African Entrepreneurship Record

Chapter 1222: Chapter 231: The World’s Fourth Largest Navy

The term ”population trash” is clearly derogatory; although harsh, it is an objective description of those East African black slaves destined to be disposed of.

For the East African Government, these aging black slaves are ”trash” without any usable value, so their ultimate destination is to be ”discarded” at a landfill.

And the only region that meets the criteria of a ”landfill” is West Africa. Although America could also serve as a landfill, it is essentially someone else’s backyard, and using it without consent would cause international disputes.

American countries have long since shed their colonial status, and the locals would certainly not permit East Africa to turn their region into a landfill. West Africa is different; it is merely a European colony, and European nations don’t care about what happens to a colony.

Therefore, during this period, East Africa’s transport of black slaves to West Africa wouldn’t likely spark any international disputes. European nations are eager to foster good relations with the current East Africa and certainly wouldn’t risk offending East Africa over such a trivial matter.

As Anton and Mars were talking, five or six vehicles transporting black slaves had already passed, and more vehicles continued to follow.

Mars exclaimed in surprise, ”This is too much! I think there are more vehicles following. Assuming each vehicle carries dozens of people, they must have transported at least several hundred black people this time around.”

Anton frowned and said, ”I’ve never seen such a scene. Although in the past, Falta also sent off black slaves to sea from here, it was rarely seen. The last time was last year with only a few dozen people. Why so many this time?”

After the tenth vehicle passed, a military truck painted green followed closely. It was clearly not black people on board, but fully armed East African Defense Army soldiers.

This clearly wasn’t some small operation since even the military was involved, indicating that it was an armed transportation.

After the military truck passed, the convoy didn’t break. More vehicles followed, and as Anton silently counted in his mind, he didn’t know how long it took before the long convoy finally ended.

”A total of fifty-five vehicles passed, with five military trucks. The other fifty vehicles were loaded with black slaves, and the number of black people arriving at Falta Port at this time exceeded a thousand, almost the scale of an army,” Anton said.

Although the scale of East Africa’s automotive industry has developed to a very powerful level, a large convoy of more than fifty vehicles is still a rare sight, which naturally drew the attention of Falta’s residents.

Mars commented, ”These should all be military vehicles, including the trucks carrying black people. The license plates are military ones, and this is obviously a directive at the government level.”

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At Falta Port, several rare sailboats were moored beside the docks as the convoy of military vehicles finally arrived here.

”Captain Robert, the headcount has been completed. The escort mission’s target amount is 1,800 people, and 1,800 people have actually arrived,” an East African soldier reported to Robert, who had been waiting at the dock for some time.

Robert said, ”Very good, now liaise with the Navy and escort all these black people onto the ships.”

Indeed, these rare sailboats are actually the relics of the East African Navy, most of which were products of the former Zanzibar shipyard.

The reason East African Military uses these antiques to transport black people is primarily due to the current lack of sufficient ships to perform the task.

On the civilian shipping side, East Africa’s burgeoning European trade has already heightened demand for ships, putting shipping globally in a supply shortage stage.

The Navy’s ships are even less available. Although the East African Navy is large in scale, it currently has a high frequency of maritime missions to perform.

After all, the vast sea-going commercial fleets of East Africa need the East African Navy to dispatch a significant number of ships for escort, and the East African Navy also occasionally needs to perform tasks locally, including militarily deterring some European countries.

With the stalemate of European wars, countries like England and France have become increasingly vigilant of civilian ships, particularly those engaged in economic exchange with hostile nations. Without naval presence, it poses a lethal threat.

It is worth mentioning that the total tonnage of the East African Navy ships has now surpassed 900,000 tons, reaching 970,000 tons, just 30,000 tons short of a million.

This significant size of the naval fleet has already brought it to the world’s fourth place, ranking just after England, Germany, and America as the fourth-largest navy worldwide.

It can be said that if the East African Navy joined the European battlefield at this time, it would be capable of dramatically altering the situation on the European front.

It is precisely because of this fourth most powerful navy globally that East African trade with Europe has not significantly been affected.

In recent years, the number of East African ports has increased significantly. Every usable natural harbor has basically been developed and utilized by East Africa, with Falta Port being a typical example.

After all, effective development of Falta Port in the previous era was something that belonged to the twenty-first century.

The increase in the number of ports has naturally driven the increase in the number of East African shipyards, with the East African shipbuilding industry reaching a new peak.

That’s why the East African Navy has the confidence to quickly grow to become the world’s fourth-largest navy in just a few years.

”Captain Robert, it seems that the country wants to finally resolve the black slave issue!” said Navy General Brand.

Robert nodded and said, ”It has been nearly twenty years since the South African War, and even the youngest Black people are now over twenty years old, while black slaves generally only have a lifespan of thirty-something.”

”In such circumstances, the black people we have now are actually all elderly, so the government surely wants to solve these troubles in advance.”

The South African War was the last time East Africa managed to gain a black population. Almost all of East Africa’s black people now were obtained from regions such as Angola, newly incorporated into East Africa at that time.

This also means that East African black people can no longer achieve natural population replacement, and those in East Africa’s hands now have no practical use.

Robert continued, ”With these years of unprecedented exploitation, black people’s attrition rate is even worse than before, and it’s been heard that the counted black population this year is now less than over 800,000.”

”It must be acknowledged that just a few years ago, East Africa’s black population was calculated in the millions, which shows the insanity of the national canal project.”

”Although this project hasn’t been fully completed yet, what’s left is merely the finishing work, which means that even without relying on black people, we can wrap things up using existing resources without causing too much loss. It seems that black slaves are truly becoming a term of history in East Africa.”

Brand nodded and said, ”It seems the government doesn’t want these last 800,000 black people to die of old age domestically, and we’ve been instructed to escort them to the Togoland Colony in West Africa, which will be their final destination.”

Handling the elderly and weak black slaves is rather troublesome, considering East Africa has never advocated ”massacres,” except in cases of uprisings or extreme situations.

Moreover, East Africa can’t afford to provide for these black slaves in their old age, as it requires food and even medicine. Aging bodies are more susceptible to diseases, and if an epidemic were to break out in East Africa, it would be a major loss for East Africa.

That is why exiling these elderly and infirm people to West Africa is currently the best solution the East African Government can think of, which is better than massacre.

As one of East Africa’s newly acquired colonies, Togoland is perfectly suitable for exiling these black slaves. In the past, East Africa lacked colonies in West Africa, so it couldn’t easily exile black slaves and had to go through the Southern German Kingdom for transit.

Being a landlocked nation, even transporting black people through the Southern German Kingdom incurred high costs. With Togoland, they could exile black slaves to West Africa on a large scale at lower cost via sea routes.

Of course, since the Togoland Colony is now part of East African territory as well, the East African Government naturally does not intend to make Togoland a Black region, but will continue using Togoland as a springboard to drive these black people to other nations’ colonies.