Greece to roman road

Prime Minister Venizelos first spoke: "Greece is located in the southwestern part of Europe. It is generally located on the edge of Europe, and its geographical location is important."

"Greece should take advantage of this favorable geographical location to actively develop industry, commerce and shipping industries, and enhance Greece's influence in the Eastern Mediterranean."

"For Greece, the most important thing is not to be easily involved in the conflict between the two European military groups."

"The government has decided to implement the Macedonian development plan within the next two years and adopt various measures to encourage people to reclaim land in Macedonia."

At this point, Venizelos paused briefly and continued: "If the finances are sufficient, the government will build the main railway line from Thessaloniki to Skopje as soon as possible, as well as other necessary roads, to consolidate the Greek government's control over Macedonia. "

Talking about financial issues, Venizelos took off the gold-rimmed glasses on the bridge of his nose and rubbed his brow: "Greece is now under great financial pressure. The Ministry of Finance has issued hundreds of millions of drachmas in national debt. This year's fiscal deficit It’s already impressive,...”

As Prime Minister, Venizelos has been worrying about money almost all day since he took office.

Since the beginning of his taking office, the Greek government has been secretly preparing for war against the Ottoman Empire. Whether it is the construction of the navy or the army, it spends a large amount of money every year to maintain it.

Especially the navy's construction plan. Every time the navy purchases a warship, Venizelos feels like a few strands of his hair will be pulled out.

In terms of domestic transportation construction, in order to rapidly develop the economy, the government invests a lot of money every year to build railway lines and harden roads.

Every day in the Prime Minister's Office, looking at the expense bill catalogs on the table, both the Finance Minister and Venizelos sighed.

When the war broke out in 1912, Venizelos, as Prime Minister, actually breathed a long sigh of relief. Although the expenses during the war were even higher, the days of worrying about money all day long were finally coming to an end. , I actually felt a little lucky in my heart.

Even though hundreds of millions of treasury bonds have been issued to domestic banks, God willing, it will finally be over.

What Venizelos expected was that after the Balkan Alliance's war against the Ottoman Empire ended, the situation in the Balkans changed fundamentally. The conflict between Greece and Bulgaria rose rapidly and became a new war threat.

The consequence is that even though the war is over, the Army not only failed to reduce the troops mobilized before the war, but the Army General Staff continued to urge the Congo to mobilize more indigenous troops to support Greece.

Now Greece's domestic finances not only have to support 250,000 local soldiers, but also more than 100,000 black soldiers. The financial pressure has not decreased, but has increased a lot.

Even the navy is demanding an increase in military spending.

The reason is that thousands of islands in the Aegean Sea, as well as Crete in southern Greece (after the 1912 war, European countries have recognized Greece's sovereignty over Crete) were recovered by the navy.

The number of targets that the navy needs to protect suddenly increased by thousands, and it is already overwhelmed. More warships need to be purchased to effectively defend the sacred territory of Greece.

In order to enhance its persuasiveness, the Navy Department also went to great lengths to list the names of thousands of islands in the funding application list, using a whole stack of paper.

Therefore, the original theme of the meeting was to discuss the national strategy. When Venizelos mentioned financial issues, he ran away and the resentment in his heart lost control.

"Ahem!" Seeing that Venizelos wanted to continue talking about financial issues, Constantine interrupted.

"The theme of our meeting today is still around Greece's national strategic issues. We will discuss the financial issues after today's meeting."

After the episode, Admiral Kontoriotis said: “After the Aegean Sea Battle, Greece’s territorial waters increased significantly. Not only did we regain the islands in the Aegean Sea, but we also made other countries recognize Greece’s sovereignty over Crete. "

"Of these islands, Lemuas and Crete are the most important"

"Limous Island guards the entrance to the Dardanelles Strait and its geographical location is extremely important. Now the Greek Navy's influence on the Aegean Sea-Dardanelle Strait-Bosporus Strait-Black Sea route has greatly increased."

"If necessary, the current Greek navy can cut off this important waterway connecting the Mediterranean to the Black Sea at any time."

"Crete is located in southern Greece, on the Mediterranean Sea between Tripoli and Greece, and is close to the world's most important waterway, the Indian Ocean-Mediterranean-Atlantic Channel."

Noticing that Kontoriotis was becoming more and more unreliable, Arms Minister Giannis sneered and said: "Your Excellency, Navy Commander, as soldiers, we'd better be realistic and not be too ambitious. What do you think the Greek Navy needs?" The strength and how much military expenditure is needed to control this most important waterway in the world."

"What gives you the illusion that Greece can get involved in this route?"

The route that passes through the Suez Canal, runs through the Mediterranean, and connects the Atlantic and Indian Oceans is definitely the most important waterway in the world.

Thousands of ships pass through this golden waterway connecting China and the West every year.

If commercial routes were compared to blood vessels, this route would definitely be an artery.

Not to be outdone, Kontoriotis said: "Our meeting today is to discuss national strategy. Strategic planning and deployment must maintain a certain degree of foresight."

"With the current financial constraints, it is simply impossible for the government to invest heavily in the Navy," Giannis countered.

"If the navy really has the ability to control the Suez Canal route, it will probably be suppressed by the British soon. Is your navy confident that it can withstand the pressure of the British by relying on a few warships purchased from the UK?"

The basis of Britain's global hegemony is its absolute control over India.

The British had more than 20 million square kilometers of colonies, but among all the colonies, only India was different.

At this time, Canada was still a cold and barbaric land, and Australia was just a place where the British exiled criminals.

As for the British colonies in Africa or other parts of Asia, they are nothing more than able to obtain some resources.

During the colonial period, India, including later Pakistan and Bangladesh, was extremely vast.

The functions of colonies have two points. The first is to provide sources of industrial raw materials for the mother country, and the second is to provide a dumping market for the country's industrial products.

And India fits both of these perfectly.

First of all, in the 19th century, India’s population reached 300 million!

For comparison, Britain at this time had a population of more than 30 million and less than 40 million.

Such a huge dumping market has allowed British capitalists to make a lot of money and talk a lot.

The population of mainland France at this time was only about 40 million, the German Empire had 50 to 60 million, and the United States had 70 million.

At this time, the combined population of the rich developed industrial countries in the world is not as good as that of India!

The British continuously transported raw materials such as tea, cotton, and wood produced in India to the United Kingdom, and then continuously transported domestically produced industrial products to India for dumping.

The British transported cotton produced in India to Europe, woven it into cloth, and sold it back to India.

Without India, Britain would be just an ordinary European power.

Even the British themselves may not be able to count the wealth that the British extract from India every year.

Later generations estimated that during its rule in India, the British stole a total of US$45 trillion in wealth from India!

It is precisely because of India's extraordinary importance to Britain that all routes from Europe to India are prohibited by the British Royal Navy, and others are never allowed to get involved.

The route through the Suez Canal is the fastest route from Britain to India.

It can be said that defending the routes is protecting the hegemony of the British Empire.

Therefore, Arms Minister Giannis naturally found it bizarre that Kontoriotis would increase the influence of the Greek Navy on this route.

"At this stage, it is enough for the navy to protect the security of Greece's coastal areas."

"Greece's top priority is threats on land. We should focus on the Balkans in the near future, increase investment in the army, ensure the defeat of Bulgaria, and guard against Serbia at the same time," said Giannis, who is on the side of the army.

"Greece's future lies on land, and there is a golden opportunity now. A weak empire is about to die."

"Who else has a better reason to accept her legacy than Greece?" Giannis said to everyone in a seductive voice.

Constantine listened to the speeches of the leaders of the navy and army with great interest. In order to get more funds, he even did not hesitate to draw tempting pie.

Of course, objectively speaking, the goals mentioned by the two people are not completely impossible for Greece.

In terms of feasibility, if Greece can really defeat Bulgaria and establish Greek hegemony in the Balkans, then once this dilapidated house of the Ottoman Empire really falls, no matter in terms of geographical location, historical origins, or the will of the people In many aspects, Greece is the best recipient.

After the victory in the 1912 war, Greece not only gained most of Macedonia, but also recovered almost all the Aegean islands. Such brilliant results greatly stimulated and encouraged the Greeks.

For a time, almost all Greeks had no doubts about the possibility of realizing the "great ideal".

Especially for the Army, after two major victories in the 1896 War and the 1912 War, the morale of officers at all levels was high, even if the opponent was the Bulgarian Army, known as the "Prussia of the Balkans."

After the victory in the 1912 war, Greek newspapers reported that the Greeks' new empire would be established through three dynastic wars, just like the unification of the German Empire.

(The three dynastic wars refer to the three wars in the process of Prussia unifying Germany, namely the Prussian-Danish War, the Prussian-Austrian War, and the Franco-Prussian War)

The optimism also infected the Greek Navy.

In the two wars, the actions of the Greek Navy also played an important role and performed commendably.

Especially in the 1912 War, the Greek Navy completely defeated the Ottoman Navy and gained control of the Aegean Sea.

The entire Aegean islands, including those very close to the peninsula of Asia Minor, were also occupied by Greece.

Now the navy and army are fiercely competing for military expenditures.

Prime Minister Venizelos frowned, feeling a little worried about the war-fever atmosphere permeating Greece, whether in the military, civilians, or even at the government level.

"Your Majesty the King, His Royal Highness the Crown Prince, I think this kind of optimistic thinking about war is very dangerous. I want to remind everyone that war adventure is a very dangerous thing, and it also consumes huge amounts of wealth. When dealing with international relations, We still have to use diplomatic negotiations as the main means, and resorting to war to solve everything is a very dangerous method," Venizelos said.

"Greece's national strength is still weak. We cannot afford the consequences of a failed war. In that case, all the achievements of Greece in the past thirty years will be lost," King George agreed.

"Your military leaders are full of war optimism, which is indeed dangerous."

The country's strategic planning is related to the direction of funding. Naturally, as senior leaders of the navy and army, they all hope to influence the strategic planning in order to obtain more funding.

Constantine stood up and nodded to the two guards at the door of the conference room.

After getting Constantine's permission, several soldiers hung a huge map on the wall.

Everyone observed attentively and saw a map including the Balkan Peninsula, North Africa, the Middle East and the Caucasus.

Constantine stood in front of the map and said loudly to everyone present: "As the map shows, Greece has a very special geographical location. It is located in the center of the three continents of Europe, Asia and Africa. I call it the central empire strategy."

The impassioned voice lifted the spirits of everyone present.

Everyone knows that in fact, Crown Prince Constantine is the real protagonist of today's meeting.

Today's meeting is not so much discussing Greece's strategic planning as it is Crown Prince Constantine stating his policy agenda to the Greek military and government.

King George has become increasingly senile and has rarely been seen in public in recent years except for specific public appearances.

King George has effectively handed over the rights of king to the crown prince.

“Greece is located like a central hub, at the intersection of the three continents of Europe, Asia and Africa.”

“If Greece wants to develop and grow, it must take advantage of this geographical location.”

"Greece is close to three important waterways, namely the Dardanelles Strait, which is the only route from the Mediterranean to the Black Sea. Greece currently controls the exit of the strait."

"The second is the Strait of Odranto (the strait between Greece and Italy), the outlet of the Adriatic Sea."

"If it affects this place, it will greatly affect the countries surrounding the Adriatic Sea."

"As for the third one, it's the Suez Canal."