Chapter 448

While the various European countries were still shocked by the airships displayed by Spain, Russia, far from the center of the European continent, was not peaceful at this time.

When the grand military parade was held in Spain, Russia could be said to be in a state of chaos. A series of extremely widespread social unrest events, mainly aimed at opposing the government, occurred one after another, including but not limited to strikes, terrorist attacks, peasant uprisings, military mutinies, and anti-Tsarist autocracy propaganda.

These social events did not have a unified organizer, and they did not even have a unified goal; they were more like a simple venting caused by the accumulated dissatisfaction with the rule of the Romanov dynasty.

Although Russia possessed the largest population among European countries, Russia's population was not a single ethnic group. The ethnic minorities suppressed by the main ethnic group also wanted to seek independent status; taking advantage of this unrest that affected most of Russia's Eastern European regions, they also launched parades and uprisings, seeking higher autonomous status.

To speak of the main reason for this large-scale unrest that affected the entire Russian Empire, one had to mention the bloody violent incident that occurred in Russia's capital, St. Petersburg, on January 22, one week before the Spanish military parade.

Because of the disastrous defeat in the Russo-Japanese War, the dissatisfaction of the military and the public toward the government was quite intense. The public hoped that Tsar Nicholas II would continue the reforms of Alexander III; only thorough reforms could save Russia.

And what did the Tsarist government do about the public's petition?

The Tsarist military police in St. Petersburg blocked these people who wanted to go to the Winter Palace, the Tsar's residence, and broke out into a large-scale conflict with the petitioning public.

If it were just a conflict, that would be one thing, but these police units, acting under the Tsar's orders, actually raised their weapons against these petitioning people after the conflict occurred.

Facing the unarmed public, these Tsarist police became very brave. They easily slaughtered thousands of petitioning people, and thousands more were injured as a result; the scene of the suppression could be described as too horrible to look at, and the continuous sound of gunfire and the wailing of the public could be heard from several kilometers away.

Although the Tsarist government later stated that Tsar Nicholas II had not given the order to fire to these police, and that the Tsar would absolutely not suppress his own subjects by force.

But the Russian public only believed in the current result: the police units acting under the Tsar's orders chose to fire on the petitioning public without the slightest hesitation, and they slaughtered thousands of people directly on the street! This was an indelible fact.

People who were already dissatisfied with the Tsarist government immediately took action; on the day the bloody incident occurred, a considerable number of workers occupied the military factories and armories in St. Petersburg, built simple street fortresses, and fought with the Tsarist police units.

When this matter spread throughout Russia, people opposing the government in various cities responded one after another, which was the reason why this unrest affected the entire Russian Empire.

Although these unrests would not cause a fatal impact on Russia, under the influence of the unrest spreading across the country, Russia's industrial and economic development would inevitably be affected extremely seriously.

As Russia was France's most important ally, after the unrest broke out within Russia, the French government immediately paid high attention to it.

They first determined that this unrest would not cause a fatal impact on Russia, and only then did they transport a batch of supplies to Russia to help Russia resolve the unstable factors within the country more quickly.

Although there was no danger for the time being, France had already lost trust in its ally, Russia, at this time.

In France's view, Russia's value had already decreased significantly. A Russia that could be defeated by a Far Eastern country, a Russia where unrest constantly occurred within the country, and a Russia where the public had already lost trust in the government, could not become a reliable ally for France.

Russia's role certainly still existed; at least millions of Russian troops could become effective cannon fodder to resist Germany. But if one wanted to win the war, relying solely on Russia as an ally was obviously not feasible.

After thinking it over, the French government still set its sights on Spain.

Currently, the only great powers that had not joined the two major military groups were Britain, Spain, and the United States; the United States was far from Europe and was not considered, so the only great powers France could win over were Britain and Spain.

The grievances between Britain and France lasting for hundreds of years were not so easy to end, and on top of that, there were not-insignificant contradictions between Britain and Russia, making it even harder to win over Britain.

Although Spain had not clearly stated whether it stood with Germany or France, in the view of the French government, the difficulty of making Britain its ally was greater than making Spain its ally, and Spain's strategic value was not lower than Britain's.

In the view of the French, there was a good opportunity to win over Spain right now, and that was the peace negotiations currently being conducted between Spain and Britain.

Spain's invitation to the French in the peace negotiations seemed to prove this point; at least in Spain's view, Germany might be more inclined toward Britain.

Understanding this point, the French government had an entry point to win over Spain.

On February 17, 1905, the French Ambassador to Spain requested an audience with Gao Da, hoping that Spain and France could sign a West African colonial agreement, agreeing on the scope of the African colonies of Spain and France to prevent any colonial conflict events from occurring between the two countries' colonies.

To express sincerity, the French government stated that France's Algeria colony would not expand one step to the west, and was willing to acknowledge that the region between Morocco and Algeria that had not been brought under direct rule by Spain belonged to Spain.

When the French made such a request, Gao Da immediately understood the French government's intentions. Although the French government would not lose too much by doing this, the proactive concession was already a clear attitude.

The French government was expressing a clear attitude to Spain: they had no intention of offending Spain, and even wanted to maintain a long-term good relationship with Spain.

Of course, the French's ultimate goal was certainly to form an alliance with Spain, and Gao Da naturally understood this point as well.

The French's winning over involved a problem, and that was which side Spain should stand on in the conflict between the two major military groups.

Standing on France's side meant facing the German army directly, and standing on Germany's side meant facing the French army directly. No matter which side Spain chose to stand on, it would need to bear huge pressure and face huge casualties in the war.

Gao Da did not care about the casualties caused by the war, but he also did not want to see Spain unable to obtain sufficient returns on the premise of paying huge casualties.

Therefore, the issue of benefit distribution after the war became an important consideration factor for Gao Da in choosing a side.

If choosing between standing with Germany or France was quite difficult, then one could change the way of thinking and consider what could be obtained by defeating Germany or France.

Germany and its two allies, the Austro-Hungarian Empire and Italy, did not have many colonies; defeating the Triple Alliance of Germany, Austria, and Italy would not yield much, after all, Spain could not annex the homelands of these three countries.

But if one were to defeat France, the benefits Spain could obtain would be too many. France and Spain were adjacent, and annexing French land was not out of the question.

Even if one could not annex France's homeland, colonies like Algeria and Tunisia could also be partitioned.

If one only considered the benefits obtained after defeating Germany or France, it was clearly more cost-effective to be enemies with France.

But if one considered the world order after defeating Germany or France, Gao Da was actually more inclined to choose to be enemies with Germany.