1850 American Gold Baron

Chapter 385 The advantage is not mine

Populism is a very dangerous thing.

Especially in this era when most people don't have the ability to think rationally.

As soon as the Dutch-Indian colonial government's atrocities against the Chinese in Borneo were announced, the entire California public, especially the Chinese community, instantly exploded.

The headlines on the front pages of major newspapers about the Royal Dutch East India Army's massacre of Chinese people on Borneo Island and the photos of massacres of local Chinese and Chinese Americans, and the burning of Chinese huts are so dazzling.

Collins, a veteran media person in California, is indeed an experienced media person. Even the stunning women in the photos are carefully selected.

In the photo, the soldiers of the Royal Dutch East India Army holding rifles with bayonets and the Dutch officers waving sabers were actors that Collins found on the street.

The old and weak Chinese women and children who fell under the sword of the Royal Dutch East India Army were also actors selected by Collins from the Chinese immigrants waiting to be resettled in the temporary resettlement area with a salary of 30 cents a day, including food and accommodation.

Even the sheds are new ones that have just been built.

Collins's photographs were successful in inspiring empathy among Californians.

However, there are also a handful of sharp-eyed and knowledgeable Chinese who wonder: How can these red-haired ghosts of the Dutch East India Company be equipped with American Springfield M1842 rifles?

However, these minor issues are innocuous. Many Chinese people do not know what the Dutch-Indian government is, let alone telling whether the photos are authentic or fake.

Although many Chinese people do not know what the Dutch East India Company is, they know what the Dutch are.

Many Dutch and Scottish immigrants have been greeted with cordial greetings in recent days. Either their windows have been smashed, or they are inexplicably surrounded by a group of Chinese and other ethnic groups who are doing no good when walking on the street.

The Dutch and Scottish immigrants soon learned that their red hair was to blame.

Because the Chinese call the Dutch red-haired ghosts, red hair is how they distinguish the Dutch from other white people.

Dutch immigrants and Scottish immigrants who knew the reason hurried to the barber shop and asked the shop owner to dye their red hair another color, or even cut it off altogether.

As a result, the business of the barber shop became booming, and the smiles of the shop owners were brighter than the blooming chrysanthemums.

Some clothing store owners who saw business opportunities even sold clothes and hats with the words "I am American, not Dutch" written in both Chinese and English in their stores. These clothes and hats were quickly swept away by immigrants with obvious Dutch characteristics.

And light.

Even teachers at language schools that teach Chinese were pestered by white people with obvious Dutch characteristics as soon as they left school, asking them how to quickly tell the Chinese whether they were Dutch.

Even Jeremiah, the director of St. Francis Shipyard, couldn't help but complain to Liang Yao that because of his Dutch origin, he had often caused unreasonable disasters recently.

In fact, Jeremiah's ancestors immigrated to New Amsterdam at that time, which is now New York, as early as the middle of the 18th century. After several generations of mixed blood, they no longer have much to do with the Netherlands. They are typical Americans.

But it is useless to explain these things to the people who have lost their minds.

On the last day of 1853, the Chinese Chamber of Commerce announced the suspension of all trade activities with the Dutch East India Company.

Just a week later, the California state government also passed a bill declaring an embargo on the Dutch and Indian authorities until the Royal Dutch East India Army withdrew from the island of Borneo.

The next day, the California Consortium announced that the ports of San Francisco, Los Angeles, Pearl Harbor in Hawaii, Nagasaki Port in Japan, and Xiangshan Port in China operated by the California Consortium would be suspended for all Dutch East India Company operations from the time they received news from the headquarters.

, as well as any services provided by any merchant ship flying the Dutch flag.

"It's still the unity of California. If the unity of California on the island of Borneo can be half as united as that of California, why should we let the red-haired ghosts bully us to this extent? We can't even keep a foothold."

Seeing this scene, Liu Shanbang couldn't help but sigh.

"California is united because there are people like Mr. Liang in California, but we in Borneo don't have people like Mr. Liang." Wang Jia also sighed.

"In Borneo, it was us who looked at foreigners, but here, it is foreigners who look at us."

In Tingtao Garden on January 15, 1854, Liang Yaozheng was mobilizing and deploying his own armed forces based on the intelligence collected from the Royal Dutch East India Army.

"According to the intelligence we have collected, the troops of the Dutch Indian authorities are composed of European Dutch volunteers and locally recruited indigenous soldiers.

Of course, in addition to European volunteers and indigenous recruits, their troops also recruited more than 2,000 foreign mercenaries of multiple nationalities and other nationalities.

However, the officer corps of the Dutch and Indian authorities are all composed of Dutch." Elvis, the commander of the Arizona Infantry Regiment, introduced to everyone.

"It must be emphasized that they are not completely professional soldiers. The Royal Dutch East Indies Army is not a military institution, but a military police agency. They play both the role of police and military functions in the Dutch East Indies.

According to my assessment, the cohesion of this army, whose officer corps is composed of Dutch and Dutch expatriates, whose non-commissioned officers are composed of European mercenaries, and whose soldiers are composed of Europeans and local indigenous people, is very problematic.

Its combat effectiveness is even lower than that of the newly formed Beaver Regiment."

Krueger, the leader of the Beaver Group, added.

Fillmore gave Liang Yao an organization of four and a half regiments. At the end of 1853, he responded to problems such as the excessive treatment of California Infantry Regiment soldiers and the mismatch between the current organization and equipment and tactics.

Liang Yao organized his officer corps to begin reforming his armed force, the Western Brigade.

After the reform, one-third of the non-commissioned officers and half of the soldiers of the California Infantry Regiment retired and became mercenaries for the Umbrella Company.

The military reform of the California Infantry Regiment left gaps in non-commissioned officers and soldiers to be filled by selecting the best from the original militia regiment.

Liang Yao concurrently serves as the commander of the California Infantry Regiment.

Due to the reasonable salary, the Arizona Infantry Regiment did not change much. In order to adapt to the new military structure of one regiment with four battalions and one battalion with three companies, the original ten infantry companies were expanded to twelve infantry companies.

The Arizona Infantry Regiment was still commanded by Colonel Elvis.

The Beaver Regiment, also known as the Oregon Infantry Regiment, was a new regiment formed by recruiting California citizens with military experience from the original California Militia Regiment that had not been transferred to the California National Infantry Regiment.

At the same time, the Beaver Regiment is also the only infantry regiment among the three infantry regiments that has no actual combat experience and record, and is recognized as the weakest infantry regiment in the Western Brigade.

The leader of the Beaver Regiment is former instructor and current U.S. Army Colonel Krueger.

The three infantry regiments are not the entire armed strength of the Western Brigade.

In addition to three conventional infantry regiments, after military reform, Liang Yao also has a cavalry battalion, an artillery battalion, and an engineer battalion.

Kruger said that the combat effectiveness of the Royal Dutch East India Army was not as good as that of the Beaver Regiment, which somewhat meant that he looked down upon the Royal Dutch East India Army.

The Royal Dutch East India Army was a colonial army established on September 14, 1814 by a Dutch royal decree, and also had police functions.

The personnel composition of the Royal Dutch East India Army is very similar to the colonial army formed by the British East India Company in India. The basic structure is white officers from the mother country plus local indigenous soldiers.

The big difference is that the officers of the British East India Company's colonial army are basically British, but the Netherlands, with a population of only three million, cannot do this.

In addition to accepting the Dutch and Dutch expatriates, the Royal Dutch East Indies Army also mainly accepts Flemish (Flemish region of Belgium, located on the northern coast of Belgium), Germans, Swiss and French. If you can master the Dutch

If you speak Chinese or German, priority will be given to employment.

Walloons (Belgian region of Wallonia, located in the interior of southern Belgium), Arabs, and nationals of the United Kingdom and the United States were prohibited from serving in the Royal Dutch East Indies Army.

The largest number of indigenous soldiers in the Royal Dutch East India Army were mainly composed of Javanese, Ambon and Manado, with the majority of them being Javanese.

When Liang Yao went to Borneo, apart from the armed forces of the Lan Fong Company that had taken refuge with the Dutch colonial authorities on Borneo, the biggest enemy was the Royal Dutch East India Army of the Dutch colonial authorities.

The Royal Dutch East Indies Army is not part of the Royal Netherlands Army, but is an independent army formed specifically for service in the Dutch East Indies.

As for the achievements of the Royal Dutch East India Army, most of them were achieved with the indigenous people of the Indonesian archipelago, such as the Padre War from 1821 to 1845, the Java War from 1825 to 1830, and the war to suppress the colonial rule of the Bali residents in 1849.

Although these wars against the local natives were victorious in the end, the Royal Dutch East India Army did not fight well. Kruger even believed that with an absolute advantage in equipment, they could win against the local uncivilized natives.

Once upon a time, the Royal Dutch East India Army was also talented.

"I agree with Colonel Kruger's point of view. When the Royal Dutch East India Army was formed, the grassroots European soldiers and indigenous soldiers were divided in half. With European soldiers holding back the battle, the Royal Dutch East India Army could still maintain a certain combat effectiveness.

But since 1835, because the Dutch East India Company could not recruit enough European soldiers in Europe, the ratio of European soldiers to indigenous soldiers has changed from 1:1 to 1:3, or it may be higher.

Therefore, I also believe that the combat effectiveness of the Royal Dutch East India Army is constantly declining, and I am skeptical about their combat effectiveness."

Elvis agreed with Kruger that the Royal Dutch East India Army was inferior to the Western Brigade in terms of combat effectiveness.

The Western Brigade is an army created with money and bullets. Except for the Beaver Regiment, everyone has corresponding combat experience.

If it couldn't even compete with the Royal Dutch East India Army, which was composed of Europeans and indigenous people and fought back and forth with the indigenous people, it would be a bit unreasonable.

"Strategically, we must despise the enemy, and tactically we must pay attention to the enemy. The Royal Dutch East Indies Army has more than 8,000 European officers and soldiers and more than 20,000 indigenous soldiers. We are still at a disadvantage in terms of military strength."

Liang Yao said.

During this military operation, Liang Yao was more nervous and apprehensive than when he was on the expedition to Japan.

After all, the vassal soldiers of various Japanese vassals and the army of the Tokugawa Shogunate were essentially medieval armies, and there was a generational difference between them and his army.

There is no obvious generational difference between the Royal Dutch East India Army and the Western Brigade, and Liang Yao does not have an advantage in maritime power. Liang Yao is not sure of victory.

Before fighting, it is better not to underestimate your opponent.

"I think we still have certain technological advantages on land. Didn't Wang Jia and Liu Shanbang say that they still have 20,000 adult men who can be armed to participate in the battle?" Fremont stood up and interjected.

"On the contrary, there is a huge disparity between our maritime power and that of the Dutch and Indian authorities. In order to control the war to a certain scale, the American Navy will not intervene. I heard that you have a good relationship with the commander of the Qing Navy. Can you please win over him?

Come over and help out? We can give you money."

"Let Hong Mingxiang help out?" Liang Yao shook his head.

"Not to mention whether Hong Mingxiang dares to mobilize troops to help us privately, even if he has the guts to earn this money and dares to mobilize troops to help us, the Guangdong Navy only has six Loach-class battleships and some old-fashioned Chinese sailboats. I'm afraid he can't help us.

Not too busy."

"Considering the issue of economic efficiency, the Dutch East India Company does not have many serious warships. The sailing warships in service are all sailing warships from the last century or even the last century! Armed merchant ships are the main force of the Dutch East India Company at sea.

major force.

We still have at least four warships that are iron-clad and have been equipped with Sacramento guns, and we have modified some merchant ships, towed a dozen Loach-class ships, and mobilized some civilian armed merchant ships, so we still have a good chance of winning."

Sven, who had just returned from Sven Island, rubbed his hands and said excitedly.

Sven had long wanted to engage in a serious naval battle. Although there were naval battles between the United States and Japan during the expedition to Japan, that kind of naval battle with completely asymmetrical strength was no different from Sven's view and was not considered target practice at sea.

Real naval battle.

"More than a dozen Loach-class ships? The Anti-Smuggling Bureau has all switched jobs and no longer has to work, right? If the Anti-Smuggling Bureau doesn't work, your Global Shipping Company will pay to support us next year?"

After hearing Si Wen's suggestion to take a dozen Loach-class ships to fight naval battles in Southeast Asia, Deng Wenyu immediately jumped out to object.

"The Dagang Company and other resistance companies still have seven or eight ships available, but the ships are small and not as big as yours. However, we know some local pirates who have a long-standing feud with the Dutch East India Company. These are also maritime areas that can be fought for.

Strength." Liu Shanbang said.

(End of chapter)