Later in the day, Rachel once again stormed Qin Lang's office. Pen % fun % Pavilion www.biquge.info

"You're taking my warnings like air again! Listen, Qin, since the Chinese always say, 'nothing more than three', in the name of God, I warn you for the last time, if you dare to come again, I will pick a child! Do you understand, if this happens a fourth time, I'll give you all the work! She roared, her expression fierce, her hands clenched into fists, and the thump of her desk made her look like a mad beast.

Qin Lang felt a headache: if Rachel picked on him, the situation would become unmanageable. In a short period of time, it is almost impossible to find a professional manager who can take over her job. Moreover, any high-level personnel change will cause speculation, suspicion and discussion from the outside world, and all kinds of gossip will circulate everywhere, and then cause a lot of unnecessary trouble.

While it can be claimed that Rachel left because she was very unexpectedly - or rightfully - pregnant, it would only lead to worse results. Even if Rachel and Yi Shui agree with this statement from a global perspective, those of her relatives will soon let the truth come to light.

Especially Henry. Daubers, he didn't know what "secrecy" was.

However, these are caused by easy water. He had long since passed the age of enthusiasm and impulsiveness, and had not shown those faults for a long time, but there had been a tendency to become more and more frequent lately—just after his return to San Diego from the Mogao Grottoes.

It seems that during that time, something unknown happened.

It's worth investigating. However, Qin Lang knew that the first problem that needed to be solved now was the angry lady in front of him.

"Rachel, you have to believe that this time it wasn't my intention, it's just that that the stupid boy never managed to correct his old problems, and I tried to help him, but I was in a hurry, and I messed things up." He argued, with a bitter look on his face.

"I'll fix his problem!" She called.

"I'm skeptical about it." Qin Lang frowned, "Your problem is that you dote on him too much. ”

"You can think so, Qin. But it's my business, and no one can interfere - including you! She was still emotional, but a little better than she had been - at least no more banging on his desk.

He shrugged his shoulders and didn't speak, acquiescing to her request.

Her attitude softened a little more.

He Lang felt that he could change the subject. "How are the negotiations with DuPont going? You know, we have to start producing those new types of weapons as soon as possible......"

"If you hadn't added to my unnecessary troubles, things would have gone pretty well." "Luckily, even though you've added all that unnecessary trouble to me, I've still made a deal with DuPont in our favor." DuPont will take 350 tons of explosives from other customers' orders and we will only have to pay 10 percent more. ”

"That's good." Qin Lang pretended to be as if he hadn't noticed her sarcasm at all, very calm and a little caring. "Other businesses?"

Rachel sat down in front of him. "It's all solved, including the white phosphorus you need."

"Transportation?"

"Your old friends are very generous," she said, referring to Morgan and Harriman, "and of course they are curious, and I am curious as to why we are so desperate to produce raw materials and wagons." It's not like your style, and according to your usual style, these things should have been prepared a long time ago. ”

"Because I don't know when the weapons development department will be able to design those things."

"Really?" She didn't believe it.

The weapons development department was given the task of unplanned, improvised, improvised work, so Claude's men had to work overtime all day. In other words, it wasn't until more than three months ago that he thought of the new weapons with strange overtones - which still didn't look like his style.

There must be something else.

Rachel believed his guess, without a doubt, and was absolutely correct. It's just that she feels that Qin Lang won't tell the real reason, just like every time in the past.

She was taken aback.

"There's one more small problem." His voice was filled with regret and self-reproach, "Our previous plan turned out to be so good that it exceeded my expectations, so that the strength of Russia and Japan was lower than originally predicted. He laughed self-deprecatingly, "I thought they didn't need the gadgets they could only use for fun. ”

They shouldn't use those little things. Qin Lang sighed secretly and thought. The war between Russia and Japan was supposed to be a war in which hundreds of thousands of gray cattle and the same number of kamikaze martyrs fought bloody battles on the vast battlefields of northeastern China, using all kinds of modern weapons - machine guns, armored vehicles, heavy artillery, poison gas, and other gadgets, and every minute hundreds or more soldiers fell and then turned to powder in the heavy artillery fire......

That's what that war should be.

However, to his extreme regret, it was no longer possible, since the Russian and Japanese empires did not have enough money to arm their own armies.

They were poorer than he expected - especially in Japan. Even with war loans from American consortia and negligible British aid, Tokyo was still unable to build a modern army that met his demands – in fact, the Japanese government was not even capable of completing the plan it had laid out five years earlier: to triple the number of its army and triple the tonnage of its ships in ten years.

Tokyo didn't get that much time, only half of the book. And the total amount of money needed for its ambitious plan is staggering - think of the Japanese government's fiscal revenues and the average income of the Japanese, it is indeed a surprising figure - 431 million yen, including the construction of the army and navy, 295 million, and the construction of heavy industry, 136 million, yet as is known, the continued economic contraction has made it impossible for the country to pay such high construction funds, and has to turn to American consortiums for financial support.

But the money is still not enough. Although the Japanese government was very decisive in cutting most of its industrial projects, it still had to face a shortage of funds because of the increased construction costs of the army and navy.

And it's multiplied.

Here's a simple example: since Vickers and Armstrong could not have built four battleships in a year, and no shipbuilder could do so, just a few weeks earlier, the Imperial Japanese Navy was forced to abandon its original idea, cancel an earlier order, and purchase five Monarchy-class battleships from the British Royal Navy. As a result, the Japanese government had to pay a sum of compensation to the shipbuilding company, and the price of five battleships was rightfully higher than the price of four.

Even these battleships were old ships that had been in service for several years. London's claim that they were the main warships of the Royal Navy and would not have been sold was true; London went on to claim that it had finally agreed to sell the ships because Britain was a staunch and unwavering ally of Japan, a statement that clearly ignored Britain's Far East strategy and the Royal Navy's latest shipbuilding program; In the end, London claimed that it had been discounted, and no one would think so except the British.

It's just that the Japanese had no choice but to buy the old ships of the British at the price of new ones, and they will continue to buy them: in addition to battleships, the Japanese Navy also needs armored cruisers, protective cruisers, destroyers and large torpedo boats.

There are also transport ships.

Qin Lang once again blamed himself for failing to see all aspects of the problem - the lack of transport ships for the Japanese was something he had not expected at all, or rather, had never considered.

Unfortunately, it is very serious trouble, or it can be described in another word: disaster. The tonnage of Japan's merchant ships was only 280,000 tons, but according to the latest calculations, in order to ensure that the Japanese army could at least receive sufficient ammunition supplies, the tonnage of Japan's merchant ships had to be increased to 600,000 tons.

At least 600,000 tons.

However, it's like the same problem that the Navy encountered: time. It is impossible for the shipbuilders of the United States, Europe and Japan to complete the construction of so many transport ships in such a short period of time, after all, it is 1900, not 1940; But Japan had to get so many ships, so there were only two options left: buy old ships or lease them from Western shipping companies.

And then a new trouble arose: at this critical moment, clouds were gathering over East Asia, war was on the horizon, and every shipping company and private shipowner who could charter or sell ships to Japan was raising their prices.

Just like in 1894, Li Hongzhang, who was buying warships everywhere, once encountered a situation.

Of course, Hirobumi Ito is not Li Hongzhang. At that time, Li Hongzhang only had 3.5 million taels of silver, and even if he was willing to accept the extortion of the arms dealer, he was not capable of turning it into a fact. But since the Japanese government has received a loan from a syndicate of American banks, it is clear that he cannot use the high price as a reason to refuse extortion.

Yes, this is a justified and reasonable reason, but Ito Hirobumi cannot use it, otherwise the war will not be on schedule; If the war does not go on schedule, he may be glad as a sensible politician who has a good impression of Russia, but the Jews in the banking group will be angry, and the patriotic young Japanese who love the motherland will also play the drama of "heavenly punishment of the national thief" according to the country's tradition.

Ito Hirobumi is not the kind of fool who sends himself into trouble, so he will accept the blackmail of Western shipping companies and private shipowners, and then channel the anger of patriotic youth on the whole Western world, so that they will spend all their free time denouncing the "Mi Ying ghost animal".

No, it should be a Caucasian ghost animal, and then, maybe it's an ABCD fence......

Qin Lang stopped, realizing that he was thinking too much and had extended the question to an irrelevant direction. He rested for a few seconds, then went back to where he had gone astray.

The Japanese government accepted the extortion of the Royal Navy and the extortion of Western shipping companies and private shipowners, which allowed it to waste too much valuable money and ultimately severely affected the Japanese Army.

Expanding the army to 600,000 men and equipping them with a sufficient number of rifles—mostly old Murata rifles—was the last thing Tokyo could do, with machine guns, armored vehicles, heavy artillery, poison gas, as he was frustrated, either a small number or none at all.

What a sad fact. Fortunately - for the Japanese, and for Qin Lang, it was another tragedy - and the Russians too. (To be continued, if you want to know what will happen next, please log in to the www.qidian.com, more chapters, support the author, support genuine reading!) (To be continued.) )