Chapter 1573 Preparation for War
Tete is a typical riverside city in East Africa. For a long time, its economic center has been concentrated on the north bank, which is mainly influenced by the characteristics of its resource distribution. However, the south bank is equally important to Tete.
The new port of Tete is located on its south bank, and the Tete shipyard will also be located in the south bank port area, mainly due to the better water depth conditions on the south bank.
All in all, Tete can be said to be one of the biggest winners among East African cities. Taking this opportunity, Tete’s transportation and infrastructure have been completely reshaped, and the construction level has been greatly improved.
The reason why it is one of them is that we have to take into account the city of Hinde at the mouth of the Zambezi River downstream. As for which of the two will be the final winner, it depends on how the two cities control the opportunities. The outcome will only be known in more than ten years.
…
As time approached the end of 1934, with Ernst's special emphasis, settlement statistics in East Africa were carried out ahead of schedule this year.
In the city of Rhine.
Ernst said to Crown Prince Friedrich: "Today, the international situation is becoming increasingly tense. Therefore, in order to cope with future changes in the world, we must liquidate East Africa's assets in advance, so that East Africa can seize the initiative in future international changes."
Now, the international situation can be described in one word: "deteriorating", and contradictions and conflicts between countries are accumulating rapidly.
Europe, in particular, is a complete "powder keg". Now the Soviet Union, Germany and other European countries are adding gunpowder to this powder keg.
The Soviet Union actively developed its defense industry. Regardless of its original intention, this would objectively cause tension among other European countries.
Needless to say, Germany has always been the main instigator of the war in Europe. Its militarist ideology is deeply rooted. Now, with the warmongering Adolf, it is unable to stop the car and has no intention of stopping.
Britain and France are also not idle, especially France. After all, after Germany plans to expand its armaments, it is impossible for France to remain indifferent. Europe is entering a new round of arms race.
At the same time, in Asia, Japan's military expansion has never stopped.
In other words, a strong smell of gunpowder can already be smelled on the Eurasian continent, and once a full-scale war breaks out on the Eurasian continent, it will inevitably affect the whole world.
Ernst said: "The current situation is that the global environment has been destroyed, and the world is brewing a crisis of unprecedented scale."
"When ordinary people foresee a crisis may break out, they should also check their savings and assets, so as to prepare supplies and arm themselves to ensure they can safely weather the crisis. This is even more true at the national level."
"We should even prepare for war in advance so that we won't be caught off guard when necessary. We should take advantage of the situation and minimize the negative impact as much as possible."
Ernst's meaning was simple, that is, East Africa should quietly prepare for war next, which was tantamount to admitting that World War II was inevitable.
Crown Prince Friedrich deeply agreed with this. Anyone with a discerning eye knew that World War II would definitely break out, but the specific time was difficult to determine.
He asked, "Father, how many years do you think it will take for a new world war to break out?"
Ernst held up five fingers and said decisively, "If I were to predict, a new world war would inevitably break out in less than five years. By then, the flames of war in Europe would undoubtedly reignite, and the war in Asia has actually already begun."
Here, Ernst is naturally referring to Japan's invasion of the Far Eastern Empire. He said: "Now Japan and the Far Eastern Empire seem to have entered a relatively stable phase, but we all know that Japan's economic model is unsustainable."
"Japan is even more extreme than Germany. After all, Germany still has a strong economy and industry, and a larger territory than Japan itself, with arable land even more than five times that of Japan."
Germany's conditions were arguably much better than Japan's. In 1934, the two countries had similar populations, both exceeding 60 million, with Germany having slightly more. However, as an island nation, Japan's terrain was mostly mountainous, with very little usable land, while Germany, at least, had abundant plains in the north and numerous river valleys in the south that provided excellent agricultural conditions.
Even when comparing mineral resources, Germany has more advantages than Japan. At least Germany does not need to rely on imports for coal, and its iron ore production is nearly twenty times that of Japan. Of course, even so, both countries still need to import large amounts of iron ore.
But overall, Japan's extreme lack of resources, severe shortage of land, especially arable land, huge population size, and extreme development strategy have made its economy very distorted.
In 1934, Japan's military expenditure accounted for more than 40 percent of its government fiscal expenditure, which was unique among the great powers and ranked first in the world.
Correspondingly, Japan's economy can now be said to be completely dependent on military orders, with heavy industry growing rapidly.
This is actually very helpless. Japan's light industry has been hit hard after the world financial crisis, especially the textile industry. The export volume has shrunk greatly. In other light industrial fields, it is difficult for Japan to compete with other powers.
Japan is ultimately a learner of Europe, so its overall industrial development is relatively backward compared with Europe, the United States, and East Africa.
Therefore, one of Japan's important advantages in participating in international competition is its abundant cheap labor force, which was also an important reason for the prosperity of Japan's textile industry in the past.
However, this is not the 21st century, and the labor costs of other powers may not be much higher than those of Japan, otherwise the world labor movement would not be so prosperous.
Japan's technology was not as good as that of other powers, its financial resources were not as strong as those of other powers, and its labor cost advantage was not significant. This forced Japan's industrial development to take a more extreme route, that is, to launch wars and plunder the resources and markets it needed from overseas.
Therefore, it is not surprising that Japan launched the war ahead of time and invaded the Northeast of the Far East Empire and other places. This is why Ernst said that the war in Asia has already broken out.
This can be seen as an "appetizer" before World War II. Once the war breaks out in Europe, World War II will be completely formed.
Crown Prince Friedrich expressed a certain degree of agreement with his father's assessment: "Japan and Germany are indeed very close nowadays, and there is a real possibility that they may form an alliance in the future."
"Thus, the scope of World War II was even greater than that of World War I, covering almost the entire Eurasian continent."
The possibility of an alliance between Germany and Japan is almost 100% because their interests and geography are too complementary, especially when it comes to their common enemy, the Soviet Union. The two countries have endless common topics to talk about.
The Soviet Union was bound to be the enemy of both countries. This was inevitable. As for Germany, the Soviet Union and it had a direct conflict of interest in Central and Eastern Europe. At the same time, it was impossible for the Soviet Union to unite with Germany ideologically. As for the Soviet-German Non-Aggression Treaty in the previous life, everyone knew that both sides had ulterior motives.
As for Japan, the contradictions between Japan and the Soviet Union in East Asia were equally acute. It was impossible for the Soviet Union to allow Japan to completely conquer the Far East Empire. After all, if Japan completely grasped the discourse power in East Asia, there was a possibility that Japan would point its gun at the Soviet Union next.
Moreover, Soviet ideology was equally fatal to the Japanese elite.
Therefore, in order to deal with the common enemy, the Soviet Union, Germany and Japan eventually came together. It was almost inevitable that Germany needed Japan to contain the Soviet Union, and Japan also needed Germany to divert the Soviet Union's main attention to Europe.
Of course, Ernst is happy to see the two countries getting closer. After all, breaking the existing international order and redistributing the spoils are also important goals of East Africa. Therefore, countries like Germany and Japan must act as pioneers. It is uncertain how much of the cake East Africa will get in the end, but it will definitely make countries like Britain and France, which are not worthy of their positions, spit out the bulk of the profits in the world market.
There is also the Soviet Union. If Germany and Japan can weaken the Soviet Union, it will also be beneficial for their advance into East Africa, the Middle East and Central Asia.
As a result, East Africa's last remaining competitor is the United States. However, East Africa is confident that it can gain an advantage in the competition with the United States.
The points of conflict of interests between East Africa and the United States are actually in the two major regions of Latin America and Europe in the future. However, it is impossible for the two countries to monopolize the above two regions.
Ernst said, "Basically, the future world will be a three-way race. We and the United States have already booked two of the tickets. As for the third country, it will most likely be a showdown between Germany and the Soviet Union, and I am more optimistic that the Soviet Union will win in the end."
In this time and space, Germany is stronger than in the previous life, so the possibility of Germany defeating the Soviet Union has increased. However, Ernst is still not optimistic about Germany because of this.
Given the national conditions of the Soviet Union, Ernst even believed that even if East Africa and the Soviet Union fought, there was no possibility of destroying the Soviet Union. Germany's strength was much weaker than that of East Africa. Therefore, it was unlikely that Germany would conquer the Soviet Union.
Of course, Ernst now hopes that the Soviet Union will achieve final victory, and he also has practical interests. That is, if Germany gains hegemony in Europe, East Africa will become passive.
For example, if the two important sea routes, the Suez Canal and the Strait of Gibraltar, fell into the hands of Germany, it would be basically impossible for East Africa to extend its influence into Europe.
If Germany unified Europe, it could really bring the Mediterranean under its control through the former Austro-Hungarian Empire. However, the situation was completely different for the Soviet Union. It would be very difficult for the Soviet Union to break out of the Black Sea. Therefore, if the Soviet Union won, it would not threaten East Africa's interests and influence in Europe.
Ernst said: "A weakened Soviet Union has no ability to unify Europe. Therefore, I hope that in the future, Germany can weaken the Soviet Union to the greatest extent possible. A strong Germany will naturally become the leader of Europe, which is not what we want to see."
Germany's geographical location can be said to be in the heart of Europe. Therefore, if Europe were a country, it would be most appropriate to place its capital in Germany. A unified Europe is obviously not in the interests of East Africa.
As for the Soviet Union, it would be difficult for it to expand its sphere of influence to Western and Southern Europe, even if it defeated Germany. After all, whether it was East Africa or the United States, it could cut off Russia's long-standing European dream.
Friedrich also expressed support for Ernst's remarks. He asked, "Therefore, carrying out the settlement statistics in advance this year is to take a deep dive into East African national strength, to determine how many chips we have and how to place our bets."
Ernst nodded and said, "That's right. We need to develop a war plan and begin preparing for military deployment, such as producing weapons and ammunition in advance and making good preparations for stockpiling."
"In this way, if a war breaks out in East Africa in the future, we can avoid the damage to the domestic economic operation caused by the war to a certain extent."
This is not Ernst's alarmist statement, but a lesson learned from the United States in the late World War II. During World War II, the United States' production capacity exploded and the military industry flourished. However, this also laid some hidden dangers for the post-war economic recovery of the United States.
For example, the crazy expansion of industrial production capacity in a short period of time led to the serious problem of overcapacity in the United States after the war. If we want to go back and solve this problem, we will have to pay a huge price.
At the same time, the wartime economy also had a serious impact on the US economic structure. For World War II, the United States mobilized a huge army of more than 10 million. These 10 million troops were undoubtedly an important main force for the original economic development of the United States. After all, those who could join the army were basically children from good families in the United States, and they were also the most high-quality young labor force group.
Their rush to the European battlefield directly led to a labor shortage in the United States. Coupled with the crazy expansion of industrial production capacity in the United States, American factories hired a large number of women and minorities to work.
After the war, millions of American soldiers returned home and faced a problem: how to find re-employment. After all, if they wanted to find a job, they had to compete with those who were working in factories, which easily gave rise to social problems.
Then there's the labor-capital issue. After the war, a large number of military orders were terminated. During the war, due to a labor shortage, companies generally raised wages to recruit workers. Now that the war is over, even restructuring and surviving are difficult, let alone higher wages. Industries accustomed to wartime wages are also unhappy with layoffs and pay cuts.
In short, it is indeed very satisfying to increase troops and production capacity during wartime, but after the pleasure, there will be a lot of troublesome problems. Therefore, since Ernst knew that this situation would occur, he had to make corresponding preparations.
Therefore, it is particularly necessary to make arrangements in the military field in advance. For example, the production of weapons and equipment can be carried out in advance, as well as personnel training, equipment research and development, logistics, etc.
East Africa can definitely gain more buffer by extending the time for preparation for war, thereby reducing the negative impact of military on the economy and society in the event of a sudden war in the future.
However, there are risks in doing so, especially if the overall development of the world situation deviates significantly from the development trajectory of the previous life, East Africa's careful preparations may backfire. However, in Ernst's view, the probability of such a risk is small and controllable, so he believes that it is completely worth it for East Africa to take a gamble.
In this way, the father and son quietly determined the long-term development direction of East Africa's military expansion. This also means that during the Eighth Five-Year Plan period in East Africa, military development will become the focus. At the same time, some large-scale livelihood projects and important infrastructure projects may also be temporarily sacrificed.
(End of this chapter)
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