xymnovel Chapter 239 The Sultan's Roar! The Silence of the Great Powers!
Chapter 239 The Sultan's Roar! The Silence of the Great Powers!
Yildez Palace, Constantinople.
Inside the luxurious palace, the atmosphere was so oppressive it felt like you could wring water out of it.
Sultan Abdul Hamid II has just received an urgent telegram from Thessaloniki.
The color had faded from his well-maintained face.
Ioannina, the capital of Epirus that had been under imperial rule for over three hundred years, fell.
The garrison commander, Abdul Bey, was defeated and captured.
What he found even more unacceptable was that the Albanian garrison, on which he had placed high hopes, stood idly by from beginning to end.
This is betrayal!
A blatant and utterly shameful betrayal!
"Useless! A bunch of useless idiots! Weren't the Greeks routed and our army able to advance smoothly? How come the battle line has moved all the way to Epirus? What about the garrison in Thessaly?"
The Sultan's roar echoed in the empty palace.
He grabbed the purebred Persian cat that was lying on his lap and, without thinking, threw it away with all his might.
The cat let out a piercing scream, crashed into the wall in the distance, slid to the ground, twitched a few times, and then lay still.
The palace attendants and ministers all knelt on the ground, their bodies trembling uncontrollably, not daring to utter a sound.
The majesty of the empire and the glory of the Ottoman Empire that had lasted for a century were shattered at this moment by a tiny Greece with an unbelievable surprise attack.
The Sultan felt a wave of dizziness and staggered, grabbing the golden throne beside him for support.
……
Athens.
It was quite different from the gloom of Constantinople.
The embassies of various countries stationed here are brightly lit all night long.
A victorious celebration, however, brought unprecedented anxiety to these most powerful men in Europe.
Ambassadors, military attachés, and intelligence personnel were urgently summoned together for an all-night meeting.
Their table was covered with reports they had sent back home over the past few months about the situation in Greece.
"The Greek army is disorganized, poorly trained, and easily defeated."
"Crown Prince Constantine is reckless, impulsive, and lacks political foresight."
"This war will end in a crushing defeat for Greece and the country's bankruptcy."
……
Now, every single one of these "professional analyses" they produce is like a resounding slap in the face to themselves.
They discovered that all their previous intelligence, judgments, and reports had become a pile of worthless scraps of paper.
They must reassess.
A reassessment of Greece's military strength.
A reassessment of the young crown prince's political ambitions.
And, a reassessment of the future landscape of the Balkans, and indeed the entire eastern Mediterranean coast.
Inside the British Embassy.
Major Lionel Harrison's office was filled with smoke.
He smoked half a pack of cigarettes in one go.
Two telegram drafts were laid out in front of him.
One document, publicly available, is about to be sent to the Foreign Office in London.
In the telegram, he used elegant diplomatic language to express his "high appreciation and warm congratulations" on the "interim results" achieved by the Kingdom of Greece in combating "drug smuggling and human trafficking in the Balkans."
The other document was a coded telegram written in a code that only senior MI6 officers could decipher.
"Target 'C' (Constantine) has demonstrated tactical planning capabilities and political acumen far exceeding expectations, and its ambitions are unfathomable. It is recommended to immediately raise its threat level from 'potential' to 'highly active.' The speed of Greece's rise may have already exceeded control. Repeating this could lead to a loss of control."
After finishing the telegram, Harrison leaned back wearily in his chair.
He had a premonition that his comfortable days on this land were coming to an end.
Larissa Front.
When the messenger presented the secret telegram bearing the Sultan's seal to Edheim Pasha.
The old general couldn't believe his eyes.
He read the telegram over and over again, word by word.
When he finally confirmed the news that Joanina had fallen and the logistics hub had been captured by the enemy.
His wrinkled face turned deathly pale in an instant.
He rushed to the huge military map.
In terror, he drew lines on the map with trembling fingers.
He finally understood.
He finally understood what he had been doing for the past two weeks.
He thought he was confronting the enemy's main force, and he thought he had the Greeks firmly pinned to the front lines.
wrong.
Big mistakes.
He is not a hunter.
He was a piece of meat nailed to the chopping board!
Constantine, the young prince whom he had always looked down upon, used a feint and a perfect deception to keep him firmly entangled here.
Then, another unit was dispatched, and a sharp, poisoned dagger was silently plunged into his waist.
The entire western flank's logistics lines, supply lines, and retreat routes...
They were all exposed to the onslaught of Metaxus's ghost army!
Edhempasha felt a wave of suffocation.
His hundreds of thousands of troops became an isolated force with its roots severed.
Constantine stood in his command post, the lights on the sand table casting a long shadow of him.
He took a small blue flag from the flag tube, representing the Greek Mountain Jaeger Division.
He held the small flag firmly, his movements steady without the slightest tremor.
He planted the tip of the flag firmly and deeply into the sand table at the location of "Ioannina".
This little flag is like a real sharp knife.
It deeply penetrated the Ottoman Empire's territory in the Balkans.
In a ruthless manner, it severed the vital artery connecting its north and south.
He did not order Metaxas to pursue, nor did he command him to expand the gains in any direction.
He walked to the telegraph machine and personally sent another telegram, completely different from the one about "victory".
"Metaxus".
"Strengthen the defenses, appease the people, and enforce discipline in the army. Incorporate all available forces. I want you to make Joanina our strongest, most impregnable fortress."
"You have won me the most important bargaining chip in this war."
"Now, the real show is just beginning."
After sending the telegram, he walked out of the command post.
The stars shone brightly in the night sky.
He knew that from this moment on, what stood across the card table was no longer just the corrupt Ottoman Empire.
And then there are those self-righteous chess players hiding behind the scenes.
He picked up the black cloak hanging on the coat rack by the door and draped it over his shoulders.