It has to be said that Patton is still a capable diplomat. After he discovered that the Tang Navy no longer had many large-tonnage wooden warships, he set his sights on small-tonnage second-hand wooden sailing warships, such as those one or two
A hundred-ton wooden sailing warship.
A large number of these warships survive in the Tang Dynasty Navy, because when it built steel warships, the navy gave priority to building capital ships. In the following years, it also built several small and medium-sized wooden warships, so there are still many relatively new hulls.
Small and medium-sized wooden battleships.
In addition to these small and medium-sized warships, Patton also set his sights on armed merchant ships.
Although armed merchant ships were originally designed to transport goods, they are also equipped with naval guns. In addition, if they undergo certain modifications, they can also be equipped with more naval guns.
Although the level of armament after modification is not very good, it is still better than nothing.
Patton's activities in Shanghai were very important to England, but they were a trivial matter to the Tang Empire.
For the Tang Empire, there was only one major issue in the situation in Europe, and that was the Tatars!
The English were located on the island, and they had always been unwilling to fight against the Tatars, so the Tang Dynasty's support for England was actually very weak.
In addition, the Tang Empire also needed Spain and other countries to resist the Tatars, so it would not easily let England replace Spain's position in the Atlantic Ocean.
Spain still needed Atlantic trade to maintain its own armed resistance against the Tatars.
Even if the Tang Dynasty did not want to see the Spanish control the Atlantic Ocean, the Tang Dynasty would break it on its own and did not need the English to inherit the Spanish maritime power.
In recent years, ships from the Tang Empire have begun to frequently enter and leave the Atlantic Ocean, but the Spanish and Portuguese turned a blind eye to this.
At first, the merchant ships of the Tang Dynasty did not enter the Atlantic Ocean, but later the Tatars invaded the west. In order to transport various arms to Europe, the merchant ships of the Tang Dynasty began to enter the Atlantic Ocean to Europe, transporting guns and other supplies to Spain and other countries.
Therefore, the Spaniards are very welcoming.
However, there are some things that, once started, are difficult to stop.
At first, they were just merchant ships specifically transporting ordnance supplies, but later, ordinary ships gradually entered the Atlantic Ocean. Countries such as Spain and Portugal also turned a blind eye to this, and even opened their ports.
In the relevant agreement signed by the two parties in the early years, the merchant ships of the Tang Empire would not enter the Atlantic Ocean, but now, this agreement has become in vain.
The root cause of this incident was not trade with Europe, but another matter, which was the empire's colonization of the western coast of North America.
Many years ago, the Tang Empire made a plan to vigorously develop North America. It established many colonies on the northeastern coast and moved millions of people to the eastern coast of North America.
However, the terrain on the eastern coast of North America is not very good, and there are not many areas suitable for large-scale development by immigrants.
For this reason, on the one hand, the Tang Empire tried to cross the western mountains (Rocky Mountains) and deserts and enter the central and western parts of North America to open up colonial sites.
But without railways, it was not easy to establish colonies across such a vast area.
After all, the local indigenous people are not vegetarians. They are not opponents of the regular army, but they still pose a relatively large threat to ordinary immigrants.
Even though many diseases brought by outsiders have caused the local indigenous population to plummet, there are still indigenous people, just not as many as before.
It was not easy to immigrate directly through mountains and deserts, so the empire adopted another method, which was to travel directly by sea, land directly on the western coast of North America, and then open up colonies.
However, this also caused dissatisfaction among the Spaniards.
According to the relevant agreements signed between the Empire and the Spanish that year, the Empire recognized the Spanish's special rights and interests in Mexico, Central America and parts of South America, while Spain in turn recognized the Empire's special rights and interests in North America and the entire Pacific region.
After the agreement was signed that year, the empire's colonial activities in North America basically avoided Mexico and focused on marching into central and even western North America.
At the same time, Spain also gave up its exploration and colonization in the Pacific.
Therefore, according to the details of both parties, Spain recognized the empire's special rights and interests in North America north of Mexico, but at that time the default was the east coast. Now, the empire has expanded this right to the west coast.
The Spaniards were very dissatisfied with this, because at this time, they had actually established a colony in Ferolida and regarded the western coast as an area for subsequent colonization.
But since several large colonial ships from the empire suddenly entered the Atlantic three years ago, then landed on the western coast of North America, established a colony, and directly established the New Penglai State, the Spaniards have protested too much to the empire.
times.
However, the Tang Empire ignored Spain's protests.
In the minds of many high-ranking military and political officials in the Tang Empire, the reason why they did not go directly south to Mexico was because of the money and effort you provided in Europe to fight against the Tatars.
As for North America, regardless of whether it is the east or the west, it is the territory of the Tang Dynasty.
At that time, the agreement was signed in black and white, and the empire had special rights and interests in North America.
Therefore, in the past three years, immigration to the western coast of North America has continued, and the immigration ships of the Tang Dynasty are very large. The immigration ships organized by the Immigration and Reclamation Division are usually large ships of two to three thousand tons. You can organize an immigration fleet at will
It can transport tens of thousands of people there.
Thanks to the development of the Tang Dynasty's navigation industry, ships became larger and the navigation safety of steam and steel ships was greatly guaranteed, so overseas immigration became more convenient and cheaper.
The most representative one is the ticket price. The price of immigration ship tickets is increasing year by year, and the Immigration and Reclamation Department provides high subsidies.
Even poor people, as long as they are determined, can bite the bullet and buy a cheap ferry ticket to North America. It doesn't matter if they don't have a penny, they can also get interest-free loans to buy the ticket.
Once you arrive in North America, you can allocate land for free, and get basic living material guarantees and production tool guarantees, and you can repay the loan in a short time.
In recent years, people within the empire have become increasingly enthusiastic about immigrating to North America. Compared with places in the South Seas, India and Africa, people are more willing to go to North America.
After doing this for several years, the empire has now established more than 20 colonies on the western coast of North America, several of which are built in the northern Gulf of Mexico. For example, colonial cities have been established at the mouths of several rivers in southern North America.
It's called Sanhe Town.
A targeted town was established next to St. Augustine in Ferolida, which was controlled by Spain.
Its intention is very obvious, which is to restrict Spain's continued expansion in this area.
In addition, colonial settlements were successively established in many areas further north with relatively good geographical conditions, as far north as the estuaries of the Great Lakes in North America. In the estuary area, Datang established Wuhu Town, which not only established colonial
The stronghold directly built a fort, and even equipped it with several advanced front-loading rifled guns.
and deny entry to any other country’s ships.
There are more than 20 colonial sites in North America, which are divided into Sanhezhou, Central State, and Wuhu State according to their geographical location. They are still directly under the jurisdiction of the American Affairs Office.
As of the autumn of the 32nd year of Xuanping, there were more than 30,000 immigrants and more than 3,000 troops stationed in the above three continents.
In fact, there are not many people, but the immigration has only been carried out for three years in total, and the first year is actually the beginning, and the large-scale immigration will be the next two years.
The Holy Emperor has already instructed the Immigration and Reclamation Division to follow up the immigration work in America. While stabilizing the east, he will focus on developing the west.
According to the plan of the Immigration and Reclamation Department, at least more than 200,000 people will immigrate to various places on the western coast of North America in the next five years.
The Tang Empire had nothing but a large number of people!
Moreover, shipping is so developed that a few immigration ships of several thousand tons can be organized to transport tens of thousands of people.
There are people, and transportation is not a problem. The only limitation is that so many immigrants will not be able to survive for a while, and they need a steady stream of material support from the rear.
However, this restriction is not really a restriction.
Because the empire is not short of money either!
The Immigration and Reclamation Department dared to subsidize the ship tickets almost in full, and mobilized supplies from all over the world to transport them to the new colonies so that the new immigrants could survive the first one or two years.
The efforts of imperial immigrants to develop North America were huge, and the Spaniards could not stop this even if they wanted to.
Not to mention, the Spaniards didn't dare to stop it.
Even in order to ease the relationship between the two parties, and because the colonial points in North America were already surrounded by the Tang colonies, Spain simply wanted to package up several colonies such as St. Augustine and sell them to the Tang Dynasty.
In exchange for more guns and cannons, the Tang Empire directly exported a batch of flintlock guns and large-caliber artillery.
At this time, the Tang Dynasty suggested that the two sides re-establish the dividing line between their special rights and interests in North America, and Spain gritted its teeth and agreed in order to avoid conflicts in the future.
Why grit your teeth?
Naturally, it was because the Tang Dynasty took the opportunity to speak loudly, and then drew a dividing line, directly dividing a large area that was originally controlled by the Spanish into the Tang Dynasty.
Why agree?
It’s impossible not to agree!
When the Spanish signed the new American Agreement in Shanghai, these Spanish diplomatic representatives had mixed feelings.
This time, the core of the Tang-Western America Agreement is the newly drawn dividing line. The new dividing line is simple and crude. The eastern point is 31 degrees north latitude in the northern Gulf of California, and then the western coast of North Africa on the eastern coast of the Gulf of Mexico.
Twenty-six degrees is a point, and a straight line is drawn between the two points.
On this dividing line between Tang and West America, the north belonged to the Tang Dynasty and the south belonged to Spain.