Portugal, a remote corner of Europe, has experienced four major turning points in its national development since the completion of national unification at the end of the Middle Ages, and has had a subtle but far-reaching impact on the modern history of the world along with the wave of geographical discoveries and global trade.

The first turning point was at the end of the 15th century when the Portuguese navigator Da. Gamma succeeded in opening the Indian Ocean route, and Portugal began to monopolize the huge profits of trade in the Far East, striding into the door of a global colonial empire.

The second turning point was the death of King Sebastian of Portugal in Morocco at the end of the 16th century, and the royal family became extinct. The Spanish royal family took the opportunity to take over Portugal, and Portugal, whose national sovereignty had fallen into a trough prematurely, was in a stagnation for more than half a century, and Spain became an empire on which the sun never sets.

The third turning point was the discovery of major gold deposits in Brazil at the end of the 17th century, and in the decades that followed, Brazil accounted for almost 70% of the world's gold production at that time. For a time, a large number of people poured into Brazil, and the prosperity of Brazil became the only economic pillar that Portugal could rely on. Portugal's overseas colonization strategy was thus strongly reversed: except for maintaining a few trading posts in Africa, India, and Southeast Asia, it basically abandoned the pace of colonial expansion in the East and went all out to develop the Brazilian colonies.

The fourth turning point was the Lisbon earthquake that occurred in 1755 AD, and later geologists estimated the magnitude to reach a terrifying 9 on the Richter scale. It was one of the most devastating and deadly earthquakes in human history, and the largest in the history of Europe, with a whopping 100,000 deaths around Lisbon alone.

The earthquake and the ensuing tsunami not only razed Lisbon to the ground, but also caused heavy damage to towns in the south and southwest of Portugal and in many coastal countries of Western Europe. It took more than 20 years to rebuild Lisbon and rebuild the country, almost depleting the savings that Portugal had accumulated for hundreds of years, and Portugal's overseas colonization career completely declined, and continued to fall from a second-rate country in Europe to a third-rate country.

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The biennial Economic Forum of North America and the Atlantic was originally planned to be held in the summer of 1646 in Angra de Marshato-Marshato, Azores, but this time it was hastily brought forward to the spring. The location was also temporarily changed to Lisbon, Portugal.

Catalyzed by Huamei, transatlantic and even transcontinental trade has become more and more mature, and the maritime trade of "America-Atlantic-Europe" has been paved from point to point. Players in this economic circle, like the Thirty Years' War in Europe, have been embroiled in more countries or regions over the past two decades.

Due to the war in Europe, there were many situations that could not be seen clearly by the United States, so this gathering of countries related to the Atlantic trade had to be made into a gathering with great political and diplomatic intentions.

The diplomatic conflict between Huamei and France was really fake, and there was secret information that Spain and France had the intention to make peace in private, so Huamei had to find a way to quickly intervene at this time to ensure that the rhythm of the final war in the whole of Europe still unfolded according to Huamei's wishes.

It was against this backdrop that the North American and Atlantic Economic Forum was moved to Portugal in Europe, and the participating countries were more different than before: proud and angry France was absent, and England in the midst of the civil war was gone.

But there are also two new members: Scotland, which has not been present for a long time, suddenly sent a representative. It seems that you want to get some support from it; Genoa in the western Mediterranean took the initiative to visit, apparently wanting to have in-depth exchanges with Huamei, which had initially opened up trade in the Mediterranean.

What was supposed to be a gathering for everyone to imagine a prosperous future for the world turned out to be a diplomatic persuasion meeting co-chaired by Huamei and Portugal. Even because France refused to send representatives to participate, the opportunity for Huamei to deliberately prepare to fight a diplomatic rhetorical war with France in front of other countries was gone.

Emden and Sweden's representatives were at odds with each other over the battle for the North Sea town of Lübeck; Denmark suddenly turned to Sweden as if it had forgotten its scars, and tried to take advantage of the contradictions and disputes between the two countries to find an opportunity to regain part of the Schleswig territory that had been forced to cede to Emden a few years earlier; Spain, for its part, was furious at the Dutch and the French openly allied with France to support the "Catalan Reaper Rebellion".

After only holding on for half a month, Huamei had to end this farce without any nutrition ahead of schedule, and Portugal, which was bent on showing its presence on the European stage, was also deflated. The rest of the Chinese delegation. It is a three-month business trip to Portugal.

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Spring in Portugal is a particularly stunning landscape.

Even in large cities like Lisbon and Porto, in addition to the mottled old city walls, monastery towers and squalid and dim urban buildings, the countryside around the city is still full of uneroded by modern industrial civilization.

Puerto Barreru across the Tagus River from Lisbon. A wave of ornate merchants dressed in different European costumes was touring the local landscape under the protection of Portuguese soldiers, followed by a more protected group of Portuguese aristocrats.

This is a diplomatic and business delegation led by the Minister of Foreign Affairs of China and the United States, Swenbo Svenbeau, who had previously participated in the "North American and Atlantic Economic Forum" and is now doing business visits throughout Portugal.

In the post-world. Barreru is an important industrial area in the metropolitan area of Lisbon, Portugal, and at this time it was only a small port. However, since a few years ago, the area has been expanding. It has gradually become a distribution center for bulk maritime trade commodities, and the newly built port wharves and warehouses are full of people.

A large Sino-American Standard 3000 ocean-going bulk carrier is unloading, sacks full of wheat grains are rolling down the merchant ship's own steam drive belt, and then being transported by horse-drawn carriage to a Sino-Portuguese joint venture flour mill deep in the harbor area, where Portuguese porters are sweating profusely.

"It has excellent port conditions for the construction of one of the most advanced shipyards in Europe." The commercial representative of the Beiyang Shipbuilding Group looked at the coastline of the port area and waved his arms exaggeratedly.

"Why don't we move the woollen yarn textile center of Iberian wool from the Azores to Serra? As long as the processing is concentrated here, the cost will be further reduced! "Yang Wenwen Living Art Group's textile business, a young Chinese middle manager, has all the thoughts.

"Then I'm sure that His Excellency the Governor of the Azores will be the first to object, and how many housewives in Angra Herosgra de Terceira will be unemployed!" Another European-American business representative disagreed.

"Maybe so...... But the wages of the workers here should be half less than that of Anjusmo Sangra, right? The Chinese young man suddenly showed a look of regret.

"See? The Barreru Flour Company, which Daeyun Group invested in last year, can make at least 10 percent more profit by importing wheat from North America and processing it into flour here. Hearing that they are also planning to invest in an olive plantation in Portugal and then continue to open a large olive oil processing plant here, I have to say that Mr. Wu Linyun has a unique vision......

A group of business representatives of Huamei enterprises whispered in the port area. Almost everyone agrees on the value of Barreru's investment.

Not far behind them, the Chinese and American Foreign Minister Swenbo was accompanying a richly dressed and thin-looking middle-aged Portuguese man walking slowly.

"Your Majesty, the Exemplary Civilization project has been approved by our Parliament, and it is fitting that this good news is announced here. As for the cooperation projects listed in the "Model of Civilization" plan, the Ministry of Commerce of China is still reviewing and approving one after another, and I believe that in the near future, relevant enterprises will be able to formally sign investment agreements with your country. ”

"There is also good news that Congress is actively reviewing the project of the Kingdom of Portugal to finance the introduction of an authorized assembly line for the Type 34A flintlock pistol and the Type 42 front-loading rotary rifle field gun, which will also be included in the Model of Civilization program, I think in two years at most. His Majesty's Royal Ordnance Factory will be ready to begin! ”

Svenbo inadvertently mixed with a little smugness in his heart, and the taciturn Portuguese king beside him suddenly lit up at this time, and his unsmiling face also flashed a trace of relief.

"Of course, I welcome more North American friends to my country, and every change and harvest here represents the deepening of our friendship." João IV turned around and expressed his gratitude to Swenbo in a slightly nervous and surprised voice, "Any land in Barreru will be open to your country, as long as you like it." ”

said. João IV pointed to a crowded construction site in the distance, and a more confident smile appeared on his slightly tired face: "Mr. Minister, the warehouse area under construction is a gift from me to all the merchants of your country, and I hope this time next year." It will be filled with goods from all over the world! ”

"Of course, shared prosperity has always been the philosophy of our Congress and our government."

Svenbo smiled very happily, as if the King of Portugal in front of him was his best friend. Privately, João IV had already sold a newly developed and fertile piece of land in the Brazilian colony of Bahia to Svenbeau at the lowest price. For the first time, the historian owned a vast and wholly-owned farm in Brazil.

Barrerou, the site personally chosen by João IV, will be a new industrial area close to Lisbon that will concentrate most of the American investment in Portugal. Thus became the true foundation of the great cause of the revival of the Kingdom of Portugal.

The starting point for this foundation is what Chinese and American diplomats call the "Model of Civilization" program, which aims to help Portugal become an "advanced, rich and civilized" European country over the next two decades.

As for the terrible Lisbon earthquake a hundred years later, those who don't know will naturally not be touched, and those who know will not care, because whether Barreru can survive a hundred years later is not at all important to the current Huamei.

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While Portugal's fundamentals are already on the decline, Portugal's fortunes seem to be a little different in this new era.

From 1621, when the first Chinese American set foot on Portuguese soil, Portugal began to enjoy the benefits of maintaining an alliance with China and the United States. As the first bridgehead for the United States to penetrate Europe, Portugal is the country with the closest economic and diplomatic relations between China and the United States in Europe.

After the Brazilian War of 1636, Portugal had become a de facto vassal state of the Atlantic hegemony of the United States. In 1642, the Peace of Spain and Portugal was brokered by the United States, which allowed Portugal to regain its independence from Spain.

Portugal is located in the southwesternmost corner of Europe, with a small country and a small population, which is a typical small European country with fragile and irreparable natural defects. However, from Brazil, the Gold Coast of West Africa to the Indian Ocean, it has a vast overseas colony or trading base, which is enough to provide the raw material output and commodity market needed by the United States, and also has a long history of good relations with Genoa and other western Mediterranean trading powers, and is one of the few countries in Europe that can be called rich in mineral resources.

Portugal was also far from the hotspots and centers of contention for hegemony on the European continent. Have a relatively stable external environment. From the very beginning, Huamei has carefully selected this supporter who can be safely cooperated, and in a sense, it is far easier to control than the ambitious Emden, and easier to deal with than Spain, which considers itself the number one in the world.

The brutality of the Thirty Years' War in Europe, coupled with the threat of neighboring Spain and the Netherlands, its biggest overseas rival, made João IV very soberly aware of the irreplaceable importance of Huamei to Portugal's strategic security and overseas interests, and his dependence on Huamei entered a new stage, and he willingly maintained an all-round alliance with Huamei.

The Chinese army defeated the Dutch West India Company in 1636 and defended Portugal's overseas colonial interests. Favouritism towards Portugal had become thoroughly open, and the boom in trade between Brazil and the United States had strengthened the conviction of the Portuguese elite.

Encouraged by profits, many churches and monasteries in Portugal abolished private alms, and beggars and vagrants in the cities and countryside were swept away and shipped to Brazil in boats.

In Bahia, Brazil, in Pernambuco, in San Salvador, and so on, there are many more Sino-Portuguese joint venture farms, plantations, and mines that require manpower. The large-scale exploitation of the Portuguese colony in Brazil was half a century ahead of the discovery of the great gold mines.

The lives of ordinary people in Portugal have not changed drastically, but they are much better than in other European countries. At least, the price of cereals in Lisbon is already the lowest in Europe.

Due to the import of large quantities of Chinese food and medicine, Portugal's population has increased rapidly over the past two decades, and excluding overseas colonies such as Brazil, the native population has already exceeded 1.8 million. And it is expected to break the 2 million mark within a decade.

At present, there are more than 5,000 European foreign workers in several road and bridge construction companies in China and the United States, of which 2,000 are Portuguese foreign workers, which is the largest export of hired labor to China and the United States among all European countries.

These Portuguese foreign workers are on paper on a labor visa. Naturally, their status was much higher than that of slave prisoners of war, but they still had little personal freedom. In addition to being able to eat and drink well, the vast majority of the salary income during the contract period was directly accepted by a Portuguese Chamber of Commerce with a royal background. Put it in a later era. They have a special identity tag, called a body worker.

In just ten years, from 1636 to 1645, Portuguese treasury revenues increased from less than $3 million a year to more than $4 million a year. While much more of the unseen gains went into the pockets of the royal family and the aristocracy, Portugal's economic power had almost doubled on the surface.

Portugal has been openly described in the beautiful domestic newspapers as "one of the few beautiful countries in a dark world that shines with the brilliance of civilization", and the Portuguese diplomats in Manchester City are complacent about this obviously politically purposeful praise, and even more so in the face of the Netherlands and Spain.

Interestingly, although Portugal, like other European countries, has a lot of gorgeous debts, whether it is the royal family or the big aristocratic families, many powerful people in Portugal have invested family money in the market and futures market of Huamei Manchester City many years ago, and they have a lot of fun. Whether the country is rich or poor, or whether the royal family is bankrupt, is not a matter for the aristocracy to worry about, and among the foreign capital active in China and the United States, the capital from Portugal is about 1 million US dollars, second only to Spain, and it can be regarded as contributing to the economy of China.

Whether it is the Portuguese royal family or the major aristocratic agencies, they are now with stable income, and they will be able to completely pay off all their debts in three years, and they are rated as the best overseas customers by the East West banking community.

In the Sino-American business delegation that accompanied Swainbo to Portugal, a group of East West Bank representatives lobbied desperately to the Portuguese crown or several large aristocratic monopolies to obtain loans from East West Bank.

Long-term commercial loans with an interest rate of 12% per annum are obviously illegal usury in China and the United States, but in this era they are the ultra-low interest rates that European countries can only dream of. The Portuguese naturally did not dislike people taking the initiative to borrow money to spend, and the Chinese American bankers wished that the Portuguese could borrow tens or millions of dollars at a time. (In order to promote domestic investment, the statutory maximum interest rate for commercial loans in China and the United States is 8% per annum.) ）

In less than half a month, King João IV of Portugal borrowed $100,000 from Huamei Qingcheng Commercial Bank in his private name to establish the Royal Portuguese Distillery, while Baron Moreira's family, which had a good personal relationship with Yang Wenwen, united with several other small and middle-aged nobles to borrow $400,000 from Huamei COSCO International Investment Bank. Purchased 6 refurbished Huamei second-hand GB 1000 steam bulk merchant ships for the ocean-going triangular trade between Portugal and North America and the Caribbean.

The Portuguese didn't seem to have any discomfort with the feeling of being tied up with their thighs hugged. Even as the news of the fall of Muscat, the heart of Indian Ocean trade, has long since reached Europe, Portugal still feels that its lost golden age is about to return.

Even though Catholicism and feudal kingship remained the cornerstones of the Kingdom of Portugal, as one of the only two European countries to maintain a trade surplus with China and the United States (the other being Ireland), João IV and his Portuguese nobles, who had enjoyed the Atlantic, Indian and Far Eastern trade, saw their future clearly in their close association with the United States. In order to get more aid from China and the United States, they chose some reforms that were in their own interests.

The first is currency reform. At the suggestion of Huamei, the Royal Bank of Portugal was established. Introducing the Magnificent Minting Equipment to mint and issue a new Portuguese currency.

They include gold escudos, silver escudos, silver rials, and bronze reis. And for the first time, the decimal system was adopted: 1 escudo was equal to 10 rials, and 1 rial was equal to 10 reis. In addition to the different patterns of silver coins, the size, fineness, and weight are exactly the same as those of several gorgeous currencies, and can be directly exchanged for the same value.

The minting and issuance of new currency was equivalent to completely getting rid of the influence of Spain and incorporating it into the monetary strategy system dominated by China and the United States, laying the foundation for Portugal to rebuild the country's monetary and financial credit in the 17th century, when mercantilism was rampant and the currency system was chaotic.

The second item. The newly established Royal Bank of Portugal must be a mixed joint-stock system and invited to take a stake in the United Bank of Rasi Atlantis, becoming the first European bank to inject capital into the bank. Based on the principle of friendly reciprocity, Rusé Atlantis Union Bank also became one of the original shareholders of Royal Bank of Portugal.

The United Bank of Atlantis was founded by some of the most capitalized banks in the United States. Together with the Bank of Amsterdam in the Netherlands, it has a monopoly on the settlement of international bills for Atlantic trade.

João IV and the Portuguese nobles were overjoyed by the return of this reform, and the commercial bills issued by the Royal Bank of Portugal could be accepted in the Union Bank of the Rasé-Atlantis. As a result, the intercontinental trade between the Portuguese royal family and the various aristocratic agents was more convenient and more financial.

The third is that Portugal will completely open all its domestic and overseas colonial ports to Huamei, and will no longer restrict the right to trade in ports.

Although this will cause Portugal to lose the initiative in Sino-American trade. But in this era when it was almost impossible to stop the influx of luxury goods, the more Chinese goods entered Portugal, the more it could increase the economic power of Portugal. After all, over the years, because of the geographical distance, Lisbon has become the first port for Chinese goods to enter Europe, and it has been comparable to Amsterdam in the Netherlands in terms of quantity and variety.

In the mainland, Brazil, West Africa, the Indian Ocean, or Southeast Asia, as long as it was a port that had opened its trade rights to China and the United States, which one was not the golden pot of the Kingdom of Portugal? Portuguese merchants flourished in the world to resell their goods.

For example, the cities of Lisbon and Porto, which are mainland Portugal, have gradually become centralized trading ports for many commodities after opening up their trade rights to China and the United States. Raw silk, silk, fabrics, ceramics, and spices from the Far East, as well as grains, refined sugar, tobacco, soap, cloth, medicines, glass, and hardware from the Far East, all made Portugal's merchants big and small eat their brains, and by the way, they also patronized the Mediterranean dealers such as Genoa, who had gone downhill in history.

Before Portugal regained its independence in 1642, Huamei did not have any industrial investment in Portugal, except for the original American Concession on the island of Terceira and the Brazilian colony. After Portugal regained its independence in 1642, in addition to rearmament of the army and navy, Portugal has been trying to obtain more strategic assistance from China and the United States in order to achieve a comprehensive national recovery.

As long as Portugal implements all the three reforms it has promised before, Huamei will make an in-depth strategic investment in Portugal in accordance with the agreed assistance intention, and name this strategic investment project "Model of Civilization".

Portugal no longer restricts the location of Huamei investment in the country's mainland or overseas colonies, but must work with "qualified" Portuguese investors. Of course, a qualified Portuguese investor is a commercial agent of the Portuguese royal family or a great nobleman.

With the "Model of Civilization" as a blueprint, domestic capital from China will import a large number of advanced modern industries into Portugal, covering pine resin, cork processing, cement and building materials, mining, papermaking, leather, food, textiles, ships and hardware manufacturing.

According to the principle of cooperation in the "Model of Civilization" plan, all of them will be jointly founded by Huamei Capital and the Portuguese royal family or great nobles, and at least half of them must be majority-owned by Huamei investors.

Most of these cooperation projects are labor-intensive industries with low technology content, and the market demand for products is broad. Moreover, the cost of labor in Portugal is much lower than that of Huamei, and the labor remuneration of a skilled tradesman is only one-quarter to one-fifth of Huamei.

After a rough calculation, as long as the shares of these future investment in Portugal can exceed 30%, the annual profit dividends that can be obtained will not be lower than the investment in China and the United States, and the Chinese American investors will eventually receive a lot of returns, and the United States will also be able to obtain cheaper Portuguese imports. Portugal will also reap incalculable benefits, and it will be a win-win situation.

Now that Portugal has finally received the good news from the Chinese diplomat himself, the joy in João IV's heart cannot be concealed, and the Portuguese nobles around him are even more happy. (To be continued.) )

PS: The second round on New Year's Day.