Chapter 203 The Third Way

It's just that Franz didn't want to choose either of the two paths in front of him.

Franz first tried to use the desulfurization method to recycle the scraps left over from shoemaking. Due to the limited level of technology at that time, doing so would only cost more money, so he had to give up.

Later, Franz tried to make a fuss from the source, using special molds to make the most efficient use of rubber, but of course he failed again. It was still the old problem of lack of pre-technical technology.

Just when Franz was at a loss, the negotiation results of Ajani came out. The Brazilians decided to make concessions and were willing to sell 1,000 tons of rubber at 500 florins per ton.

This made Franz feel very hurt. In fact, he now hopes that the Brazilians will raise the price of rubber as high as possible. Because the Austrian rubber industry at this time has already occupied the first-mover advantage.

If the cost is increased at this time, it will undoubtedly greatly increase the entry threshold, so that competitors can be reduced, thereby maintaining Austria's leading position.

At the same time, it can also delay the modernization process of other countries' industries. The increase in rubber prices will also help Brazilians expand production capacity.

Historically, Brazilians were too lazy, and rubber production did not reach 18,000 tons until the end of the 19th century and the beginning of the 20th century.

At the same time, the rubber crisis occurred, just in time for the great development of the automobile industry. At the peak of the crisis, the price of rubber once reached 6,600 US dollars per ton, and even after the crisis, it remained above 1,000 pounds (5,000 US dollars) for a long time.

It even forced Europeans to find places to grow rubber themselves.

In the end, it was with the support of our people that the rubber crisis was completely resolved. At that time, the United States, Spain and other countries defrauded a lot of money from a certain Eastern power to invest in rubber production.

It was not until a large number of rubber plantations were established in Southeast Asia that the global rubber shortage problem was solved.

If Brazil's rubber production is still as low as in history, then it will not be enough for the Austrian Empire alone, let alone the whole world.

Franz had just returned to the study, and Talia followed him, and Ajani quietly closed the door.

As soon as Franz sat down, Talia and Adjani burst into laughter. They were obviously laughing at the conversation between Franz and the Great Salt Cedar.

"Don't laugh." Franz said.

"Why? Are you going to brainwash us too? Haha!" Talia and Adjani opened their arms together, and Franz had to turn his head away and ignore them.

However, they didn't want to let Franz go.

Talia and Adjani hugged each other and deliberately raised their voices.

"Oh, dear, let the world feel your pain!"

"I will give you the power you want! Come and drink from this cup of hatred!"

"Have you had enough fun? Don't roll around on my bed." Franz said helplessly.

Talia returned to her serious expression and said.

"Why didn't you bring Miss Shanyin with you? She seems to admire you."

"Why should I bring her with me? And seeing that her grades are pretty good, I want to know where she can go? If Da Yan Shanyin really has some talent in science and technology, I would rather she stay in Austria." Franz explained.

"What do you think of Miss Elina? She is also very smart and beautiful. Although she is a Jew, her loyalty to the royal family is no less than anyone else." Talia said.

"Miss Talia, you are the principal of the Imperial Women's Academy in Vienna. You should be a gardener, not a... Even the stupidest farmer would not do such a thing as pulling up seedlings to help them grow." Franz said.

"Those children are still young, and so is Franz. They are still in the learning stage. We have to see how they develop. It's not too late to make a decision later." Ajani rescued.

Beirut, Syria.

The Austrian reinforcements had just arrived at the port and were warmly welcomed by the British army.

General Gabrentz even doubted whether this was the city in urgent need of rescue.

Looking at the spotless uniforms of the British Navy and the magnificent military band, General Gabrenz once felt that he was just attending a party, not a military rescue operation.

Fortunately, General Gabrenz had seen absurd things in the Mexican War.

General Gabrenz was previously sent to Mexico with Count Stadion as a military adviser to Tasan Anna, and even served as a Mexican general for a period of time.

However, with the end of the Mexican Civil War, they also got the opportunity to return home. General Gabrenz did not have such a strong background as Count Stadion, and could not directly become the governor of a province. He could only take his troops across the ocean to Beirut to win a future for himself.

At this time, Gabrenz had 3,000 Austrian expeditionary soldiers in his hands. His mission was to cooperate with the British in Egypt. Although Prince Metternich asked him to preserve his strength as much as possible, both he and the Austrian military hoped to outperform the British in performance.

However, Gabrentz soon received a despairing news from the British. Egypt had 130,000 troops in Syria. The difference in strength between the two sides could not be described as disparity. It was simply a difference of heaven and earth.

What was even more terrifying was that the British naval commander in front of him wanted to drink with him as soon as they met. The heartless British guy was about to make General Gabrentz explode. He had to have a good drink to calm down.

While drinking, William Simond revealed to Gabrentz the situation in Beirut at the time, which was far less critical than what was said in the war report.

Although the total strength of the Egyptians was 130,000, only about 70,000 could really fight, of which 50,000 were confronting the Ottoman army on the northern front, and the remaining 20,000 were besieging Beirut, and there were about 60,000 auxiliary troops transporting supplies and maintaining public order.

General Gabrentz took advantage of the wine and rested in Beirut for a night. He arrived at the fortress outside the city the next day, and found that the British Army soldiers were eating potatoes at this time.

Colonel Carter Wynn of the British Army received him very warmly, but there was really nothing to show for him, so he had to peel a potato for him personally and sprinkle a little cumin and salt.

Gabrentz remembered the "Looking up at the Stars" he had last night. Although the dish was a bit scary, it was not as shabby as the British Army.

In addition, he also found a very strange scene. The British only had one regiment of troops, but they had nearly 50 cannons, which was really unusual. You should know that at this time, the firepower of a general army in European countries was 50-70 cannons.

Later, Gabrentz figured out that these cannons were originally loaned to the army by the British Royal Navy. Of course, these cannons were not borrowed for free. The army had to exchange them with their supplies, so now Colonel Carter could only eat potatoes.

The 3,000 people brought by Gabrentz, plus Colonel Carter's 2,000 people, the coalition forces added up to only 5,000 people. Seeing the corpses on the battlefield ahead, he couldn't help but start to worry about his future.

He even doubted whether these people under him could survive the fierce battles in the future.

"Colonel Carter, you are such a brave man. You have persisted for twenty days in such an isolated city and such a tragic battle. It is really admirable."

"You misunderstood. Egyptians have no habit of collecting corpses for their companions. Anyway, those corpses will be buried by wind and sand sooner or later. As for fighting, there has never been a real battle here." Colonel Carter replied.

"What do you mean?" Gabrentz was a little confused.

"The morale and discipline of the Egyptians are extremely poor. As long as the sound of the cannon sounds, they will have a large-scale rout, and then there will be a one-sided massacre. I have been stationed here for more than half a month, and only 160 soldiers under my command were killed, while the total number of Egyptian troops killed and captured has long exceeded 10,000." Colonel Carter said with some pride.

If Colonel Carter's words were told to other European generals, they would definitely accuse Carter of bragging. But Gabrentz had seen more outrageous battles than this during the Mexican Civil War.

If the American army is a mob, then the Mexican army is simply a group of street thugs. The Egyptian army, which was excluded from Western civilization, was certainly not as good as the Mexicans.

This was indeed the case. Ibrahim returned to support Beirut as soon as he learned that it had fallen. He personally led an army of 20,000 and faced Beirut, which had only 2,000 lobster soldiers. He wanted to fight quickly.

But what Ibrahim did not expect was that he suffered unimaginable setbacks here.

He wanted to lead the other side to a decisive battle, and took the opportunity to send the Death Army (a barbaric army that claimed to be fearless of death) to encircle the other side's rear and then completely annihilate it.

Due to the lack of sufficient mobile troops on the Syrian battlefield, he could only use infantry instead of cavalry.

But the result was that their elite troops suffered heavy losses in the front due to the firepower suppression of the lobster soldiers, and the Death Army responsible for the circumvention was defeated by the bayonets of the lobster soldiers and fled after leaving more than 100 bodies.

The Death Army had 3,000 people, and the death rate was less than 5%, and the morale completely collapsed.

Later, Ibrahim also tried to attack Beirut directly, but the Royal Navy and Beirut volunteers were not vegetarians. Not only did it not achieve any results, but because the forces were too dispersed, many of the living forces were annihilated by the British. Now he can only temporarily recruit auxiliary troops to continue the siege of Beirut.

After learning that the Egyptian navy was completely wiped out in the Beirut naval battle, Ibrahim drank every day to drown his sorrows.

He once advised his father Muhammad Ali to beg for peace, but was scolded. Ali blamed Ibrahim for not taking Istanbul, which gave the Ottomans a chance to breathe and invited foreign aid to destroy Egypt's maritime power.

Ibrahim, on the other hand, felt that Ali should have sent all the fleets to take Istanbul directly from the beginning, instead of fantasizing about defeating Britain and Russia to become the world hegemon.

Since the Egyptian offensive was frustrated, the Ottomans organized a counterattack.

Letters asking for help piled up on Ibrahim's desk like snowflakes.

At this moment, he was powerless because the Egyptian coast was plundered by the Austrian navy and Ali refused to support the Syrian battlefield.

In addition, the effect of the imperial edict in the flower hall was very significant, just like Lincoln's "Emancipation Proclamation". In a short period of time, the Ottoman army recruited a large number of minority soldiers.

The most terrifying thing was the resistance of the lower-class people. Ali's brutal rule had long made the civilians complain. They kept organizing guerrillas to harass the supply lines of the Egyptian army and even passed intelligence to the British and Ottoman armies.

Just when Ibrahim was at a loss, his adjutant suddenly came in and reported, "The British and Austrian coalition forces are moving!"

Vienna, Schönbrunn Palace.

Just when the war in Beirut was about to break out, Franz received a letter from Friedrich. In the letter, Friedrich complained madly about Franz's Congreve rocket.

In the previous sneak attack on the Egyptian Navy, this thing caused more damage to the Austrian army than the Egyptian Navy. The maximum range can reach 4 kilometers, but the radius of the error range can reach as much as 2 kilometers.

What's more, the flames and hot gases ejected by the rocket launch often burn soldiers and even ignite ships.

Franz rubbed his forehead. Rockets can't be used for precision strikes even in World War II. To continue to improve the accuracy, Franz thought of the rodless spin design.

However, this kind of rocket has higher technical requirements, and must use a launcher. At the same time, it also needs the help of a hydraulic press during production, otherwise it cannot be mass-produced.

After some investigation, it was found that Austria did have hydraulic presses, but most of them were used to squeeze vegetable oil, and the power was too low.

What surprised Franz even more was that the Austrian industry still used hydraulic hammers, and it was obvious that steam hammers should have been used in the steam age.

In fact, the reason is very simple, that is, Austria has a dense river network, a large drop in height, and abundant water resources. Compared with spending money to buy expensive steam hammers, simple, cheap and readily available hydraulic hammers are more popular.

As for hydraulic presses, they are considered to be only for oil extraction and are not used in industrial production at all. Franz knew nothing about these engineering machinery. He only knew that hydraulic presses would play a huge role in industry and military in the future.

So he could only throw out a topic in general and leave it to Austrian scientists to solve. However, Franz knew one thing, the real development of hydraulic presses was due to an engineer mistakenly adding oil to the hydraulic press as water, which greatly improved the efficiency and made it really valued.

Soon the first oil-water mixed hydraulic press was born, and what Franz could never have imagined was that the first experiment of this hydraulic press was actually used by Doppler's daughter to press coffee beans, which indirectly led to the birth of instant coffee.

Under the night, the Mediterranean was dark, with only the sea breeze blowing violently.

Friedrich sat on his flagship, the third-class battleship "Venice", looking at the distant Alexandria, the richest city in Egypt.

Alexandria is a strong city, but because it is a strong city, its defenders are more likely to slack off.

To be honest, the Venetians are really professional when it comes to pirates. Coupled with the instigation of the Karamanli family, many tribal elders who have long been dissatisfied with Ali's brutal rule took the opportunity to cooperate with the actions of the Austrian Navy, and for a time Egypt was wailing.

Due to excessive drinking of opium wine and continuous blows, Muhammad Ali's temper became more and more violent, and he executed two governors of Alexandria in succession.

Ali believed that today's situation was entirely caused by the dereliction of duty of the governor of Alexandria, so he vented his anger on the two unlucky guys.

The replacement of four governors in a row made the defenders of Alexandria panic. The new governor, Al Said, did not want to die in vain, so he extorted money everywhere as soon as he took office.

Friedrich List, then US Secretary of State, promised Al Said that as long as he was willing to pay $10,000, he would send a ship to pick him up and accept him as an American citizen.

Friedrich List also assured Al Said that as long as he became an American citizen, he would be protected by American law and Muhammad Ali would no longer be able to sanction him.

In fact, in order to generate income, Friedrich List also extended the same invitation to many Egyptian officials.