Rise of Empires: Spain.

Chapter 119 The Development of Military Factories
Although Prime Minister Primo and Archduke Serrano did not say it explicitly, their attitudes actually showed their support for the Royal Arsenal.

The government is openly encouraging civilian arms companies to grow bigger and stronger, but in fact it also hopes to have a larger-scale military factory to support Spain's image.

No matter who owns this military factory, as long as it can develop more advanced weapons for Spain, and continuously manufacture these weapons and provide them to the Spanish army, that will be enough.

Spain does need a leading military-industrial enterprise. A large military factory can do more than dozens of small military factories. Spain currently needs a very large-scale military factory to fill its facade.

This is the same for all countries, just like the Krupp Arsenal of the German Empire and the future Skoda Arsenal of Austria.

Only such military-industrial giants can open up the arms market. If we rely on small and medium-sized military factories to expand the arms trade, it would be better to expect foreign weapons to be sold at a lower price.

Currently in Spain's military industry, only the Royal Arsenal has the scale and capital to qualify as a military giant.

After all, there were no particularly advanced weapons in this era, and rifles and cannons were already the most commonly used light and heavy weapons.

There are a large number of military-industrial enterprises in Spain, including hundreds of factories and private workshops of all sizes.

However, most of these military industrial enterprises produce old hunting rifles, pistols and the like, which have no technical content and even the quality of the guns cannot be guaranteed.

Even if there were military factories capable of producing muzzle-loading rifles and cannons, they were destined to be unable to compete with the Royal Arsenal in developing breech-loading rifles and manufacturing more advanced cannons.

The current attitude of the Spanish government towards these military industrial enterprises is to provide as much assistance as possible to other medium-sized military factories on the premise of focusing on supporting the Royal Military Factory.

It would be better if we could expand into more places. But if these medium-sized military factories are not up to the task, we will eventually have to focus all our efforts on making the Royal Military Factory the leading military enterprise in Spain.

Of course, those small and medium-sized military enterprises will not be eliminated. After all, there is a market for shotguns and pistols. The Royal Military Factory will not be able to grab orders for these weapons with low profits and few orders.

After receiving orders from the military and the Guards, the Royal Arsenal became busy.

Although it is a company that has only been established for a few years, the Royal Arsenal is the largest among all military industrial enterprises in Spain.

But compared with the larger military factories in Europe, the Royal Arsenal is still relatively small in scale.

The Royal Arsenal has fewer than 500 employees, and there is no exact number for weapons production. But based on the current production capacity of the Royal Arsenal, it can basically produce at least 10 rifles, 7.5 artillery pieces, 1200 rounds of ammunition, and rounds of artillery shells every month.

Of course, this is based on a little bit of everything. If we focus on producing rifles and bullets, the monthly production capacity should be able to increase to 1000 rifles and more than 15 bullets.

This also shows the current scale of the Royal Arsenal, which is too small for Spain.

Not to mention too much, just for the Spanish army of 1872 to be equipped with the latest Vitali M rifles, it would take at least eight years even if the Royal Arsenal worked overtime to produce them.

This also means that the Royal Arsenal's biggest task in the future is to expand its scale, increase the number of employees to at least 5, and increase annual weapons output to at least rifles.

The current production capacity of the Royal Arsenal cannot even meet the domestic demand in Spain, let alone open up Spain's arms trade market and trade arms with other countries to earn a steady stream of foreign exchange income.

The good news is that with the technical experts from the Austro-Hungarian Empire in charge, the expansion of the Royal Arsenal will be much smoother. New employees entering the Royal Arsenal can master certain skills under the short-term training of these technical experts, and it will be no problem for them to invest in the production of weapons.

The large-scale expansion of the Royal Arsenal was not approved before. One reason was that the breech-loading rifle under development had not yet made any progress, and even if the arsenal was expanded, it would not produce weapons.

Secondly, there is no confirmed order from the military. If the military factory expands to a sufficient scale but there is no continuous order, it will just eat up all the resources and waste the royal family's funds in vain.

Now that there are a steady stream of orders, it can ensure that the Royal Arsenal will not lack income in the next few years. As for the source of orders after this order is completed, it can also turn its attention to America across the Atlantic.

Breech-loading rifles were just beginning to be developed in Europe, so it was impossible for Latin American countries to master this technology. With the help of technical experts from Italy and the Austro-Hungarian Empire, Spain's breech-loading rifle technology was considered to be among the best in Europe.

The standard long rifles that Spain is equipped with on a large scale naturally have a certain market in Latin America.

Argentina, Mexico and other American countries were once colonies of Spain. Although they became independent from Spain, they also resolved the only conflict with the Spanish government.

In theory, Argentines and Mexicans share the same roots with the Spanish. Although this connection has been alienated by long-term colonization and intermarriage, these people are naturally closer to Spain than to other countries.

As long as the weapons of the Royal Arsenal are of good quality, it is easy to get an order from these countries. Although it may not be a large-scale order, as long as it can feed the Royal Arsenal, it is not a problem.

These Latin American countries can at least put together orders for tens of thousands of rifles. Coupled with the expansion and consumption of the Spanish army and small orders from other regions, the Royal Arsenal will not be short of weapons orders in the next five years.

Besides, even if there are not enough orders for rifles, we can give priority to producing artillery. Moreover, bullets and shells are consumables, so there will be a steady stream of orders.

In the future, the Spanish army will pay more attention to infantry target practice and artillery training, and bullets and artillery shells will be consumed continuously.

These orders combined are enough to support a royal arsenal with more than 10,000 employees. Even if it is in a loss-making state, it is acceptable to Carlo as long as it is not too serious.

After all, there are still many wars that these European powers will face in the future. As long as Spain’s weapons and equipment are not too backward, it will still be able to grab an order.

There will also be military operations to develop African colonies, and Carlo has nothing to worry about the development of the Royal Arsenal.

But then again, the expansion of military factories cannot be carried out blindly. The expansion of these factories is always linked to one another, and the expansion of one enterprise is the result of the simultaneous development of many industries.

Take military factories as an example. The production of rifles and artillery requires a lot of steel. The first step is to expand the steel mills to meet the steel demand after the expansion of military factories.

This is not the end. A production line of rifles or artillery requires a lot of mechanical manufacturing equipment, which can also help the development of mechanical manufacturing plants.

The expansion of the Royal Arsenal will not only create tens of thousands of visible jobs, but also thousands or even tens of thousands of invisible jobs.

This will have a huge impact on the development of the Spanish economy and is a good thing for both the Spanish government and the people.

Apart from other things, a large factory with more than 97 employees pays a huge amount of tax every year. According to the current per capita income of Spain, which is about pesetas, the annual salary paid to these workers is more than one million pesetas. After the workers receive this income, no matter which industry they spend it on, it can continue to drive the economic development of Spain.

The government can also obtain a steady stream of tax revenue from these consumption links, thus achieving a win-win situation for military factories, the people and the government.

Of course, the one that benefited the most was probably Carlo's royal family.

The military factory is a royal property, and the salaries paid to workers by the military factory will also make the workers grateful to Carlo.

You know, the salaries and various welfare policies provided to workers by the royal industries are basically the best among all factories in Spain.

The ten-hour work system, monthly vacations, holiday overtime pay, etc., make the Spanish people very optimistic about joining the royal industry.

Logically speaking, Carlo is also a big capitalist. In fact, Carlo's capital far exceeds that of all the capitalists in Spain, and his wealth is comparable to some of the top nobles in Spain.

If the Bourbon royal family's land had not been taken away by the government, the royal family would probably be the richest family in Spain at that time.

But this is also a good thing. After the people learned that the original Bourbon royal family's land had been taken away by the government and distributed to the people in various ways, their favorability towards the royal family would naturally increase.

Knowing that he could not get these lands, Carlo naturally took the initiative to provide them to the government and advocated various policies so that the people could actually enjoy the benefits.

For example, a considerable portion of these lands will be rented out to the public at low prices. If agricultural taxes are reduced, the income of these farmers who rent the land will also increase significantly.

Although it was the government that actually rented the land, Carlo had the help of a lot of public opinion organizations, and the people would naturally be grateful to the royal family and Carlo.

It was impossible for the government to come out and declare that the leasing of land had nothing to do with the royal family, so Carlo was able to enjoy a good reputation among the people at no cost.

Although Carlo did not make any big moves, due to the influence accumulated over time, the Spanish people still have a relatively high level of recognition of Carlo. They no longer have any rejection or prejudice towards this foreigner who came from Italy to be king.

Compared with many previous kings of Spain, even if Carlo cannot be ranked as excellent, he can at least achieve good results at present.

With Prime Minister Primo's reforms and the development of the Spanish economy, Carlo's achievements will continue to improve.

At least so far, Carlo is not in a hurry. Now he has firmly established his throne and no one can drive him off the throne.

What he needs to do next is to gradually exert influence in the government and the military, and then wait for the opportunity to take over power.

After completely taking over the power of the government and the army, Carlo had to set his own goals while maintaining the rapid development of Spain's economy and industry.

The only goal is to make Spain stronger and once again become a European power, a player in the world chess game rather than a pawn on the chessboard.

There is only one sign of whether Spain is strong or not and whether it can rise, and that is the ownership of Gibraltar, which is right at its doorstep.

If Spain can just retake Gibraltar, then Spain will have accomplished a powerful goal and will be back among the great powers of Europe.

But if Gibraltar, right at Spain's doorstep, is still in the hands of other countries, Spain will not have completed its task of becoming stronger and will still be some distance away from becoming a European power.

The reason why Gibraltar is seen as a target for Spain's rise is that Gibraltar is very important to Spain and the Spanish.

Later generations of Spain have never given up their claims to Gibraltar. Unfortunately, the time for Spain to take back Gibraltar has long passed, and the ownership of Gibraltar has always been one of the topics of concern to the Spanish.

If Carlo could take back Gibraltar from the British, it would greatly enhance his reputation. It is no exaggeration to say that as long as Carlo could take back Gibraltar from the British, he would become one of the greatest monarchs in the hearts of all Spaniards, and even the title of one of them could be removed.

This would be a huge boost to the morale of the Spanish military and the people, and would also greatly increase the loyalty of all Spaniards to Carlo.

After retaking Gibraltar, even if Carlo directly declared that he would ascend the throne and become the emperor of Spain, no Spaniard would object.

The fact that it could boost public morale and infinitely improve military morale meant that Carlo was destined to take Gibraltar.

What's more, Gibraltar's geographical location is also very important. It can control the Strait of Gibraltar and cut off the shipping routes between the Mediterranean and the Atlantic.

However, it is precisely because of Gibraltar's extremely important geographical location that the British also attach great importance to Gibraltar.

If Spain wants to retake Gibraltar, it is doomed to have a war with the British. The British are not fools, and Spain will never use any land in exchange for Gibraltar.

So in Carlo's mind, the British have never been Spain's allies, not now and not in the future.

The only countries in Europe that are suitable to be Spain's allies are Germany and Austria-Hungary, and they are also the countries that can actually help Spain retake Gibraltar.

As for Italy, basically there is no need to think about it. First of all, Italy is unlikely to go to war with the British for Spain, and they don’t have much conflict with the British.

Secondly, even if the Italian government was willing to go to war with Britain for Spain, Carlo did not dare to believe how the Italian government would perform in the war.

Although Carlo is also a member of the Italian royal family, this does not mean that the relationship between Spain and Italy will be so close.

Both countries are powerful countries on the Mediterranean coast, and there is competition between them. In Carlo's mind, Italy is not necessarily as reliable as the Austro-Hungarian Empire, and Carlo never expected Italy to help Spain.

The second update of 4200 words, please support!

I forgot to ask for leave yesterday, I’m very sorry. Today I wrote almost 1,500 more words as compensation. Thank you all for your support.

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(End of this chapter)