Chapter 171: Firm Supporter
Kobdo's propaganda strategy was a huge success on the front line.
Stimulated by hot news and the deliberate guidance of frontline officers, grenade tutorials became popular in a short period of time and it became a hot-selling equipment on the front line.
It is said that soldiers rotated down from the front lines had to successfully throw a few grenades into the enemy trenches, otherwise they would be embarrassed to say that they had been to the front lines.
The promotion of "Gongxun Newspaper" among the people was also quite successful.
This was mainly because it was the only newspaper that reported accurately from the military...all other newspapers made guesses about the battle based on reasonable associations with the existing information and then pieced it together.
There is only the "Meritorious Report", which is a personal account from Charles, the commander who participated in the battle. Gallieni also appears on camera to help. In addition, there are interviews with officers and soldiers who participated in the battle, as well as photos and their experiences.
Then not only the Battle of La Foulkes, but also the Battle of Ypres, the Battle of Antwerp and the Battle of the Marne were reported one by one by "Le Merit".
It's like students are arguing over a problem for a long time and coming up with all kinds of creative ideas, and finally the teacher gives a standard answer, and everyone suddenly realizes what the answer is.
People even compared the reports in the Meritorious Newspaper with those in previous newspapers and laughed at their absurdity and ignorance.
This made the 100,000 copies of the newspaper distributed to the public like a rat's tail falling into a rice jar. They were sold out as soon as they were on the market. The price of 10 centimes was driven up to 25 sous on the black market. Many people even collected this first-issued military newspaper as a collectible.
Kobdo immediately expanded the civilian circulation to 300,000 copies, and increased it to 500,000 copies the next day. The front-line circulation increased from 200,000 copies to 300,000 copies.
This has almost reached the limit of the 50 printing presses purchased, and it will take about two hours to complete the printing if all of them are put into printing.
Kobdo was so frightened that he urgently purchased 50 more printing presses from various channels.
Kobdo was busy in the headquarters while shouting excitedly: "This is crazy, this is too crazy, it sold 800,000 copies right after it was released and it is still in short supply. It took decades for the Little Daily to reach a sales volume of one million. We are about to beat it now!"
(Note: The Little Daily was founded in February 1863, more than 50 years ago)
In fact, it is easy to defeat "Little Daily". All you need to do is increase the supply to the military, although this will not only make money but also lose money.
But Charles chose not to do so, as he felt that simply increasing the data on paper did not make much sense.
Gallieni's newspaper reading habit naturally shifted from "Le Petit Journal" to "Le Merit", not only because it was the military's own newspaper, but also because it was professional.
At the same time, Charles did not have to worry about the "Meritorious Newspaper" squeezing out the sales of the "Little Daily" and causing Steed's dissatisfaction.
"Meritorious Service Newspaper" is a military newspaper. If you have any complaints, go and get angry at the military!
…
Steed just laughed it off and didn't take it seriously at all.
At that time, he was planning to expand the production of grenades.
"Double the scale?" asked the project manager in charge of grenade production.
"No, we have to double it at least!" Steed said without hesitation: "We will produce 60,000 per day, and that's still a conservative estimate!"
"Yes, sir!" the project manager responded with a shocked look on his face.
Steed had a smile on his face. They thought that 60,000 grenades a day was already an astonishing number, but there were millions of people on the front line, and an average of 16 people threw one grenade, so all 60,000 grenades could be thrown in one day.
Once a war breaks out, grenades will be thrown at the enemy crazily, with each person possibly throwing several, dozens, or even dozens of grenades.
Therefore, the production scale of 60,000 pieces per day is already quite conservative, and it needs to be further expanded depending on the situation.
At this time, the butler Lucas stepped forward to report: "Sir, Bonnet called just now and said that the military issued the "Meritorious Newspaper", which caused the sales of the "Little Daily" to drop sharply, and lost more than 100,000 customers in one day!"
Steed didn't take it seriously. He just casually replied, "I see. Bonnet should think about his own problems!"
Steed was well aware of the problem with the Little Daily. It used cartoons instead of photographs. Although this had the advantage of reducing costs and speeding up publication, its weakness was equally obvious: cartoons were drawn based on imagination and were very different from the real thing.
If other newspapers find it difficult to obtain physical information in the first place, or require high costs and high prices to obtain, "Small Daily" can indeed take advantage of being first and cheap.
But what if…
The opponent is a military newspaper with an official background, the Meritorious Daily. Its reporters can easily obtain information and even physical photos that the outside world cannot know. The advantages of the Small Daily will disappear and even become a weakness. The Meritorious Daily will deal a crushing blow to it.
"Sir!" Lucas came closer and lowered his voice and said, "Bonnet believes that this is most likely the Shire United Military..."
Steed interrupted Lucas with a "hmm" sound. He frowned slightly and said with dissatisfaction: "Tell Bonnet not to let your imagination run wild. Do you understand?"
"Understood!" Lucas responded.
He turned around to pass on the message, but was stopped by Steed again.
Steed stared at Lucas with a serious look on his face: "Tell Bonnet, there is only the military, not the Shire!"
Steed tapped the table heavily with his fingers and emphasized, "No Charles! Tell him to keep his mouth shut!"
"Yes, sir!"
Steed actually knew that Charles was involved, and he also knew that Charles was building his own power and voice. He was not stupid.
But compared with the grenade and the huge possible benefits in the future, what is the "Little Daily"?
Even if Charles asked him to give him the "Little Journal", Steed would give it to him immediately with both hands without even frowning!
As for the right to speak... Steed understood that Saint-Etienne's right to speak had long been out of match with its strength.
The right to speak should be based on strength, otherwise the right to speak is empty.
Even though the Little Daily had a million copies sold every day, it still could not control the production rights of the future rifles, and it was easily handed over to the United States under pressure from the parliament.
Steed understood that what could not be obtained on the battlefield could never be obtained at the negotiation table. The same was true for the struggle between parties.
Now, between strength and voice, Steed chose strength without hesitation.
It will only make sense to consider the right to speak when we have sufficient strength to survive and develop in the future.
Steed silently lit a cigar, and in the smoke he carefully considered a question: Will Charles grow into a formidable opponent like Schneider in the future?
No, he will be more terrifying than Schneider. He is a genius in both equipment research and development and battlefield command. No one will be able to defeat him in the future!
A smarter choice...
Instead of competing with Charles and becoming his enemy, you should become his supporter, a firm supporter!
Thanks to Du Nai Lai for the reward, thank you very much!
(End of this chapter)
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