Chapter 265: Secret Anglo-american Agreement
After agreeing with the British Government on the specific time for the diplomatic visit, preparations for negotiations with the British Government became the top priority for the Spanish Government.
Although the current direction of events was within the Spanish Government’s expectations, this did not mean that the final outcome of the negotiations would also be as the Spanish Government anticipated.
As fellow European Countries, Spain was well aware of the British Government’s greed. For the British Empire, if it could not obtain more interests, the British Government would not agree to the terms of colonial exchange.
Spain hoped to obtain all of Britain’s colonies in West Africa during the colonial exchange process, and achieving this would not be that easy.
The good news, however, was that if Britain withdrew from the colonial competition in West Africa, the countries colonizing West Africa would be left with only Spain and France.
Although relations between Spain and France were relatively good, the possibility of the two cooperating on colonial development in West Africa was nearly zero.
Considering the British habit of stirring trouble, even if the British Government agreed to abandon all its colonies in West Africa, it would surely dig a big pit in the diplomatic relations between Spain and France.
Considering France’s awkward situation in Europe, the deterioration of diplomatic relations between France and Spain could very likely cause a series of changes.
Even Carlo was seriously considering Spain’s diplomatic situation. Once the Three Emperors Alliance broke apart, the classic historical confrontation between the German-Austrian Alliance and the Franco-Russian Alliance would instantly emerge.
Where should Spain go in the confrontation between these two military alliances? Based on marriage ties, Spain should be closer to the Austro-Hungarian Empire.
If Spain obtained all of Britain’s colonies in West Africa, it would also deepen the conflict with France. If Spain wanted to fully annex Morocco and control West African colonies, it would also have to stand against France or even Britain.
But the problem was that the German-Austrian military bloc plus Spain was clearly no match for the five great powers of Britain, France, Russia, Italy, and the United States.
Unless Russia could be made to erupt in revolution early and Italy’s defection prevented, perhaps achieving a situation of Britain and France VS Germany, Italy, Spain, and Austria.
If such a situation could be achieved, the Americans would definitely remain neutral and not easily join the war.
While Carlo was still thinking of ways to break the deadlock, time had quickly arrived in September.
The British Government assembled a grand diplomatic visit team and openly headed to Spain for a diplomatic visit.
Such a diplomatic visit was quite rare for Britain and Spain, two countries with not particularly good diplomatic relations, and the diplomatic meeting between the two countries also attracted attention from many European Countries.
Neither country would leak the content to be discussed in the meeting before reaching an actual agreement, which also led to European countries’ media speculating over the past few days of the British Government’s visit to Spain about what the two governments were exactly going to negotiate.
At the Madrid Royal Palace in Spain, Carlo received the British Government’s diplomatic visit delegation. The facts proved that the British attached great importance to the proposal for colonial exchange.
Prime Minister Gladstone personally stepped forward, along with several cabinet ministers; the scale of such a delegation was already quite exaggerated.
Although Carlo personally received the British diplomatic delegation, he would not participate in the subsequent negotiations with the British Government, with the purpose also being to directly remove Carlo from it.
No matter what the outcome of the negotiations between the Spanish and British Governments, the land ultimately obtained by Spain through colonial exchange would definitely be inferior in existing value to Cuba.
This also meant that the officials promoting this clause would very likely face criticism or even abuse from the public. As Spain’s king, Carlo still needed to avoid such a situation.
As long as Carlo did not participate in the negotiations between the two governments, Carlo would not have to take the blame for this matter.
In this era when monarchy prevailed in Europe, it was quite common for cabinet governments in various countries to take the blame for the monarch. Especially when the Conservative Party was in power, the interests of the party, the cabinet government, and the monarch were aligned, and taking the blame for the monarch was also very necessary.
If the monarch’s reputation was damaged, even leading to public outrage, the monarchical system would be impacted, which was not a good thing for the Conservative Party either.
The Conservative Party was mostly composed of landlords and nobles, who were natural royalists. If the monarchical system ceased to exist, the special treatment they enjoyed would also disappear in an instant.
This also formed a tacit understanding among European Countries: in such risky situations, the cabinet government had to take the blame for the king.
Anyway, the cabinet government relied on elections; at worst, the prime minister’s position would be dismissed, and then elections would be held again.
Taking the blame for the king was not a political stain; under propaganda and whitewashing by public opinion, officials could even participate in the next cabinet election and soon return to the government’s stage.
Prime Minister Gladstone was obviously well aware of this, and he showed considerable respect toward Carlo. After all, whether it was Spain’s overall strength or the status of the Spanish Royal Family in Europe, it was enough to make the British Government maintain an attitude of importance.
If Spain’s overall strength was not strong, Britain would not even need such diplomatic negotiations; threats with military force could obtain the colony.
This was, after all, an era of the law of the jungle. The only reason for the two countries to conduct diplomatic negotiations was mutual apprehension of each other’s overall strength and unwillingness to offend the other unless necessary.
Although Carlo outwardly did not participate at all in the negotiations between the two governments, in private, Prime Minister Cánovas still reported the progress of the negotiations to Carlo every day.
In the first few days of the negotiations, progress on both sides was quite slow, even describable as stagnation.
The British Government was not foolish; they would absolutely not make a loss-making deal. Even for the British Government, in colonial exchange, earning less was no different from a loss.
The Spanish Government proposed splitting Australia in two: Spain would exchange the Cuban Colony for the West Australia colony plus Britain’s Straits Settlements, and establish a buffer zone nearly 50 kilometers wide between Spain and Britain in West Australia and South Australia colonies.
Such a proposal was firmly rejected by the British Government. Although the West Australia colony had little population and not much value besides mineral resources.
But the area of this land was still enormous, and mineral resources were countless; Britain had no need to pay West Australia for a small Cuba.
The Straits Settlements naturally went without saying. East Asian countries heading to Europe had only one route: going south through the Strait of Malacca, sailing along the Indian coast across the Indian Ocean, and then arriving at the Mediterranean Sea via the Suez Canal.
Bypassing the Strait of Malacca was possible, but it would at least add over a thousand kilometers to the journey, requiring at least one or two weeks round trip.
The geographical position of the Strait of Malacca destined that the British could not abandon this land, regardless of Cuba; this was not something that could be decided by economic value.
After rejecting the proposal from the Spanish Government, British Prime Minister Gladstone put forward his own proposal: using the Gold Coast and Spain’s colonial rights over the Brunei Empire, plus 5 million pounds sterling in funds, to purchase Spain’s Cuban Colony.
If the Spanish Government’s proposal was still considering the value of the colonies, then the British Government’s proposal completely disregarded the value of the colonies, with conditions that could be called quite harsh.
The British Gold Coast had a large number of gold mines, which was also the origin of the Gold Coast’s name. But the problem was that this land had been discovered by the Portuguese as early as 1471, and the earliest European colonial settlement, Elmina Castle, was established in 1482, now nearly 400 years ago.
In these 400 years, Portuguese, British, Dutch, Danes, Prussians, and Swedes all came here to trade slaves, gold, ironware, necklaces, glass mirrors, rum, and guns, plundering vast wealth and occupying many large and small gold mines.
The Gold Coast had two most famous products: one was the gold produced by the grand gold mines that gave the coast its name. The other was the local specialty, African indigenous people, that is, black people.
Over a long period, the Gold Coast was not controlled by any single country but was colonized and managed by various European Countries respectively.
However, with the might of the British Empire, after the British Gold Coast was established, it gradually annexed the nearby Danish Gold Coast and Dutch Gold Coast, and the Gold Coast evolved into one of Britain’s large colonies under its control.
Because of its many gold mines, the Gold Coast was Britain’s largest colony in West Africa, with the highest population.
However, these people came from various European countries, and the proportion of British in the Gold Coast was actually not high; the largest populations were Portuguese and Dutch.
Although the Gold Coast was rich in gold mines, due to 400 years of exploitation by European Countries, the value of the Gold Coast had greatly diminished.
The property that countries could exploit and squeeze had long been transported back to their homelands, leaving only a few relatively large gold mines still holding out.
But the output of these gold mines was not as enormous as imagined, and relations between the British Colony and the northern Asante Empire were not good, even erupting in several wars.
The main condition proposed by the British was the Gold Coast, plus Spain could conduct colonial infiltration into Brunei. Although 5 million pounds sterling in funds was not insignificant, compared to the Cuban Colony, that 5 million pounds sterling amounted to nothing.
Such conditions were somewhat stingy compared to the Cuban Colony, from which the British greed could also be seen; they were really unwilling to pay too high a price and wanted to get Cuba with empty hands and minimal interests.
Fortunately, Spain at this time possessed sufficient strength, and Britain did not dare to directly fall out with Spain. Both sides could only sit at the negotiating table for talks, which was also beneficial for Spain.
Because Spain had many choices, and since it was a loss-making sell-off anyway, why not sell to a country with a better attitude?
Carlo also had full confidence in this regard. If the British Government was really unwilling to reach cooperation, Spain was not without backup choices.
Either sell the Cuban Colony to France, letting France tacitly allow Spain to annex Morocco. Or sell Cuba to Germany or the United States; Germany could provide the industrial technology and some technical talent Spain needed, while the Americans could provide sufficient funds, both of which Spain needed.
When the negotiations between the two sides entered a stalemate, before the British Government could take action, Spain broke news that drastically changed the British Government’s expression: the Spanish Government had plans for a diplomatic visit to Berlin and was considering it.
The British Government naturally understood that this news was actually released by the Spanish Government. The purpose of releasing this news was, naturally, to remind and threaten the British.
The Spanish Government was openly telling the British Government that the countries Spain could cooperate with were not only Britain; all European Powers were within Spain’s scope of cooperation.
It did not matter who the Cuban Colony ultimately belonged to; what was important was that if this incident pushed Spain completely toward Germany, would not France be completely diplomatically isolated by Germany?
Germany’s threat was already great to begin with, and the British Government was considering helping France pull in Russia to form the Franco-Russian Alliance to resist Germany’s threat.
If Spain went to Germany’s side, how could the Franco-Russian Alliance play out? France would be directly pinched between Spain and Germany, and the Austro-Hungarian Empire’s army might also bypass Switzerland to attack France’s border.
Do not forget there was also Italy, a great power-level country; although its army strength was not powerful, it could still pin down 300,000 to 500,000 French troops.
If Spain really leaned toward Germany, the European situation would be over. Unless the British were willing to personally intervene to help France, but the problem was that Britain’s army was not strong either.
For the British Government, it had to prevent Spain from leaning toward Germany no matter what. Spain could either maintain diplomatic neutrality or temporarily lean toward the French side.
Unless the Three Emperors Alliance broke apart, the British did not want France’s situation to be too disadvantaged.
What worried the British even more was that if Spain leaned toward Germany, on the European Continent, Germany would have pulled in four of the seven great powers of Britain, France, Germany, Austria, Russia, Italy, and Spain, forming an alliance of the five great powers of Germany, Austria, Russia, Italy, and Spain.
In such a situation, what business would there be for the British in the European situation? No matter how powerful Britain was, it could not fight five, let alone hope that France alone could resist the united five great powers.
This also meant that the British Government had to make concessions, at least not make the conditions too harsh, to avoid Spain, in extreme dissatisfaction with Britain, leaning toward the Three Emperors Alliance.
With this little interlude, the conditions proposed by the British Government the next day became much more generous.
On top of the British Gold Coast, the British added the British Gambia Colony, while also raising the funds compensation from 5 million pounds sterling to 10 million pounds sterling.
At this era’s cost of 500,000 pounds sterling per ironclad ship, 10 million pounds sterling was already enough for Spain to build 20 of the latest ironclad ships, which was absolutely not a small sum.
If converted to pesetas, 10 million pounds sterling also had a value of 260 million pesetas, exceeding one-quarter of Spain’s annual total fiscal revenue.
Although the British Government had raised its conditions, such conditions obviously could not satisfy Spain’s appetite.
Prime Minister Cánovas put forward more demands, such as the Sierra Leone Colony sandwiched between Britain’s two colonies, as well as demands for more land.
Spain could abandon colonial action against Brunei, but Spain should obtain land with a larger area, thereby avoiding public outrage due to the loss of colonies.
The negotiations continued for several more days after this, finally steering the topic to land in the Middle East.
For the British, land in the Middle East was not only large but also of little value. More importantly, this land was not in their hands, so promising Middle Eastern land to Spain was not a loss for the British.
It was precisely because of this that Britain and Spain quickly reached an agreement.
Spain exchanged the Cuban Colony for Britain’s Gambia Colony, Sierra Leone Colony, and Gold Coast, while the British Government also allowed Spain to launch colonial action against Oman in the Middle East.
The British Government would also pay the Spanish Government 5 million pounds sterling in funds compensation, and both sides’ colonial exchange would be completed within the next three months. Once all handover work was completed, both governments would consider publicly announcing the news of the colonial exchange.
