African Entrepreneurship Record

Chapter 510: Chapter 188: Preparing for Mediation

Just as Ernst expected, the Portuguese army was dragged in three directions, with East Africa recklessly devouring Mozambique’s territory from the north.

At this time, Portugal realized something was wrong. Although their forces were not small, East Africa could spare efforts to deal with them from different directions, as did the British and French. So, how large was East Africa’s army?

With the outbreak of the East-Portuguese War, East Africa had successively expanded its army to more than 300,000, of which over 70,000 were Black.

Due to East Africa’s deliberate use of the Black Corps for cannon fodder, they were not very attentive in battle, similar to the Black soldiers in the Mozambique army. These two slack armies surprisingly equaled each other in mediocrity.

Clement was quite furious: ”These idiots, armed with more advanced weapons than East Africa, still couldn’t win against them?”

He also noticed the Black soldiers were slacking. East Africa did not care if their Black soldiers slacked off, but Clement couldn’t ignore it. Apart from the Black Army, Mozambique had no other reliable force. Unless Portugal could deploy forces from the mainland, but if they could, East Africa wouldn’t have been an issue in the first place.

As Mozambique was gradually being devoured by East Africa, the western line was also unsettled. Like Mozambique, Angola too joined the war against East Africa.

However, Angola was not as lucky as Mozambique because it encountered East Africa’s regular troops, the 411th and 412th Divisions.

Unlike the eastern front, where both sides only engaged in skirmishes, on the western front, the two East African infantry divisions demonstrated to the Angolan colony what modern warfare was.

The Mauser rifles were more advanced than those provided to Portugal by Britain and France. The artillery, machine guns, and grenades were lavishly used by the two infantry divisions against the Portuguese.

After receiving British and French support, the Angolan army was still dazed after entering East Africa. Was this the level expected of an African nation? No martial ethics!

”What about our communications with the mainland? Did they respond?” the Angolan Governor raged.

”Your Excellency, as far as I know, the Germans are probably coming towards Luanda. It’s too late to ask for help from the mainland now!”

”Damn it, Mozambique is their favored child while we, Angola, are more important to the mainland than Mozambique!”

One couldn’t blame the Portuguese mainland for slow responses; it was because the West Coast of Africa was so backward, they still relied on ships to deliver messages. However, the East Coast, due to East Africa laying submarine cables, could send messages directly back to Europe. Foreigners could also use this line in Dar es Salaam and Mombasa for a fee. So although East Africa was at war with Mozambique, Mozambique could use East Africa’s telegraph to contact the mainland, reporting the war situation to Portugal in real-time.

Mozambique was currently in a defensive posture, but most messages they sent to the mainland were somewhat boastful, with a sense of ”I’ve got the upper hand” — perhaps because, after fighting the Black Corps so much, they gradually regained confidence.

The East African Black Corps and the Mozambique army were like Lying Dragon and Phoenix Chick, but the East African Black Corps had a higher casualty rate than the Mozambique army.

However, Angola faced East Africa’s regular troops right away, so the treatment was different. The East African army moved in as if they owned the place.

For unknown reasons, Britain and France were less focused on Angola than Mozambique. However, one thing is certain, the British must have done it on purpose.

The French might have felt strong in West Africa and East Africa’s core was in East Africa, so weakening East Africa was France’s goal. As for the Southwest Africa’s West Coast, it held no appeal for the French—of course, this was due to East Africa’s misleading former country name.

East Africa’s territory actually surpassed these regional constraints: Southern Africa, Central Africa, and parts of Southwest Africa were involved. East Africa wasn’t limited to just East Africa, with several powers in the northeast. As for the southeast, there was only the eyesore known as Mozambique.

Previously, Mozambique could help hide East Africa’s inland expansion trends, but since East Africa reached the West Coast, East Africa’s approximate territorial range was no longer a secret, making Mozambique of no value to East Africa.

However, the British were aware of how much East Africa resented Mozambique, which is why they wanted to keep Mozambique as a fishbone stuck in East Africa’s throat.

Britain and France valued Mozambique primarily because of its significant restraining effect on East Africa, while western Angola couldn’t match up. East Africa’s economic centers were distributed in the east, so both Britain and France believed that even if Angola occupied East African western territories, it wouldn’t weaken East Africa’s power.

So East Africa showed no mercy to Angola, the differential treatment being evident. If the Angolan Governor knew this was the reason they were targeted, he might be furious to death.

While the Angolan Governor was fretting, he suddenly heard gunfire outside the city and urgently asked, ”What’s going on?”

”Report to the Governor, the Germans have attacked, what do we do now?”

”Hold Luanda first, don’t let the Germans into the city, prepare the ships, and head north!”

With the cooperation of two East African army divisions, the Angolan capital Luanda was breached the same day. Actually, as Angola’s political center, Luanda’s defense should have been good. But as a coastal fortress, Luanda made a fatal mistake: for a long time, their enemies all came from the Atlantic, so their cannons were concentrated on the western coastal belt, lacking defense on the city’s east. After all, the era when inland indigenous people wielded spears and bows is over, and now the east of Angola faces Germans, not primitives.

With Luanda occupied, it essentially meant that the Angolan colony was mostly lost, but the Angolan Governor had already escaped by ship to Cabinda to continue resisting.

The loss of the Angolan colony was a major blow to Portugal, while the situation in Mozambique was slightly better.

After East Africa occupied northern Mozambique, the Portuguese were caught in a pincer by East African forces between Lake Malawi and the Tete region.

However, Mozambique had anticipated this because they deliberately abandoned the northern region. Mozambique, although smaller in comparison to East Africa, also had more than 600,000 square kilometers, whereas mainland Portugal covered only about 90,000 square kilometers.

Thus, Mozambique too was sparsely populated, with even fewer White people, and the undeveloped north was essentially empty land. If it hadn’t been for East Africa’s rise, Mozambique wouldn’t even think of dispatching a 300-strong army northward.

Therefore, East Africa’s occupation of the north had been foreseen by the Portuguese, and it didn’t bother them too much.

However, what concerned the Mozambique government now was their insufficient troop numbers. East Africa was exerting pressure on Mozambique from all directions, with even troops in South Africa beginning to mobilize. This made Governor Lieford quite worried.

Portugal is sure to lose, but the British didn’t worry at all. Instead, they began assessing East Africa’s capabilities.

”We have underestimated East Africa’s strength; so far, we can confirm that East Africa has mobilized at least over 70,000 troops for this war. East Africa likely mobilized nearly 100,000 people, which is double the number from the last East African invasion of South Africa. Moreover, we observe that the East African army is not entirely composed of Whites and Asians; there are also many Blacks.”

”Including the western front, they still have to engage Angola, so the number of East African troops involved must be over 100,000.”

”If we aim for Cape Town to expand northward, we will need at least 100,000 more troops, which is not difficult to arrange. We just don’t know which, Indians or Africans, have stronger combat effectiveness.”

”Let’s mediate the war first! Portugal is bound to lose. We must preserve Portugal’s strength in Africa, for if East Africa swallows Angola and Mozambique, convincing the Germans to give them back through negotiation will be very costly.”