Chapter 3513
Chapter 3513
Chapter 3513
During the Zhoushan Forum, Hai Han’s foresight and organizational capabilities were fully demonstrated.
Almost all the guests at the event praised this event. After all, such an orderly and relatively fair international exchange platform is unique in the world.
Every country attending the forum had a chance to speak out. Even Hai Han’s rivals, the Ming and Qing dynasties, could express their views on the international situation.
For the politicians attending the event, they can take this opportunity to showcase their talents and political stance to the world and select partners suitable for their country.
Especially those small countries with limited influence, which in the past had no qualifications to discuss issues on an equal footing with big countries, now have the opportunity to win the attention of the international community here.
For example, the Champa Kingdom publicly proposed at the forum that the "South China Sea Merchant Alliance" established by Hai Han many years ago should be further expanded, and its trade scope should no longer be limited to the countries surrounding the South China Sea, but should be changed accordingly based on the actual control scope of the member states.
For example, the East China Sea and the Yellow Sea controlled by Hai Han, and even the other side of the Pacific Ocean and the eastern Indian Ocean where it has established colonies, should all become the effective scope of the relevant policies of the South China Sea Merchant Alliance.
This actually means that the area covered by the "South China Sea Merchant Alliance" must keep pace with the size of Hai Han's territory. This will of course have many practical benefits for the member countries of the Merchant Alliance, so once this proposal was put forward by Champa, it immediately received support from many countries.
Regardless of whether the content of this proposal was planned by Champa itself or was secretly instructed by someone, it did make Champa famous, and thus also prompted other small countries that wanted to show off to follow suit.
However, such ideas of following Hai Han to reap the benefits are mostly proposed by small countries. Even if countries with some real strength come up with similar proposals, they often prefer to negotiate with Hai Han privately in bilateral talks in order to reduce the number of people sharing the cake.
In particular, colonial powers like Portugal and the Netherlands have extensive experience in overseas expansion and division of interests. Therefore, they hardly participate in discussions on public issues, and all negotiations are conducted one-on-one with Hai Han.
Under Hai Han's deliberate control, the armed conflict on the island of Ceylon in the Indian Ocean had not yet reached the Dutch envoy Sukey. Therefore, the project he discussed with Hai Han on behalf of the Dutch East India Company was the division of the two countries' spheres of influence in the Indian Ocean.
After Hai Han sent troops to the western end of the Strait of Malacca last year and established a garrison base there, the Dutch gradually realized that Hai Han's move was a defensive move. Its goal was not as simple as controlling the Strait of Malacca, but to ensure that the key waterway into the Indian Ocean was completely under its control.
The Dutch also knew that even if they launched a war, it would be unlikely to prevent Hai Han from entering the Indian Ocean. The top priority was to establish rules and divide spheres of influence with Hai Han.
Simply put, it requires Hai Han to recognize the Netherlands’ interests in the Indian Ocean and not to compete for areas where the Netherlands has already entered.
Unfortunately, this attempt came too late. If the East India Company had proposed it last year, there might still be room for negotiation. But now that both sides have already fought in Ceylon, the conditions proposed by Sukeyi are no longer valid. And after Hai Han has gained an advantage, it will certainly not make concessions on its own initiative.
Since Hai Han had an information gap, after rejecting Sukeyi, the Executive Committee took the initiative to propose a relatively compromising plan, namely that Hai Han would only recognize colonies that the Netherlands had occupied and operated in the local area for more than a certain number of years.
As for those areas whose ownership is still controversial and those that have not been occupied by the Netherlands, Hai Han does not recognize them at all. In this way, the so-called "interests" of the Netherlands in Ceylon are not recognized by Hai Han. There is no dispute about the armed conflict between Qian Tiandun's troops and them.
Of course, when Takahashi Minami fought with the Dutch colonial forces outside the city of Colombo, he still deliberately left room for the Dutch and did not kill them. He also did not continue to pursue the Dutch when they were defeated and evacuated from Ceylon, allowing the Dutch fleet to return to the Cochin colony.
This "merciful" approach also left enough buffer space for the subsequent negotiations between the two sides in Zhoushan.
Hai Han’s proposal was actually within Sukeyi’s acceptable range. Although it did not completely follow the wishes of the Batavia authorities, it could at least ensure that the Dutch base in the local area would not be invaded by Hai Han. It could be considered a bottom-line agreement.
But before he agreed, he still had to find out what Hai Han wanted to gain from it. After all, with Hai Han's shrewdness, it was impossible for the Netherlands to gain benefits without paying a price.
"Our request is very simple, that the Netherlands should not interfere with our colonization, trade and garrison in the Indian Ocean. If there are actions that clearly hurt our interests, then we have the right to respond in any form."
Tao Donglai's response was very tough. To put it simply, he asked the Netherlands to stand further away and not block the road, otherwise he would find any excuse to beat the Netherlands up.
Although this request cannot be said to be humiliating, it does not leave much face for the Netherlands. It's just that the wording is more official and does not sound as harsh.
Su Keyi took a deep breath and tried to calm himself down.
Although he had long been accustomed to the overbearing attitude of the bigwigs of the Hai Han Executive Committee, Su Keyi still felt a little angry. The Dutch East India Company was at least a powerful company in the Indian Ocean, but in the eyes of these Hai Han officials, it was just an existence that could be ordered around at any time.
Moreover, the conditions proposed by the Executive Committee did not seem to leave any room for Su Keyi to argue.
Even if the Dutch disagreed, Hai Han would probably implement it unilaterally and withdraw the minimum guarantee agreement previously promised to Sukeyi.
Su Keyi didn't like Hai Han's coercive negotiation style, but he was powerless to fight back. He sighed and said, "It seems that this is the final plan your country has prepared?"
Tao Donglai smiled and said, "The purpose of proposing this plan is just to hope that both parties can reach a consensus as soon as possible and avoid wasting time on some unimportant details."
Yes, since we won't win the argument in the end anyway, it would be better not to allow room for bargaining from the beginning. We can just follow Hai Han's wishes and reach an agreement, which will save both sides time arguing.
Su Keyi smiled bitterly and said, "What else can I say? My Lords, just follow this!"