Chapter 303: Colonial Merger Strategy
As the Berlin Conference progressed, European countries also accelerated their steps in African colonization.
Although Carlo had no intention of establishing new African colonies, for the African colonies currently controlled by Spain, the necessary stabilization measures still needed to be implemented.
After internal discussions within the Spanish Government, Spain’s African colonies needed to be reduced, ideally to three colonies.
The largest colony by area would be the Congo Territory. According to the Spanish Government’s plan, the current Gold Coast, Guinea Colony, and São Tomé and Príncipe would all be incorporated into the Congo Territory, making the Congo Territory the largest colony in central and western Africa.
In the West African region, the smaller Sierra Leone Colony would also merge with the West African Colony. The new West African Colony would occupy the westernmost part of Africa, with an area of at least several hundred thousand square kilometers.
The last African colony would be the South Morocco Colony. All land occupied by Spain in Morocco would be incorporated into the South Morocco Colony. If the entire Morocco could be annexed, the Morocco Colony would gradually become a native province of Spain, no different from regions like Madrid.
As for the originally planned land connecting Gambia to the Congo Territory, it now appeared basically hopeless to achieve.
Between these two colonies were several French colonies, and Germany had also sent some merchants and colonial exploration teams into this land. Spain could not monopolize these lands.
The good news was that the war between France and Vietnam was still continuing, which also tied up part of the French Government’s energy.
Spain could easily merge its existing colonies, and the merger process would hardly lead to conflicts with the great powers.
It was worth mentioning that because the war between France and Vietnam was growing larger in scale, the country behind Vietnam also had to invest massive financial strength into this war.
The most obvious gap was that previously the peace faction had the upper hand, which led to the royal arsenal’s sales personnel failing to sell weapons even when they approached proactively.
But now, after feeling the threat from the French, they also began to find ways to purchase firearms to resist the French offensive.
During the period of the Berlin Conference, the royal arsenal’s sales representatives had already signed an arms purchase order with the other party, including over ten thousand rifles, hundreds of cannons, and matching bullets and cannonballs.
Regarding naval vessels, the other party also purchased several small cruisers, all warships that the Spanish Navy had equipped for several years, at prices that were not expensive, basically at cost price from construction.
Buying a second-hand warship at the price of a new one seemed like a loss. But considering that the purchased warships could quickly be put into this war, the strategic value they played was absolutely worth it.
After all, in terms of current naval strength, the Vietnamese side had already fallen into disadvantage. If they did not find ways to make up for naval power, the French Army could land from ports without restraint.
Because Spain’s main purpose was to delay France’s war progress, the batch of weapons and equipment sold by Spain were all at lower prices.
Precisely because of this, Spain continuously sold a large batch of weapons and equipment. Just relying on these weapons and equipment, it seemed
the other party could effectively slow down the French Army’s offensive speed.
Time came to August 1884, when the Minister of Colonial Affairs suddenly came to report urgently that evidence had been found of Germany attempting to establish colonial outposts within the Gold Coast and Guinea Colony areas.
This was serious, immediately alerting Carlo and the Spanish Government.
Germany’s power was beyond doubt. Although their establishment of Southwest Africa under the British nose had some opportunistic suspicion, it was indeed land taken from the British.
If it were another country, it might not have made the British yield.
The reason Britain chose to yield in the competition for Southern Congo land and give compensation to the Spanish Government was that their colonists had not yet set foot in Southern Congo.
Rashly sparking a dispute was not good for Britain either. To reach Southern Congo land, they also had to cross several indigenous tribes, and even pass through the Orange Free State and Transvaal Republic, which did not have such good relations with Britain.
These two countries might not be so famous, but mentioning the Boers, the population widely living in these two countries, would definitely remind many people of the Boer War that broke out in the early 20th century.
Although Britain won the Boer War, this war also consumed massive manpower, material resources, and financial strength from the British.
The cause of the war was somewhat similar to the dispute over Southern Congo land. The positions of Orange and Transvaal happened to block Britain’s Cairo-Cape Town Line.
Coupled with the Cape Colony’s continuous northward expansion, it seriously affected the living space of Orange and Transvaal.
Returning to Spain’s colonies, after discovering that Germans wanted to establish colonial outposts in the Gold Coast and Guinea, Carlo immediately convened a cabinet meeting, requiring the government to discuss a solution.
Whether it was the Gold Coast or the Guinea Colony, Spain could not possibly abandon them.
The name Gold Coast might sound unfamiliar to many people. This land had another name in posterity: Ghana.
Of course, the name Gold Coast now was also quite fitting. How exaggerated were the gold reserves here? Even in posterity, Ghana remained an important gold exporting country.
Data showed that Ghana’s annual gold output could reach over 4 million ounces, or more than 100 tons of gold.
Although the annual gold output fluctuated, such gold production was enough to make Ghana the second largest gold producing country in Africa after South Africa.
Just this massive gold reserves alone made it absolutely impossible for Carlo to abandon the Gold Coast. Not to mention the income from accessible timber exploitation, which destined the Gold Coast to be a colony with income far greater than expenditure.
Since the Gold Coast had such rich gold reserves, why was Britain still willing to exchange it?
The main reason was that although many gold mines had been discovered in the Gold Coast at this time, these gold mines’ reserves were not large.
Historically, large-scale gold mining in the Gold Coast had to wait until the late 19th century, becoming an important gold producing area only in the 20th century.
Ghana’s gold mines were mainly concentrated in the Ashanti region, which was the area conquered by Spain after taking over the Gold Coast.
Britain had not yet had time to conquer Ashanti, so naturally could not discover large gold mines on Ashanti land. Without discovering gold mines, the value of the Gold Coast in the British eyes would drop significantly.
More importantly, Spain’s Cuban Colony was no worse at all. Cuba’s sugar industry was more profitable than the Gold Coast’s gold mines, sufficient to clamp the United States’ geographical position, also making Cuba’s strategic value more important.
If viewed from posterity’s perspective, counting Ghana’s gold and other mineral resources in West Africa, it was unclear who profited or lost in such a colonial exchange.
But from the perspective of the British in the 1880s, exchanging several not-so-large colonies in West Africa for a complete Cuba, the British absolutely profited.
Just manipulating Cuba’s sugar to monopolize the sugar industry in Europe and America was enough to make the British earn full pots.
Of course, doing so would also offend the United States more. The pros and cons would need to be weighed by the current owner of the Cuban Colony, Britain, itself.
To prevent Germans from sticking their foot into their colonial plan, Carlo immediately decided to accelerate the speed of colony merger, prioritizing the merger of the Gold Coast and Congo Territory.
From the Gold Coast to the Congo Territory stretched 3000 kilometers east-west, located at the bend of Africa’s 7-shaped form, a land with huge development value.
Just the gold reserves in this region were estimated at least starting from 3000 tons. After all, at this time, the gold mines in this region had not undergone large-scale exploitation, so the gold reserves were more than in posterity.
Just the total value of these 3000 tons of gold reached the exaggerated 78 billion pesetas. Adding other mineral resources in this land could ensure Spain gained massive profits from this land for decades to come.
Besides gold mines, Spain’s these colonies in Africa also possessed over 20 billion tons of iron ore and 200 million tons of coal mines, laying a good foundation for Spain’s future industrial development.
20 billion tons of iron ore was completely sufficient for Spain’s industrial development. Although 200 million tons of coal was not much, Spain domestic coal reserves reached 8 billion tons, perfectly compensating for the shortcomings of coal insufficiency in Spain’s African colonies.
From the map, Spain wanting to integrate the land from Gold Coast to Congo Territory still had certain difficulties.
Especially the nearly 1000-kilometer coastline from Gold Coast to Guinea, where there existed relatively powerful indigenous forces including the Sokoto Sultanate, Kingdom of Niger, Aro Confederacy, Kingdom of Bam, and Benin Kingdom.
These indigenous forces, like the Ashanti Federation, were African indigenous with a certain civilization level, not those backward indigenous tribes.
To conquer these indigenous, Spain had to use more means. Besides deploying more armies for forcible conquest, it also needed to sabotage connections between these indigenous nations to prevent them from uniting to block Spain’s colonial expansion.
To accelerate Spain’s colony merger plan, after discussions with the cabinet government, Carlo decided to increase investment in the Colonial Affairs Department, while also increasing military spending in various African colonies.
Last year, the Spanish Government’s total fiscal revenue reached a new high of 1423 billion pesetas, with a fiscal surplus of 7 million pesetas.
Even if the government used a portion to repay foreign debt, this year the Spanish Government still had massive fiscal budget to allocate to various departments.
The Spanish Government’s cabinet ministers had no objections to accelerating African colonization progress. With the Berlin Conference convened, European countries tacitly accelerated colonizing Africa.
Spain absolutely could not fall behind, after all, the volume of this African cake was limited and would sooner or later be partitioned by European countries.
The more share Spain could get in this cake, the more interests it would naturally obtain. Even if some lands were not so important to Spain, they could be exchanged for desired lands through colonial exchange.
Precisely because of this, the attitudes of ministers from various departments in the Spanish cabinet meeting were quite consistent: recognizing acceleration of colonization in Africa, and willing to sacrifice their departments’ fiscal budgets to invest in the Colonial Affairs Department and military expenses.
Benefiting from cooperation from various departments, the Spanish Government quickly gathered 50 million pesetas in funds.
This was not a small amount; if used frugally, it could launch a medium-scale war.
Investing this fund into the development of African colonies already showed how much importance the Spanish Government officials attached to the colony merger.
Among them, the Colonial Affairs Department would receive about 15 million pesetas in extra budget, used for colony integration and construction work, preparing logistics and supply for the army.
The remaining 35 million pesetas would all be invested into combat against African indigenous.
If only African indigenous, it would not require so much military spending investment. But the problem was, with the Berlin Conference convened, European countries had all increased investment in African colonies.
If Spain wanted to integrate existing colonies again, it would face conflicts with other European powers.
Although Britain had withdrawn from the competition for West African colonies, with Germany’s joining, this West African region would become lively.
Do not forget the British troublemaking nature; under the premise of Spain offending Britain multiple times, the British would not mind thoroughly muddying the West African waters, creating bigger trouble for Spain.
Investing so much military budget was also a warning to European powers: wanting to interfere in Spain’s colonial affairs meant preparing to sink into this quagmire.
Currently, Spain’s colonization in Africa had made great progress; just the indigenous population in the Congo Territory reached over ten million.
Forcibly arming these indigenous could also form hundreds of thousands or even millions of indigenous armies. If not involving European mainland, only local conflicts in African regions, other European powers might not necessarily be Spain’s opponents.
Of course, relying on huge industrial and economic gaps could also drag down Spain, but whether it was worth deadlocking with Spain over a small piece of African colony was a problem other European powers needed to think deeply about.
Since massive military budget was invested, it was certainly necessary to greatly expand the colonial armies in the African region.
Currently, Spain possessed a total of 1 colonial defense division and 22 colonial defense regiments, totaling 70,000 indigenous troops, which was obviously insufficient in the more severe African colonial competition.
After discussions by the Spanish Military Committee, it was decided to expand Spain’s colonial divisions to 3, and colonial defense regiments to 35, to cope with more intense colonial conflicts.
In this way, Spain’s military power in colonies would reach about 138,000 people, basically able to maintain the safety of existing colonies.
Two of the three colonial divisions would be deployed along the line from Congo Territory to Gold Coast; these two divisions would also be the main force against indigenous combat.
The remaining one colonial division would be deployed in the West African Colony, responsible for the task of annexing the indigenous areas between the West African Colony and Sierra Leone Colony.
As for the 35 colonial defense regiments, their main role was to garrison local colonies, maintaining local order and security.
Therefore, these 35 colonial defense regiments would be dispersed across all Spanish colonies, adding bricks and tiles to the stability of Spain’s colonies.
Army expansion was something Spain welcomed with open arms.
First, expansion could increase promotion channels for Spain’s grassroots officers. Although colonial army treatment was not as good as home army, the seniority of officers in colonial armies was real.
These mid-to-high-level officers in colonial armies were all served by Spaniards, which was also a means to control army loyalty.
Currently, Spain’s military academies cultivated massive military talent for the country each year; only with continuous army expansion did these talents have employment opportunities.
Second, expansion also meant the army needed more weapons and equipment. For the royal arsenal and other small factories producing weapons and equipment for the military, this was a major source of income.
Especially those small private arsenals; if not for the royal arsenal outsourcing many not-so-important orders to them, they probably could not survive at all.
After all, Europe’s this era was relatively peaceful; small conflicts existed, but war was absolutely impossible.
Without war threats, countries’ army sizes also always stayed at lower levels. Even the King of Italy Umberto I, who had been shouting to expand the army, had only elevated Italy’s army size to 200,000 at this time.
The smaller the army size, the less wear on weapons and equipment and bullet consumption, which was bad news for countries’ arsenals.
Larger arsenals were fine; like Spain’s royal arsenal and Germany’s Krupp Company, they could find foreign buyers through their own channels.
Even if for various reasons they could not find foreign buyers, these large arsenals could receive domestic government support to maintain normal operations without problem.
Small arsenals were different. Because of smaller scale and output, they could not attract foreign buyers.
In better situations, like the royal arsenal, because the behind-the-scenes owner was King Carlo, who was very willing to support these small arsenals.
In worse situations, large arsenals were also private enterprises; capitalists were unwilling to give up orders in their hands, let alone transfer already signed orders to those small enterprises.
Upon learning that Spain was expanding colonial armies, Spain’s small arsenals all breathed a sigh of relief.
This colonial army expansion was a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity for them, allowing them to make a small profit and keep the arsenals running.
The good news was that the royal arsenal had signed an arms order with Vietnam and the country behind it; plus the orders to be signed after Spain military expansion, the royal arsenal was not short of orders during this period.
Since the royal arsenal was not short of orders, these small enterprises had hope to obtain some orders that the royal arsenal looked down on from it.
For example, producing bullets matching rifles, producing some parts for firearms, etc.
Although the income from these orders was destined not to match finished firearms, for small-scale factories, having them was definitely better than none.
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