Nanyang 1931: From piglets to giants

Chapter 143 Ready
Due to the flapping of Zheng Yi's little butterfly wings, although it was only the end of 1936, the country had already become panic-stricken, as if an arrow was on the string.

Especially the troops on the northern front, their eyes are red with envy when they see the Japanese, and some of them really want to take the initiative to attack and give them a fucking blow.

If we could also get several million dollars in funding from Nanyang, wouldn’t we become stronger immediately?

Anyway, the war will come sooner or later. This has actually become a consensus among all kinds of people in the country.

To be honest, the situation is already on the verge of war, and both sides are ready to start fighting. What's the point of waiting for others to fire the first shot and trying to gain the moral high ground?

The so-called international mediation, whether it is useful or not, if Britain and the United States want to help you, they will help you no matter what you do. If they don’t want to help you, even if you stand on the moral high ground and do whatever you want, they will still stand by and watch.

From Zheng Yi's point of view, he really hopes that the Battle of Shanghai will start immediately.

The impact of the war on China a year earlier was actually not that great. The several defensive fortifications built by the Nationalist government between Shanghai and Nanjing did not actually play any significant role. It became a curse.

Looking back at the entire World War II, none of the so-called defense lines that all countries had high hopes for actually worked. It was particularly weird.

Let’s put domestic affairs aside for now. Zheng Yi is certainly not idle either.

Since we give him money, he will naturally expand production as well.

While scrap steel prices in the United States are still relatively low, buy as much as you can, especially in Yangon.

After a brief inspection, U.S. Steel announced that it would form a joint venture with Zheng Yi to build another branch in Yangon and expand it. In addition to being used to make railway tracks,
Zheng Yi said that he would collect as much scrap steel as possible from the United States, and opened an artillery factory in Yangon that specializes in producing large-caliber artillery.

Artillery is actually the simplest military equipment. It is so simple that even the Nanjing government can mass-produce it. Zheng Yi doesn't mind placing it in Yangon, mainly because there is really not enough space in Penang.

The produced artillery can be directly shipped to the country, which is relatively convenient. Of course, Zheng Yi’s main goal is to compete with Japan for American scrap steel.

With his own financial resources, he is trying to compete with the financial resources of Japan. Although he is definitely no match for Japan, he must at least raise the price of scrap steel by 30%.

Is it a good idea to grab the point?

In Penang, two factories, including Taiyou Machinery, were transformed into military industries, and all other machinery factories were transformed into firearms factories. At the same time, they continued to introduce European and American arms directors to start work here and persuade Royal Machinery to expand production.

On the other hand, Taiyou Machinery also completed the mold making of various parts of the Zhongzheng rifle in one month and built an assembly line for the production of this rifle in Penang.

After all, this is a bolt-action rifle. Its structure is relatively simple to produce and it saves bullets. Isn't this the gun that is equipped in the domestic army? It also saves the country from using foreign-made products.

According to preliminary estimates, if the work is done quickly, large-scale production can be put into operation in Penang within half a year, with an annual output of about 10 units.

Yitaiyou Machinery's mold-making capacity can be doubled approximately every six months, but in order to have enough skilled workers, it also needs to purchase a certain number of high-precision machine tools from the United States.

The processing of some gun parts requires considerable precision.

To be honest, Zheng Yi didn't know how the government had been able to prevent such a simple thing from being mass-produced.

The so-called high-priority project was only able to produce 700-800 units per month when it was officially put into mass production at the end of last year. The expansion of production has been in vain, and the national stock so far does not exceed units.

It’s hard to imagine that this is a project that was launched 32 years ago.

Nanyang even felt that this thing was not suitable to be made in Penang, and planned to move it to Yangon when expanding production, with Penang only responsible for a small number of precision structural parts.

I just don’t know whether the Indians and Burmese in Yangon, as well as the new Chinese, can become qualified technical workers through training.

This has to do with the unique advantages of Yangon. Zheng Yi actually did not plan or manage Yangon much. It was all thanks to the inexplicable following of other Penang businessmen that the entire Yangon entered the fast lane in the past six months.

It is a plain, tropical area with a good port along the coast, and has extremely rich human resources. Its land resources are much richer than Penang and are almost inexhaustible.

When Zheng Yi first took over the area half a year ago, the population was only 50, but now it has nearly two million.

Except for a small number of Chinese who have leased land and opened large farms, all Chinese people from all over Myanmar are flocking here.

Although Zheng Yi did not plan to build Yangon like Penang, a steel plant, a railway bureau, and the necessary supporting water, electricity, ports, and road construction alone would be a huge project.

Even without counting the cost of building the railway, the funds invested jointly by Zheng Yi, US Steel, and British Railways in half a year have reached more than five million US dollars, and are still increasing day by day.

Some smart businessmen are already preparing to show their talents here by opening cement factories and brick and stone factories, recognizing that the construction and real estate industries in this area will definitely be promising.

Now I just don’t know whether Zheng Yi will allocate houses directly to people in Yangon like he does in Penang.

When people in the north, Shan State and other areas heard that Zheng Yi was coming to build a railway, they all changed their identity cards and now regarded themselves as Chinese. They even sent people to Nanjing to petition tearfully for Chinese citizenship.

Many people said that they were descendants of the Ming Dynasty who had to flee overseas to escape the brutality of the Qing Dynasty. Now that the Qing Dynasty has fallen, their identities should be restored and they should be allowed to recognize their ancestors. What's even more bizarre is that in such a large country like northern Myanmar, there are actually several people with the surname Mu who insist that they are descendants of the Mu Palace.
He even went to Penang to desperately request an audience with Zheng Yi, and he actually did something awful to rebuild the Mu Palace. He raised funds in Yangon and even went to Penang to desperately request an audience with Zheng Yi.

Zheng Yi naturally couldn't pay any attention to them and passed them all to Hu Wenhu, which annoyed him to death.

These people didn't get anything good in Penang, and Zheng Yi himself doesn't recognize it. You are using an old story from more than 300 years ago to claim kinship with me, isn't that bullshit?

But Nanjing seemed happy to admit this.

This bald guy actually has a strong sense of nationalism.

During the Republic of China, the management of Chinese nationality was very lax, because it was indeed not worth much. As long as you were willing to ask for it, they would give it to you.

So in the blink of an eye, there were a large number of Chinese people in Myanmar, and they were all heading to Yangon.

Several states in northern Myanmar have also established railway bureaus and are trying every possible way to use their connections to find Hu Wenhu, hoping that the railway can pass through their area. As the sons and daughters of China, they must help.

There was no ethnic conflict originally, but now that they have done this, it is inevitable that people will feel that the Chinese are superior, which has made the local Burmese people a little unhappy.

Not only that, as Long Yao and his troops directly entered Yangon, General Long's efficiency was also very high. A large number of civilians and engineers had already rushed from north to south.

After all, when building a railway, the situation in Myanmar itself is quite special. It will pass through various princely states and tribal territories. You must know that apart from a few port cities, the British rule over Myanmar is just like that.

It is difficult to say whether there are any disturbances among these states and tribes. General Long is trying to intimidate these states and chieftains by continuously sending more troops. If they cooperate well, it would not be a bad idea for Zheng Yi to give them some land acquisition fees.

But if anyone makes trouble or blackmails him, General Long doesn't mind fighting them until they surrender.

Extraordinary times call for extraordinary measures. Zheng Yi and General Long did not have enough time and patience to accompany the Tubang Tusi along the way.

In the face of major events, even invasion and sacrifice are not taken into consideration, but a rather domineering side is displayed.

The headquarters of these foreign military corps naturally fell in Yangon.

Originally it was just a regiment of soldiers, but with the continuous increase in strength, it quickly became a brigade, two brigades, and now Zheng Yi even wondered if it had become a division?
These people have also greatly increased the proportion of the Chinese population in Yangon. If the so-called descendants of the Ming Dynasty in northern Myanmar are also counted, the current Han population in Yangon has exceeded 400,000.

But unfortunately, compared with the population base of more than two million, it is still an absolute minority.

There are still more Burmese people. When they heard that we would pay them when we were looking for workers, they came in droves.
Zheng Yi and General Long were anxious to start work, so naturally they couldn't be picky and set rules like only hiring Han people.

After all, this place is not Malaya, and there is not such a rich pool of Chinese labor for them to use.

Even the original Indians in the city were calling their friends, and a large number of Indian piglets were transported here by boat.
Moreover, they are hardworking, honest and obedient. These low-caste people are also quite hardworking and have low labor costs.

As a result, these Indians can still firmly occupy the mainstream population niche of more than half of Yangon's population. Zheng Yi had to instruct Hu Wenhu to find a trustworthy and reliable Indian to be the deputy mayor, at least to show them a demonstration.

This is the result of Zheng Yizhen's lack of effort and planning, and it is now gradually beginning to have industry.

Is it true that labor costs in Penang are high now? Land is in short supply, and factories that are not high value-added or strategically significant are not being granted land for expansion.
After the implementation of the labor law, many companies were indeed dissatisfied, and many even went bankrupt.

Especially tin processing and rubber processing, which are traditional pillar industries of Southeast Asia, have become useless in Penang. In fact, as long as the labor cost is reduced, there can still be huge profits.

Isn't this all brought to Yangon?

There was even a trend of getting bigger and bigger. Toyota Risaburo excitedly said that he would find partners in Yangon to open more textile factories, saying that there was no place more suitable for textile production.

Indians and Burmese are almost infinitely available and do not need to abide by labor laws.

If all of it were used to weave chemical fibers, we would definitely make a fortune.

After more than half a year of investigation and preparation, Zheng Yi and General Long were finally ready. From Kunming to Yangon, twenty-eight sections of railway were started at the same time, and the steel factories producing the rails worked day and night.

Artillery, guns, and ammunition began to be sent to the country one ship after another.

In Nanyang, all preparations have been made to support the domestic war. Once the war begins, we can provide continuous and large-scale blood transfusions to the country.

At the same time, Zheng Yi himself began to exert more and more strength in the international arena. Snatching scrap metal from the Japanese was just a small matter.
There is no need to wait for US sanctions. Zheng Yi now has the ability to severely hit Japan on the issue of oil and bleed it.

Of course, there are still ways and means to do this. After all, the refinery is not his alone.

(End of this chapter)