The Rise Of Australasia

Chapter 1122: Chapter 840: Ambitions for Poland

News of King George V’s illness quickly spread to other nations and regions across Europe.

Although the British tried to block the news, King George V had not appeared in public for a long time, which inevitably raised suspicions among other nations.

After all, King George V was already 70 years old, an age that truly signaled the twilight years of life.

Unlike the British Government, which was more concerned with the succession to the throne, the rest of Europe was thinking about whether the change in the British monarchy would have a significant impact on the European situation to come.

Of course, those who were particularly interested in this issue were naturally the German Empire and the Kingdom of Italy, nations with immense ambition.

These two countries, donning the guise of monarchism, were extremist nationalist states that could hardly contain their urge to expand.

After careful consideration by Germany and Italy, they believed that during the time from King George V’s critical illness to Prince Edward’s accession, the British would hardly involve themselves deeply in European affairs.

Even more, should Germany and Italy meddle with the British succession, the British would be preoccupied with the crisis of the throne and thus unable to attend to other matters.

However, to be on the safe side, Germany and Italy still decided to ensure that other nations, including the United Kingdom and Australasia, were too preoccupied to meddle in European affairs.

The best way to hold Australasia at bay was naturally to create some friction with the Island Nation at the borders, to draw Australasia’s attention.

The Islanders had not intended to act in this way. However, after they were promised a large amount of material support by Germany and Italy, especially in industrial equipment, the Islanders still changed their minds wholeheartedly.

Thus, the three great Powers of the Triple Alliance began to move simultaneously, no longer able to contain their ambition for expansion and their desire for more territory.

For Germany, the best target for expansion was actually the Austrian Empire. The Austrian Empire internally had a large number of South Germans, who were ethnically akin to the Germans.

Moreover, the industry in both the Austrian region and the Czechoslovakia region of the Austrian Empire was quite significant.

If the German Empire swallowed the Austrian Empire, its industrial scale would reach a level comparable to the British Empire, and its population would definitively outpace Britain and France, becoming even more powerful than Germany before World War I.

But unfortunately, if Germany insisted on annexing the Austrian Empire, it could face more than just France and Austria as enemies—Britain would definitely not allow Germany to do so.

With no other choice, Germany had to aim for the next best, setting their sights on strategically-important Poland.

The German Government originally planned to partition Poland together with the Russian Nation to the east.

But several unsuccessful contacts with the Russian Government, plus signing a treaty against Russia with the Island Nation and Italy, led Germany to abandon the plan of coaxing Russia into dividing Poland.

To Germany, Poland was just a mid-sized country in Central Europe.

The German rulers once proudly announced in Congress that their military could crush Poland in just one month.

Having excluded all opposition, Germany’s rulers now had complete control over the country.

On Germany, Italy, and the Island Nation, one could see extreme cases of blind personal adoration.

This led to extremely high levels of loyalty within the military of each of these three countries, not only enhancing the combat strength but also solidifying their rulers’ own power and status.

Why not choose the Low Countries as the target for invasion, but instead target the more populous and militarily stronger Poland?

Most importantly, Poland lay between Germany and Russia, with Austria’s Czechoslovakia region to the south.

The north of Poland bordered the Baltic Sea, and the country possessed extremely rich mineral resources. Metallurgy, chemistry, machinery, and shipbuilding were well-developed and could greatly supplement Germany’s still incomplete industrialization.

Furthermore, should Germany occupy the whole of Poland, it would have a huge logistics base. The entire plain of Poland could become a grain production area and ranch for Germany, providing large amounts of grain, meat, and fresh dairy products each year.

After dealing with Poland, Germany would have no more rivals in the entirety of Eastern Europe, with the exception of the low-profile Russia which remained non-committal.

This was extremely beneficial for Germany’s plan to attack Western Europe. With the grain and mineral resources provided by Poland each year, Germany could outlast France in a war of attrition, even over a short duration.

In order to occupy Poland, Germany and Italy drew up an extremely detailed plan.

Although Italy couldn’t annex Polish territory, Germany conceded on the territory of Austria, agreeing that after occupying the Austrian Empire, Italy could swallow larger portions of Austrian land and control the Kingdom of South Slavia in the Balkan Peninsula.

In a meeting between Germany and Italy, both parties laid out detailed plans for the invasion of Poland. The governments of Germany and Italy agreed to be ready for an attack on Poland within three months and to also guard against any potential actions from France and the Austrian Empire.

This world and its history are quite different. Up till now, Germany, besides reclaiming the demilitarized zone of the Rhineland, had not undertaken any territorial expansion.

Because there were no military actions taken against the Austrian Empire, the attitude of Britain and France towards Germany was mostly conciliatory at this time.

This also provided Germany with the convenience of planning for Polish territory. Germany’s true ambitions had not yet been revealed, and the people of the United Kingdom and France had not yet seen through the true intentions of the Germans.

According to the agreement reached between the German and Italian governments, after three months of preparation, both parties would launch an attack on Poland on October 15, 1945.

If Poland was willing to yield before this, the war preparations could be canceled. But if either Britain or France decided to maintain Poland’s independence, Germany and Italy were ready to engage in a super-war, forcing the British and French to concede.

On July 21, 1935, in a routine session of the German Congress, the German ruler gave a quite spectacular speech lasting a full two hours.

The German ruler revisited the vast territories once held by the German Empire but stressed that Danzig was at all times the legitimate territory of Germany, and its sovereignty would not tolerate any nation’s violation.

Seeing that the speech had provoked a very good reaction, the German ruler took the opportunity to revisit the fact of Poland’s occupation of German territory after World War I.

By transferring national hatred to Poland, it greatly increased the German people’s desire for war against Poland.

This speech, not being made public but rather in the form of major news, quickly spread across the whole of Europe.

Before Poland could make any statement, on the media interview the following day, the German government openly declared that Germany would reclaim Danzig’s sovereignty at all costs and vowed to defend all of Germany’s legitimate territories to the death.

The German government’s position quickly caused tensions across Europe, especially in Poland, which was very wary of its neighbor.

The Polish government responded quickly. The Poles declared that whether it was the Free City of Danzig, which was under Polish control, or the annexed German territories, all had been ceded to Poland as a form of atonement for Germany’s guilt in the last European great war.

The Germans’ attempt to reclaim Danzig and their territories was not only a provocation to the Polish government’s dignity but also a challenge to the Allies’ judgment of Germany’s crimes.

The Polish government asserted with righteous indignation that the Polish people would never forget Germany’s sinfulness in the last European great war and would never accept Germany’s demand to return the territories.

At this time, Poland was still indulging in its Greater Poland ideology proposed over a decade ago. After acquiring control over the Kingdom of Lithuania from the Russian Nation, the confidence of the Polish people had inflated boundlessly.

Even though they faced Germany, which before World War I was the strongest army superpower, the Poles did not perceive Germany to be as mighty as imagined.

Moreover, Poland had reached cooperation with several European powers, including the British and French, soon after its independence.

The treaties Poland had with the European powers included the Franco-Polish Mutual Assistance Treaty, the Anglo-Polish Mutual Assistance Agreement, the Polish-Russian contract, and more.

Backed by the support of the United Kingdom and France, the Poles had no intention of retreating before Germany. After Germany frequently mobilized its troops toward the German-Polish borders, the Poles announced an expansion of the army and gathered most of their forces along the frontier with Germany.

Now, Europe was no longer shrouded in the fog of war, but the flames of war had been kindled.

As the likelihood of war breaking out between the two parties grew, France, which had no relation to this conflict, began to panic.

For France, the potential war between Germany and Poland was in fact pushing France into the abyss.

If France did not help Poland, Germany, after annexing Poland, would completely surpass France’s comprehensive power and could match or even exceed the former German Empire.

But if France helped Poland, a large-scale war with Germany at this time was not something the French wanted to see.

What was more fatal was that Germany at this time did not have just Italy as an ally. The Nationalists, already prevailing in the Spanish Civil War, and the Island Nation in the Far East, were also allies of the Germans.

At this time, only the Austrian Empire was clearly supporting France; combined, France and Austria barely managed to match the strength of Germany and Italy.

Even if they could ultimately defeat the Germans, the casualties the French would face were guaranteed to be no less than those of the last World War.

Enduring two significant casualties within a short span of a little over twenty years was a catastrophic loss the French government could not bear. It was also a horrifying experience the French people were unwilling to endure again.

For the sake of their own security, the French government decided to demand certain concessions from the uncompromising Poles.

To the doves in France, Germany’s territorial demands on Poland had some valid points. Just as the French desperately longed for the return of Alsace and the Lorraine Area after the Franco-Prussian War, it wasn’t so unreasonable that the powerful Germans had the idea of reclaiming Danzig and other territories that had been ceded away.

Even though the Germans had not yet presented any territorial demands on the Republic, formerly German territory under French control, the French decided to transfer the sovereignty of this Republic to Germany.

If a slight piece of territory could be traded for long-lasting peace, for the current French government, this was a welcome solution to their significant problem.