"Mother... I think we should lend a helping hand to Xiao Letian!" Edward plucked up the courage to say, but the Queen was rarely angry and looked at him patiently. "Help him? What do you want to do?"
Edward thought for a moment, "Mother, although the British Empire is the overlord of the world and is known as the empire on which the sun never sets, you still know the real situation. Our control of the world is not as strong as imagined!"
"In the Indian subcontinent, we must cooperate with the princes and the upper echelons of the caste system to completely control that fertile land. In Africa, we must rely on the Sudanese kings and other tribal elders for effective rule. …”
"In Asia, we need strong local governments to protect our interests! The core of the empire's rule is not dictatorship but effective control and cooperation!"
"The fundamental reason for this pattern of rule is population. Our colonies are too vast, but how big is our population? Mother, you should know that the real population of the British Isles is only a little over 40 million, and all the colonies How many people are there? 300 million or 400 million?"
"With a minority ruling the majority, we can only choose the agency mechanism, which means we must cooperate with local forces. Only in this way can we ensure that our interests are maximized..."
"I suggest... can we consider Xiao Letian? Can he, a Chinese, be our right-hand man in ruling Asia? The Qing Dynasty rules the interior, the Chinese rule the Pacific Rim Island Group, and we, the British, control the most important Ports and golden waterways..."
"Of course the best interests must be in our hands, but we still have to give away some of the meat and bones. Having a few useful hunting dogs is also a blessing for us in the UK!"
The Queen nodded after hearing this, "From a diplomat's standpoint, there is nothing wrong with your analysis. Asia is too far away from us and is indeed beyond our reach. Our military means can only be used as a punishment whip to deter. It is indeed impossible to deploy a huge amount of troops to carry out a full-scale war..."
"Finding a group of good agents is good for the interests of the British Empire, but..." the Queen said with worry, "But how can you be sure that Xiao Letian is a good agent? Just..." Because of this jade sculpture, you have such a judgment?"
"No, mother, I will never be bought by bribes. Xiao Letian respects my father, which really touches my heart. I am willing to become friends with him in private, but when it comes to national affairs, I can still abandon him. Personal relationships, the interests of the empire come first, far outweighing my personal relationships!"
"That's good! Edward, if you can understand this, your father's efforts have not been in vain..."
Edward rubbed his red and swollen eyes and sighed and said, "Through two wars, we have tamed the hound of the Manchu and Qing Dynasties. Now the southern coast and the Yangtze River Basin have opened the door to us. I believe that with the passage of time, our capital will enter the hinterland of China." It’s not a problem either…”
"But Asia is not just a continent, there are countless islands scattered across the ocean. Wherever the environment is harsher and the conditions are more difficult, although there is wealth, it is difficult to extract it..."
"I have sponsored several expedition teams to explore Southeast Asia before, and the reports they brought back to me are very interesting..." Edward lit a cigarette for himself and thought for a while to organize his words.
"There is indeed endless wealth on the islands of Southeast Asia. The spices, rubber, medicinal materials, tin ore, gold and silver, iron and coal, including food that we Europeans need are all abundant..."
"But it is a pity that many of these natural resources are sleeping in the mountains and tropical rainforests, completely unusable... In the final analysis, it is because there is a lack of available human resources!"
"Aborigines? Haha, they are all uncivilized cannibals. This is really not a joke. Cannibals have always existed in the rainforest, including headhunters, who are proud to chop off the heads of other humans!"
"There are only some civilized humans in coastal port areas, and these people are basically divided into three categories. One is the descendants of European immigrants, including new immigrants. Their number is the smallest, and they can only do some management work. Expect them to open up rain forests and barren mountains? It’s unrealistic..."
"There is also a group of civilized human beings who believe in the Middle East, but they have their own independent culture and have been in conflict with our European civilization for thousands of years. It is easy to do business with them. What if we really want to have in-depth cooperation with them? I It’s hard to see…but these people are the largest number of civilized people in Southeast Asia!”
"The last group of people are the Chinese immigrants. These Chinese who left their hometowns due to war and other reasons, including the local ethnic groups affected by them, are ranked second in number, but their productivity is the highest! "
"I was very surprised by the reports my expedition team gave me. These Chinese people have very superb farming skills. In their hands, the vast rainforest was turned into farmland and economic forest in just a few years!"
"They have primitive and backward but still effective management methods. Large and small mines, farms, and rubber plantations were born in their hands, and countless indigenous people became their employees..."
"The Chinese are a group of natural builders. It's hard to imagine that they regard construction as a belief in life! The expedition team once saw an old man who was nearly eighty years old, clearing wasteland on the edge of villages and rainforests every day... …”
"In one day, he may only be able to clear three or four square meters of land, cut down shrubs and weeds, level the land and pick out gravel... But just these three or four square meters of land can be turned into his vegetable garden. Grow fresh vegetables and fruits and thrive in his garden!”
"Our expedition leader thought he was a poor lonely old man, and he was so loving that he wanted to give him some money to support him in his old age. But when he went to the old man's home, he asked, "What's wrong with you, mother?"
The Queen was attracted by the story of the expedition and couldn't help but ask, "What happened? Tell me..."
Edward spread his hands, "My expedition leader blushed with embarrassment at his own judgment. He never expected that such an old man would have his family own three hundred acres of rubber plantations and more than five hundred acres of land... …”
"He is a landowner!"
"How could it be? He has so much wealth and is nearly eighty years old. Why does he still have to work?" Queen Victoria looked at her son in disbelief.
"Three hundred acres of rubber plantation and more than five hundred acres of farmland. With such financial resources, it would be considered a wealthy family in London... Could it be that his descendants abandoned him?"
Note: Thanks to HiG9527 and Hu LaoTian for the red envelope reward!
