I want to be emperor

Chapter 702
The Spice Islands, also known as the Maluku Islands, is a place of treasure in the seventeenth century, especially for Europeans.

After the Dutch monopolized the trade of the Spice Islands, the profits they earned every year were astronomical.

But this archipelago rich in spice gold, in fact, strictly speaking, does not mean that the entire archipelago is rich in spices, but that a few of the islands are rich in different spices.

Cloves are found in Denardy and Tidore, cinnamon and nutmeg in Ambon and the Banda Islands.

Cloves, cinnamon, and nutmeg are the most precious hit spices in this era. As for spices, pepper is also widely distributed in Southeast Asia. Before the Malay Peninsula under the control of the Great Chu Empire, it was There are many births.

Therefore, the production of pepper is not as rare as cloves, cinnamon, and nutmeg, and the price is far less expensive than the latter three.

Since the Dutch gradually entered and controlled the Maluku Islands at the end of the sixteenth century, this place has become the main source of income for the Dutch.

They imposed a strict blockade control on the export of spices produced in the Maluku Islands in order to implement a monopoly, and even strictly prohibited the outflow of these spice plants.

In the end, super high profits were realized.

But all this came to nothing in the autumn of Chengshun's 23rd year.

Because the Great Chu Empire is here!

In fact, the top leaders of the Great Chu Empire have no interest in the spice trade, even if they spend a lot of money to import spices every year, but for the Great Chu Empire, spices are just like other imported overseas specialties, which are dispensable product of.

The high-level officials of the Great Chu Empire paid very little attention to the spice trade. Relatively speaking, the high-level officials of the Great Chu Empire paid more attention to the high-quality long-staple cotton in the Indian Peninsula.

In order to obtain a stable source of cotton in these places, the Western Trading Company has fought at least a dozen battles with more than a thousand people in the past four or five years. At the same time, it is actively developing cotton in West Asia, especially Egypt. import.

Because cotton is an important industrial raw material for the textile industry of the Great Chu Empire, and although the amount of domestically produced cotton is increasing day by day, it is still not enough. At the same time, the quality of domestic cotton and the amount of imported long-staple cotton are still limited gap.

Cotton is also divided into types, some have shorter fibers, some have longer fibers, and cotton with long fibers has more advantages when using mechanical spinning and weaving. Not only is it easier to process, but the quality of the woven cloth is also better. excellent.

Whether in contemporary or later generations, the long-staple cotton in Egypt is the top variety.

In addition, it is worth mentioning that the origin of Egyptian long-staple cotton is in the Indian Peninsula... The reason why this kind of cotton is called Egyptian cotton is that it is because of the large-scale promotion of planting and export in Egypt, which has caused huge controversy. repercussions.

Therefore, among the cotton on the Indian Peninsula, there are also long-staple cottons of very good quality, and these long-staple cottons are important imported raw materials for the textile industry of the Great Chu Empire.

Cotton imports are currently the largest imported material in the Great Chu Empire, and the annual import volume is very large.

For the sustained and rapid development of the domestic textile industry, the Great Chu Empire actively introduced various types of high-quality cotton to promote domestic cultivation, and planted long-staple cotton in some areas, especially in Turpan Province, which is suitable for cotton cultivation, and overseas. Actively maintain the stability and quantity of cotton imports.

Compared with before, spices are actually useless in the industrial system of the Great Chu Empire. Even the various daily-use chemicals that have emerged recently, that is, products such as soap and soap, do not need to use these imported spices .

Most of the imported spices are basically used as food seasonings.

For things that are not needed in industry, and are not considered indispensable in people's livelihood, the upper echelons of the Great Chu Empire generally don't pay much attention to them.

The reason why we are now fighting with the Dutch and wanting to seize the Spice Islands is not for the spices produced in the Spice Islands, but to drive the Dutch out.

Nanyang is the Nanyang of the Great Chu Empire!

In the back garden of the Great Chu Empire, the upper echelon of the empire would never allow a European colonial country to stand in the way.

It can even be said that even if the Dutch occupied not the Spice Islands, but a barren land, the Great Chu Empire would still launch a war to expel them.

To monopolize Nanyang and build Nanyang into its own back garden is the main purpose of the top leaders of the Great Chu Empire.

As for direct control of one or two local products, it doesn't really matter.

From this point of view, the defeat of the Dutch is already doomed.

The first task force of the Nanyang Fleet of the Great Chu Empire Navy arrived in the Maluku Islands soon, and attacked many Dutch colonial strongholds there.

These colonial strongholds are not as large as Batavia City, and the garrison strength is only small, and there are no large-scale coastal forts with strong defenses.

Therefore, the operation of the squadron was very smooth. Many warships rushed up to approach the port and directly bombarded the port with grenades on a large scale, and then sent the marines ashore to attack the stronghold.

If it doesn't work, at worst, just pull a batch of naval guns directly to the shore, and get close to the shelling, and it will take a few more days to take it down.

Under such circumstances, the city of Batavia has not lost, but the rule of the Dutch in the Maluku Islands was quickly disintegrated.

It's just that the Dutch defenders in Batavia don't know about all of this.

Now the Chu army surrounded Batavia like Tietong. The Dutch in the city had no way to break through, nor could they get reinforcements or news from the outside world. They could only passively hide in the city and resist.

But this kind of recalcitrance did not last long, because when Major General Wan Binglin was ready, the attack, which had been seriously delayed in the eyes of the Navy, finally launched.

More than 13 20mm short-barreled howitzers of the No.[-] Heavy Artillery Regiment began to make loud noises and projected heavy shells into the city.

There are also many 170mm siege guns and 150mm light howitzers also joined the shelling combat sequence.

As a result, there are more than 60 large-caliber howitzers alone. The grenades fired by these howitzers are constantly exploding in various fortifications in Batavia City, and occasionally shells fly over the city. Some of the explosions also sparked fires in ordinary areas of the city.

The city of Batavia, after the bombardment started, turned into a deserted place, which made it hard to bear to look directly at.

As for the Dutch defenders on the top of the city and some fortifications outside the city, they suffered heavy casualties in the early shelling.

Even if they aimed at the fierce howitzer bombardment of the Chu army, they also built a certain amount of anti-cannon fortifications, but after all, it was quite easy to use to really fight against the army of the Great Chu Empire.

They originally thought that the anti-aircraft fortifications that were already very strong were useless in the face of the large-caliber grenades of the Chu army.

Even the overall strength of the artillery fortifications is not as good as that of the Ming army or the Dongyao people... The Ming army or the Dongyao people are really bombarded by the Chu army every day. The defense against howitzers is extremely important, and the artillery fortifications built are all the same as tortoise shells, so that when the Chu army fought against the Dongyao people in the later period, they had to pull hundreds of artillery to fight...

It’s not enough to have grenades alone, and then you have to get a large-caliber cannon, such as a 130mm cannon.

In the end, heavy armor commandos had to be used frequently, and these heavy armor commandos were dispatched after the shelling to kill the enemy and seize positions.

However, after the Dongyao people were killed by the Chu army, the Chu army had never encountered any opponent who really attached great importance to it and took full precautions.

Be it Zhungeer, the Russians, or the indigenous countries in Southeast Asia, they don't fully understand the artillery advantages of the Great Chu Empire... Although they will all be prepared, this kind of preparation is seriously insufficient.

Today's Dutch are no exception. They also know that the Chu army's artillery is powerful, and they also know that the Chu army's grenades are very powerful.

For this reason, they also responded by building a lot of anti-grenade fortifications.

But this kind of defense is just what they think is sufficient... When they are really facing the bombardment of more than 60 large-caliber grenades, these fortifications are just like paper.

Especially their two coastal defense forts, although they built very strong fortifications to guard against the Chu army, when they were actually shelled, their open-air artillery positions were still subjected to inhumane cover bombardment.

A large number of their gunners died directly in this covering shelling.

Who let their fort be arranged in the open air, and there is no ring fortification to prevent impact or shrapnel.

Open-air circular artillery fortifications, even the Ming army knew about this thing, but the Dutch just didn't know...

The main reason is that the Dutch have never experienced a grenade...but if they have experienced it once, they will not be so foolishly bombed. If you stack up a few sandbags, the killing effect of the grenade will not be so good.

But the Dutch don't!
Therefore, on the first day of their first coastal defense fort, its gunners had suffered heavy casualties, which in turn caused a large number of artillery to misfire before they played much role.

The gunners suffered heavy casualties, what's the use of having a cannon.

After the first coastal defense turret was misfired, an infantry regiment of the army went up directly, and after half a day of fierce fighting, it finally captured the right turret of the Dutch.

As the fort was captured by the Chu army, the next situation was even worse for the Dutch.

Because the warships of the Nanyang Fleet of the Chu Army were no longer threatened by the fort on the right, they all approached the coast on the right for artillery fire, providing strong fire support for the army, and directly bombarded the urban area of ​​Batavia City.

The artillery unit of the No.14 Division pulled more than 20 115mm field guns to the right turret in the afternoon, and took advantage of the condescending geographical advantage of the right turret to conduct a comprehensive bombardment of Batavia City.

At this time, the artillery fire of the Chu army had already covered the entire city of Batavia.

Comprehensive coverage can be achieved from ports to urban areas.

At this time, in fact, the continued resistance of the Dutch defenders in the city has no practical significance.

On the evening of the next day, the No.14 Division of the Chu Army captured the left fort of Batavia Harbor, which was also the last main fort of the Dutch in Batavia.

The fort on the left is said to be a new fort built by the Dutch to further protect the city of Batavia after the threat of the Great Chu Empire increased. After continuous strengthening and emergency supplements before the war.

There are more than 30 large and small artillery pieces deployed, many of which are ship-borne heavy artillery such as 24-pound cannons, and there are even more [-]-pound and [-]-pound artillery.

At the same time, because the shooting range of the turret is extremely wide, it can not only shoot at the sea to protect the port, but also shoot at the land to protect the city.

But such a fort, which is quite a heavy artillery, was declared to have fallen the next day after the Chu army launched its attack.

Even the Chu army did not pay too much for taking down the fort!
During the offensive, in addition to using large-caliber howitzers to cover the shelling to suppress the enemy's artillery, the Chu army infantry also dug traffic trenches to advance, and did not suffer actual losses during the advance.

When they got closer, the infantry of the Chu army would use intensive shooting, 110mm ultra-light short-barreled howitzers, and even throwing grenades to launch the last tens of meters of attack.

After the firepower suppressed the enemy, he rushed out with a rifle loaded with bullets and a bayonet at the same time... After rushing out, he shot the defender first, and then went straight up to fight the bayonet.

To be honest, there is nothing new about the offensive tactics, nor can it be said that they are very tall.

But the Dutch just can't hold back...

It has nothing to do with bravery, tactics or anything... When shells are constantly falling on your head, and you don't have any professional bomb holes to hide in, it's good if you hide and don't get killed by shells, there is still Take care of blocking the enemy's attack.

That's right, just like previous battles, the Great Chu Empire Army once again used artillery to bully people!
After directly submerging the opponent with a large number of shells and grenades, let the infantry rush to clean up the battlefield!

In this way, the fort on the left side of Batavia City, which seemed to be extremely strong and powerful, fell.

When the left fort also fell, the city of Batavia was equivalent to a crab whose left and right pincers were chopped off, along with eight feet tied up...

It can only be thrown into the pot and cooked obediently, becoming a delicious food.

In fact, this is indeed the case. After the fall of the two outer forts, the city of Batavia lost its crucial outer barrier, and then the Chu army began to launch a fierce attack on the city of Batavia.

The most important thing is that the Chu army also used two forts, not only using the artillery left by the Dutch, but also moving a large number of their own artillery, and then launched a fierce attack on the city of Batavia .

On the third day and the fourth day, the sound of the rumbling guns never stopped. However, in order to avoid a large number of casualties of soldiers, Wan Binglin was more cautious in using infantry to attack, and only adopted frequent small-scale assaults. The more important purpose of continuously launching offensives is not to conquer certain places, but to attract and mobilize the Dutch defenders to leave the solid defensive positions to expose them, and then use artillery to kill them quickly.

Before the final attack, it is the combat plan designated by Major General Wan Binglin to kill and injure the enemy's vital forces as much as possible.

This tactic made the Dutch very uncomfortable. The large number of casualties caused the Dutch defenders to quickly lose their strength. More importantly, the continuous high-intensity fighting in the past few days caused a large number of casualties and caused a large number of soldiers to flee.

Among the Dutch, there are not a few people who sneak away and hide like Lawrence.

What's more important are those Javanese natives. These natives were originally servants, and fighting for the Dutch was only based on their salary.

There was little loyalty to the Dutch themselves.

Ever since, before the Chu army launched a general infantry attack, the native Javanese soldiers in the city collapsed one after another.

A large number of Javanese soldiers began to flee the battlefield, and many of them voluntarily ran out to surrender to the Chu army.

All this made the top management of the Dutch East India Company extremely desperate.

Originally, they wanted to stick to it for at least half a year, and if they were lucky, they could even stick to it for more than two years. For this reason, they had stockpiled a large amount of food, weapons and ammunition in advance to ensure that they would not be unable to stick to it due to insufficient weapons and ammunition.

But now, these hoarded food and ammunition have not been used much yet, but two crucial forts have fallen, and the soldiers in the city have also suffered heavy losses.

On the other side of the two forts, the combined loss of troops exceeded 2000.

Hundreds of people were killed and injured in the city one after another, and thousands of people fled.

Only a few days after the real war started, only about 4000 of the [-] troops under their command were left.

Even among these 4000 people, most of them are probably thinking of fleeing or surrendering.

This city cannot be defended!
After realizing this, the top executives of the Dutch East India Company finally accepted the reality.

On November 23th, [-]rd year of Chengshun, the defenders of the Dutch East India Company in Batavia officially sent representatives to negotiate the surrender.

The Dutch wanted to surrender, and the Chu army was also happy not to carry out the final infantry attack, so as to avoid unnecessary casualties.

After negotiations, the Chu army promised to ensure the safety of the Dutch soldiers in the city, and allowed a small number of senior executives of the Dutch East India Company to leave Batavia with their personal belongings and return to India. The Dutch East India Company officially announced its full surrender.

On the day of the surrender, more than a dozen senior executives of the Dutch East India Company, like bereaved dogs, carried some of their personal belongings and headed for India on a ship of the Western Trading Company of the Great Chu Empire.

As for the others... they are not treated so well.

Then the mercenaries of the Dutch East India Company will be sent to the prisoner-of-war camp, and they can leave after the war between the two sides subsides. Before that, they should work honestly in the prisoner-of-war camp.

These Dutch soldiers, the top executives of the Dutch East India Company, managed to get them the treatment of a prisoner of war.

As for the Javanese native soldiers, the Dutch East India Company didn't treat them as human beings at all, and didn't put forward any conditions... The Great Chu Empire didn't bother to deal with it, and directly treated them as illegal native armed forces.

The experience of dealing with the indigenous armed forces of the Great Chu Empire is very rich. When I was in the Malay Peninsula and the central and eastern regions of Sumatra Island, I often encircled and suppressed some illegal indigenous armed forces. During the encirclement and suppression process, basically no prisoners were left...

With the surrender of the Dutch in the city, the No.14 Division of the Chu Army officially entered Batavia City and took over the last European colonial city in Southeast Asia.

Since then, it has also been declared that Southeast Asia, including the peninsula and the islands, has all become the sphere of influence of the Great Chu Empire.

The news was first sent back to Guangzhou City through the communication clippers, followed by a vote of joy in the business circles in Guangzhou City, no matter those trading companies, shipping companies, or ordinary factories, as long as they are related to foreign trade, they are all right. The news couldn't be happier.

Because this means that there will be many more Nanyang regions in the market for industrial commodities in the Great Chu Empire.

Java Island, the Spice Islands, Borneo and other regions will all become new markets and raw material suppliers for the industrial and commercial circles of the Great Chu Empire.

This is a great benefit to domestic industry and commerce.

And when the news further spread back to Jinling City, it was already December.

Even though the Great Chu Empire has special communication ships, the speed of news transmission is still not fast. The news from Nanyang can be delivered to Jinling City within a month, which is already the result of these communication ships galloping day and night.

But even a flying clipper ship, which is known for its speed, will be affected by monsoons and ocean currents. It is impossible to say that it has always maintained a speed of more than ten knots.

As for the steam engine, the steam engine these days is still unreliable. It is not a big problem to propel small-tonnage ships for inland river navigation, but it is used to propel large-tonnage large-scale ships for ocean-going voyages of thousands of nautical miles. It's just not likely.

Even if steam engines are widely used by then, the speed of ships will only be more than ten knots, and the transmission of ultra-long-distance information will still be very slow.

If you want to solve this problem, you can only wait for a huge breakthrough in electromagnetism, especially in electromagnetic applications, and then you can get a breakthrough after you get wired telegraphy or even wireless telegraphy.

Now, if Luo Zhixue wants to get news from other places, he still needs to rely on this backward way of passing ships and horses alternately.

It is not too late to know the specific wars in the Nanyang region in about a month.

If this is replaced by the Dutch, it is estimated that by next year, people in the Netherlands may not necessarily know that the Spice Islands have been taken by the Great Chu Empire.

After reading the navy's report, Luo Zhixue summoned a number of civil and military officials to finalize the post-war handling issues in the Nanyang region.

The Dutch were driven away, and the western part of Java Island, the Maluku Islands and other areas that the Dutch occupied before fell into the control of the Great Chu Empire. Naturally, it is impossible for the Great Chu Empire to take down these places and leave them alone. Instead, it is ready to be included in the rule of its own overseas territories.

For this reason, after the discussion of the high-level empire, the governor of Banten was formally established.

The governor will be stationed in the city of Batavia. Of course, this place is no longer called by this name. After the Great Chu Empire captured the city, it took the first two syllables of the city's name and named it Bada.

The reason why the new governor of Banten was established, rather than directly under the jurisdiction of the governor of Nanyang, is because the area under the new control is very large and far away from each other.

If it all belongs to the governor of Nanyang for management, to be honest, the governor of Nanyang is too busy to manage it at all. There is only one governor under the jurisdiction of such a large area of ​​Nanyang, not to mention restricting power and the like. .

In addition, most of these places are not yet under the rule of the Great Chu Empire. There are many various indigenous kingdoms in this area... For example, Borneo, in fact, the Great Chu Empire only has a few trading posts on it. , this place is still the territory of the local aborigines.

Therefore, in name, the jurisdiction of the governor of Banten includes Java Island, Borneo, Sulawesi Island, Maluku Islands, and other affiliated islands in this area, but the current actual control area is only the west of Java Island, that is, the Banten Island. Dan area and the Spice Islands.

In most of the remaining places, it is estimated that there will still be natives ruling for a long time in the future. The Great Chu Empire will gradually infiltrate, control, and expand the scope of its direct territories, but it will take time.

During this period, it was dominated by colonial rule, especially economic plunder.

Therefore, the Great Chu Empire simply set up a new governor of Wandan, who is fully responsible for the colonial rule of this area.

The same situation is also the governor of Luzon. Before the Luzon Islands, the Great Chu Empire had little power, but after purchasing the Luzon Islands from Spain, the Great Chu Empire began to station troops here and send officials to rule. A Luzon governor.

Taking advantage of this opportunity, the top leaders of the Great Chu Empire sorted out the administrative structures of other overseas colonies by the way.

In view of the fact that the Nanyang Governor’s jurisdiction is too large, and the Malay Peninsula has been established as the Province of Malacca in its jurisdiction, it stands to reason that a Malacca Governor should be established, but because it overlaps with the Nanyang Governor’s jurisdiction, there has never been a Malacca Governor.

This time, the high-level empire intends to make a complete cut, and the Malacca province officially sets up a governor to take charge of the colonial affairs of Siam and Cambodia.

Colonial activities in the central and eastern parts of Sumatra were gradually carried out. For this reason, a new governor of Palembang was established to govern the affairs of the central and eastern parts of Sumatra and the colonial affairs of the Kingdom of Aceh.

In addition, the governor of Yunnan, who was previously in charge of Myanmar and the Bay of Bengal affairs, was also officially revoked the above-mentioned escrow authority.

The Great Chu Empire also set up a governor of Bangladesh, stationed in Dagon Port, Myanmar, responsible for the colonial affairs of Myanmar and the Bay of Bengal.

The previous governor of India was in charge of the affairs of the Indian Peninsula and Ceylon before, and he had actually managed the affairs of West Asia, North Africa and other places. Now he directly and clearly stated that the governor of India has jurisdiction over the colonial affairs of West Asia and Africa.

Finally, in view of the continued colonial expansion of the Great Chu Empire in North America, there are already about [-] immigrants or garrisons there. A governor of the Americas was specially set up.

Such overseas territories or colonies or spheres of influence of the Great Chu Empire formally formed eight governors, namely: Governor of Fusang, Governor of Nanyang, Governor of Palembang, Governor of Banten, Governor of Luzon, Governor of Bangladesh, Governor of India, Governor of America .

Among them, the establishment of the governor of the Americas means that the Great Chu Empire is about to start its colonization activities in North America in an all-round way!
It is no longer a small fight, just to make some trade with the local natives to make money, but to start a large-scale organization of immigration and seize a large amount of American land!

(End of this chapter)