The Cape of Good Hope, the spark that had ignited this world war, was now seeing the fighting enter its final stage. Watching one defensive line after another fall to the enemy, yet being powerless to stop it, Lieutenant General Stade was worn down both in body and spirit. His entire appearance had grown haggard. This was nothing like the last South African War. Back then, the British had naval firepower to support them. Now, the Cape of Good Hope was nothing more than an isolated island. Every time the Royal Navy approached, the enemy’s air force followed close behind, leaving no room for the fleet to exert its strength. In just two short months, Britain had paid a heavy price to reinforce the Cape. Three warships and eighteen merchant vessels had been lost. It was not that the enemy’s air force was especially formidable. The real problem was their support. Among the many British ships that sank, not a single one had been sunk outright by enemy attacks. Even the three warships were only damaged by the enemy, then claimed by the sea itself. There was no helping it. The Cape of Storms lived up to its name. Waves above two meters were a daily occurrence, and six or seven meter swells were commonplace. From time to time, typhoons stronger than Force 11 on the Beaufort scale would sweep through. Even an undamaged ship faced extreme danger sailing in these waters. Once a hull was damaged, survival depended entirely on God’s mercy. To avoid attacks by the Holy Roman air force, logistical resupply was forced to move to nighttime operations. The seas were already treacherous during the day, and at night they were far worse. Fortunately, it was summer in the Southern Hemisphere. If this had been winter, with violent monsoons and the unpredictable “killer waves,” the mere thought of it was suffocating. Rubbing his temples, the exhausted Lieutenant General Stade spoke to the guard: “Send another message home. Ask when reinforcements will arrive.” By this point in the war, the Cape of Good Hope had already received three waves of reinforcements, with total troop numbers once exceeding two hundred thousand. Unfortunately, most of these reinforcements were colonial troops from India. They were fine for filling numbers and serving as cannon fodder, but their combat effectiveness was not worth mentioning. The only units with any real fighting capability were two Australian and New Zealand divisions. Even then, their strength was severely limited. In any case, they were being crushed by a collection of aristocrats’ private armies. Lieutenant General Stade had completely lost hope in the colonial troops. His only remaining expectation was that reinforcements would be sent from the homeland. He had already sent out many requests for help, but each time they were rejected with the same excuse. The army was expanding and could spare no forces. Stade understood the difficulties back home all too well. The army’s original establishment had been small. After expansion, its size had swollen by more than ten times. There was a severe shortage of junior officers, and almost every veteran had been promoted to an officer’s post. All of the new units had been hastily formed. Without time for coordination and training, there was simply no way to throw them straight onto the battlefield. Understanding, however, did not change reality. On the battlefield, time waited for no one.
Relying on colonial troops alone to face the enemy meant having no chance to fight back. The newly formed units at home were not exactly reliable either, but at least their officers were seasoned veterans. No matter how one looked at it, they were still better than colonial cannon fodder scraped together at the last minute. There was no helping it. Most of Britain’s colonial forces came from India, and India itself was now a front line. Any colonial unit with even a bit of combat capability had been held back by the Governor-General of India. The troops sent to reinforce other regions were nothing more than random people assembled to fill quotas. These units needed supervision even for basic logistical work. Sending them into battle was little more than handing the enemy free kills. Stade was not a man burdened by moral scruples. If sacrificing manpower alone could hold the Cape of Good Hope, he would not have hesitated to throw cannon fodder into the grinder. It was not entirely useless. The expendable troops did slow the enemy’s advance, but they ultimately failed to stop it. As he watched the defensive perimeter shrink day by day, Stade felt both helpless and frantic. He feared that losing this strategic stronghold under his command would brand him a criminal in Britain’s history. The only small consolation was that he was not the only unlucky one. There were others in even worse shape to serve as company. The Far Eastern Fleet had lost Malacca, and Cam Ranh Bay was on the verge of collapse. Nearby British East Africa was also trapped as an isolated stronghold, with reinforcements unable to get through. Its fall was likely only days away. Defeats were happening everywhere and public tolerance had been thoroughly tempered by now. As long as he performed better than his peers, there was a very good chance he might still escape disaster. Especially with London itself trembling under enemy bombardment, public attention had been completely drawn away. All the firepower of criticism was focused on the big shots back home. If not for the collective cover provided by his fellow commanders, then by past precedent, after suffering such a string of defeats, Lieutenant General Stade would already be standing before a military tribunal, or on his way there. This time, however, things were different. Unless the Cape of Good Hope actually fell, the British government had no intention of replacing him. On the one hand, Britain was suffering from a severe shortage of officers. On the other, no one was willing to jump into such a massive pit. With such an overwhelming gap in strength, no individual could turn the situation around. Even if Jeffery Amherst himself were put in command, the outcome would be the same. Moments of calm were always fleeting. As the alarm sirens wailed, the Cape of Good Hope once again entered a state of aircraft circling overhead and artillery roaring without pause. The flames of war reignited. Before any reply could arrive from home, Lieutenant General Stade had already turned and headed straight for the command center. After a long string of defeats, the defenders’ morale had sunk to rock bottom. As for the Indian colonial troops, they had never possessed morale to begin with, so there was nothing left to fall. Panic, hostility, hatred, pessimism, and every kind of negative emotion spread rapidly through the garrison. At this moment, the Cape of Good Hope was like a powder keg. All it needed was a single spark, and it would explode in an instant. Life was hard for those at the top, but the front-line soldiers had it even worse. Continuous fighting had already drained them both physically and mentally. War was filled with danger, but it also created opportunity. Take Berlant, for example. After the outbreak of war, he had risen from an ordinary private to a captain commanding a company. Although he had not yet received a formal commission, the appointment had already been announced. Rules existed to be broken. Extraordinary times called for extraordinary measures, and in wartime everything was simplified. Berlant was far from an isolated case. There were many similar battlefield promotions. It was not that the British Army’s promotion system had changed. The real reason was that the casualty rate among platoon and company-level officers was simply too high. Coupled with the emergency expansion of the army, junior officers were in desperately short supply. The only option was to pull so-called talent from among the veterans. However, this kind of promotion was the last thing Berlant wanted. There was no choice. Once you became an officer, you had to lead the charge. The discipline squads stood right behind you, watching every move. There was nowhere to hide. In just two short months, Berlant’s company had already gone through five commanders. As the sixth, it was impossible not to feel pressure. Perhaps it was cursed. Of the five predecessors, one had been promoted during the army expansion, two were still lying in rear area hospitals, and the remaining two had already gone to meet God. With such a terrifying casualty rate, it was practically a “dead man’s command.” Unfortunately, the appointment was mandatory. Berlant had no right to refuse. Under a storm of bullets and shells, Captain Berlant continued to hold the line. Any fear he once had was long gone. All that remained was numbness. To the east came violent explosions. To the south, bullets flew in all directions. Overhead, rows of airburst shells blossomed endlessly, like a volcano with no crater. Lying low in a hastily dug trench, Captain Berlant buried his head deep, with no intention of peeking out. The ground began to tremble. From experience, Berlant knew exactly what that meant. The enemy’s tank units were coming. “The enemy is about to advance. Prepare for combat!” No matter what, orders still had to be carried out. Even though he did not believe this ragtag unit under his command could do much against enemy tanks, resistance was still mandatory. … Compared to the defenders’ tension, the attacking side was far more relaxed. The Holy Roman Empire operated under a universal reserve system. The noble private armies had already been reorganized according to reserve formations. By this stage of the war, it was no longer just those private armies fighting. Regular troops stationed in Africa had also entered the battlefield. The tank unit launching the current assault was among the elite. Since joining the war, it had cut through the battlefield without restraint, unstoppable wherever it went. They were exploiting the British Army’s lack of anti-tank weapons and its shortage of armored units. With tanks supporting infantry attacks, success was almost guaranteed. After all, this was a colony. No matter how strategically important it was, Britain could never afford to station two full tank divisions at the Cape of Good Hope. However, the Holy Roman Empire could. Across the vast African continent, let alone deploying two armored divisions, even several more could be stationed there without anyone raising objections. The British Army was a different story. It was practically a pocket-sized force, and naturally its armored troops were few in number. Even when they were all called tank divisions, the actual organization varied greatly from country to country. A single Holy Roman tank division was almost the equivalent of two British tank divisions combined. Yet even with such reduced formations, the British Army still possessed only a handful of them. It was not that they did not want more. The simple truth was that the military budget could not support such extravagance. These toys were far too expensive. Although armored forces technically belonged to the army, when it came to expenses they were on the same level as the navy and the air force. An infantry division could be maintained for the cost of a single battleship. But once armored forces entered the picture, even the most advanced battleship of the era could not match the daily operating cost of a single tank regiment. That was calculated under the standard three battalion, three company, four platoon structure, totaling one hundred and eight tanks per regiment. All of this was forced by reality. If the British Army did not tighten its belt, how could the Royal Navy ever hope to dominate the world? If the army, navy, and air force all joined an arms race at the same time, then no matter how wealthy the British Empire might be, it would never be able to endure the strain. This was a matter of economic scale. The British Isles imposed a hard ceiling, and no amount of pushing could break through it. Command could not keep up, equipment could not keep up, training could not keep up, and morale was no better. This was an asymmetric war from the very beginning. If the battlefield was not completely one-sided, that would have been the real surprise. At the forward command post, the highest-ranking commander on the front line, Baron von Reuter, was no longer focused on the battle itself. British South Africa was simply too small. The Cape of Good Hope might have been famous, but to the Holy Roman Empire, which controlled the Suez Canal, it was nothing special. Its economic value was mediocre, and its strategic value was equally so. Its so-called importance existed only from the British perspective. Control of the Cape meant avoiding being throttled by the Holy Roman Empire. Perhaps with continued economic and technological development, merchant ships would grow ever larger, and the importance of the Cape of Good Hope might become more apparent in the future. But that was only a possibility. For now, the Suez Canal route alone was more than sufficient to meet the needs of global trade. Even within the Holy Roman Empire, the calculation of military merit could never escape the influence of economics and strategic value. Generally speaking, the higher the economic and strategic importance of a captured region, the greater the merit earned from conquering it. The reverse was also true. The Cape of Good Hope did not hold much importance for the Holy Roman Empire, but that did not mean the level of commitment was low. For the sake of this war, the African nobles truly lived up to the saying of contributing money if they had money and contributing effort if they had strength. Even now, with the war already at this stage, many of the strategic supplies on the South African front were still being privately raised and paid for in advance. Although the government would reimburse these expenses in the future, they still had to be converted into military merit. Without tangible benefits, who would be so enthusiastically generous? According to the conventions of the Holy Roman Empire, if everyone worked together to seize British South Africa, then after the war the land and property there would naturally be divided among the contributors. The problem now was that everyone had contributed to the war, which meant there were far too many people qualified to share the spoils. Unfortunately, British South Africa was simply too small a cake. Uneven distribution of loot had always been a fatal taboo. If someone put in great effort but received no corresponding reward, then in future wars everyone would start weighing costs against benefits. In the end, a dangerous pattern would emerge. Whenever there was meat to be had, everyone would rush forward together. When only bones remained, no one would care. Once that happened, the entire system of military merit and noble titles would collapse. Similar cases had occurred throughout history. The most classic example was the farming and warfare system of the Great Qin Empire, which collapsed when later generations found there was no land left to distribute. Now, the Holy Roman Empire had reached the same crossroads. The only difference was that this was already the industrial age, and there was still a chance to choose a new path. Of course, this was a problem for the highest levels of government to consider. As the supreme commander on the front line, Baron von Reuter had not yet thought that far ahead. The issue before him was more immediate. With the spoils of war insufficient, how should they be distributed to satisfy the majority? Although noble titles and fiefs were ultimately decided by the Emperor, the verification of military merit was still handled by Baron von Reuter. This responsibility also included submitting detailed proposals for disposition. In most cases, as long as the frontline merits were confirmed to be accurate, the division of land and the granting of titles would take the opinions of the frontline commander very seriously. Of course, this was only part of the picture. In actual practice, many more factors had to be taken into account. For example, the personal wishes of those receiving rewards had to be respected as much as possible. Relatively speaking, nobles had far less freedom when it came to choosing fiefs, and the larger the fief, the fewer options there were. Ordinary soldiers, on the other hand, were treated quite differently. Those awarded ten or several dozen hectares of land generally had their personal preferences honored. Even if there was no room to settle them on the spot, they would be arranged in nearby regions, never too far away. Baron von Reuter had already calculated the numbers carefully. All armed forces participating in this war combined totaled as many as two hundred and thirty thousand men. Based on the military merits tallied on the battlefield, this palm-sized patch of British South Africa would be doing well just to accommodate the ordinary soldiers who had earned merit. There was no helping it. The total area was only twenty to thirty thousand square kilometers. After subtracting cities, forests, and land unsuitable for farming or grazing, the amount of land that could actually be turned into farms was extremely limited. The soldiers themselves were not too difficult to deal with. If British South Africa did not have enough land, they could simply be resettled elsewhere. This war had been fought with such intensity that the Holy Roman government would certainly not be short of land after it ended. The real headache lay with the nobles. According to long-standing tradition, whoever captured a piece of land had priority in its distribution. Those who did not participate in the war naturally had no right to reach out for a share. In the earlier anti-French wars, the entire African continent had effectively counted as a single battlefield, so this kind of problem never arose. But the Cape of Good Hope campaign was different. It was an independent operation, unconnected to any other battlefield. If meritorious contributors were granted fiefs in other regions, it would violate the unspoken rules of the game, and might even provoke resistance.
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