The latest website: www. What does this mean?
75,000 tons of saltpeter!
This means that tens of thousands of tons of nitric acid can be extracted, which is hundreds of thousands of tons of explosives!
With those saltpeters, Britain can continue the war and beat the French and Russians to pieces!
The question is...is Santos, a profiteer, willing to sell?
"Will you sell them?"
"How much are you willing to buy?"
Santos asked.
"all!"
"Haha, you are very greedy..."
Making a face, Santos said simply:
"But the problem doesn't seem to be too big. As long as the price is right, I can sell you 70% of the saltpeter."
Why is it 70%? Because he needs to sell the saltpeter as part of the fertilizer in the market, thereby concealing the fact that most of the saltpeter falls into the hands of the British.
"That's absolutely correct. Each of us does business for money. This business can be our beginning. In this transaction, you will get unimaginable returns."
Santos shook his head and said.
"The reward is bound to be there. The question is, how much are you willing to pay to buy these saltpeters? We all know that saltpeter... this is a very popular thing in the market!"
"Oh, yes, that's true,"
After thinking about it, Stan said,
"1.2 million pounds! This is the price quoted on the "Mermaid". As for the remaining saltpeter, I guarantee that it will not be lower than this price. If the market price rises, my purchase price will also rise with the market price."
Santos laughed as he listened to the other party's bid.
"£1.3 million!"
He knew in his heart that the other party would definitely not be able to refuse the temptation of saltpeter. After all, saltpeter was the key material for the British to win this war. And now after the war broke out, the Ming Empire imposed an embargo on Britain and Germany, prohibiting any entry or exit.
Suspicious materials at national borders are strictly guarded against.
Since then, the British have been trying every possible means to obtain saltpeter. Purchasing it through neutral countries is the easiest way. However, because the empire's saltpeter is a long-term contract, they can only purchase it from traders like Santos at a higher price.
As for whether Portugal's agricultural production was affected after Santos sold saltpeter to the UK, that has nothing to do with Santos. After all, he is just a businessman, and a businessman's duty is to make as much money as possible.
Then they discussed a series of issues such as how to deliver, and finally finalized the deal.
In war, this kind of thing is simple and common.
However, when Stan happily sent a telegram back to London to tell London the good news, what he didn't know was that Santos also sent a telegram, and the recipient of the telegram was a trading company in Yingtian of the Ming Empire.
company, it seems to be just an ordinary business telegram.
But soon the telegram was delivered to Qian Zizhuang's desk in the Imperial Investigation Department of Zhongdu, and soon he went to the palace with several telegrams.
"The British got what they needed."
Standing in front of His Majesty, Qian Zizhuang said.
"According to the intelligence we have, the British purchased more than 40,000 tons of saltpeter from third countries at high prices, and Germany purchased 32,000 tons, including their pre-war reserves of saltpeter. They have approximately 200,000 to 300,000 tons of saltpeter in their hands, enough to manufacture
Hundreds of thousands of tons of explosives."
In fact, all major powers will consider their own security issues. In view of the fact that the empire controls more than 90% of the world's saltpeter resources, major powers including the United Kingdom have established saltpeter reserves as early as ten years ago. They have a small amount of saltpeter reserves in stock.
It could be tens of thousands of tons, or even hundreds of thousands of tons of saltpeter. That saltpeter would be enough for them to carry out a medium-sized war.
However, it is difficult for them to imagine that this war will last longer than they imagined and will consume astronomical amounts of ammunition.
Of course, if they wanted to continue the war, they had to import saltpeter from the Ming Dynasty. Otherwise, they would have no raw materials to produce nitric acid. Without nitric acid, it would be impossible to produce explosives. Without explosives, it would be impossible to carry out a war.
"Oh, that's millions of tons of ammunition."
Emperor Zhu nodded and said.
"With these supplies, they can almost continue the war. Well, there is no need to consider embargoing saltpeter on neutral countries in the past two years. We need them to continue the war."
While speaking, Emperor Zhu Da did a quick mental calculation. Millions of tons of ammunition may be more or less, but for a world war, this is just the "starting price".
Why should they be allowed to continue the war...because Europeans must bleed!
Even France, as an ally of the empire, also needs to shed blood!
As for the "Pseudo-Roman Empire", which is known as the world's largest country, there is even more need to bleed! Especially the Pseudo-Roman Empire, only if they bleed all their blood will their strength be weakened.
For the Ming Empire, fighting to the last European was not a bad option.
After all, the goal of this war is to fight to the last European!
In order to achieve this goal, the best option is to sell saltpeter that is closely related to the war to the participating countries, including Britain as an enemy country. Of course, this kind of business cannot be done by the Ming Dynasty itself, but can only be left to middlemen.
Do it.
The so-called "middlemen" are actually agents set up by the Investigation Department many years ago. The huge profits from saltpeter smuggling must not be allowed to be made by others.
Since you have money to make, of course you should keep it for yourself! After all, gold pounds and gold marks are both gold!
Some people love white silver, not to mention yellow gold.
As for betrayal, we can't talk about it.
Business is about making money and not being shabby.
"Your Majesty, by selling saltpeter to the British, the Germans can indeed weaken the Europeans to a certain extent, but the United States also needs saltpeter. Although the American DuPont Company acquired the saltpeter mine in India many years ago, if the British
Official expropriation will definitely affect the supply of saltpeter in the United States. For every ton of saltpeter we sell to Britain, the United States can get one more ton of saltpeter from India, and they will inevitably be turned into explosives and used in the western battlefield. This will definitely
It will cause casualties on our side."
Qian Zizhuang's worry made Emperor Zhu Da nodded and then said.
"There is nothing we can do about this. Everything has its own gains and losses. Choose the lesser of two powers that harm each other!"
Emperor Zhu Da certainly knew that selling strategic materials to enemy countries during the war would bring unnecessary losses to his own side, but sometimes this kind of transaction was unavoidable, that is, in another world, during World War II, Mao Zedong did not wait until he was young.
Before the declaration of war, oil, coal, iron ore and other materials were still exported to Xiaoli via land and waterways. 42 years later, they even did not hesitate to transport materials from Europe to the Far East and sell them to Japan. For his own benefit, Da Mao was very close to the devil.
The interests of allies?
What does it count?
It's just our own casualties... This problem is really difficult to deal with!
But this is the case with many things. It is a double-edged sword. If you are not careful, you will hurt yourself.
After thinking about it, Emperor Zhu Da said.
"Well, I will instruct the navy to increase interception efforts at sea."
For the empire, the only thing it can rely on is naval interception at sea.
After Emperor Zhu hung up the phone to the Admiralty and asked them to increase the intensity of search and interception at sea, the attendant came in and delivered a telegram from France. After receiving the telegram, Emperor Zhu couldn't help but be startled.
, and then murmured to himself.
"The Marne...the Marne!..."
The old group has died and a new book club group has been established: 739209015. Everyone is welcome to join and discuss and deduce the plot together.
(End of chapter)
This chapter has been completed!