Chapter 857 European Military Expansion

The Persian Gulf Territory is a very important area in Australasia. It contains most of Australasia's oil reserves and is the absolute energy center for the country's development in the next hundred years.

The garrison in the Persian Gulf territory has evolved from two divisions at the beginning to an entire army.

After the current rotation, the newly formed Eighth Army is stationed in the Persian Gulf territory. The commander is Major General Eric, a young man who graduated from the Royal Academy of Australasia and is very talented in military matters.

Among all the senior military officers in Australasia, Eric is considered one of the most promising generals.

At present, Major General Eric is only 37 years old with full qualifications. Even if he piles on qualifications, he can easily reach the level of lieutenant general.

Once a war breaks out, the accumulation of a large number of military merits will give these guys in the military the opportunity to be quickly promoted.

Perhaps after this war is over, Australasia will have several more lieutenant generals. Even more senior generals and marshals are not impossible.

You know, in the 36 years since the establishment of the Australasian Army, the number of generals and marshals can be counted on one hand.

The Minister of Defense is the highest-ranking member of the Australasian military, and his current standard military rank is general. Thomas, the current Secretary of Defense, was promoted to general four years ago by virtue of his qualifications.

The military ranks of the staff offices under the Ministry of National Defense and the military headquarters of the navy, army and air force are unified to the lieutenant general level.

The chief of general staff of the General Staff Department, commanders, and staff officers of the three armed forces, all have the rank of lieutenant general.

Further down, the standard military rank for commanders and staff officers of each army is major general. There are also a few who have reached the rank of lieutenant general due to promotion of military merit.

But lieutenant generals are always in the minority. In the Australasian Army, apart from the Commander of the Guards, few commanders reach the rank of lieutenant general.

The standard military rank of division commanders and staff officers is brigadier general, and some colonels are promoted to division commanders or staff officers on an exceptional basis.

But in the 36-year history of Australasia, there has been only one marshal, and that is Arthur, the marshal-in-chief of the armed forces.

In fact, Arthur did not restrict the promotion of these high-ranking military officials, but apart from the rapid promotion of military ranks such as war, it is difficult to be promoted to the marshal level by relying on the accumulation of seniority.

Especially because the national army was not large in size and the defense minister was only a lieutenant general, it was even less possible for senior military officials to be promoted to marshal.

So far, there is only one person at the rank of general in active service in Australasia, and that is Minister Thomas.

There are seven lieutenant generals, including Chief of Staff Patrick, Army Chief of Staff Brady Ellison, Army Chief of Staff Charlie Tucker, Navy Chief of Staff Andrew, and Navy Chief of Staff David Scott. Husband, Air Force Commander-in-Chief Anna Collett, Air Force Chief of Staff Michael Beach.

In addition to these active military leaders, the current Prime Minister Raul Plange received the rank of general during his tenure as Minister of Defense.

But after becoming prime minister, his military status has ended, and naturally he cannot be counted as active duty.

The same is true for former Prime Minister Kent. While serving as Defense Secretary, Kent held the rank of Lieutenant General.

However, after becoming the Prime Minister of the Cabinet, the previous military rank is equivalent to retirement and has been automatically invalidated.

After all, the reason why the number of senior military ranks above the lieutenant general level is so rare is that, in addition to the fact that the country has not experienced too many wars until now, another reason is that Australasia only has a history of 36 years since its founding.

The founding of the country was too short, which directly led to the fact that those soldiers who were promoted based on their seniority have not been promoted to too high a level until now.

But I believe this phenomenon will be much better after the war is over. Whether it is a war against an island country or a war that may interfere with Europe in the future, there are plenty of opportunities for military glory.

By then, Australasia will not only have a few more senior officers above lieutenant general, but also many senior nobles above baron.

The so-called military knighthood is nothing more than that. Use military merit to mobilize the enthusiasm of the army, and then let these new aristocratic groups who become nobles because of military merit serve the royal family, thus achieving a good cycle.

By the time Arthur returned to Australasia, it was already mid-March.

In addition to being deployed in the UK as much as possible and turning the British government into a war-fighting faction, some changes in France are also necessary.

The French government is currently an out-and-out peacemaker, and a very important reason for this is France's cowardly President Albert.

Now that the presidential system has not been outlawed, the French president still has considerable power. As long as President Albert is still in office, it will be difficult for the French government to transform from a peace faction to a war faction.

This is very bad for the situation in Europe. France's geographical location determined that it was the first line of defense against German attacks.

Once France gives up resisting Germany, Germany will no longer be able to resist it and can easily sweep through Western and Central Europe.

By then, if you want to use war to defeat Germany, the casualties you need to pay are completely disproportionate to what you are doing now.

However, it is much more difficult to change the attitude of the French government than that of the British government.

All Arthur could do was to ask the Australasian government to remind France that the Germans' goal was definitely not just a small Poland.

If the French persist in their stubbornness, Poland being partitioned and annexed by the United Nations will be their final outcome.

Anyway, Australasia is on the other side of the world. No matter how fiercely Europe fights, it will not do any harm to Australasia, and it will even make Australasia make a lot of money.

Looking back now, France's poor performance in World War II is not surprising at all.

Whether it was the weakness of the government before the war or the shocking speed of surrender of the French after the war broke out, it was enough to be amazing.

On the eve of World War II in history, it was really a bad era. Britain, France and the United States were all pursuing a policy of appeasement, and ultimately created a behemoth that made the world tremble.

There may be some of these reasons why France surrendered so quickly. After all, the United Kingdom and the United States are both pursuing appeasement policies. Can they still imagine that the French can fight against Germany alone?

After all, the outcome of World War I proved that France alone against Germany would ultimately benefit countries far away from the battlefield, such as the United Kingdom and the United States.

Victory or failure will cause heavy harm to the country, so why not choose the less damaging option?

In order to change the attitude of the French government, we can only take the lead in changing the attitude of the French people.

After all, for a country like France, the attitude of the people is above all else. Even if President Albert is unwilling to launch a war, he has to become a staunch militant with the support of French public opinion.

Otherwise, the angry French people will stand up and continue to oppose the government, and President Albert's rule will not be stable.

At worst, they would mobilize public opinion to plunge President Albert's rule into crisis, and then take the opportunity to support a war-minded French president.

In any case, there are forces opposed to President Albert, and the militant faction in France also has a certain scale. The matter has not yet reached a point where it is completely irreversible.

On March 27, 1936, Germany disbanded Poland's millions of troops, retaining only some relatively elite infantry and artillery that had been baptized by the flames of war.

But Germany has no intention of dismantling its domestic army. This also caused the size of the German Army to jump to 1.4 million, making it the country with the largest army in the world.

Faced with such a huge army, the French finally felt the pressure.

Arthur mobilized a large amount of media to promote the German threat theory. The evidence is that Germany still retains more than 1 million troops. Not only do these German troops have no intention of disbanding, but they are still conducting a lot of training.

The major military factories in Germany are constantly producing weapons and equipment at this time. All this Germany has done proves the fact that they are planning a war larger than the German-Polish War.

On March 28, 1936, the Austrian Empire announced an army expansion, expanding the size of the army to 850,000.

At the same time, Austria's major arsenals are constantly producing weapons and equipment, and are constantly hoarding supplies for the front line.

The expansion of the Austrian Empire played into Italy's hands. The next day, Mussolini held a public speech, in which he announced that he would formally expand the army by 500,000 men and increase the size of the army to about 1.1 million men.

At this time, it was impossible for the French not to expand their army.

Under pressure from Germany and Italy, France also announced an army expansion in early April, raising the size of its army to 1.2 million.

Immediately afterwards, the island country released a recruitment plan, announced that it would increase the size of the army to 1.4 million, and aggressively built the weapons and equipment required by the army.

In Europe, after receiving material assistance from Germany and Italy, Spain reduced the original 400,000 troops of the Spanish Republican government to 200,000. Together with its own army, it also assembled an army of more than 550,000.

This series of army arms races has raised the tension in Europe to the highest level. The British government could not help but start planning, and had a long debate on whether to intervene in the European situation.

On April 17, 1936, King Edward VIII of England once again proposed to the government his plan to marry Mrs. Simpson.

Due to the previous opposition from Prime Minister Baldwin, Edward VIII also gave in and proposed another plan that seemed to have the best of both worlds, that is, Mrs. Simpson would not have the title of queen after marriage, and the children of Edward VIII and Mrs. Simpson would also automatically give up the UK. Succession to the throne.

For Edward VIII, such concessions were inevitable. Not only giving up Mrs. Simpson's title of queen, but also giving up the inheritance rights of their future descendants to the throne is the biggest concession that Edward VIII can make.

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