Chapter 617: Franco-Austrian Alliance
The most anxious country in the world recently should be the French, who have always regarded the British as their rivals.
Take a closer look at what Britain has done in the past two years. It has taken control of Central America, gained Persia, and fully controlled the Middle East.
With the help of Australasia, Britain has absolute voice in Europe and the World Alliance. As the strongest country in the European continent, the French have far less voice in Europe than Britain.
The naval limitation treaty makes it impossible for the French to catch up with Britain in the navy, and the isolation and helplessness in diplomacy also make the French feel crisis.
After all these considerations, the French feel it is necessary to find an ally for themselves, a reliable ally at the level of a great power to relieve their pressure.
Looking carefully at all the European countries, only Russia and Italy can be called great powers at present.
These two countries are obviously unreliable. The complete Russia may have the strength to help France, but now it is an incomplete Russia that has been damaged by the civil war, and the Russians have no intention of participating in things outside of Russia. Nicholas II's attention is all on recovery and development.
Italy is naturally needless to say. After Mussolini established a dictatorship, Italy's presence in international affairs has been greatly reduced.
And Italy's performance in World War I was indeed not very good. Such an ally would even become a burden to the French and was first eliminated by the French.
In addition, there are not many countries in Europe that can provide help to France. After careful consideration and selection, the French still set their sights on the Austrian Empire, which has been greatly weakened.
Speaking of the Austrian Empire, it should be the luckiest country among the Allied Powers in World War I. Although it lost part of its territory including Galicia, Bosnia, Hungary and northern Italy, the core of the country, Austria and Bohemia, are still there.
However, because of the loss of the Kingdom of Hungary, the current Austro-Hungarian Empire has been renamed the Austrian Empire and restored its original imperial name.
However, even if it only relies on Austria and Bohemia, the current Austrian Empire still has the strength of a great power, but it is just a relatively bottom-ranked great power.
It is precisely because of the loss of most of its territory and the heavy casualties in World War I that the Allies did not impose such high restrictions on the Austrian Empire, and the current recovery of its industrial strength is still relatively good.
The French could not form an alliance with Germany, so they naturally set their sights on the Austrian Empire.
Although the Austrian Empire did not seem to be the best choice, they could not choose countries like Poland and Turkey.
Poland's overall strength was not necessarily stronger than that of the Austrian Empire, but the Polish ambitions had offended Russia.
The French had no intention of offending Russia for Poland, because in the eyes of the French, after the Tsarist Russia regained its strength, it was still their more important ally in Europe.
Perhaps stimulated by the British control of the entire Persia, the French quickly contacted the Austrian Empire, and signed a treaty between the two countries in the eyes of a group of officials of the Austrian Empire and Karl I who were very excited.
The reason for the excitement was that Karl I's position was already very dangerous.
Although he was able to keep his throne because of the joint declaration of the European royal families and the operation of Karl I, he was still a defeated country after all, and the Austrian Empire still had to bear a lot of reparations.
Although the industry and economy have recovered a little, the financial situation of the imperial government and the economic situation of the Austrians are not optimistic because a large amount of funds have to be spent on reparations every year.
Although Karl I has been trying his best to maintain his reputation and donating some royal funds from time to time to help the Austrians.
But there are still many voices to abolish the royal family. After all, the culprit who made the Austrian Empire a defeated country was actually Emperor Franz who signed the declaration of war at that time.
The old emperor's prestige in the Austro-Hungarian Empire was indeed very high during his lifetime, but this did not prevent him from bringing disaster to the Austro-Hungarian Empire after making the Austro-Hungarian Empire a defeated country in World War I.
If the Austro-Hungarian Empire was not a defeated country, Karl I would not have been deposed just a few years after ascending the throne in history.
The reason for signing an alliance with the Austrian Empire was not only because of the remaining strength of the Austrian Empire, but also because the Austrian Empire was close to Russia and could achieve the Paris-Vienna-St. Petersburg system.
The important reason why the Russians remained silent in international diplomacy was actually Russia's poor industry and economy, as well as Soviet Russia, which posed a threat to Tsarist Russia.
As long as France and the Austrian Empire can provide Russia with a lot of support, Russia's unification and return to its peak are inevitable.
By then, the three countries of France, Austria and Russia will be able to compete with Britain and Australia together, and will completely suppress Britain and Australia in terms of army strength. This is also the hope that the French see to defeat the British.
Although they have to constantly support the Austrian Empire and Russia for this, and even pay a lot of money and materials for this.
But making friends with allies is not without paying. The British provided a large amount of materials and equipment to their ally Australasia, which in return won the support of a powerful Australasia.
The French also decided to follow the example of Britain and cultivate their allies into two powerful countries.
The French aid is an emergency for the current Austrian Empire, and it is also a timely help.
Especially, some of the food and medical supplies provided by the French can help to stabilize the prices of the Austrian Empire and allow the Austrians to have enough food, which is the most important thing at present.
After all, only when the people have enough food will they not make trouble. If the people do not make trouble, the government's rule will be stable and the status of Karl I will be stable.
In order to express their sincerity, the French even exempted most of the Austrian Empire's compensation to France, which greatly reduced the pressure of the Austro-Hungarian Empire to pay compensation.
After all, the main compensation countries of the defeated countries are the four Allied Powers of Britain, France, Russia and Australia. In particular, the proportion of compensation received by the United States since the flu incident has been completely offset, which also means that the proportion of compensation received by the French is actually greater.
The French gave up the compensation of the Austrian Empire, which also made the Austro-Hungarian Empire feel relieved, at least it was not so nervous about the compensation.
It is precisely under this so-called mutual benefit that France and the Austrian Empire are getting closer and closer, and there are also frequent reports of the signing of an alliance between France and the Austrian Empire.
The British were not surprised by this. After all, the French were not wooden stakes and would definitely take their own actions.
To be honest, the British were surprised that the French did not make trouble in the previous Central American War and the current Persian War. It was normal to find allies in Europe.
For Britain, even if France and the Austrian Empire really formed an alliance, the threat to Britain was not that great.
After all, the Austrian Empire was still a defeated country and suffered a considerable degree of restrictions.
What's more, the Balkan countries that had fought against the Austrian Empire had expanded their strength compared to before World War I.
In particular, Serbia, which had hatred for the Austrian Empire, was still a major threat to Austria.
Austria had Germany in the north, Hungary in the east, Italy in the south, and Serbia and other Balkan countries in the southeast.
The westernmost part also bordered the neutral country Switzerland, which made the Austrian Empire attacked from several sides, and its development space had been greatly reduced.
If you want to make the Austrian Empire a threat, you must be able to regain control of Hungary and then control the Balkans.
But whether it is Hungary or the Balkan countries, it is definitely impossible for them to be controlled by the Austrian Empire so easily.
It is not even an exaggeration to say that judging from the current limited strength of the Austrian Empire, it is not necessarily possible to defeat the Balkan countries.
As for Hungary, Hungary's independence was a hot topic at the time, and the Hungarians naturally could not take the initiative to join Austria.
From the current situation alone, the alliance between the French and the Austrian Empire is actually a good thing for the British.
Because after the French gave up the reparations, the Austrians had more funds to compensate Britain and Australasia.
Combined with France's aid to the Austrian Empire, isn't this equivalent to France compensating Britain and Australasia in disguise?
It is certainly a good thing to gain an ally, but it is not necessarily a good thing when you have to pay a lot of price for it and you have to support the enemy.
Perhaps the French did feel pressure from the British. In short, the alliance between France and the Austrian Empire was signed very quickly, and the Franco-Austrian alliance speculated by the media became a reality.
Arthur was surprised by the alliance between France and Austria, because it meant that the world situation was completely different from history and was already developing in another direction.
However, this was not necessarily a bad thing for Australasia. The Austro-Hungarian Empire became the Austrian Empire plus Hungary, and it still had a certain weight and strength.
This also meant that even if Germany became the Third Reich in the future, it would not be so easy to annex Austria.
It might even directly trigger a world war, and the future World War II would become confusing, and no one knew what the situation would be.
Arthur was not even sure whether the mustache could succeed in taking the throne, and whether the situation in World War II would be the same as in history.
But no matter how the world situation develops, Australasia does not have to worry too much with its geographical advantages.
In addition to Australasia's leading position in tanks and aircraft, and the development of rockets, missiles, and nuclear weapons that Arthur attached great importance to, World War II would not be out of Arthur's control no matter how it developed.
Compared with the alliance between France and the Austrian Empire, Arthur paid more attention to one of Australasia's current development policies, which was the old-fashioned colonial localization policy.
As the first region to truly achieve localization of colonies, the development of Timor-Leste in the past four years can be said to be a natural outcome.
Five years ago, Timor had a population of only 110,000, but now, the population of Timor-Leste has exceeded 250,000. Its infrastructure and urban scale are no less than those of Tasmania, and it is completely native to Australasia.
After the successful localization of Timor, the government directly set its sights on most colonies, including the large-scale colony of New Guinea.
If Timor is a pilot area for localization of colonies, then the first batch of regions to officially enter the localization of colonies are New Guinea, Solomon Islands, New Caledonia, Fiji and other regions.
Of course, neither Arthur nor the government thought of localizing all these colonies at once.
After all, localization is not just a name, as long as all aspects of the colonies are built like the local areas.
This requires not only a population that matches the local population, but also a considerable degree of industrial and agricultural construction, a large amount of materials and energy, etc.
In the past four years, the government has paid the most attention to and vigorously carried out localization construction, naturally, the New Guinea colony.
In terms of land size, the land size of the New Guinea colony is not inferior to any state, and it is even a bit extravagant to regard it as a state.
However, because the current population of New Guinea has just exceeded 800,000, it cannot support too many administrative divisions.
At present, there are three major cities in the New Guinea colony, which are actually the capitals of each of the three divisions at that time.
As the first area controlled by Australasia, Port Moresby, the former capital of the Australian New Guinea colony, is currently the largest city in the New Guinea colony and the only city with a population of more than 250,000.
In addition, there are two cities with a population of more than 100,000, Herbertshoe and Modowe.
Then there are many small coastal cities with populations ranging from thousands to tens of thousands, such as Ballymo, Kerima, Okaba, Wan, Jayapura, Lae, etc.
The so-called localization of colonies actually means building these colonial cities into local cities, and then influencing smaller towns and villages.
Arthur still attaches great importance to New Guinea's localization policy. In order to review New Guinea's progress, he decided to go to New Guinea in person to inspect the localization progress of many cities.
The first stop must be Port Moresby, the capital of New Guinea.
On August 11, 1925, Arthur, escorted by the fleet and a group of guards, arrived in Port Moresby with some government officials and was warmly welcomed by the Governor of New Guinea, local officials, and a large number of New Guinean immigrants.
Arthur has been to Port Moresby before, but compared with the last time he came to Port Moresby, the current Port Moresby gives Arthur the feeling that it is larger and more advanced.
This is actually normal. After all, the population of Port Moresby has increased several times, and it is impossible for the port not to expand.
At present, the island of New Guinea has achieved almost zero indigenous people. If you don't think about this as a colonial city, there is actually not much difference between the current Port Moresby and the ports in Australasia.
All residents of this port city are Australians, and all architectural styles, various systems, etc. are all Australasia.
Accompanied by John Price, the governor of the New Guinea colony, Arthur inspected the hospitals, schools, streets and infrastructure in Port Moresby, and was quite satisfied with the localization process of Port Moresby.
In the next few days, Arthur successively inspected Kerima, Palermo, Lae, Okaba, Wann and other areas, and even went to Herbertshoe on New Britain and Kavieng on New Ireland. The inspection situation was basically not much different from that of Port Moresby, and the localization construction of these cities was relatively successful.
This also represents a fact that after Timor became a direct state last time, the time for the New Guinea colony to become a direct state of New Guinea will not be far away.
Compared with immigrants in the colonies, these permanent residents of New Guinea would definitely prefer to become residents of the native cities, that is, the direct states.
Because the welfare policies of the native cities are definitely better than those of the colonies, and the infrastructure that can be enjoyed, including various transportation conveniences, is something that the colonial cities cannot experience.
After affirming what Governor John did in New Guinea, Arthur set out on the journey back to Sydney.
Since the localization work in New Guinea is well done, the progress of renaming the New Guinea colony to the direct state of New Guinea can also be accelerated.
After all, if the war breaks out, there will definitely not be much time to continue the localization work of the colonies.
This also means that if the localization of the colonies cannot be completed before the war comes, if the colonies want to continue to localize after the war, they will inevitably be hindered by countries including the United States.
Besides, after the localization of the colonies, the economic development of these cities will also accelerate. If the Great Depression breaks out again, it will also help Australasia to better survive the economic crisis and reduce the damage caused by the economic crisis to the country.
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