In April 1653, just when the east coast was busy with autumn harvest work, two or three east coast warships formed together on the coast of Brazil from Saint Vicente to the General Pernabuco region. Occasionally, there were some merchant ships full of cargo, which were east coast ships that provided supplies to Dutch Brazil. When they returned, they could often bring some sugar, wood, dried fruit and other commodities. In this way, in the resentment and unwilling eyes of the Portuguese, the east coast people interfered in the armed conflict at their doorstep.

It is really great to bully the weak! Even Gaomo, who is well-known for "calcium deficiency symptoms", has a clear psychological advantage in the face of Portugal, the most backward country in Western Europe, today when the country's comprehensive strength is constantly improving. Especially after reaching a temporary "understanding" with the other party and the trade between the two countries reopened, this sense of superiority has reached its peak.

"Portugal, the last place in Western Europe, was the last country that was incorporated into the Visigoth Empire, the last country that adopted the Christian calendar, and the last country that adopted the aristocratic title consistent with other regions, were destined to be eliminated by history." Gao Mo held the memorandum of understanding and looked at Blanco, Vieira and others who turned and left, thinking with emotion.

And the Portuguese, who were quickly leaving the East Coast Merchant Station in San Vicente, was also discussing something seriously in a serious atmosphere.

"The development of the situation teaches us that the most effective way now is to let His Majesty Joao cater to and adapt to this 'rogue state' and tolerate their fraud, double-facedness and other bad behaviors, because it will obviously prevent us from falling into a catastrophe." Blanco said with a complicated face. "You have also seen it. The East Coast people only left St. Vicente for a brief moment. The trade in this place has been greatly damaged, and many merchants have turned into poverty due to unfavorable capital turnover. In addition, the tax revenue of customs has also been reduced a lot. In short, the impact of trade is definitely quite large. After all, the East Coast is a market with a population of 400,000, and the purchasing power of the residents of this market is generally strong."

"His Majesty the King is time to change the center of gravity of the strategic." Vieira snorted heavily and complained: "Our country has only a million people, but from the Cape of Good Hope to Japan in the Far East, in this vast area of ​​5,000 rigs, we almost want to seize everything and don't want anything to exceed our control. This is bad, really bad! We do not have the ability to calculate our own, we are covered by the rich profits, and we are blinded by the continuous victory. In fact, with the national strength and population of our country, this conquest cannot last forever. Now our overseas colonies are strongly challenged by the British and Dutch people, and sometimes some French pirates will come to us for trouble, but we can't do anything about it, because the territory we control is far beyond our ability."

"Your Majesty should turn all his energy to Brazil!" Felipe Kamalao, who had been silent and without speaking, suddenly said. Kamalao was the chief of a mid-sized Indian tribe. He had Portuguese descent, and his tribe was "successfully tamed" by the Portuguese from top to bottom. He fought for the interests of Portugal all day long. In the war with the Dutch for northeastern Brazil, they were both one of the backbone of the Portuguese army, and they made great contributions in several battles, so they successfully became a member of the Portuguese ruling class of Brazil.

"That's right, His Majesty Jueu should do his best to build his "Atlantic Empire" instead of an "Indian Ocean Empire"!" Vieira rarely agreed with the guy who looked inferior to his bloodline, and heard him say: "In Asia, we should give up as much as we need to give up, and then shrink all our strength to the coast of East Africa. If it really doesn't work, the East African coast should also be abandoned to free up manpower, material resources, financial resources and military power to protect our Atlantic Empire. In this huge colonial empire, we should take Brazil as the center of construction, Luanda, Bengra and some other West African colonies as subordinates. This is not an alarmist statement. In fact, we are now neighboring the two rogue countries of the Netherlands and the East Coast, so that our peace will be in jeopardy. Both countries have strong expansions, and we have to be wary of this."

"Without Brazil, we will lose precious sources of sugar, cotton, tobacco, cocoa, without shipbuilding wood, and without lovely dyes, we will become nothing. In addition, from the perspective of distance, our efforts in Asia have always been difficult, expensive and not worth the loss. Instead of doing so, it is better to give up the damn Ceylon, the East Indies and the Malabar coast and hand them over to the Dutch East Indies Company, which is attacking us, and we will evacuate! Just like when we evacuate Malacca, we don't want it, and everything is given to the Netherlands! You know, the Netherlands has less than 1.8 million people. The larger the territory they occupy and the more routes they control, the more dispersed their energy will be, and the less they can compete with us in Brazil!"

Vieira's inadvertent complaints revealed the essence of the future development ideas of Portugal, which is to give up some territory beyond its reach, establish its core interests, and then focus on business. Of course, since the 1660s, the nobles of the Portuguese Kingdom did more thoroughly: they took over the thighs of the British, not only married King Alfonso VI's sister to King Charles II of the United Kingdom, but also gave British merchants various privileges in Portugal, attracting a large amount of investment from British Protestants (later the newly established Brazilian General Corporation had a large amount of Protestant capital). To be honest, this behavior of holding the thigh was extremely successful because it was one of the most important factors that Portugal was able to retain a large number of colonies until later 20th century.

To be honest, the Portuguese aristocrats are not talented without strategic vision. In fact, they have made some changes over the years. For example, after Portugal's restoration, the trade network that had passed through Manila was suddenly broken, and the Portuguese had to undertake the reconstruction of the Oriental trade network by themselves. After several years of restorative development, a large number of Portuguese merchant ships from Asia have begun to moor in the Bay of El Salvador. These merchant ships brought textiles, silks, porcelain, spices, gems and other commodities from Asia.

These goods used to have no market in Brazil, but in recent years, with the development of Brazil's economy and population, many luxury goods also have markets. In addition, the large number of Indian cotton textiles smuggled and carried by sailors of these merchant ships themselves have also formed a certain degree of competition with East Coast textiles, because many black and Indian slaves in Brazil wear such crude cheap Indian textiles.

In addition, the Portuguese government temporarily gave up the requirement to allow ships from various colonies to travel directly to Lisbon. In the past, they required ships to travel directly to Lisbon when returning, and were not allowed to dock at any port in the middle of the journey, in order not to lose tariff income in the country, but now this law has been in name only. Vessels from colonies such as Macau, Goa, Sofara, Mozambique, Luanda, Bengra, Brazil, etc. to the mainland have been allowed to dock in the Bay of El Salvador, Brazil.

This decree was not long before it was implemented, but in fact it promoted the prosperity of Brazil's economy. Many people with insight have seen such signs in small details. Vieira is one of them. Ships from Africa are loaded with ivory, leather, wood, jewelry, and black slaves regarded as important property by Portuguese Brazil, ships from Asia are loaded with luxury goods and Indian textiles, and ships gathered from other parts of Brazil are filled with specialties from all over Brazil. These undoubtedly promote the prosperity of the Brazilian economy as a whole, which is undoubtedly popular for a family of sugar tycoons like Vieira.

In addition, the supranational treatment given to the UK has also attracted the arrival of quite British businessmen, which undoubtedly opened up another channel for the sales of Brazil's cane sugar. In short, with the intentional or unintentional policy changes in the Portuguese government, Brazil is gradually embarking on the fast lane of development - perhaps at the current stage, this policy change is a little slow (because it is not that simple to change a country's national policy, coupled with Portugal's backward system, it took them 20-30 years to change in history), but Brazil has undoubtedly seen the dawn of hope.

"Brazil is still very weak now, and the East Coast people are so strong that we need to deal with such incidents more carefully. Look, the East Coast people are so arrogant that they want to fill this seawater with warships, block our trade line, and exhaust our wealth." Vieira turned her head and looked at the East Coast gunboats that were still slowly swimming on the sea outside the window, and said: "We cannot make them happy. We must work hard to develop the Brazilian economy, migrate more people to Brazil, build our fortresses and forts, and build a fleet that can provide us with security. This is crucial!"

"Go back and go to El Salvador to find Governor Silva. It is time for us to have a good talk about the future of Brazil. This rich land must be paid utmost attention to His Majesty the King and invested to the greatest extent. Otherwise, shame similar to today will continue to be repeated in the days to come. I am sure that this point will be undoubtedly." Vieira finally said, "This time, the Governor was forced to reopen trade under the gunboats of the East Coast people. It is best not to appear again in the future." (To be continued, please search for astronomy, the novel is better and faster!

ps:  Continue to recommend the fan "Looking West: From China to the East Coast" written by book friend Lao Liang, /book/
Chapter completed!