1635 Han style rises again

Chapter 958 Visiting the European Fleet ([-])

September 1679, 8, Amsterdam.

In this world, I have to say that some countries are really blessed by God, and it is impossible not to develop.

The Netherlands is a treasure land with a very superior geographical location. It is on the edge of the North Sea, on the edge of the Atlantic Ocean, and in the lower reaches of the Rhine and Scheldt. It is very convenient for both sea transportation and inland waterway transportation, which is very conducive to commercial circulation.

Therefore, the Netherlands has been one of the most economically developed regions in Europe since the 15th century. The wool textile industry, fishery, and transshipment business were extremely prosperous, especially the transshipment business, which gave the Netherlands a "sea coachman". title.

In addition, due to the development of commerce, more than 300 cities have been developed in the Netherlands, among which the urbanization rate of the province of the Netherlands has even exceeded 50.00%, which is the region with the highest urban density in Europe. Therefore, the Netherlands also has a "city-state" title.

The Netherlands is so promising, which makes the Spaniards seem to have picked up a treasure, and they should cherish it more and take care of it carefully.However, the logic in Spain is simple and crude. If you make money, I will tax you.

At that time, the Spanish Empire had already colonized the Americas, but the wealth looted from the Netherlands every year amounted to more than 200 million florin gold coins (about 3.5 grams of gold), accounting for as much as [-]% of the annual income from the outside.

It is estimated that every Spanish king would be happy in his dreams at night. The Netherlands is simply a pearl in the crown of Spain.This frankly accounts for [-]% of the income, of course it is Pearl Baby, but it is bloody.

Commercial prosperity led to the rise of commercial capital in the Netherlands, and they were no longer willing to be taken advantage of. They really couldn't bear more and more feudal aristocrats lying on them to suck blood.This kind of contradiction cannot be reconciled at all, because grabbing money from the Netherlands is the survival logic of Spain, and Spain cannot smash its own jobs unless the Netherlands talks to Spain with its fists.

The wealthy people in the Netherlands were so upset because of this, they might as well overthrow the Spanish autocratic rule directly.Leveraging the east wind of the European Reformation, the upstarts of the commercial capital of the Netherlands followed the example of the German Lutheran princes, seized the land and wealth of the Catholic Church, and established an opposition political organization headed by Prince William of Orange—"Nobility League", against the Spanish authorities.

The Spanish royal family, who were the number one "robber" in Europe at the time, saw it, hehe, this cash cow is still resisting, and it must be suppressed!Suppressing rule is the best skill of the Spanish royal family, and of course it has to be revealed at this time.

While intensifying religious persecution in the Netherlands, the Spaniards suppressed and restricted the commercial economy of the Netherlands.The Spaniards' approach was to intensify their looting of the Netherlands while bankrupting the Netherlands' economy.It’s like when a robber comes to your home, he wants to rob all your assets, and also burns down your house and all the shops, so that you won’t be able to make a fortune in the future.

This is to drive the Netherlands to death!

The last forbearance in the Netherlands region finally disappeared, and the Spanish authorities completely tore apart and began to fight. In August 1566, the Dutch Provincial War of Independence broke out and soon swept across 8 provinces in the Netherlands. This war lasted for 12 years, also known as the "80 Years' War".

In the years of continuous war, Spain has become weaker and weaker. Not only has its finances gone bankrupt several times, but its maritime strength has also been severely weakened, and it has gradually lost its world hegemony that dominates the ocean.

However, with a small body, the Dutch became stronger and richer in the war of independence for decades, and then they stepped on the top of the Spaniards and jumped to the number one maritime supremacy in one fell swoop.

The opening of the new shipping route has shifted the European trade center from the Mediterranean to the Atlantic coast. The previous locations of Mediterranean commercial centers such as Venice and Milan have been gradually replaced by cities such as Lisbon, Seville, Antwerp, and London on the Atlantic coast. Atlantic trade has become The most important part of European trade and even world trade, it gathered most of the world's merchant ships, and its trade scale and influence were the highest in the world at that time.

This is the business revolution happening in Europe.

And the Netherlands, as a country where commercial capital is in power, just caught up with the great era of sea power with unprecedented development of world commerce, so it was born at the right time!
As a country with few land resources, the Netherlands’ only survival logic is to develop commercial trade. In order to survive, this is also the survival mode that it must be good at.Therefore, once the Netherlands became independent, it became its basic national policy to focus on the development of commercial trade.

The Netherlands is located on the Atlantic coast, on the commercial route from the North Sea, the Baltic Sea to the Mediterranean Sea, and it is the trading center of the European commercial revolution.

Therefore, the unique geographical location of business and trade, the genetic advantages of the country where commercial capital is in power, standing on the cusp of the era of sea power, and the basic national policy of focusing on the development of the business industry to the extreme, etc., these four basic conditions are matched at the same time. Created a Dutch business empire.These are the four basic conditions for its rise. If any one of the conditions is missing, the Netherlands will probably be destroyed, but it has gathered all of them.

The oceans of the world in the 17th century were the oceans in which the Netherlands galloped.

The era of sea power pioneered by great voyages has come, and the Netherlands not only stands on this cusp, but also has no competitors in sight.

The pioneer of the Age of Discovery, Portugal, has been playing tricks since the end of the 16th century.Portugal has a small area, a small population, and lack of talents, resulting in a long-term lack of manpower to colonize the world.Although the Portuguese colonists opened up new sea routes, they didn’t know how to operate them. Not only were they inferior to the Dutch bourgeoisie, but even Venetian merchants couldn’t compete with them, resulting in decreasing income from the new sea routes.Hedonic style prevails in Portugal, and a lot of wealth is used for consumption instead of developing economic production.In the context of the decline in domestic economic productivity, aggressive and militaristic overseas colonization led to the disintegration of many overseas colonies by competitors.

Spain, as the previous sea power overlord, is also the most threatening competitor to the Netherlands. It also has the same problems as Portugal. Most of the wealth robbed from overseas is used for luxury consumption instead of economic production. It is like a huge wealth funnel. , leading to stagnation of the country's economic level, far behind the economic productivity of the Netherlands.Moreover, in order to maintain its hegemony, Spain went to war everywhere, fighting with France, the Ottoman Empire, and the United Kingdom, etc., and its huge national power fell into endless consumption until it declined.

Another country that naturally has sea power genes, the United Kingdom, is just a little freshman who is worried about making a living. At best, it is a second-rate European country that is turning somersault in the quagmire.Its domestic commercial capital is far from growing as strong as that of the Dutch commercial capital, and its domestic commercial system design cannot be compared with that of the Netherlands.

During this period, the capital accumulation of the Netherlands was even greater than that of other European countries combined, and the scale of foreign investment was equivalent to 15 UKs.The national bonds of many regions such as Europe, the East Indies, and the Americas have Dutch investments, with a capital scale of more than 3.5 million Dutch guilders.The national bonds of countries such as the United Kingdom, France, Spain, Russia, Sweden, and Germany all have a considerable degree of Dutch investment, and the Netherlands receives tens of millions of Dutch guilders in dividend income from these countries every year.

The Dutch, whose families have a lot of money, have fantasized that it would be best if such a peaceful life lasted forever.However, God seems to deliberately tease the Dutch, while giving it a unique "eating capital", while also arranging a powerful and greedy neighbor for it, and this neighbor has a strong desire for the Dutch with pockets. Heart.

The six-year Franco-Dutch war caused serious damage to the entire Netherlands. Countless towns were burned, countless wealth was swallowed up by war or floods, and more than [-] soldiers and civilians were killed or injured. De Ruyter, who was regarded as the god of war in the navy, also died in the Augusta waters.

Although the territory of the Netherlands has been completely restored, and the French market has also received preferential treatment of low tariffs, the Netherlands has completely fallen into the geographical disadvantage of being double-teamed by Britain and France.Coupled with the short-sightedness of the merchants in the Dutch province and the parliamentarians of the Federal State Council, they forced the ruling William and other provinces to sign a peace agreement with France in the name of the Republic as a whole, which made Frederick William, the main ally of Brandenburg, very angry. He was dissatisfied, thinking that he had been betrayed by the Dutch, and angrily severed relations with the Netherlands.

After the war, countries began to recognize and respect Louis XIV's title of "Sun King". The Sun King's France also completely replaced the Netherlands and became the most powerful and influential new arbiter in Europe.

"In continental Europe, the rise of France is irresistible, and Louis XIV's ambition will grow infinitely with the expansion of French power." William III, the governor of the United Provinces, said to the visiting envoy of Qi State, Ji Changrong, with a serious expression: "Under this situation, none of us knows when the next war, provoked by France, will break out again. And we, the United Provinces, may once again become their targets, bringing our people into In a terrible disaster."

After William III became the governor of the United Provinces, he performed very well on the battlefield.Although this war was very difficult, when the Dutch fought until the end of 1673, all the French troops were driven out of the country. This made William III's prestige reach its peak, and he won the title of "Hero of the National Defense".

William III not only saved the Orange family, but also saved the interprovincial republic and maintained the stability of the Dutch maritime colonial empire.

Strong as he was and a near-uncrowned king, William III was far from authoritarian and politically no more capable of reforming the constitution than the country's former leader, John DeWitt the Great Speaker.Because, after all, the wealth of the Dutch province is the foundation of all the military and political power of the Netherlands. It does not accept the control of William III, but insists on its own free judgment and decision-making power.After the war, the two sides had frequent frictions because of this, and William can be said to have embarked on the old path of confrontation between his father William II and the merchants of the Dutch province.

In fact, since the founding of the federal republic, it has been often controlled by the parliamentary oligarchs dominated by commercial wealth, especially by the merchant oligarchs in the Dutch province, who dominate the state affairs by threatening to refuse to pay taxes, because the Dutch provincial family provides nearly 60% of the national treasury income.And when the semi-hereditary "ruling" power penetrated into the independent municipal operations of the provinces, it would naturally be firmly resisted by the town merchants in the strongest province of the Netherlands.

This shows the unsolvable political problem of the United Provinces - the line struggle between centralization (Orange faction) and decentralization (parliamentary faction).Although from the beginning of the Franco-Dutch War in 1672, William III won the support of businessmen who supported him and served as the speaker of the Dutch Provincial Assembly, the sharp conflict between the Dutch Provincial Assembly and William continued, and he proposed to strengthen the centralization and rectification. The proposals of the Federal Provincial Army were all rejected.

All this made William III feel angry, but at the same time seemed so helpless.Under such constraints, William III, who decided to devote his whole life to combating the Catholic hegemony in France, was unable to respond positively and effectively in the United Provinces.

Deep in his heart, he was actually very envious of Louis XIV, who possessed supreme power.Words follow the law, mouth contains the constitution of heaven, I am the country, how high-spirited and reckless it is.Louis XIV is definitely a great example for all European monarchs and princes of this period.His way of life, his governing style, and his policies are what the monarchs of all countries dream of, and everyone wants to be a little sun king.

"Your Federal Province Republic is the most cherished friendly state of Qi. In the past 20 years, we have established a profound friendship and trust with each other." Ji Changrong said solemnly: "Our Emperor and the cabinet government promise, No matter what kind of crisis your federal province is in, we Qi will continue to support you as always."

"Thank you very much, His Majesty the Emperor and the cabinet government for your long-term support and trust in our Federation of Provinces." William III nodded with satisfaction, expressing his gratitude for Qi's long-term almost unconditional maintenance of the Federation of Provinces, "Our Federation of Provinces The 150 million people will always remember the help you Qi State gave us, and on behalf of the United Provinces, I would like to promise you Qi State that we will always be the most reliable and loyal strategic partner of Qi State in the European continent."

After the visiting delegation from Qi State arrived in the Netherlands, representatives of the two sides conducted a series of positive and beneficial discussions and signed a package of deepening cooperation agreements on politics, economy, military affairs, and cultural exchanges.

Among them, in terms of military affairs, Qi State and the United Provinces Republic signed a secret treaty against the United Kingdom, agreeing that when either of the two parties is attacked by the United Kingdom, the other party will give the other party the greatest military and material support, which can be used freely and without compensation. Overseas bases owned by both parties.

Considering the geopolitical balance policy, the Netherlands is eager to use Spain to check and balance the expansion of France. William III tactfully stated that he does not want Qi to fall into a war with Spain, so as not to weaken Spain's strength.If the Qi State is willing, the Inter-provincial Republic can actively engage in diplomatic mediation for this purpose and mediate the military conflict that broke out between the two sides.

"The French provided us with a very important piece of information." Ji Changrong said blankly: "The Spanish royal family is actively contacting bankers in Florence and Venice, preparing to borrow a huge amount of money. And this amount, it is believed It will be used as war funds. The Spaniards are preparing to form an expeditionary fleet to launch a large-scale attack on our American possessions. Your Royal Highness, the Spanish war machine has already started. You are sure Can you persuade them to stop the war?"

Hearing this, William III was silent for a long time, and then sighed softly.

(End of this chapter)