.

He speaks in a rambling, unpredictable way, and acts on a whim. It's not uncommon for him to contradict himself from the previous moment.

Faced with such a silly question, no one answered, because in this world, how could any empire or monarch complain that their territory is too large?

Of the three Kazakh ghuz, the Seres Empire controls two. It's obvious they'll also try to control the last one, the West Kazakh ghuz, which is caught in a constant tug-of-war between Seres and Tsarist Rus.

Once Xiyuz is captured, the Seris Empire will gain suzerainty over all Kazakh tribes and can turn the entire Kazakh steppe into a logistical base for further westward expansion. With such a huge benefit, anyone who doesn't continue fighting would be a fool.

Paul I probably realized he had asked a really stupid question. This Tsar, who already lacked prestige, quickly turned and walked toward his permanent residence, Mikhailov Palace.

With his ministers out of the public eye and no longer needing to face them, the fragile Paul I regained his confidence. "My ministers," he said, "the Seres are attacking tribes that have submitted to the Third Roman Empire with impunity on the northern shore of the Caspian Sea, and are even massacring the people of the Empire."

How should we respond? Should we recall the Empire's army and wage a major war against them?

He really does come up with things on a whim, but Paul I is surrounded by his close advisors, many of whom are already used to the Tsar's unpredictable thinking.

Count Valentin Musin, a trusted advisor of Paul I and an Imperial Marshal who had befriended him since he was still under the oppression of his mother, Catherine the Great, asked in a low voice:
"Your Majesty Caesar, this alliance against the French mob government was initiated and formed by the Empire, especially by you personally."

If you move the Empire's valiant army to the East, the Alliance will crumble due to a lack of sufficiently skilled officers and soldiers.

"Damn Frenchmen, damn mobs!" Just a moment ago, Paul I was furious about the actions of the Seres Empire on the northern shore of the Caspian Sea, but now, after Count Pushkin's reminder, his anger quickly shifted to the Frenchmen.

As a devout Orthodox Christian, a Rome enthusiast, or rather, as all the Tsars of the Tsarist Rus' Empire were Rome enthusiasts.

They dreamed of possessing Constantinople and transforming Tsarist Rus' into a true Third Rome.

Therefore, when Malta was occupied by Napoleon and the members of the Hospitaller scattered across Europe seeking help, the Tsarist Russian Empire and Paul I immediately accepted them.

Emotionally speaking, the Knights Hospitaller are a remnant of the former Christian Kingdom of Jerusalem and a living fossil of the Crusades.

Their tenacious resistance against the overwhelmingly superior armies of the Ottoman Sultan over several centuries without surrendering holds immense symbolic significance for Christian nations in Europe.

From a practical standpoint, the island of Malta, ruled by the Knights Hospitaller, is adjacent to Sicily and the Greek peninsula. If the Tsarist Russian Empire could acquire Malta, it would be like driving a crucial thorn into the Mediterranean, greatly aiding in the recapture of Constantinople.

Moreover, last December, members of the Hospitallers, who were under the protection of the Tsarist Rus' Empire in St. Petersburg, had already elected Paul I as their protector.

They are even now trying to bypass the tradition that the Grand Master of the Knights must be a Catholic and elect an Orthodox Christian, with Tsar Paul I as the Grand Master.

For other emperors, becoming Grand Master of the Hospitallers might not have been a big deal, but for Paul I, it was extremely important.

Besides his religious needs, Paul I also hoped to use his achievement of becoming Grand Master of the Hospitallers to prove to all Tsarist Rus's people that he was also very capable and worthy of the Romanov bloodline.

From birth, this Tsar was believed by most people not to be his father Peter III's son, but rather the son of Empress Catherine II and her lover Otlov or Saltykov.

"Moreover, Your Majesty, it's too late to recall the army now, because it has already reached Austria and is preparing to march to northern Italy to fight," said Peter von Palen, the governor of St. Petersburg, who was standing nearby.

"Then what do we do? Is the great Third Rome really unable to spare any troops to deal with the Seres' harassment?"

Paul I asked, quite unwillingly, as the Tsar suddenly realized that his empire was caught in a pincer movement.

The Tsarist Russian Empire is now like a giant bear lying at the northernmost tip of the Eurasian continent, its head facing the European continent, roaring in a way that terrifies its enemies, but its rear end to the east is being stabbed and bleeding profusely by the Seres Empire.

“Your Majesty, the problem in the East is easy to solve. As long as we adjust our policy towards serfs, I believe the Cossacks on the east bank of the Ural River can completely stabilize the situation.” Privy Council advisor Nikolai Zubov replied with a gloomy face upon hearing the Tsar’s question.

The Zubov family, the most powerful family in the Tsarist Rus' Empire, saw its power greatly diminished after Paul I ascended to the throne.

Nikolai Zubov's elder brother, Field Marshal Platon Zubov, was directly expelled from the center of power by Paul I.

Although Paul I promoted Nicholas Zubov to the Privy Council, this was clearly not enough, and Nicholas Zubov was extremely dissatisfied with the Tsar.

"Hmph! All of this is just your assumption, Mr. Consultant!"

Paul I's face flushed instantly. He boarded the Tsar's carriage in great displeasure, and even after getting in, he angrily turned around and shouted at Nikolai Zubov:
"If the people on the east bank of the Ural River are loyal to the Third Rome, loyal to their Caesar, then they should solve the problem now!"

Having said that, Tsar Paul I left a group of ministers behind and angrily ordered the coachman to drive away.

“Nikolai, we all know where the problem lies, but Caesar refuses to acknowledge the failure of his policies. It’s a tragedy, the tragedy of the Third Rome!”

Watching the Tsar's carriage disappear into the distance, St. Petersburg Governor Peter von Palen muttered something to Nikolai Zubov beside him, seemingly on purpose.

The reason why Tsar Paul I was so angry was that Nikolai Zubov's words touched a nerve with the Tsar, causing Paul I to break down.

The serf problem has always been a fatal flaw in the Tsarist Rus' Empire.

If the serfs were emancipated, it would greatly harm the interests of the nobles of the Tsarist Rus' Empire. The Tsar was merely the most powerful nobleman supported by these nobles; the foundation of the Tsar's rule was not the serfs, but these nobles.

Liberating the serfs was tantamount to the Tsar digging his own grave and committing a rapid suicide.

But without liberating the serfs, the Tsarist Russian Empire would forever remain just an enhanced version of the Ottoman Turks.

The Tsar's power was forever constrained by the nobility, he could never catch up with the pace of Western European countries, he could never industrialize, and the empire would eventually be destroyed by the cruelly exploited lower classes.

Therefore, failing to emancipate the serfs was tantamount to digging one's own grave, only this time it was a slow death through chronic poisoning, rather than an immediate suicide. This was the Achilles' heel of the Tsarist Rus' Empire and the Romanov family. Successive Tsars, including the great Peter the Great, were always preoccupied with this issue.

Paul I was no exception, but he was more unconventional.

His solution to the problem of serfs was to stipulate that serfs could work for nobles for a maximum of three days a week, naively hoping to reduce the amount of labor serfs had to do without excessively diminishing the interests of the nobles.

What a genius! This unrealistic and fanciful plan, when implemented locally, turned into a tyrannical policy that severely damaged the interests of minor nobles and ordinary manor owners.

Since no one among the high nobility dared to carry it out, they could only drag the lower nobility and manor owners into it to demonstrate the results.

The minor nobles and landowners along the Don and Ural rivers, far from the centers of power, suffered greatly.

This is actually the fundamental reason why the Tsarist Rus' Empire showed no will to resist on the northern shore of the Caspian Sea and kept retreating and avoiding conflict.

The Rus', mainly composed of minor nobles and Cossack landowners, suffered losses and were unwilling to fight against Seris for the sake of the empire and the Tsar.

"I've had enough of this kind of life, with policies being overturned at will and nobles and generals being punished arbitrarily!" Nikolai Zubov glanced at the Governor of St. Petersburg, their eyes gleaming with a strange light as they drew closer.

. . . .

Just as the Tsarist Rus' Empire was brewing a violent internal explosion, the situation in Europe had begun to undergo significant changes.

On February 5, 1799, Napoleon assembled an army of 2 and marched eastward from Cairo in an attempt to seize Palestine and Syria.

The French expeditionary force captured Gaza on February 20 and Jaffa on March 7.

After capturing Jaffa, Napoleon did not have enough food to feed the prisoners, nor was he willing to release them to prevent them from rejoining the Ottoman army. So he executed more than three thousand prisoners outside the city of Jaffa.

While this solved Napoleon's immediate problem, it brought an even bigger one: the execution strengthened the Ottoman army's resolve to resist in Palestine.

Then, on March 17, the French army advanced to the outskirts of Acre, only a little over 3 kilometers from Jerusalem.

However, the city's commander, Yazapasha, used the brutality of the French army to inspire the city's defenders to fight to the death. Furthermore, Acre was a very fortified city, and the French army, lacking artillery, was unable to capture it quickly.

Meanwhile, Rear Admiral Sydney Smith, captain of the Degley III battleship, had already arrived. He provided Acre with a large number of defensive cannons and also used his warship to assist the Acre defenders in defending the weak points on the seaward side.

On April 20, after a little over a month of siege, the French army still had not been able to capture the small city.

Meanwhile, Ottoman Turkish troops began to continuously assemble here, with the most elite Ottoman cavalry and the elite new army trained by the Ottoman Caliph being sent from Istanbul.

Meanwhile, Sydney Smith spread the news of the formation of the Second Coalition against France and spread rumors that the Egyptian Expeditionary Force had been abandoned by the Directory.

The combination of actual military strength and psychological warfare even made Napoleon waver. Just then, the weather turned hot, and the French expeditionary force suffered from acclimatization problems, with infectious diseases breaking out in the army.

On April 25, after days of bombardment, the French Expeditionary Force finally managed to breach a section of the Acre city wall.

But what appeared before them was not chaos, but a new city wall and a corresponding fortress. It turned out that the garrison had built another city wall in a short period of time using the limited building materials available in the city.

This caused the morale of the French Expeditionary Force to plummet, and they lost all will to launch a fierce attack.

On May 21, after several battles with the Ottoman Turkish army that appeared in the field, the arrogant Napoleon had no choice but to retreat.

They left Acre, and even abandoned the cities they had already occupied, such as Jaffa and Gaza, and withdrew entirely back to Egypt.

In this battle, the French Expeditionary Force of 13,000 men suffered approximately 2,000 casualties, with nearly 2,000 dying or being wounded due to infectious diseases. In total, they paid a heavy price of at least 3,000 dead and more than 1,000 wounded.

These lost soldiers were not cannon fodder, but extremely skilled elite troops. Coupled with the growing rumors of the expeditionary force being abandoned, this dealt a heavy blow to morale.

At this point, the French expeditionary force's conquest plan in Egypt completely failed, and it essentially lost its offensive capabilities, entering a defensive phase.

. . . .

In early March, French commander Jean-Baptiste Jurdand led an army of about 25,000 men from what would later become southern Germany and northern Switzerland, crossing the Rhine River between Basel and Kehl, thus opening a vital gateway to the Swiss interior and the heart of Austria.

Meanwhile, André Masséna's 30,000-strong French army entered Switzerland and took control of Zurich.

“We have no choice, Ferdinand. If we cannot drive France out, not only the Holy Roman Empire, but even Austria will be in grave danger,” Archduke Charles said to Mogenze beside him in the face of the French offensive.

“Cousin Karl, isn’t this exactly the scene you wanted to see?” Mo Gongze ignored the seemingly aggrieved look on Grand Duke Karl’s face.

In fact, Archduke Charles had long anticipated the French army's attack, and thus mobilized more than 100,000 troops from across the country in advance. They had been resting in Augsburg for several months, waiting for the French army to come and fight.

"Marshal, the French have made significant progress in the Ndinga region. We have lost at least ten thousand men." Just as the two were talking, the adjutant came to report with the latest battle report.

The Enginga region is located in Switzerland, near Zurich, where Austrian troops are under attack by the Swiss Army under André Masséna.

Archduke Karl remained unfazed upon hearing this, as it was entirely within his expectations. The more than 10,000 troops who had been forced to surrender and captured were also highly unreliable and of low combat effectiveness, consisting of a militia formed by Swiss feudal lords loyal to the Holy Roman Emperor.

But Mo Gongze's expression changed somewhat, because the situation and the fighting strength of the Austrian army were much worse and much lower than he had estimated.

"Marshal, my most elite infantry, the 4th Regiment of the Belgian Army, can serve as the backbone, appearing where they are most needed." Mo Gongze changed his address, taking on the most difficult task for his Belgian army.

At this point, it was no time to consider minor gains and losses. Just as Archduke Karl had said, if they were to be defeated, the Habsburg family would truly be shaken to its core.

"Then let's go here!" Archduke Karl was overjoyed. The 4th Regiment of the Belgian Legion was the central guard of the Lu Prince's Three Guards. Although it was called a regiment, it actually had about three thousand men and was the most elite of the Lu Prince's army disguised as the Belgian army.

Mo Gongze looked up and saw the location that Archduke Karl had pointed to on the map. This was the key position where the French and Austrian armies were facing off, a valley plain called Austrach on the shore of Lake Constance.

If the French army occupies this area, they can drive the Austrian army down the hill and force them to retreat in disarray towards Vienna.

If the Austrian army seizes this place first, they can have a commanding position to suppress the French army's attack, use their numerical advantage to chase and beat them, and drive them directly back to France.

(End of this chapter)