I want to be emperor

Chapter 935 European Governor
At the same time, the Chu army continued to attack cities and territories along the Mediterranean coast. In the process, some small countries chose to submit, while others chose to resist and were eventually killed by the Chu army.

It seems a little more troublesome, but the progress is not slow at all.

By the middle of the 40th year of Chengshun, the Italian peninsula had basically fallen into the hands of the Chu Empire, and Chu had accepted and supported several new kingdoms in these areas.

At this time, the Great Chu Empire began to cause trouble in the Holy Roman Empire again... In response to this alliance country with a relatively large land area and a large population, but internal chaos, the Great Chu Empire used both war and diplomatic methods... In the end, the Holy Roman Empire The titular emperor of the Roman Empire, the Habsburg dynasty of Austria, still chose to surrender.

The market was opened to the Chu Empire while retaining some rights in the early stage.

The Polish and Lithuanian side did not lag too far behind. The rebels in the Lithuanian region had begun to sweep through the northern region in the spring and moved towards the center.

Poland and Lithuania have actually been divided between north and south, and the southern regions are constantly losing.

At this time, they had to accept a series of conditions proposed by the Great Chu Empire, giving up territorial sovereignty over the northern region, recognizing the newly established Kingdom of Lithuania, and liberalizing the market at the same time.

By this time, all regions in central and western Europe had basically opened their markets, either actively or by force.

The Dachu Empire also formally established European governors in Europe to oversee colonial affairs in Europe and North Africa.

A considerable number of indigenous countries within the jurisdiction of European governors were colonies directly controlled by the Chu State, and the original aristocratic system was purged on a large scale. In all likelihood, such as Spain, Portugal, France, the United Kingdom, and later parts of Germany.

There are also some places that have opened their markets and accepted the Chu advisory group, but retained part of their sovereignty. At the same time, the king and nobles also retained their indigenous countries, such as the Netherlands, Denmark, Sweden, Lithuania, Poland, and Austria. areas.

At this time, the Chu Empire had not yet been completely controlled, and there were only two major countries left in Europe, namely the Ottomans and Russia.

The cooperative relationship between the empire and the Ottomans was pretty good before, but that was before. Sooner or later, the Ottomans will have to be taken down in the future. Not to mention anything else, but Luo Zhixue knows very well that Egypt and the peninsula will definitely be taken down in the future. , after all, canals can be dug in Egypt. With the canals, the empire's control over Europe can be strengthened.

As for the peninsula, there is oil there...that's the reason enough.

When the empire deals with the Ottoman issue, the European areas currently controlled by the Ottomans, mainly the Balkans, will naturally fall under the control of Chu.

In general, there is not much problem with Osman!

On the Russian side... the problem is also not big, and it is also a problem that the Chu people have prioritized to solve in the near future.

This country has actually been in a state of war with the Chu Empire. Although the war between the two sides has long since ended, the Russians gave up all the territory east of the Ural Mountains and withdrew to the west of the Ural Mountains. They have repeatedly tried to negotiate with the Great Chu Empire. The Chu Empire held peace talks and officially ended the war.

But the Dachu Empire ignored them... Because for many people in the Dachu Empire, the continued westward expansion is not over yet. The reason why they are not fighting now is purely because the logistical pressure of continuing to expand westward is too great. They have been Waiting for the completion of the Central Asian railway network.

With the construction of the Central Asian Railway all the way to the Ural Mountains, the Chu Empire has actually had the idea of ​​continuing to move westward in recent years, crossing the Ural Mountains and taking over Eastern Europe.

This composition is something that the Army has always been obsessed with. Not only is the Army obsessed with it, but there are actually many people in the civilian system who support continuing to advance westward to capture the Eastern European plains.

Mainly because the civil servants learned that the fertile land in the Eastern European plains was very suitable for large-scale food cultivation.

In recent years, the Chu Empire's internal governance direction and many policies actually have only one core goal, which is to obtain more food and increase the per capita food level.

Four hundred kilograms of grain per capita, this is the slogan that the monarchs and ministers of the Chu Empire have been chanting for more than 20 years!
Therefore, after learning that the Eastern European plains were extremely suitable for attaching importance to food, especially for mechanized cultivation, the Da Chu Empire also wanted to capture this area.

It is not used as a colony, but after it is taken down, the immigrants will be expelled and the indigenous people will be expelled to carry out large-scale agricultural development, just like in North America.

This is the reason why the Chu Empire has never formally ceased war with Russia.

Now that the Central Asian Railway has been built to the Ural Mountains and the logistical problems have been initially solved, the Dachu Empire is already thinking about launching a new round of Western Expedition.

Russia under such circumstances is likely to continue to exist in the future... After all, the Chu people actually have little interest in the territories in northern Russia. What the Chu people want is only southern Eastern Europe, that is, the north of the Caspian Sea and the north of the Caucasus. , this large area of ​​arable land on the north side of the Black Sea has a good climate, flat terrain, and fertile land!

As for the cold and freezing places in the north, the Chu people actually don't have much interest... The area east of the Ural Mountains has a huge Siberian area.

To be honest, the people of Chu are disgusted when they look at this rotten land.

If you don't develop it, you'll still have your own place, but if you develop it, the cost will be too high, and transportation will be a big problem.

Although the railway technology of the Dachu Empire is also good, it does not have the ability to build large-scale railways on the frozen soil plateau...or it cannot guarantee the continued operation of railways on such frozen soil plateaus.

Because of that poor place, it seems to be solid frozen soil in winter, but when the rainy season comes in summer, it will turn into a swampy area... It is difficult to build railways or roads.

Therefore, in the past 20 years, the Chu State's rule in Siberia seemed to have established several provinces and several cities, but in fact the progress was very small, and the main development areas were also in southern Siberia, such as Kurdistan. Places like Ercheng and further north have very little opening up.

In addition, in the past ten years, the population of the Chu Empire has not exploded like the previous 30 years, but has entered a relatively stable period of population growth.

The current population of the Chu Empire has reached [-] million. Although it will continue to grow in the future, according to statistical estimates, the future population growth rate will not be as exaggerated as before.

Because most families no longer have four, five or even more children as they did in the past. Today’s families generally have two or three children.

The reason why there are fewer children but the population growth rate is still relatively high is because medical conditions continue to improve, the mortality rate of children has dropped significantly, many children successfully survive to adulthood, and the average life span of adults has also increased significantly. From around 30 years old during the Unification War, he has risen to over 40 years old.

Nowadays, the average life span of the Great Chu Empire is reaching 50 years old.

It is worth mentioning that the mortality rate of children has decreased and the proportion of children who survived to adulthood has greatly increased. This is also one of the important reasons why people in Chu do not have so many children.

In the past, the reason why many Chu people often had four, five or even seven or eight children was because quite a few children actually did not live to adulthood. In order to ensure that their children would live to adulthood, people would choose to have more children to ensure that At least one child survived to adulthood.

But now people find that having two or three children is enough, so the number of births will naturally decrease.

Of course, this is only one of the reasons. There are too many factors that affect the birth rate, including living standards, medical standards, education levels, and many other factors.But in any case, after experiencing a population surge in the early stage of industrialization, the Chu Empire has now entered a relatively stable period of low-speed population growth.

This also prevents the situation that many people worried about in the early years that Chengshun will exceed one billion people in 50 years, and then eat up all the food and cause a great famine.

Even if it is an optimistic estimate, it may take another 30 to [-] years for the Chu Empire to reach a population of one billion.

And 30 years later, I am afraid that what the Chu Empire needs to worry about at that time is not that the birth rate is too high, but that the birth rate is too low...

This is a population curve experienced by all industrial countries in the original time and space! (Immigration is not considered)

Without exception!

This is also the reason why there were a large number of immigrants in European and American countries in later generations. Because the local white people no longer liked having children, those capitalists and politicians began to introduce immigrants on a large scale in order to obtain enough cheap labor.

As for whether this situation will happen in the Dachu Empire... this is unlikely!
Because when there is international competition, cheap labor is needed... and the Dachu Empire has no international competitors.

The Chu Empire did not allow those indigenous countries to retain weapons handicraft workshops and cotton spinning workshops... let alone allow them to maintain any industrial system.

How could they compete with Chu if they didn't even have industry?
With no competitors and a large number of colonies to supply nutrients, the Chu Empire will not need to consider the issue of cheap labor for many years to come!

For an economic system that is dominated by the domestic demand market and supported by many external colonies, what needs to be considered is not external competition, but an internal virtuous cycle.

This is also an extremely special situation of the Dachu Empire. There is no reference for such a special empire in the past history, including the history of the original time and space.

This also led to the fact that many policies in the Chu Empire, especially economic policies, were very different from those of modern countries in the original time and space, or even completely opposite.

Faced with this situation, as the emperor of the empire, Luo Zhixue, the helmsman of the entire empire, even sometimes has trouble making a choice. He is also in a dilemma when formulating some policies. It is difficult to make the right choice based on the empire's own situation!

Because he does not know what is correct and cannot find the correct reference in history or the original time and space in modern times.

It is also difficult for him to accurately judge what effect a policy will have on the future after its implementation.

Although he can control the positive effects of these policies in a short period of time, what if he extends the time to ten or 20 years?

This is the case with the 'grain production support plan' that has been jointly discussed by multiple cabinet departments for more than two years and revised many times. Although it looks good in a short period of time, who knows what negative impact it will have in a few years?
What's more, although the people who formulate these policies are all elites in the empire, and there are many people involved, they cannot think of all aspects. Some people even think of certain negative consequences, but don't care, or even deliberately let these negative effects go.

Because everyone has their own interests and interests, and there are often conflicts between interests.

The food production support plan sounds like a good name, and the prospects seem wonderful... But to be honest, such a huge plan inevitably contains various exchanges of interests, selfish motives of some people, etc.

Luo Zhixue can detect some of these, but some he really can't see... After all, he is not a perfect person, let alone a robot, and he cannot even master all the information.

Therefore, when the plan was submitted, Luo Zhixue could only make judgments based on some information he knew, but what about what he didn't know?
He could not judge, and he was not even aware of the hidden dangers that some of the clauses might hide.

This is also the problem Luo Zhixue faces when dealing with government affairs, especially when dealing with some major government affairs. It is difficult for him to make correct judgments as before, well, at least what he thinks is correct.

Under such circumstances, Luo Zhixue had to collect more information and use some indirect methods to verify the information.

The grain production support plan was repeatedly rejected by Luo Zhixue and re-established by the cabinet, which is the product of this kind of thinking.

In fact, Luo Zhixue had rejected this plan many times before without any clear reason for his objection. He simply rejected the plan and then observed the reactions of his ministers... Are they happy or unhappy?
Then analyze it based on the personal interests of these happy or unhappy ministers and the groups they represent behind them.

In other words, Luo Zhixue doesn't care whether this is right or not. He wants to see who is opposing it and who is supporting it.

After all, ministers can deceive people, but the interests they represent will not deceive people.

After several rejections, Luo Zhixue figured out the complex exchange of interests. After compromise, when he looked at the grain production support plan, he could see many things that he had not seen before, or was unaware of.

Then targeted support or suppression was carried out, and finally the new version of the grain production support plan that Luo Zhixue saw today was formed.

But even so, it is still difficult for Luo Zhixue to figure out what impact this plan will have on the long-term future once it is implemented on a large scale.

It's just that Luo Zhixue can't care about things that are too long ago. After all, the food production support plan is imperative. The empire needs more food, and a corresponding food production support plan needs to be introduced. It can no longer be delayed.

At the same time, in the short term, according to Luo Zhixue's judgment, this plan should be able to produce relatively positive effects in the next three to five years. As for five years later... it is expected that problems of one kind or another will arise by then.

However, in the Dachu Empire, there is no such thing as a plan that will remain unchanged forever after it is launched. It can just continue to be modified according to the new situation.

Under such circumstances, in the autumn and August of the 40th year of Chengshun, Emperor Luo Zhixue officially approved the "Grain Production Support Plan". The empire will support the grain production and transportation of the empire's mainland and directly overseas territories from multiple aspects such as policy and financial support. .

Strive to bring the empire's grain production capacity to a new level and break through the four hundred kilograms of grain per capita, a major hurdle that the empire has been fighting for for more than [-] years!
Affected by the introduction of this policy, companies in many industries in the stock market have experienced rises and falls, and even seemingly unrelated shipping companies have experienced increases.

Because part of the grain production support plan is to further reduce grain transportation costs, especially shipping costs, relevant grain transportation subsidies were introduced, and then the stock prices of shipping companies soared!
On the surface, this plan is to reduce the cost of food transportation and increase the supply of food. However, it is not the food industry that benefits the most, but the shipping industry... It's interesting!

This is also the reason why there are many entangled interests, mutual compromises, and even conflicts in the grain production support plan.

Such a huge policy plan contains so many interests and so many stakeholders that even the emperor Luo Zhixue could not figure it out for a while.

We can only observe from many aspects, and finally implement it with the mentality of taking one step at a time and adjusting at any time.

(End of this chapter)