The Rise of Australia - Chapter 978

c959 The London Conference ends

If 1937 was the most unclear side of the Second World War, then 1938 was the cruelest year of the Second World War.

This is not an empty talk. In the first half of the first month of 1938, Britain, France and Australia launched the North African offensive, the French battlefield counterattack and the Normandy landing. The three battlefields together deployed millions of soldiers, and the aircraft and tanks used were countless.

In order to cope with the pressure from Britain, France and Australia, Germany could only constantly mobilize new soldiers at home and send them to the French battlefield after hasty training.

The war did not stop in Eastern Europe. On January 22, 1938, when the battle on the French battlefield was fierce, the Germans urgently launched the Battle of Sudalingrad.

According to the original words of the German Prime Minister, they needed to occupy the entire Sudalingrad as soon as possible within half a year, and then march to the Caucasus to cut off Russia’s energy supply.

As long as the Russian problem is solved first, Germany can return to France and eliminate the British, French and Australian troops jumping around in France.

At this time, Italy and Spain become more important. During the six months when Germany attacked Sudalingrad, Spain and Italy will bear the heavy responsibility of defending the British, French and Australian armies.

Only when these two countries can bear most of the pressure for Germany, Germany will have enough energy to concentrate on dealing with Russia, a powerful enemy.

In addition to the comprehensive national strength of each country, the competition in World War II actually also includes the strategies and means behind each country.

For Australasia and Britain, neither wants to defeat Germany, the enemy, too early when Russia has not suffered a lot of losses.

This also led to a thought-provoking scene on the French battlefield, that is, most of the British, French and Australian troops did not advance fast, and the attack on Germany was not as fierce as imagined.

Even some British, French and Australian troops have been mobilized, and they will go to Spain and Italy respectively to attack these two countries first.

There is an advantage to attacking these two countries, that is, it can cut off Germany’s left and right arms. After Germany lost Italy and Spain, it basically only had reliable allies like Romania and Bulgaria.

However, a small Romania and Bulgaria could not turn the tide. How could the German Empire alone shake the powerful alliance formed by Britain, France and Australia?

On February 2, 1938, a joint army consisting of 500,000 French troops, 350,000 Australian troops and 250,000 British troops arrived in Turin, a city in northwestern Italy, and continued to advance towards Milan in the east.

There is an advantage to attacking Italy. As long as you cross the Alps on the French border, the south is basically a narrow peninsula area, and there is no place that is easy to defend and difficult to attack.

The Alps and Turin had been breached in the previous war between France and Italy. Even though the French army lost the capital Paris, it did not lose the city of Turin.

This also makes people sigh again about Italy’s performance in World War II. France was almost destroyed, but Italy only barely stabilized the front line in the hands of such a France, and did not recover too much territory.

Milan is to the east of Turin, and Genoa is to the south of Milan. Further southeast of Genoa are important cities such as Florence and Rome.

The British, French and Australian troops will not be polite to Italy. A large number of tanks drove towards Genoa from the gap in the southern Alps, and quickly broke through to the rear of Florence.

The intention of the combat command is also very clear, that is, to quickly encircle the entire area north of Florence through the mobility of the armored forces.

You know, the north of Florence covers most of northern Italy and is also a very important industrial area in Italy.

Once these areas are occupied, the threat from Italy will completely disappear.

The 350,000 Australasian troops fighting in Italy belong to the newly formed 4th Army, and the commander-in-chief of the army is the former commander of the 4th Army, Barford.

Thanks to the expansion of the army, the commanders of the original nine armies in Australasia have basically grown into commanders and chiefs of staff of the army groups, and each of them has become a commander who manages hundreds of thousands of troops.

According to the merits of the various armies, the commanders-in-chief and chiefs of staff of several army groups can basically be promoted to one level after the war.

“How many Italians are there in front of us?” The commander of the Fourth Army, Barford, looked at the area dozens of kilometers away and asked his subordinates without looking back.

“According to British intelligence, there are at least 150,000 Italian soldiers stationed in Genoa, and there are at least 1,500 aircraft in northern Italy.” The subordinates have already been familiar with the number of Italian troops in Genoa, and they quickly answered after hearing the question.

Barford nodded, pondered for a moment, and ordered the messenger: “Let our armored army move and penetrate directly to the rear of Florence. We not only want to take Genoa, but the entire north of Florence is our attack target.”

“Yes!”

Unlike the exhausted British and French armies, the Australasian army had not fought with the island countries for a long time, and was not obviously tired of the war at this time.

More importantly, after the Australasian soldiers established merits, they could exchange them for corresponding fields and funds, and even accumulate merits to become nobles.

Under such motivation, the soldiers were not averse to the battlefield, and even hoped to establish certain merits on the battlefield to create a better life for themselves and their families.

Not to mention that there were only 150,000 Italian troops in front of them, even if there were 1.5 million Italian troops, Barford would still order the implementation of the interspersed tactics, because 1.5 million Italian troops represented more merits.

Moreover, as early as the African battlefield, General Barford had already understood the actual combat effectiveness of the Italian army. If it were 150,000 German troops, they might still need to be wary, but even if there were 1.5 million Italian troops, they would still surrender when it was time to surrender.

On February 11, 1938, with the support of Australasia and Britain, an armed conflict broke out in South America.

Brazil did behave a little better after the unrestricted submarine warfare policy was promulgated, but neither Australasia nor Britain was willing to let go of the country with the largest land area in South America.

Especially in the case of the chaos in Europe, Brazil is likely to grow into the only great power in South America or even the entire America.

This is not a good thing for Britain and Australasia, because if there is only one great power in the whole America, South America and North America will become the back garden of this great power.

Such an incident has already happened to the United States once, and neither Arthur nor Britain wants to see such a thing happen to Brazil again.

Compared with the other two powers in South America, Argentina and Chile, Brazil has almost no major disadvantages, and its territory is larger than the sum of Argentina and Chile.

This is obviously not in line with the regional balance policy pursued by the British, nor is it in line with the interests of Britain and Australasia in South America.

As a result, armed conflict in South America is inevitable.

Before this conflict, Australasia and Argentina signed an agreement on the development of black soil. Argentina promised to lease part of the black soil to Australasia for long-term agricultural cultivation, and the two sides also established close trade relations.

This can be regarded as Arthur’s layout for the future. As a country on the Pacific coast, it is very important for Australasia to closely unite with the Pacific coastal countries.

North America and South America are both within Arthur’s plan. In the future, a new Pacific Alliance will be formed, and the relationship will be closer than the current Pacific Alliance.

Arthur even plans to provide some of the less important weapons to the allies of the Pacific Alliance at a low price. This will not only enhance the military strength of the entire Pacific Alliance, but also effectively expand the arms market of Australasia.

For small and medium-sized countries, such arms trade is undoubtedly a timely help. Because small and medium-sized countries are simply unable to afford the development of military technology, from research and development to manufacturing, not only a large number of talents and long-term accumulation are required, but also a lot of funds.

Even if more advanced military technology is developed, it is still necessary to invest manpower, material resources and financial resources to build military factories and produce them.

Instead of doing this, it is better to use Australasia’s advanced weapons at a price lower than the market price, which is much more convenient than developing weapons by yourself.

Doing so also has a benefit for Australasia, that is, to weaken the weapons research and development capabilities and military industrial capabilities of its allies, so that they can unite more closely around themselves.

This is what happened to the United States in later generations. Europe was very glorious during World War II. Various weapons of Britain, France and Germany emerged one after another, and the military industry was also quite powerful.

However, European countries in later history have weakened a lot in terms of military industry. France is the only country with complete military industry capabilities. Most European countries rely heavily on the military industry trade of the United States to maintain their military strength, which also allows the United States to have the right to speak in some European countries.

Currently, Arthur is also planning to do so, uniting most of the Pacific coastal countries to his periphery.

Even if European countries are weaker, they can also follow the example of the United States in history and propose a revival plan for Europe, and use Europe to fight against Russia after World War II.

On February 22, 1938, the talks held in London for several months finally ended.

This meeting delineated the scope of interests of various countries and divided the interests of the Allied countries such as Germany, Italy and Spain.

First of all, Italy’s colonies.

As previously discussed by Britain, France and Australia, the entire Abyssinian Empire and Italian Somalia were divided by Britain and France.

The other participating countries did not have the strength to eat a bite of meat in Italy’s colonies, and could only watch Britain and France accept Italy’s colonies with a smile.

The same is true for Libya. The entire Libyan region was divided into two by Britain and France, with the area near the west belonging to the French colony and the area near the east belonging to the British colony.

All the remaining colonies of Spain were taken over by Britain and France. However, the British occupied relatively few colonies, only a small amount of land such as Ceuta and Tetouan in northern Morocco.

France took over Melilla, Sahara and other relatively large areas.

However, in terms of importance, the areas taken by the British are definitely more important. Ceuta and Gibraltar are across the sea from each other, which makes it easier for the British to control the western outlet of the Mediterranean.

However, Equatorial Guinea in Central Africa is also under the rule of France, which can be regarded as making up for France in terms of Spain’s North African colonies.

Australasia did not participate in the division of Spanish colonies. As compensation for Australasia, Puerto Rico, which originally belonged to the United States and is now controlled by the British, will be included in the rule of Australasia.

Puerto Rico is located in the Caribbean Sea, which is considered to be at the junction of North America and South America. The geographical location here is still relatively important. When missile technology becomes more powerful in the future, the weapons deployed here can threaten North America and South America, which is more conducive to Australasia’s world hegemony strategy.

Originally, Jamaica or the Bahamas in Australasia, but the British were unwilling to let go, so it was left unresolved.

After all, it was beyond Arthur’s expectations to get Puerto Rico. Australasia will not develop Puerto Rico too much. In the next few decades, Puerto Rico’s more important purpose is to serve as Australasia’s naval base and missile base in the Caribbean.

Finally, there are ways to divide and deal with several countries such as Germany, Italy, Spain, Romania and Bulgaria.

After the victory of the war, it is impossible for these countries not to pay some price.

Especially in terms of territory, they must pay enough price to make them understand that it is immoral to wantonly launch a war.

Among them, Britain, France and Australia did not have much debate on the division of Romania and Bulgaria.

If nothing unexpected happens, Romania will still have to spit out Transylvania, which was annexed from Hungary. Even the Banat region close to Yugoslavia will basically belong to Yugoslavia after the war.

The same is true for Bulgaria. As an accomplice of Germany, Bulgaria must at least pay the Vidin, Burgas and Haskovo regions to satisfy the appetite of surrounding enemy countries.

The real big deal is the treatment of the three countries of Germany, Italy and Spain.

However, in these three countries, the debate between Britain, France and Australia is relatively large.

First of all, none of the three countries want to see any country annex too much land, which is a destruction of the balance of Europe and is not in their own interests.

But if these defeated countries are allowed to retain too strong strength, it will inevitably lead to the situation of World War II breaking out again after World War I.

This is where the three countries quarreled, and even representatives from many other countries joined in. This is the real reason why the London Conference was delayed for several months.

However, Spain and Italy are still easy to deal with. The real headache is Germany. If Germany is too strong, it will take revenge sooner or later. If Germany is too weak, the balance in Europe will be broken, and another more powerful country will rise.