Korean TV series: King of Peninsula 1997

Chapter 473 Employment and Security

Zhu Mengyong also understood what Li You wanted to do, which was nothing more than wanting to impact the market for low-end small economy cars.

Just like what Daying Group did in the past.

In the 1980s, due to various restrictions on Japan's automobile exports to the United States, it was forced to transform to high-end cars.

In order to maximize profits, the United States adopted the approach of raising selling prices, which created a gap in the market for low-end small economy cars in the United States. Daying Motors seized the opportunity to enter the US market.

In the first year after Daying Motors entered the U.S. market with its small cars, it priced its cars $1000 lower than Japanese cars of the same level. The American auto industry called it "Japanese technology, Korean prices" and achieved sales of 17 vehicles in the first year.

Thanks to the word-of-mouth and reputation brought by foreign markets, Daying Motors quickly captured the domestic market of the Korean Peninsula and had been the dominant player until Tianxia Group entered the automotive industry.

Zhu Mengyong squinted his eyes and thought for a while, and always felt that something was weird.

At that time, the Daying Group was able to dominate the domestic market because the market in the Korean Peninsula was mostly occupied by foreign cars. With the help of its reputation overseas and the national self-esteem of the people on the Korean Peninsula, people began to support Daying as a local brand, which enabled it to dominate the domestic market.

But now, 99% of the domestic market has been occupied by Daying and Tianxia.

Even if those future cars are better marketed, they cannot match the brand effect that they have left in people’s minds for decades.

In fact, he was overthinking it. Li You didn't think that much at all.

In today's South American countries, most people are not in good economic conditions, which makes this kind of low-end small economy car destined to be popular.

Taking the terrain over there into consideration, Li You also asked Future Automobile to make certain improvements to the small car and add some shock-absorbing functions.

He plans to use Suriname as a breakthrough point to sell these cars to South American countries.

The Surinamese government will not only fully support it, but will also use government power to negotiate with neighboring countries.

This is for the development of their local economy.

In less than two months, future cars have already occupied a small part of the market on the Korean Peninsula, even a one-time market.

Because their target group are people whose economic conditions are not very good, but after they buy a future car, they may not change the car for five or even ten years.

But it doesn’t matter, the reputation has been established.

Two future car factories have been built in Suriname, one of which has begun manufacturing various parts.

The refinery in Suriname is also about to be completed.

At this time, Li You received another call from Amy, the daughter of the CIA boss. Every time she called, she would give some benefits.

Li You guessed that this woman was instructed by her superiors.

They want to use the Kinmen Group as a starting point to further strengthen their observation of the Korean Peninsula and their control over the entire peninsula.

Her meaning was also made clear on the phone.

Iraq is far from being as combat-ready as Afghanistan.

The US military successfully entered the city of Baghdad, the capital of Iraq, and did not encounter any stubborn resistance along the way. However, several top Iraqi officials suddenly disappeared and their whereabouts were unknown. A large number of Iraqi troops surrendered to the US military. After that, Iraqi cities such as Baghdad and Basra fell into anarchy.

After President Booker announced the end of the large-scale military operation, the smoke of the war gradually dissipated. The United States had achieved most of its goals of defeating Saddam and taking control of Iraq, but they soon discovered that they might be dragged into a protracted guerrilla war.

Since the 1970s, the United States has basically lost the initiative to control the supply of the world oil market.

These Western countries can only cope with the fluctuations of the world oil market through international energy organizations and energy-saving technologies, and counter the quota production mechanism implemented by the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries. Although the phased victory of this war has also enabled them to regain control of the world oil market to a certain extent, after all, Iraq's oil reserves are second only to Saudi Arabia, ranking second in the world, and it is an important supplier to the world oil market, but the problem is that
The situation in Iraq has not stabilized as expected, but has become increasingly chaotic.

The U.S. military seems unable to stabilize the increasingly complex war situation here, not to mention the huge military expenditures, which have gradually made the U.S. government feel overwhelmed.

This has also cast a shadow of uncertainty over the global economy in the past two months.

For example, Li You has been paying attention to the international oil prices. Now the international oil prices remain high, which has directly led to heavy losses in the tourism and aviation industries.

This is also one of the reasons why Amy called Li You.

As a senior CIA agent, she heard the news from someone higher up and decided to use it to solidify her friendship with this man who is currently ranked among the top five on the Korean Peninsula.

"President Li, we now have a new plan."

Amy said it simply, "The president is going to hand over a large number of combat operations in Iraq and Afghanistan to battlefield contractors and withdraw some of the country's troops."

The so-called battlefield contract workers are employees of private military contractors, most of whom appear in the form of security companies.

To put it bluntly, they are mercenaries.

"He will pursue a style of warfare that relies heavily on mercenaries while reducing the number of troops his country sends overseas."

Li You narrowed his eyes, "Proportion?"

"At least one to one," Amy hesitated. "If possible, the people above even hope to reach three to one, with three being contract workers."

“How many people would be needed if it was one to one?”

"Ten thousand," Amy reminded, "This move is to reduce the loss of personnel in our own army, but in order to maintain the combat effectiveness of these contract workers, their daily wages will be quite high."

“The maximum daily wage will be one thousand dollars.”

Amy still concealed some things, such as her superiors were not planning to withdraw many people, and the most fundamental reason they needed mercenaries was that they could help escalate the situation in Iraq.

Because these mercenaries are not considered U.S. military personnel, Congress also considers them not to be U.S. military personnel.

The U.S. government also does not track the number of mercenaries in war zones.

This allowed the government to commit more troops to the war than were reported to the American public, thereby facilitating their stability in Iraq, even as these mercenaries became almost invisible.

"Of course," Amy said softly, "In order to maintain the friendship between the CIA and Chairman Li, I also brought more valuable benefits to Chairman Li."

"What?" Li You responded with a smile.

"I certainly won't recommend Chairman Li to use the people of Golden Gate Company in the United States to do those cannon fodder jobs," Amy said calmly, "There are also some jobs that the US military in Iraq is going to outsource to security contractors."

"Security work?" Li You raised his eyebrows. "Some important figures in Iraq?"

"That's right," Amy responded quickly, "The protection missions for the Prime Minister of the Iraqi interim government and the US Chief of Staff in Iraq will be outsourced by the US military."

"There are American soldiers protecting us outside," Li You said in amazement, "but we still need to hire security personnel inside at a high price. It seems that the situation in Iraq is not what the President said on TV."

The president he was talking about, of course, was President Booker from Amy's side.

(End of this chapter)