Chapter 331 Balkan Situation (End)

Compared with William II, who was mentally disturbed from time to time, Ferdinand was not much better. He was famous among European royal families for his extremely vengeful character.

In addition to the "grievance" with William II, Ferdinand also had ridiculous conflicts with other princes and nobles.

In 1910, while traveling to attend the funeral of his second cousin, King Edward VII, Ferdinand had a dispute with Archduke Franz Ferdinand, the Crown Prince of Austria-Hungary, over the placement of the carriage, which the Archduke ultimately won. , his carriage was placed directly behind the engine, and Ferdinand's was placed behind the Archduke. But when Ferdinand realized that the train's dining car was behind his own carriage, he refused to let the Archduke pass through his carriage to enter the dining car.

As mentioned earlier, in October 1908, he announced that Bulgaria would completely separate from the Ottoman Turkish Empire and become a sovereign and independent kingdom, and he would be titled "Tsar". Rumor has it that he also hid in his wardrobe the full royal regalia of the Byzantine emperor obtained from a costume merchant, in preparation for wearing it when he would one day reunite the territory of Byzantium under his scepter. This makes other monarchs who are the same as him as the Nine-Fifth Emperor cannot help but feel resentful.

In his private life, he is bisexual. There were many rumors that in his later years Ferdinand frequently dated his assistants and valets. It was an open secret among royal families across Europe that he regularly vacationed with a wealthy gay man in the then-famous resort of Capri.

In 1895 the secret was leaked to the Frankfurter Zeitung by the resentful Bulgarian Prime Minister Stefan Stambolov, sparking a nine-day scandal across Europe.

As for why the former prime minister was resentful, it was because after the abdication of Grand Duke Alexander I in 1886, he crushed Russian interference and supported Ferdinand as the Grand Duke of Bulgaria. After Ferdinand came to the throne, Stefan Stambolov organized a cabinet, which naturally took control of Bulgaria's domestic political situation.

During his administration, Stefan Stambolov continued to oppose Russia, maintain diplomatic relations with Turkey, and expand Bulgaria's sphere of influence in Macedonia. He used terror to deal with the rising tide of anti-imperial conspiracies and mutinies. When Ferdinand regained power in 1895, he was forced to resign as prime minister, and then the Ferdinand scandal broke out.

As a result, in July 1895, Stambolov, his bodyguard and a friend were riding home in a carriage. On the way, the carriage was attacked by an assassin who shot the horses with a revolver.

Stambolov quickly exited the carriage, but was attacked by several assassins armed with knives. He killed one of the attackers, but the others pushed him to the ground. They knew Stambolov was wearing a bulletproof vest, so they stabbed him in the head and hands. His bodyguards eventually drove away the attackers, but Stambolov was carried home and died. As for who the murderer is, it is "unknown."

After exchanging a few words, Ferdinand asked. "Yanik, I heard that you have sent troops into Albania?"

Yannick nodded. "That's right."

Ferdinand hesitated and asked again. "Then you plan to annex the Balkans?"

Yannick shrugged. "I actually don't have much interest in the Balkans. The march into Albania is just to help ally Italy consolidate its occupied areas. If the countries in the Balkans want to remain neutral, I am willing to support it."

Take Türkiye for example. Yannick believes in Türkiye more than Greece's neutrality.

At the beginning of 1943 in the original time and space, British Prime Minister Winston Churchill personally went to the Turkish city of Adana to meet with the then Turkish President. Churchill directly expressed the hope that Turkey could declare war on Germany immediately, so that Britain would use Turkish airports to launch air strikes against Germany. However, Turkey did not respond, because Turkey also understood the situation at that time. Although Germany was facing huge losses, it could still defeat Turkey.

Naturally, Churchill would not give up. Britain, which was good at playing with international politics, urged Turkey to join the fight against Germany as soon as possible through the Soviet Union. Under pressure from the Soviet Union, Britain once again sent diplomats to negotiate with Turkey, saying that if Turkey did not join the fight against Germany, Turkey would face a new opponent once the war ended. The Soviet Union entered Turkey, and the allies at that time There will be no troops sent to help at all. Because Türkiye did not participate in the war, Turkey had no right to speak at all in the post-war world structure.

Forced by helplessness, Turkey agreed to the British request, but it hoped that the time would be more relaxed as to when it would officially declare war against Germany. At the same time, Turkey stated that it needed some necessary military assistance, and quickly handed over the list to the British side, which roughly included 126 of Britain's latest Spitfire fighter jets, 500 tanks, and at least 70,000 tons of fuel.

The British side gritted its teeth and agreed.

But in November, Turkey's top leaders did not reach a unified view on the war, but it has to be said that Turkey was relatively gloomy at this time. Because they felt that if they joined the war, Germany would immediately deal with themselves, so they might as well wait until Germany could no longer deal with themselves before taking action. This idea led to unification in Turkey.

After receiving British supplies, Turkey clearly stated that it would join the war against Germany, but the time would have to be relaxed. In this way, Turkey successfully obtained those weapons and was also working hard to train its own soldiers. As soon as Britain attacked, Turkey replied that it was still training soldiers. In this way, Turkey did not join the fight against Germany until February 23, 1945, but at this time Germany had almost no war to fight.

Yannick hoped that Turkey would stand on the side of Britain without knowing whether to live or die, so that he would have an excuse to send troops to attack Turkey and seize the Turkish Strait, known as the "throat of the world".

You must know that the Turkish Strait is the throat of West Asia, North Africa and Southern Europe to the Black Sea. This unique geographical location will make it a place of contention for military strategists. It has very important military value.

Unfortunately, with Turkey's cunningness, unless Germany is about to be defeated, it will definitely adhere to neutrality.

"If Bulgaria wants to remain neutral, that's fine. As long as it doesn't flirt with our enemies, we will support it."

In March of the 41st year of the original time and space, Bulgarian King Boris III was forced to join the Axis.

After the outbreak of the Soviet-German War, the Bulgarian king found a good excuse for himself: Bulgarians have deep feelings for Russia and are not suitable for fighting Russia. In addition, various excuses include: his army's equipment is not suitable for modern mechanized warfare (this makes sense), the peasants in his army cannot fight well away from their hometown (but they can go to Macedonia to fight guerrillas), and the Bulgarian army must stay within the country to prevent Turkey's possible attack at any time, plus the anti-guerrilla warfare in the country, and the anti-Allied landing plan in the Balkan Peninsula.

In any case, the Germans accepted the royalist's statement. The Bulgarian army did not go to the Soviet-German front, but stayed in the Balkans to deal with the guerrillas. However, the performance of Bulgarian officials was really bad. In Macedonia, the locals were soon disappointed with the tyranny and corruption of the new officials. The Bulgarians became as unwelcome as the Serbs. In Thrace, there was not even a honeymoon period, and armed resistance soon broke out. As the war progressed, many Bulgarian deserters hid in the above two areas. The two captured lands became the biggest threat to the stability of Bulgaria.

At home, Boris III's reputation was not greatly affected. If the economy did not get better, it at least did not get worse. 44 years ago, air raids and guerrilla warfare were basically negligible. Although the German army had garrisons, they were really pitiful compared to World War I. Even after the Battle of Stalingrad, because Boris firmly refused the Bulgarian army to participate in the Eastern Front, the Bulgarians were not as shocked by so much blood as their neighboring Romanians.

After all, Ferdinand had abdicated for many years and was no longer involved in the matter. This time he came purely to test Yannick's attitude. Seeing that Yannick was not very interested in the Balkans, he stayed for a while and then left.

On the other hand, Eden finally reached a final agreement with the Soviet Union after some bargaining and returned to London.

Churchill was really relieved. "Great, then when can they send troops?"

Eden replied. "They need to make some preparations, and they will send troops by the end of November at the latest."