Welcome to 19th-century Europe, where strength reigns supreme

Lillian's policies soon achieved good results. In fact, the economic crisis that the UK encountered was not as big as the problems caused by the American economic crisis. However, the root cause was that the industry expanded too fast and industrial products could not be sold. The economic crisis Things finally improved a few months after Lilian came to power.

Economic crisis is a very cyclical problem. With the advancement of science and technology, such crises are definitely inevitable, but that is not a problem that Lilian should consider at the moment. She still mainly focuses on science and technology. She wants the UK to To gain an absolute advantage in the future arms race, heavy industry must be developed.

The bourgeoisie is conservative. After they make money, it will be difficult for them to continue to carry out drastic reforms and progress. They just want to maintain their existing interests. The bill advocated by the conservative party for domestic conservatism and external expansion is basically nonsense. It is obvious that Without a complete governance system, it would continue to expand. When she officially took over the files of the British Empire, she was completely confused.

The native population of the British Empire is about [-] million. People in this part of the country basically have files from maps to household registrations. But if you focus on the colonies, it will be a big problem. You don’t know the size of the country. How many areas are completely controlled? How many, I don’t know, I still don’t know how many people there are in the empire.

There are no detailed maps and no census. Basically everyone is blind outside the British Isles. The British only know how far they have traveled. Although they have many colonies, they are useless. What is on them? There is absolutely no record of where the resources are and where the people are.

Lillian had no choice but to try to summon all the governors of the various colonies back, including of course British India and British Canada. The East India Company and the Hard Bay Company were very troublesome guys. They all chose to oppose the government's coercion. demanded, and also said that the government violated the sacrosanct rights of citizens to their wealth.

Lillian said that you have no rights. She explained, "Canada and India are British territories. Individuals or companies only have the right to develop resources in the territories, but the British government has never said that you still have rights to the territories. There is also the right of ownership, and besides, the territory belongs to the country, you just bought the right to use it for several decades, isn’t it natural for us to take it back when it expires?”

Lilian's retort left the major colonial companies speechless, but Lilian changed the subject again, "But to the companies, I'm not a devil after all, so why don't we come and talk about something."

The territory was snatched by the colonial company through various methods. Now that Lillian wants to take these territories back, the colonial company will definitely not be happy and even threatens that if everyone quits, so much territory will be controlled by the British government. ? Can the British government handle this?

In the history of Europe, there has never been a country that controlled a large population and resources and remained unified. From ancient times to the present, there has never been a super large feudal dynasty in Europe. Since the fall of the Roman Empire, Europe has It was never unified again, and Napoleon's French empire was short-lived.

Because of the language barrier, different banknotes were used, and the nationalities did not have enough time to integrate, because they fell apart within ten years of unification, it was shorter-lived than the Qin Dynasty. The Qin Dynasty survived for fifteen years, and Napoleon's empire was only half full. Eleven years, and it was not completely unified. In fact, Napoleon only had a few years to integrate it, and in the end it was not done well.

Moreover, Napoleon divided the kingdoms, such as the Kingdom of Prussia and the Kingdom of Austria, into vassals of France. According to this formula, to be honest, even if Napoleon won and really conquered the entire Europe, he would not have the means to integrate the entire Europe. , it is estimated that at most the French mainland will be slightly expanded, and then a few royal members from each country's original region will be thrown over to be the king. Is this of any value? Napoleon worked for a long time and became the European version of Xiang Yu. Within a few years, Europe fell apart again.

Why can the United States be unified? It is nothing like unity. It is just one country made up of about fifty countries. Each state has different laws. It is indeed very free, but this is actually very opportunistic. The European Union of otl is actually almost the same. Such an operating idea is just the difference between a parliamentary republic and a presidential republic. Moreover, its country name already tells you what it is. It is the United States, a country composed of many countries.

Russia simply has a lot of land, and its population is not large, and most of it is concentrated in Europe. It also has huge internal problems. It can be said that it has almost no control over the territories in the east. It can only control a few big cities. There was not necessarily effective rule, but there were quite a few brutal ones. Peasant uprisings never ceased.

Lillian also seemed to know that the British Empire might not be able to last forever. One day the British Empire would have to disintegrate. Especially after the rise of nationalism, the cost of maintaining the empire would be huge. And for various reasons, Lillian She does not want Britain to become Britainstan, so her difficulties are still many.

Lillian arranged for Chamberlain to be the colonial minister. He was responsible for revising colonial policies and gave him the power to mobilize the SS. It can be said that he was very qualified. Chamberlain was a fledgling politician and an industrialist, so his His vision is very broad, and he is better able to understand the crises hidden under the times than ordinary politicians.

The rise of Germany has become inevitable, and now the Anglo-German alliance is finalized, and he is one of the few politicians among all politicians who is aware of the threat from the United States. When he gets this power, he has all his aspirations and ambitions. Space to display.

When he was inaugurated in the House of Commons, almost all the seats were occupied by members of the Social Democratic Party. They supported Lillian unconditionally, and the less than fifty seats in front of the podium were occupied by the Conservative and Liberal parties.

Chamberlain once again repeated his thoughts, "The strength of a country is ultimately determined by the country's population and size. If the policy of the Free Empire continues, Britain will return to an international status commensurate with the size of the British Isles, maintaining the To achieve the status of a great power, we must establish a closely connected, strong and powerful entity of the British Empire, and use the form of a federation to connect the British Empire into a real and unified country. This is not just a change in the form of the country, but a change in the concept of governing the country. , a unified empire will inevitably require the establishment of a centralized and powerful government."

The concept of "Imperial Federation" was officially put on the table, and what matched it was the new British Parliament, the new Imperial Federal Parliament, including following suit. Lillian also learned from August's experience and established the British Royal Institute and Imperial Federal Investment Agency.

Yes, it completely copied August's operation. The former existed in the UK, but it was just a matter of universities concentrating talents. The latter was negotiated by Lilian and August. It was originally the two of them. It's something, but Lilian hadn't taken power yet, so August's Prussian Foundation started it first.

And Lillian has scouted out geniuses from all walks of life. Just pronouncing their company names is enough to be on the street lights a hundred times. To be honest, these capitalists are really not good people. To be honest, Lillian doesn't want to find such guys. It would be great to do something like August, personally supporting monopolies, but this is too slow. Britain is not Prussia. Newly supported companies must first defeat the former monopolies. This is ridiculously difficult. Then Might as well take advantage of existing monopolies from the start.

Lilian has the corresponding prestige. She can carry out drastic reforms from the beginning without paying attention to the opinions of the capitalists. The capitalists' method is to incite hatred between the government and the people, and then let the two sides fight each other, and finally reap the benefits. , and when the government is not hostile to the people, the capitalists have lost their greatest support. The capitalists cannot leave the people, but the people can leave the capitalists. As long as the people know who is oppressing them, they can attack, and the winner will definitely be people.