Chapter 375: People’s Dreams Will Never End

Netherlands, Amsterdam.

The Dutch army has assembled and is about to go to the front line. The 80,000-man army is almost all the wealth of the Netherlands. In order to take back Flemish, King William II of the Netherlands thought it was worth a try.

In fact, he was betting on the fate of the country and the character of the Habsburg family. Because at this time, the Netherlands had less than 20,000 troops stationed, and it was actually an empty shell.

If the Austrian Empire took this opportunity to attack the Netherlands, William II would inevitably be exiled overseas like his ancestors.

(During the Napoleonic Wars, Napoleon once named his younger brother the King of the Netherlands, known as "Ludwig II")

In fact, William II was not a gambler, he just had a new lover who liked to play a few games. This lady's gambling skills are superb, and she always allows William II to kill all sides at the gambling table.

Over time, this timid king turned into a gambler. This time when William II was wavering, it was also this lover who made the decision for him.

The reason is:

"Although Britain is close at hand, its reinforcements are far away. Although Austria is 840 kilometers away from the Netherlands, their troops have already reached Luxembourg.

Britain promised us that as long as we try our best, we can keep our territory intact, but who caused the incompleteness of the Netherlands' territory at this time?

Although Austria wants to assign the province of Limburg to Luxembourg, you are still the nominal monarch of Luxembourg. At the same time, Austria will return the Flemish region to you, and Austria is willing to serve as a place of exile for local Catholics.

Are you going to let 100,000 Dutch soldiers sacrifice in vain to wait for the illusory reinforcements, or are you willing to take back the territory that truly belongs to you at the cost of Limburg?"

At this time, William II received a new message that the Austrians had occupied Flemish and captured King Leopold I of Belgium, and had sent envoys to the palace to urge him to take over the area as soon as possible.

This surprised and delighted William II. He was delighted that the Austrian side kept its promise and conquered Flemish without even sending troops from the Netherlands. He was also surprised.

Flemish region is the core area of ​​Belgian rule, and Brussels itself is a city built on a fortress.

But the Austrians took this strong city before their army was assembled, not to mention the Walloon region, which was the only way to attack Flemish province.

It was really scary to conquer the whole of Belgium in less than a week.

This made him sure that the Austrians had completed mobilization and deployment before the war started. If he rejected Austria's proposal, he would either become a prisoner like Leopold I, or face attacks from two directions.

"Let General Foren Gurlitt take over." King William of the Netherlands ordered.

General Foren Gurlitt woke up from the shock. As an army general, he was much more shocked than others at this time.

"Is this Napoleon reborn?" General Vollen Gullit simply couldn't believe the speed of Austria's advancement. On the other hand, he was also wondering who this Archduke Albrecht was.

Although Archduke Albrecht was very famous in the Austrian Empire, he was not well-known in the European military circle or the aristocratic circle.

One reason was that he was too low-key, or not sociable.

The second reason was his age. At that time, both the military and the political circles had to pay attention to seniority.

"Exchange Limburg for Flemish."

In fact, the happiest person for this transaction was the abdicated King William I of the Netherlands.

William I was called the "Merchant King", but it was not just a derogatory term, but also a praise for his outstanding achievements in economic development.

However, William I was not satisfied with the title of Merchant King. He wanted to completely unify the north and the south (the south refers to the Austrian Netherlands and other regions) and become the real King of the Netherlands.

Unfortunately, William I's business methods had a counter-effect on the people, and at the same time, the malice from overseas did not want the Netherlands to complete the unification and become strong. In the end, he could only watch his country split and abdicated sadly.

When the news of the Dutch army's recovery of Flemish lands reached the country, William I locked himself in the room, took out the bottle of gin from the cabinet thirteen years ago and drank it.

Thirteen years ago, France sent troops, Belgium became independent, and he abdicated in disgrace. The scenes seemed to have happened yesterday.

Twelve months later, the 71-year-old former Dutch King William I boarded the merchant ship that he had traveled across the world when he was young. Here he seemed to feel his heart full of blood, the sea that made his heart surge, the world that fascinated him, and his motherland that made him unswerving - the Greater Netherlands.

"People's dreams will never end!"

On December 12, 1843, the former Dutch King William I died.

Back to the book.

At the Franco-Belgian border, 20,000 French vanguards crossed the Franco-Belgian border in a mighty manner, preparing to take over the Wallonia region in advance.

The reason why the French army violated the agreement with the German Confederation was that Louis Philippe hoped to get a more favorable situation, and Guizot hoped to leave room for negotiations with the British.

Of course, this can only be achieved by cutting off the Austrians' retreat. According to their intelligence, the First Army of the German Confederation (Austrian Army) was heading to the Flemish region.

If the French army occupied Wallonia at this time, then whether negotiating with the British or the German Confederation, France would be invincible.

The 20,000 French troops ignored the warnings of the German Confederation Volunteer Army, forcibly broke through the Franco-Belgian border, and marched straight to the Namur Fortress, a major military town.

William Friedrich Ludwig, who received the news that the Prussian vanguard was defeated, felt humiliated. The Austrians in front were about to return victorious, but he was broken through by the 20,000 French troops.

William Friedrich Ludwig was the famous "Prince of Cannonballs" in history, the first emperor of the German Empire, William I, a hot-tempered emperor.

At this time, his military staff was Moltke the Elder, a great figure in military history.

Both of them felt that being defeated by a mere 20,000 French troops was too embarrassing. Although this group of French troops came to cut off the retreat of the Austrian army, the entire German Confederation had more than 100,000 troops here, and Albrecht himself had nearly 30,000 troops. It was not difficult to defeat this French army of only 20,000.

In addition, the Dutch have sent 100,000 troops (claimed) to support the German Confederation. If Namur is lost in this battle, let alone leading Germany in the future, it may be expelled from the German Confederation.

The German Confederation's army is not uniformly dispatched, and most of them act independently, which makes them vulnerable when facing the powerful French army.

This also gave the French general Jean Durd a kind of confidence that he should not have. Coupled with the lack of intelligence, he thought that there were only a few thousand German Confederation troops in Wallonia at most, and as long as he occupied Namur, he could completely reverse the situation and achieve a real center of glory.

This chapter was written before, but I felt it was a bit too bland, so I changed it, and now I feel it is a bit too much.

I will sort out my thoughts tomorrow. If I can think of it, I will update it as usual. If I can't think of it, I will continue to do it.

Cuckoo.