I want to be emperor

The train was clanging on the island of Ceylon, and the locomotive was still dragging white smoke. Luo Zhixue was sitting in the armored carriage at the back of the special train, looking at the mountains outside through the small glass window.

There is nothing special about the mountains and fields of Ceylon, except that the plants are different from the native plants.

But some of the towns the train passes along the way look no different from the local places.

The Dachu Empire had operated Ceylon Island for many years and established a large number of immigrant settlements here. Some of these settlements gradually developed into towns and finally became prefectures and counties because of their better transportation locations or special mineral resources.

It's just that the most typical feature of these towns as a whole is that the buildings are relatively low. However, this is not because the towns on the island of Ceylon are not developing well, but because the island of Ceylon is an overseas territory. Although it has a population of two to three million But for the entire island of Ceylon, it still seems vast and sparsely populated.

In addition, many inland cities are either resource cities or ordinary population gathering places, and there is not much demand for urban land.

In this way, there will naturally be no so-called "gold and land" situation, and people will naturally not spend a lot of money to build high-rise buildings... There is no need. There is a large area of ​​wasteland next door, so just build an ordinary three- or four-story building. , there is no need to build high-rise buildings that cost many times more.

Although the buildings are not high, with two- and three-story buildings being the mainstream and four- and five-story buildings being rare, the basic things are there.

Many of the main roads are cement pavement, with gas lights on both sides of the street, telegraph wires hanging with wires, and electric lights in some high-end commercial buildings.

This is also due to the rapid development of the Dachu Empire in the past few decades, especially the electrification development in the last decade.

In the past forty years, the Chu Empire's technological progress has been very rapid. Not to mention changes every year, but there will be huge technological changes in three to five years.

This is not to say that the Chu people are smarter and more hard-working... It is simply that after completing the first industrial revolution, the Chu Empire successfully started the second industrial revolution, and the second industrial revolution brought to mankind The changes are huge.

This is also reflected in the second half of the nineteenth century in the original time and space.

In the second half of the 19th century, technological innovation could be said to be very rapid. Taking transportation power as an example, in the 1850s, the steam engine was still in the earliest stage of high-pressure steam engine and could barely be used as a train. Power, vessel power use.

But by the 1894s, the steam engine had become a triple-expansion steam engine. The power increase was so terrifying that it could propel huge ships of to tons. This is not the point. The point is that in the s At that time, steam turbines had already appeared and started to be used in practical applications. The first ship using steam turbines was launched in . After that, the development of warships gradually entered the era of steam turbines... Steam turbines have been used on large warships. By the st century, the latest American Ford aircraft carriers were still using steam turbines... but the coal-fired boilers for boiling water had become nuclear reactors.

Nuclear reactors plus steam turbines are the preferred power source for super warships of the largest power in the 21st century, while oil-fired boilers plus steam turbines are the preferred power source for large warships of the second most powerful country.

Secondly, in the civilian field, such as thermal power stations, steam turbines are still the only feasible method of thermal power generation.

The steam turbine is actually a variant of the steam engine...the essential principle is actually the same: boil water!

And until the 21st century, humans still have not found a more efficient way to convert energy than boiling water!

The Da Chu Empire has accumulated considerable achievements in the field of boiling water after decades of development. The three-expansion and four-cylinder steam engines have become very mature and are widely used in the fields of warships and civilian ships... and are also used in In the electrical industry that is currently developing: power generation.

At the same time, the development of power in the second half of the 19th century was not only the development of the steam engine, but also the internal combustion engine!

Industrial gas engines, gasoline engines and diesel engines were all invented and put into practical use in the second half of the 19th century.

This was the case in the original time and space, and it was similar here in the Chu Empire.

Because the success of many things does not actually depend on the designer's inspiration and ingenious design, but on things that appear naturally after the basic technology reaches a certain level.

For example, the Dachu Empire started working on internal combustion engines in the 1930s, but there was little progress. They only built a gas engine, and they went the wrong way.

However, after entering the 1940s, the development of internal combustion engines was extremely rapid, and gasoline engines and even diesel engines were soon developed.

why?

Because in the late 1930s, the Chu Empire began to develop its oil industry and then refined gasoline and diesel.

This thing about a gasoline engine... there is gasoline first, and then there is a gasoline engine!

Otherwise, there would be no gasoline engine even with gasoline.

In addition, we need to develop a gasoline engine. The early primitive gasoline engines can also use hot tube ignition, but this thing has almost no use value... and if you want the gasoline engine to have actual use value, you have to develop electronic ignition.

And this thing needs the support of electrical technology... If you don't even have electrification technology, you can't even think about making a gasoline engine.

And with electrification, you can basically say that you have entered the second industrial revolution.

Later generations often say that the representative products of the second industrial revolution are the internal combustion engine and electrification applications... But in fact, the gasoline engine in the internal combustion engine is also part of the electrical application.

Unless it is a diesel engine... Early diesel engines did not require any electrical technology. You only need to pass the raw materials and processing, and be able to produce a cylinder that can withstand compression ignition. Then you can build a diesel engine... But the requirements for basic technology are much higher than Electrification is still high.

The electrification application of the second industrial revolution brought huge innovations to the power industry...Gasoline engines and electric motors are typical representatives.

The development of these basic industries has brought higher productivity, and higher productivity and technological development have brought various power application products.

Such as motors used in industrial production or other equipment, as well as refrigerators, electric fans, telegraphs, trams or trolleybuses, lights, elevators, etc. that people can see.

When these electrified products appear, they will bring about a substantial increase in productivity...the production capacity of various industrial products will be greater, and better industrial products can be processed.

The first-generation electric automatic multi-axis machine tool introduced to the market by Hantian Machinery Company uses electric motors as the power source, replacing the previous steam engine power source... This can save complex and expensive transmission and transmission systems, reduce costs, and can also be more accurate. The processing of parts is even higher, and the production efficiency is even higher.

After their first-generation electric automatic multi-axis machine tool was introduced to the market, it directly triggered a wave of collective replacement in the industry...

Especially for some high-tech companies that have strong demand for high-end processing equipment, they are very eager for Hantian Machinery Company's first electric automatic multi-axis machine tool, and they can't wait to throw a check directly into the face of Hantian Machinery Company's sales staff. , and then snatched the machine tool directly home... Unfortunately, the output of this epoch-making new machine tool is extremely limited. Even if the price is extremely expensive, many people are pursuing it. It is a typical wolf with more meat but less meat. Ordinary companies cannot buy it even if they have money. arrive.

This made Li's Machine Tool Company, which was the first to officially launch electric machine tools on the market, very unhappy... Obviously they were the first to develop electric machine tools, but the fattest meat was still eaten by Hantian Machinery Company. .

But there is nothing that can be done about it. The technology of Hantian Machinery Company is wherever it is, and the machine tools they make are better. Even if they are sold more expensively, many companies will pay for them.

On the other hand, other machine tool companies, including Li's Machine Tools, are not doing well. If they can't survive, they will rely on the so-called cost-effective competition on mid-range machine tools.

Unlike Hantian Machinery Company, every time they launch a top-notch new product on the market, they never talk about cost performance. They don’t even bother to compare with other companies’ machine tool products on the market!

The objects of comparison are all our previous generation products, such as how much the processing accuracy has been improved, how much the processing efficiency has been improved, how much the overall cost has been reduced, how much the efficiency has been increased, etc.

And what's very interesting is that even if they launch new products, the previous generation, or even the products of the previous generation, can still occupy a large amount of high-end market share.

In the current high-end machine tool market in the Dachu Empire, the top ten products by sales are all products of Hantian Machinery Company... Some of them are even old products launched on the market in the 1930s.

Otherwise, why do you think Hantian Machinery Company can monopolize more than 80% of the profits in the general machine tool market!

It relies on the top technical level. Even the high-end machine tools produced more than ten years ago can still beat the so-called latest high-end machine tools of other machine tool companies in the 47 years of Chengshun.

Although other machine tool companies such as Lee's Machine Tool Company have only been able to make a living in the mid-to-low-end market, they have never stopped their efforts to enter high-end machine tools. Every once in a while, Lee's Machine Tool Company will introduce their so-called high-end machine tools to the market. Products... Although they failed to sell a few units each time and suffered huge losses, they never stopped developing high-end machine tools.

The fierce competition among these large domestic enterprises has in turn promoted the rapid development of the overall technology of the Dachu Empire... Without the competition from these machine tool enterprises, the domestic industry would not have been able to use electric motors on a large scale in just a few years. , electric equipment such as electric lights, thus bringing about a substantial increase in productivity.

The substantial increase in productivity has been directly reflected in many civilian industrial products and changed people's lifestyles.

This is fully reflected even on the island of Ceylon.

Even though there are no electrification companies or other large-scale companies on the island of Ceylon, it can still benefit directly from the rapid development of new local industries.

Local companies can also purchase advanced equipment for production, and local people can also use various electrification products.

This ultimately led to the fact that the Ceylon Island that Luo Zhixue saw was generally not much different from the local small towns, and the local people's lifestyle was not much different from the local people.

Technology is something that can completely change people’s lifestyles!

Of course, the premise is that this place must be a territory directly under the jurisdiction of the Dachu Empire. If it is an administrative territory, it will be different, not to mention those colonies.

The Dachu Empire had very strict controls on technology exports.

In addition to the unrestricted territories, administrative territories and colonies are subject to strict technology export restrictions.

Even in a directly-controlled territory, it doesn't mean that you can do whatever you want. The purchase and use of many sensitive equipment require approval.

For example, some mechanical equipment that can be used for the production of rifled guns, especially the mechanical equipment for artillery production, cannot be purchased by just any factory. It needs special approval... Of course, as long as your factory is in the territory directly under the Central Government. , and it has formal and necessary uses, and if it cooperates with supervision, general applications can be approved.

But administrative territories are different.

Administrative territory is actually a type of colony of the Great Chu Empire. In addition to Chu people, there will also be a large number of indigenous people in the administrative territory. Not to mention sensitive equipment cannot enter these places, even ordinary industrial development Restricted.

As for those vassal states, protectorates, or economic colonies, the restrictions are even greater. Except for specially approved transportation, procurement, agriculture and other specific fields, these enterprises must be wholly owned by Chu people. Except for the specific equipment needed by companies with shares and actual control that can be approved, other industries cannot expect to be able to import these advanced equipment from Chu State.

Even the most primitive steam engine is currently an export restricted product and is not allowed to be sold to any indigenous people.

Therefore, the way of life in the administrative territories is actually relatively traditional... As for the indigenous people in the vassal countries, their way of life has not changed much from before...

But it's not that they didn't get benefits. In fact, even these natives also got certain benefits from the development of the Chu Empire... that is, at least they can wear clothes. Although they still don't have enough to eat, at least there are Chu people. Plenty of cheap food for sale to keep you fed.

The textile industry of the Great Chu Empire is still developing rapidly and on a large scale...To put it bluntly, the global indigenous people...well, maybe except for some indigenous people in the interior of Africa who are still closed and have not communicated with the outside world, the clothes worn by other indigenous people, All made in the state of Chu.

In terms of eating, the Chu people's large-scale promotion of high-yield foods such as potatoes and corn has also brought great benefits to these indigenous people... because on a global scale, food production capacity has increased significantly.

Although the Chu people eat a lot and consume a lot, 700 million people consume almost most of the world's food... but the little food scraps that the Chu people leak out can also keep these natives satisfied.

After all, the Chu people also need these indigenous people to work alive, to plant various economic crops or for breeding, mining, road construction, etc.

The Chu people needed these indigenous laborers for labor production, and then harvested the surplus value of their labor through trade. Naturally, they would not let them starve to death easily.

From this point of view, the economic colonization of the Chu people brought certain benefits to the people at the bottom of the vassal states.

Of course, the benefits are limited... After all, the people of Chu are not here to do charity. Although their behavior is better than those European colonists who directly set up slave plantations, it is also limited.

Even... through international trade, the dumping of industrial products in exchange for agricultural and mineral resources is even more secretive, and the indigenous people don't even see any problems...

We Chu people are not exploiting you directly, it is your bosses and landlords who are exploiting you... I, the people of Chu, have nothing to do with you working so hard and not having enough to eat!

In this way, most of the lower-class natives will not blame the Chu people for their hunger... They can't even come into contact with the Chu people!

Who can they blame? The local owners of the means of production, that is, the local ruling class... But they basically don't know that the ruling classes in these indigenous vassal states are all agents supported by the people of Chu in order to better plunder economic benefits!

The Chu people have done a good job in maintaining their image, and even in the eyes of quite a few indigenous people who have come into contact with the Chu people, the Chu people are a group of civilized, polite, and friendly people from a great country.