The Qing Dynasty

Chapter 590 Military Expenditure Still Expensive
Teng Yuzao put away his smile and said, "At this time, you should all still be asleep."

Teng Yuzhao was originally thinking of making a joke, but when he saw Ning Xingpu sitting not far away, he stopped it in time.

"The reason why I asked you to come here today is that no matter whether we are willing or not, and it is not even a question of whether the court is satisfied or not, our two provinces of Zhishan, which are separated from Fengtian by mountains and the sea, will enter a state of war from today on."

Thanks to Teng Yuzao's analysis just now, these people knew that the war was about to begin, so no one was surprised by Teng Yuzao's words.

Teng Yuzao continued, "As I said just now, whether it's the old Russians who are occupying the three provinces of Kanto or the Japanese who are under the banner of expelling the old Russians, they all have the same goal, which is to occupy our three provinces of Northeast China. It's just a matter of time."

"Even if the Japanese drive the Russians away, they will definitely not leave. If we want to take back our three northeastern provinces, we can only rely on ourselves."

Teng Yuzhao reached out and took the beer glass that Wei Jinghai had filled for him, took a big sip of beer and said.

"Therefore, our two provinces of Naoyama will enter a wartime state starting today."

Teng Yuzao added that he was worried that these people still did not understand the so-called wartime state.

"The so-called wartime state, in simple terms, means that everything is done to ensure the war. We don't need to be so nervous for the time being, but there are still many things to do, especially for people like you who are responsible for the national economy and people's livelihood in the two provinces of Zhishan. You must keep this in mind."

Teng Yuzao looked at Yang Shixiang and said, "First of all, we must maintain local stability and keep the people at ease."

Teng Yuzao said with some worry, "Zhili and Shandong have suffered serious natural disasters in recent years, mainly floods and droughts. Zhili has frequent floods, and Shandong has continuous droughts. We didn't do very well last year."

Teng Yuzao stopped Yang Shixiang, who was a little ashamed, and said, "Last year, we just took over Zhishan Province and were not familiar with some things, including me. This is understandable, but this year we must do a good job. You have a heavy burden on Lianfu, and you must ensure that our rear is stable."

Without waiting for Yang Shixiang to answer, Teng Yuzao continued, "In Zhili, we must focus on flood prevention and dredging. The Yongding River, Hutuo River, Daqing River, and Beiyun River sections must be managed as soon as possible. For those that cannot be managed in time, we must also do a good job of flood prevention."

"Shandong must be prepared to deal with large-scale droughts. Judging from the situation this year, Shandong will face another major drought."

"Droughts are not like floods. We have almost no idea where to start. It is too late to dig wells throughout Shandong to fight drought. We can only store food for disaster relief."

"Except for ensuring military supplies and the export of the flour mill of the Aurora Industrial Development Company, all other surplus grains must be purchased at high prices and shipped to Shandong to prepare for drought relief."

"In order to fight drought in Shandong, we should not simply distribute relief grain. In addition to ensuring the food needs of the extremely poor, we should adopt the method of work-for-relief, build water conservancy facilities and roads and bridges, and also prepare for conscription and tax exemption for counties affected by the disaster."

"Shandong has very good soldiers. We can recruit more. We should be prepared to recruit 300,000 to 500,000 soldiers."

No one had much to say about what Teng Yuzao said about the resettlement of the disaster victims in Zhishan and other two provinces. However, when Teng Yuzao said that he wanted to recruit 300,000 to 500,000 soldiers, everyone except the generals present was quite surprised.

If they were to find 300,000 to 500,000 soldiers, the Zhi army's strength would have to exceed one million, and the military expenditure alone would be a shocking figure.

Although Zhili promoted Westernization and vigorously encouraged the development of industry and commerce, and tax revenues increased significantly every year, the burden was still considerable.

Teng Yuzhao saw that everyone was a little surprised and couldn't help but smile bitterly.

"You just heard that the Russians have more than 800,000 troops in the Far East, and the Japanese may have more than 500,000 troops. That adds up to 1.4 million. This doesn't even include the Russians' continued reinforcements and the Japanese's continued expansion of their military in China."

"If this is the case, it is possible that their total military strength in the three northeastern provinces will exceed two million. We must be prepared for the worst-case scenario, which is that both sides join forces."

"They may even harass our coastal areas, such as Fujian, Guangdong and Liangjiang. These places also need troops to defend. At least the troops in Fujian and Liangjiang cannot be withdrawn."

Teng Yuzhao's words shocked everyone again. The Zhi army had to deal with an army of two million, and the current few hundred thousand people were not too many.

“But this military expenditure.”

Xu Shichang said worriedly, "Marshal, with so many troops, the military expenditure is too heavy. Can we afford it? Should we stop the construction of the Jinpu Railway first?"

Teng Yuzao shook his head decisively and said, "The railway construction must not be stopped. Even after the construction of this railway is completed, we must build railways to Fujian and Guangdong, so that we can deal with the coastal war."

"After that, we will build the Zhengtai Railway and Longhai Railway. The Longhai Railway will eventually be extended to XJ, and there will also be a railway to Kulun. Even the construction of railways in the three northeastern provinces should be included in the schedule early."

Only the brothers Yang Shixiang and Yang Shiqi knew the truth about the railway lines Teng Yuzao mentioned. The others were stunned by Teng Yuzao's idea. It would cost hundreds of millions of silver!

Teng Yuzao sighed and said, "As for the military expenditure issue, it is not a big issue for now."

"I just mentioned that the Mauser rifles produced by the Baoding Arsenal were sold back to Germany. Although the Germans can make a lot of money by reselling them, if we include the ammunition, we can make a net profit of nearly 20 yuan per rifle, which is more than 10 million yuan per year."

"We are gradually selling the captured guns in our inventory, including the small-caliber artillery that we have eliminated, at low prices to the marching troops that are being formed in various provinces. They are almost all sold out now. By the end of the year, they should all be sold out, and we should be able to earn more than 10 million."

"The most important ones are the Kaiping, Datong and Jingxing coal mines managed by Jizhi. Among these coal mines, although the transportation cost of Datong coal mine is high and it loses money, and all the coal is supplied to the navy, the Kaiping and Jingxing coal mines are both treasure troves, with tens of millions of revenues every year."

"Especially as we promoted Westernization, many factories in Zhili and Shandong used steam engines, and some power plants were built. Even because we vigorously promoted coal burning in Tianjin, Baoding and Jinan, our coal sales increased significantly."

"Wuchang, Hankou, and Shanghai also need our coal."

"All these add up to more than 50 million in revenue. Although we can't count on Shandong's taxes for now, Zhili's taxes have more than doubled. The tax revenue accumulated by Lianfu in the past two years is nearly 20 million. Huang Chujiu's dividend from the construction of the new city was more than 5 million last year. According to what he told me, this year's dividend is likely to be close to 20 million. All together, this is more than 90 million."

"But this is far from enough. I estimate that once we join the war, the annual military expenditure will not be less than 200 million. This is because we are fighting on our home soil, and the pressure on logistics support is much smaller."

"The rest of the gap will be filled from the Aurora Industrial Development Company controlled by Jizhi. I personally don't need that much money, so I'll just subsidize the military. If that's still not enough, we still have the Aurora Bank."

After Teng Yuzao finished speaking, everyone looked at him with surprise and admiration. They were not only surprised that Zhili could quietly take out such a large amount of silver, but also surprised that Teng Yuzao was willing to take out tens of millions of silver for nothing. This was his own money! Teng Yuzao first stated that he would not take a penny from the Aurora Bank, and now he was going to take out money that belonged entirely to him. Such a mind is definitely not something that others can do.

Seeing the expressions of the crowd, Teng Yuzao thought that these people were worried that he would not be able to fill many gaps, or even that his participation in the war would drag down the Aurora Bank, so he smiled and said nonchalantly.

"Even if the war lasts for two years, we still have enough military funds, and we will definitely not bring down the Aurora Bank."

Teng Yuzao lit a cigarette and said, "You may not know this yet, but my Aurora Industrial Development Company is a golden goose that lays golden eggs."

In order to strengthen these people's confidence in joining the war, Teng Yuzao then began to tell them about the companies to which the Zhendan Industrial Development Company belonged.

"Aurora Industrial Development Company" now has more than 30 new enterprises of various sizes, each of which is very profitable, and many of them have higher profits.

For example, the flour mill. The factory in Shanghai has been moved to Tianjin. Because the flour mill does not have much technical content, it can make a lot of money entirely by relying on some little tricks, or soft technology.

Although ordinary flour only cost more than 20 wen per pound, after simple improvements, this flour mill raised the price to more than 30 wen with almost no increase in cost, which was 30% higher. Moreover, most of the flour was sold abroad, and only a small amount was purchased by Beijing and other big cities such as Shanghai, Jinan, Qingdao, Hankou, Guangzhou, Kaifeng, and Taiyuan.

In order to avoid high domestic grain prices, most of the wheat used by this large-scale expanded flour mill is purchased from Southeast Asia and even East India. In the past two years, the amount of wheat purchased from the United States has also increased significantly.

Now, the annual revenue from this flour mill alone is seven or eight million yuan.

In addition, there are two extremely profitable companies in the emerging automotive field. One is a company that produces automotive aluminum wheels, and the other is a company that specializes in producing automotive gearboxes and hydraulic brake systems.

Both companies have their own patents, especially the aluminum wheel company. Because the wheels are made of high-strength alloy aluminum and steel spokes, they are not only strong and sturdy but also greatly reduced in weight. They have become the wheels used by all major brands of cars in the world at this time, and the benefits are particularly outstanding.

This type of aluminum alloy wheel did not appear until World War II in history, and it was not used in large quantities until after World War II.

In addition, there is a home appliance company whose most profitable product is now a mechanical refrigerator with a compressor that can automatically control the temperature, which has been marketed in Europe and the United States.

In fact, this kind of refrigerator would not appear in the United States until six years later. Although in Teng Yuzhao's opinion, such a refrigerator would be insignificant in the future, it was an absolute luxury item and a money-making machine at that time.

There were also tobacco companies that produced cigarettes with filters, which were also extremely profitable. Teng Yuzao not only owned the patent for the filters that would not appear until more than a decade later, he also invented a simple machine for installing the filters, and the machine for installing the filters was kept secret.

Now, this is the only company in the world that can mass-produce cigarettes with filters. Other companies cannot do so on a large scale because they have to install them manually.

Historically, this would take several years to occur.

So much so that the company now makes two cents for every pack of filtered cigarettes sold in the world.

Although this patented tobacco company will surely become the most profitable enterprise among Teng Yuzao's existing companies after a period of development, it is not yet the most profitable company in "Aurora Industrial Development Company" at this time.

Because of the "Aurora Industrial Development Company", there is also the MSG Company and the United Alkali Company, a pharmaceutical company that produces aspirin.

MSG was originally invented by Japanese Kikunae Ikeda four years later, so Teng Yuzao would not have felt the slightest bit of guilt.

The new companies that adopt the new alkali production process, namely the combined alkali production process, produce soda ash which is not only of good quality, but also of low cost due to the new process. Moreover, due to its wide range of uses and huge production demand, it is very popular internationally and is almost entirely used for export.

Moreover, its by-product, ammonium chloride fertilizer, is a by-product and has almost no cost even from the perspective of alkali production. Therefore, its price is much lower than the international selling price. It has not only been widely promoted and used in Zhili, but has also been exported in large quantities.

This does not include the fact that pharmaceutical companies have also successfully developed the life-saving miracle drug sulfa according to Teng Yuzhao's guidance. However, this drug is still in the confidential stage and is not sold externally.

The bicycle company's bicycles are also very popular. If they can add speed devices, it will become a profitable company.

Teng Yuzao has joint ventures in the United States for all the patented technologies of the above-mentioned companies, and these companies are responsible for investigating and claiming compensation for infringements in Europe and the United States.

Others include textile factories, soap factories, match factories, etc.

After Teng Yuzao finished talking about the company's situation, he continued, "There is still no accurate number on how much money these companies have made. Jizhi knows the specific figures, so I think it's not too little."

"Besides, we will take all these products to the American Expo this time. I think we will make more money after the Expo is over."

Following Teng Yuzhao's words, everyone's eyes turned to Zhou Xuexi. Zhou Xuexi opened his mouth, but in the end just smiled and didn't say anything.

Everyone present here knew how much money these companies made. Although Zhou Xuexi didn't say it, these people secretly calculated it in their hearts and knew that it must be a very shocking number.

"If that's not enough."

Teng Yuzao looked at Xi Ligong and said, "Yucheng, since you are ready to issue banknotes, start selling them at the end of the month."

Teng Yuzao finally nodded and agreed to issue banknotes, which made Xi Ligong very excited and he hurriedly spoke.

"Marshal, the Aurora Bank still has 48 million in cash, all in dollars and gold coins. According to convention, we can issue about 120 million in banknotes. If we base it on the current assets of the Aurora Bank, we can issue it."

This time, Xi Ligong's words were interrupted by Teng Yuzhao.

"Okay, Yucheng, these specific data are confidential to Aurora Bank, so don't tell them out."

(End of this chapter)