Speaking of Madagascar Island, Ernst had always had designs on Africa's largest island. It was an excellent strategic fulcrum.
Conversely, it was also a place where outside powers could easily threaten East Africa. A typical example was the United States and Cuba. Cuba's position could be said to have made the United States extremely uncomfortable, especially during the Cold War, when it was the Soviet Union's only strategic fulcrum capable of threatening the United States in North America.
Madagascar Island was even more remarkable. It was far larger than Cuba, covering nearly 600,000 square kilometers, and possessed vast amounts of arable land.
The Kingdom of Imerina, the island's foremost power, was a typical powerful feudal agrarian state. Its historical development had merely come relatively late; otherwise, it would not have lost out to traditional African powers like Abyssinia at all.
However, because East Africa had been expanding on the mainland all along, it had lacked the energy to fight on two fronts. Especially during the South African War, the East African Navy had wished it could split one man into two. Moreover, it had to consider the French attitude, so East Africa had gained nothing on Madagascar Island even now.
Yet Ernst was determined to obtain Madagascar Island's tropical savanna regions, chiefly the plains in western and southern Madagascar. These two areas consisted of tropical savanna and tropical dry savanna, with climates similar to East Africa's.
Of course, Madagascar Island's truly habitable regions were much like East Africa's as well. The eastern highlands were the island's core region and also the Kingdom of Imerina's sphere of influence.
At present, the Kingdom of Imerina remained an independent state and was chiefly friendly with Britain. Of course, France had already successfully established colonies in the north of the Kingdom of Imerina. If