Although East Africa had attached great importance to tropical jungle warfare training for its military since the 1870s, it had basically all been conducted in the tropical rainforest regions of the mainland, leaving it lacking in large-scale combat experience.
East Kalimantan, meanwhile, had been a real battlefield, profoundly testing the East African Army's tropical jungle warfare capabilities over the past two years.
As for the final result, it could only be said that they had barely passed the line. The casualty figures East Africa had suffered while suppressing the remnants of the two sultanates were hardly pleasing to the eye.
Nor was this surprising. Ernst knew very well that East Africa's colonial rule in the Nanyang region differed from that of other nations.
Other countries emphasized winning people over through "virtue." As long as they settled the local upper classes and made them willingly serve their respective nations, fierce military conflicts would generally not erupt.
India was the most typical example. When certain uprisings and riots broke out in India, the British did not even need to act themselves; India's princes and nobles would resolve them on their own.
The two sides were, in truth, in a symbiotic relationship, joining together to parasitize the common people at the bottom. Put plainly, they were the imperialist powers and the comprador class they had propped up.
They could coexist symbiotically, and since that was so, there was naturally no need to fight until one side died and the other lived.
East Africa, by contrast, was different. Its colonial activities in Nanyang had no need to cultivate compradors. East Africa had always pursued a policy of "remove the people, retain the land."
This was destined to make the local powers unite as one against East Africa, their mortal enemy.
Cristiano said, "As long