World War: Battleship Arms Dealers

"Prime Minister!" Kitchener finally couldn't hold back any longer. "This is appeasement! Today they can station troops right under our noses, tomorrow they can establish a base in the Indian Ocean, and the day after tomorrow..."

"We'll talk about tomorrow's business then," Asquith interrupted him, his tone suddenly stern. "Lord Kitchener, tell me: if we go to war with Lanfang now, how many troops and ships will we need to spare? How many fewer shells will the Western Front have? Should the Somme offensive be postponed? Until when? In winter?"

A series of questions left the Army Minister speechless.

"We have no choice." The Prime Minister's voice lowered. "In the third year of the war, the empire's strength has been stretched to its limit. Russia is teetering on the brink of collapse on the Eastern Front, France is barely surviving on daily blood transfusions, and Italy is making no progress in the Alps. And we... our young people are falling in droves in the mud of the Somme."

He paused, a flicker of pain in his eyes: "Yesterday I received a list, a list of fallen officers. Oxford University's 1913 graduates—seventy-two of them enlisted that year, and now… only nineteen remain. Cambridge is even worse; out of one hundred and five, only twenty-one survive. These boys, the future of the empire, died in the French fields, hundreds of kilometers from their homes. And we're supposed to open a third front? Send even more people to the Middle Eastern deserts?"

The meeting room was completely silent. Only the ticking of the clock on the mantelpiece seemed to be counting down something.

"So, be patient." Asquith sat down, as if he had used up all his strength. "Not because we are weak, but because we must win the war at hand first. When Germany falls, when we are free... then, all the scores will be settled, one by one."

He looked at Gray: "Return the call to Chen Feng, be polite, and say that we understand Lanfang's 'commercial development needs' and hope that both sides can establish a communication mechanism to avoid misjudgments. Also... tell Gerald privately to sound out Chen Feng's intentions: Is Lanfang willing to sell us tank technology? The price is negotiable."

"Prime Minister!" Even Balfour was surprised this time.

"Pragmatism, gentlemen," Asquith said with a wry smile. "It's better for us to buy it than to let the Germans monopolize it. And... it's also a way to buy time. Negotiations can go on for a long time, and time is on our side—as long as the Western front breaks through first."

The decision was made. Although some people were dissatisfied, no one offered a better solution.

After the meeting, Asquith remained alone in the conference room. He took a bottle of whiskey from his drawer, poured himself a small glass, and downed it in one gulp. The alcohol burned his throat, but it couldn't burn away the heaviness in his heart.

He walked to the huge world map on the wall. The red territory of the British Empire covered a quarter of the earth, from Canada to India, from Australia to South Africa, once the glorious empire on which the sun never set.

But now, at the edge of the red area, a brand new color is seeping in—it's Lanfang's red, more vibrant and dazzling, like blood dripping onto a map.

Asquith's fingers lightly brushed over the spot on Hurdsa.

"Chen Feng..." he murmured to himself, "What exactly do you want? Just oil? Or... more?"

Outside the window, the London sky was overcast. A late summer thunderstorm was brewing.

Meanwhile, on the other side of the world, another storm is quietly gathering.

Hurdssa, 9 a.m., September 2.

The desert nights are bitterly cold. The temperature plummets from fifty degrees Celsius during the day to five degrees Celsius at night. The soldiers, wrapped in their overcoats, huddle around makeshift fires lit with diesel fuel—if a few oil-soaked sticks can be considered a fire.

On his sentry post in the 3rd Company of the reconnaissance battalion, Corporal Liu Changfu, rifle in hand, stared into the darkness to the west. His night vision was excellent, a unique talent of children raised in the mountains. At that moment, his eyes moved slowly behind his binoculars, scanning the horizon.

"There's movement," he suddenly whispered.

Private Wang Shuanzhu, who was standing nearby, immediately leaned over and asked, "Where?"

"At two o'clock, about two kilometers away. There's a reflection... a metallic reflection."

The two held their breath. A few seconds later, several blurry shadows appeared in the darkness—vehicles, their lights off, but the moonlight occasionally shone on them, reflecting a faint glow.

"Three...no, four. Wheeled vehicles, possibly jeeps." Liu Changfu put down his binoculars, grabbed the field phone, and reported, "Post number three reports: four unidentified vehicles spotted two kilometers to the west, slowly moving eastward. Contact or not, please advise."

There was a few seconds of silence on the other end of the phone before the company commander's calm voice came through: "Continue to observe, don't expose yourself. If they cross the red line... fire a warning shot."

"clear."

The vehicle was getting closer. Now it was clear: it was indeed a jeep, but the model was unfamiliar; it wasn't the "Dongfeng" jeep that Lanfang was equipped with. However, there were no obvious markings.

When they were about a kilometer away, the vehicle stopped. Several figures got out and set up binoculars to observe in the direction of Hurdlesa.

"They're watching us," Wang Shuanzhu whispered.

Liu Changfu also raised his binoculars. Although he couldn't see their faces clearly, he could tell that their movements were very professional—they took turns providing cover, quickly set up observation equipment, and had someone specifically responsible for guarding the rear.

"Soldiers," he judged, "but not Ottomans; their movements are more... efficient."

The two sides stared at each other across a kilometer in the darkness, like two wild beasts that had encountered each other by chance in the night, sizing each other up and assessing the threat.

Twenty minutes later, the people in the jeep packed up their equipment, got back in, turned around, and disappeared into the darkness.

Liu Changfu breathed a sigh of relief, only then realizing that his palms were covered in sweat.

"They're gone."

"Hmm." Liu Changfu picked up the phone. "Post number three reports: the unidentified vehicle has retreated westward. No contact has occurred."

"Received. Remain vigilant."

After hanging up the phone, Wang Shuanzhu couldn't help but ask, "Corporal, those were British, weren't they?"

"Most likely."

"Why don't they just come straight over? We can't shoot."

Liu Changfu glanced at the eighteen-year-old recruit and shook his head: "They're not here to fight, they're here to scout. To see how many of us there are, what our equipment is like, and how well our fortifications are built. Once they've seen enough, they'll go back and report."

"So we're just going to let them see it like that?"

"The division commander said: Let them see." Liu Changfu picked up his rifle again. "Only when they see it clearly will they know how great the price is for messing with us."

The sky began to lighten with the first hint of dawn. Dawn comes quickly in the desert; within ten minutes, darkness recedes and the world is once again bathed in color.

The Khordesa base was beginning to take shape. Thirty-six 105mm howitzers were divided into three groups, all pointing east, and the gunners were doing morning exercises under the camouflage netting. Infantry soldiers were doing drills, their footsteps and shouts echoing through the desert. An engineer battalion was digging anti-tank ditches—though it was uncertain whether they would be used, combat readiness was combat readiness.

Smoke rose from the mess hall. Breakfast consisted of compressed biscuits heated with soup, with a few pieces of dehydrated vegetables and dried meat floating in the soup, but for the soldiers who had marched for six days, this was already a feast.