Chapter 135 Rest

The war was temporarily over, and the East African colonies resumed their normal operations.

During the war, immigrants had to be transported to the front line, which was an overloaded challenge for East Africa.

Therefore, the war machine in East Africa needs to be slowed down. The entire East Africa is an agricultural colony, so its ability to support large-scale military operations is stronger than those of traditional agricultural countries.

Fortunately, the East African colonies were young, with a large land area and large arable land per capita, so the total food output was high, self-sufficient, and strong support for the movements of new immigrants and the army.

The army needs to rest and recuperate, and the new immigrants heading to the west must work quickly to plant the land as soon as possible and create value. Other areas in East Africa must also work hard to open up fields.

In the past two months, East Africa has received 170,000 immigrants (this figure is not an exaggeration. It refers to the slave trade and the ability of British ships to transport black people. So what East Africa lacks is not the transportation capacity, but the lack of immigrants, especially German immigrants. origin.), all taken over by the newly occupied North-Western Zone, West Kenya District and Omorat Town.

If these 170,000 immigrants were divided among the already established colonial strongholds, all parts of East Africa would surely reach a higher level of development.

In the first half of 1868, East Africa imported more than 500,000 immigrants. In the first half of the year alone, Ernst's estimate of 600,000 immigrants a year at the end of last year was almost completed.

At present, the population of East Africa has reached 1.2 million, and the land area is about 1.5 million square kilometers. In the previous life, Uganda has also been regarded as a meal, with more than 200,000 square kilometers of land.

It is expected that by the end of the year, it will definitely be able to swallow it. If the immigration activities go smoothly, it can reach at least 1.7 million.

As the population exceeded one million, Ernst was no longer panicking at all. One million was not only a unit, but also a tranquilizer. In this era, a country with a population of more than one million had exceeded.

In the 17th century, when the Netherlands rose, its population was in the millions; in the 19th century, when the United Kingdom rose, its population was in the tens of millions; in the 20th century, when the United States rose, its population was in the hundreds of millions.

With more than one million people, the East African colonies will be able to gain a foothold in Africa. On one-third of an acre of land in Africa, their strength will be at least fourth.

The first is naturally the Egyptian Muhammad Ali dynasty under the nominal territory of the Ottoman Empire.

Anyone familiar with history knows that Muhammad Ali's reforms brought Egypt into a period of rich countries and strong military forces, and even defeated its overlord, the Ottoman Empire.

Later, the intervention of Britain and France saved the dying Ottoman Empire, and Egypt was reduced to a semi-colonial state again.

Although Egypt's reform failed, after the reform, Egypt has half a foot into industrialization, and its army has also completed modernization. Therefore, Egypt's comprehensive strength should currently be the well-deserved number one among local forces in Africa.

The current Egyptian territory also includes Sudan (including South Sudan), which actually borders the Omo River Basin colony in the northwest region of East Africa.

The East African colonies may not be afraid of Egypt militarily, but the East African colonies are not as comprehensive as Egypt. They have industry, agriculture, and a navy, and they have even achieved self-sufficiency in some weapons and equipment.

The second is France. France has nothing to say. Considering the distance between the French North African colony (Algeria) and the French mainland, it is no problem to say that France is the strongest force in Africa.

Anyway, the French are mainly expanding in North and West Africa, and are not close to East Africa. The closest French colonies to East Africa are the Comoros Islands and French Madagascar, separated from East Africa by the Indian Ocean.

The third is Britain. Like France, its navy is too strong, so no other power in the world can compare with these two countries.

Why not put Britain and France before Egypt, that's because these two countries are not purely African countries.

So in the mainland, excluding some colonists, the first is Egypt, the second is the Abyssinian Empire, and the third is that Ernst himself doesn’t know.

The British and French colonies had national support, so East Africa naturally did not dare to feel uncomfortable in front of the two countries, but it was not at all timid when facing the Boers and Portuguese.

Because it offended Britain and France, East Africa could only be beaten and could not get out of the Indian Ocean if it wanted to fight back. But facing the remaining forces, it was different. The Boers had a population of hundreds of thousands, and the Portuguese in Mozambique, including merchants and immigrants, probably only had 10,000. Take people (maybe just a few thousand).

The East African colonies are on the same level as them. As for the Portuguese Kingdom's support for Mozambique, just listen to it. Ernst will not take it seriously unless he brings hundreds of thousands of troops over.

When fighting a war, don't charge into battle yourself. As long as the immigrant population in the territory is large, the army will be larger, and the army is the basis for Ernst to establish a foothold in East Africa.

Of course, there is no need to conflict with the above-mentioned forces in East Africa at present. There is still a lot of open space in Africa that can be developed.

Therefore, before the great powers set their sights on Africa, the East African colonies could expand as much as they wanted, and their opponents were only indigenous forces.

Without the support of external forces, it was basically impossible for the indigenous people to be opponents of the East African colonies.

Don't look at the smooth development of the East African colonies and their extremely rapid expansion, which was based on Ernst's daily fear.

The East African colony was nothing more than Ernst's use of the identity of the Hohenzollern family to give the outside world the illusion that the East African colony was Prussia's attempt to colonize overseas.

Compared with Prussia spending its energy on developing colonies, various countries were more worried about Prussia unifying Germany, so the expansion of East African colonies could gain the acquiescence of Britain, France and other countries.

Prussia itself does not have the energy to pay attention to overseas affairs. Now the top officials of the kingdom are making various preparations for the unification of Germany. As for the Hechingen royal family to develop Africa, as long as Prussia provides money and effort, and the Hechingen royal family counts, Our own people will eventually have to move closer to themselves when developing colonies in Africa.

Needless to say, Tsarist Russia’s interests are all in Eurasia.

The Austro-Hungarian Empire supported Ernst. The Austro-Hungarian Empire had no energy to expand overseas, and the relationship between Habsburg and Ernst was so good that they almost became a family. Ernst recruited immigrants in Austria-Hungary, not only It was good for Austria, but also good for Hungary, and stabilized its rule. Many factors caused the Austro-Hungarian Empire to support Ernst's colonization.

But support is support, and the Austro-Hungarian Empire can only sell Ernst. Apart from being more relaxed on the immigration issue, it has no practical benefits at all.

To sum up, there is no country that the East African colonies can rely on, and a complete fall to either side may lead to catastrophe.

Therefore, we can only protect ourselves by relying on immigration and forming an army. Of course, there must be a threshold for immigration. If all kinds of people are accepted, then if imperialism comes knocking on the door, they will definitely lead the way.

This is also the reason why immigration from East Africa is slow. If quality is not taken into consideration, two to three million immigrants can easily arrive every year. However, it took two and a half years for the East African colonies to reach a population of 1.2 million, which is Ernst's reverse. The result of improved immigration standards.