1627 Rise of the South China Sea

Chapter 1938
Although Xue Zheng and the group of people he led were not afraid of death, they also knew that the overall situation should be the top priority in this matter, and it didn't mean that they would complete the task if they surrendered their lives here.Before achieving the purpose of the operation, they all had to carefully hide their identities, so as not to frighten the enemy and make the entire operation plan fail.

The sudden appearance of a group of cavalry made Xue Zheng immediately realize that there was nothing he could do. In desperation, he could only temporarily stop the action and step back to observe the movement.But soon he also noticed that some people began to gather in groups of three or five on the nearby streets. This place is a busy production site, it is impossible to have so many idle people, and it is very likely that they are the plainclothes that the accomplices discovered earlier. .

Xue Zheng felt that the gathering of these people near this workshop might be directly related to the carriage that arrived earlier. There might be some high-ranking Haihan official in the carriage, so the security measures were temporarily strengthened.But the two coke-filled carts they left behind were nearby, and they would probably be discovered by these eyes and ears soon. If they didn't leave here quickly, they might be questioned soon.

Xue Zheng quickly re-evaluated the pros and cons, thinking that it is basically impossible to succeed if he continues to stay, but there is a risk of being exposed. For the present plan, he should evacuate here first and save his strength before making plans.

Xue Zheng issued an order to his subordinates to disperse and evacuate from this place as soon as possible, and rejoin at the port.Because he knew that the three big trucks of coke could no longer be processed at the moment, and these materials were left on the roadside of the industrial area, which would most likely attract follow-up investigations. If they continued to stay nearby, it would be easy for them to listed as suspicious.

In fact, Haihan's security forces responded faster than Xue Zheng estimated. Someone had already found the coke trucks parked in two places, but the porters in charge of transportation were completely missing.Fortunately, the goods transported on this cart can be seen at a glance, and each cart has a unique body number, so it is not difficult to determine the foreman it belongs to and the departure time.

However, the porters in charge of operating this kind of cart are almost all new immigrants who have not yet been naturalized. Generally, they will not register their identity when undertaking this kind of rough work. Whoever dropped the car here ran away.

It will take a certain amount of time to find out the relationship between them. When the relevant departments wanted to find the whereabouts of these irresponsible porters nearby, Xue Zheng and others took advantage of the time difference to leave the field quickly and mixed with a team of empty carts The convoy withdrew from the industrial area.

At the same time, in the Wusan workshop, Li Lu had no idea that there had been a round of secret confrontation targeting him outside. At this time, his attention was all on the big man who had just arrived——Beks, the executive committee member. One of the high-ranking officials of Haihan, the official in charge of the Ministry of Industry of Haihan, is also in charge of the research and development of weapons, and is considered by the outside world to be the creator of many advanced weapons of Haihan.

As far as North Korea is concerned, Beks actually has another experience related to them, that is, he visited Liaodong in 1636 and personally organized and participated in the three-nation talks between Haihan, Ming and North Korea, which paved the way for the establishment of new diplomatic relations among the three parties. the way.Haihan later successfully concluded an alliance with North Korea, of course Beks contributed a lot.

On the day of Li Lu's arrival in Sanya, he had a brief meeting with this high-ranking Haihan official, and then Bai Kesi went to Danzhou on a business trip to handle official business.Today, I stopped by Changhua on the way back to Sanya from Danzhou to inspect the operation of several new local production units. However, this was a temporary trip, and Qiao Zhiya was not notified before this.After he disembarked, he learned that Qiao Zhiya was accompanying the son of Joseon to visit the industrial area, so he also came to join in the fun. Half of the cavalry escorting him were from the local establishment, and the other half were Beks' exclusive guards.

Of course, Bai Kesi didn't expect his impromptu action at all, and unintentionally foiled an assassination plan against the son of Joseon. The purpose of his coming here to meet with the son of Joseon was just to take this opportunity to make Li Min look at it from a higher perspective. To understand the long-term significance of cooperation between the two countries on industrial projects.To put it simply, it is to paint a cake for Li Mo, so that he can realize the many benefits of long-term industrial cooperation with Haihan.

"Your Majesty, it does take a lot of resources and time to build an industrial zone like Changhua, but please believe me, all the effort is worth it. As long as your country can persevere in the development of industry, it will take one or two generations People's time can become a regional power. At that time, whether it is the Qing Dynasty, Japan, or even the Ming Dynasty, they will give your country enough respect! It is not because your country is an ally of our country, but because your country's national strength has become worthy of the word "powerful country!"

Bai Kesi's words were quite provocative, and Li Mo, who was already shocked by Changhua's large-scale metal smelting and processing industry, was even more yearning for the so-called "Haihan-style industrialization".Of course, he has only a vague concept of the development model advocated by senior officials in Haihan. As for how to realize the prosperity of the country through industry, he can only think of the application in the military field for the time being, but this does not prevent him from giving birth to The idea of ​​"I can do it if I do it", after all, Hai Han Guo has already set an example, and it can be emulated. Aren't Hai Han's hard-core allies such as Annan and Fujian doing such a thing?
As for Bai Kesi's mention of using one or two generations to realize the dream of becoming a strong country in North Korea, Li Min's understanding of this is more simple and straightforward-the father king Li Zhen counts as one generation, and the generation after he succeeds to the throne is counted as a generation. It is hoped that this goal will be achieved during his term of office.

Of course, Li Wei also knew that his father, Li Yu, was in his prime at this time, and he was in his prime, so it would be impossible for him to abdicate for a while.It will probably take several years to realize the succession of the great unification.However, Li Jing's administration is relatively conservative, and he may not have the determination to invest a lot of money in industrial projects for a long time, so he probably has to figure out a way to persuade his father to change his mind.

In fact, the attitude expressed by Bai Kesi was similar to that of Qiao Zhiya, but as a senior official of the Executive Committee, Bai Kesi's position and authority were higher than Qiao Zhiya's, so what he said would naturally be regarded as representing the attitude of the Executive Committee.

For Li Lu, the main purpose of this visit to Haihan is twofold. One is to broaden his horizons and learn from Haihan's knowledge in those advanced fields. Also fully supported by Haihan.This second purpose naturally includes large-scale projects in industrial fields such as salt fields, shipyards, mineral mining, and metal smelting.

Although the two countries had already reached an agreement on the cooperative development of these projects before Li Min set off from North Korea, even the construction land was circled, and the construction would start after the funds were in place. Due to the current situation and level of the industry, Li Mo took the initiative to apply for such a field trip after arriving in Sanya.Although Changhua is only the second stop of this investigation, Li Mo can basically confirm based on what he has seen and heard that Haihan's management level in these industrial projects has far exceeded expectations. It is even more different.

Then try to win the technical support provided by Haihan as much as possible, so that the level of operating these industries in the country will be closer to that of Haihan, which is the goal that Li Wei is striving for now.As the industry official of Haihan State, Bai Kesi's statement has a different meaning to North Korea.

Li Luo absorbed every word and every word that Beks said into his ears, and kept it in his heart, especially the word "powerful country", which greatly stimulated him.North Korea has been bullied by foreign enemies for decades. Generations of rulers have been thinking about making the country stronger and crushing the enemies who invaded North Korea. But until now, it seems that they have really seen the future The possibility of wish becoming reality.

At this time, the cavalry on duty outside the workshop also noticed that the difficult porters had disappeared at some point, and even left the cart of coke and ran away.However, they are not professional security personnel, and they did not realize the potential crisis in the first place. It was not until the news that two other trucks of unowned coke were found nearby that someone familiar with the situation in the industrial zone finally noticed something was wrong— —These cokes can only get the receipt number plate after unloading in the workshop. Without the receipt number plate, these porters can’t get a penny of remuneration. The three cars of coke were delivered by manpower, at least a dozen people, so many It must be unreasonable for everyone to give up their wages.

Where are the dozen or so porters? Why did they just leave after leaving the goods?A reasonable guess is that they have more important things to do than wages, but for these low-level porters who have not even applied for Haihan nationality, what is more important than wages for subsistence Woolen cloth?
Unless...they are not porters who need to sell their labor for a living.

After figuring out the key point, the military officer in charge of peripheral security immediately ordered the entire E-Zone area to be martial law, mobilized reinforcements from the garrison camp, asked the nearby police to cooperate, and immediately sent people to clean up the surrounding workshops.

In fact, when this series of orders were issued, Xue Zheng and his gang hadn't even left the industrial area, but the officer in charge of the security work only thought that these disappeared porters might be hiding somewhere nearby to plot evil, so Bai Mi Yi Shu did not give the order. Immediately block the passages in and out of the industrial area, leaving a passage for Xue Zheng and his gang to escape from here.

Soon Zhang Qianzhi and Gai Liangcai in the workshop also received the news, Gai Liangcai hurriedly left, gathered his men outside, and directed them to arm themselves.Although there is no evidence so far that this is a conspiracy against important people in the workshop, it is always a good idea to deploy defensive measures first.

Qiao Zhiya also received a report from his subordinates at the same time. His experience was obviously richer than that of the officers who commanded the defense outside, so he immediately ordered the expansion of the blockade, and intensified inspections of several entrances and exits in and out of the industrial area.

"Is there something going on outside?" Bex saw soldiers coming in and out to report and ask for instructions, so he also guessed a bit at the moment.

"I'm not sure yet, but it shouldn't be a serious problem. Maybe there are some rotten fish and rotten shrimps who can't help but want to jump a few times... My people are already dealing with it." Qiao Zhiya responded calmly, looking quite Take it easy.

Li Wei is also clever, and he knew that there must be something happening outside, but he didn't think about it at all. After all, the Haihan people didn't publicize their arrival locally, no matter whether they were going to Shilu or in Changhua. The slightly exaggerated welcome ceremony was not organized in the industrial area.The only ones who knew his whereabouts were the accompanying Haihan officials and the local reception organizers.

Of course, the most important reason is that Li Luo does not think that anyone will take him as a target. North Korea has no hostile countries in the South China Sea. The real opponents are all in the far north. It is obviously impossible for the Qing Dynasty to send people all the way to Hainan Island to deal with it. Own.As for the purpose of undermining Haihan's diplomatic relations with North Korea by attacking him, he didn't even consider going in such a deviant direction.

In fact, it wasn't just Li Luo who couldn't think of this direction, basically none of the people present thought that this strange phenomenon was aimed at the North Koreans.Even Gai Liangcai, who directed his subordinates to deploy close defense in the workshop, didn't feel that the situation outside had something to do with Li Mo. At this time, there were two senior officials in the workshop, Beks and Qiao Zhiya, and either of them was more important than the son of Joseon too much.

About ten minutes later, another garrison of an infantry platoon rushed to the outside of the Wusan Workshop, and erected a barricade to temporarily block the traffic in several nearby streets.And the local police have started to search the adjacent workshops, counting the personnel in the workshops one by one to confirm whether there are idlers mixed in.All the porters in the blocked area were gathered together to check their identities and corresponding freight carts, and even those without suspicion were temporarily detained pending further identity checks.

The sudden disappearance of more than a dozen people has never been found, and the scope of the search is also gradually expanding outwards from the Wusan Workshop.At this time, the foreman in charge of delivery at the coke plant has been brought under control, and someone specially assigned to interrogate him.

The foreman never dreamed that disaster would come from the sky, but he didn't really understand why a dozen porters disappeared, and a group of soldiers would suddenly come and arrest him for interrogation.

"Mr. Jun, there are new faces who come here to do odd jobs every day. How can I remember so many people... More than 70 carts of coke were transported from here this morning. Excluding mules and horses, there are at least four more. Fifty carts were pulled by those porters, so there are one or two hundred people!" The foreman desperately explained for himself with a sad face.

"Do you have a record of the goods you sent out here? Hurry up and check the vehicle number!" The soldier in charge of the interrogation threw a piece of paper in front of the foreman, which was the vehicle number of the three scooters: "You Good to remember something, or your troubles are still to come!"

(End of this chapter)