Chapter 354 Taking over the Solomon Islands

According to the agreement between Australasia and the Allied Powers, when the number of standing troops in Australasia reaches 400,000, it is the time when Britain and France begin to transfer Pacific colonies to Australasia.

You know, although there are only a number of archipelagos and islands in the Pacific, the total area is not too large.

But this does not mean that transferring colonies is a simple process. Even if Australasia is relatively close to the colonies, it will take at least half a year to fully accept them.

This also involves the acceptance and repatriation of the colonial population, the reconstruction of colonial order and government, the takeover of colonial garrisons, etc.

More importantly, this area involves half of the Pacific Ocean, which also means that the Australasia Navy must patrol this area to ensure the safety of the sea areas of these colonies.

However, the good news is that Australasia currently has no opponents in this area, and it is backed by the Allies, so it is not worried that the security of these colonies will be threatened.

Of course, if you really want to calculate, the current United States may be a danger.

Because of the current South American war, the forces behind Argentina and Chile are actually competing in secret.

However, the United States should not have the courage to participate directly. Under the premise that the Allies do not help the United States, the comprehensive military strength of the United States is not comparable to any country in Britain or France.

However, for security reasons, Australasia will first receive islands that are relatively close to the mainland, such as the British Solomon Islands Protectorate, which is very close to Australian New Guinea.

The land area of ​​the entire Solomon Islands is about 28,400 square kilometers, with a total population of nearly 220,000.

But the current Solomon Islands are divided and governed by Britain and Germany. Germany occupies the two islands in the north, and Britain occupies the entire Solomon Islands except these two islands.

After a note with the British ambassador to Australia, the transfer of colonies officially began on September 1, 1913.

The population of the British Solomon Islands Protectorate is about 150,000, of which less than 20,000 are British and European immigrants, and the rest are local indigenous people.

What needs to be solved is the issue of whether these 20,000 people stay or go. For the remaining nearly 130,000 indigenous population, the problem is easy.

Or, pay your life for the future construction of the Solomon Islands. Or, they will be repatriated to Southeast Asia or other regions.

There is also a more thorny issue, which is the resettlement of the Solomon Islands, or the political division level of the Solomon Islands.

There are generally two ideas and methods at present. One is to separate the Solomon Islands and create the Solomon Islands Colony.

The other is that because the Solomon Islands are close to New Guinea, some officials proposed to incorporate the Solomon Islands into the Australian New Guinea Colony without setting up separate administrative divisions.

These two proposals actually have little impact on Arthur.

After all, the governor of the colony is appointed by Arthur himself, which also means that the governor of the colony will be more loyal to Arthur than the elected governor.

Whether the Solomon Islands are incorporated into Australian New Guinea or as an independent colony, they are all within the scope of the colony, so the difference is not too big.

After comprehensive consideration, Arthur, at the suggestion of Prime Minister Kent, decided to make the Solomon Islands a separate colony and named it the Solomon Islands Colony.

After all, the Solomon Islands are hundreds of kilometers away from Australian New Guinea, and it is not convenient to manage them uniformly.

More state-level administrative units are also conducive to Arthur's rewarding his subordinates. At the same time, these colonial governors are also Arthur's loyal supporters, and to a certain extent, they can also support Arthur's status.

On September 2, a thousand-man colonial garrison accompanied the first governor of the Solomon Islands Colony, Mark McOsland, to the Solomon Islands, which also represented Australasia to take over the Solomon Islands and expand its sphere of influence again in Oceania and the Pacific.

Before Mark McOsland left, Arthur met with him specially and tested Mark McOsland's ability.

What the Solomon Islands have to do now is, first, to retain the population of the colony as much as possible and ensure the development of the colony.

Second, to stabilize the order of the colony as soon as possible and prevent possible chaos in the Solomon Islands.

Third, it is to establish a complete defense system in the Solomon Islands as much as possible. Coastal defense is also very important. After all, this is the actual northeastern border of Australasia.

Of course, these tasks are not difficult to complete in practice. At least from the perspective of Mark McOsland's ability, it is not difficult to complete these.

After all, the Solomon Islands also have more than 100,000 indigenous people to use. This is a labor resource that can be consumed at will, which can lay a solid foundation for various constructions in the Solomon Islands.

Taking advantage of this opportunity in the Solomon Islands, Arthur also modified the defense of all colonies.

The Solomon Islands and Australian Timor are each stationed with a garrison of about 1,000 people.

Australian New Guinea and the Royal Territory are stationed with a garrison of 3,000 people.

These garrisons are independent armies and are directly under the Ministry of Defense. The colonies have the power to apply for transfers, but the salaries, weapons and equipment of the garrisons are all provided by the Ministry of Defense.

Doing so can weaken the power of the colonial governors and minimize the possibility of the colonial governors' mercenaries becoming independent.

However, the colonial governor still has the power to mobilize these garrisons. After all, some policies regarding colonial security also require the cooperation of these garrisons.

After this mobilization, the number of troops stationed in the northern colonies and royal territories has been greatly reduced, and there are only 8,000 people at most.

However, with the cooperation of the Australasian Navy, the security of these colonies can still be guaranteed.

As for the 15 colonial divisions currently owned by Australasia, they were mobilized by Arthur to the mainland of Australasia for unified and standardized training.

Before the outbreak of World War I, they also had to undergo a period of training to ensure that they had a certain combat capability.

Of course, more importantly, it is necessary to cultivate the loyalty of these indigenous soldiers. At least there will be no chaos and no defection in the war, which is also the most basic requirement.

But I think it shouldn't be. After all, these troops will arrive at the European battlefield in the future. Who can they defect to? Defect to Germany?

You know, racism in Europe is much more serious than in Australasia, and they may not be free from life danger if they flee the battlefield.

It would be better to fight for Australasia. After winning, they will also receive the rewards promised by Arthur.

Yes, in order to motivate these soldiers and ensure that these indigenous troops will not be in chaos, Arthur promised that as long as these indigenous soldiers serve Australasia for ten years, they can get a financial reward and be sent to Southeast Asia with their families.

This is the first time that Arthur has publicly promised to send the indigenous people to Southeast Asia safely since he took control of the entire Australasia.

This also gave some indigenous people who originally thought that they would die in Australasia with a tragic fate hope of life, even if it was just for their families, they had to hold on to this life-saving straw.

In order to make these indigenous soldiers believe in their words, and to cultivate the combat effectiveness of these indigenous soldiers and ensure their loyalty.

Arthur waved his hand and provided meat for these indigenous soldiers, but only once every two days.

But this is much better than the lives of these indigenous people before. On the basis of obedient training every day, they can get enough food, beef, mutton and fruit every two days, even if it is just a tomato or apple, it is enough to make these natives excited.

In addition, these colonial divisions have instructors set up by Arthur, who are actually officials responsible for brainwashing.

Therefore, since the beginning of training, these 15 colonial divisions have not had too much chaos, and the training is also proceeding in an orderly manner.

In fact, this is also normal. After all, after these natives join the army, they and their families will be treated much better.

One of the many benefits of the native soldiers is that their families can be exempted from forced labor and become regular laborers under the government or colonial government, and they will also be paid for their work.

This also means that after these natives join the army, the safety and life of their families are guaranteed.

At the same time, some natives who are promoted to squad leaders and officers will be given more generous rewards and guarantees. With these natives conducting internal supervision, the control of the entire colonial division can be more secure.

The most critical rule to ensure that the colonial division has a certain degree of loyalty is that Arthur established a rule among the indigenous soldiers, which Arthur simply called the disclosure rule.

As long as you can expose the disloyalty of your comrades and superiors, you can get a generous reward once it is verified.

This reward includes a certain amount of money, as well as the freedom of the informer and his family.

This also means that if the disclosure is successful, you and your family are likely to be directly free.

Even if money is not moved by people, Arthur believes that no indigenous people will not yearn for freedom. The promulgation of this disclosure rule will make some indigenous people with ulterior motives feel fearful even if the indigenous people do not have the courage to expose their comrades and superiors, and create rifts between indigenous people.

At the same time, there will not be too many indigenous soldiers from one region in a colonial division.

Such rules are even deepened to the class unit. In the same combat class, there will basically be no more than two indigenous people from the same region.

This also means that these indigenous soldiers are relatively unfamiliar with their comrades, which increases the possibility of indigenous soldiers exposing their comrades and increases the distrust and suspicion between indigenous people.

The best way to manage these indigenous people is to separate indigenous people from indigenous people and use indigenous people to manage indigenous people.

Under various policies, even if the loyalty of the colonial division is not too high, it can be used for combat.

Anyway, these colonies are sent to Europe, and their life and death are not important to Arthur.

Of course, Arthur will do what he says. After the end of World War I, most of the indigenous people will be repatriated by Arthur, even including those who did not join the army.

All indigenous soldiers are uniformly equipped with Lee Enfield rifles, which also consumes part of the rifle inventory of the Royal Ordnance Factory.

However, the good news is that the British Empire supported part of the funds for this batch of equipment, and the Australasian Ministry of Defense did not contribute much.

In addition to rifles, the colonial divisions are equipped with very few heavy weapons. Each colonial division is only equipped with a few machine guns and more than a dozen artillery pieces, and the heavy firepower weapons are just for show.

Compared with the luxuriously equipped regular troops and Guards Division, the equipment of the Colonial Division seemed a bit shabby.

But after all, they were used as cannon fodder by Arthur, and being equipped with some machine guns and artillery was quite good.

In terms of training, the colonial division also had a big gap with the regular troops.

The most important training for the colonial division was discipline and discipline training, and simple English training.

This was to facilitate these soldiers to communicate better with Europeans after going to Europe, and to make these soldiers better obey the command of Australasian officers.

As for target shooting training, although the colonial division also had it, it was not as frequent as the regular troops.

Generally speaking, these indigenous soldiers can conduct target shooting training once every five days, and each target shooting training consumes about ten bullets per person, and an average of two bullets per person per day.

This also means that 300,000 indigenous soldiers consume up to 600,000 bullets per day, which is also a test for the production capacity of the Royal Arsenal.

However, such consumption is also effective. At least these indigenous soldiers have improved their marksmanship a lot since they joined the army.

Of course, the Ministry of National Defense did not expect these indigenous soldiers to have good marksmanship. From the shooting training every five days, it can be seen that the Ministry of National Defense's requirements are actually just to let these indigenous soldiers master the use of firearms proficiently, so as to avoid not knowing how to shoot on the battlefield.

Anyway, when they arrived at the European battlefield, the consumption of these indigenous soldiers was basically provided by the British Empire.

As for whether these indigenous soldiers would waste a lot of bullets, it depends on the strength of the British Empire's logistics capabilities and the speed of production of military factories.

While the colonial divisions were conducting a lot of training, the training of the regular forces of Australasia, two guards divisions and three regular divisions did not stop.

This also led to the current daily training consumption of soldiers in Australasia, which is a very large number.

At present, the bullets consumed by ordinary soldiers in each shooting training are as high as 20 rounds, which also means that the bullets consumed by all ordinary soldiers in each shooting training are as high as 1.6 million rounds.

This does not count the training consumption of the colonial divisions, otherwise the number will be higher.

Of course, regular troops do not conduct shooting training every day, after all, there are many other trainings. But in theory, soldiers of the regular army conduct target practice at least three times a week.

Calculated in this way, the annual bullet consumption of all the armies in Australasia is nearly 100 million rounds.

If Arthur had not ordered the Royal Arsenal to expand frantically and increase the production speed of weapons and equipment in order to cope with the future world war, I am afraid that the consumption in Australasia alone would be enough to give the Royal Arsenal a headache.

The current Royal Arsenal is one of the largest enterprises in Australasia.

The Royal Arsenal has a total of 17,000 employees, one main factory and two branches.

With the combined production capacity of the three factories, the Royal Arsenal can produce 500 Lee Enfield rifles, 200 Gew98 rifles, 90 artillery pieces of various types, 30 heavy machine guns, 110 submachine guns, and 400 grenades per day.

In terms of ammunition, the Royal Arsenal can produce 500,000 rounds of rifle bullets, 150,000 rounds of machine gun bullets, and 8,700 rounds of various artillery shells per day.

If we can concentrate our efforts on producing a certain type of weapon or ammunition, the output value of this type of weapon and ammunition should be able to multiply several times, but the disadvantage is that the output value of other weapons and ammunition will decrease.

However, the good news is that the production capacity of the Royal Arsenal is still increasing, and it will increase almost every few months.

Moreover, in addition to the Royal Arsenal, Australasia's current civilian military factories, including those invested by the government and the royal consortium, can also produce 100 rifles and more than 100,000 rounds of various ammunition per day.

A sufficiently developed military industry is the basis for Australasia to dare to participate in World War I, and it is also Arthur's confidence in gaining enough benefits in World War I.

You know, in World War I, countries around the world were very short of weapons, ammunition and supplies.

In the war, the problems caused by the shortage of weapons and ammunition also made these countries miserable.

In particular, Australasia's current ally Russia is one of the hardest hit countries lacking weapons, ammunition and other supplies.

In 1915 alone, Russia ordered 3 million rifles, 2 billion rounds of bullets and 12 million rounds of artillery shells from the Allies and neutral countries, but only 8-15% of these arms actually arrived.

This also means that the arms market in World War I is infinite. Whether or not you can get this cake depends not only on the strength of the country, but also on the development of the military industry.

With Arthur's advance preparation, it was not difficult for the Royal Arsenal and the military industry in Australasia to obtain enough weapons orders in World War I.

To this end, under Arthur's supervision, the Royal Arsenal has begun to frantically stockpile weapons and equipment, including various weapons and ammunition.

According to Arthur's understanding, the Royal Arsenal currently has more than 500,000 rifles of various types, 250 million rounds of bullets, 1,200 machine guns, 750 artillery pieces, 67 million machine gun bullets, 1.1 million rounds of artillery shells, 209,000 grenades and other weapons and equipment in stock, and it is still growing.

If Arthur had not been afraid of harming the normal development of Australasia, he would have even planned to expand the Royal Arsenal and other military factories madly, and to lay out production lines for all kinds of weapons and ammunition.

At least in World War I, weapons and ammunition were not difficult to sell. The more weapons and ammunition you can produce, the more money and benefits you have.

As a member of the Allied Powers, Australasia can sell weapons and ammunition to Britain, France and Russia. Why not do it if you can gain the favor of these three countries?

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