Chapter 421: Leftovers

"That's right." Liang Yao replied with his hands behind his back.

"Your army is the strongest opponent I have ever encountered in the East Indies. I am convinced that I was defeated by the American army led by you." Andersson said.

Although Andersson did not take Liang Yao seriously before, at the moment of defeat and surrender, Andersson chose to admit the strength of the enemy.

If the enemy is weak and you lose to a weak enemy, doesn't it mean that you are even more incompetent?

Only by being defeated by a strong enemy, Andersson and his Dutch-Indonesian army will not appear so unbearable.

Liang Yao is an American general, and his army is an American army.

Andersson constantly instilled this view into this, which was his last comfort and excuse, or a fig leaf.

Before that, Andersson was more willing to compare Liang Yao with the officers and generals of the Qing Dynasty, and agreed that Liang Yao's army was an army composed of yellow people.

Even though Liang Yao's army was actually a mixture of most Chinese and white people of various ethnic groups.

After losing Pontianak and fleeing to Kendawangan in a panic, Andersson did not think that the Dutch-Indian Army was defeated by Liang Yao's army.

It was because of the shameless sneak attack by the other side that the Dutch-Indian Army lost Pontianak without any preparation.

It was not until Andersson witnessed the failure of the Dutch-Indian Army's attack on Pontianak and paid a huge price in casualties but still did not achieve any results.

Andersson realized that the Dutch-Indian Army was really no match for Liang Yao's elite division. Liang Yao's army was fundamentally different from the armed forces of the Chinese Resistance Company in West Borneo and the army of the Qing Dynasty.

But when Andersson understood this, it was too late.

His army fell into an awkward dilemma outside Pontianak, until it was completely defeated and lost the ability to challenge Liang Yao's Western Brigade.

Liang Yao knew that Andersson was just trying to flatter himself and the Dutch-Indian Army, but as long as the Dutch-Indian Army was willing to surrender, Liang Yao was too lazy to bother with Andersson about these trivial things.

Since Andersson is a man who wants to save face, he will give him some face and let him surrender decently.

"General Andersson is also one of the few strong enemies Liang has encountered in his military career."

As soon as he said this, Liang Yao felt that he couldn't hold it back. He turned his head and laughed softly. After he was able to effectively control his facial expressions, Liang Yao turned his head and said to Andersson very seriously.

"As long as your army lays down its weapons and surrenders, I will guarantee the personal safety of the European officers and soldiers in your army."

The East Indies Fleet of the Dutch-Indonesian authorities can be called a strong enemy. After all, Liang Yao achieved his strategic goal after paying a huge price in the Battle of Java Sea.

The Royal Dutch East Indies Army is just a scrap, but it can't be called a strong enemy.

Since landing on land, Liang Yao's Western Brigade has been fighting smoothly.

The casualties caused to him by the Dutch-Indonesian Army, the Lanfang Army, and the local Sultan Chiefdom are far less serious than the casualties caused by tropical diseases to the Western Brigade.

"There are still many Javanese in our army," Andersson emphasized.

Liang Yao laughed loudly and then asked Andersson a soul-searching question: "Is Batavia willing to pay ransom for Javanese soldiers?"

Liang Yao treated European prisoners of war differently from indigenous prisoners of war because the Dutch-Indonesian authorities would pay ransom for European prisoners of war.

He would be able to get back the food, shelter and other things these prisoners of war had to eat and live with interest at the negotiation table in the future.

As for the indigenous soldiers, who were mainly native Javanese, the Dutch-Indonesian authorities did not care about the lives of these indigenous soldiers.

Sumatra and Java were not short of people, and it was much more cost-effective to recruit new soldiers than to spend money to buy these native soldiers and prisoners of war.

Of course, another deeper reason why Liang Yao treated European prisoners of war differently from indigenous prisoners of war was that he needed a large amount of cheap labor to open up rubber plantations on a large scale after the war.

These strong Javanese soldiers were undoubtedly an excellent cheap labor resource and could contribute to the banana plantation business in Borneo in the future.

For some well-known reasons, Liang Yao had no good feelings towards the natives of the East Indies, but rather he hated them.

Andersson was speechless, and he could not refute Liang Yao's question.

If the number of native soldiers captured was not large, the Dutch-Indonesian authorities might be willing to make a show of spending some Dutch guilders to redeem these native soldiers and win people's hearts.

But the problem is that Liang Yao has at least 3,000 native soldiers, mainly Javanese. Since the establishment of the Royal Dutch East Indies Army, it is the first time that such a large number of Dutch-Indonesian soldiers have been captured.

Even if Liang Yao is kind and only offers a ransom of 100 Dutch guilders for each native prisoner, it is still a huge sum of 300,000 Dutch guilders.

And to recruit a strong Javanese soldier on Java Island, the Dutch-Indonesian authorities only need to pay 20 Dutch guilders, or even less than 20 Dutch guilders.

Choosing between native soldiers and European soldiers is not a difficult choice for Andersson.

As for conscience?

If Andersson was a man with a conscience, he would not have chosen to leave the Netherlands to serve in the East Indies.

"As long as you provide treatment for the wounded European soldiers and officers of the Dutch-Indian Army and provide us with enough food to fill our stomachs, I have no objection to how you deal with these native soldiers."

After a moment of silence, Andersson said slowly.

Liang Yao nodded and agreed to Andersson's not-too-excessive request. After Andersson's fresh troops on Borneo surrendered, he had no worries on land and could free up troops to occupy the last colonial stronghold of the Dutch-Indonesian authorities in West Borneo: Kendawangan.

After signing the surrender letter, Andersson's Dutch-Indonesian army formally surrendered.

Andersson also cooperated with Liang Yao's work very well, ordering his officers to bring European soldiers to surrender to Liang Yao's Western Brigade in an orderly manner.

Thanks to Andersson's cooperation, the entire surrender process went very smoothly.

The Dutch-Indonesian army handed over their weapons, and after completing the registration, they obediently went to the prisoner-of-war camp that had been prepared for them.

After the European Dutch-Indonesian army left as prisoners of war, only the short, thin and dark Javanese soldiers were left in the Dutch-Indonesian army's barracks.

These Javanese soldiers were cleaning up the bodies in the barracks.

For some time to come, this will also be the residence of these Javanese prisoners of war.

Liang Yao walked into the camp of the Dutch-Indonesian Army. The Javanese soldiers looked at Liang Yao and the guards around him in fear, their hearts were in turmoil.

In the four-year-long Dutch-Chinese War, the blood debts of the Chinese on the hands of these Javanese soldiers were no less than those of the Dutch.

Sometimes the slaves who took advantage of the power of the tiger were even worse than their Dutch masters.

"A black slave in the southern slave states can be sold for a good price of more than 2,000 US dollars. What do you think these Javanese soldiers can be sold for?"

Liang Yao pointed at these trembling Javanese soldiers and asked the people around him.

"Are you going to sell them as slaves to the slave states?" Fremont frowned, and did not forget to remind Liang Yao.

"You are now a well-known figure in the military and political circles. Openly trading slaves will have a bad impact on you and California."

Although Fremont was not a fanatical abolitionist, he still opposed the act of selling these Javanese natives to America.