Chapter 84: Athens
Xu Jun loves the sea, and when he was a Chinese college student, he would often go to the coastal resorts of China to enjoy the sun, sea and sand.
After coming to this time and space, I came up and met Dunkirk, a big beach, and it was full of people, raising their hands one by one and being happy.
Then there was the Strait of Dover, where he spent about a month and a half at his base near Calais, where he could not only enjoy the special French style, but also overlook the famous White Cliffs of Dover on the opposite side in good weather, or lie on the beach and bask in the sun while watching the hordes of bombers pass overhead, which is not a scenery that can be seen casually.
After coming to Greece, Xu Jun found that compared with the English Channel, which has no wind and three feet of waves, the Mediterranean Sea is like a beautiful girl raised in the depths, and he has never seen such a clear and quiet sea. The Greek official who received it said that the Mediterranean actually has its violent side, perhaps to welcome the great Führer, and has only become particularly gentle and shy in the past few days.
Xu Juncai didn't care about these sycophants, he just regretted that he came in the wrong season, and he couldn't jump into the sea to swim, catch a few famous red mullets and taste them, and imagine that he had become His Majesty Napoleon. However, the Greeks quickly granted his wish, swimming was no longer possible, but the red mullet was still available, and the cooks sent by the Greek royal family were very skilled, and the fried fish pieces were very delicious. Eventually, the Führer faced the beauty of the Mediterranean, tasting Napoleon's favorite dishes while drinking the French Champedin wine, which was also loved by the Emperor. The German Führer's heart remembers this great monarch who once shook the world, and soon he will face the old enemy of the French emperor, the invincible French army is defeated in that land, Xu Jun believes that he will never become another Napoleon, he will not make the mistakes made by his predecessor in history, and he is trying to make up for the loopholes that have been proven by history, for the upcoming war he has spent countless scheming, even to the extreme, he firmly believes that the final victory must be his own.
The Greeks welcomed the German Führer in the form of a hero, and as a result they gave the Führer a grand triumphal ceremony, and the Greeks generously offered everything they had to entertain the benefactor from Germany.
Under the propaganda of the media, the Third Reich became a knight who turned the tide in the hands of the vicious Italian invaders and saved Greece from fire and water, while the German Führer was a saint who upheld justice and benevolence, and upheld justice and justice.
Originally, the Greek people had a very good impression of Germany, but because of the marriage, the high-level people chose to turn to Britain one by one. The Greek royal family is very Habsburg in the style of the Habsburg royal family on the issue of marriage, the country is not big but has a relationship with most of the European royal families, the current king is one of the great-grandsons of the European grandmother Queen Victoria, and there is also a certain blood relationship with the Austrian and Prussian royal families.
Compared to the few existing royal families in Europe, the population of the Greek royal family is quite prosperous, and Xu Jun believes that it may have something to do with the Mediterranean diet, and several generations of Greek kings have had children and grandchildren.
The real ruler of Greece at the moment is Giannis. Prime Minister Metaxas, interestingly, turned out to be a hardcore royalist, and after several deposes, the Greek royal family at this time had become a frightened bird, so that he obeyed the prime minister's words and was willing to be reduced to a rubber stamp.
Since the end of World War I, Greece was forced to enter a republic, the domestic political situation has been constantly turbulent, in just 23 years, there have been thirteen coups, the most recent occurred five years ago, in which the Greek royal family was successfully restored again, and George II ascended the throne of Athens for the second time.
Xu Jun felt that the country was so ridiculous, that Greek politics was divided into two factions, the liberals who supported the existence of the royal family, and the republicans who supported the republican form of government.
Born in the military, Metaxas was not a man of great power in his own right, as mentioned earlier, he was a hardcore royalist who had gone into exile with the royal family several times.
Some say that he initiated the military dictatorship purely because of the situation at a time when the left-wing forces at the grassroots level of Greek society were very active, and various trade unions and left-wing parties instigated strikes and riots from time to time, and many discerning people could see that a left-wing revolution was imminent in the country.
The royal family and politicians knew very well that once the left wing came to power, the Tsar's family would be an example to them, and that if the revolution broke out, whether it was the king or the republicans or the liberals, would all end up together.
The Greek upper class would never allow this to happen to them, so Metaxas came to power strongly, directly used force to dissolve the parliament, arrested and exiled left-wing leaders, and completely suppressed the signs of left-wing revolution in Greece.
If, according to the original history, after the failure of the Italian invasion of Greece, Germany, which had long been unable to stand on the sidelines, took decisive action. The Greek Army, which had beaten the Italian army to a great loss, had just gained a little self-confidence, and then it was beaten back to its prototype by the Wehrmacht, and the Greeks saw what a real blitzkrieg was, what a mechanized cluster was, and the Greek army was crushed and finally occupied by the Germans.
However, the prime minister did not see the Nazi iron hooves ravaging the land he loved, and his pharynx contracted cellulitis, a terrible bacterial infection that had no cure at the time, and soon the bacteria infected the blood and caused sepsis, and he died in the Athenian hospital on January 29, 41. Because of the dictator's defection to the allies, he was posthumously recognized by the government as prime minister for life after the war, which caused a lot of controversy among the people.
In a sense, it can indeed be said that the intervention of the German Führer saved the sad fate of the king and the prime minister, and the king was deposed once in history, ascended the throne three times in his life, and finally died on April Fool's Day, as for the dictator, with the special antibiotic penicillin, cellulitis is no longer a terminal disease, he can live a long time, watching how the German Führer changes the world.
Xu Jun really didn't have too many requirements for the Greek government, he just wanted a stable Mediterranean environment, after the alliance with Italy and France, the entire Mediterranean Sea was already under the control of Germany, Greece for Germany, not even a chicken rib.
The country has no mineral and energy resources, no developed industry, even agriculture is only below the average level, the national character is scattered, and the illiteracy rate is extremely high.
Greece could neither supply Germany with the raw materials it needed, nor could it provide qualified workers, not even farmers, and in Xu's plan, it could only be used as a dumping point for industrial goods and a hub for European tourism and trade.
Greece's position on the Mediterranean route has certain advantages, but it is not indispensable, especially now that the German army has occupied the island of Malta, and the convoy can completely avoid calling at Greek ports.
Today there is not a single country on the entire Mediterranean coast that can pose a threat to Germany, and the value of Crete has become insignificant. As a result, the German paratroopers did not have to shed Cretan blood, and the Greek male inhabitants of the island also escaped a catastrophe (described in more detail above). Perhaps the German airborne division could be organized to conduct a large-scale airborne exercise on the island to make up for the regrets in real history, Xu Jun was ready to go back and discuss with the high command to see, if there was that opportunity and time, he would be very interested in visiting that island.
This time Xu Jun came to Greece, one was invited by the Greek royal family and government to participate in the celebration of the end of the Greek-Italian War, and the other was that he was going to meet with the leaders of several Balkan countries in Athens by the way.
At the same time, Xu Jun was preparing to sign a series of secret agreements with these countries, and he needed the Balkan countries to provide some of the resources that Germany urgently needed at the moment, and at the same time to agree on a joint defense strategy on the Eastern Front.
Speaking of which, this group of Balkan scum don't know where so many blood feuds come from, and if they put it in any of them, they may cause trouble, who knows if there will be a second Sarajevo incident, and the last thing Xu Jun wants to see at this time is what sudden change happens.
At this time, it was clear that the bones of Greece were clear, and not only did this country have no mortal enemies in the Balkans, but had marriages with most of them, and the conference was held in Athens, and none of them raised any objections.
At noon on 16 November, amid the enthusiastic cheers of more than 100,000 Athenian citizens, the German Führer entered the city of Athens with his guard flag, standing on a two-wheeled horse-drawn chariot specially prepared for him by the Greek government.
PS: Thank you all for your support, the author will continue to work hard.
I won't forget the chapters I owe, and I'll make up for them when I have the chance.
Thank you for the tips and monthly passes, please continue to support this book, thank you.