On September 29, 1701, Amsterdam was covered with clouds, just like the current situation on the European continent.

Zheng Dexiang has been coming from London for almost half a month. During this period, he has met countless people from the Dutch political and business circles publicly or privately, some of whom are old friends who have been dating for many years, and most of the goods sold to the Netherlands are represented by them; some are upstarts who have just joined in recently, wanting to establish relationships with people from the East Coast to facilitate their careers to a higher level in the future. As the influence of the East Coast increases, such things will only increase.

Zheng Dexiang is the deputy envoy of the East Coast Republic of China to Europe, mainly responsible for the North Sea and the Baltic Sea. He has high autonomy in business, diplomacy and politics. He was previously stationed in the London Iron Mansion, and half a month ago, he came to Amsterdam at the invitation of the Union Provincial Government to meet with the Third-level Speaker Van Beverninghe Hironimus.

The meeting ended three days ago. The gray-haired and haggard Van Beverninghe asked the East Coast government to provide "strong support" to "curb the French ambitions" and "better join in from the beginning". To this end, the United Province will provide some things that East Coast people are interested in, such as land located in India, Southeast Asia and East Asia.

The Dutch said that he could sell several of his strongholds in India. If the East Coast people were interested, as long as they paid a reasonable enough quotation, they could negotiate with the Dutch East India Company. It sounded like the Dutch opened a department store to raise funds and seek foreign aid. However, Zheng Dexiang thought more deeply. Perhaps the Dutch realized that if he experienced another fierce war, the Dutch East India Company's operations in the East would be greatly affected and his strength would be severely weakened. This is certain that the company's merchant ships would be captured by enemy privateers. It would be uncomfortable just to pay the huge donations during the war and that it would not be able to maintain too much territory. In addition, it would be fine if there was no accident, but if something happened, it would be in a crisis. In this case, it would be better to shrink and focus on defending one's core interests.

The Dutch East India Company's stronghold in India can actually be called a colony, that is, Kochi, which they came from the Portuguese, a city where the Portuguese once created military miracles. The Dutch East India Company has been operating Kochi for more than 40 years. The land area it controls is about 150 square kilometers, and there are many water areas inside, which are much stronger than the Diu Island of the Portuguese (similar to Macau and Mozambique Island). The people on the East Coast are actually quite interested.

Moreover, Kochi is a natural port, with a flat inland hinterland, rich in resources and a large population. There are also big rivers to communicate inland towns and great trade potential. Even in later generations, this is a very important city in India. The largest shipyard in the country is located here, and even built domestic aircraft carriers for India. The Dutch East India Company controlled the city of Cochi and a surrounding rural area at this time. The tax collection was no less than one million rupiah per year, not to mention that they could transport these goods back to Europe for sale to obtain huge profits. In short, the benefits are very huge, and the role of the city's fulcrum is quite obvious. The Dutch East India is willing to sell this asset, but I don't know how much pressure it is under the third-level parliament.

Of course, the Port of Cochin is not the largest asset of the Dutch East India Company in India. In fact, Ceylon (here is classified as India). But the company has devoted a lot of effort to build this island, and is afraid it is reluctant to take it out and cut the flesh. And even if it is sold, the price may be very expensive, and it cannot be obtained for more than two million yuan (or even higher). After all, this is an island rich in spices, gems and tropical fruits. It has a large population and a huge area (65,600 square kilometers). I heard that the Dutch have tried to plant tea trees in Ceylon in recent years, which is even more valuable.

In addition to the Port of Cochin and Ceylon, the Dutch also had some small strongholds on the Coromandel Coast, the Malabar Coast and the Bay of Bengal. However, the area of ​​these strongholds is generally only a few square kilometers, which is of commercial stations. In principle, they must be under the jurisdiction of the local Indian government (actually basically autonomous), pay taxes and donations, and often there may be a city where commercial stations from several countries may be squeezed into one city. For example, Surat now has three commercial stations from Portugal, England and United Provinces competing with each other, and people on the East Coast are not very interested in them.

There are Indian goods, East Coast people! The import and export of two-thirds of the goods in the Rajput region of Northwest India cannot be separated from the palms of the East Coast people. East African transport companies are enough to make a fortune by monopoly trade here. How can they regard the several restricted commercial stations in the hands of the Dutch? Of course, if the price is cheap, East Coast people don’t mind taking over. East African transport companies are nothing more than re-planning the route.

There is another thing that makes people on the east coast laugh. That is, because the Dutch East India Company faces aggressive pressure from the Fujian Zheng family on Shermosa, it also intends to seek buyers from the southern part of Taiwan that they occupy. In recent years, after Zheng Kezang's stable position, perhaps because he had accumulated a lot of money and materials at hand and the army also trained a lot. The Taipei Mansion under Zheng's control began to constantly create friction with the Dutch, and even caused human lives to cause the Dutch Alexander. The year before yesterday (1699), the Zheng family even directly sent troops to occupy the Pescaldo Islands (Penghu Islands), and established Penghu County in an open manner, which was under the jurisdiction of the Taipei Mansion.

The Dutch have been here, the Portuguese have come, and the Spanish have also come. The Dutch have set up military camps on the island, built lighthouses and sheltered anchorages, but later abandoned them because they had no interests. At that time, the fishermen in Fujian often came here to shelter from the wind, and some immigrants have come to reclaim land and farm. The Dutch have not expressed any objection, and the Zheng family did not say that this is their land, and the status of the archipelago has always been vague. But now Zheng has directly pointed it out and clearly said that this is his own territory. How can the Dutch not feel the pressure?

After careful discussion, Batavia believed that Holmosa Island would likely become a blood loss for the company in the next few years. Faced with the quick and fierce offensive of Fujian King Zheng Kezang, they may not be able to resist and even an armed conflict broke out. At this time, will Batavia support or not? Support will cost a lot of money. If it lasts for a long time, it may cost millions of shields; if it does not support, it will be directly occupied by the other party's armed forces and get nothing. It is a dilemma.

Therefore, for the Dutch East India Company, the best choice is to sell it. Considering that Holmosa can bring more than 300,000 rupees in taxes to the company every year, and there are also a lot of income from foreign trade, but because of external threats, it is more appropriate to price it at 3 million rupees. If the people on the east coast do not buy it, they will ask them to contact us and sell it to the King of Fujian. If they have finished it, they will save the trouble of many people.

When Zheng Dexiang heard this, he felt that the Dutch had a broad mind and didn't care about face at all. He was really a businessman and had to calculate income and expenditures in everything. Selling the income from Shermosa Island will likely fill the account of the East India Company to replenish cash flow. This giant colonial enterprise is said to have been forced to purchase bonds from the three-level governments of United Provinces, the Netherlands Provinces and Amsterdam, which were five million, three million, and two million. It was seriously injured and needed to be replenished at present. The Hague probably also felt that the company was slaughtered too hard, so he came forward to serve as an introducer and helped Zheng Dexiang sell his assets and recover his blood.

Van Beverninghe deliberately avoided the issue of Malacca Port. In fact, this is the place where the East Coast people care about the most and are eager to seize it quickly. But it is obvious that this place is also extremely important to the Dutch East India Company and belongs to the other party's core assets. Although the East Coast people have made large-scale infiltration into the city, not only are there East Coast members in the city council, but there are also large areas of land reclamation outside the city, the Dutch East India Company is still unwilling to sell this asset after careful consideration, which is already very telling. The city plays an important role in their plan!

But this city also plays an important role in the East Coast government's plan! Zheng Dexiang asked Van Bevrennhe without hesitation whether the city was for sale. After receiving a negative answer, he said that the East Coast people were willing to bid for it 2 million rupiah and gave the Dutch East India Company the right to dock for free. The fees for entering and leaving the port can also be paid 30% off, with a discount of 50 years. Van Bevrenhe did not explicitly refuse, but instead used the excuse of the port of Malacca as a private industry, and they were inconvenient to intervene and excuse it. In this regard, Zheng Dexiang just laughed. Private industry? Why didn't he mention it when he helped sell Kochi Port? Or was he unable to think about it? You don't sell it now, and when the war is at its most critical moment in the future, don't you still have to sell it? And it can only be sold to the East Coast people, no one else can buy it, and they dare not buy it! Don't believe it? Try it!

Zheng Dexiang also had an important achievement in the Netherlands, which was to communicate with the Dutch about the affairs of Gdansk Free City. Van Bevreninghe did not object in principle. He said that the people of Gdansk were free and their port was only loaned to the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth. At present, Poland appoints local officials were actually illegal and the Poles had no right to deal with the city. In addition, Van Bevreninghe also hinted that Zheng Dexiang would come forward to make the Swedish King Charles XII agree to hand over the port city to the East Coast person in Gdansk Free City. The cost is only some money and military supplies, not too much. A 300,000-500,000 yuan is enough.
Chapter completed!