1627 Rise of the South China Sea

Chapter 1926
After visiting this refined salt processing plant, it was almost noon, Luo Shengdong said that he had prepared a lunch in the county town, and invited Li Min to return to the city for dinner.Of course, these saltworks outside the city also have collective canteens, but the quality of dining is obviously not up to the level of entertaining foreign dignitaries, and Li Lu has no intention of experiencing the life of ordinary Haihan people. After going abroad, he has long been used to the official Haihan In terms of entertainment, there is no objection to Luo Shengdong's arrangement at the moment.So a group of people took a carriage and rushed back to the county town.

After returning to the county seat, it was not Li Lu who was most relaxed, but Gai Liangcai, who was in charge of directing the security.Although nothing unusual happened in the past two days, Gai Liangcai still did not dare to be careless in the slightest, and deployed more thorough security measures with the armed forces at hand.Compared with the outdoors, it is obviously easier to protect the target person in a closed space, and it is much safer to go back to the county office than to stay outside.

Of course, Captain Xue and his team, who were watching from afar, would not be so relaxed. Seeing the official convoy returning to the county town, everyone sighed silently, knowing that there would be no chance to do anything for the time being.This is definitely not good news for them. This group of people are not fledgling novices, and they know that the longer the time drags on, the easier it is for their intentions to be exposed.If you had to wait until the Haihan people relaxed their vigilance before doing anything, then you were actually betting your own life while waiting.

"Go back to the county first. They want to go back to the city for dinner, so let's go back to eat too!" Although Captain Xue has figured out the next arrangement of the Haihan people, he has no choice but to continue to follow Haihan's rhythm. up.

Having said that, he did not give up immediately, and followed the official convoy back to the city. After confirming that they were going to the county government, he began to look for a temporary foothold nearby.

After curling up in the hot and stuffy carriage all morning, and still not daring to relax, the group was already tired. At this moment, they just wanted to find a cool and ventilated place, sit down, eat something and rest.Fortunately, Yinggehai County is quite prosperous, so it is not difficult to find such a place, and soon found a restaurant near the county government office, and the waiter in the shop enthusiastically helped them untie the pack horses that pulled the carts, and led them to drink water. It's time to eat grass - of course, this kind of thoughtful service is also one of the charging items.

Captain Xue ordered two people to stay on the street, watching the movement of the county government, and the others went to eat with him first, and then replaced them later.But because of the mission, under the supervision of Captain Xue, everyone must have no alcohol for this meal.

"Boss, what should we do this afternoon? Or just set up an ambush outside the city to kill him?" After sitting down, some impatient subordinates began to ask Captain Xue about his next arrangement.

Captain Xue was very calm, and reprimanded: "What's the rush? We've just started contacting our opponents, and acting rashly will only be counterproductive. First, observe carefully, find their loopholes, and wait for the right opportunity to move!"

Of course, Captain Xue also understands that dragging on for too long will cause nights and dreams, but at this time, he can't show anxiety in front of his subordinates. position.

As for the plan of setting up an ambush outside the city, he would definitely not adopt it now.There is not even a local in this group of people, and everyone is blind to the environment here. In this situation, it is foolish to set up an ambush against a dignitary accompanied by dozens of armed guards, and the chance of success is too low , far below the possibility of annihilation of the entire army.

Because they were worried about the new movements of the North Koreans, Captain Xue and his group could only deal with it in a hurry and had lunch, making preparations for departure at any time in advance.However, the people watching the wind on the street have changed two batches, but there is no movement from the county government, and the waiter at the shop here has come to ask them twice if they want to add more food, and they almost didn't say that if they don't eat, they can pay the bill leave.

Captain Xue had no choice but to pay for the meal first, and then ordered two pots of good tea and a few plates of snacks, lest the waiter in the shop try to urge you with different tricks.Fortunately, after noon, the restaurant didn't have much business, otherwise the shopkeeper would probably urge them to leave.

This group of people was waiting outside, but Li Wei in the county government had already made other arrangements.After consulting Li Min's opinion, Luo Shengdong canceled his visit in the afternoon and held a tea party in the county government office instead.This is because Li Lu is not very interested in visiting the salt fields. After seeing two places in the morning, the novelty has almost worn off. He thinks it is better to sit down and chat if he continues to go around the white salt fields. Let’s talk about the development history and future development plan of Yinggehai, so that we may be able to find experience that is beneficial to North Korea’s future saltworks operations.

Of course, Luo Shengdong was happy to accompany him, and he didn't want to do some long-term explanations of the cow playing the piano, and the most important production project in the local area was the saltworks. People from outside came here to visit and inspect. What else can they see if they don't see the production of the saltworks?Instead, he sat down to have a tea party, and he was able to take this opportunity to give the North Koreans some advice and complete the propaganda task that the accompanying officials conveyed to him yesterday.

There are two issues that Li Min is most concerned about. One is whether the production and operation model of Yinggehai saltworks can be effectively copied to North Korea, and the other is what difficulties Luo Shengdong thinks the new type of saltworks opened by North Korea may face.

Regarding these two issues, Luo Shengdong gave his own views very carefully: "From a technical perspective, there is actually no artificial obstacle for your country to introduce our country's salt production method. I believe that the son has already passed the visit in the morning. I feel that we have nothing to hide in terms of production technology, and the experts sent by our country to your country to guide production technology will not hide their secrets, and will definitely pass on the technology they have mastered to your country."

"But if we talk about difficulties, there will definitely be. I think the most likely difficulties will be in the construction stage. Shizi also saw it in the morning. The construction process of our salt field here is more detailed, which means that the project cost is much higher. I don’t know how much money your country plans to spend on building new salt farms, but it will definitely be a lot of money, and it may affect your country’s planning for this project.”

When it comes to money, the North Koreans have no confidence.Li Luo knew very well that his country's national treasury had been exhausted during this year's war, and the reconstruction expenditure after the war was huge, not to mention the construction of new projects such as saltworks.He remembered that when he went abroad to visit the Datong River, the local area had roughly delineated the area for the construction of the saltworks, but when the construction would start, to put it bluntly, he still had to wait for the money to be in place first.

What Luo Shengdong said was very straightforward. The construction cost of Haihan-style salt farms is much higher than that of traditional salt farms. If North Korea cannot pay for the construction costs, then even if Haihan is willing to teach the production technology, North Korea will still not be able to afford it in the end. Bowl of rice.Whether it can successfully replicate the production and operation method of the Haihan Salt Field depends on whether North Korea can meet the corresponding conditions.

Seeing Li Luo's solemn expression, Luo Shengdong knew that what he said might have hurt the young heir of North Korea, but this was exactly the effect he wanted, so that he could throw life-saving straws to the other party at the right time. .

"Your Majesty, don't feel discouraged. Even if your country has difficulties in developing funds, don't forget who your country's partners are. After your son finishes his inspection and returns to Sanya, he will negotiate more with the adults of the Executive Committee. Find a reasonable solution."

Although Luo Shengdong didn't know that Haihan Bank had already gone to Seoul to discuss the loan development model with North Korean officials, but he had already learned from the accompanying officials yesterday the general outline of the two countries' joint development of salt farms and other projects in North Korea. Knowing the situation, knowing that since the official agreed to cooperate with the North Koreans to operate the salt farm, it must be sure that it is profitable, so the official must have a corresponding plan to solve the problem of insufficient funds of the other party.At this time, it is definitely not wrong to stand up and build momentum for the Executive Committee.

In fact, Li Lu also felt that Luo Shengdong's words made sense. The people of Haihan had great powers, and there might be some way to solve the country's funding problem.Taking a step back, even if the funding problem cannot be solved in the short term, I believe Haihan can come up with a construction plan with a lower cost and lower some technical standards. Anyway, North Korea’s demand for refined salt is not so urgent.

He certainly didn't expect that the Haihan people had long-term plans for this issue, and even less that after he left North Korea, the two countries conducted a series of consultations on the development funds for cooperation projects, and finally urgently needed to revive after the war. The economical North Korea had to choose to compromise on most projects and accept the loan construction plan provided by Haihan.But in this way, the proportion of shares held by the two parties in the cooperation project will also be adjusted, and Haihan will get more benefits from it, so as to ensure the rapid recovery of the funds lent to North Korea.

Tian Zheng also took over the conversation in a timely manner and said: "Our country has been very willing to provide all-round support for the infrastructure projects of our allies for many years. Even if some projects have funding problems in the early stage of development, our country will try our best to give Help. Master Li has been in our country for a long time, and I believe he has heard of some cases in this regard."

Mr. Li mentioned by Tian Zheng naturally refers to Li Xi. After he arrived in Sanya, he has also had close contacts with Fujian and Annan. He must have heard of the many infrastructure cooperation projects between Haihan and these two companies in the past few years. .Tian Zheng asked Li Xilai to answer this question because he thought that Li Min would trust his family more.

Li Xiying said: "I have indeed heard of some of the cases Mr. Tian mentioned, but there are many confidentiality conditions between the two parties, and the inside story is not very clear. I only know that your country does have many overseas cooperative projects, such as salt farms. , ports, mines, etc., if conditions permit in the future, in fact, I really want to go to the field to see the operating conditions of these projects.”

Li Xi responded very politely, but he refused to endorse Tian Zheng's statement. As an envoy of North Korea, he naturally had to consider the interests of his own country, and Haihan's overseas cooperation projects did not have Tian Zheng's expectations. so understand.

Tian Zheng was slightly taken aback, but he didn't expect that his gesture of favor was thrown away with a wink, and the other party didn't accept the move at all.Fortunately, Hong Jingwen quickly took over the words: "It seems that our publicity is not enough to let more people understand the cooperation projects between our country and other friendly countries. way, we need to work harder in this area in the future!"

Hong Jingwen took the initiative to take over the blame, Tian Zheng couldn't help but cast a grateful look, thinking that this person surnamed Hong is knowledgeable and interesting, and he can make friends again in the future.

Zhang Qianzhi said at this time: "When the son went south, he heard that he had been to Zhangzhou and Kaohsiung. In fact, there are many cooperation projects between our country and Ming merchants in these two places. I don't know if the son has visited."

Li Min nodded and replied, "I have indeed been to these two places. Master Xu from Zhangzhou and Master Li from Kaohsiung are quite enthusiastic about me, and took them to see many places. Especially the agricultural development zone near Kaohsiung Port. , It really feels like a land of fish and rice, Master Li said that almost half of the local plantations and farms were built by Ming merchants, which is equivalent to the cooperation between the two countries to develop local agricultural resources."

Li Mo still has a deep impression of the experience of visiting these two places.In fact, he also knew that Haihan's investment in the coast of Fujian was entirely due to his trust in Xu Xinsu, a partner, not because of the close relationship between Haihan and Daming.Seventy-eight out of ten of the Ming businessmen who invested in agricultural projects in Kaohsiung also came from Fujian, where Xu Xinsu was located.

In fact, this model is difficult to apply to the cooperation between Haihan and North Korea, because North Korea’s current conditions, even the development projects on its own land are stretched, and it is almost impossible to invest in the area under Haihan’s rule.Moreover, Haihan's investment projects open to the outside world are mostly for private agricultural projects, and North Korea does not have so many wealthy and capable businessmen investing money overseas.

However, the example Zhang Qianzhi mentioned can at least illustrate one point, that is, Haihan's allies are keen on industrial cooperation precisely because Haihan is a trustworthy partner.Although North Korea has just entered this mode, judging from past successful experience, there should be no need to worry about any bad consequences of cooperation with Haihan.

Li Lu silently summed up everyone's opinions, that is, there may indeed be a funding gap in North Korea, but there is no need to worry about this problem, Haihan will try to help North Korea solve it.As for how to solve it, this group of people didn't mention a word. Li Wei felt that Li Xi should know the answer, but just now Li Xi didn't answer Tian Zheng's topic, and Li Wei felt that maybe Li Xi deliberately avoided talking in front of Haihan officials. And some sensitive content, I wrote it down first, and planned to find a chance to ask Li Xi later.

(End of this chapter)