Imperial Elite

Chapter 95 Brave New World

Theoretically speaking, bypassing the main force of the Prags' left wing, which is currently engaged in fierce fighting in the north, and directly attacking Helsinki would be a brilliant idea.

As the political, economic, cultural, industrial, and shipping center of Prag, capturing this place would completely cut off the support of the Prag left wing, which is currently engaged in fierce fighting in the north. Strategically, this would directly sever the Prag left wing's support, fundamentally change the battlefield situation, and thus secure victory.

As the largest city in Plug and an important port area in the north, Plug has three ports. Since both Plug and Esti belonged to the Lucia Empire in the past, there were no obstacles to exchanges between the two.

Therefore, many Esti people are familiar with the environment and port conditions of Helsinki. Although, based on current reconnaissance, after Wagner signed a contract with the right wing of the Prag and appeared north of the Prag, the left wing of the Prag strengthened its defense of the coastline.

Many new coastal defense works and bunkers have appeared along the coastline, and some people in civilian clothes wearing red armbands are stationed there.

However, given that at this moment no force could withstand the land-based firepower of the British Royal Navy's shallow-draft heavy gunboats, Joe did not take this simple defense seriously.

On the Helsinki coastline, the only place that could pose a threat to Joe's landing forces was the fortress called Prag on a small island outside the main port.

It is common knowledge that no matter how powerful a warship is, attempting to engage coastal defense artillery is a foolish act.

However, this fortress could only protect the two ports to the south of Prag, so Joe decided to use the most effective tactic ever employed when facing a fortress: to bypass it.

It seems like a perfect plan, except for one small flaw: Joe doesn't have enough troops.

Logically speaking, Joe doesn't actually lack troops. Although Wagner's troops only have eight battalions, out of a simple national sentiment towards their "northern brothers," the Esti government had previously agreed to send volunteers to Prag, and the Livonia also agreed to send troops based on the principle of unity among allies.

Three mechanics trained by Wagner stormed into Helsinki, and Joe had no idea how he lost.

If those armored troops trained by Wagner hadn't mutinied, this would have been Joe's script for resolving the Northern problem.

However, due to the unexpected mutiny, and the fact that the Versailles Peace Conference was already in its final stages, Joe could not mobilize the troops of Esti and Livonia to avoid causing others to make any unnecessary connections, due to international concerns.

However, Wagner's troops were insufficient, so Joe could only consult with the right wing of Prag and transfer some right-wing troops from the north to join the Helsinki landing operation and fill in the gaps in the operation.

Praggle's right wing would certainly not refuse a plan that could end the war, even though it had suffered heavy losses and was now in the north cooperating with Wagner's forces to launch an attack southward.

However, Praggle's right wing still managed to assemble a division and join Joe's plan.

Under the cover of arms and food transport ships, Joe successfully transported these troops to Tallinn without anyone noticing. Members of Wagner who had previously carried out raids in the Low Countries also successfully infiltrated the port area. Joe's connections also secured support from the Royal Navy of Britannia at a discounted price, almost at cost.

The Royal Navy not only sent shallow-draft gunboats, but also dispatched a fleet of cruisers and destroyers to provide cover in order to prevent the Lucia left wing from sending out their small fleet to do anything.

Logically speaking, with preparations at this stage, and having successfully conducted similar amphibious raids against the Teutons in the past, and considering that the Pragmen stationed in Helsinki were not elite troops, there was really no reason for them to fail.

Then, as expected, things took an unexpected turn. The unexpected didn't happen during the landing phase; in fact, the landing operation was very successful.

When the landing operation began, the Wagner veterans who had completed their infiltration easily seized the port from the left-wing militia of the Pragger.

With the arrival of Wagner's 1st Panzer Battalion in Helsinki, the outcome of the battle was essentially decided.

Praggle's left wing was no match for the elite Wagner 1st Armored Battalion, nor could it withstand the firepower of the Royal Navy's shallow-draft gunboats; defeat was essentially only a matter of time.

Thanks to their extensive experience in urban warfare, the Praggar left-wing defenders fought tenaciously after the landing at the port, but lacked any anti-tank experience.

Therefore, even if the left-wing defenders wanted to hold their ground house by house, they were powerless against the tactics of clearing the area with flamethrowers after the assault guns got close and fired.

Even so, Wagner discovered that there were quite a few Lucias among these left-wing defenders, and these Lucias fought very bravely.

However, courage could not bridge the huge gap in equipment and tactics. Faced with tanks and armored vehicles, these brave Lusians could only briefly halt the relentless advance of the armored forces and postpone the moment of defeat slightly.

With overwhelming military superiority, Joe completely occupied Helsinki in just two days. Except for a small number of defenders who retreated to the north in the final stage, most of the defenders were either annihilated or chose to surrender.

At this point, according to Joe's plan, the next step should have been to reassure the citizens and begin preparations for reconstruction.

Deploying troops cost a lot of money, so it's better to recoup the investment as soon as possible and see a return on investment quickly. After all, although Joe is earning a lot now, he has even more places to spend money.

In York's laboratory, enormous sums of money are burned every day.

Joe did not intend to use extreme measures against the captured left-wing prisoners of war. He was basically prepared to sentence them to punishments ranging from hard labor to exile, according to their left-wing leanings.

Although most of Prag's export resources are now local timber, Joe doesn't believe that there are no worthwhile minerals to be mined in this mountainous northern country.

Joe had already hired a large-scale mining exploration team in Wagner's name in London, just waiting for the war to end.

They then began large-scale mining exploration in Prag, which allowed Wagner's stock to continue to soar.

Then, just when Joe thought all the combat missions were basically over and the troops should begin to restore order, Prag's right wing began a massive purge in Helsinki.

They began arresting large numbers of people associated with the left, and after the arrests, these leftists were executed by firing squad without trial.

This large-scale public execution startled Joe. Weren't the Praggle right wing afraid of provoking resentment and resistance from the local residents by carrying out such a fierce purge?

The answer is no, because the left wing has done the same thing to the right wing before.

So now that they have the upper hand, they do not intend to reconcile, but rather to thoroughly cleanse the poison of the left-wing movement.

Since Joe came here to keep the left-wing plague out of the East, he had no reason to stop the right-wing purges.

After all, in the military contract, Joe did not get involved in local politics; he simply provided military services and developed local resources.

So all Joe could do at this point was to release all his prisoners, whether Lucia or Prag, into Lucia's body, so that these guys would never come back here again.

After all, Joe could foresee how strict the anti-leftist policies would be after the right wing came to power. Under such policies, even if these people were doing hard labor in Wagner's mines and forestry, their lives would probably not be much better.

So instead of training a bunch of guys who would rather die than fight each other, it's better to just throw them at the Lucia.

In any case, the left-wing government of Russia is currently exchanging views intensely with the right wing of Russia, and these people will probably not be idle after they go back.

At the same time, Joe was also advising the right-wing general who ordered the purge that the opposition could not be completely eradicated, and that tolerance was the greatest revenge against the opposition. Moreover, he argued that bread was more effective than bullets in many situations, and that bayonets could not intimidate anyone in the face of poverty and despair.

The right-wing general agreed with Joe's advice, but he said that the war had progressed to this point, and if he appeared too weak, his men would have a problem with him.

After a brief pacification of Helsinki, Joe led his troops north to deliver the final blow to Prag's left flank, while the peace conference held in Versailles was drawing to a close.

Because the Gallic and American armies performed poorly in the final stages of the war, the Buntanians, despite being known as the "Big Three" of Versailles, gained the upper hand in the talks.

Even though the United States was the largest creditor at the meeting, having provided tens of billions in loans for the war, it did not perform well on the battlefield and did not even complete a single battle independently.

They were basically working in cooperation with the Gauls, so their voices weren't very loud, even though the Citizens president repeatedly mentioned his fourteen-point principle and even threatened to withdraw from the talks.

However, due to a lack of hard power, the Citizen's president's threats are not always effective.

Although the United States' proposal to establish an international alliance to prevent war through collective security was adopted after repeated consultations.

At the Conference of Versailles, all the nations, even the defeated Teutons and the fragments scattered after the disintegration of three other collapsed empires, joined this international alliance.

Even the representatives of the Praggo right wing, who had just occupied Helsinki, were able to sign the documents for joining the League of Nations.

However, Citibank failed to successfully push forward with any other issues they wanted.

This devastating war nearly wiped out a generation, leaving everyone between the ages of 18 and 35 with rifles to defend Verdun and bayonets to drive the Teutons out of Paris. The Gauls, in this conference, had even less say.

As two of the three giants of Verdun, Caucasus and Gaul did not have much say, and the other small or newly established countries naturally had even less say.

Buntania practically dominated the meeting, with the Buntanian Prime Minister making full use of everything he had learned in the Buntanian Parliament over the past few decades.

As the Prime Minister of Buntania, Your Excellency has acted on only one principle in this great battle to establish postwar rules: everything you do is for the benefit of Buntania.

In order to satisfy the interests of Bunitania, His Excellency the Prime Minister did not hesitate to betray the interests of the Gauls, even though the Gauls regained the Alsace-Lorraine region that they had lost in the last war.

However, in order to continue the balance of power policy inherited from the Bunitania era, Bunitania did not agree to dismantle the Teutons. At the same time, in order to weaken the Teutons, it was necessary to ensure that the Teutons were not completely weakened to the point of being unable to maintain the balance of power on the continent.

Therefore, the Teutons lost most of their most important industrial region in the East, Silesia, even though they fought a hard-fought seven-year war to acquire it, leaving almost every Teutonian family in mourning and many ancient noble families extinct in the war.

The Buntanians did not hesitate to hand over most of the region to the newly restored Polish-Germans.

In order to compensate for the losses suffered by Buntania and Gaul in this war, Buntania imposed an astronomical sum of reparations on the Teutons. This amount, when averaged out to each surviving Teuton, was equivalent to each Teuton paying 2,129 marks to the two countries.

Of course, since the Teutonic economy had collapsed at this time, the prime minister, who had extensive experience in making money, requested that the calculation be based on the pre-war exchange rate of one gold mark to 0.358 grams of gold.

This left each Teutonic person with a huge debt of 762.182 grams of gold after the war.

Of course, even if you threw the Teutons into a millstone, you couldn't squeeze that much money out of them, so in order to enable the Teutons to pay off this huge debt...

The Bunitas will act as guarantors to borrow money from the United States to get the Teutonic industry running again.

Since the Teutonic homeland suffered almost no significant attacks, even when Joe brought the war to the Teutonic homeland at the end of the war, he exercised great restraint and did not carry out large-scale destructive destruction.

Therefore, the Teutonic Kingdom still maintains a complete industrial system. As long as this industrial system can be put into operation and the country rejoins the world trade system, the money can definitely be repaid.

Of course, the extent to which the Teutonic industrial system would exploit the Teutons in order to repay this huge debt was none of the Bunitania's business.

After all, the Bunitaians were only concerned with collecting money; everything else was the Teutonics' business.

The Teutonic representatives lodged a strong protest against the huge sum of money, but the protest was ineffective.

The already furious Gauls slammed their fists on the table, declaring that the Teutons had better refuse the reparations now so they could march their troops into Teutons.

In fact, the Gauls were indeed hoping that the Teutons would refuse the amount, since Poland had obtained most of Silesia, but the Gauls had not obtained the Rhineland, the northern defense line they had dreamed of. Moreover, in order to prevent the Teutons from being weakened too much, the conference did not allow the Rhineland to be separated from the Teutons and become an independent country.

Therefore, the Gauls are currently experiencing a strong sense of unease, as the loss of adult males is so significant that the Teutons' population advantage over the Gauls will continue to expand in the future.

This time they barely managed to hold off the Teutons in Paris, but whether they could do so again next time was causing anxiety among the Gallic leadership.

At the same time, also in order to continue the policy of maintaining the balance of power on the continent, the land that was released after the collapse of the three empires, apart from the part occupied by Wagner, was the part that neither Bonitania nor Gaul could control.

The Prime Minister of Bunitania also made full use of the traditional craftsmanship of the Bunitas, and under the premise of national self-determination, incorporated people who were not of one ethnicity into one country, and divided a region that was historically one country into several parts.

In short, you are a nation only if Buntania allows it. Otherwise, even if you look the same, speak the same language, and have the same customs, you are different nations and must be counted separately.

As long as Bunitania needs it, even if you are not of the same ethnicity, you must now live on the same land.

Under such a principle of division, it's impossible to avoid trouble, but this is where the League of Nations, established under the leadership of the United States, can come in handy. According to the Americans, the League of Nations should have its own independent forces, and if anyone disrupts the peace, then the world should unite to fight them and nip the war in the bud.

So who is in charge of the League of Nations?

If they want to gain the League of Nations' tacit approval, shouldn't some people with ulterior motives at least do something to prevent the matter from becoming meaningless?
In this way, even if the geopolitical environment changes, Bonitania's interests can still be protected.

Moreover, the original idea of ​​President Citizens to establish a League of Nations army did not include how the League of Nations army should be organized.

If each country were to send troops, not to mention that the management and training of these troops would be a disaster, the very question of whether these troops could be kept on standby or whether they would be temporarily assembled only after problems arise would be an unsolvable problem.

However, the idea of ​​recruiting people from all countries to form an army under the League of Nations without sending troops is enough to make one realize that it would be a disaster.

Just when the problem reached a stalemate, Wagner Defense Contractors came along and solved it.

Regarding the issue of the League of Nations' army, the Prime Minister of Buntania stated that the League of Nations could easily resolve this problem by hiring Wagner.

After all, Wagner's deployment of troops brought peace to two troubled Eastern countries, which already proved the effectiveness of the defense contracting company system.

Since they were not an army, there was no legal issue with the League of Nations hiring them, nor was there any need to resolve the question of which countries the League of Nations forces were composed of or who trained and commanded them.

All countries need to do is provide the funding, and then let these defense contractors solve the problems. Wouldn't that be enough?

When the Prime Minister first made the proposal, the other two bigwigs immediately said, "That's enough. Everyone knows that Wagner, despite claiming to be a defense contractor, is actually an unofficial member of the Bonitania army. Even their commander, Old Joe, hasn't retired from your army yet! You can't fool a fool like that!"

Then, amidst protests from the Gauls and Americans, the Gauls and Americans also formed their own defense contracting companies.

The Gauls were even faster at establishing their own defense contracting companies than the Americans.

After all, as a long-established colonial power, the Gauls were also quite adept at how to use manpower in their colonies and how to maintain security in their colonies—two issues that all colonial powers would encounter.

Unlike the Bonitania's habit of instigating conflict between natives, the Gauls chose to establish a Foreign Legion and colonial forces, letting these natives understand what the iron fist of the empire meant.

So now, a portion of the foreign legion troops were given a slightly different name, and some more reliable officers were selected to manage this organization that was destined to make a name for itself. This organization, named 'Bayar Company', was thus established.

It is called Bayar because Pierre Teraille de Bayar, a legendary 16th-century Gallic knight, was known for his courage and loyalty and was regarded as a symbol of Gallic military tradition.

The Gauls hoped that this company could do something in the post-war world, just like those Wagnerian musicians.

The company's first-generation leaders, the Parisian gentlemen, hesitated for a long time between Charles and Jean-Pierre. Ultimately, they chose Jean-Pierre because he had a deep cooperation with the Citizens during the Second Battle of Paris, making him very "international," and unlike Charles, who had spent a lot of time in prisoner-of-war camps.

Jean-Pierre, a colonel who had been active on the battlefield since the first day of the war and had fought in all the important battles of the Gallic Wars and was still alive, had become a national hero of Gaul, even though he did not have a miraculous record like Joe. No one doubted his loyalty, so Jean-Pierre became the first generation of managers of the company.

Although the Citizens were a bit slow to act, they were not short of troops at the time, so they quickly established a defense contracting company called 'Freedom Vanguard'.

However, unlike the Britannians and the Gauls, although the 'Freedom Vanguard' company was established very quickly, the Citizens were unable to find a suitable manager for this defense contractor.

After all, for a defense contracting company like this to manage such an organization, it must have experience in managing large-scale troops. It doesn't have to be a powerful officer like Joe or Jean-Pierre, whose names alone are known to be formidable figures; at the very least, it has to be an elite soldier who can be deployed and win battles.

But what legitimate elite military officer would be willing to give up their career at this time to run away and manage such a mercenary company?

The United States is not like Bonitania or Gaul; they don't have that many colonies to manage, nor that many officers to waste.

After the frenzied expansion of the military, even if downsizing is necessary, the outstanding officers of the army and navy are too busy pursuing advanced studies and exploring new-era military development. No one wants to waste their time in a company where they don't know where they work or what the future holds.

Because the military was unwilling to provide personnel to manage it, Citibank had to rely on personnel from the FBI to manage the agency.

Although it's a bit strange to have secret agents manage a defense contracting company, at least the framework has been set up.

As the Citizens and the French established defense contracting companies, it became established that the League of Nations would place orders with these companies if it needed to deploy troops.

Then, during the conference, the three leaders set extremely strict standards and requirements for what kind of defense contractors the League of Nations could place orders with. They were practically writing down on paper that the only defense contractors the League of Nations could order from could be named "Wagner," "Bayar," and "Freedom Vanguard."

After the last remaining issue of peacekeeping at the League of Nations was resolved, the conference, which had lasted for more than half a year, finally came to an end as representatives of all countries signed the treaty.

All participants agreed that a new era had begun, an era that would end all possible future wars. With the establishment of the League of Nations, all future conflicts between nations would be resolved through negotiations within the League.

Just as the conference delegates announced a new era, an era without war, amidst the clicking of cameras like machine guns from the reporters, the conference delegates were declaring this new era.

Joe completed the encirclement of the left wing of Prag north of the city, trapping 30,000 left-wing fighters in a small seaside town called Kask. Meanwhile, the navy of the Lucian left government, which was trying to support the left-wing fighters of Prag, was also confronting the Royal Navy of Buntania in the Baltic Sea.

Meanwhile, the Russian left and right wings also launched the largest battle since the outbreak of the civil war in a vast area between Tsaritsyn and Saratov.

The Third Army, once the strongest armed force of the Lucian Empire, which conquered Constantinople and swept across the Balkans, came here with all the right-wing armed forces they could muster.

Meanwhile, the Lusian left wing also gathered all the troops they could muster, including left-wing veterans who had fought their way from the Siege of St. Petersburg to Riga and liberated Minsk and Kiev, as well as other left-wing figures from various countries who responded to the call of the People's Revolutionary Union to arm themselves in defense of the revolution, and the Teutonic Left Spartacus Regiment, which had been tempered in the Silesian melee, all of whom came to this battlefield.

Millions fought, roared, and died for their ideals on this vast land, but no one in the rest of the world cared that day, and the same headline appeared on the front page of every newspaper: "Peace Has Arrived."

Looking at the headline "Peace Has Arrived" on the newspaper in his hand, Joe, who was peeking out from the tank turret, shook his head and stuffed the newspaper back into the tank for his gunner to see.

Since Prag is almost a polar country, the long summer days provided Joe with ample time to conduct military operations.

In fact, after surrounding the left wing of the Prags in Kask, Joe, not wanting to kill too many people, sent a treaty to the left wing of the Prags, saying that he had now taken control of the situation and that all their supply lines had been cut off, and that they would not receive even a pea's worth of supplies, whether on land or at sea.

I could wipe you out here at any time, but I don’t want to. I believe life is precious. It only takes a second to pull the trigger to kill someone, but it takes at least eighteen years to raise a working person.

So if you lay down your arms and surrender to me, and promise never to return to Plug, then I will guarantee your safety and transport you to Lucia by ship and train.

You have time to consider whether to accept my proposal, but don't try to bargain; this is already the final and best offer.

Of course, you can choose to resist, but if you choose to fight me to the last man here, then please make sure the residents leave before the battle begins.

This is our war. The residents here are innocent. They should not die because of ideological differences. I will open a humanitarian evacuation route so that the residents here can be evacuated to a safe place.

However, all evacuees will be screened.

After submitting the proposal to the left wing of the Prags, Joe ordered Wagner and the right wing of the Prags to begin building fortifications, as if preparing to continue the siege.

Because of the abundant sunshine in summer, the besieging troops had plenty of time to leisurely dig trenches and set up defenses.

Even after the trenches were dug, thanks to the abundant supplies, Wagner's veterans began frying bacon, grilling sausages, and brewing black tea in the front-line trenches.

The air was filled with the aroma of roasted meat.

What would you choose?

"The meat is ready. Would you like some?"

Just as Joe was using binoculars to check the movements on the left flank of the Plug in Kamingk, Elena climbed onto the tank carrying two skewers of meat and came to Joe's side, handing one skewer to him.

Joe glanced at the skewers of meat in Elena's hand, swallowed hard, and took the skewers from her. The Lucia people really knew how to grill meat; these skewers smelled delicious.

So Joe took the skewer and started eating.

Just as Joe was happily eating his kebabs, a debate broke out among the leftists in the surrounded Kamingk. Some argued that they should fight to the last moment, so that their spirit could inspire future generations like that of the Paris Commune.

Others believe that only by living can we have the chance to successfully plant the red flag all over the world. Staying here is just a pointless sacrifice. If we leave here and go to Lucia where the fighting is still going, we can do more.

Since neither side could persuade the other, they began to accuse each other of opportunism and compromise while surrounded, and then began to expel each other from the left.

However, since Joe's cannons were positioned outside the city at this time, both sides rationally used the weapon of criticism against each other, rather than using weapons to criticize.

Finally, before sunset, the left wing of Prag had completely split. Some were preparing to leave for Lucia, while the rest were prepared to fight to the last.

Joe sighed at the choice made by the left wing of Prag. If he could, Joe really hoped that these people would choose to leave, now that they had made their decision.

Joe respected their choice. After the left-wing members who were willing to leave laid down their weapons, Joe put them on a train to Lucia, while also screening the evacuating civilians.

After quickly doing some calculations, Joe signaled to the shallow-water heavy gunboats patrolling the shore, instructing them to begin unleashing a barrage of fire on Kamink.

As the cannons on the shallow-water heavy gunboats began to roar, Wagner's veterans also began to wolf down their food.

They knew that once the shelling ended, it would be time for them to get to work.

As the buildings in Kamingk crumbled under heavy artillery fire, a telegraph operator suddenly delivered a telegram to Joe.

Upon receiving the telegram, Joe's eyes widened.

What do you mean by saying that the situation on Emerald Island is out of control and that they want you to go to Emerald Island to suppress the rebellion?
Didn't we agree that once I came to the East, I wouldn't have to worry about Emerald Island's mess?
Meanwhile, as the Teutonic Army grew to 60,000 troops, Holtz, who had been kicked out of the army by the wave of disarmament, was drinking himself into oblivion in a beer hall.

As a professional soldier who has received rigorous training and spent the first half of my life in the military, I really don't know what I can do after leaving the military.

Just as Holtz was drinking his beer in frustration, he heard a commotion nearby.

This annoyed Holtz. All the excitement belonged to others, while he had nothing. Now, he didn't even have the right to quietly drink a beer and eat some sausage?!

With this thought in mind, Holz angrily grabbed his beer glass and walked over, ready to yell at the person who seemed to be giving a speech to be quiet. He was telling them to go give a speech in the square, or even in the damn parliament! A beer hall was a quiet place to eat!

Then, on his way there, Holtz finally heard what the man was saying. When Holtz stopped outside the crowd, he no longer wanted to kick the guy out of the beer hall.

He thought this guy had a point, and he wanted to hear what other insights this guy had to offer.

--------

The Versailles Conference, manipulated by Bonitania, did not bring peace but instead sowed the seeds of war.

The unequal treaties imposed on the Teutons, coupled with their economic recovery, gave them not only a reason to wage war, but also the ability to do so.

—From *A History of Twentieth-Century Warfare*

Joe Harrison is the most dangerous enemy of the world's left-wing movement. This danger lies not in how many battles he can win on the battlefield, but in the fact that his policies of tolerance and bread have numbed many proletarians, preventing them from realizing that class contradictions are inherently irreconcilable.

——————A History of the Left-Wing Movement in the 20th Century

(End of this chapter)