Empire Conquest

Chapter 638 - 634: The Unfamiliar President

Due to a slight delay, by the time Wang Kaiyuan led his team back to the conference room, Newland’s military and political negotiation representatives, headed by Nizi, were all already seated.

Wallace did not participate in the negotiations personally, merely appointing a plenipotentiary representative.

In reality, Wallace now was just a commander without troops; aside from having the identity of Newland President, he didn’t have a single person he could use around him.

It was only the day before yesterday that he had secured a long-range patrol aircraft, hastily leaving Gold Bay, which was soon to be besieged by General Patton’s Armored Forces.

Upon arriving at Treasure Harbor, aside from Missy, who played a critical role, Wallace didn’t have even one aide by his side.

Furthermore, just a few hours earlier, his family had crossed the border into Mexico under the escort of Sixth Bureau intelligence personnel.

As for the full authority representative he had appointed, was in fact a local official from Honu Island.

This arrangement was simply to prove that Wallace was the genuine President of the Newland Federation.

Regardless, this kind of grassroots negotiation was not something the President would personally attend to.

Unlike previous negotiations, after the talks started, Wang Kaiyuan went straight to the point, presenting two options for Wallace’s representative to choose from.

Either hand over all the armed forces including Newland’s East Ocean Fleet immediately, and wait for the Consortium Group’s assistance to launch a counter-offensive operation on the homeland,

or just stay on Honu Island, wearing the president’s laurel and awaiting death.

Following that, Wang Kaiyuan didn’t even give the other party a chance to speak, citing the wait for Wallace’s decision as the reason, and left the venue with Zheng Jiangming and several other negotiators.

This move was beyond the expectation of all Newland negotiating personnel.

Not to mention the local official who became the President’s full authority representative temporarily, not even Nizi had anticipated Wang Kaiyuan would play such a hand.

Clearly, there was no room for negotiation in this matter.

Nevertheless, Nizi quickly regained his composure.

After asking the other personnel to go back and wait for news, he went to find Wallace by himself.

To say he was unprepared would obviously be impossible.

The moment Nizi decided to pledge allegiance to Wallace, ordering Spur to lead the Fleet northward, he considered that they would have to surrender to the Liangxia Empire next.

The crux of the matter was that Howay Islands were simply too small.

Even if the uncivilized natives were included, the total population of Howay Islands didn’t even reach a million, and there were no industries worth mentioning.

Relying on the Howay Islands to mount a counter-offensive on the homeland?

Clearly, that was wishful thinking.

Even without considering the size, population, and industry of the islands, the mere 3,000 kilometers distance alone made the idea of launching a counter-offensive from the Howay Islands quite unrealistic.

For a landing operation facing the continent, a supply line exceeding 3,000 kilometers would undoubtedly be a disaster.

Not to mention a rootless Wallace exile government; even the Liangxia military undertaking a landing operation could only yearn in vain.

According to the Imperial Navy’s plan, after capturing Howay Islands, they would not attack Newland’s homeland.

The next step was to march towards Wangxi Canal to land in the central part of the isolated Gu Continent far from Newland’s homeland, and then figure out a way from there over Sunset Ocean.

That was the key reason for Liu Xiangzhen to have the Fleet active in Sunset Ocean.

More damning was that all the Newland military personnel on Howay Islands were from the homeland, and their families were also there.

Even if Wallace was the legitimate president, he could not solve the issue of greatest concern to the military personnel.

Clearly, it wouldn’t be long before concerns for their families would replace loyalty to the Federation and the President.

The only way to solve this problem was to surrender to the Liangxia Empire.

Once surrendered, there was no concern about whom to pledge loyalty to.

No matter how cruel the Huacheng Authority was, they wouldn’t harm the families of the captured officers and soldiers.

As for the counteroffensive on the home front, at least at that time, Nizi hadn’t even thought about it.

In the negotiations, appearing tough and using the Fleet as a bargaining chip wasn’t really Nizi’s intention, it was Wallace’s idea.

Why did Wallace want to do this?

Even if Nizi wasn’t a politician, he could guess.

This fugitive President had nothing left; his biggest asset was the Fleet. If he lost the Fleet, he would truly have nothing.

What value does a President with nothing have?

Wallace wanted to use the Fleet to extort or, to put it another way, to gain more benefits from the Liangxia Empire to ensure his interests in the Newland Federation.

Unfortunately, the Liangxia Empire clearly wasn’t falling for it.

When Wallace suggested using the Fleet as leverage to negotiate with the Liangxia Empire, Nizi had explicitly stated that such a move would backfire.

At the time, Nizi had warned Wallace that he was playing with fire.

Fundamentally, the fact that Wallace had managed to make it to Treasure Harbor alive was a grace bestowed by the Liangxia Navy.

What right did he have to haggle with the Liangxia Empire?

From another perspective, if negotiations with the Liangxia Empire failed, he would lose his value.

In contrast, after losing him, the Liangxia Empire wouldn’t suffer any loss.

If anything, supporting Wallace would pose a significant nuisance, as it would inevitably mean direct, or at least indirect involvement in the Newland civil war.

Collaborating with Wallace, the biggest advantage the Liangxia Empire could gain was actually to avoid attacking the Newland homeland.

That was the second option proposed by Wang Kaiyuan.

On a nominal defeat of the Newland Federation, that is, after Wallace’s regime declared surrender, the Consortium Group, led by the Liangxia Empire, could deal with the Huacheng Authority by blockade, thereby ending large-scale military actions and allowing tens of millions of soldiers to return to their families as soon as possible.

If the war continued, the Consortium Group would have to sacrifice at least 3 million soldiers to attack the Newland home front!

Because the Liangxia Empire was the absolute main force of the Consortium Group and had always been leading the operations against the Newland Federation, it had to undertake the hefty task of attacking the Newland mainland; therefore, at least 2 million of the 3 million soldiers destined to die would be from the Liangxia Empire.

Could the Liangxia Empire afford such a heavy casualty?

However, that didn’t equate to reducing losses.

The key was, as long as the Huacheng Authority didn’t declare surrender, the Consortium Group, led by the Liangxia Empire, would have to maintain a high-pressure stance against it.

Moreover, strategic bombings would be needed to weaken their military and industrial strength.

In fact, this was the first option mentioned by Wang Kaiyuan.

According to Nizi’s understanding, so-called support for Wallace’s counteroffensive against the Newland homeland was actually a pretext for seizing several islands near the Newland mainland, such as the Bermuda Islands, and Newfoundland Island to the north, and Cuba to the south, getting a forward base for deploying bombers.

As for whether it was necessary to attack the Newland homeland, that was another matter.

Through intense bombing and strict blockade, even if it were impossible to completely dismantle the Huacheng Authority, it was still possible to neutralize its threat.

A Huacheng Authority without a threat, perhaps, was the result the Liangxia Empire hoped to see.

What lay before Wallace was not two options, but one.

To put it bluntly, Wang Kaiyuan had conveyed a very clear signal.

Accept the reality!

Nizi had already figured it out, but had Wallace?

To be honest, Nizi really had no idea.

Not until the day before yesterday, when Wallace arrived at Treasure Harbor, did Nizi meet the former Vice President at such close range for the first time.

In other words, Nizi didn’t understand Wallace at all, thus could not predict what choice Wallace would make.

Yet, that still wasn’t the most pressing issue at hand.