Chapter 468 Southwest Africa
The East African warships have been following closely behind the British survey ship. The British ships are like annoying flies hovering around the coast of New Hamburg Port. What makes the East African Navy even more angry is that they cannot slap the fly to death with one hand.
In fact, it is not just the New Hamburg Port. Recently, British ships have been doing similar things in almost every port in East Africa, especially the two open ports, which the British have conducted careful assessments.
"The economic open zone mentioned by the East African Kingdom is already quite prosperous. It is simply a smaller version of London and Paris. Although the population is not as large as the two capitals, it is developed enough and has a strong atmosphere of business and service industries. Many ships along the way stop at these two ports and enjoy the services of East Africans."
"The population of the two cities is a mixture of white and yellow people. We didn't get any valuable information from the local residents, but through indirect inquiries, we learned that the East African Kingdom is different from the African countries we imagine. It is both orderly and not backward. The Hechingen royal family from Prussia rules here, and the royal family has a very high reputation among the people."
"Dar es Salaam and Mombasa are now no less important than European port cities. Large tracts of European buildings have been built along the coast of East Africa, making the coast of East Africa completely different from what it was a dozen years ago. The Germans have completely replaced the Arabs and become the unrivaled overlords of the region. In addition to the Transvaal and Zulu Kingdoms, the Zanzibar Sultanate, which existed on the map a few years ago, has completely become a province in East Africa. Most of the Somali coast has also been annexed by the Germans."
"The Portuguese once divided the shores of Lake Malawi with East Africa. The inland areas are basically monopolized by the East African Kingdom, whose territory is likely to exceed 1.5 million square miles."
"However, we don't have a clear idea of how much land East Africa occupies inland, because we haven't found any East African kingdom forces on the west coast, which means that East Africa has not yet set foot on the west coast. If we want to learn more about the scope of East Africa's territory, we must send an expedition team from the west to conduct reconnaissance. However, the west coast of Africa is a colony of Angola. If we want to bypass the Portuguese, we can only enter from the desert area in the south, which is not an easy task for us."
As Britain began to explore Africa, the veil of East Africa began to be lifted little by little. Just the tip of the iceberg gave Britain a great shock.
Benjamin: "The containment of East Africa is inevitable. If we allow East Africa to continue to develop, will we monopolize Africa like the United States?"
The Minister of Finance said: "Your Excellency, we must not act rashly now. Although the East African Kingdom has certain potential, it is far from a threat. Africa is not as fertile a land as the United States. Moreover, we must also consider the attitudes of the Austro-Hungarian Empire and Germany. These two countries may have provided a huge amount of help for the development of East Africa."
He would never believe that East Africa could develop to this point on its own. After all, Britain has rich colonial experience. The difficulty of colonial development is closely related to population. In addition to gold mines, population is an important indicator of a wealthy colony.
Just like the Philippines, India is built up by population, while Africa is a typical region with vast land and sparse population. Without sufficient population, the colonial value will be greatly reduced. At the same time, vast land and sparse population are not conducive to governance, unless you really go there to do charity.
Benjamin: "Anyway, we have to put East Africa on the agenda after we finish dealing with India."
Benjamin's idea was good, but Ernst did not believe that Benjamin would have the opportunity to focus on East Africa, because Tsarist Russia had not taken any action yet and signs of the tenth Russo-Turkish War had already appeared. If the British could really ignore the risks and choose to fight to the death in Africa and East Africa, then Ernst would believe that Benjamin was a real man.
Regardless of the British's ideas, East Africa still needs to eat without British intervention. After the abnormal actions of the United Kingdom were reported to Ernst, Ernst summoned military personnel and began to discuss new expansion plans for East Africa.
"We have achieved good results along the Indian Ocean coast, but East Africa has never had its own foothold in the Atlantic Ocean. The importance of the Atlantic Ocean is self-evident, so this time I plan to target the Skeleton Coast between Angola and the Orange River."
The Skeleton Coast refers to the coastal area of Namibia. The earliest Portuguese sailors called this long coastline of Namibia the "Hell Coast". Here Ernst uses the Skeleton Coast to refer to the entire coastal area of Namibia.
"Your Highness, if we want to march into the Skeleton Coast, we must overcome the geographical disadvantages. The entire Southwest Africa is almost desert. This is different from the Somali region. In the Somali region, we can control Somalia along the oasis and with the help of camels. The conditions in Southwest Africa are far inferior to those in Somalia."
"Yes, but I have no intention of actually occupying the southwest on a large scale. Instead, I will focus on occupying certain areas to cut off other countries' opportunities to colonize Southwest Africa."
In the past, the large and arid Namib Desert made Namibia one of the least densely populated countries in the world. Namibia's 1,600-kilometer coastline is basically covered by the Namib Desert.
So during the hundreds of years when the west coast of Africa served as the main shipping route from Europe to Asia, no colonists had any idea of going to Southwest Africa. The Portuguese, Spanish, and Dutch all landed here, took a look, and left.
It was not until 1884 that Germany took the coastal areas of Southwest Africa as its colony. Southwest Africa was not a good place, but poor Germany entered too late and even did not let go of the desert.
"Our control over Southwest Africa mainly covers three areas: one is the border with the Portuguese, one is the mouth of the Orange River, and the other is Walvis Bay in the middle of Southwest Africa."
East Africa is not far from Southwest Africa, and part of the western part of East Africa is actually considered the Southwest Africa region, mainly the plateau area of Southwest Africa, the Okavango River basin, which is the Lethania Province.
The Okavango River originates in central Angola in the past, passes through Namibia, and is finally swallowed up by the Kalahari Desert in Botswana.
However, the Lethania Province is mainly located on the east bank of the Okavango River (now northeastern Namibia and southeastern Angola), and there has been no large-scale exploration and development in western East Africa.
Southwest Africa is not a small place. Together with the Kalahari Desert, it is estimated that 700,000 to 800,000 square kilometers of land are uninhabited, so it is not easy for East Africa to occupy this place.
The main reason is that transportation is more difficult. After all, the desert is vast. Moreover, unlike the desert in Somalia, the population here is too small and there are no human settlements for supplying supplies.
If nothing unexpected happens, the Orange River line will be the easiest area to occupy. We can advance westward along the Orange River, and the Orange River can solve the water problem.
For other areas of Southwest Africa, Ernst's idea this time was to advance both by land and sea. While penetrating deeper into Southwest Africa on land, he also built strongholds in the coastal areas of Southwest Africa by sea transportation.
(End of this chapter)
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