The meeting ended, and when Zhou Yongtao returned to the study, it was already past 2 a.m.

But, it's not time to rest.

Lin Shiping had been waiting here for more than an hour, and even he did not expect that it would be delayed for so long.

“How will it be opened?”

Zhou Yongtao just nodded, sat down and closed his eyes, looking exhausted both physically and mentally.

From yesterday morning to now, in addition to the three meals in the morning, noon and evening, there are also the first midnight snacks, and I have never stopped. I am always reading documents when I squatting in the toilet.

Lin Shiping waited patiently for a few minutes. After noticing that Zhou Yongtao's expression had relaxed a little, he said: "We have long thought that it will be a matter of time before we can get to this point, otherwise you would not have been selected six years ago and you will lead the empire to meet the challenge."

"If I had known it, I would have stayed at the Navy Command."

Lin Shiping smiled, he knew that Zhou Yongtao was just complaining.

"According to the agreement at today's meeting, after the Cabinet plenary meeting tomorrow morning, the relevant preparations will be officially launched, and there will be no turning back since then." Zhou Yongtao breathed a sigh of relief and said: "Although there are still some differences on specific issues, major issues have been reached. Even if we are willing to compromise and concessions, in the current situation, there is no way to prevent the outbreak of the global war."

"The choice between fighting or not is not in our hands."

"It's not in either of us."

"No matter what, we didn't take the initiative to provoke this war, nor did we..."

"What's the point of saying this now?"

Lin Shiping was stunned for a moment, then sighed with a wry smile.

"As you said, this day will come sooner or later, and when I was selected 10 years ago, there was a similar judgment."

"The war has not yet broken out, and it may be able to be saved."

After hearing what Lin Shiping said, Zhou Yongtao frowned, his eyes full of doubt, and suspected that Lin Shiping was still holding an ace in his hand.

Lin Shiping didn't explain, and glanced at the phone on the desk.

Zhou Yongtao immediately understood, then shook his head with a wry smile.

Lin Shiping was asking him to call Wolfgang Reinhardt, Prime Minister of Tsuman.

"Anyway, Reinhart is not a rude dictator like Hussein. At least he can reason and perhaps have room for negotiation."

"If there was really something to talk about, I wouldn't have come to this point, at least it wouldn't be my turn to make this call."

After hearing what Zhou Yongtao said, Lin Shiping couldn't help but sigh.

Reinhardt is indeed a reasoning person, but the current situation is obviously not something that can be resolved by just making a sound or making a phone call.

The key is that Reinhardt called Zhou Yongtao before he issued a statement.

This is a very clear signal, and there is no need to talk about it at all.

"It's getting late, so you can go back and rest early."

"Okay, wait until there is new news, and I will contact you."

After coming out of the study, Lin Shiping met Luo Youbin who was guarding outside. He originally planned to remind Luo Youbin, but after thinking about it, he thought it would be better.

Luo Youbin is just a secretary, so there is no need to make things difficult for him.

In fact, Lin Shiping came to the Prime Minister's Residence and waited patiently for more than an hour, hoping that Zhou Yongtao would make this call.

Of course, Lin Shiping did not come empty-handed.

In the past ten days, he contacted Sims, the intelligence leader of the Tsuman Empire, through various channels, and received a positive reply. He could contact Reinhardt through Sims, that is, maintain contact through intelligence agencies, without worrying about being known to the outside world.

The premise is that Zhou Yongtao has to call Reinhardt and bring up this matter.

According to Lin Shiping's opinion, no matter what the future happens, as long as the contact is maintained and the Supreme Commander negotiates directly, there will always be a day when the roundabout way will be.

The key is that Sims also revealed a similar intention.

It is not a deception of intelligence, nor is it necessary. After all, the Tyman Empire launched a war at this time, not in the hope of defeating the Liangxia Empire on the battlefield, but in order to divert internal contradictions, it is possible to control the situation and avoid the development of a full-scale war.

At least in Lin Shiping's view, this is a way to prevent the outbreak of a full-scale war.

Unfortunately, Zhou Yongtao's mood was obviously not very good, or he did not think that Reinhardt was willing to work with him to stop the war from breaking out.

Lin Shiping had no reason to argue, and could not compete with a strong chief assistant.

In fact, when Zhou Yongtao mentioned the results of the military meeting, Lin Shiping had already thought that it was probably not Zhou Yongtao who was pushing the situation forward now.

It’s not that Zhou Yongtao has been controlled by soldiers, and no general in the empire can control him.

The only thing that can push Zhou Yongtao forward is the "general trend".

To put it bluntly, at this critical moment, even Zhou Yongtao has to obey the general trend, otherwise the surging public opinion will crush him to pieces.

It can be seen that this is not a question of whether to fight or not.

It was after understanding these things that Lin Shiping did not stick to his own opinions.

However, he also knew that there was still a trace of hope to prevent regional wars from turning into global wars, and it was not time to give up.

In fact, Lin Shiping is not the one who has this idea.

After he left, Zhou Yongtao called Luo Youbin in.

In addition to instructing Luo Youbin to arrange a plenary meeting of the cabinet in the morning, Zhou Yongtao also arranged something for Luo Youbin to contact Nong Chengpei.

Let Nong Chengpei take the special envoy diplomatic team to Switzerland in the Western mainland as soon as possible.

As for what to do in Switzerland, Zhou Yongtao has not made any arrangements for the time being.

Switzerland is a permanent neutral country recognized by almost all countries, and is also the only country on the Western Continent that has not yet joined the Western Continental Group.

Obviously, if we need to resolve disputes through diplomatic means one day in the future, we need to rely on Switzerland.

From this we can see that Zhou Yongtao also believes that there is still a glimmer of opportunity.

Unfortunately, as Lin Shiping judged, when the empire was angry at the statement of the Tyman Empire, even if Zhou Yongtao was the chief minister with the strongest prestige and appeal after Lian Xusheng, it would not be possible to violate the wishes of 800 million soldiers and civilians, let alone to sack the military because of unrealistic fantasies!

At the beginning of the meeting, Qin Fenglie mentioned that now compromising with the Tiaoman Empire is to act against the contrary.

No matter who it is, we cannot let the brilliant victory achieved more than 40 years ago, which cost more than 3 million soldiers and lost hundreds of billions of gold to be ruined for no reason. If you do stupid things that destroy the Great Wall yourself, you will inevitably be nailed to the pillar of shame in history.

What's more, the current Tyman Empire is no longer as good as the original Tyman Empire.

In fact, Qin Fenglie said this not only reminding Zhou Yongtao, but also warning Zhou Yongtao not to bet on his prestige in the empire.

To be said, the "strong man era" of the empire has long passed.

Lian Xusheng was the last "strongest master" in the empire.

The Boei War suffered a crushing defeat, and several civilian prime ministers subsequently completely ruined the strong-man politics.

It’s not that there will never be a strong chief minister like Lian Xusheng again, but that appropriate conditions are required.

This condition is actually a war of great victory!

To put it more directly, if Zhou Yongtao could lead the empire to win this war, even if he had won a few victories in the early stages of the war, he would have become a strong assistant like Lian Xusheng, and he could have implemented his own policies as he pleased, and before that, he would have been dominated by public opinion.

This is not very nice, it is just a fact.

After being the chief assistant for 6 years, Zhou Yongtao could not understand the significance of it.

In fact, Zhou Yongtao has always been famous for his unique political vision, otherwise Bai Zhizhan would not have been able to ensure that he would be the chief minister.

The most representative thing is actually a lifelong event for a person.

More than 40 years ago, when the war was about to end, Zhou Yongtao married the eldest daughter of the Zhang family and became Bai Zhizhan's nominal niece.

It was from this time that he officially entered the political arena of the empire.

Interestingly, many people thought that at that time he would follow Bai Zhizhan and become the empire's son-in-law and marry the little princess of the time, which is the real sister of the current emperor.

If you become the imperial prince consort, you will definitely be inseparable from wealth and honor.

But the problem is that as the prince consort, Zhou Yongtao's highest achievement was to replace Li Mingbo and become the commander-in-chief of the Imperial Navy after the Baizhi War.

It is basically impossible to live in the official residence of the chief minister as the imperial prince consort.

The key is that everyone will regard the "son-in-law" as the spokesperson of the royal family, thus shaking the political foundation of the empire and at least affecting the basic political structure.

In addition, there is also the suspicion of "unconstitutionality", which violates the original intention of the constitutional reform initiated by Emperor Shiwu.

The key is to pose a threat to major interest groups.

To a large extent, Bai Zhizhan did not serve as the chief minister of the empire after Lian Xusheng's first resignation, which led to the reversal of the empire's basic strategy at that time, which was closely related to his identity as the prince consort. At that time, Xue Yuanzheng opposed him as the chief minister of the empire.

From a post-event perspective, this was the first major strategic decision-making mistake that the Empire made after the war.

At that time, the domestic and international situation between the 110th and 115th years of the 115th year of the 11th calendar. After Lian Xu was promoted to leave office, if Bai Zhizhan was appointed as the chief minister of the empire, the empire would have been likely to avoid the subsequent quagmire of war and would not be involved in the War of Independence of the Boy State when the Republic of Ter could not continue.

If you want to say it, the Bo Yi State would not even have a war on independence!

According to later declassified information, the Boy's national independence movement organization chose to take risks because it felt that the civilian prime minister after Lian Xu was promoted lacked decisive decision-making ability, and might not dare or be willing to send troops to fight as soon as possible, so there was hope that he would take this opportunity to gain independence in advance. Because of the deception of the outside world, the leaders of the Boy's national independence movement always felt that those politicians who played with authority would not fulfill their promises.

Don’t forget that according to the agreement signed during the war, you only need to wait a few more years, and the Boei region will hold a referendum on whether to establish an independent country.

If it were the Baizhan War, the leaders of the Boy's national independence movement would never dare to make such a judgment.

In addition, the credibility of military leaders is certainly above politicians.
To be continued...