1627 Rise of the South China Sea

Chapter 3957

Chen Pingliao didn't need to worry about purchasing various high-value goods before setting off, because in addition to him and Li Yuande, a large number of Yangzhou salt merchants' sons were also going to sea with him.

These people came from merchant families, and the salt merchants behind them all had extremely keen business acumen. They would never miss such a great opportunity to make money, and they had probably already started purchasing various goods separately.

The Yangzhou salt merchants decided to provide manpower and financial support to the special operations division, with the intention of opening up a westward shipping route and profiting from it. This expeditionary force would serve as a test to see if this westward route possessed the commercial value championed by influential figures like Qian Tiandun and Shi Diwen.

Of course, Li Yuande's reminder to Chen Pingliao might also have been motivated by a desire to prevent the salt merchants' sons from monopolizing the benefits. After all, once these people arrived there, they would immediately become business competitors of Furuifeng and Li Yuande himself. Rather than letting the salt merchants' sons reap all the benefits, it would be better to use them to do Chen Pingliao a favor.

However, what Li Yuande was really worried about was something else: "We are taking so many people from the East China Sea region this time, as well as a large amount of money they are going to invest overseas. Will this make Commander Shi uncomfortable?"

Chen Pingliao said, "This matter was originally arranged by Commander Shi, so how could there be any problem?"

Li Yuande said, "That's true, but Commander Shi may not have anticipated that the scale of the salt merchants' overseas expeditions would be so large. If he changes his mind, it will be a big problem."

Chen Pingliao shook his head and said, "You're overthinking it. Commander Shi is a member of the Executive Committee, and what he does and says doesn't just represent his personal attitude. These salt merchants' sons going overseas with capital must be driven by more important figures behind the scenes. I speculate that the Executive Committee should have a more comprehensive plan to support the Special Operations Division's operations overseas."

There was a discrepancy in Chen Pingliao's words, but Li Yuande certainly wouldn't have noticed it. That discrepancy was not made by him, but by his father, Chen Yixin, who speculated about the Executive Committee's next plan.

Although Chen Yixin was also a member of the Executive Committee, he rarely met with other members of the Executive Committee because he stayed in the north for many years. Therefore, the Executive Committee could only consult Chen Yixin's opinion or inform him of the decision through telegrams on some major issues, making it difficult for him to participate in the real-time discussion.

Before Chen Pingliao went south, Chen Yixin had already revealed some information to him: the Executive Committee would definitely support the Special Operations Division's operations overseas, but the specific measures and力度 (intensity/scale) were still under discussion and no final decision had been made. Allowing the Special Operations Division to issue war bonds domestically to raise military funds was clearly one of these measures.

It was only after Chen Pingliao traveled south to Hangzhou that he learned from Shi Chengxin the details of the East China Sea Region's plan to consolidate the salt business and arrange for the sons of Yangzhou salt merchants to take capital overseas. He then deduced that this was not just Shi Diwen's personal decision, but more likely one of the Executive Committee's practical measures to support the Special Operations Division.

Li Yuande's access to information was naturally far less than Chen Pingliao's, and he was quite gratified after hearing the news: "If the Executive Committee is willing to speak out and clear away all obstacles for the Special Operations Division, that would be the best outcome."

Chen Pingliao laughed and said, "The so-called obstacles are actually just because resources are limited and far from meeting the needs of overseas expansion. Each region wants to receive priority treatment. The Executive Committee cannot fully support the Special Operations Division, so it has turned to civilian forces to participate in this matter as a supplement." Li Yuande said, "But the target that the Special Operations Division is preparing to take down is related to the world situation for the next few hundred years. It can be said to be of particular importance and should be prioritized to enjoy priority treatment."

Chen Pingliao had far more information on this matter than Li Yuande, and patiently explained to him, "That's true, but other regions also have their own advantages. The Southern New World, which is currently being developed by the Luzon and Xingdao regions, is said to be full of various minerals that will be inexhaustible for the next thousand years. Moreover, there are no competitors from the European continent there, so we can say that we have taken the lead and can enjoy the benefits all to ourselves."

"And then there's the North American region across the ocean, which also has a unique natural environment, abundant resources, vast land and sparse population. Its coastal harbors are even better than some of the major ports in China. In another hundred years, it might even develop into a new Jiangzhe region."

Upon hearing this, Li Yuande couldn't help but think to himself that, given the environment of the places occupied by the special operations division along the Indian Ocean coast, it was absolutely impossible to recreate an overseas Jiangsu and Zhejiang region. Fubo Port and Zhenhai Port were not even suitable for large-scale farming, and were hardly livable. It seemed that they were far inferior to the North American region.

As for minerals, according to Li Yuande, the most abundant resource in the Special Forces Division's territory was oil buried deep underground. Although it was said to be incredibly valuable in the future, at least at this stage, oil was far less valuable than metals like gold, silver, copper, and iron. This was evident from the Star Island Region's change of strategy, which shifted resources to the Southern New World.

In this respect, the Special Operations Division's jurisdiction currently does not have any obvious strengths. The only hope lies in the goal set by Qian Tiandun—to occupy the Suez Canal, dig a canal connecting the Mediterranean Sea and the Red Sea, and rely on this unparalleled geographical location to gain a development advantage.

But then he thought that the canal project, which was still in the planning stage, might take more than ten years to see any hope, and he couldn't help but feel a little frustrated.

Chen Pingliao seemed to notice Li Yuande's emotional change, so he comforted him, saying, "General Qian's plans are extremely ambitious and cannot be completed in a year or two. Since we are going to assist him in completing his plans, we must be prepared. Just like General Qian's many arrangements in the Northern Region back then, they only started to bear fruit recently after many years of development."

Chen Pingliao then cited several major projects implemented by Qian Tiandun during his rule in the north as examples, such as the Jinzhou Shipyard, the coal and iron composite industrial base located near the former Liaodong Military Commandery, and the Liaohe River navigation project connecting the Bohai Bay to Shenyang. There were indeed many large-scale infrastructure projects, some of which took one or two decades to see results.

Li Yuande listened with great interest. His understanding of local governance came almost entirely from his experiences following Qian Tiandun overseas. In recent years, his primary goal has been to rapidly expand his territory, so he has not had much experience with large-scale projects like this.

In his view, building an overseas colony like Fubo Port was already a remarkable achievement, but compared to the projects Chen Pingliao was listing at this time, it didn't seem so impressive.

(End of this chapter)