Fox of France

Yes, for Simeone, this document is indeed much "friendly". The French even generously promised to provide Britain with a huge sum of money to restore the British economy after the war.

Of course, Simeone is not a fool, of course he can see that this is a glass of poisoned wine, or, as the French are used to saying, this is a sugar-coated cannonball. This funding is not gratuitous, no cost and no requirement. In the words of a certain great man: "The grandpa is fishing, and those who wish to take the bait. If you eat the food, your stomach will hurt!"

The use of this fund must be supervised by the French, which is of course reasonable; Britain must carry out domestic reforms that meet the requirements of the French. The government has even lost the power to formulate its own budget, because the budget method must meet the requirements of the French, so that they can get that little "food from the past" from the French.

"Finance is the mother of all governments." This is the basic truth that every senior British bureaucrat knows. In fact, the struggle between all state machines in the United Kingdom, whether it is Parliament and the King, or Whigs and Tories Yes, it is still between various government departments... All these struggles revolve around the budget.

But now, once the "aid" of the French is accepted, a supreme arbiter will suddenly appear in this supreme struggle. Although according to the text, this adjudicator is not a plenipotentiary like "our Father in heaven", he only has veto power.

But having the veto is already decisive. Just imagine, if you meet such a referee while playing football, his principle is: I say it’s not a foul, it’s not a foul, even if he directly kicks your head on the ground; When I say the goal is invalid, the goal is invalid, no matter how you kick it in, even if you take the ball from your own goal line, it has been brought into other people's goal; whether you are the Spanish team or the Italian team , I said that you are going to be eliminated, you are going to be eliminated, even if your opponent is just a substandard team.

Once the French have such power, the entire British government, everything that depends on financial support to survive, from the army to the police, from courts to prisons, if they want to live a good life, the most important thing will become To please France. Because only by pleasing the French can they get the budget they need.

So as long as this aid is accepted, the entire British government becomes a subordinate department of the French government. The food that comes here, eating it is not just as simple as a stomachache, it will be taken away. But can the United Kingdom today really refuse this aid?

The consequences of refusing this assistance are clear. Many rogue parties have links to the French - and the French themselves make no secret of it. This is a lot of money, the United Kingdom government doesn't want it, don't the rebels don't want it? In today's British people, anyone who can come up with such a sum of money just needs to raise the check book of the French and wave it like a big flag. Those soldiers who can't eat enough, those who are hungry The policemen who can't feed their wives and children will not hesitate to abandon the United Kingdom and go to his command, and then drag the guillotine captured by the British in Toulon from the museum and erect it in the Tower of London , and then starting from the king, all those who have the title of nobility—even if it is only a title of knight—are lined up in a long line and sent to the guillotine one by one. Whenever a noble head fell, the mob who watched would thunderously cheer. The heads of kings and dauphins were paraded through the streets of London with the heads of kings and dauphins on lances, and the crowds followed the dreadful lance and rejoiced as if at a carnival.

There is a head hanging on every street lamp in London, and there is a piece of paper with their crimes written on it, which reads: "vampire", "enemy of the people", "nobility"... The children from Running below, while running, he sang a song from France cheerfully in English: "It will be fine, it will be fine... the nobles are all hung on the lampposts..."

"This is really terrible!" Even just imagining such a situation, Simeone couldn't help shaking, sweating, and even tears streaming down.

"The United Kingdom must not be reduced to such a situation. Therefore, even if it is poisonous wine, I can only drink it. If I don't drink it, I will die. If I drink it, I don't know who will die, but at least I won't Floating in the wind on top of a lamppost."

But Simeone still wants to work hard to get as much as possible for the United Kingdom.

So when he met Talleyrand again, he told him that, in principle, he agreed with the basic concept of the memorandum. He believed that under the guidance of such a concept, Britain and France would be able to overcome all misunderstandings and conflicts. Unfortunately, it became a state of brothers who went hand in hand.

Of course, there are still some small problems, such as the various restrictions on the British government's budget attached to the French aid.

"Of course, now that the misunderstanding has been cleared up and the war is over, it is of course appropriate to reduce the size of the excessively large army, but reducing the size of the entire British army to less than 30,000 people and limiting the size of the navy to only Having an armored cruiser, isn't that too...Mr. Minister, you know, the military has a lot of say in the government, and cutting their budget so much will bring us a lot of resistance."

"Ah, my friend, I thought that only an invincible army could put pressure on the government. Besides, your thinking is trapped by the old ideas of the past. We don't have to hurt the leaders of the military. Benefits. It is true that the size of the army should exceed 30,000, but we have not stipulated how many soldiers and officers there are among the 30,000. Even if the 30,000 are generals, even if the number of generals is greater than the number of cannons, That's not a problem."

"The people will not accept such an absurd thing," Simeone said.

"Ah, if the people don't accept it, it must be that your explanations are not in place. So, in many things, you British people are better than you and you have to learn." Talleyrand replied with a smile on his face, "For example, you You can tell them that maintaining too many armies will consume a lot of wealth and affect everyone's living standards. If you only keep the skeleton of the army, that is, the establishment and officers, you can save a lot of money. There are officers, and once it’s time to expand the army, the army can be expanded quickly. Isn’t this an explanation? The taxes collected from them are less, but the army is still usable. What else are they dissatisfied with? What about?

In addition, in this way, the number of the army can be reduced, but all the establishments are still there, and the number of officers can still be retained. Although the army's budget has been cut a lot, because there are no big soldiers, it can be distributed to each officer. Yes, but more. Isn’t this a good thing for the military? As long as you can explain your interests and reasons to them, how can they oppose such a thing that is beneficial to the country?

As for the navy... First of all, the navy is very costly. If your country must spend a lot of money to build battleships, who is its imaginary enemy? As for the opposition of the navy. If the army can stand on the side of the government, what's wrong with their opposition? Besides, if there are really such ignorant guys in the navy, wouldn't it be enough to throw these guys in prison first for the crime of being unfavorable in combat? I think his successor will be much smarter. Besides, the navy, like the army, can be reduced in size, but the organization remains the same, isn't it the same? "

When he said this, Talleyrand did not know that in the original history, many years later, the British Royal Navy, which once ruled the ocean, was once reduced to only six destroyers. But even under such circumstances, our British Navy still retains many fleet establishments that have long since ceased to exist.

For example, after the "Amethyst" incident, the "Yangtze River Fleet", which was driven out of the Yangtze River, has been maintained in the establishment of the Royal Navy of the British Empire until the 21st century, and various officers are attached to it, such as fleet commander, deputy Commander, chief of staff, deputy chief of staff and so on. This is also normal, after all, my British Empire has its own national conditions here. The British Army already has more generals than tanks. The generals of my British navy must be no less than the red deer of the army! But there are too few ships in the British Navy, so the general cannot be assigned the post of chief engineer. Therefore, a dead soul organization like the "Yangtze River Fleet" can come in handy. As a result, some fleet commanders of the British Navy had fewer warships and soldiers than the Mongolian Navy of the King Shichibuhai.

However, Simeone still had some doubts, so he said: "But you also know that there are some factors of instability in our country. If there are so few troops and they rebel, what should we do?"

"We have calculated that your army should be able to have an army of more than 10,000 people capable of fighting if you retain the officers under the current establishment. Considering that your railway has been repaired well over the years, the army's ability to move quickly is quite strong. , We feel that a quick reaction force of 10,000 people is enough to deal with such a situation." Talleyrand replied.

"But..." But Simeone still shut up. Theoretically, there are still more than 10,000 capable troops left. In theory, these armies are indeed enough. However, this is all in theory, in practice, it is another matter.

For example, the recovery of the army and the removal of so many people is a very important task. Shouldn't a special agency be set up to take charge of such important work? For example, set up an Army Downsizing Work Committee to take charge of this work.

The members of the "Army Reduction Committee" must of course be officials, some of whom are military officers, and some, of course, are civilian officials of the government. Their expenses will naturally come from military expenditures. In theory, of course, this is a temporary agency that is revoked when the work is done. However, this is only in theory. When did the "temporary institutions" set up by me in the United Kingdom really become temporary? Considering the number of people occupied by these temporary agencies, God knows how many places will be left for the combat troops in the end.

But it's too embarrassing to say this kind of thing, so Simeone really can't say it. After all, although he is a professional diplomat, an important characteristic of a diplomat is that the lower limit is low enough, and he doesn't feel shameful when he talks nonsense. But in this regard, Simeone is still far behind a certain fat diplomat from the later Beacon Country who openly regards lying, cheating, and stealing as the glory of continuous improvement. (A certain glory of continuous improvement: What does this have to do with me? Well, let’s work together to overthrow Huawei!)

So the military issue was satisfactorily resolved. Then there are some other details. Now that he has decided to sell his country for glory. The most important thing, of course, is to get a good price. Before coming out, the UK has already established the basic bottom line for this negotiation, that is, to protect the kingdom and not to protect the Great Britain.

In theory Great Britain and Kingdom are two different things. Great Britain could be the United Kingdom, but it could also be the United Republic, or even, if the revolution goes well, the Union of Soviets. Ah, no, it should be Solvay Love Alliance.

But neither the United Republic nor the Suwei Love Alliance has a place for nobles. Therefore, today, the interests of Great Britain and the interests of the kingdom have run counter to each other. The Kingdom must immediately and firmly fall to France in order to continue to rule Great Britain.

Now that this attitude is maintained, there are no real insoluble problems between the two parties. Therefore, in a cordial and friendly atmosphere, the two sides conducted sufficient communication on some details of the new memorandum proposed by French Foreign Minister Talleyrand, and formed a broad consensus. In the end, the two parties signed the memorandum to show their "willing agreement".

Then Simeone hurried back to London with a new memorandum, and handed the memorandum to the Crown Prince and the Earl of Liverpool for review.

It was late at night when Simeone arrived in London, but the crown prince ordered him to take the memo to Buckingham Palace immediately and report to them.

As soon as he entered Buckingham Palace, he was greeted by attendants. The waiter led him into the living room, and Simeone saw that the crown prince and the prime minister, the Earl of Liverpool, were already waiting there.

"How? What did you bring back?" the Crown Prince asked, his tone and expression, as if a prisoner was inquiring about the court's sentence for him. It's fear, it's anticipation.

"Peace," Simeone replied, "His Royal Highness, Your Excellency Prime Minister, I have brought back the peace of our time."