Nanyang Storm 1864

Which country is most anxious about the deteriorating relations between Chu and the United States?
The answer is France.

On the Western Front in Europe, after the First Battle of the Marne, the two sides fought hundreds of battles, and the war became increasingly open and brutal.

In order to change the passive situation of being suppressed on the battlefield, the French army, the British expeditionary force and other Allied forces were preparing for the unprecedented Battle of the Somme, hoping to turn the tide in one fell swoop.

The objective of the campaign was to break through the German defenses, inflict heavy casualties on the German forces, and force them to retreat to the Franco-German border line that existed before the start of the war, thus giving the Germans a valuable respite.

This unprecedented large-scale battle requires a massive amount of supplies, and preparations have been underway for several months.

If Chu and the United States start fighting in the rear, it will be like a fire breaking out in the backyard. Chu and the United States are the first and second largest suppliers of supplies to the European battlefield, and we absolutely cannot afford any mishaps.

This involves the outcome of the current major battle, and even more so, the future strategic dominance in Europe.

So, while France was overwhelmed with problems on the European front, it dispatched its wartime foreign minister, Pierre La Rochefort, and British special representative, George Clinton, on an emergency visit to Washington and Manila to conduct shuttle diplomacy.

In May 1915
Another miraculous reversal occurred on the European battlefield. The Kingdom of Italy, which had declared neutrality after the outbreak of war and refused to participate in the attack on other countries' territories, suddenly changed its tune and publicly announced its allegiance to the Allied Powers of Britain, France, and Russia.

This bizarre move completely baffled Germany and Austria-Hungary.

When it comes to this kind of fancy trick, the Italians are the best; they don't care about saving face at all.

The emergency visit by the British and French special representatives relieved the White House in Washington, and U.S. President Thomas Woodrow Wilson repeatedly mentioned the great friendship with Britain and France in his public speeches in an attempt to salvage his reputation.

At the same time, it publicly condemned the bullying behavior of a certain major Eastern power, emphasized its firm commitment to upholding the spirit of fairness, freedom, and democracy in the United States, and expressed its willingness to make efforts for regional peace.

The White House also took a variety of measures to forcefully suppress the direction and tone of news media reports, cool down the uproar in public opinion, and strengthen police and urban security measures.

The Great Chu Empire
Given that the special representatives from Britain and France will not be able to arrive in Manila for at least another month to conduct consultations between the high-level officials of the friendly nations.

Previously

The State of Chu had already conducted multiple rounds of transoceanic telecommunications with friendly European countries such as Britain and France, and was well aware of the urgent needs and bottom lines of the Allied military bloc, thus avoiding further escalation of the conflict.

For Britain and France, at least for the time being, a breakdown in relations between Chu and the United States is unacceptable, as it would jeopardize the Allied military alliance's current primary preparations for the Battle of the Somme.

As for how things will develop in the future?
That's beyond the reach of countries like Britain and France; the pressure is now on the United States.

The Chu government promised
As long as the US does not deliberately create friction and conflict, the Chu state will handle the situation calmly and avoid further escalation.

The key lies with the US; as long as they don't cause trouble, we won't attack them.

French Prime Minister Clemenceau was very satisfied with the result, but he put the matter aside and went to deal with the urgent war on the Western Front.

The urgent matters facing French Prime Minister Clemenceau, with a stack of documents requesting urgent handling that could reach over a meter in height, were all thorny issues.

After the first Battle of the Marne, the main force of the German Second Army was only kilometers away from Paris.

This frightened the French into an emergency retreat, moving the provisional government to the Redonde station in the Compiègne Forest. At that time, there was complete chaos, and it was only with great difficulty that things were brought together.

The most pressing issue right now is coordination with the British Expeditionary Force. The British have committed far too few troops, and the new French army group needs a large number of reinforcements. There are also significant shortages of various supplies.

Half of France was occupied, and the fields that were once used for growing grain and livestock were turned into battlefields.

With a large number of young French men and women being deployed to war logistics, industrial and agricultural production could not continue, leading to a shortage of supplies in post-war French society.

Countless thorny issues that are causing headaches are far more important than mediating relations between Chu and the United States.

The British and French both had grievances against the Americans, especially the French.

This is not without reason.

In order to support the Americans in winning the War of Independence, the French provided money, troops, and manpower, which ultimately bankrupted the French monarchy's finances, leading to Louis XVI's execution.

It was the French who pushed the United States to independence, so when the British commander-in-chief signed the armistice treaty after the war, he arrogantly said, "We only lost this war to the French."

On the centenary of American independence, France spent a huge sum of money to build the Statue of Liberty, which was placed on Liberty Island in New York and became a symbol of New York and the entire United States.

The French were working tirelessly for the United States, and they could see the outbreak of a major war in Europe, but the Americans were only interested in making money and stubbornly clung to their "Glorious Independence Policy," which infuriated the French.

"Black-hearted capitalists," "American cowboys with black fingernails and despicable character," and "country bumpkins who only care about money" were all terms used by French newspapers during this period to describe Americans.

As for the British, needless to say, Americans had long been labeled as "traitors" and subjected to ridicule and exclusion.

More than 100 years since the founding of the People's Republic of China
Surprisingly, no US president was invited to visit the UK, and the US influence was strongly suppressed by the UK, making it virtually invisible on the European political stage.

Let's not get into idle talk.
After its defection, Italy immediately turned its guns on Austria-Hungary, and on June 23, 1915, the First Battle of the Isonzo broke out.

The battle took place near the Isonzo River in Italy. Two hundred thousand Italian troops launched an initial attack in an attempt to drive out one hundred thousand Austro-Hungarian troops stationed in the Isonzo River and the surrounding mountains. However, the Italian artillery fire failed to provide sufficient cover for the Italian troops, and the two sides fought a stalemate.

Before long, the Italian army could not hold out and retreated in disarray.

Britain, France, and other countries realized this was unacceptable and that they had to support their Italian ally; they couldn't allow Italy to be crippled, and they had to rein it in.

As a result, a large amount of supplies, including weapons and equipment as well as a huge quantity of daily necessities, were imported from Chu and the United States through contracts signed by countries such as Britain and France and were shipped to Italy.

Due to the shift in the focus of logistical supply, the planned Somme campaign had to be temporarily shelved, and the western front entered a long stalemate.

From July to September 1915, the princes who were triumphant on the Arabian Peninsula established one kingdom after another. Along the Red Sea coast were the Kingdom of Yanbu, the Kingdom of Said, the Kingdom of the Northern Plains (formerly the Kingdom of Jordan), the Kingdom of Beirut, and the Kingdom of Riyadh in the heart of the desert. Along the Persian Gulf coast were the Kingdom of Qatar, the Kingdom of Bahrain, the Kingdom of Kuwait, and the Kingdom of Manama. In total, there were nine new kingdoms, which basically occupied the entire Arabian Peninsula.

November 1st

These 13 new kingdoms formed the Arabian Peninsula Union in Dubai, jointly recognizing the Great Chu Empire as their suzerain state, surrendering their collective military and diplomatic sovereignty, requesting the suzerain state to station troops, and willingly becoming vassal states.

The Great Chu Empire readily agreed and announced the establishment of the Overseas Affairs Department of the Imperial Cabinet's Zongli Yamen, which was reorganized from the former Colonial Department and was dedicated to the affairs of vassal states.

At the same time, the establishment of the Arabian Peninsula Military District was announced, with three infantry divisions and one artillery division drawn from Eritrea (Note: the former East Africa Governorate) to be stationed there, with a focus on the Northern Kingdom of the Arabian Peninsula (Note: the former Jordan Kingdom) and the Kingdom of Sa'd (Note: adjacent to Egypt).

In West Africa

The main force of the princes' allied forces, which arrived in West Africa one after another, rested in the city of Great Bay for more than two months before taking the railway that traverses more than 2480 kilometers across West Africa eastward. After passing through the city of Daxing, they arrived at the city of Moon Lake (Note: also known as Kalemie) on the side of the East African Rift Valley.

This is the easternmost of the seven West African provinces belonging to the Great Chu Empire. Across the border lies the German East African colony, which later became Tanzania.

At the end of September
The main force of the princes' allied army, numbering over 1.82, arrived one after another and met with Major General McKent, commander of the British East African Expeditionary Force, in Moonlight Lake City. The two sides held a very amicable meeting there and formulated a specific battle plan.

The commander-in-chief of the Princes' Allied Forces was Major General Chu-Zheng Hui, former commander of the Royal Army's 9th Expeditionary Division, and the deputy commander-in-chief was Major General Mo Yuanhang, a highly experienced former Chief of Staff of the Dubai Army, a veteran with extensive colonial experience.

Mo Yuanhang was born into a large Chinese rancher family in Da Haiwan City. Their ancestral home was called Mo Family Town, and the family ranch owned tens of thousands of acres of land and hundreds of thousands of cattle and sheep.

Furthermore, they established a milk powder factory, a frozen meat processing plant, and a leather factory, and have been exporting to the European market on a large scale for over a year, making a fortune.

Mo Yuanhang had no ambition for this. In 1903, he resigned from his military post and followed the King of Dubai to conquer the world. Based on his military achievements, he rose to the position of Chief of Staff of Dubai and was awarded the rank of Major General.

During last year's princely expedition, he commanded the 1.42-strong eastern route princely allied army advancing along the Persian Gulf, conquering cities and territories along the way and earning a formidable reputation.

Now, I've returned to my hometown.

Major General Mo Yuanhang was full of ambition and wanted to make further contributions to his military career.

Major General McKent, commander of the British East African Expeditionary Force, who took the initiative to seek cooperation, was completely dismissive of them, and there were reasons for this.

The performance of the British East African Expeditionary Force was truly indescribable.

Before the outbreak of the European war, Germany had four colonies in Africa: Turkolan, Cameroon, German Southwest Africa, and German East Africa.

When the war broke out last August, the German army in its overseas colonies was negligible, and these four colonies were surrounded by colonies of Britain, France, and China.

The German garrisons in these colonies were scattered and weak, consisting only of some Black Native guards who served as police officers and had no regular military force whatsoever.

After the war began, Britain, France, and other countries saw this as a good opportunity to drive the Germans out of Africa, so they joined forces to attack these German colonies.

Governor of Hai'an, Great Chu Empire
The small number of German and indigenous police forces were simply unable to resist, and soon Turkolan, Cameroon, and German Southwest Africa all fell into the hands of Britain and France.

Taking advantage of the opportunity, Prince Chu-Zheng Hong, the 71st son of the Emperor of the Great Chu Empire, who was originally the Duke of Hai'an and Governor of Hai'an, launched a rebellion. After publicly resigning from his post as Governor of Hai'an, he led a private army of more than 10,000 men south and directly annexed Angola, the former Portuguese colony.

This led to the establishment of the Kingdom of Angola, which is currently undergoing a period of domestic rectification and absorption of Chinese immigrants from the north, making it a master at profiting from chaos.

As for why Portuguese Angola was eliminated during the partition of German colonies, that's a matter of opinion.

Anyway, the Portuguese have little influence now, and with Europe in such turmoil, nobody cares about these trivial matters, since the territory has changed hands.

Turkolan fell into French hands, German Southwest Africa fell into British hands, and the Prince of the Great Chu Empire in Portuguese Angola fell into the hands of the Crown Prince. In any case, everyone was happy.

The last tough nut to crack was German East Africa.

German East Africa covers an area of ​​approximately 38 square miles and has a population of about 765 million. However, there are only about 8600 white people of German descent, and another 2.7 Indians and Arabs.

It was surrounded by enemies, including Chu-controlled West Africa (Congo and Zaire), British East Africa (Kenya), Uganda, Northern Rhodesia (Zambia), and Nyasaland (Malawi), most of which were British and Chu colonies. Only the southern Belgian Africa (Mozambique) was neutral.

Therefore, in terms of defense, German East Africa was almost in a precarious situation, surrounded by enemies on all sides.

It seems logical and reasonable that German East Africa was divided between the State of Chu and Britain.

But things weren't that simple, because there was a formidable commander in German East Africa, Lieutenant Colonel Paul von Leto-Volbeck, a mid-level German officer who had served in the Eight-Nation Alliance. Although his hair was gray, he had extremely rich combat experience.

Over the past year, he has inflicted heavy losses on the British expeditionary force, causing them to suffer a series of crushing defeats.

Lieutenant Colonel Paul von Leto-Volbeck himself was also specially commended by the German Army General Staff for his outstanding achievements, and was promoted to the rank of major general and appointed as the military commander of German East Africa.

The 4400 German troops and 16,000 African soldiers he led caused more than 10,000 British casualties, and more than 300,000 African soldiers and porters died from various attacks, malaria, hunger, and attacks by wild animals, among other non-combat factors, and the progress remained stagnant.

To maintain the front line, the British army used Mombasa, Kenya as a base for resupply. During the campaign, each British soldier needed 5-10 African porters to provide supplies.

The Germans keenly perceived this and launched frequent attacks on Britain's long transport lines using guerrilla warfare and multi-pronged attacks, causing numerous casualties among African porters.

The incompetence, arrogance, and conservatism of the British officers were not only seen by the Germans, but also by the experienced Chu officers, which was the main reason why Major General Mo Yuanhang looked down on them.

These white British officers never cared about the lives of the black porters and logistics soldiers. The supply lines were attacked time and again, but this never attracted attention, let alone a targeted combat plan.

This gave the Germans a perfect opportunity. By attacking logistical supply lines, they could not only obtain large quantities of supplies and military equipment, but also severely damage the British forces and slow their offensive. (End of Chapter)