Chapter 512 Providing a Stage for the Russians

There is a small village more than 60 kilometers north of Kabul.

A group of Afghan resistance organizations gathered here. Before the outbreak of the Second Anglo-Afghan War, the Russians were Afghanistan's allies. Afghanistan and Tsarist Russia formed an alliance in July last year, and Britain invaded Afghanistan in November of the same year.

Obviously, Russia has no deterrent power over Britain, or it can be said that Britain attaches great importance to Afghanistan. In order to prevent Russia from entering the Indian Ocean, even the slightest possibility must be nipped in the bud.

This is the same as the United States in its previous life. Everyone knows Russia's breakthrough points. One is the Black Sea in the Middle East, and the other is the Indian Ocean.

If Tsarist Russia could really open up an outlet to the Indian Ocean, it would be no exaggeration to say that its geopolitical influence would be invincible. Although Tsarist Russia is already invincible due to its large territory, without the ocean, Tsarist Russia would never be able to obtain the world hegemony it longed for.

Since the Age of Navigation, the ocean is almost equal to trade, and controlling the ocean will naturally make one become the world hegemon. This status was something that Russia, the former European policeman, and France, the former European overlord, could only dream of, so the hegemony over the European continent could not compare to the value of Britain's maritime hegemony. The maritime hegemon is equivalent to the world hegemon, and Portugal, Spain, and the Netherlands are well aware of this. Of course, France was also the hegemon for a few years, but France never had an overwhelming advantage like those maritime hegemons.

Of course, the struggle between sea power and land power shows that land power is still relatively competitive, but Ernst does not believe that land power can compete with sea power. Unless a centralized empire that controls the Eurasian continent emerges, there may still be a glimmer of hope.

Let’s not talk about whether this empire can emerge. Even if it emerges, its sphere of influence will only be Europe, Asia and Africa. After all, the land is cut by the ocean.

As a maritime hegemon, Britain can intervene in the affairs of the world through the ocean. Wherever British warships go, that is the British sphere of influence.

Therefore, it is understandable that the British targeted Tsarist Russia. If Ernst was British, he would definitely want to block Tsarist Russia inland. Of course, as long as Ernst was not Russian, he would definitely support blocking Tsarist Russia inland.

Russia's territory is equivalent to occupying a single continent. In this respect, only the United States, East Africa, and the Far East Empire can be compared with Russia. If the environment in most of Russia's territory were not bad, only Britain, with its huge colonies, could suppress Russia.

This time, Russia watched its ally being annexed by Britain, and was very unhappy, but the Russo-Turkish War lasted longer than in history, leaving Russia with nothing but staring at the British.

As a result, it was unable to provide even simple support to Afghanistan and could only symbolically send a few military instructors and a small amount of weapons to Afghanistan to support the Afghan opposition forces in their fight against Britain.

The main reason is that the Russo-Turkish War was very costly, so weapons supplies were prioritized to the Russo-Turkish battlefield, but Russia's industrial and logistical capabilities were unable to cope with the Russo-Turkish War.

Therefore, the weapons provided by East Africa have greatly alleviated the urgent needs of the Afghan resistance forces. Although these weapons are relatively backward, they are quite satisfactory for Afghanistan, a country with zero industrial base.

So today, Ilya, the Russian military instructor stranded in Afghanistan, was surprised to find that the Afghans had obtained a batch of weapons from somewhere.

He found Murati, the leader of the Afghan resistance organization, and asked him, "Where did you get these weapons?"

Murati was not disgusted with this Russian who supported Afghanistan in its fight against Britain. He said to Ilya, "It is said that these weapons were sent by international friends from Persia, but they are unwilling to reveal their identities."

Persia? But Ilya didn't think the Persians had the guts to support Afghanistan. After all, the British were not easy to mess with. If they got burned, they would be finished.

"Persia is unlikely. After all, they are terribly afraid of Britain and would not have the guts to do so. Do you know who sent these weapons?"

"Mr. Ilya, it is indeed a wealthy Arab businessman who sponsored us. According to him, these weapons were most likely provided by you Russians."

Hmm! This made Ilya unbelievable: "This is impossible. If it was the weapons provided by Russia, how could I not know about it? And if it was domestic support, their person in charge should have met with me, not through a third party, right?"

Murati scratched his head and said, "I don't know the details, but the Arab businessman said they were Russians, because the leader who sent him this batch of equipment was a Russian, and it was said that he was from St. Petersburg."

Feeling that something was fishy, ​​Elijah asked seriously, "Could it be someone impersonating me?"

Murati: "That shouldn't be the case! That rich businessman has been doing business with your people for many years, so he should be able to tell if I'm pretending to be a Russian."

"So that's how it is? Am I too suspicious?" Elijah was a little confused.

At this time, Murati said: "Mr. Ilya, you don't have to worry about this issue. The forces that provide us with weapons must be friends of the Afghans, or at least enemies of the British. We just happen to be short of weapons, so this matter is beneficial to us."

After hearing what Murati said, Elijah felt that he was getting stuck in a dead end. Anyway, his mission was to cause trouble for Britain. This batch of weapons and equipment could just enhance the combat effectiveness of the resistance organization, so the British should be the ones who have a headache.

"Mr. Murati, you are right. It is impossible that the British are kind enough to send us equipment."

Speaking of Britain, Elijah was suddenly surprised to find that there were quite a few British weapons mixed in this batch of weapons.

"Is this an Enfield? There's also a French Martini, this is a German Dreiser, and there are various models of flintlock rifles."

This discovery aroused Ilya's great interest. He rummaged through the pile of weapons and found that the sources of these weapons were quite diverse. There were weapons and equipment from various countries, but they were mainly German, British and French weapons, and there were very few from Russia.

So Ilya analyzed that there are two possibilities. First, this batch of weapons may really be provided by Arab countries. After all, the sources are too mixed. It feels like they are temporarily pieced together from second-hand goods purchased from various European countries. Second, this batch of weapons is provided by Russia, because Russian guns are the least in this batch of guns, which is very suspicious. Could it be that a certain domestic force really supplied Afghanistan, but did not want to reveal its identity?

The second guess is not impossible, but Ilya is more inclined to the first one, because if the country supports Afghanistan, there is no need to be so secretive.

In fact, this batch of weapons was the equipment of the East African Black Corps that had just retired from the East-Portuguese War, plus some captured Portuguese equipment, that is, the weapons provided by Britain and France.

Of course, the East African intelligence agencies were more cautious and mixed some weapons from other countries into it, including those from many countries.

"This batch of weapons doesn't look very new. Can they be used against the British? Will the failure rate be too high?"

Elijah no longer worried about the source of the weapons, but instead began to pick and choose the quality of these weapons.

However, Mutila said with satisfaction: "It doesn't matter to us. With these weapons and our brave soldiers, we can definitely deal a heavy blow to the British."

”

(End of this chapter)