Empire Rising: Spain

In the southern part of the East Indies, there are still indigenous forces like the Minangkabau States and Maguindanao. Meanwhile, across the sea from the East Indies, Spain has already infiltrated the Sulu Sultanate in Borneo.

However, owing to the continuous decline of Spain and frequent domestic issues, the colonial advance into the Sulu Sultanate was not accelerated.

This eventually led to the Sulu Sultanate, along with the indigenous people of the Brunei Empire and Sarawak Kingdom, being annexed by the British, turning into the British North Kalimantan Colony.

The European nations have an understanding regarding colonization; generally, the first country to arrive and establish some colonial base can claim that area as its own colony.

In most cases, countries maintain this understanding. However, for some particularly important colonies, competing nations do not yield; instead, they may provoke a colonial war due to competition.

But war is not the only means to resolve disputes. Besides colonies being too important and colonial efforts being neck-and-neck, generally, whoever arrives first has the upper hand in other cases.

No one usually challenges these rules, after all, both of the great colonial empires, the United Kingdom and France, adhere to them. To challenge these rules is essentially to challenge the existing colonial system.

Under the current colonial system, Anglo-French and Anglo-Russian contradictions are quite intense competitive conflicts. But why did World War I ultimately evolve into the United Kingdom, France, and Russia vs. Germany and Austria? The reason was precisely that Germany challenged the existing colonial system.

However, there was no choice, as by the time Germany unified, important colonies had already been divided, leaving only Africa, which had not been deeply explored.

Germany was relatively far from Africa without any colonial base. Although the United Kingdom was equally distant, the British had established multiple colonial bases earlier and possessed the Cape Colony, which is a vast colony like South Africa, having long secured a foothold in Africa.

At this time, Portugal and Spain advanced faster than Germany in Africa’s colonial progress, which is also why Germany ultimately did not obtain any fertile colonies.

Having not gotten much on the dining table, Germany could only overturn it, at the cost of being besieged by the feasting British and French.

It ultimately boiled down to Germany’s poor geopolitics. Situated in Central Europe, Germany is positioned in a besieged area. Such a terrible geographical location makes it difficult for a powerful nation to emerge, let alone with Germany surrounded by powerful nations.

Although geographical location is not the fundamental factor determining a nation’s strength or weakness, it significantly influences a country.

Why could the United States become powerful? Largely due to its geographical location being distant from Europe, avoiding the chaotic European wars.

This characteristic attracted numerous European immigrants to the United States, quickly surpassing the population of European powers.

The longstanding peace accelerated the United States’ industrial and economic development, leading to its eventual rise as the world’s most powerful nation.

Placing the same United States in Europe would totally eliminate its chance of becoming the world leader. The primary reason for the United States’ strength is the European powers concentrating on infighting, allowing the American upstart to profit by chance.

The United States’ talents and technology mostly come from Europe, with those escaping conflict going to the United States eventually establishing its power.

If Germany were placed in the geographical location of the United States, Germany might perform even better. Yet Germany happened to be in such a besieged area, considerably signifying Germany’s final fate.

The plan for colonizing the Congo River Basin was quickly approved, and the meeting concluded successfully.

For Carlo, ensuring that the Congo River Basin ultimately belonged to the Royal Family was the critical matter.

Although the profits need to be shared with the Government equally, the Royal Family won’t lose out. After all, the Government has to fund the development of this land and deploy the military to protect the land’s sovereignty—the Royal Family simply waits for dividends.

However, no one can question the legitimacy of the Royal Family’s sovereignty over this land. After all, this land was discovered by the Royal Family’s expedition team, which is the source of the Royal family’s sovereignty.

If the Spanish Government itself doesn’t recognize such sovereignty, other countries naturally won’t either. This turns it into a colonial competition between Spain and other countries, rather than a debate between the Spanish Government and Royal Family.

Prime Minister Prim understood this point, thus expressing affirmation towards Carlo’s proposal. Actually, there’s no difference whether it’s Royal Family territory or Government colony, since the profits from this land are split 50-50 between the Government and Royal family.

The only difference is that the position of the Royal Family becomes more secure. Once the Congo River Basin is established as Royal Family territory, the sovereignty belongs to the Royal Family.

If the Savoy Family is expelled from Spain, then the Congo River Basin land has no relation with the Spanish Government.

By doing so, Carlo is telling the Government’s Cabinet Ministers that, at this moment, the Spanish Royal Family and Government share both prosperity and adversity.

After determining the specific plan, the Ministry of Defense entered a tense preparation stage.

Given the dispatch of over 4,000 personnel, and the need to create a reasonable justification so that Portugal and England and France would believe it, ensuring every detail of the action is reasonable.

Since the news from the East Indies takes a certain amount of time to reach Spain, the troop reinforcement action can be executed no sooner than a month later.

This period is fitting for directing the military, preparing the transport fleet, etc. Once the news of rebellion from the East Indies returns to mainland Spain, the Government can take advantage of this pretext to urgently dispatch troops, reinforcing the East Indies.

About two and a half weeks later, the Spanish African expedition leader Menotti finally returned smoothly from the Guinea Colony.

The extended time was not due to travel costs, but rather on arranging the next steps of the expedition team’s actions and consolidating specific information.

Although Menotti returned from Africa, Anthony still needs to lead the expedition team back and forth between Guinea and the Congo River Basin, establishing more bases and strengthening ties with the local indigenous people.

This not only creates better conditions for Spain’s colonization in this region but also stabilizes their achievements to ensure no unexpected incidences occur.

If due to the expedition team’s negligence resulting in the substantial destruction of established bases, even if Menotti and Anthony’s accomplishments remain intact, it would be an unseemly affair.

Moreover, should any accidents occur delaying Spain’s colonial progress, the accomplishments of both Menotti and Anthony would surely be significantly reduced.

Before returning to Spain, Menotti deliberately arranged the expedition team’s future actions clearly, and Anthony repeatedly promised to implement them one by one.

After all, it concerns their accomplishments and the concluding work of this expedition, having diligently persisted for nearly four years. The remaining few months hardly matter.