Dominate the Country

Chen Ming had a sudden idea, but the speed of forming the exchange delegation to Europe was quite fast. Even though this delegation involved multiple categories such as education, economy, philosophy, literature, law, music, etc., most of the selected members were well-known characters.

But this matter did not cause any waves among the Chinese people.

China's international status is not the late Qing Dynasty and the Republic of China in the original time and space, or after the reform and opening up. A foreign exchange delegation can't attract the attention of the common people at all.

The attention of the people is more focused on the "Journey to the West" of the King of Jieyang, while the attention of the officialdom is focused on the slight collision between the Li Group and the Liu Group. The number of gold mines in Xiangzhou is somewhat shocking. Now the Mineral Bureau and the Cabinet have publicly invited foreign investment.

The Li and Liu families had a slight collision in this regard.

Another thing is to pay attention to the trilateral talks between China, Austria and Russia that are about to end. You know, there is a rumor that Emperor Chen will become the son-in-law of Abdul Hamid I next year.

The Sultan of the Ottoman Empire has a princess who is only sixteen years old. One of the purposes of Selim's trip is to finalize the marriage between the two sides.

The Ottoman monarchs and ministers in Istanbul did not even look at Chen Ming's sons. Chen Ming, who was only in his early forties, was in his prime. In the next twenty years, the whole world would still be the hunting ground of the Chinese emperor.

Therefore, the Ottoman monarchs and ministers only considered Chen Ming, not the sons of Chen Ming who were close to his daughter's age.

As for the happiness of Abdul Hamid I's youngest daughter in the second half of her life, it was not worth mentioning in front of the interests of the empire.

Maybe at this time, the Tianfang princess was preparing her dowry.

Although the Ottomans did not know about Chen Han's recent foreign policy adjustments, their goodwill to Chen Han was open and undisguised, and they also supported Chen Han's plan to find a place to settle in North Africa. Invisibly, they had already catered to Chen Han!

Chen Han's development in the Tianfang world is very favorable now. He has a foothold on the Arabian Peninsula and now on the south bank of the Gulf of Aden. It is possible that in Chen Ming's lifetime, the gold mines in South Africa can be dug into Chen Han's treasury.

The agreement between the Ottoman Empire and Russia was also reached with great difficulty.

The Russians recognized that Georgia was the sphere of influence of the Ottoman Empire, but they were determined not to completely withdraw from the Crimean Peninsula. After repeated negotiations, the two sides reached an armistice agreement - Russia and Austria enjoyed equal treatment in Crimea.

The armistice agreement between China and Russia was also easy to reach. Based on the actual control line of the two armies, each retreated 100 miles. This 100-kilometer distance was the demilitarized zone between the two sides. Only a small number of border troops were allowed to patrol and wander!

As the price of being swallowed up by China, China will release the Russian civilians and prisoners of war in its hands in the next five years, and St. Petersburg will not pay war compensation to Nanjing.

However, for the West Sea on the west coast of the Caspian Sea, Russia firmly demanded that China withdraw.

…

The first few months of the 18th year of Chengtian were a mixed blessing for the Russians.

On the Western Front, Russia and Sweden reached a ceasefire agreement, and Russia had not paid much. Gustav III's personal desire was too strong.

What made the Russians even happier was that Gustav III had just signed a formal armistice agreement with Russia for less than two months, and he was assassinated by a Swedish noble at a masked ball.

This news was shocking.

In history, Gustav III died of wound infection, and the assassin's shot at his back did not really kill him. But at this moment, although the masked ball with the king's blood was opened three months later than in the original time and space, Gustav III died cleanly. He was shot in the head and died on the spot, instead of dying sadly from the infection of the gunshot wound.

Russia got rid of a powerful enemy.

Gustav III was a strong man with great political skills. If he could continue to sit on the throne of the King of Sweden, Sweden would probably become a headache for Russia.

At the same time, in the main battlefield in the south, the Russians made great efforts and finally captured Ochakov with the cooperation of the Austrians.

In just two months, the Russian and Austrian navies launched three fierce battles in the Ochakov Sea. The Turkish army lost a total of 32 ships of various types, and the remaining ships either fled to the west coast of the Black Sea or took refuge in Ochakov. In order to save the defeat, the Ottoman command dispatched troops to reinforce. The two fleets encountered each other at sea, and in May, the fleets of both sides fought the Battle of Fedonisi Island. Russian Admiral Ushakov led the ship to attack at full speed to seize the upper hand, so that the Ottoman fleet that returned was caught in the crossfire of the Russian fleet. The Russian army destroyed 7 Ottoman warships in this battle, and the remaining Turkish ships were all withdrawn to the western coast of the Black Sea.

At this point, the Ochakov Fortress had no chance of being spared.

The Russian-Austrian coalition harassed Ochakov for a month, and then in a dark night with a strong wind, they divided their troops into six groups to attack Ochakov. After several hours of fighting, the coalition captured Ochakov, killed and captured 11,500 Turkish troops, and seized 110 artillery pieces.

Soon after, the third battle of the Rumnik River started, and the two sides fought fiercely for 12 hours. The Ottoman army was severely damaged and abandoned its position and fled, with more than 10,000 casualties and drownings. The battle of Rumnik disrupted the Ottoman position. After this battle, the Russian army captured the Bindera Fortress and captured Akkerman without a fight, controlling the entire Moldova.

The Russian army seemed to have finally won the harvest season. The results of the war against the Ottomans in the past six months were higher than the sum of the past three years.

Unfortunately, a basin of cold water was soon poured on the Russian army.

The new round of offensive war they launched against Xihai not only failed to capture Xihai, a non-fortress-like city - let's call it a city, but the Russian army that was involved in the battle suffered a great setback, with a loss of more than an astonishing 5,000 people.

Since the Russian army had repeatedly attacked Xihai but failed, the troops it mobilized have become more elite and capable.

Then they took advantage of the heavy fog in the West Sea after the autumn, divided their troops into multiple routes, and launched a fierce attack on the West Sea. But they still failed to take it.

To be honest, the Russians spent most of their efforts on the southern battlefield in this war. Although the Ottomans were not idle, the Russians had the cooperation of the Austrians.

Now the war has been fought year after year, and the Ottomans can no longer hold on. In this year, although the Russians and Austrians have spent a lot of effort, they have achieved considerable results. It can be said that they completely suppressed the Ottomans on the battlefield.

But in comparison, the results they achieved on the Ottomans can even be said to be brilliant, but in the war in the West Sea, it was as rotten as a pile of shit.

The situation in the West Sea has always been that Russia is strong and China is weak. The latter's fortifications are also mainly civil engineering, and there are few reinforced concrete buildings and permanent fortifications on the surface.

The Russian nobles in St. Petersburg could not understand why a small non-fortress city with only 10,000 people stationed (the Russian army slightly exaggerated the facts) remained unmoved under the siege of 30,000 to 40,000 troops. They even had the spare strength to attack everywhere, riding warships along the northern coast of the western line of the Caspian Sea, harassing Russian towns and villages, which greatly shook Russia's prestige in the local area.

Especially more than a month before the Russian attack, Pan Chang personally led 600 people and boarded 12 warships, which was the entire surface force of the current Caspian Sea National Defense Army, and the second batch of warships launched in the east not long ago.

Landing in the north of Astrakhan, the Russians there were not prepared at all. Pan Chang conquered four towns in a row in one day, killing no less than 300 young and strong Russians, many of whom were militiamen, and the rest were mostly people who helped the militia fight. They also dispersed the garrison and policemen in one of the towns, who were about a hundred strong. Fortunately, they found out in time and ran away early, otherwise they would have been eaten.

They robbed a total of 40 to 50 young and beautiful Russian women, and set fire to all the houses they saw. They couldn't take away many livestock, so they killed them all. After eating and drinking, they threw them into the river, wells, or simply threw them into the fire.

And such an attack was not the first time for the West Sea National Defense Army.

The local Russian garrisons were either small in number or could not catch up with the fleet. They watched the National Defense Army sail away again and again, and there was nothing they could do. The Russians hated the West Sea National Defense Army.

Faced with the dilemma of the war on the west coast of the Caspian Sea, how much did the Russians want their own Caspian Fleet to become powerful overnight? But this was impossible.

Whether it was the shipbuilding craftsmen and various materials, or the most important wood, it would take a long time to prepare.

Therefore, the Russian army urgently needed to take the West Sea.

Even the commander-in-chief of the Russian army in the Caucasus had to adjust the focus of operations. A group of Cossack cavalry was transferred east to the Caspian Sea for defense. In addition, a large army was organized to besiege and consume the reserve materials in the West Sea. At the same time, the shipyard burned by the Chinese in Astrakhan was picked up again. Catherine II in St. Petersburg felt the wisdom of Peter the Great in the past. This sea area really needs an orthodox naval fleet.

St. Petersburg should not ignore the Caspian Fleet and regard it as a place for demotion and exile. It is very important.

It's just that the Russian army is really tight.

Before Gustav III was dealt with, St. Petersburg was so nervous that it had to borrow troops from Vienna. Originally, Russia and Sweden signed an armistice agreement, and the Western Front could not be completely defenseless. But now Gustav III is dead, everything is ok!

It's just transferred from the Western Front battlefield to the East, across the entire northern end of the European continent. There is no 10,000 miles, but there are always thousands of miles. And the troops also need to be adjusted. Therefore, the Russian army's "rich" troops have not arrived yet.

The Russian army can only dig east wall to fill west wall, and put together a group of Cossack cavalry to rush to the Caspian Sea. In addition, the weak villages and forts along the coast were ordered to move inland. At the same time, a policy of merging small villages was implemented to concentrate the scattered Russians, and then some of the young and strong among them were armed as a militia to strengthen the defense force along the Caspian Sea coast. At the same time, the Cossack cavalry also stationed mobile forces at various key points. If there was an incident in one place, a large group of cavalry would be assembled immediately to rescue, hoping to curb the endless harassment of the National Defense Army in the coastal areas.

The Russian army is seizing the time to mobilize troops and adjust deployment to cope with this most tense period. The Wehrmacht is in a rare truce period. Pan Chang is waiting for the launch of the third wave of warships on the east coast.

In the previous attacks, the Wehrmacht suffered very little loss, with a total of only 200 casualties, but the results were very brilliant. They burned more than a dozen Russian towns and large tracts of farmland, seized more than 5,000 stones of grain [including potatoes], and shipped more than 400 livestock and more than 200 horses back to the West Sea.

They plundered more than 500 Russian women, killed more than 2,000 young and strong Russians, and killed more than 10,000 Russian livestock.

Not only that, they also encountered the Russian Caspian Fleet four times in the Caspian Sea and sank a total of five Russian Caspian Fleet warships. Their own warships were only slightly damaged twice.

In general, Pan Chang fought well on the west coast of the Caspian Sea, which dealt a powerful blow to the arrogance of the Russian army and greatly shook its prestige in the west coast of the Caspian Sea and the eastern end of the Caucasus.

In the last harassment battle, the National Defense Army, led by Pan Chang, directly crossed Astrakhan, which can be said to be a heavy psychological blow to the Russian army. They were shocked to find that the battlefield on the west coast was not limited to the two cities of Astrakhan and the West Sea, but depended on the entire coastline controlled by the Russian army.

This small-scale sneak attack by the National Defense Army was like the harassment of nomadic peoples when the Russians just entered the northern part of the Caspian Sea. It’s just that the nomadic peoples of that era, the Kazakhs and Tatars, had no ability to conquer the Russian towns. They could only harass the villages one or two.

And now the National Defense Army has advanced weapons. Not to mention small towns, even large towns, as long as they are given time, they can turn them into a scorched earth.

This understanding made the Russians extremely headache and hate the West Sea.

More than one Russian nobleman swore to God that he would build and reorganize the Caspian Fleet after the war. But these had no effect at all.

It is impossible for God to transfer the elite Russian warships from the Baltic Sea and the Black Sea to the Caspian Sea with a "miracle", nor is it possible to stop all the actions of the Chinese in an instant and give the Russians ten years to strengthen the Caspian Fleet.

Although such words are full of regrets, they are useless. What's more terrible is that when the war is over, it is likely that a large number of people in the St. Petersburg nobles will forget this sentence again.

As long as the Russians cannot gain the upper hand in the naval battle, the Chinese's asymmetric war will remain asymmetric forever. Because they can come and go freely on the sea, they can often attack the weak with the strong. The Russian army has limited manpower, weak defense, and has no idea of ​​the enemy's next attack target, which makes them always in a passive state. The Wehrmacht firmly grasped the initiative on the battlefield, making the Russian army exhausted, but still losing everywhere. It can be predicted that if the Russian army can't come up with a good countermeasure, there will be trouble in the thousands of miles of sea here.

The Russians can't tolerate this kind of passivity, which makes them lose face.

Before, Russia had the advantage of strength and psychology over Baku Khan and the Persian Kingdom. But now, they can't raise their heads.

The Persian Kingdom and Baku Khan helped the Chinese a lot on the issue of the "West Sea". If the Russian army wants to retaliate, the Chinese will definitely not agree. Russia found that if they didn't destroy the "West Sea", a place that made them ashamed, their prestige and their psychological advantage over Baku Khan and the Persian Kingdom would be like a bathtub with a drain valve opened, and they would quickly lose it.