Chapter 205 Queen of India

In the UK, in addition to the big news of the economic crisis, there is another piece of news that has also aroused heated discussion among the British people, that is, the Royal Titles Bill promulgated in May.

This bill gave Queen Victoria a brand new title, that is, the Queen of the Indian Empire.

Although the United Kingdom is called the British Empire, the title of the British ruler is actually the King or Queen of the United Kingdom. At a time when European empires are everywhere, Britain, as the most powerful country in Europe, has finally taken a step towards the level of empire.

But compared with the titles of other European empires, the title of Queen of India is a bit embarrassing.

The imperial titles of other European countries, the Russian Empire claimed to have inherited the title of the Eastern Roman Empire, and the Austro-Hungarian Empire was formed by the merger of the Austrian Empire and Hungary, which were originally established by the Holy Roman Emperor.

Although the German Empire is only an empire in the German region, the German region once had the Holy Roman Empire, an imperial title with reasonable legal principles.

On the contrary, the title of the Queen of India, which the British have been preparing for a long time, comes from the Mughal Empire, the previous ruler of the Indian region.

From the legal perspective of imperial titles, the so-called Indian Empire is completely disproportionate to the imperial titles of other European countries. Europe is also a place that attaches great importance to legal principles, which also puts Queen Victoria under a lot of pressure to be crowned as the Queen of India.

The title of Queen of India was originally a nickname given by the rulers of the Indian states to the Queen of England. When the way Britain ruled India changed from the East India Company to the East Indian colonies, Victoria, as the Queen of England, also began to believe that she was the Queen of India.

More than ten years ago, Queen Victoria had become accustomed to the title of Queen of India and regarded the land of India as part of the empire under her rule.

In June 1872, when the envoys of the East Indian colonies prostrated themselves to Queen Victoria, Queen Victoria used the title of Queen of India: "As the Queen of India, I refuse to accept such etiquette."

Queen Victoria's public acceptance and love of the title of Queen of India inspired some nobles to push Queen Victoria to the throne of India.

As early as three years ago, Queen Victoria's secretary Frederick Ponsonby had publicly proposed to Earl Granver that Queen Victoria be crowned the title of Queen of India.

The reason given by Frederick Ponsonby was that the title of Queen of India had been used to refer to Her Majesty Queen Victoria a long time ago, but it had not been publicly announced.

As Queen Victoria's secretary, Frederick Ponsonby could not have spread some ideas that the Queen disagreed with.

This also means that it was Queen Victoria's own opinion to be crowned as the Queen of India.

The reason why Queen Victoria was so anxious to become the Queen, in addition to her love for such a title, was that her son-in-law, Frederick William Nicholas Karl, had been promoted from the Crown Prince of Prussia to the Crown Prince of the German Empire, and his father, William I, had been promoted from the King of Prussia to the Emperor of the German Empire.

When her son-in-law inherits the throne in the future, she will still be just the Queen of England. In terms of title level, isn't she one level lower than her son-in-law?

Among the five traditional European powers, Germany, Austria-Hungary and Tsarist Russia are all at the imperial level, and France is a republic and is not included.

Britain, which has the strongest comprehensive strength, is just a kingdom, which is also what Queen Victoria is not satisfied with.

It is precisely because of this that even though there are many obstacles in Britain, Queen Victoria still relied on the Title Act to be crowned as the Empress of the Indian Empire, becoming the fourth monarch with the title of emperor among the rulers of European countries.

Britain is busy crowning its queen with the title of Queen, and Britain's mortal enemy France is not idle either.

As the United States is about to usher in the 100th anniversary of its founding, France announced that it would present a statue representing freedom to the United States. This statue is very famous in later generations. It is the Statue of Liberty, which represents the symbol of American freedom.

This proposal was proposed by French political intellectual Edward de Laboulaye in 1865, and was helped by many French people including sculptor Auguste Bartholdi, and was also approved by the French and American governments.

It was also in this year that Bartholdi began to build the statue. In just a short time, he carved the torch held by the Statue of Liberty and shipped it from France to the United States to participate in the Centennial Exposition held in Philadelphia.

When the United States gained independence a hundred years ago, the French made great efforts. And a hundred years later, the French also took great pains to present the United States with the famous landmark Statue of Liberty. France is very grateful to the United States.

1876 was a busy year for European countries, and the same was true for Spain.

Carlo closely followed the situation in the Balkans. At present, the Russians did not seem to have any intention of starting a war.

After adding the title of Queen of India to Queen Victoria's head, the British hurriedly prepared for the coronation ceremony in Britain.

After all, this is the imperial title of India. If the coronation ceremony is not held in India, the so-called imperial title will have no sense of existence.

We have to admire the British people's attention to the situation in the Balkans. Under the premise that they are already so busy at home, the British can still pay close attention to the situation in the Balkans, and even complete the material assistance to the Ottoman Empire on time to help the Ottoman Empire stabilize the situation in the Balkans.

Seeing that the Balkans could not fight, Carlo turned his attention back to Spain. While revising the problematic laws in Spain, he accelerated the development of Spain and moved towards the goal of making Spain great again.

For Spain, there are still a lot of good news in the development of the past few years.

First of all, in terms of railway mileage.

More than two years have passed since the end of the last five-year plan, and Spain's achievements in railway construction are still quite gratifying.

Since the second five-year plan, the average annual railway mileage has exceeded 550 kilometers, which has also brought Spain's current railway mileage to an astonishing 8,875 kilometers. There is hope that the total railway mileage will be increased to more than 9,000 kilometers this year.

According to the current speed of railway construction, Spain's total railway mileage will exceed 10,000 within the second five-year plan, and there is even hope to exceed the goal of 11,000 railway kilometers set in the second five-year plan.

In terms of railway mileage, Spain has surpassed Italy, which was once on par with itself, and is catching up with the five traditional European powers.

The construction of railway mileage brings not only convenience in transportation, but also a series of improvements in railway-related ancillary industries.

By radiating these ancillary industries, stimulating the overall growth of the Spanish economy is the benefit of building railways that cannot be seen on the surface.

As for what can be seen on the surface, there are actually many. Including facilitating exchanges and cargo transportation between various regions of Spain, facilitating the Spanish government to control various regions more quickly and effectively, and stimulating population mobility, etc., these are all benefits brought by railways.

The total mileage of railways in Spain does not include the simple railways built in the colonies. Otherwise, the total mileage of railways in the current sphere of influence of Spain would have exceeded tens of thousands of kilometers.

At present, Spain's colonies can be divided into Cuban colonies, South Moroccan colonies, Guinea and Congo colonies, and Philippine colonies.

Spain has built a large number of railway and road systems in these four colonies, among which the railways in Cuba and the Philippines are the longest.

However, with the decline of Cuba's importance and the new occupation of South Moroccan colonies and Congo territories, Spain's focus on building railways in colonies has been placed on Africa.

Although the railways in Cuba and the Philippines are also under construction, the intensity of construction and the proportion of investment are obviously less than those in the other two African colonies.

It is worth mentioning that after the military guidance group arrived in Lan Fang, it also planned a railway construction plan to connect the Lan Fang Republic and the Spanish-occupied area.

The Lan Fang Republic and the Spanish-occupied area are located in the southwest and northeast of Kalimantan respectively. It is difficult to build a railway connecting the two regions.

It is impossible for the railway to pass through the Dutch colony in the southernmost part, which also means that there are only two options for the construction of railways between the two regions, either to go north through the Kingdom of Sarawak and Brunei, or to go through the central part of Kalimantan, pass through the primeval forest and then go north along the Sultanate of Burungan to connect the land controlled by Spain.

Going north will pass through the British sphere of influence, and going central will pass through the Elan Mountains in the central part of Kalimantan Island, which also makes it difficult to realize the plan to connect the railways of the Lan Fang Republic and the Philippine colony controlled by Spain.

The good news is that with the help of the military guidance group, the new army of the Lan Fang Republic has been trained quite smoothly. After a year of training, this army of about 20,000 people has officially become the main force of the Lan Fang Republic.

During the military training, the local natives and the Dutch did not cause trouble. But because of the small number of people, they were quickly defeated by the newly formed new army.

Read the error-free version! 6=9+Shu_bar first published this novel.

After all, it is an army of 20,000 people, all using muskets and cannons. Although the weapons and equipment are not as good as the main forces of European countries, they are more than enough compared to those natives in Kalimantan.

Most of the natives' army are cold weapons, and there are very few hot weapons. Even if they are equipped with hot weapons, it is difficult for the native soldiers to figure out how to use hot weapons.

The muskets and cannons owned by the natives are basically sold to them by Britain and the Netherlands, which also means that they are extremely dependent on ammunition supplies from Britain and the Netherlands.

Even if they can learn how to use guns and cannons, they have no way out after the bullets and shells are exhausted.

The British mainland and the Dutch mainland are tens of thousands of kilometers away from Kalimantan Island, which means that the weapons, equipment and ammunition supplies available to these natives are limited.

Under such circumstances, it is difficult for them to pose a threat to the 20,000 new troops trained by the Lan Fang Republic, unless the Dutch are willing to personally take action and transport a batch of weapons and ammunition to the colony before launching a war.

In the Philippine colony, after unifying the entire Philippine region, Spain carried out a series of reforms and investments in the Philippine colony.

Not only did they strengthen the construction of railways and ensure the colonial government's control over the colonies, they also invested in some plantations and mines to generate enough benefits for the Philippine colonies.

For the management of the Philippine colonies, the Spanish government adopted a strategy of division and suppression.

The newly ruled natives were separated from the natives who originally belonged to the Philippine colonies, and the natives who originally belonged to the Philippines were given certain privileges.

In this way, the natives of the Philippines were not a monolithic entity, which was more conducive to the rule of Spain.

Those natives who obtained privileges wanted to maintain their privileges, so they had to support Spain's rule in the Philippines and fight against those natives who did not have privileges.

And those natives who did not have privileges faced the suppression of the privileged natives, and they would also transfer their hatred to those natives who had privileges.

Through division and suppression, the Filipinos who were supposed to hate the Spanish colonists were divided into two factions to ensure that they would not unite to oppose the Spanish colonial rule.

In fact, in Carlo's conception, the Lan Fang Republic was also a very important part.

Although the Philippines can be effectively controlled by dividing the natives of the Philippines, this is only temporary after all.

There is no big conflict between the natives of the Philippines, and their hatred will sooner or later return to the Spanish colonists.

But if the Lanfang Republic also joins in, it will evolve into a conflict between the Lanfang people and the Filipinos.

Because of the different nationalities and cultures, it is difficult for the two nations to unite to oppose the Spanish colonial rule. Spain can also stabilize its rule in the Philippines by controlling these two nations and make both nations its thugs.

The future World War I and World War II still require a large number of manpower to participate in the war. Spain itself does not have a large population. If a large number of vassal troops can be provided through the Philippines and the Lanfang people, the loss of the native population of Spain can be reduced.

And the loss of these vassal troops is acceptable to Spain. Even if the war loss ratio is a little worse, as long as there is a contribution, the cost of forming an army is not a loss at all.

The amount of manpower loss is also related to the distribution of post-war benefits. France's losses in World War I are not to be underestimated, and it almost killed a generation of French people.

The economic and agricultural losses caused were even more severe. It was not until more than ten years after the end of World War I that France gradually emerged from the shadow of World War I.

But it was just coming out of the shadows. The war lost young and strong labor, and the impact on the country could not be made up in more than ten years.

Later, France changed from a traditional white country in Europe to a dyed country where blacks occupied the majority of the population, which was also related to the huge losses in World War I and World War II.

France lost too many people in World War I, causing France to rely on the labor of the colonies to supplement the local manpower needs.

The consequence of this was that a large number of white people were dyed, and France eventually became a representative country where blacks took over.

For Carlo, he did not want to see the day when Spain was dyed. Because of this, how to minimize the loss of manpower in Spain during the war was a question that Carlo needed to think about.