Episode 12
“I will take a break.”
The fight in Moscow seemed endless. I didn’t know the details of agriculture, so I was just warming up the chairs.
“You suffered.”
Dark circles appeared on Stolipin’s face, who had a one-on-one discussion by himself.
“By the way, what was that?”
“If I said earlier, what should I say?”
“Didn’t the farm equipment do something out of the blue?”
“Oh, you mean agricultural modernization? Well, you can’t always plow the field with cows, can you? The best way to increase the food production of the empire is to mechanize the means of production like the United States.”
“I know that, but where does that money come from? There are only landowners who can afford to buy a tractor right now. Do you know that if you approach it prematurely, it can degenerate into joint purchase and joint use in Mir, etc., and become an obstacle to reform?”
“Why don’t you give the farmers a loan at a low interest rate or have them pay it off in installments and then pay it back monthly? After all, Gyeonggi Province is doing well these days.”
Before World War I, Russia’s game was actually quite good. Although he fell into the abyss during the war.
“Is there any entrepreneur who would take that risk? If it were run by the state, it would quickly become a hotbed of corruption.”
This method was quite popular in the United States around World War I and right before the Great Depression. A method of taking things first and paying the installments over several months.
However, no one thinks that Russian farmers will have good purchasing power, and due to the characteristics of farmers, they have to take annual installments, so the risk is very high, but the return is not very good. There will be few.
“I do it.”
“……What did you say?”
“Priority in the tractor business in the Empire, give me. It may be difficult to get a monopoly, but if you give me priority, I will do it. At the government level, just help with the initial cost of the facility and get the technology from a foreign company. The operating expenses are my personal company, so I have to pay them. Instead, I will take the profits, deducting taxes.”
“That’s natural, but… are you really going to do it?”
“Think of it as an advance payment that shows my sincerity. It means that I am also a person who thinks about the future of the empire.”
Stolipin looked at me with skeptical eyes, but I just smiled quietly.
‘The cost of attracting a factory is reduced.’
After all, it will be World War I in five years. If it takes 2-3 years from the time the budget comes out and the factory is completed, it is almost like a war in a few years after the factory is built.
‘Is the tank any good?’
Even during the interwar period, armored trucks or tractors with one or two machine guns mounted on them looked like tanks, and the early tanks were called tanks.
After the war, you can build a factory that can be converted into a tank production line by raising the turret and armoring it, and operating it with money within 1 to 2 years? oh i can’t stand this
Of course, the selection of the site for the factory is entirely mine. I guess I’ve conceded this much on the surface, but I’m not the kind of person Stolipin confiscated his face enough to say anything about the site selection.
As a bonus, I owed Stolipin a bunch of debt, so it’s the business that’s left over.
‘I will eat well at the military plant. Turn it off.’
Should tanks be mobilized after World War I? This tank assembly plant was originally decommissioned. I can do whatever I want. war breaks out? This tank factory is in our sphere of influence. We can do whatever we want.
If you print out a tank unit in the Red White Civil War, the enemy army and other warlords will bubble up, maybe.
‘Now, why don’t you hire some gents who make tanks later? What did Christie do now?’
To be honest, I was greedy and wanted to try some aircraft manufacturers, but unfortunately, finding some aircraft technicians in the US was the limit.
‘Go away from the Gallipoli yangban, and I am the tank creator in this world. No, it’s not a tank here, but could it be called another name?’
But can I come up with a more catchy name than a tank?
‘Chariot? It’s the most intuitive name, though.’
“The Count?”
In an instant, my thoughts were shattered. As I turned around shyly, something pressed against my cheek.
“What……”
“You seem to be in trouble without knowing the world.”
Olga shook her head, putting her finger on my cheek.
“You must be worried. I know the Count isn’t a money lover, but it’s hard to run a factory that doesn’t know how many years it’s going to run like a charity business.”
no? Absolutely not?
Since I’m a philanthropist, there’s no such thing as a wasteland.
How badly do I take money, but I’m a philanthropist.
Still, it’s a bit hard to openly say that I’m lying….
“It’s just embarrassing. What I have done in front of true sages and righteous people is nothing more than shameful and unbearable.”
It’s not a lie. lie is.
Then an uninvited guest intervened.
“It’s a good time.”
“Chief? What’s going on here…”
“Father and brother are coming, but there is nothing I can’t come.”
Pavel Sheremetev, Russo-Japanese War veteran and reserve medical officer, second lieutenant. and the mayor.
He was a person I didn’t know well in the original history, but he was also someone I couldn’t know since I lived in the Imperial Court.
“By the way, I was also very impressed with what I just shared. Will you bear that burden yourself for the sake of the farmers? If the peasants hear it, they will insist that the Count should be canonized.”
“Maybe that’s enough. And to be canonized, I must first die.”
“haha! May you continue to do good deeds and go to heaven very slowly.”
The voice was good, but something felt uncomfortable.
‘I haven’t been officially baptized.’
I doubted for a moment if it was meant to be Meg, but I was even more perplexed by the next words.
“All of this is out of loyalty to the Tsar and patriotism to the Empire, and if we stand still, the name of our family, which has served the Romanov dynasty for centuries, will weep. You wouldn’t hate it just because we added a little bit of money, would you?”
uh… huh?
***
“What did it look like?”
“For now, judgment has been put on hold.”
The middle-aged man who followed the old man smiled bitterly.
“It is understandable that the doctor was awarded the count. If the Crown Prince has improved the hemophilia that no one has been able to handle for several years to the point where he can carry on a daily life, he can receive that amount. Besides, didn’t they create a cure for that terrible cholera? That alone is enough for the Count to recognize it.”
Cholera is also rampant in Russia. Among the swear words in Russia, there is a swear word about getting cholera or getting sick.
No, not that much. Even after Albert Koch identified Vibrio as the cause of cholera, cholera was a worldwide problem. However, that is the predecessor of the World Health Organization (WHO).
In the meantime, as it is the first case of discovering a cure for cholera and testing it in academia, his ability as a doctor was reluctantly recognized by the sassy Russian aristocrats.
The award of the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine is being carefully discussed for contributing greatly to alleviating the fear of a disease that has taken the lives of tens of thousands of people regardless of the aristocrats and serfs, 40 to 70% of which occurred in one region. Do I need more words?
However, since no Asian has ever won a Nobel Prize – the record for the first Asian award is held by Hideki Yukawa in 1949, after the end of World War II – although opposition is strong, he is still a nominee.
“But it is true that his actions are worrisome… but there is nothing wrong with him. There is ample evidence that every move has a cause and is based on patriotism and loyalty to the imperial family. No matter who attacks, there’s no justification, so it’s perfect to be hit with a headwind.”
“Do I need to be vigilant? Is there any reason why I have to get rid of him…?”
“For now, I would like to withhold judgment on him. Father, I heard that you and Stolipin are working together to build a tractor factory…. First, I think we need to put some money in our family and collect some information on how the factory works. So we talked about investing.”
“Good job. How much money would it cost to run some of those factories?”
The wealth owned by the Baptist Demev family is the second largest in the Russian Empire after the Imperial Family and the Romanovs. In their heyday, they had millions of serfs in their estates.
They accumulated a fortune through the oral infusion method, various businesses in the new continent, and the wealth bestowed by the tsar, but it would not be comparable to the wealth they had accumulated over the centuries.
If he directly participates in the management by beating him with money, it would be much easier to know his intentions, and it would be much easier to catch the brake in case of an emergency.
The Count recalled the Count of Vostok. An unprecedented, truly unique person.
Ironically, his image was polarized from person to person. Outside Russia, a young genius physician, outside St. Petersburg, he is a young count favored by the Tsar. Within the Imperial Palace, the prophet of the East. I don’t know what it will be like in the New World, maybe an inventor or a businessman or a resourceful person.
Of course, outside of Russia, only those who knew him knew about him, but that was generally the case.
“I wish what he was doing was really out of loyalty. Aren’t you a bad person?”
“Does your father think so?”
“Yeah, but no matter how precious a person is, if his existence is in danger… we have to cut him off.”
It’s funny, but even he who said this was pretty friendly to him in the court of the Russian Empire.
Public opinion within the court against the Earl of Vostok was literally shattered, so there was nothing particularly good about it, but he was treated as such a close friend.
Fortunately, he got along well with the prince and princesses, so he only avoided being completely ostracized.
Of course, it will only be a matter of time before the situation is completely turned upside down if the day Crown Prince Alexei takes the throne, but at least not now.
“Let’s wait and see until his course of action is clear. I don’t like being with Stolipin, but what can I do, that he is also a Tsar-appointed bureaucrat and Minister of the Interior.”