Chapter 395 Southern Netherlands Initiative

Chapter 396 The Southern Netherlands Initiative

Austria.

Vienna, Schönbrunn Palace.

Joseph II tried to raise his withered right hand, and only an unclear sound came out of his throat: "Talley..."

Leopold II on the side hurriedly guessed: "Your Majesty, are you talking about Talleyrand?"

Seeing the emperor nod, he continued: "Are you very concerned about what he said about the British intention to export revolution?"

Talleyrand had just finished his visit to Austria and stayed for three days. He criticized the British conspiracy to overthrow monarchs of various countries in Vienna.

"It is worth... vigilance." Joseph II said, rested for ten seconds, and then continued with difficulty, "First, use..."

Leopold II followed his words and added: "You mean, we can use this to weaken the British influence on the situation in the Southern Netherlands."

The Holy Roman Emperor nodded weakly: "Cooperation, France."

On the point of squeezing the British out of the German region, France and Austria are very consistent.

"Yes, Your Majesty, I understand. I will take care of it."

...

West of the Mediterranean, Almeria Bay.

In the conference room of the Colossus, a third-class battleship of the British Royal Navy, Lord Tarmos, the British envoy to the Maghreb countries, was reporting to the Foreign Secretary:

"The Moroccan Sultan has agreed to launch an attack on Bizerte as long as we make concessions on grain import tariffs and use Morocco as a transit point for textile trade in North Africa. At present, there are 14,000 Moroccan guards on standby in Annaba. These people are basically equipped with brown bess flintlocks and equipped with 20 cannons."

The Marquis of Wellesley nodded without thinking much:

"Tell the Moroccans that their request will be considered by the parliament."

Compared with the situation in India, the Empire's interests in North Africa can be given up. And using Morocco as a trade transit will not have any impact on British profits.

"I will go to Morocco as soon as possible, Marquis." Lord Tarmos continued, "Algiers has also prepared an army of 12,000 people, but you also know that their combat effectiveness is not worth looking forward to."

The Algiers Guards were previously beaten by Joseph, and they have not recovered after more than half a year.

"Well, let their navy increase harassment of French merchant ships."

Marquis Wellesley gave an order and asked, "What about Tripoli?"

"Currently Benjiul has 12,000 Ottoman Guards." Tarmos said, "But... he has made secret contacts with him according to your instructions, and he is only willing to send no more than 800 troops to plunder. After all, Constantinople has never wanted to offend France."

Marquis Wellesley waved his hand indifferently: "It doesn't matter, I came here to solve this matter this time."

He has obtained a grant of 350,000 pounds from the British Parliament, which is nearly 9 million livres. Of this money, 100,000 pounds was used to bribe Benjiul.

Later, he would go to Constantinople and provide a certain degree of diplomatic support and trade concessions to the Ottomans in exchange for Selim III turning a blind eye to the unauthorized actions of the Tripoli garrison.

Wellesley had absolute confidence that Benjiul, the Ottoman warlord, was driven by huge profits. As long as the Ottoman Sultan did not hold him accountable, he had enough courage to provoke the French army in Tunisia.

In addition, Tripoli also had a fleet of nearly 300 ships. Although most of them were small boats and were by no means a match for the French navy, if they could get British intelligence, artillery and port supply support, they still had the ability to seriously disrupt France's trade in the Mediterranean.

Wellesley knew that the troubles encountered by the East India Company in Mysore were very difficult - this time Britain would definitely have to give up some interests to France to solve this matter.

So he had to try his best to create bargaining chips for himself, so that he could minimize losses during negotiations.

He even planned to let the pirates in Algiers and Tripoli harass the coastal cities in southeastern France to increase the pressure on France after the French army in Tunisia fell into a passive position - being attacked from both sides by nearly 40,000 troops, and the French army with only more than 20,000 people would inevitably be exhausted.

In addition to his layout in the Southern Netherlands, if he was lucky, he might not have to pay anything to exchange for France to stop interfering in the situation in Mysore.

However, when the Colossus arrived at the port of Mitiga for a simple supply and was about to weigh anchor, a fast paddle boat of the Royal Navy, the "Wheeze", came chasing from Gibraltar.

The Marquis of Wellesley was talking to Talmos in the cabin about how to use Britain's naval advantage to attack France's trade in the Caribbean - although Britain and France had a series of treaty restrictions, there must be a way to bypass the treaty to deal with the French. The sugar exports from Saint-Domingue contributed more than 40 million livres of fiscal revenue to the French government every year!

Just when the two had just begun to make some progress, an official from the Breathless knocked on the door and handed Wellesley the latest European intelligence.

The Foreign Secretary took out a few pages of documents from the mailbox, waved them at Talmos, and smiled:

"I guess there is good news from Van der Nott."

He unfolded the paper, read only a few lines, and his smile froze on his face.

"My Lord Marquis, what is the situation in the Southern Netherlands?" Talmos asked rather tactlessly.

"Damn the French!"

Wellesley put away the documents with a gloomy face, hesitated for a moment, gritted his teeth and shouted to the outside of the cabin:

"Tommy, help me call Captain Taylor."

He looked at Talmos again:

"The affairs of Tripoli and the Ottoman Empire are left to you. I must go back to Europe first."

The intelligence mentioned that Austria, Spain, Bavaria, Mainz and other countries have submitted notes to Britain, requesting to clarify Britain's attitude towards the rebellion in the Southern Netherlands and the connection between the previous liberal riots in France and Britain.

Especially the notes from Austria and Spain, the wording was very harsh, and the words between the lines were criticizing Britain's export of revolution in Europe.

Wellesley turned his back and looked out the porthole irritably. He was still careless. He didn't expect that the shameless French would actually link the incitement of riots with "exporting revolution"!

He knew very well that if this matter was not handled properly, it would likely lead to a diplomatic disaster...

More than ten days later, when Wellesley left Cologne for Prussia—yes, even William II had questioned Britain—he suddenly received news that Ludwig IX, the head of Hesse-Darmstadt, had proposed a "Southern Netherlands Initiative."