After reaching an agreement with the Americans privately, Crown Prince Wilhelm breathed a sigh of relief.
Of the three major powers in Allied Powers, he has now secured the United States and the United Kingdom, leaving only France.
But France and Germany are sworn enemies, and their conflict is too great to be resolved, so he has no intention of wasting time on the French.
With the support of the United States and Britain, that’s enough.
If the French are not satisfied, let them attack.
If they can’t defeat the Allied Powers, surely they can defeat France?
However, Allied Powers ‘ army of millions is still not disbanded, so it’s best not to confront the French head-on.
If this alerts the Allied Powers and they assemble a coalition to invade Germany, then things will be completely messed up.
Britain, France, the United States, Russia, Italy which had defected, and Japan which was taking advantage of the situation.
These guys need to be written down in a little notebook, and then dealt with one by one when they grow up.
For now, we should play it safe and develop slowly.
We should not make a move until we are strong enough, so as not to follow in the footsteps of the leader.
…
Compared to the restraint of Americans, the ambitions of another emerging nation, Japan, are much greater.
Shortly after the outbreak of World War I, Japan declared war on Germany, citing its alliance with Britain as a pretext.
Subsequently, Germany sent troops to seize its colonies on the Jiaodong Peninsula in China, as well as some island territories in the Pacific Ocean.
Since the Beiyang Government later declared war on Central Powers, it was nominally an ally of the Japanese.
Therefore, after the war, the Japanese should return those German colonies in Shandong to the Chinese government.
But how could the Japanese easily vomit up what they’ve ingested?
In order to seize Shandong and then use the Jiaodong Peninsula as a springboard to invade the whole of China.
The Japanese government secretly made several deals with Britain, France, and Russia, bribing these governments with various benefits to persuade them to support Japan’s claims after the war.
Therefore, at the Paris Peace Conference, Britain and France, disregarding the strong opposition from the Chinese representatives, unilaterally decided that Japan would inherit Germany’s privileges in Shandong.
This decision satisfied the Japanese, but aroused strong indignation among the Chinese people.
After the news reached China, large numbers of students, workers and citizens took to the streets to protest through marches, strikes and boycotts of Japanese goods.
But at that time, China was too weak and had little say in the international arena.
Their discontent and anger are not felt by countries like Britain and France, and even if they are aware of it, they don’t care.
After repeated protests and unsuccessful attempts to meet with high-ranking officials of the British and French governments, the Chinese delegation angrily withdrew from the Paris Peace Conference and packed their belongings to return home.
But on the night before they were to leave, an unexpected guest knocked on their door.
“Sir, you just said what country you are from?” ” Germans!” Joachim von Ribbentrop’s expression remained unchanged, showing no sign of being offended by the other party’s attitude.
“But Germany has already been defeated…” Wang Zhengting, the representative of the Southern Military Government, couldn’t help but mutter something under his breath.
“Defeat will not prevent us from doing business with your country.
In fact, it is precisely because we were defeated that this business can take place!” The members of the Chinese delegation were somewhat puzzled by his statement and pondered its meaning.
The head of the delegation, Lu Zhengxiang, then the Foreign Minister of the Beiyang Government, reacted quickly and asked: What do you want to trade with us?
“Agricultural products such as rice, flour, eggs, and tea; minerals such as tungsten, antimony, tin, mercury, bismuth, and molybdenum; and industrial raw materials such as raw silk, raw cotton, leather, wool, and licorice—your country has a lot of what we need, and we also have what your country needs!” Upon hearing this, Lu Zhengxiang and the others’ eyes lit up.
China currently desperately needs foreign exchange to purchase advanced weapons, production equipment, and finished industrial products.
However, its industrial base is very weak, and its export earnings are mainly based on grain, minerals and raw materials.
It simply cannot produce industrial products with higher added value.
However, these raw materials don’t fetch a high price.
Established industrial powers like Britain and France have vast overseas colonies, so they can simply plunder what they want from their colonies, limiting their demand.
Therefore, the annual foreign trade volume was pitifully low, and customs revenue was even lower than during the Qing Dynasty.
At this time, the sudden appearance of a large buyer like Germany naturally delighted them.
But soon, concerns appeared on the faces of several Chinese representatives: “We have all these things, but please make it clear in advance what currency your country wants to use for settlement.
We will not accept your country’s Mark.” Although they decided to withdraw from the Paris Peace Conference, those who had participated in the conference were well aware of how harsh the treaty drafted by Allied Powers was for Germany!
In addition to ceding large tracts of land to other countries as reparations, defeated Germany also had to pay Allied Powers 132 billion gold marks, equivalent to approximately 96,000 tons of gold.
This number is so large that most people probably don’t have a concept of it.
Several representatives calculated the war reparations from the Boxer Protocol and found that the amount of war reparations paid by the Germans was 300 times that of the Qing Dynasty when it signed the Boxer Protocol!
Saddled with such a huge war reparations, the Germans couldn’t possibly pay it back even if they sold their underwear.
Therefore, they do not believe that Germans have the money to buy things.
“You don’t need to worry about that.
Our transaction won’t use Deutsche Marks, it will use US dollars!” Dollar?
Several representatives were stunned for a moment.
Where would defeated Germany get US dollars?
Could it be that…
They couldn’t help but recall the conditions that US President Wilson had proposed a few days earlier.
The group exchanged glances and discussed their opinions.
Everyone present was a seasoned diplomat, and they could easily deduce something from the information the other party had just ‘inadvertently’ revealed, but this matter was irrelevant to them, and they didn’t need to care how the Germans obtained the dollars.
As long as the other party can obtain US dollars, the transaction can proceed.
At that time, the US dollar was also called the gold dollar, and under the gold standard, the US dollar could indeed be directly exchanged for gold.
At this time, China and Germany, one an agricultural and resource-rich country and the other an industrial country, were naturally complementary in terms of economy.
Even without the US dollar as the settlement currency, trade between the two countries can still proceed normally through direct barter.
Taking out US dollars is merely to reassure the other party.
…
In addition to sending Joachim von Ribbentrop to make contact with China, Crown Prince Wilhelm also wanted to make contact with South American countries and even the Soviet Union to the east, countries with abundant natural resources that were ideal partners for Germany.
Industrial development requires a lot of resources, but Germany is a resource-poor country.
After losing vast territories and all its overseas colonies, the Germans found it extremely difficult to obtain cheap resources and had to seek cooperation with resource-rich countries.
Britain and France were certainly not suitable, despite their rich colonial resources and lack of almost anything.
However, purchasing raw materials from them could leave Germany vulnerable to being held hostage.
If relations between the two countries deteriorate in the future, and the other side were to impose a slight restriction, Germany’s industry could be completely wiped out.
Germany will definitely overturn the Treaty of Versailles in the future.
Therefore, we should try to reduce our dependence on Britain and France as much as possible.
In this way, once the two sides go to war, the negative impact of the war on Germany will be minimized.
However, cooperating with the Soviet Union also carries huge risks.
Whether the Germans initiate Operation Barbarossa or the Soviet Union executes Plan Thunderstorm, war seems inevitable.
Once war breaks out, the Soviet Union will inevitably cut off supplies to Germany.
Other supplies are manageable, but oil is too deadly.
Without this thing, the German Army’s planes and tanks would be unable to move, and its military strength would be greatly reduced.
So don’t blame the Führer for plunging headlong into the frozen Soviet Union; he really couldn’t do without oil!
The Japanese ambitions not only provoked resistance from the Chinese, but also alerted Americans across the ocean.
It was from this time that Americans gradually came to regard the Japanese as their main threat in the Pacific.
While vigorously developing the Atlantic Ocean Fleet to compete with European nations, Japan also began to focus on developing the Pacific Fleet to counter the threat posed by the Japanese Combined Fleet.