From Chief to Ball

Chen Jian nodded in praise, thinking that this young man is still very insightful. From the point of view of spices alone, the British Indian Company is really ten times behind the Dutch Indian Company in the monopoly trade of the Spanish royal family.Basically they are all right, but the last one is wrong, a shameless colonial company is the most promising.

Obviously, the Dutch Indian Company was very worried that the British would strike up a conversation with Chen Jian.For the Republic and Chen Jian, the United Kingdom or the Netherlands are optional allies, but for the Netherlands, the Republic is the best ally, and the United Kingdom is just a helpless choice. Moreover, the two sides still have disputes and foreseeable sea power issues in Europe. future conflicts.

The Netherlands urgently needs an ally, the Dutch Indian Company urgently needs Chen Jian’s support for the company, the first plenipotentiary governor of the Dutch Indian Company urgently needs Chen Jian’s support to make achievements, and the Dutch Indian Company’s young and ambitious financial Accountants urgently need to demonstrate their ability to handle affairs...

Listening to Peterson Kun's ambitious plan, Chen Jian was also thinking about how to gain the greatest benefit, and he kept ummmmming and ahhhing Petersonkun's remarks in a symbolic way to show the minimum respect he was listening to.

Chapter 1 Arrangements before departure ([-])

Facing Chen Jian, Petersonkun hopes to win the greatest benefit for the company. This is an excellent opportunity, not only for the company but also for his personal future.

As soon as he became an adult, he pinned all his hopes in this life on overseas trade, and made a plan for his life at the age of 15.When the young people in the Netherlands were busy going to sea and getting rich young, he went to Italy to enrich his mind and spent two years learning a set of Venetian bookkeeping system; when the northern provinces of the Netherlands When the young man was obsessed with the stocks of Indian companies, he calmed down and studied Latin, French, English and Italian for two years.

It is precisely because of his life planning and extremely useful knowledge that he was valued by the company when he first joined the company. After participating in the voyage, he proposed the company's development direction in Asia in Amsterdam.The ambitious plan is in line with the ambitious momentum of the company's board of directors. The 24-year-old young man has completed the most difficult step of entering the decision-making circle of the Greater Asia region from an intern employee.

Based on the experience he has accumulated in doing business in the Netherlands over the years, he has come to an astonishing conclusion in this era: oversupply will lead to unprofitability.

The very simple reason has become the most important reason why he is valued by the company's board of directors.

In view of the turbulent forms of Asian trade, he proposed two important development directions to the first Plenipotentiary Governor of Asia of the company:

One is to monopolize the spice trade, cut down trees to reduce production, burn excess spices, monopolize by force, expel the influence of the three countries of Britain, Spain, and Portugal in the spice producing areas, kill people to the island without smuggling power, send Dutch residents to settle and bring slaves to establish companies. The controlled spice plantations and the burning of some spices kept the European spice market short.

The second is that the company abides by some agreements signed with Chen Jian in Pattani, no longer focuses on the north, concentrates on gaining a foothold in Jakarta, and focuses on patrols in Banten and other places, so as not to give the British the There is an opportunity to deliver rice and cotton cloth, and the two necessities of life, rice and cotton cloth, are exchanged for nutmeg and cardamom on the island at the lowest price.

The most important of these two development directions is to be able to reach a plan of exchanging spices for rice and cotton cloth with Chen Jian, and partner with Chen Jian to fight against Ming Dynasty merchants who spontaneously went to the Spice Islands to trade, forming a non-interference relationship between the South and the North. monopoly trade zone.

At the same time, it is necessary for Chen Jian to come forward to help collect or lure a group of immigrants from the coastal areas of the Ming Dynasty to Jakarta, so that these hardworking Chinese can become another force there, thereby instigating the relationship between the local aboriginals and Chinese immigrants, especially It is to let Chinese immigrants become the middle class there so that the hatred of the natives can find a vent instead of directly resisting the Dutch.

If it is not possible to use barbarians to control barbarians locally, then artificially create third-party participants, and do not engage in dualization, which will lead to sharp and direct conflicts.

The plan was perfect, and as soon as it was proposed, it was praised and supported by the first governor.

And the most uncontrollable factor in this plan is the British.The British are not strong in Asia, they don’t have many footholds, and they are not afraid of losing anything if they have nothing: if the British find Chen Jian and the two sides cooperate, the bottom line of the British is predictably low, and they can even choose as long as A third of the spice share, because they don't get much spice at this time except future promises.

The United Kingdom used to be an indispensable ally of the Netherlands, but now the word indispensable is meaningless, so the company's board of directors has become very tough on the United Kingdom.

Don't give up an inch and completely stop considering the matter of cooperation and monopoly-for the sake of spices, they will not hesitate to go to war. The navy of the Inter-Provincial Republic has finished the battle of Gibraltar and it is at its peak.

Chen Jian could hear the longing in the young man's heart, and he could also imagine the young man's ambition. He had his own considerations about this matter.

The current situation in Asian trade is as follows: the British began to reach out to the spice trade, and the Dutch wanted to monopolize the spice trade. These two had no conflict of interest with themselves and did not dare to have any conflicts of interest before the spices were decided.Manila, Spain, is an ATM for itself, and now even if the Dutch go to fight Manila in spite of the truce, they have to send troops to support Spain’s legal rule in Manila—no Spaniards have traveled thousands of miles to bring silver from Potosí , where to dump the handicraft products along the coast of Fujian in exchange for a large amount of precious metals?

After all the calculations, the European forces in the entire Asian region, in the short term, have the most conflict with themselves, but Portugal, which is gradually fading and weakening.

Spain and the Netherlands were not qualified to directly trade with the Ming Dynasty. The Portuguese occupied Macau to guard against Spanish merchants very strictly. The Portuguese made a lot of profits when they went to Manila to trade, but they were not allowed to go directly to the colonies of the Governor General of the Americas to trade. The local Spaniards seized and confiscated the goods.

Therefore, there is a great area of ​​overlapping interests between the Portuguese, Wangbei City and the Chamber of Commerce: both parties can legally trade with the Ming Dynasty, so the trade forms of the two parties are destined to be completely different from those of the Dutch or the Spaniards.

Because of overlapping interests, the two sides have deep contradictions.

Every time a ship from the Fujian Maritime Chamber of Commerce arrives in Manila, the Portuguese will sell less goods; the Portuguese business house in Japan has been greatly threatened by Chen Jian, and Chen Jian added fuel to the issue of Catholicism in the Tokugawa family. Chen Jian’s actions in Pattani and Thailand have seriously violated Portugal’s interests in Myanmar. Portugal has already asked and threatened the King of Thailand to expel businessmen from the Republic; The substantive action of accompanying the Dutch to Malacca in the form of a soldier made Portugal even more resentful; the exclusion of Catholicism within the Ming Dynasty took away the way that the Jesuits were good at spreading technology and getting close to the upper-class scholar-bureaucrats...

It's a pity that the Netherlands has now reached a truce with Spain, and now it can only rely on itself to deal with Portugal within ten years.

As for the choice between the Netherlands and the UK, it has little impact on short-term interests.

In the long run, Chen Jian decided to stand on the side of the Netherlands and just make some small moves neutrally.

Without it, the population of the Netherlands is too small, the land is too small, the commerce is too developed, the return on investment of commercial capital is much higher than the return on investment of industrial capital, the national consciousness has not yet been formed, and the domestic political struggle is fierce... The Netherlands is doomed to be only a short-lived meteor Swipe across and can't jump up, so of course we have to stand on the side of the Netherlands, and it will be easy to clean up in the future-the Dutch need to win all the time, as long as they lose once, it will be difficult to turn around.

Let the British and the Dutch mix it up, and it's really time to support the Dutch a little bit when the two sides decide the outcome.

The two sides did not hit it off on this matter, but Peterson Kun thought within ten years, and Chen Jian thought ten years later, so there was a strange prospect of cooperation.

After waiting for a long time, Peterson Kun finally waited for Chen Jian to speak.

"You can buy cannons and muskets, as well as loans for a batch of cotton cloth and handicraft products... This is of course possible. But, this time you came from Europe, didn't you bring enough?"

"Mr. Chen, the board of directors is in Amsterdam. They cannot fully grasp the situation in Asia. This is exactly the purpose of setting up the post of Plenipotentiary Governor. The Governor has already applied to the company's board of directors for more warships, soldiers and silver. I believe it will be obtained. Answer. In view of the risk of sea transportation, we can take advantage of the transaction advantages of the Bank of Amsterdam to repay these debts in Europe. In addition, the company knows that you can conduct legal trade in the Ming Empire, so we want to establish a long-term cooperative relationship with you, including Long-term trading method.”

Chen Jian grinned, shook his head, and said, "Long-term transactions are naturally possible, but such long-term transactions cannot be settled in a bank in Amsterdam. You must know, interest and shipping costs. "

"Yes, you or your special envoy need to discuss this with the governor. I am just conveying the company's wishes. In addition, we also hope to conduct trade in Wangbei City."

"This is impossible. Wangbei City is not a trading port, but a military base against pirates. The emperor of the Ming Empire granted me the right to station and govern here, but did not give me the right to open a market here. This is a military port, not a trading port. This is the territory of the Ming Empire, and I must abide by the treaty signed with the Ming Empire."

Chen Jian refused very simply, not because of any treaty, but because he could legally trade in Quanzhou and Zhangzhou, and did not need to build Taiwan into a smuggling trade transit point.

Not only can the Dutch not come here to trade, but neither can the Japanese. The reason for their refusal is to use the Ming Empire as a tiger's skin.Anyway, the Netherlands, Japan, and Spain could never obtain the status of legal trade in the Ming Dynasty. If the trading companies of Fujian maritime merchants who want to smuggle get on the right track, they are the most resolute anti-smuggling navy.

Peterson Kun was not too surprised, the company was well aware of the trick involved, and also understood that it was impossible for Chen Jian to spit out the trading rights he had worked so hard to obtain.

Now that the company's focus is on spices, and he doesn't want to provoke Chen Jian, he naturally has other purposes for saying this.

After Chen Jian explained, Peterson Kun nodded and said: "Mr. Chen, I don't think there is a third company in the whole world who can understand the similarities between us. Just as you and your employees have worked so hard to achieve Naturally, the trading rights of the Ming Empire would not be shared with those who did not contribute. Why not? We fought hard with Spain and Portugal in the Spice Islands and negotiated with the local indigenous people several times before we obtained the right to trade spices. It doesn't make sense that the British want to interfere, does it?"

Chen Jian said seriously: "This metaphor is not appropriate. I signed the treaty with the Ming Empire. As a powerful and non-vassal empire, the Ming Empire is qualified and capable to sign any treaty and guarantee the implementation of the treaty. If You were able to obtain a trade agreement with the Ming Empire. Of course, I will respect the decision of the Ming Empire, and not think that this treaty is unreasonable because our interests are damaged. In the same way, I reiterate that the relationship between you and Spain and Portugal The war between the two countries has nothing to do with the British. It doesn’t matter whether they enjoy their gains or are morally unworthy, it is meaningless until international law is truly established. If we say that the new international law system believes that the sphere of influence acquired by force If it is in accordance with international law, then the Republic, as the initiator of international law, will naturally abide by it.”

Chapter 1 Arrangements before leaving ([-])

Petersonkun was a little taken aback, not understanding why Chen Jian's attitude was so firm.

Even though he was young and promising, he was not a diplomat after all. These cloudy diplomatic rhetoric made it difficult for employees from companies who had always followed force to solve all problems to understand Chen Jian's true meaning.

In the end is to support the United Kingdom?Or support the Netherlands?

"You have to be clear, I am not only a businessman, but also a member of the National People's Council of the Republic. I cannot easily express my position on this matter. I have my inclinations, but they can only be inclinations. Decisions are made at the National People's Council Before, I had to abide by this rule. Of course, cooperation between companies or private individuals is another matter. I can make decisions about supporting some of the firearms, gunpowder and goods mentioned earlier.”

Petersonkun breathed a sigh of relief. As long as Chen Jian remained neutral and did not favor the British, the company was still sure to gain a firm foothold in Jakarta within ten years.Future wars are inevitable, but with the support of these people, the chances of victory will be greater.

"Mr. Chen, what do you mean, as long as the treaty is signed with an independent country, other people have no right to interfere?"

"Yes."

"Then do you agree with the series of treaties signed by our company in Banten, Bandar and Jakarta?"

"Yes. Even if the British signed the rest of the treaties with them, we still recognize your treaty. There are still some differences. The relationship between Banten and Jakarta is different from the system of the Ming Empire, so you signed with Jakarta We agree with the treaty, but we will not agree with any treaty you signed with other countries in the Ming Empire's tributary system, please be sure to tell your governor about this."

"for example?"

"Several confirmed tributaries such as Ryukyu and North Korea. Including trade with them, a treaty must be signed with the Ming Empire, not any form of treaty with them alone, which is invalid. Similarly, the Ming Empire, including Taiwan We leased the land of the empire, and the emperor of the Ming Empire granted me the right to garrison and manage this place, so I will cooperate with the army of the Ming Empire to repel any enemies who do not occupy this place through legal means. This is our side in the treaty. One of the obligations. I ask you to make this point clear to the governor. Even if a war breaks out, it is not a war between the Republic and a third party, but a war between the Ming Empire and a third party. We only abide by the treaty with the Ming Empire and perform it obligations, not a declaration of war against a third party."

"Mr. Chen, the company is not interested in occupying this place. What the company needs is the spice trade, and will abide by the treaty with Mr. Chen. As long as Mr. Chen does not get involved in the spice trade with Europe, we will not set foot in the area north of Pattani Trade. But... except for Japan. Japan is an independent country, they sent people to Pattani to invite us to set up a trading house..."

Chen Jian said with a smile: "Of course, there is no formal tributary relationship and vassal documents between Japan and the Ming Empire. The commercial exchanges between you and Japan are your freedom, and we have no right to interfere. But Taiwan and Ryukyu It is another matter. The Republic has obtained the obligation and right to lease Taiwan and protect Ryukyu from the Ming Empire. This is unquestionable, and unless the Ming Empire takes back this right, we cannot give up or allow other people to get involved .”

"I will convey Mr. Chen's meaning to the governor."