The rise of a great power: starting with military industry

Chapter 1004 Meeting old friends

Hong Kong.

an island.

The island is located about 20 kilometers south of Hong Kong Island in Hong Kong.

There are probably a hundred households on this island, and they have made their living by fishing for generations.

There are several seafood stalls on the island, and this is the favorite place for Hong Kong's wealthy to eat seafood.

You can catch fish and shrimps yourself and let the stall owner prepare them for you; you can also order seafood from the stalls, which have the freshest seafood.

The seafood here includes both common and expensive ones.

The method is not very complicated, mainly steaming or boiling soup.

The main feature is the freshness of seafood.

Today Liu Tao brought his guests here to entertain them.

"Al, Rashid, my friend, long time no see!" Liu Tao poured a glass of wine for both of them.

Their friendship has lasted for almost twenty years!

Compared to those days, they have all changed a lot.

The Panshan Group headed by Liu Tao has become an extremely large behemoth.

Al and Rashid have also become top figures in Iraq. Al is still the Iraqi Foreign Minister, traveling around for Iraq's interests, while Rashid is the number one person in the Iraqi army.

There is both friendship and interests between them.

Al and Rashid's families are among the top five families in Iraq.

Both of their children are developing in China.

Following the turmoil in Africa and Southeast Asia, the Balkan Peninsula is now also in chaos.

International crude oil prices fell instead of rising, because of the slowdown in world economic growth, causing international crude oil prices to fall to a low of US$9 per barrel.

In oil-producing countries such as Latin America, oil companies suddenly went bankrupt, stopped production and went bankrupt.

Middle Eastern oil is exported at $9 per barrel, so there is still some profit in the Middle East, but Latin America and Africa are in trouble, as they lose money on every barrel produced.

Saddam cursed a lot for this.

The Southeast Asian financial crisis in 1997 hit not only the financial sectors of Southeast Asian countries and Japan and South Korea, but also major oil-producing countries.

You know, after going through untold hardships, Iraq's oil exports finally reached 400 million barrels per day. The oil price fell by $21 per barrel, and Iraq's daily oil revenue decreased by $8400 million, which means an annual loss of $306.6 billion.

But even so, Iraq still has to export oil because of the reconstruction after the Gulf War. Iraq is heavily in debt and needs oil revenue to repay its debts.

Panshan Group is Iraq's largest oil importer.

Most of the oil exported by Iraq is imported by Panshan Group.

The two sides have extensive cooperation.

Al's family owns the largest telecommunications company in Iraq. The telecommunications business alone is enough to make the Al family a lot of money every year.

The Rashid family is the largest engineering contractor in Iraq. A large part of Iraq's post-war reconstruction work was won by the Rashid family and then subcontracted to China Construction Group or other China Construction companies.

At the same time, the Rashid family is also the largest real estate developer in Iraq.

The cooperation between the two sides has always been a pleasant one.

This time the two of them came to China, they first arrived in Hong Kong, and Liu Tao naturally had to entertain his two good friends well.

After three rounds of drinks, they started talking about business.

However, as Iraq's post-war reconstruction work progressed, Iraq's economy has recovered greatly, and Saddam wanted to rebuild a strong Iraqi army. The Iraqi army was severely damaged in the Gulf War.

In order to protect himself and rebuild Iraq, Saddam had to humble himself and recognize Saudi Arabia as the leader of the Arab League.

But it doesn’t mean that Saddam was really convinced. On the contrary, he was very unconvinced in his heart.

He never gave up the idea of ​​rearming a powerful army.

Only with a strong army can Iraq have a relatively high international status and Saddam can have a greater voice.

Over the years, Saddam never gave up.

This is the case with Iraq sending a troop into the Afghan coalition every year.

In the Gulf War, the poor performance of Soviet tanks made Saddam extremely disappointed. On the contrary, the excellent performance of China's advanced tanks made Saddam very satisfied.

Of course, in addition to building a powerful tank and armored force, Saddam also wanted to restore a strong air force and navy and strengthen air defense capabilities.

Now the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia has given everyone a living lesson.

Iraq also suffered from air strikes during the Gulf War, so it naturally had to learn lessons. Panshan Group's "Aegis" air defense missile system was Iraq's best choice.

Liu Tao found it unbelievable. Iraq hasn't even started to enjoy a good life yet, but Saddam is already thinking about rearming the Iraqi army?
You know, Iraq’s foreign debt is still more than 200 billion US dollars!
Now that oil prices have fallen, Iraq is having a hard time, after all, the sharp drop in oil revenues is obvious.

Even though a large portion of Panshan Group's natural gas is imported from Iraq, 25% of the hydraulic natural gas transported by Panshan Group every month now comes from Iraq, which brings considerable income to Iraq.

However, when business comes to you, there is no reason to turn it away.

Of course, due to the agreement with the Americans, some weapons cannot be exported to Iraq.

The total value of the military purchases is US$150 billion, and the price has not increased compared to before, but Iraq has to make some concessions on the currency for oil settlement.

Prior to this, the RMB accounted for 50% of Iraq's foreign oil export settlement currencies, the euro accounted for 30%, and the US dollar accounted for 20%!

The euro accounts for 30%, and this was when the euro was born, something Saddam did personally, specifically to disgust the United States.

If we were to name the person in the world who hates the United States the most, Gaddafi would be at the top of the list, followed by Saddam.

In recent years, Saddam has often spoken against the Americans in the international arena.

Liu Tao hopes that the currency used for settlement of Iraq’s foreign oil exports can be increased to 70% or even 80%!

This military purchase can also be settled in RMB.

RMB settlement is no longer a new thing internationally.

After all, using RMB as foreign exchange, almost anything you want can be imported from China.

As the world's factory, China has huge advantages in this regard.

For example, in Southeast Asia and the South Asian subcontinent, the RMB has wide circulation and can even be used in daily life.

In the Middle East, in addition to Iraq, where 50% of its oil exports are settled in RMB, Persia also accounts for 50%. Other countries such as Saudi Arabia have more or less adopted RMB settlement.

In Africa, such as Djibouti and Tanzania, a large proportion of trade settlement is also in RMB.

It is precisely because RMB settlement is becoming more and more common and accounting for an increasingly higher proportion in the international market that the RMB exchange rate is very stable.

Now there is pressure for the RMB not to depreciate, there is pressure for it to appreciate, and there is also pressure for it to depreciate.

How to maintain the right balance is a challenge for decision makers.

This is also a question of trade-offs, and also a game!
As for the weapons that could not be purchased from Panshan Group, Liu Tao also pointed out the direction to Al and Rashid, that is, polar bears and others!

Al and Rashid's eyes lit up.

(End of this chapter)