Dominate the Country

Half of the Michigan Peninsula where Detroit is located is now controlled by the US military. This peninsula is like a sluice that separates Lake Michigan and Lake Huron. The two lakes are connected by the narrow Mackinac Channel, which is very close to Sault Ste. Marie. Lake Huron, which is more northerly, is connected to Lake Superior, the westernmost of the Great Lakes, through Sault Ste. Marie, and Lake Superior is closely connected to the Mississippi River that runs through the north and south of the United States.

From Lake Huron, further east is Lake Erie. Although Lake Erie is connected to Lake Ontario to the east, the Niagara River connects the two lakes, and there is a magnificent Niagara Falls in between. The Niagara Fort built by the French is now becoming a key point for Britain to communicate with the United States.

From Lake Erie to the west is the Detroit River, and then Lake St. Clair - the St. Clair River and the waters of Lake Huron. Therefore, as long as Chen Han controls Detroit, he can not only cut off a blood vessel for Britain to supply the United States - the north of Detroit is the southern convex part of Canada in the Great Lakes region, where the cities of Toronto and Hamilton in later generations are located. It is too convenient for the British to transport supplies to the United States from here. In addition, it can cut off an arm of the US Navy.

In the later generations of Michigan, there is a place in the upper and lower peninsulas that is close to Canada.

The Detroit area is one of them, located in the lower peninsula. And Sault Ste. Marie is the one located in the upper peninsula. Do you think the location of Sault Ste. Marie is important?

This place was still controlled by the British a few years ago. Although the population is not large, this is the earliest settlement established by white people in Michigan, which was in 1668.

But now Sault Ste. Marie is divided into two, with the Sault Ste. Marie River as the dividing line. The north belongs to Britain and the south is controlled by Chen Han. The South Sault Ste. Marie controlled by Chen Han was originally given to the United States by the British. Fortunately, another border material transportation line was established on land.

As a result, the Americans were not up to the task. This area, which had been cultivated by the French since 1670 and was the location of Wisconsin in the United States in later generations, was cleared by Jiang Kui and his troops at the beginning of the war. The British had to transport the large amounts of materials stored in North Sault Ste. Marie by ship to Sarnia [the mouth of the St. Clair River].

All the territory [Wisconsin] was occupied by the Chinese. The Americans had no foothold here. Why did the British still store so many military supplies in North Sault Ste. Marie? Did the British have to go down in person? This was obviously impossible.

Chen Han captured half of the Lower Peninsula of Michigan in the subsequent battles, so the entire Lake Michigan became Chen Han's inner lake-Lake Michigan was wrapped between Michigan and Wisconsin in the United States in later generations. The land of Michigan in later generations is the northern part of the Michigan Peninsula [Lower Peninsula] and the Wisconsin Peninsula [Upper Peninsula], which is the Upper and Lower Peninsulas of Michigan. The width between the upper and lower peninsulas is only about twelve miles, and there are three closely spaced islands at the upper mouth of the waterway: Mackinac Island, DeLong Island and Boi Blanc Island for cover. This is the Mackinac Channel mentioned earlier. Chen Han deployed a large number of artillery at this point, and also set up water rafts and hidden piles to successfully "protect" Lake Michigan. The straight-line distance from here to Sault Ste. Marie is less than 250 miles.

The 14 American warships commanded by Colonel McDonough Thomas, commander of the U.S. Great Lakes Fleet, can now only operate between Lake Huron and Lake Erie. Detroit is the top priority for connecting these two lakes.

The Great Lakes are not navigable to the Atlantic Ocean now. Historically, the Erie Canal, which took more than eight years to build [influenced by the Second Anglo-American War], had not even a blueprint design planned at this time. The Welland Canal [which bypasses the waterfall to connect Lake Erie and Lake Ontario] was built later than the Erie Canal in history. Therefore, the Great Lakes cannot be directly connected to the Atlantic Ocean, even for the smallest single-masted warship.

Let's put it this way, after the British handed over their nine small warships to the United States, they no longer had any serious surface weapons. Because the ships from outside could not be transported in, the British, in addition to rushing to build them themselves, either used their transport ships as gunboats.

So, Sault Ste. Marie, a city more than 200 miles away from Detroit, with China and Britain controlling the north and south cities respectively, became the rear base of the war. And with the uninterrupted exchanges between China and Britain, this city has become more and more important. All kinds of drunkards and snakes gather here!

Because this land connects Lake Superior, Lake Huron and Lake Michigan, it is the intersection of the three lake channels, and Lake Huron and Lake Michigan are two very important points for the current Sino-US war.

The area around Lake Michigan was occupied by Chen Han, which was an enemy-occupied area for the Americans; and Lake Huron was a war zone, and the five American warships were always floating on this water. Sault Ste. Marie is also the only way for Chen Han to exchange intelligence and trade with the British. It is like the Great Shanghai during the Anti-Japanese War in the original time and space. Although it has fallen into the hands of the enemy, all kinds of people gather here, and the enemy and us are engaged in endless spy wars. It is also a city of great significance to Britain and the United States.

Sault Ste. Marie was originally just an inconspicuous small city. It was only because of the war that it "shined" in the North American continent.

With the investment of Chen Han's manpower and material resources, the depressed and calm South Sault Ste. Marie in the early days of occupation quickly grew like a balloon. There is no fortress-style defensive fortress group here, but it is the center of trade between China and British Canada.

Fur, timber, grain, and cloth are the focus of Sino-British trade, and metals, gunpowder and medicines are prohibited items.

Moreover, trade between China and Britain is rarely traded in money, but mostly barter.

The British exported furs, timber and American ginseng, and traded grain, cloth and some handicrafts from Chinese merchants. The pricing of the former is lower than the original market price, while the pricing of the latter is much higher than the original market price.

Because the former is a commercial product, while the latter is a necessity of life. Especially food.

Chen Han's garrison here has always maintained the standard of a reorganized camp. No matter how the British stir up in America, the army here is always so much. At the same time, there is no fanfare to build fortresses and fortifications, and even the camp is a civil structure.

As a city that has prospered suddenly due to "import and export" trade, there are no indestructible reinforced concrete buildings in Sault Ste. Marie. The houses are still Western-style, which are left by the original residents. The houses and buildings that were reduced to ruins in the war, such as the church, have all been cleaned up. Things that can still be used are kept, and things that cannot be used are completely thrown away. The scars left by the war have faded to the point where they are almost invisible. There are less than a thousand residents in this small town now, and among them there are not only Chinese, but also some whites, blacks and mixed races, with very complicated origins - immigrants from various vassal states, Indians, British, a small number of Americans with the name of British, and a small number of black escaped slaves. As for the origins of mixed-race children, they are even more complicated. There are British-Indian mixed-races, French-Indian mixed-races, British-Black mixed-races, French-Black mixed-races and Indian-Black mixed-races.

In a city with a total of only a thousand people, the floating population is almost more than the permanent population. But no matter how many there are, the population will not exceed 2,000. One reorganized battalion is more than enough to suppress Sault Ste. Marie.

Even if the British deployed a regiment of regular troops in North Sault Ste. Marie, and Arthur Wellesley deployed almost one-third of the regular lobster soldiers he had left in North Sault Ste. Marie, South Sault Ste. Marie showed no pressure at all. This is also a confident performance! In fact, the most stressful and busiest place in South Sault Ste. Marie is not the garrison, but the police station.

Even if the British secretly support the Americans, the big ducks and Portugal, London will not have a direct conflict with Chen Han and openly intervene in the war.

The prosperity of business has allowed Chinese immigrants in South Sault Ste. Marie to quickly open pubs, shops and hotels. The population here is much less than the 3,000 people at the peak, especially the permanent residents, but the consumption capacity of the floating population is much greater than that of the past residents. But at least two-thirds of the thousand permanent residents are doing business wholeheartedly. The shadow of war does not scare them. On the contrary, many people think that this will maximize their interests.

The people of the South Sault Ste. Marie Police Department are more determined that there must be more than a few spies among the thousands of floating residents in the city. It can even be said that there are a lot of intelligence personnel.

Is South Sault Ste. Marie a trading point specifically for the British? It is so convenient for information transmission. The police station can finalize a group of suspected spies every day, and every now and then they can invite people to the police station for free.

And those prey that are about to fall into the net are really unaware? How is it possible. But they still go to South Sault Ste. Marie one after another. Anyway, the trade in South Sault Ste. Marie is still running, and there is no sign of decline.

It was noon, and the restaurants in the city were busy. Especially the old Luoyang shop in the center of the town. The owner, Liang Zhaoxing, is from Chenzhou Prefecture in eastern Henan. When he was a child, he followed his fellow villager Liang Guangliang to join the army, but his score in the recruit training was the last. In the following years, he was always working on the stove. I don’t know how he learned the skill of making soup from him. He made a good beef soup. It is rich and fragrant, and sticky without starch.

Liang Zhaoxing originally opened a shop to sell soup in Bankou Town, Chenzhou, his hometown. He was a retired soldier, and he had connections in his hometown to take care of him, so his business was doing well. People like him didn’t need to immigrate at all, but nothing could stop bad luck.

Liang Zhaoxing’s business was booming, and the shop was big, but it ended up in trouble. Someone got drunk in his shop and got into a fight and died. Although Liang Zhaoxing was not mainly responsible, the person who died was a second-generation official. People used a little trick to make Liang Zhaoxing’s business go bankrupt, and later he was reported on the immigration list, so he had no choice but to immigrate.

Maybe that person will be punished for his revenge, but the time of retribution is not so timely, Liang Zhaoxing's family has to immigrate. But relying on his skill of making soup and his previous savings, Liang Zhaoxing has already established a firm foothold in South Sault Ste. Marie.

Although he was always a cook in the army, he was much braver than ordinary people. Confident that the British dared not to have a conflict with Chen Han, South Sault Ste. Marie seemed dangerous, but in fact it was as solid as a rock.

Now the Liang family has settled down in the small town of South Sault Ste. Marie, relying on the unique beef soup, the reputation is resounding throughout the city.

The people who come here to drink soup are not only Chinese, but also many white people from the north. The Liang family's store is crowded with people.

This person is just changing with the times, just like the rootless duckweed, drifting with the wind.

In the original time and space, the fortune of the West was at its peak, and Western civilization flourished, becoming the universal value of the world. Westerners disdain to change their taste for Eastern food. The preserved eggs that many Chinese people like to eat are called devil's eggs by them, and bird's nest is called swallow's saliva. As for stinky tofu, hairy tofu, chicken feet, and internal organs, Westerners reject them all. Instead, they call the foie gras and caviar that they admire the world's three major delicacies, and many brain-deficient people still believe it.

But in this time and space, the fortune of the East is at its peak. China's powerful national strength shocked the whole of Europe, and China's splendid civilization and culture made Westerners take the initiative to learn. Human worship of the strong is not divided by East and West. With the support of China's strong national strength, Chen Han does not need to set up Confucius Institute in Europe with great fanfare. China's culture, food, customs, etiquette and other things have been continuously imported into the West for 20 to 30 years, and Westerners have been actively trying to understand them. The East is prosperous while the West is declining. The transformation of Westerners is just like many banana people and petty bourgeoisie in the original time and space who worship foreign things, infinitely admire the deliciousness and etiquette of Western food, and admire coffee and the West. Westerners have also begun to actively transform into egg people. Now many Westerners also think that "clear tea" is more tasteful, and they also think that China's eight major cuisines are delicious. And Western matsutake, caviar, and foie gras are all hehe.

Liang's beef soup restaurant is just a small and inconspicuous example. Those foreigners who drink Luoyang-style beef soup may not even notice the change in their hearts while admiring it.

Perhaps a hundred years from now, there will be some "masters" and "experts" in the West who will clamor to abolish Latin and implement Chinese characters; abolish the marriage system of monogamy with lovers and turn to monogamy with multiple concubines; do not believe in God but believe in the Three Pure Ones Buddha and the Jade Emperor.

Chinese schools will not have special exams on foreign languages, and in the education system of Western countries, Chinese will become extremely important.

Everything ultimately comes down to the question of the strength of a country.

Whether a national culture is competitive in the world depends on whether the country behind it is competitive in international affairs.