African Entrepreneurship Record-Chapter 705 - 9: Vast Gap
Transvaal Republic Government.
"Mr. President, we can no longer sit idly by; reality forces us to act ahead of time, or it will be even harder to stage a comeback in the future."
"Our main issue now is military expenses. Maintaining such a large army is an enormous burden for a country like ours. To describe it as a reckless military venture would certainly not be an exaggeration. Including the Orange people, the entire Boer population of the Orange Free State is only about forty thousand, which means just twenty thousand males, excluding the old, weak, sick, and disabled. So a standing army of over ten thousand is simply an astronomical figure for us and is unsustainable."
"Back when our Transvaal Republic still existed, the national treasury often saw rats running about, and couldn't support the army at all. Now, even if rats came, they would have to leave shedding tears; the only thing left is a pile of debt!"
"In this situation, even if we restore the nation in the future, we can only keep repaying debts to the British. So, Mr. President, we must make the British choose: either provide some free aid, or the Transvaal Rebel Army will disband immediately."
Little Pillotolius listened grimly to his subordinate's report. Due to the issue of military expenses, the Transvaal Republic now faced two choices: either disband the troops or start a war quickly.
Neither of these choices is favorable for the current Transvaal people. Disbanding the troops would severely undermine the government's authority.
After all, the so-called "Rebel" Army would be no more, leaving the Boers in the Orange Free State thinking, "What happened?"
To maintain combat strength and keep the army operational, the Transvaal army has already undergone several reductions, which naturally caused dissatisfaction among the Orange people.
Orange people are more actively promoting the "re-establishment of the Transvaal Republic" than the Transvaal people. This is not due to a newfound conscience or regarding the Transvaal people as "brothers."
Instead, it is to quickly get rid of these British dogs in the Orange Free State, and the prerequisite for the Transvaal people to leave the Orange Free State is clearly the re-establishment of the original Transvaal Republic. Otherwise, the Transvaal people can only stay within the Orange Free State. 𝒻𝓇𝑒𝘦𝘸𝑒𝒷𝓃ℴ𝑣𝘦𝑙.𝒸ℴ𝘮
As for starting the war quickly, this option is also something the Transvaal people want, but the Transvaal people are just dogs led by a British rope. The British government has instead become the main force maintaining regional peace, and the key reason for this result is that the British are not yet prepared for war.
So Little Pillotolius said, "If the British don't cooperate with us, this war is doomed to fail. So now the issue is not whether I want to go to war but when the British want to go to war. After all, the gap between us and East Africa is too large. As long as the East Africans keep depleting us, even a few great victories can't change our disadvantage."
The population is East Africa's core secret, along with East Africa's semi-closed national management system; it is hard for external countries and forces to learn the actual population data of East Africa.
However, through observing East Africa's coast and the performance in East Africa's past wars, other countries agree that the East African population now should be no less than ten million. It's just unknown which is more compared to Brazil, as for being on par with America, no country dares think that, given East Africa's relatively short existence.
East Africa is happy to camouflage its national strength; besides the military and trade volume, there's practically nothing openly noticeable for other countries to judge East Africa's national strength.
After all, the value created by each person is different, for instance, a steam engine creates value akin to dozens of workers. Even agricultural exports have substantial elasticity, aside from not wanting to excessively disrupt international food prices; domestic consumption is also significant.
However, East Africa is a large country. With abundant resources, food, various economic crops, industrial products, minerals, and a vast trade fleet, along with a powerful military, without millions of people, such comprehensiveness couldn't be sustained.
After all, those small countries with a population of just a million can't possibly have such a complete industrial chain and trade exports. Therefore, East Africa can only be a country with a population over ten million. This can be glimpsed from the development of open coastal cities in East Africa.
East Africa's two major cities, Dar es Salaam and Mombasa, in comparison to those large cities in Europe, are not lagging, with industrial development on par with Europe and America, so it can be confirmed that East Africa's eastern coast has reached the European level.
And East Africa's vast land can still bolster national defense. Being neighbors with Portugal, Transvaal, Britain, and a group of countries at the northern border indicates that the stock of East Africa's military is substantial, and such a large military requires population support.
And what makes British intelligence personnel most uneasy is that East Africa has been demilitarizing for years.
Just like how Dar es Salaam used to be full of people in military attire, at that time, East Africa was called the "military nation" by passing ships. Later, as clothing styles increased in Dar es Salaam, the number of police also skyrocketed, turning it into a "police state." Now Dar es Salaam and other open cities are no different from ordinary European cities; walking on the streets feels indistinguishable from cities in Germany or the Austro-Hungarian Empire.
This all indicates that East Africa is moving towards becoming a normal country. However, under this condition, East Africa's military power is not weak but has grown stronger, even establishing a powerful new navy.
This suggests only one point: East Africa's national strength is growing, and they no longer need to "arm the whole nation" like before; this is a manifestation of confidence, and clearly, East Africans' confidence is related to their national power growth.
British intelligence equals Transvaal intelligence, as the Transvaal people can naturally engage closely with East Africa's border.
East Africa maintains a large army in the southern regions annually, with numerous defensive structures and military forts on the border. Military expenditures must not be small, yet East Africa's eastern economy continues to develop rapidly, a situation that makes Transvaal people fearful.
The southern border's two provinces (Southern Border Province and New Baden Province) annually station about fifty thousand troops, plus military dependents and personnel serving the army, totaling nearly hundreds of thousands. Moreover, New Hamburg Port City, the capital of the Southern Border Province (Kingdom of Zulu and southern Transvaal Republic), is indisputably the largest city in the South African region, with a population of thirteen thousand, whereas the second-ranking Cape Town only has about five thousand.
So East Africa's southern two provinces bordering the Orange Free State have a population similar to the Orange Free State, and these are just among East Africa's lower-ranked economic provinces. Of East Africa's more than twenty provinces and regions, only Southwest Africa, the Congo rainforest, and parts of the western provinces have fewer people than these provinces.
"The disparity between us and East Africa is significant, so we must rely on the British for anything. Without the British, East Africa might have crossed the Fite River and struck us Transvaal Republic elements long ago." Little Pillotolius clearly understood the gap between East Africa and the Transvaal Republic, so he spoke with a touch of solemnity.
"Mr. President, now is not the time to consider the national power gap between the two countries. The mission of restoring the nation is this generation of Boers' responsibility, to revive the glory of the Boers of yesteryear. The masters of the South African land are us. Britain and East Africa are both thieves, and we must first solve the grave threat East Africa poses."
"Our smallest gap with East Africa is ironically in the military. As long as all Boers unite and have British support, we might be able to take a Prussia-like script to reverse France."
