"Big brother, I plan to design a long-endurance ship, and then improve the steam engine and boiler, otherwise the navy will need to patrol when establishing overseas bases, and the difficulty is not ordinary." Qiaoxi walked to Li Xuanqing's side with the report sent from the Tianjin shipyard in his hand and said, "This is the feedback of the navy from the shipyard on the Shandong-class battleship. I felt that the warships we designed with a range of 3,500 kilometers could not meet their requirements for a long endurance. ”

"3,500 kilometers is a bit insufficient, but can the current technical reserves increase the cruising range?" Li Xuanqing glanced at it and sighed: "But didn't the Shandong-class battleship already use the three-rise steam engine and small water tube boiler we designed?" It's a bit difficult to improve it, right? In this life, Li Xuanqing didn't care about using any other length unit to specifically measure the distance at sea, but the displacement of the Shandong-class battleship was 3,500 tons, and the range could reach 3,500 kilometers, which really made Li Xuanqing helpless, so he thought about it and nodded: "Let's take time to go to Tianjin, in addition to increasing the cruising range, in addition to increasing the power, there are actually other ways, and it is not necessarily a matter of power." The Shandong-class battleship is not good because it has not done a good job in design optimization. Our mechanics research has only just entered the exploration stage, and it is difficult for those designers to sketch a complete mechanical diagram of a warship in the water. ”

"Big brother, don't worry, they have actually done a good job, and when the time comes, we may be able to get through it when we go over and point out the key places." Qiaoxi was not as pessimistic as Li Xuanqing, but smiled happily, and it could be seen that Qiaoxi had thought of the key point in his heart. Most of the assets of the royal family are now under the direct management of Murong Feixue and Qiaoxi, and Li Xuanqing basically doesn't ask, naturally the specific situation here cannot be as clear as Qiaoxi.

However, after the couple put this matter down, they saw the latest report sent by the Ministry of Industry and Commerce, after the opening of the Lingnan Railway, the cargo throughput of Xihai County began to increase rapidly, and the Xu family, the Ma family and the Murong family, led by the three emerging maritime trade merchants of the Tang Dynasty, established dozens of large and small ocean trading companies in Xihai County, and began to conduct large-scale Western trade.

"Big brother, you see, once the straight-line distance between Nanzhao, Yunnan and Guangdong and Jiaozhou is shortened by railways and trains, all areas along the way will enter the peak period of development." Qiaoxi said with a smile: "It's just that in this way, the major Nanyang route trade ports led by Guangzhou are afraid that they will be left out a lot." ”

"So I'm going to set up a predominantly royal and state-run ocean-going trade and exploration agency in Shantou." Li Xuanqing said with a smile: "Extensively expand the trade in the South Seas, explore the minerals and natural resources of the South Seas, and then mine and use the sea transport back to the mainland, so that the large amount of mineral resources that need to be consumed in industrial development can basically be obtained from the South Seas region to make up for the domestic shortage." If this business only relies on private people, even the Xu family and the Murong family are beyond their strength, and only if we take the lead can we persevere. ”

"What the eldest brother said is that we can go through the Nanyang, which is still in the barbaric stage at the moment, so that other merchants in the country can free up their hands to open up the Western market, and transport more and more of our goods to those prosperous areas of the Western Ocean that have been civilized for a long time to earn wealth so that the empire can develop rapidly, which can be regarded as shearing sheep to feed us." Qiaoxi tilted his head and thought for a while: "Leave this matter to me and Sister Murong, I will go to Mr. Cen if I need the assistance and shareholding of the cabinet, but in this case, our freighter must find a way to achieve a displacement of about 10,000 tons." A few thousand tons of freighters can't carry too much ore in one trip. Moreover, once the road for the transportation of mineral resources by water is widened, it will inevitably affect our industrial layout. ”

Qiaoxi's words also made Li Xuanqing ponder for a while, his five-year industrial plan is already the third year this year, and most of the basic industries in the northern industrial belt have been fully laid out, so it can be said that the remaining two years are actually the results of acceptance. However, once overseas mineral resources are developed and transported back to the mainland in large quantities, then the best development direction is the major coastal cities, that is to say, the next development direction is what later generations called the open era. In fact, Li Xuanqing also knew that this was in line with the law of economic development, but it was different from what Li Xuanqing envisioned. After the southwest economic stimulus plan was nodded by Li Xuanqing, in fact, both Li Xuanqing and the cabinet have begun to make the southwest region the second key area for the development of the empire. Although the terrain of the southwest region is not good, it is not conducive to the large-scale development of industry and commerce, but once the main railway line is built, in fact, the southwest region has three trade exports, and the southwest railway can be connected to other places in the north and south, and now the Yangtze River golden waterway, which is becoming more and more important and busy, the development potential of the southwest region will not be inferior to the northern provinces.

"Leave this alone for the time being, it is not possible to achieve significant results in the transportation of overseas mineral resources in a short period of time." Li Xuanqing pondered for a long time and then said with a smile, "Let's discuss how to transform the ship first, without this, everything is nothing." ”

In fact, when Li Xuanqing and his wife were considering the overseas raw material market, the Western trade led by the Ministry of Industry and Commerce reached its climax in the middle of the sixth year of the Apocalypse. At this time, the body poison has fallen into the trap of the caste system, and it has been divided into countless large and small forces, so they do not have much resistance after the Datang forces squeeze in, although in the face of the huge area, whether it is the Tiance Army and Navy on the front line or the high-level Datang leaders who make decisions in the rear, we are not too interested in this land, but such a huge market, in just over two months after the initial entry, hundreds of freighters of various ocean trading companies in Xihai County have run back and forth several timesAfter the full load of industrial commodities was almost sold out, the domestic economy began to gradually feel the pull of overseas trade for the development of industry and commerce under such a strong pull.

Driven by this overseas trade, Datang's industry and commerce began to operate at full capacity, and the industrial products from the major northern provinces and regions began to be continuously concentrated along the land and waterways to the south, and then loaded in Shantou and Guangzhou, all the way to Xihai County, and then loaded again and shipped across the ocean. Because it is located at three key nodes, the development scale of the three transportation hubs of Shantou, Guangzhou and Xihai County has changed again and again in just half a year, not only Guangzhou has surpassed the scale of the Kaiyuan period in one fell swoop, but also the emerging cities of Shantou and Xihai County have begun to gradually develop in the direction of super cities. Under this development demand, a large number of people gather in urban areas from all directions, and then become part of urban development.

Time to the weather in August of the sixth year, in the Tibetan war into the final stage, Lhasa and other places were taken by Xue Yang in one fell swoop at the same time, Wan Yi and others returned to Chang'an from the northwest side to report on their work, at this time Li Xuanqing was full of emotion after seeing a few people, the northwest land in front of these people finally recovered, so a grand dinner was held in the palace to entertain the accompanying generals at all levels, and at the same time promised Wan Yi that the development of the northwest side will become the key planning direction of the empire, and in view of the war and the unclear war with the Great Food Empire, After the Central Garrison Battalion withdraws to the mainland, the General Staff will mobilize other troops into the northwest according to the situation, refill the shelf of the Western Expeditionary Army, and maintain a high degree of suppression of the Great Food Empire. In fact, before the northwest side was fully incorporated into the Tang Dynasty's ruling system, Li Xuanqing had already thought about it, using the influence of the Silk Road to transport the Tang Dynasty's goods to various places for sale, so as to complete the unification and naturalization of the economy. After all, it is a bit unrealistic to focus on the development of the northwest when the empire itself has not yet completed its industrial development, and the current financial resources of the empire do not even allow Li Xuanqing to concentrate on the development of the north while taking into account the south, so after the development of the Western route, Li Xuanqing will let Murong Hanhai dump goods to the West so vigorously, only in this way can he use the original accumulation of industrial products to complete the original accumulation of capital in a short time.

"The General Staff should inform the Marine Corps and the Western Fleet that if there are other forces in the Western Ocean that suppress and suppress our caravans entering and leaving the Western Ocean, they must provide a military guarantee to protect the interests of our Datang merchants overseas from being infringed upon." Li Xuanqing's eyes flashed. For those indigenous forces who are in the natural economy and even the feudal natural economy, the impact from the industrial age will quickly destroy their original economic model, and the ensuing conflicts are inevitable and unavoidable, and the purpose of the marines stationed in various places is to safeguard the interests of the Tang Dynasty with the strong combat power of the army when necessary.

Li Xuanqing and Qiaoxi, the eyes of the future world, thought of everything they could think of in advance, and almost the entire Tang Dynasty weather for six years, the two and even the entire empire were busy around the Western route. After the large-scale transportation of all kinds of building materials, the major strongholds in the West have been built one after another, and the Lion Kingdom as the center of the West has also begun to be gradually developed, on the newly established new dock, Qu Chengxing is ready to bypass the southernmost point of the Poison Peninsula again and then go to the northwest, continue to develop the stronghold of the front, Qu Chengxing's goal is to build the stronghold all the way to the Great Food Empire, and if possible, he can also cross the Great Food Empire and continue to move forward. What Qu Chengxing didn't know was that his idea at this time was officially put forward by Li Xuanqing not long after, and Datang's side also began to gradually move towards exploring the unknown direction after the entire Western route stabilized.

"Your Majesty, I think our fiscal revenue this year will only rise by more than 30% compared to last year." After Cen Tianshi got out of the previous busyness, he and Li Xuanqing went to Lishan for temporary recuperation, and the two played against each other in Lishan and said with a smile: "The financial income of the Western route is the bulk of this year, more than the gold and silver goods collected by Xiao Si from Tubo, and this is not dead money." Yin Honglin, the kid from Qianzhuang, personally went to Xihai County to improve the construction of Qianzhuang, and established a complete set of entry and exit procedures with the customs. ”

"Our Tang coins are the most deadly weapon for robbing foreign wealth." The corners of Li Xuanqing's mouth rose slightly, took a cup of tea handed over by Qiaoxi, drank it and said with a smile: "Over time, the entire Western Ocean will use Tang coins for trading, and at that time, our Datang Money Village will store all the gold and silver in the entire Western Ocean." Li Xuanqing didn't say a word, once the situation became like this, as long as there was a slight fluctuation in the value of the Tang coin, it would affect the entire Western region. However, Cen Tianshi didn't expect this, he just felt that once Xihai County perfected the financial and entry and exit systems, then the annual financial revenue of one place alone would be more than the total income of the entire Nanzhao region.

"Sir, don't just count the revenue, our GDP is the focus." Qiaoxi remembered that Li Xuanqing asked the Ministry of Finance earlier this year to select the gross national product to count the economic strength of Datang, so he smiled: "Although Qiaoxi doesn't know what the specific value is, but under the strong trade promotion, the domestic GDP is only afraid that there will be explosive growth, and if it will be stable next year, we will continue to develop at this rate." What the cabinet needs to do is to stabilize the pace of economic development on the one hand, and actively explore new markets on the other hand, so that the pace of industrial development will not be slowed down because of the market. ”

"The Ministry of Finance has been counting for more than half a year, and I don't know if Qi Hong has done it." Cen Tianshi touched his beard and said with a smile: "But even if you can't do it, it doesn't matter, according to the growth of fiscal revenue, our economic development rate is at least about 10%, right?" ”

"Next year, when you have money, we will continue to promote the Southwest Railway, once the Southwest Railway is completed, I am afraid that the transaction volume of Western trade will increase, but the development model of some cities needs to be changed." Li Xuanqing thought for a while and said, "The cabinet needs to communicate well with the political envoys of these provinces in advance, so that they can think of ways in advance. Li Xuanqing knew that Qiaoxi had asked Zhang Qiang to go to Shantou to set up a Nanyang Trading Co., Ltd., and also placed a batch of orders for new freighters for Liuqiu Shipyard and Dalian Shipyard, and at the same time recruited people to prepare to explore the road first. Because Zhang Qiang was a royal family, he even got a Fuxing-class warship to follow, and Li Xuanqing's first destination for them was the Ryukyu Islands and Luzon Islands in the east.

Zhang Qiang personally took about a dozen ships and a team of more than 1,000 people to go to sea to explore the way, and the Nanyang Fleet would also send fleets to rush over in the later stage, so that these two places would enter Li Xuanqing's sight and soon become the raw material source for the industrial development of the Tang Dynasty.