1627 Rise of the South China Sea

Chapter 496 Consumables
On March 1630, 3, the construction site headquarters located somewhere in the interior of Changhua.

"During the eight-month construction period, more than 500 people died in your hard labor camp, an average of two lives a day!" Tao Donglai looked at the accident record list of the Changhua project, and couldn't help but sigh: "You If this death rate is placed on Tian Du's side, I'm afraid we, the executive committee members in charge of industry, will all have to be dismissed because of it!"

Qiao Zhiya shook his head lightly and said, "Mr. Tao, the situation is different. We can't compare numbers so simply. Tiandu has a strict management system, operating procedures, and medical insurance, but we have nothing here. From Changhua to Shilu Most of this road is constructed in the wild, and the most dangerous and tiring work is also handed over to these hard laborers. We do not have extra medicine and food to ensure their physical condition, and limited resources can only be used as much as possible. It may be used on your own people. You can look at the casualties of the naturalized people since the start of the work, and there are only a dozen people in total so far, at least the loss of the naturalized people is still at an acceptable level."

Tao Donglai said: "About how many people are still on the hard labor at the construction site?"

"280 and three people." Qiao Zhiya immediately reported an accurate number: "The hard labor camp counts the number of people every day and reports them to me. This number is the result of last night's statistics at the end of work."

Tao Donglai was about to speak when a cadre of the naturalized people hurried in and said, "Report to the chief, there was an accident on the construction site, and two hard laborers were hit by stones. The construction site has been temporarily suspended, please give instructions!"

Tao Donglai and Qiao Zhiya looked at each other, and they really said whatever they wanted.Tao Donglai took the initiative to stand up and said, "Since something happened, let's go and have a look!"

The place where the accident happened is not too far from the construction site headquarters. It is more than one mile away and only a few minutes' walk away.When Tao Donglai and Qiao Zhiya arrived at the accident site, it was already separated by a squad of militia soldiers.The one who dealt with the accident at the scene was Anxi, who was temporarily dispatched as a technician. When he saw the two people coming, he just shook his head helplessly and said: "No way, two people were injured, one was dead, and the other was also disabled. .”

The place where the accident happened was a not-too-high soil slope, where the track line from Changhua to Shilu would pass through, so the construction team dug a gap about six meters wide in the middle of the soil slope.However, because the slope walls on both sides of the gap did not have time to be further solidified, as a result, a loose stone fell from the top of the slope today, and the two hard laborers who were constructing the road below were unlucky. Hanged up, the other was hit on the thigh, and now he is still lying on the ground moaning loudly.

Tao Dong came to see the scene and had nothing to blame An Xi for.Although according to the normal operating procedures, the construction should be continued after eliminating the dangerous factors on the construction site, but the construction period for this road is very tight by the Executive Committee. If the standard procedures are followed, the slope walls on both sides of the road should be dealt with first , then the entire project progress may be delayed by three to five days.And Anxi chose to continue building the road while dealing with the slope walls on both sides, also because of the consideration of the construction period.

"President Tao, this has to be dealt with quickly, otherwise it will be a waste of time to put it here." Qiao Zhiya reminded Tao Donglai in a low voice when he saw that Tao Donglai did not express his opinion soon.

Tao Dong came back to his senses and nodded, "Okay, let's deal with it in your usual way."

Qiao Zhiya immediately ordered: "Come here, take away the dead and injured. Coach Anxi, send someone to check if there is any looseness on the top of the slope, and resume work as soon as possible!"

Several laborers quickly carried away the dead and the wounded who were still wailing on stretchers, and another laborer stepped forward to cover the bloodstains at the accident site with floating soil.The supervisors yelled at the nearly [-] hard laborers who were squatting aside and quickly got up, telling them to return to the construction site and start working.

Tao Donglai didn't ask how the two slave laborers who were carried away would be dealt with. In such a wild place, they probably could just find a place to dig a hole and bury the dead.As for the man with a broken leg, it is probably even worse. The medical staff can at most tie a splint to his leg. However, for such a hard labor who cannot work due to an injury, half of the food supply will be deducted. This guy Whether you survive until the day when the bones grow back together depends on luck.

"Something like this happens once or twice a day." Qiao Zhiya said with a wry smile: "These hard laborers are not professional construction workers, and they don't have much sense of self-protection on the construction site. Even if a foreman warns them, they won't be able to save much Moreover, many of them were prisoners of war from South Vietnam, and they probably couldn’t even understand what we said, so we specially recruited a group of naturalized people of Annan origin to work as foremen here and direct them to work. "

Most of the hard labor on this construction site were South Vietnamese prisoners of war sent to Haihan by the Annan court in the name of mortgaging war debts. These southerners could not speak Chinese, and their blood was closer to that of the Malay area People, it is difficult to have a sense of identity and belonging to Haihan, and it is not of great recruiting value to the Executive Committee. Except for a small number of people with experience in sailors and craftsmen who are screened out, most of the prisoners of war are He was sent directly to the labor camp as pure labor.

These people can only get the most basic survival needs in the hard labor camp, and there is no clear sentence. The default is to work until they die. Almost all the foremen from the executive committee to the grassroots regard them as consumables.Although Tao Donglai also questioned Qiao Zhiya before, his starting point was to regard these people as property under Hai Han's name, and he didn't care about their lives.If it can be exchanged for double the speed of infrastructure construction in a similar way, then the executive committee will probably be happy to absorb more of this super cheap labor.

Although this approach is not very humane, the traversers are also very clear that they came to this time and space not to do charity, but to conquer the world. The oppression and killing of the weak will inevitably run through the history of Haihan's gradual expansion , which is an absolutely unavoidable reality.Even if the casualties in the hard labor camp doubled compared to the current level, the executive committee would at best pursue management omissions and slow down the speed of hard labor attrition as much as possible, but it would never question the rationality of this approach, because the establishment of a hard labor camp This matter itself was a decision made by the Executive Committee at the time.

In the new trading plan that Tao Donglai submitted to the Portuguese representative Thomas a few days ago, the independent item "labor force" was impressively added to Haihan's shopping list.At that time, Thomas also asked Tao Donglai what kind of labor force he needed. Tao Donglai's answer was very simple-as long as he had sound limbs and the ability to work like a normal person.As for the price of a single labor force, further negotiations can be made depending on the quantity and quality that Portugal can provide.

Thomas was not an honest man, and he understood Tao Donglai's words—the Haihan people wanted to buy a large number of slaves!This is really finding the right person. The time when the Portuguese started slave trading can almost be equated with the time when they opened up transoceanic routes on the sea. They are really familiar with this.

As early as 1441, a Portuguese expedition led by Antao Gonsalves robbed several African blacks along the coast near Mauritania, and brought them back to Lisbon for sale as slaves. The recorded slave trade begins.In the second half of the 15th century, the Portuguese trafficked a large number of black slaves from West Africa back to China as labor force, and also sold them to work in sugar cane plantations on Atlantic islands such as Madagascar Islands, Canary Islands, and Cape Verde Islands.

A century later, the Portuguese slave business turned to the Americas. Sao Tome Island in the Gulf of Guinea in Africa became the main slave transfer station at that time, and thousands of black slaves were transferred from here to the Americas every year.It was not until 1576 that the Portuguese established a more convenient new transshipment base in Luanda Bay that Sao Tome Island gradually lost its function.

The Portuguese naturally did not forget to bring their traditional business to Asia, but because they did not occupy a large colony in the Far East, there were not many labor-intensive industries such as plantations. The demand for black slaves was very limited.Although even Thomas was accompanied by black slave attendants, the Portuguese never realized that this industry could be marketed to the Haihan people.

It wasn't until Tao Donglai brought up the matter on Haihan's behalf that Thomas realized that he hadn't realized that Haihan's need for labor was so urgent.He only knew that the Haihan people started another extremely large engineering project on the west side of Qiongzhou Island, so that almost all the engineering and technical personnel and slaves in the labor camp were transferred away from Sanya. But judging from Haihan’s request, it is obvious that Some labor cannot meet their engineering needs, so they have to find ways to obtain more cheap labor from other means-such as buying directly from the Portuguese.

Tao Donglai even hinted on the spot that he could consider exchanging weapons for labor, which is definitely a suggestion worthy of serious consideration for Portugal.After all, the cost of capturing slaves in Africa is extremely low, and it must be much more cost-effective than buying Haihan weapons with real money.After that, Thomas sent people to Malacca to deliver a letter, entrusting the Goa colony on the Indian Peninsula to collect a batch of black slaves locally and send them to Sanya as soon as possible, which is at least much faster than capturing a batch from Africa.

Of course, even if it starts from Goa, it will take about half a year for the first batch of slaves to arrive after the news comes and goes. Therefore, before that, all kinds of critical manual labor at various construction sites in Haihan still have to be done. Rely on the labor force of the hard labor camp to withstand it.Although the loss rate due to various accidents is quite high, as Qiao Zhiya said earlier, at least the casualty rate of the naturalized people is controlled at a relatively low level, which is what the Executive Committee compares One of the important indicators.

Within a week after this industrial accident, four more slaves died on various construction sites along the Changhua-Shilu traffic line.One of them died of illness, one was shot dead on the spot by the militia while trying to escape, and the remaining two lost their lives from serious work-related injuries—they accidentally fell into the water at the construction site of the Changhua River Railway Bridge and were directly washed away by the river. Gone, their bodies were found two days later on a river beach downstream.

In mid-March, Tao Donglai left Changhua Port and returned to Shengli Port.There is still half a month to go before the third anniversary of crossing, and this has become one of the main festivals celebrated every year in the Haihan area. The executive committee has a lot of preparations to be arranged in advance, and Tao Donglai must also Go back to your post to preside over the overall situation.

In addition, the main leaders of various agencies stationed abroad will return to Victory Harbor during this period to perform their annual debriefing tasks.The main members of the executive committee will basically not go out during this period, and they will stay in Shengli Port to participate in the discussion of various plans for the next year.

However, before the anniversary celebrations came, the steam engine operators and maintenance personnel who made the Navy look forward to the stars and the moon were finally in place. The "Majesty" announced the advent of the era of steam warships with a loud whistle in the early morning-this is better than the world. The first steam-assisted power warship on the sea, the "Napoleon" built by the French in 1849 was more than two centuries ahead of schedule.

When the "Majesty" sailed away from the military port wharf with soot coming from its chimney, many people on the civilian wharf on the other side looked straight at it—this big ship obviously didn't raise its sails, so how could it still be on the sea? sailing?There is also the black smoke constantly spewing out from this ship, could it be that there is a fire?
When the "Majesty" sailed out of Victory Harbor, Tom Wang always had a faint smile on his face.As one of the main forces promoting the steam warship plan, Wang Tom enjoys this hard-won pleasure very much.Another sister ship of the same class, the "Weifeng" warship, will also officially join the navy within the first half of the year.These two new warships representing the highest level of combat power of the militia navy will be stationed in Victory Port and the newly completed South Port of Hong Kong Island respectively, and will become the flagships of the two fleets in the Sanya and Pearl River Estuary waters.

Of course, it is not all good news in terms of shipbuilding. Due to the high cost of building this new type of warship, the executive committee has ordered to suspend the construction of the third steam-assisted power battleship-this third ship was originally It should be allocated to the navy stationed in Annan, but because the civil war in Annan has come to an end, the Executive Committee believes that it seems a bit wasteful to station such a powerful force in the Indochina Peninsula, and several ports in the south have just started construction. If they come out, they can only be stationed in the north where wars will not break out, and the actual effect it can play is not great.

(End of this chapter)