Rise of the 1630s South America

Chapter 2476 Great Northern War ([-])

The Russians have indeed been enjoying themselves recently.

After Fort Notte was captured by the Tsar himself and renamed Shlisseli Fortress (meaning "Key Fortress", because it was the key to control the Neva River), Peter I and Menshiko Marshal Husband continued to march westward. After a series of battles, they wiped out a large number of Swedish defenders, and then captured the important town of Njeshnac, approaching the mouth of the Neva River.

Earlier this month (April 1703), on Hare Island near Njeshnac, Tsar Peter drew a cross on the ground with a soldier's rifle and ordered a fortress to be erected there.Regardless of the severe cold in early spring, the Russians drove the first foundation of the new fortress into the frozen ground. Peter I named it "Peter and Paul Fortress" after his patron saint.Interestingly, it is said that Peter I chose the location of the fortress with the help of an eagle (well, eagles really like rabbits...), he attaches great importance to this fortress, and plans to move a large number of people to settle in the future and gradually fade it away Its military color has developed into an important port city!

Yes, the port city, the eyes of the Russians are almost wet!They used to have access to the Baltic Sea hundreds of years ago, but unfortunately they were snatched away by the Swedes, and today they finally snatched one back from the Swedes. Arkhangelsk and St. Nicholas, who have been waiting for half a year, are much stronger, aren't they?

Peter I plans to visit the Peter and Paul Fortress again in May.He is very fascinated by this place, and regards it as a monument to his victory over Sweden and the starting point for realizing his ambition.Needless to say, Peter is very fond of sailing, especially the advanced culture of the West, so he decided to build a naval base here - well, our poor Baltic fleet finally got rid of Lake Lagado and can enter the real sea - the city Many western-style buildings will be planned inside.Please note that the West here does not only refer to Amsterdam or Paris. In fact, Peter Tsar, who has a broad vision, also plans to build a large number of Eastern-style buildings here, and invites diplomats, businessmen, artists, engineers, soldiers, etc. from the East Bank here. Live here to add a different atmosphere to the city.This is a new city that is different from most Russian cities, there is no doubt about it!

Compared with the high-spiritedness of the Russians, the Swedes, who have been victorious in wars, are of course very happy, but there is always something wrong.King Charles XII of Sweden garrisoned Poznan, while suppressing the aristocratic armed forces opposing him in Poland, while fighting the stubborn Saxons.Sweden once asked him to return to Stockholm, but Charles XII said that all government affairs reports that needed to be processed would be sent to Poland, and nothing would be delayed.Charles XII was so confident that he might not have known that he might never have the chance to return to Stockholm—well, it might be inaccurate to say that, after all, Charles XII had been lying in the basement of the Royal Church in Stockholm for twenty years. months.

But in any case, the situation at this time is very good for the Swedes, which may be the main reason for the pride and complacency of Charles XII: they defeated the Danes and their allies at the Holstein Lightning, and they defeated the Danes and their allies at the Battle of Narva. The Russians were severely defeated in the battle, and the Saxony and Polish coalition forces were defeated in the Battle of Riga, and then they entered Poland, chasing August and his henchmen, winning consecutive battles, forcing him to "voluntarily" give up Polish throne.

Such a brilliant record is like a god coming down to earth, and any monarch would be satisfied, not to mention that Charles XII is only a 19-year-old young monarch.Under such circumstances, Charles XII slowly began to indulge in Polish affairs. He confiscated the wealth and labor of the Polish people in Poznan, and built a very beautiful palace as his residence and office.He also tacitly allowed his generals to loot the Polish countryside, and he did not hesitate to arouse the great disgust of the Poles. Perhaps in his eyes, the opinions of the Poles were of little importance.

The only thing that made him feel uncomfortable was that Lesinski, the puppet, was too incapable and caused him a lot of trouble.To say that he is poor, mainly refers to the inability to unite the Polish nobles.As the son of the former King Sobieski, who enjoyed great prestige in Poland and the entire Central and Eastern European region, Lesinski has been elected as the King of Poland—of course, many Polish nobles do not recognize his status as king—but Unable to effectively control the situation in Poland, August, the rebellious king, was still surrounded by a large number of supporters, and the entire Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth was in a state of fragmentation, which made it impossible for the Swedes to effectively extract Polish resources and manpower. On the contrary, it is really useless to send troops to help Lesinski crusade against opponents, consuming a lot of resources in vain!

To say that Leszinski loves to make trouble mainly refers to his extremely hostile attitude towards the East Coast people in Gdansk.Since Sweden, the Netherlands, and Russia agreed to acquire the Free City of Gdansk on the east coast and Poland lost its only access to the sea, Lesinski made a big fuss about it, making frequent offensive remarks, and after the withdrawal of the Swedish army , privately bewitching the local nobles to attack the people on the east coast, although it ended in failure.

Charlie XII had already figured out that Leszinski was planning to use this incident to unite people and strengthen his prestige in Poland, but he thought that Leszinski had chosen the wrong opponent and had done a stupid thing.According to the reports of his subordinates stationed in Gdansk for a period of time, Charles XII realized that the east bank army was well-equipped and well-trained, which was not comparable to the rabble under Leszinski.Although he also has his own reasons, for example, the East Coast people have doubled the control area without authorization, for example, the East Coast people have severely persecuted the local residents, for example, the East Coast people have greater ambitions in the future, etc., but this is not Lexings The reason why Ki secretly messed up.Charlie XII has already decided to send someone to Warsaw as soon as possible to give this guy a warning and ask him to keep his hands in check and not to provoke without authorization, so as not to affect the overall situation.

At present, the most important thing for Lesinski to do is to try his best to persuade his supporters to cooperate with the Swedish army to defeat August and his allies.In addition, the trade agreement reached with the Kingdom of Sweden must be implemented as soon as possible, which is very critical for the increasingly meddling kingdom's finances.According to the agreement, Poland’s export commodities will be transferred out of the island via the port of Riga; if they settle down in Polish cities, businessmen from Gothenburg and Stockholm will enjoy a series of privileges and preferential treatment. In other words, Poland’s foreign trade will be substantially controlled by Swedish businessmen Third, even if peace is restored with the Russian Empire in the future, the Kingdom of Poland is not allowed to conduct any entrepot trade with Russia (not to say that it cannot trade, but that it cannot entrepot trade, there is still a difference...).

In return for these commercial costs, the Kingdom of Poland would be spared territorial losses, which is not bad.In this era, how could it be possible for a defeated country not to pay any price?Either money or land, choose one of the two, the Poles are not difficult to understand.What’s more, they are a little bit fortunate that the traditional land nobles are mostly, and the business earns less. The most important thing is to keep the land and the power to control the serfs. This is the most important-some people may I'm still a little bit happy, you're an idiot, people from the east coast, all our products will go to Riga in the future, so you can stay at the port of Gdansk and wait slowly!

Of course, the people on the east coast are not very aware of the complicated mood of the Poles.In fact, they were newcomers and didn’t know much about Poland. Except for the desire of the Poles to want China to invade Poland, other information was superficial.But it doesn't matter, the meal has to be eaten one bite at a time, and the work can be carried out slowly.Their primary task now is to digest the control area, which has exceeded 360 square kilometers, almost three times the original size, with a population of more than 70, more than [-]% of whom are Poles, and the rest are Germans and Livonians. and a small number of Swedes.

With a population of 6, most of them are farmers in terms of social status.After the Fourth Mixed Regiment quickly occupied their homeland, they carried out a certain degree of land reform in the local area.The first is the land clearing of the fugitive nobles or anti-Eastern elements. The land of the fugitive aristocrats will be confiscated first. The land owner can use the certificate to ask the Danzig County Government for redemption fees. Give.

The collected land was not allocated to local landless or landless Polish farmers, but was managed in the form of state farms.The farm workers are from China, mostly Indians, with a small amount of Brunei, Arabs (from Bahrain) and Indo-Portuguese.According to regulations, if they have worked on the farm for a certain number of years, performed well, and their beliefs are correct, they can obtain the right of first refusal of these lands when the state-owned farm is liquidated and ends operations, and become official residents of Danzig County.

It's not that the Danzig County government has never thought of attracting people from the east coast to farm.But the shameful thing is that they failed, and few people are willing to travel across the ocean to Danzig.If you want to farm a lot in the local area, why go to the Baltic Sea? People are not stupid!In desperation, they had no choice but to focus on the immigrants from the Far East. In 1704, at least [-] Far East residents were relocated to live, and some land was sold to them at a low price as their livelihood.

According to the latest statistics, the sum of all the foreign population in Danzig County only accounts for 0.5% of the total population here, which is pitifully small.Although the country has been sending new immigrants here, and although the local Poles have been losing (interestingly, the Germans, Livonians, and Swedes basically have no intention of leaving), if you want to change the composition of the local population, you must achieve A more stable rule still needs a long process.

Don't worry, people on the east coast have plenty of time, so you can wait slowly.The old generation can no longer be transformed, but the next generation can still fight for it.People on the east coast control the education and religious system in Danzig, so are they afraid that someone will turn the world upside down in the future?In addition, the Baltic Bank has also started to operate now. With such a powerful tool, and Danzig being a pure land with few wars, the economy of Danzig County will definitely usher in waves of leap-forward development in the future.With the development of the economy, there is no need to worry about not being able to attract local talents to come and settle down. As long as you give them a comfortable life, why not come?With the new ideas, new atmosphere, new knowledge and new way of life brought by these people, after decades of continuous development, are you still worried that the local people will love Poland and Prussia?Just kidding!

(End of this chapter)