Empire Conquest-Chapter 767 - 56 Shattered Illusions
"Don’t overthink it," he said. "The generally peaceful situation after the war has been maintained for over forty years, and it’s not strange for some people to harbor fantasies."
"But do you think it’s normal for even Qin Fenglie to have such thoughts?"
Lin Shiping gave a bitter smile and sighed without picking up Zhou Yongtao’s words because he too didn’t know what to say.
Initially, Qin Fenglie still believed that the scale of war could be controlled. As long as the West Continent Group could be defeated within a year, it was possible to prevent the Newland Republic from entering the war and thereby avoid the outbreak of a global war. Because of this, he repeatedly emphasized the importance of quickly securing victory.
Is that possible?
Theoretically, if the West Continent Group could be rapidly defeated, it might dissuade the Newland Republic from joining the war. But from another perspective, the Newland Republic could not tolerate the defeat of the West Continent Group, that is, the domination of the World Island by the Eastern Group and the final showdown.
After the West Continent Group was finished, even with the barrier of two oceans, the Newland Republic could only maintain a precarious existence for at most fifty years.
With the strength of the Liangxia Empire, once the World Island was dominated and the terrestrial threat eliminated, it would take at most a few generations to establish a complete order of rule; then, they could gather resources far exceeding those of the Beigu Group and build a fleet capable of sweeping the global oceans.
Throughout history, any country based on the periphery, that is, situated outside the World Island, had core strategies focused on preventing and containing the superpower dominating the World Island.
The most representative was the once-glorious Bulan Kingdom.
After successively defeating the Sban Empire and the Tulip Kingdom, thus becoming the world’s leading superpower, the Bulan Kingdom’s basic strategy was to prevent other Great Powers from dominating the West Continent. For over a hundred years after that, the Bulan Kingdom successively targeted the Luosha Empire, the Locke Empire, and the Tiaoman Empire. 𝕗𝐫𝐞𝕖𝕨𝐞𝗯𝚗𝕠𝘃𝐞𝚕.𝐜𝗼𝚖
Even after losing its status as the global hegemon, the Bulan Kingdom never abandoned its efforts to contain the leading power on the West Continent.
If the West Continent were expanded to represent the entire World Island, how similar the position of the Newland Republic is to that of the Bulan Kingdom!
From this perspective, the Newland Republic could never allow itself to be the second power on the World Island, after the only Empire capable of contending with the Liangxia Empire, the Tiaoman Empire!
They say, as long as the Empire finishes its war mobilization, it’s assured of landing on the Gu Continent in this great war.
Thus, it’s clear the Newland Authority would never just watch the West Continent Group defeat and would inevitably join the war beforehand.
Moreover, the Newland Republic could complete its war mobilization in at most six months, while the Eastern Group could never defeat the West Continent Group in half a year.
According to current plans, it would be quite an accomplishment to stabilize the battle situation within half a year.
Looking at it developmentally, the third Global War has already broken out; it’s just that the Newland Republic, as the third party, has not yet joined the conflict.
At this time, to still fantasize about stabilizing the situation is indeed very naive and childish.
"How is the situation with the Bulan Kingdom?" Zhou Yongtao didn’t pick a fight with Lin Shiping, as he was well aware of the reasons for the current situation.
As Lin Shiping said, they’ve had too many peaceful days!
"It’s not good."
Zhou Yongtao’s brow twitched a few times, shifting his gaze.
Previously, he had tasked Lin Shiping with clarifying the stance of the Bulan Kingdom, to keep it as neutral as possible.
It wasn’t that the Bulan Kingdom’s military power was so strong that it could alter the strategic balance between the two sides, but the Kingdom’s stance held significant political meaning.
Although it was once The Empire on Which the Sun Never Sets, and still had the world’s third fleet before the last war, after its defeat in the last war, the international status of the Bulan Kingdom plummeted, not only losing almost all its colonies but also the foundation to remain independent.
Even after joining the West Continent Group, the Bulan Kingdom’s naval power never recovered.
Of course, the Bulan Kingdom has been striving to rebuild its Navy.
Shortly after the end of the war, with the help of leasing Portsmouth and Scapa Bay to the Liangxia Empire, the Bulan Kingdom acquired 3 second-hand small carriers from the Liangxia Empire, rebuilding its Royal Navy. After joining the West Continent Group, the Bulan Kingdom used its unique strategic location to rebuild its shipbuilding industry, designed several types of carriers, and ultimately independently designed and built 3 "Aircraft carrier cruisers" carrying Vertical Takeoff and Landing Fighters, also known as small Anti-submarine Carriers, making it one of the few countries within the West Continent Group capable of building carriers.
However, this did not change the fact that the Bulan Kingdom was already in decline.
The Bulan Royal Navy’s decision to build the "Invincible" class "Aircraft carrier cruisers" with a displacement of less than 20,000 tons, only capable of carrying "Sea Harrier" Vertical Takeoff and Landing Fighters, primarily anti-submarine ski-jump carriers, reflected the decline of Bulan’s comprehensive national power.
Of course, this also directly reflected the Bulan Kingdom’s position within the overall strategy of the West Continent Group.
To put it simply, it was responsible for protecting the strategic shipping lanes from the West Continent to the North Gu, countering enemy submarines on patrols to break communications in the North Sunset Ocean.
That is, the submarines of the Liangxia Navy.
The problem is that the Bulan Kingdom has never turned against the Liangxia Empire and has been the country with the closest ties to the Liangxia Empire among the entire West Continent Group.
To this day, Scapa Bay remains a military base for the Imperial Navy.
Indeed, if the Bulan Kingdom could be kept neutral, even tentatively so, it could greatly alleviate the combat burden of the Imperial Navy.
