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The expeditionary fleet led by Zhang Chunrui arrived at Nanshan Port in early November, leaving the merchant fleet, including immigrants, to rest, and the Foreign Legion was also returned to the establishment. After completing a simple maintenance and replenishment break, it sailed to Butterfly Island Twin Ports at the end of November, and was warmly welcomed by the citizens of Twin Ports. Butterfly Island overseas consular government officials led by Mayor Zhang Mingcheng and representatives of local businesses hosted a lavish dinner for all the officers of the expeditionary fleet at the city hall.

After resting on Butterfly Island for a few days, the expeditionary fleet continued its march towards Manchester City. When passing through the city of Shuangwan in Bermuda, although Zhang Chunrui did not choose to stop at the port, the Bermuda Naval Base still sent an offshore patrol ship to accompany him for dozens of nautical miles.

Finally, the return fleet, consisting of four light cruisers and two transports, arrived in Manchester Bay on December 15, marking the end of the largest military expedition ever undertaken by China and the United States.

Today happened to be Saturday, and as it approached the most lively multi-holiday period of the year, tens of thousands of elated Manchester citizens flocked to the wharf of the military port in the western district of Long Island, and some family members of officers and soldiers from other towns rushed to the capital a few days earlier. The city was lit up with lights, and the harbor became a sea of joy, and even the coastal slopes outside the military port were full of people.

The expedition has been going on for a year and four months, and the gorgeous expeditionary fleet has sailed into Manchester Bay, and every time a cannon salute is fired at the Inner Bay Fortress, it sets off a wave of cheers from the crowd on the shore. The National Assembly, the government cabinet, and the Army and Navy Command all sent high-level representatives to greet them, and a large number of police officers set up a cordoned off area inside and outside the military port to prevent overzealous citizens from disrupting the normal welcome celebrations.

Military music sang in unison, and a song "When-y-es-Marg-Home" was played repeatedly. Amid the cheerful drum beats and piccolo, the Wehrmacht officers and men who accompanied the fleet had already changed into brand-new uniforms and marched into the harbor in a neat procession. The citizens who welcomed the people in the middle of the road should clap and applaud rhythmically to the military music. Occasionally, women who saw their relatives in the queue wept and let out piercing screams.

A large number of welcome or award ceremonies that had been prepared for a long time were staged directly in the military port, and some officers and soldiers with outstanding performance were promoted to military ranks. President Chen Yuanyuan even bypassed Naval Commander Wang Tiehammer and personally awarded Zhang Chunrui, commander-in-chief of the expeditionary fleet, the Gold Medal of Outstanding Service, and Zhang Chunrui's meticulous and decisive performance in the overall leadership of the expeditionary fleet has won many praises from the National Assembly and the government, and he may soon be promoted to rear admiral.

Captain Andrew, the captain of the Sapphire, calmly handled the battle battle in the Battle of Futou Bay, and minimized the chaotic and erroneous situation of the battle line due to the error in the transmission of the flagship's command signal. Promoted to Lieutenant Commander.

Although Sun Yang had flaws in his operational command during the Battle of Futou Bay, he did not hide the flaws, and he used the limited strength of the expeditionary fleet properly in a series of complex naval operations, and was also promoted to colonel.

In addition, a number of army officers, including You Nanzhe and Scott, have also been promoted in military ranks. It's a joy for all.

……

The lively welcoming ceremony lasted almost until the afternoon, and the returning officers and men of the army and navy were given a holiday that lasted until after New Year's Day. Every officer and soldier will receive a large expeditionary allowance after today, including the Foreign Legion, which is as high as $320 for the lowest-ranking soldier in the expedition, and the state cost of the expedition officially exceeded $4.5 million on the day it ended.

During the expedition of one year and four months, a total of 27 soldiers were killed or wounded. Among them, 8 people were wounded in battle, only 2 were killed, and the rest all died of illness. It can be regarded as the smallest proportion of losses since the founding of the People's Republic of China. However, in terms of operational expenses, it is the most expensive military operation in all operations.

The equipment of the navy's ships has undergone a rigorous expeditionary test, and the difficulties and shortcomings of its logistical maintenance support have been exposed one after another when they are far from the mainland. It once again proves that the construction of overseas military bases has not yet reached the standard. It is not enough to complete the replacement application of the Navy's all-steam-powered ships.

Due to the low intensity of military operations, most of the expeditionary military operations were concentrated on logistics and transportation support. Multiple personnel and material delivery missions. Both the Gray Whale-class sail transport ships and the Chaoyang-class large sail merchant ships have played a great role, especially the former, which basically undertook high-intensity sailing tasks, and the failure rate was satisfactory.

Influenced by the use of all-steam-powered merchant ships already underway on the domestic Atlantic routes, the Navy has also made ambitious attempts to change the design of the latest generation of Princess-class large light cruisers, and it now appears that sail hybrid will remain the Navy's safest choice for years to come.

The final summary report on the military will take some time to complete, while other issues are at the forefront of the conversation in Congress and the administration. One of the most important is whether the Eastern Route has the status of a new interest growth point.

At present, if the country's ocean-going commercial capacity can reach a more abundant ideal state, the freight per 100 nautical miles per ton of cargo will not be less than 60 cents in the domestic market, and the freight from the mainland to the Pearl Island of Asia is more than 100 US dollars per ton, which does not include the cost of other logistics storage and transportation.

These freight costs could have been easily passed on in the 17th-century transcontinental ocean trade, but for a private trading company engaged in large ocean trade in China, a short shirt-class flying scissor merchant ship would have lost nearly $50,000 in net profits!

Combined with the trade round-trip cycle, a short shirt-class flying shear merchant ship can make at least eight round-trip voyages a year on the Atlantic route, while the eastern route can only carry out one round-trip voyage, then the net profit loss in the middle is even greater. Unless the Far East's commodity export profits can exceed those of Atlantic trade by several times, every ton of capacity put on the Eastern route for a round-trip voyage is not going to be able to get along with oneself.

Are the commodities and raw materials of industry and agriculture in the East important? In a certain way, it is true that some species have an irreplaceable and important role, but the industrial and agricultural development of the whole country does not depend on some specific raw materials. In view of the European market with a large population, the popularity of Huamei goods is no worse than that of Oriental luxury goods, so in terms of current demand, it seems very chicken to travel all the way to the East for trade and reselling.

Yang Xiaohua, vice president of COSCO International Trade Group, who has roughly figured out the market conditions of various major commodity raw materials in the Far East. He has written a very detailed analysis of this issue for his own trading group, and then it has been transferred to the helm of other trading companies through various channels.

Obviously, in the United States, which surpassed the general trade standards of the world in the 17th century, Europe had become an "economic colony", and from the point of view of raw materials to markets, from the point of view of pure commercial profits, the voyage through the East to trade between Asia and Europe was not the road to paradise in the imagination.

There is still huge potential for trade on both sides of the Atlantic, and the raw material supply channels and markets in Central and South America and Africa are still expanding, while the bottleneck of domestic ocean commercial capacity has not yet been broken. If the Oriental layout is to be developed, the important business interests and cost links are a dead knot that can never be bypassed.

Only by referring to the Mediterranean and Baltic trade zones in Europe, taking advantage of the unique geographical advantages of the Southeast Asian trade circle, and establishing a "rooted" business district around Southeast Asia, is probably the only way to achieve "effective profits". But in fact, whether it is a state-owned group. It is unlikely that most private companies will be able to project their precious resources far away from the East at this stage.

But if you can earn the same amount of money in the Atlantic Ocean at your doorstep, and live easily and nourishingly on your home turf, why go to the East to work tiringly? This is a question that the expeditionary fleet has been asking itself for a period of time after its return, from Congress to the government, to ordinary businesses and businessmen.

……

In fact, it is not only the summary of the Eastern Expedition, but also the summary of all walks of life in the country at the end of 1629 and the planning of the new year.

According to the strategic layout planning in North America. The total population of Porter City in the middle reaches of the Song River and Jiangkou Town, at the entrance of the Mohek River Valley in the northwest, finally exceeded 10,000 people, and together with nearly half of the army's troops stationed, the strategic support point in the north of Song Prefecture has been firmly established. To the west, the Mohoek Valley gradually expands into the depths. Looking at the direction of the fat Great Lakes from afar, there is always a trace of irrepressible ambition in the hearts of the traversers.

In addition, a few months ago, the Ministry of Civil Affairs organized a survey of the distribution of the population of the Delaware Indians on the west bank of the Pasayak River, west of Jersey Town. Iron ore was unexpectedly discovered in a forested swamp around Newark. For several years, he has been struggling to find more convenient mineral resources near the banks of the lower reaches of the Song River, but he has missed such a rich iron ore under his nose. Former Minister of Land and Resources, An Shaoqing, was taken aback by the discovery. It is said that this "great shame" was the reason why Shao Qing gave up his post as minister of land and resources and devoted himself to the cause of education.

In fact, this can't be entirely blamed on An Shaoqing, after all, the relevant information at hand is so limited, and the people of Newark inadvertently discovered this iron ore during a pioneer in the early 19th century.

Nowadays, the country's iron smelting industry has formed two major centers, the outer island industrial zone of Mancheng City, and Beiyuan Town in the north of Qingcheng City, Haizhou. The country's total steel production reached 110,000 tons in 1629, of which crude steel production exceeded 20,000 tons for the first time. The numbers seem to be proud, and they are far ahead of the history of this world. However, from 70,000 tons in 1624 to 110,000 tons in 1629, the increase was not as strong as everyone imagined.

An important factor in this, in addition to the size of the mining area and the problem of skilled miners, is that the distribution of iron ore is too fragmented. Iron ore from West Point and Elm, and even Virginia and Cuba, constitutes the import of metallurgical raw materials for the industrial area of the outer islands of Manchester. Not to mention that the cost of steel is difficult to fall, raw material input will always lead to periodic shortages for various reasons. The overall iron-smelting efficiency of the domestic steel industry has been difficult to expand on a large scale.

Now that the Newark area has discovered an open-pit iron ore mine with an average iron grade of more than 45%, and the initial estimated reserves are enough to support mining operations in the next few decades, the establishment of a more large-scale "steel complex" has become the core project of the country's industrial development.

According to the plan of the government cabinet, Beiyuan Town in Haizhou, due to the superior and complete mining conditions of nearby iron coal mines, can independently become an iron smelting center for key investment, and will introduce a series of steam-powered mine equipment that has been put into trial operation in Tongguò in the mining area of Xidian Town, and strive to reach 50,000 tons of steel annual output in four years; Relying on coastal and inland river transportation, the iron ore from West Point Town, Yushu Town, and the mining town to be established in Newark in the future will be transported to the outer island industrial zone of Mancheng City, and the coal mine transportation in the middle and lower reaches of the Song River will be used to establish a joint steel center, and strive to achieve an annual output of 150,000 tons in four years; The import of all kinds of ores from overseas will be settled in the future Binzhou town for centralized smelting and processing, and Binzhou's metallurgical industry will be developed.

Of course, such a large-scale industrial adjustment can only be organized by the state, and the state-owned energy and mining group, which is the largest industry giant in China, has become the largest contractor. However, the private metallurgical giant North Industries Corporation, which was criticized in the "steam turbine technology patent incident", was subjected to a lot of "difficulties" in the Commission of Science and Technology, and only got the industrial project in Binzhou.

At the same time, the shipbuilding industry has also entered the process of large-scale expansion. The Commission of Science, Technology and Industry has submitted a proposal for the SASAC to invest in the establishment of a "state-owned shipbuilding industry group". However, in Huamei, where the world is divided between state-owned and private, it is not a matter of money to add a state-owned shipbuilding enterprise, but of technical personnel.

Beiyang Shipbuilding Company has almost monopolized the vast majority of shipbuilding senior technical personnel and skilled workers, even if it is a "state-private joint venture" Haizhou Qingcheng Shipbuilding Company, it is also the core of technical engineers sent by You Qi and Shi Yige, and has trained a lot of skilled workers for each other in the past two years. Of the Flower-class sail frigates currently under construction, the last cornflower is on the slipway of Qingcheng Shipbuilding Company.

Initiated by the Commission of Science and Technology, promoted by the National Assembly, and acquired by the State-owned Assets Supervision and Administration Commission of Haizhou Qingcheng Shipbuilding Company, the initial intention to establish a state-owned shipbuilding industry group has been semi-public. It seems that the trend of "the state advancing and the people retreating" set off by the "state-owned faction" such as Bao Zitu and others after they came to power is eagerly infiltrating the advantageous industries that were once monopolized by private capital.

In the end, it is not known whether the Beiyang Shipbuilding Company will be able to resist the lobbying of all sides to sell the shares of Haizhou Qingcheng Shipbuilding Company, but this is enough to arouse the great vigilance of domestic private capital.

(To be continued)