Chapter 240 "London Contract"

The statement of the Portuguese Republican Party caused an uproar in Portugal and quickly spread to most of Europe, becoming one of the hot topics among European people in recent times.

Of course, this is also good for Australasia. At least it can quickly get rid of the suspicion of assassinating King Carlos I of Portugal and quickly gain more favor from the European people.

After all, Australasia and Portugal are at war. The Portuguese people have begun to oppose the rule of Carlos I and even have a good impression of the enemy country Australasia.

In contrast to Carlos I, Australasia and Arthur have become the most righteous party.

As the saying goes, there is no harm without comparison. In order to maintain his autocratic rule, Carlos I used this conflict with Australasia fishermen to establish an image of caring for his people and not fearing strong enemies.

But he ignored the real public opinion in Portugal. Continuing to insist on the war will not benefit Portugal in any way. Some of it is just to maintain the image established by Carlos I.

In addition, the Portuguese government has gradually shown a tendency to offend Britain, Germany and Russia. At present, the trade between Britain, Germany and Portugal has gradually decreased, which has caused many Portuguese factories and individuals to suffer significant losses.

As a result, the Portuguese were more disappointed with Carlos. After all, there was complete evidence and photos of the fishermen's conflict in Australasia at that time. The fishermen in Australasia were indeed seriously injured, and the fish and property they obtained were also robbed.

The Portuguese government's statement on the fishermen's conflict was very vague, and there was no evidence at all, just relying on the one-sided words of the fishermen.

If the government continues to offend Britain and Germany, I am afraid that Portugal will really have no status in Europe.

Britain and Germany currently represent the powerful groups of the Allies and the Entente respectively. Britain and France have an entente relationship, and France has an entente relationship with Russia.

Germany has an alliance with Italy and the Austro-Hungarian Empire, which also means that Britain and Germany are related to all the European powers.

Portugal has offended all the European powers at once. Isn't this really a lantern in the toilet?

Thanks to the fact that Portugal had been a constitutional monarchy for decades before Carlos I came to power, Portugal has many parties and supporters of the republic and democracy.

The ideas supported by these people are contrary to the autocratic monarchy, and naturally they are also within the high-pressure strike range of Carlos I.

The failure of Carlos I's plan this time is a good opportunity for the Republican Party and the pro-democracy party, and it is also the reason why they have to stand up at the risk of being cleared by the government.

The influence of this newspaper in Portugal is not limited to this. If there is a detailed polling agency at this time, a surprising conclusion can be drawn that the public support rate of the Portuguese Kingdom Government has experienced a sharp drop in a short period of time, and it is currently less than 40%.

This seems a bit exaggerated, but when you think about the fact that the Kingdom of Portugal only lasted for more than two years in history and then disappeared, you can gradually understand it.

Carlos I established a high-pressure oppression system and autocratic rule in Portugal, but it did not bring much benefit to the Portuguese.

It is not surprising that such a monarch who only covets his own rights and only cares about his own status is eventually opposed.

Although Carlos I had gained some support from Portuguese civilians with his previous firm attitude of protecting fishermen.

But after this incident, civilians have gradually begun to wake up, which is also the reason why the Portuguese government's public support rate has dropped sharply.

Hearing his subordinates' reports about the outbreak of multiple demonstrations across the country, Carlos I was a little angry, but he could do nothing about it.

But this was not the only bad news. After several hours of rescue, the hospital that treated Crown Prince Luis finally announced helplessly that the rescue of Crown Prince Luis was ineffective.

This was another heavy blow to Carlos I, and it also made Carlos I, who looked energetic before, suddenly age by more than ten years.

When Carlos I came to the government building again, the senior officials of the Portuguese Royal Government were surprised to find that the king's hair had turned gray.

At present, Portugal is in the midst of internal and external troubles. The external troubles from the peace talks with Australasia and the internal troubles of the domestic democratic liberals have made the government busy.

In order to maintain his ruling position, Carlos I finally decided to compromise with Australasia and concentrate all his energy on solving domestic problems and safeguarding the ruling position of the kingdom government and himself.

On October 18, 1907, the London Peace Talks, which had been suspended for five days due to an accident, were resumed.

This time, the Portuguese ambassador Herbert Simon was obviously much more active and formally acknowledged Portugal's defeat in this war.

Seeing that the Portuguese government finally began to be realistic, the three countries of Britain, Germany and Russia nodded with satisfaction.

Finally, after several days of consultations, under the witness of the representatives of Britain, Germany and Russia, the representative of Australasia, General David, and the representative of the Kingdom of Portugal, Herbert Simon, signed the "Australasian and Portuguese Treaty on the Settlement of Fishermen's Conflicts and War Incidents and Compensation Clauses" in London with a smile. Because it was signed in London, this treaty is also called the "London Peace Treaty" between Australia and Portugal.

According to the Treaty of London, Portuguese Timor will be ceded to Australasia as compensation from Portugal to Australasia, and Australasia will be recognized as having sovereignty over it.

In addition, Australasia has the right to berth in the ports of Portugal's East Asian colonies, and both warships and civilian ships can freely enter and exit the ports of East Asian colonies.

In addition, Portugal should pay financial compensation to fishermen and this war. All Australasia fishermen affected by this conflict and war should be compensated by Portugal, and finally, this amount was set at 15 Australian dollars per person.

In addition, the Australasia fisherman in the fishermen's conflict should be compensated by the Portuguese government for 100,000 Australian dollars and publicly apologized to him.

As for war reparations, the Portuguese government needs to pay the Australasia government 5 million pounds, which should be paid within three years. The annual interest on the amount not paid after three years is as high as one-fifth.

What does this mean? If the Portuguese government does not pay any compensation within three years, the annual interest after three years will be as high as one million pounds, which is not a small amount of money.

The accumulated interest for two years is worth a dreadnought, so Arthur is happy that Portugal will repay later.

Anyway, with the witness of Britain, Germany and Russia, Arthur is not afraid that the Portuguese government will default on its debt. These three countries are old European hooligans, and there are really not many countries that dare not give face to these three countries.

Of course, the three countries of Britain, Germany and Russia can agree to come to the peace talks, and most of them are still looking at Arthur's face.

Such favors still need to be repaid. After all, to put it bluntly, Britain, Germany, Russia and Australasia are all relatives, and Australasia is far away from Europe. Under the premise of no conflict of interest with these countries, it is very necessary to have good relations.

If it were not for the support of these three old rogue countries, it would take some time for Australasia to sign a real contract with Portugal.

Although Australasia is not afraid of the Portuguese army, the Portuguese navy is indeed a troublesome matter.

Of course, the main countries to build good relations are Germany and Russia. Although Australasia's main development goal in the future is the navy, and the navy of the British Empire is currently the most powerful in the world, its shipbuilding industry and shipbuilding technology are naturally the world's top.

But as long as Edward is the King of England, Australasia will not be able to establish a close relationship with the British Empire.

Apart from anything else, even if Arthur said that he didn't care about the previous things, would King Edward believe it?

However, with Arthur's good relationship with Queen Victoria before, and Arthur's goodwill in the UK, there is no need to worry about the malice from the UK, unless Arthur stands on the opposite side of the UK many times.

The previous airships set off a wave of research on airships in Europe, and Arthur was also happy to go with the flow and presented an AU-2 airship to Britain and Germany respectively.

I believe that with the technology of Britain and Germany, it is not difficult to quickly master the AU-2 airship.

Especially for Germany, the AU-2 airship is an improved and enhanced version of the AU-1, and the AU-1 is a replica of the Zeppelin LZ-1 rigid airship.

With such a relationship, Germany will be able to research the AU-2 airship faster, and even manufacture it by itself in a short time.

The gifts given to Russia are different from those given to Britain and Germany. This is not to say that there is a close relationship, but from the perspective of Russia's scientific research capabilities, Britain and Germany have developed the next generation of airships, and Russia may not be able to successfully master their technology.

Therefore, Arthur catered to Russia's needs and presented Russia with a batch of weapons and ammunition manufactured by military factories and originally used for this war.

Australasia was well prepared for this war, and a lot of weapons and equipment were produced.

Although a lot of weapons and ammunition were consumed under Australasia's powerful firepower, there were still a lot of surplus.

These surplus weapons and ammunition are nothing to Australasia, but they are a timely help to Russia's Far East Army.

Although the current situation in Russia is much more stable than in history, with Russia's investment in dreadnoughts, the Far East Army is still the one that suffers.

After obtaining this batch of weapons and ammunition reserves, the Russian Far East Army finally had some assets, and was somewhat prepared for possible wars in the future.

The honest Russians were very happy about this, and even Nicholas II sent a telegram to Arthur to thank him for the gift and praised the friendship between Russia and Australasia.

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