Rise of Empires: Spain.

Chapter 573 Scientific Research
As 1916 arrived, the Central Powers, led by Germany, began formally paying war reparations to the Allied Powers.

Given that countries have already invested too much in the war and their fiscal revenues are already overburdened, the war reparations in the first year can be paid in lieu of factories, enterprises, equipment, production technology and materials, mineral resources, gold and industrial products.

Apart from Spain, other countries were still very interested in the industrial products of the Allied powers. However, Spain's industrial scale had increased rather than decreased during the World War, and it was worried about not having a market for its industrial products, so it was naturally impossible for it to import industrial products from Germany and other Allied countries.

On the contrary, it is other compensation from Germany, such as some well-known factories and enterprises, production equipment and means of production, and some well-known scientists, that Spain is truly interested in.

Of course, there was also gold. However, during the long World War, the Allied powers had already converted most of their gold reserves into cash to purchase large quantities of weapons, equipment, and strategic materials from other countries.

The same principle applies to the Allied Powers, which resulted in a significant portion of the gold accumulated by European countries through plundering colonies ending up in the hands of Spain and Britain.

To pay war reparations, Britain used a portion of its gold reserves as collateral for pesetas. Through several intermediaries, Spain eventually amassed a vast amount of gold, making it currently the country with the largest gold reserves in Europe and the world.

The more gold one possesses, the greater the benefits. In a world where the gold standard is the monetary system, gold has a fixed value and is the most valuable currency.

Even if countries abandon the gold standard, they cannot allow the value of their gold to depreciate.

The increase in gold reserves has another benefit for Spain: it indirectly weakens the United States.

Historically, it was the United States that played the role of Spain. Through extensive trade with European countries, the United States earned substantial foreign exchange earnings, transforming itself from a debtor nation into a creditor nation.

More importantly, a large amount of gold flowed into the United States through trade with European countries, which directly led to the strength of the dollar after World War II and laid a solid foundation for the dollar to become the world's reserve currency in the future.

Spain has now perfectly replaced the United States, and with a large influx of gold into Spain, there is hope that a world monetary system based on the Spanish peseta will be established in the future.

Of course, in terms of national size, Spain is still far smaller than the United States. If the European Union had been formed after World War II, with the euro as the world currency, it would have been much easier than the peseta becoming the world currency on its own.

However, considering all this now is clearly just wishful thinking. The specifics of World War II will not be clear until more than 20 years from now.

All Carlo could do was to lay a solid foundation for Spain before the outbreak of World War II, in preparation for the even more brutal war.

Spain had priority in selecting talent from Germany and other defeated countries, and Carlo had a list in mind of which talents he needed.

Although Carlo was not very familiar with most scientists, he could still name some who made outstanding contributions in later generations.

More importantly, as the Royal Spanish Academy of Sciences gained a reputation in Europe, Spain's scientific research field had long been in line with Europe's, and the Royal Spanish Academy of Sciences was naturally quite aware of some of the outstanding talents in European physics and chemistry.

Even during the long period since the establishment of the Royal Spanish Academy of Sciences, the Academy had long invited scientists from all over Europe in the name of the Spanish government and the royal family, and indeed, it did invite a number of talented individuals.

Today, the number of members of the Royal Academy of Sciences is increasing, and the royal family invests nearly 2 million pesetas in the Royal Academy of Sciences' research and development every year.

What is the actual value of 2 million pesetas? If converted into gold, it would be equivalent to a full ton of gold.

This already demonstrates the Spanish royal family's investment in scientific research. Although investing one ton of gold every year is not a small amount, it is still a huge expense for the Spanish royal family, whose annual income has increased significantly.

Of course, the various research and development achievements of the Royal Academy of Sciences have also made the royal family very wealthy. Carlos also specifically warned Prince Juan Fernando that unless there are problems with the operation of the royal family's businesses, the investment in the Royal Academy of Sciences should only increase and not decrease.

The research and development of the Royal Academy of Sciences is not only related to Spain's military and economic development, but also to the status and influence of the Spanish royal family.

The Savoy family of Spain alone has enough research and development in automobiles to make them the richest royal family in Europe.

Although it has lost some market share to other car companies over the years, Royal Mercedes-Benz of Spain remains a leading brand because it was one of the first companies to sell cars globally. It is still the most popular car brand in Europe, bar none.

Despite facing challenges from a number of automakers, including Ford, in the United States, the market share of Spanish Royal Mercedes-Benz has never fallen below 40%.

If it weren't for the strong support the United States provides to its domestic automakers, the American auto market would probably have had little to do with domestic cars, and would have been dominated by the Spanish Royal Mercedes-Benz.

With its dominant position in half of the global automotive market, Royal Mercedes-Benz has generated substantial revenue for Carlos and the Spanish royal family.

Although these revenues are shared with partners in car factories around the world, Mercedes-Benz headquarters ultimately receives about half of them.

This explains why the royal family spends 2 million pesetas annually on the Royal Academy of Sciences without batting an eye. It's no exaggeration to say that 2 million pesetas is equivalent to the annual fiscal revenue of some small countries.

Investing all of this money in scientific research will not only cultivate a large number of outstanding talents for Spain, but also enable Spain's civilian and military technologies to achieve a rapid leap forward, completely closing the gap with the old powers, and even surpassing them in some areas.

After obtaining a detailed list of physicists and chemists from the Royal Academy of Sciences, Carlo handed the list over to Cadil, the head of the Royal Security Intelligence Service, and requested that the Spanish Royal Security Intelligence Service mobilize all its resources to recruit a large number of scientists for Spain.

And you know what? Germany does have a lot of scientists. This is also because of Germany's investment in education; as early as the Prussian era, it was already one of the countries in Europe that placed the most emphasis on education.

After integrating the various states in the German region, Germany not only had no talent gap with established colonial empires like Britain and France, but even had a slight advantage in terms of talent.

Famous physicists such as Heisenberg, Born, and Planck, and chemists such as Haber, Bergius, and Staudinger, were all products of the German education system and achieved considerable success in their respective fields.

Carlo showed no courtesy whatsoever to these talented individuals from Germany. The Royal Security Intelligence Service's primary task was to invite these scientists to work at the Royal Spanish Academy of Sciences in the most amicable way possible.

Spain will offer them top-tier treatment in Europe, including top-notch salaries for scientists, top-notch research funding, and comprehensive research facilities.

For most scientists who don't have much wealth, such conditions are still very attractive.

Before receiving capital or government funding, most scientists have to rely on their own savings to continue their research.

Unfortunately, scientific research is the most expensive, requiring sophisticated research equipment and suitable research facilities.

Some scientific research requires sufficient assistants, and coupled with the long research time and the high probability of failure, many scientists, despite their abilities, have gone bankrupt during the research process and can only make ends meet.

Although many scientists are born into wealth or receive early funding from prestigious universities and governments.

However, these people are ultimately a minority compared to the large group of European talents. Spain can easily fill an entire list of scientists by offering generous incentives.

Of course, while some were willing to come to Spain, others were less so. For some, leaving their home country was undesirable. Especially given Germany's recent defeat, some ambitious scientists at that time wanted to contribute to their country and help Germany recover and rise more quickly.

Spain doesn't have many good options for dealing with these people openly.

If they were scientists who would later become particularly famous, Carlo might have considered kidnapping or other means to forcibly bring them to Spain.

If even kidnapping can't be accomplished, then the Royal Security Intelligence Service will have no choice but to kill the hostage. After all, the role a gifted scientist can play can sometimes be more powerful than that of an army.

Weakening Germany's scientific talent pool at this juncture would not only reduce the likelihood of Germany developing an atomic bomb during World War II, but also allow Spain to have a more abundant talent pool, enabling it to develop an atomic bomb earlier.

For Carlo, the most intimidating weapon of World War II was undoubtedly the atomic bomb.

Although Spain will also conduct in-depth research in the fields of aircraft, tanks and aircraft carriers, what can determine the outcome of the war, or rather, what can greatly reduce the casualties of the Spanish army, will definitely be the atomic bomb.

At this time, Spain was frantically trying to recruit German talent, precisely for the purpose of developing the atomic bomb.

There's more good news for Spain: the Congo region possesses extremely rich uranium deposits. Not only does Congo have the world's largest uranium reserves, but its uranium ore is also of extremely high purity, making it even more suitable for uranium purification and refining.

In other words, as long as Spanish scientists can figure out the theory of atomic bomb explosion and design a reasonable atomic bomb explosion model, Spain can manufacture atomic bombs by refining Congo uranium ore.

Despite the advanced nuclear weapons technology of later generations, the earliest atomic bombs were actually quite simple.

It involves triggering a fission reaction in uranium-235 through an explosion, thereby causing a massive explosion and destruction.

The earliest atomic bombs did not make the most of uranium-235, which is why the early atomic bombs were not very powerful.

However, for a world war like today, one or two atomic bombs would be more than enough.

With sufficiently advanced bombers, an atomic bomb could not only destroy enemy cities, military strongholds, and transportation hubs in the rear, but also drop it on the enemy's head, directly rendering an army group of hundreds of thousands of soldiers combat ineffective.

The atomic bomb caused not only physical damage, but more seriously, psychological damage.

Those within the blast radius of the atomic bomb are naturally unaffected; the heat wave from the explosion would be enough to obliterate a person. The psychological trauma is primarily felt by survivors in the outer perimeter of the blast; for these individuals, living may have been more cruel than dying.

In any case, Carlo certainly didn't want an atomic bomb dropped on his head.

This also means that Spain must be the first country in the world to develop an atomic bomb, and only the first country to develop an atomic bomb can hope to use it in war.

Of course, it was also necessary to prevent Spain's enemies from developing the atomic bomb during World War II.

Otherwise, a scenario unprecedented in history might have occurred: two countries dropping atomic bombs on each other, which would have led to even more devastating damage in World War II.

The good news is that, judging from the current progress of atomic bomb development in various countries, not many countries are able to develop an atomic bomb ahead of Spain.

To put it dramatically, there is currently no country that could develop an atomic bomb at the same time as Spain.

The United States was the first country in history to develop the atomic bomb. The European talent recruited by the United States during World War II played a crucial role in enabling the United States to develop the atomic bomb so early.

However, it was Spain that absorbed these talents. Without the help of these scientists from Europe, it would have been highly unlikely that the United States would have been able to develop the atomic bomb during World War II.

Germany was also developing the atomic bomb during World War II, but it never succeeded. Carlo still needed to be wary of this.

Although Germany did not possess the atomic bomb in history, who can guarantee that no unexpected events will occur in this world?

After all, the world situation has changed dramatically compared to history, and Carlo does not want any accidents to happen in the development of the atomic bomb, since this weapon can really destroy cities.

Even if it weren't thrown at Carlo's head, but at any city in Spain, the impact on Spain would be enormous.

Because Spain's overall potential is insufficient to become a world superpower, Carlos still has his own plans to control the whole of Europe and thus dominate the world by forming the European Union.

Because dominating the world required the help of Europe, during World War II, Carlo did not want Spain to become enemies with other European countries, at least not with blood feuds.

Barring any unforeseen circumstances, Spain would almost certainly have been on the opposite side of Germany in World War II.

Even if Spain had developed the atomic bomb, it would most likely not have dropped it on the heads of the Germans.

After all, compared to other countries outside Europe, European countries remain a unified entity. Once the European Union is formed, European countries will be allies, so there's no need to completely sever ties.

If Spain were to use atomic bombs in the future, the targets would essentially be only two: either the United States, which poses a significant threat to Spain, or that ambitious but ruthless country in the Far East.

Dropping atomic bombs on these two countries would minimize the impact on Spain. Although the United States also has a large number of European immigrants, it would be quite difficult to use these immigrants to damage relations between European countries and Spain.

More importantly, it is now 1916, and the global pandemic known in history as the Spanish flu is about to arrive.

If Carlo remembers correctly, the so-called Spanish flu was actually a scapegoat that European and American countries forced upon Spain.

Today's Spain is not the extremely weak country it was in history, and Carlo naturally wouldn't allow anyone to force such a huge blame onto Spain.

If historical records are accurate, the Spanish flu first broke out in the United States. With proper manipulation of public opinion, the Spanish flu could be renamed the American flu.

Even if it's not enough to destabilize the United States, it would certainly damage relations between European countries and the United States. Even if an atomic bomb were dropped on the United States in the future, there would be no need to worry about European countries being wary of such actions.

Of course, the best solution would be to find a way to directly cause the United States to split up during a major flu pandemic or economic crisis, thus completely resolving this major problem.

(End of this chapter)