Holy Roman Empire-Chapter 995 - 9: Mercenaries
Chapter 995 -9: Mercenaries
“Spain’s defeat is not the issue,” the strategic importance of the Philippine Islands must not fall into the hands of ambitious Japanese, or else there will be no peace in the region of Southeast Asia.
Even now, the Japanese Government is acting very compliant, even with the Vienna Government openly supporting Spain, they still keep a low profile as if they have no temper at all.
But this is based on a fear of the strong. Now the Holy Roman Empire is powerful, just the military forces in the Southeast Asia region are enough to make them unable to cope, even if they want to be restless, they can’t.
Yet times are changing, the Philippine Islands in the hands of Spaniards, and in the hands of Japanese are two entirely different concepts.
The former is already in decline, even if the Philippines are fertile, that can only contribute a sum of revenue to Spain, which is not of significant help to the national strength.
If it fell into Japanese hands, it would be completely different. With the resources of the Philippines, coupled with the Japanese hard work and endurance, creating a middle power is entirely feasible, and moreover, one with strong combat abilities.
If it was just these, Franz would not be worrying. After all, the Holy Roman Empire is so abnormal now, even he himself never thought that one day he could create such a vast empire.
The problem is Japan is not a normal country, now restrained by the elders, they are temporarily not going crazy. But the future is uncertain, looking at their actions in the original timeline, it’s completely like a series of films about acting recklessly and asking for trouble.
No one can guarantee that one day the Japanese won’t go mad and set their sights on the Austrian South Seas Region. Franz certainly does not want to make an arduous expedition to the Far East and fight a battle with the Japanese.
A war where losing is disastrous and winning is still disastrous is probably not liked by any sane person. Unless there is certainty of a fatal blow, Franz would not launch such a meaningless war of attrition.
From the perspective of the Holy Roman Empire, it’s best if the Philippine Islands remain in the hands of the Spaniards; at least the Spanish Government would not fantasize about competing with them for dominance over Southeast Asia, nor dare to have any crooked thoughts about the Austrian Southeast Asia region.
“Is the Spanish Army really that useless?” Prime Minister Carl asked first. As a normal European, he really couldn’t imagine a European Army, fighting against Japanese natives, would actually produce such a poor record.
Without the record-setting low performance of the Italian Army, the current performance of the Spanish Army could be said to be the worst of all European Colonial Empires.
Not to mention a 1:1.4 exchange ratio, even a 1:10 exchange ratio is the performance of a poor student. Normally, it is about one company chasing after thousands or one battalion being enough to engage in a war of annihilation.
Spain is even the pioneer of colonial warfare, the creator of conquest records. Reminiscent of the era when Spain used 600 men to conquer the Aztec Empire, and 177 men and 62 horses to overthrow the Inca Empire.
Compared with the current performance of the Spanish Army, there cannot be such a huge gap between heaven and hell. Faced with such a concept shock, Prime Minister Carl naturally found it hard to believe.
Foreign Minister Weisenberg explained, “They are more useless than we imagined. However, there were signs of this, as early as the European wars the Spaniards showed problems with their army’s low combat effectiveness.
They concentrated all the elite troops of the country, planned the campaign carefully, and in the end, they didn’t even defeat the cannon fodder army assembled temporarily by France.
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In the Anti-French Alliance, only the armies of the Italian countries had combat effectiveness that could compete with them. Now the combat effectiveness they’ve shown should be the lower limit of European armies.”
While everyone was criticizing the Spaniards for being useless, no one mentioned that the combat effectiveness of the Japanese Army was formidable. Okay, Franz admitted that nowadays the combat effectiveness of the Japanese Army really can’t be associated with being powerful.
It’s not that the Japanese are not trying, but military funding sets the upper limit of an army’s combat effectiveness. Without firing a few hundred bullets, how could one say they are veterans? Without thousands of bullets, how could one feed an elite?
This applies to infantry, and even more so to artillery. Every qualified artilleryman is trained with shells, and generally, hundreds of shells are indispensable. Even if most are training rounds, that’s still a significant expense.
Moreover, there’s the wear and tear on the cannons; it’s standard practice that training a few gunners results in the scrapping of a cannon.
Not to mention the even higher technical requirements for armored troops and pilots; these are virtually bought with money. Of course, the Japanese don’t have these arms, so there’s no need to consider that.
Apart from ammunition consumption, soldiers’ salaries, daily life, and the maintenance of weapons and equipment also represent a significant expense.
If we were to adapt the Sacred Shinra Army standards, the Japanese Army’s small military budget could just about maintain an infantry division, two would be a struggle, not to mention others.
And this difficult situation will continue until they can achieve domestic production of weapons and equipment, reducing the cost of weapons and ammunition, after which it will only slightly improve.
Looking at the original timeline, for a long time, the Japanese Army only maintained a few permanent divisions and often they weren’t even at full strength.
Even with such a reduction in forces, the military budget was still not sufficient. Out of necessity, the Japanese Army practiced bayonet tactics and then became masters of bayonet fighting.
But the combat effectiveness brought by sheer courage, although good for bullying poor cannon fodder, if they met real elites, it would be nothing but delivering food.
In fact, elite troops are not necessarily daredevils; their real advantage lies in professional proficiency.
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To put it simply, even hundreds of meters away, his chances of hitting you are around twenty to thirty percent, yet your return fire can only rely on luck.
In modern warfare, on average, it takes several thousand bullets to kill an enemy, and tens of thousands in future wars, which is mostly the accomplishment of regular troops. The elites, however, need far fewer rounds to eliminate an enemy.
This very fact accounted for why the Vienna Government’s top echelons did not take the combat capability of the Japanese Army seriously. A country that even had to import its artillery simply had no right to be feared.
…
Franz interrupted the topic which was veering off into complaints, “Whether the Spanish Army is useless or not is irrelevant, the key point is that the British have gotten involved. With the London Government supporting the Japanese, we can’t afford to let Spain lose the war—or at least, they must not lose too miserably.”
In international politics, face is sometimes very important, especially for a nascent hegemon.
Although in the Japanese-Spanish war, both the Anglo-Austrian countries were only controlling things from behind the scenes, to many observers, it seemed as if the struggle for hegemony between the Anglo-Austrian powers was continuing.
If Spain suffered a crushing defeat, it would send out a signal to the outside world: in overseas competition, the Holy Roman Empire is no match for the British.
Even though that’s the truth, the Vienna Government had to stubbornly deny it. In some sense, admitting inferiority to Britannia in overseas competition meant admitting defeat.
As challengers, we can tolerate failure but cannot admit it. Politics is like that sometimes; one must deceive oneself and others.
Moreover, if we don’t show some real strength to our subordinates, how can we keep them reassured?
Franz didn’t expect Spain to turn the tables completely, but he would be satisfied if they could fight to a mutually destructive stalemate.
If they couldn’t even manage that, then having Spain lose with dignity was still acceptable. After all, a military victory isn’t the only form of victory, the diplomatic struggle could still rewrite the final outcome.
As long as the Spaniards showed enough strength, Franz was confident that through diplomatic means, he could pressure the Japanese to withdraw from the Philippine Islands.
“Helping the Spanish train their army is too late, if we want to change the situation on the battlefield quickly, then the only choice is to hire mercenaries.
The current problem is that the Spaniards are too poor, they’re already struggling to fund an expeditionary force, they simply don’t have the financial capacity to hire a whole army.
Moreover, the military strength of the Japanese is not too weak, there’s simply no mercenary group in the world that could complete this task,” Prime Minister Carl suggested. The Vienna Government had done something similar before; during the struggle with the British over South Africa, they hid behind the guise of “mercenaries”. But they soon found it was pointless and openly campaigned under the flag of the Boer Republic Government Army.
The only issue is that the Philippine Islands are not like South Africa. The South African region was one we took for ourselves, where it was proper to commit both men and money; however, the Philippine Islands belong to the Spaniards and for the sake of international reputation, the Vienna Government cannot just seize them.
Who has ever heard of going to war on someone else’s behalf, bringing your own provisions? Even if the Spanish Government has already paid a price, it was only to secure the support of the Vienna Government, not enough to compel the Holy Roman Empire itself to join the battle.
Without participation from the Vienna Government, relying just on Spanish capability, even if they were willing to spend money to hire an army for help, they wouldn’t find any mercenaries powerful enough.
Normally, a mercenary band has just over a hundred or so people; those over a thousand members are considered huge teams, and any larger would be unsustainable.
Their combat capability varies widely, with the strongest amongst them being able to dominate government armies—they are the elites among the elite; most other mercenary teams are only good for bullying natives, straight up cannon fodder against a regular army.
They might be suitable for small-scale conflicts, but in large battles of tens of thousands, or even more than a hundred thousand, a mercenary army of just a few hundred is insufficient.
Franz nodded, “If they don’t have the money, we’ll lend it to them. Let the Spaniards mortgage their colonial revenue. If there’s no strong enough mercenary band internationally, then we’ll just have to create one.
The European wars have just ended not long ago, and there’s still a plethora of ex-servicemen on the European Continent, always some desperadoes willing to live on the edge.
If the numbers are too few, we can recruit from France; they’ve been starving for some time now, I believe there will be those willing to risk their lives to feed their families.
And yes, don’t hire mercenaries from the Italian area. This time it’s to fight in the Philippine Islands, and there’s no pasta there.”
If the conditions don’t exist, create them. Whether the mercenaries can defeat the Japanese Army or not, nobody knows, but action is better than inaction.
Rather than watch the Spaniards be defeated, it’s better to try our hardest. After all, it’s the Spaniards who are paying; the Vienna Government just needs to give a little push behind the scenes.
If it’s effective, that’s excellent, and if not, no harm is done; the situation has deteriorated to this point, it can’t get much worse.
And if the plan fails, it will be the Spanish Government who will cry, not the Vienna Government; at worst, we lose some face and temporarily stop competing with the British overseas.
