Nanyang 1931: From piglets to giants

Chapter 267 Sugar-coated bullet, Americans want to build the second headquarters of SAARC?

Two months passed in a flash.

After France decided to withdraw its troops from Vietnam, Israel was officially established.

What is very different from the original history is that the first Middle East war did not happen, or it did not happen so simply and purely.

After all, in history, the main forces of the first Middle East War were actually Jordan and Egypt. Even in the so-called five Middle East wars, no larger countries participated from beginning to end. Whether Egypt can be considered a regional power is actually controversial.

Jordan certainly doesn't dare to move. In fact, if he can't find a way to stir up trouble now, it's hard to say whether the royal family can still hold on to its position. Alawish directly intervened in Jordan and began to mobilize his grassroots people.

After all, in the Middle East, even before Zheng Yi traveled through time, the concept of nation was relatively vague. One of the core principles of the Alawish resistance was to refuse to recognize the borders maliciously drawn for them by the colonizers.

Moreover, they emphasize Arab rather than religious, which is a bit similar to the Pan-Arabism during the Naqsh period. Although it is impossible to overthrow the royal rule easily with just a wave of the hand, it is certain that the royal rule is unstable.

If he really attacks Israel, he will be an accomplice of the French, and I am afraid that the Alawish will attack him.

This is not how you seek death.

The situation in Egypt was slightly better than in Jordan, but it was also limited. Tunisia was already in a state of complete chaos after the chaos, and Libya, which was jointly administered by multiple countries, immediately erupted in an anti-French wave. A large number of refugees poured into Egypt, and even the Egyptian people launched an anti-colonial wave.

Libya is a very magical place. It is nominally under the administration of the United Nations, but in fact the entire country is divided into three parts, with the United States, France and Britain each in charge of one part. The place looks big on the map, but in fact the population is concentrated in a line along the coast. Like Egypt, most of the territory is uninhabitable desert.

To put it bluntly, before the discovery of oil, European and American powers had little interest in this broken place and were too lazy to fight for it. The result of the lack of national concept was that when making trouble and breaking the law in Tunisia, many Libyans actually didn't know that they were not Libyans.

You must know that the anti-colonial and anti-feudal forces in Egypt are also very powerful. In addition, with the help of SAARC, Israel's arming speed is far beyond imagination, so naturally it has no unreasonable expectations.

To put it bluntly, the reason why Arab countries wanted to destroy Israel during the first Middle East war was actually because: I can't afford to offend Britain, France, and the United States, so how can I afford to offend you?

Isn't it because these Jews are rich but have no armed protection, so the mustache guy can kill them but I can't?

Again, if they were really messengers of justice and had such a lofty reason as saving their compatriots, you can't explain why they would sit back and watch one million of their compatriots in Algeria being killed without doing anything.

Although Israel is also bad, the number of Arabs it killed in the six Middle East wars combined is probably not even a fraction of that killed by the French.

The Arabs are always criticizing Israel's war crimes, but they turn a blind eye to France's historical crimes. At least the essence of the first three Middle East wars is to bully the weak and fear the strong.

Now, the Egyptian upper class, who have little culture and international vision, has also reacted: these Jews even dare to offend the French, and it seems that the French have accepted this loss.

The whole world is paying attention to the Middle East battlefield and the Vietnam War. In recent times, the transformation of the SAARC military industry has completely failed.

Because this business is so good.

Nowadays, the weapons of the South Asian Association for Regional Cooperation are of guaranteed quality, although they are all light weapons, such as rocket launchers, anti-tank guns, grenade launchers, flat-fire guns, and some ordinary firearms.

But it looks far less advanced than tanks and cannons.

However, people all over the world were surprised to find that these things were surprisingly useful in the Middle East, and the French army actually did not gain any advantage with these gadgets.

After all, their tactics were learned from the Southern Alliance, and the tactics of the Southern Alliance, at least in terms of guiding ideology, Zheng Yi learned from the later light infantry relying on the Pearl Party, and the tactics of the Pearl Party were originally used in the Middle East battlefield to fight asymmetric warfare.

Not to mention the French army's World War II weapons, even modern weapons and equipment from the 21st century would be no match for this set of tactics.

To put it bluntly, a motorcycle carrying a rocket launcher and carrying armor-piercing bullets can still destroy a tank by shooting it from the side.

There are not many motorcycles in this era, so bicycles can be used as well.

With the terrain and social structure of the Middle East, you have no chance of survival unless we engage in a head-on battle. The distance between cities is too far, and there is a lack of water on the roads!
Besides, how elite can the colonial army really be?

Penang's economic transformation plan has therefore had to add some variables, especially the rocket production factory, which has not only not been transformed but expanded. Israel has become a major customer, and the factory has also provided loans for production and loaned them to Syrians and Tunisians.

Penang's arms business is growing at an extremely fast pace. The whole world has discovered that although the weapons produced in Penang are not very advanced, they are much more suitable than American weapons for many colonial wars in the Third World.

Besides, the United States does not accept loans for weapons.

Although SAARC cannot receive payment for the weapons it sells to the Arabs,...

"This should be the location. Let's drill down."

In Deiz-Zor Province in northern Syria, Zheng Yi finally determined the location after a week of personal investigation and began to arrange for the oil company to go down to the well.

This should be the location of the Omar Oil Field, the largest oil field in Syria in later generations.

Although it is not as famous as the Ghawar oil field and has such a large output, Zheng Yi actually does not know its exact location, but the SAARC now has its own oil exploration team.

He didn't know the exact location, but as an old petrified man, he knew the approximate location. If he took a professional team to explore a specific location, the success rate would naturally be much higher.

The most crucial issue is the mentality. The essence of oil exploration is the same as gambling on stones, especially in the vast desert. The cost of mining once is frighteningly high. A drill can cost at least hundreds of thousands of US dollars, and up to millions of US dollars. If oil is produced, you will make a fortune, but if there is no oil, all the money will be wasted.

There are thousands of places around the world that are recognized as likely to have oil wells. There may be oil underneath, but who dares to drill down easily?
Zheng Yi was different. He knew very well that there was oil nearby. He just had to find it. When he found it, he would drill. If he couldn't drill it out, he would drill in another place. It was only a matter of time before he would find it after drilling a few more times.

Not knowing the outcome is gambling, but knowing the outcome is investment. No matter how many empty drills there are, they can all be considered as the cost of developing the oil field. What does it matter?

half a month later.

呲~~
Accompanied by a pleasant sound of high-pressure spraying, black oil gushed out from the ground like a fountain without stopping. All the people on the construction site seemed to be on stimulants, shouting and jumping around, and couldn't stop at all.

It is still difficult to determine the actual reserves of this oil field, but it has at least proved once again that Mr. Zheng Yi really has the ability to turn sand into oil!

"Boss Ku, we agreed that 50% of this oil field will be mine. We will also write off the billion South Asian francs loan Syria previously borrowed from me to purchase weapons."

"Also, the exploration costs were paid for by the Jewish people in Israel. They've been busy running the operation for so long. Later, they'll build an oil pipeline from here to Haifa, and that's also paid for by them. They even helped you shoot down French planes. Giving them 20% as a thank you isn't too much, is it?"

"The remaining 30% belongs to you, Syria. Let's set up a state-owned company."

How could President Ku disagree? You have to remember that Britain and France share all of their oil fields in the Middle East with the local Arabs at a 19:1 ratio, or at most 28:1 ratio.

Now SAARC and Israel split the profits 30% and 70% respectively. They made a profit of 30% for nothing. Moreover, they made it very clear that the bulk of the profit was used to repay SAARC's arms loan. To put it bluntly, it was a thank you to SAARC for helping them fight against France.

How could anyone have objections? They weren't helping out for free, so they nodded repeatedly, even suggesting that he might have taken too much. They were a bit flattered, and that the loan from SAARC could be deducted gradually from their share of oil revenues afterwards, rather than being completely canceled.

Zheng Yi naturally didn't take this small amount of money seriously and waved his hand to indicate that he didn't need it.

In fact, this oil field is of great significance. After all, the world economy is in a downturn, and the landlords have no surplus food. The weapons that SAARC provides to the Arab world are all loans.

Although this was essentially to resist France, the problem was that France had already withdrawn from Asia in succession and had even agreed to a complete withdrawal.

If loans and weapons continue to be given away, there will naturally be objections within the SAARC.

The same is true for Israel. The Jews only have a certain influence in the United States. Although the Jews of this era have basically controlled the financial industry, the financial industry itself is still just an auxiliary service industry in the United States, and is far from the point where it will become the master in later generations.

The bankers' money doesn't come from the wind. It's just that it's easy for them to get loans from American banks, but that doesn't mean they don't have to repay the loans.

Everything is different with this oil field. The entire business chain has been revitalized.

Zheng Yi turned around and asked Mrs. May, "Does Mrs. May think this distribution method is reasonable? After all, we are businessmen, not robbers. We can't be as arrogant as Britain and France and implement a 90:1 split."

"Besides, oil extraction is only the first step. There's still refining to come."

Mrs. Mei's face flushed, tears welling in her eyes. She nodded repeatedly and said, "That's enough, thank you very much, Mr. Zheng. Now, we Jews have finally taken root in the Middle East."

Zheng Yi: "Over in Haifa, I've also completed the design drawings and construction plan for the oil refinery. We can start construction on the refinery now. As we agreed before, I will personally own 20% of the shares in the refinery, and you Jews will own 80%. We will establish a special joint-stock company and join the Southern Alliance."

“The construction and operation of the factory will be done by our SAARC workers for the time being, but you have to provide them with travel allowances and wages that are no less than double their wages in Penang.”

Mrs. May: "Of course, no problem. I hope you will take care of the construction of Haifa."

Zheng Yi: "It's not a big deal. I, as well as the Nanyang Chinese Chamber of Commerce, have a lot of investments in Haifa. Besides, Haifa is under the jurisdiction of the SAARC. Of course, the mayor will be chosen from among you Jews. Ultimately, when it comes to matters in the Middle East, the SAARC needs you Jews as its focal point."

Mrs. May nodded. They, the Jews, have a much deeper understanding of such non-state actors than other nations and are much more accepting of them.

"Mr. Zheng, have you read the third edition of the urban plan for Haifa? Do you have any comments? We plan to invest $2 billion in this city."

"Two billion dollars?"

For a moment, Zheng Yi couldn't help but smack his lips in amazement.

I have underestimated the power of the Jews. These guys really have a lot of money.

Haifa alone is willing to spend 2 billion US dollars, what about Tel Aviv? What about other cities? The money that the entire country can get must be more than 10 billion US dollars, right?
I can’t envy you.

Historically, Israel did not receive so much money at the beginning of its independence, and it was almost all donations with very few loans, because the Jews who had just settled in Israel were good at farming and fighting, and their main energy was focused on clearing land and growing crops.

To put it bluntly, everyone knows that the Middle East is rich in oil resources, but no one expected it to be so rich. In addition, after World War II, at least before the 60s, the price of oil was at a low point, and everyone's enthusiasm for oil extraction was indeed far less than it was later.

When the price of jade is low, there will naturally be fewer people gambling on jade. Although the things are completely different, the principles are the same. Who can be as accurate as Zheng Yi in extracting oil and make a profit without loss?
Apart from oil-related industries, there is indeed no industry that can be developed in the Middle East in the short term, and there is no foothold at all.

Later, Israel and the Arabs fought five consecutive Middle East wars. Opposing Israel became the political correctness of the entire Middle East. It was too late to develop oil-related industries.

So even though Israel is a country in the Middle East, the industries it developed later had nothing to do with the Middle East: military industry, IT and the Internet, diamond trading, financial money laundering, and biomedicine.

It's nowhere near anything, and even in the Middle East, a region facing extreme water shortages, they've managed to develop a chip manufacturing industry. There's no more abstract industrial structure in the world. In this location, oil refining and fertilizer production should be the future.

At this moment, at least Haifa's planning is honestly centered around the oil refining industry as its core industry. Zheng Yi does not need to invest money in this refinery, but only invests in technology. He also personally holds a 20% stake.

Even Zheng Yi could see that it was probably not just Haifa, Tel Aviv would also take related subsequent processing as the main industrial direction, such as plastic processing.

"I have no problem. With the SAARC expansion, all cities except Kolkata are now fully armed. We must also enforce labor laws. The income gap between the highest and lowest salaries within the same company cannot exceed six times. In certain industries, this can be relaxed to eight times. A company's salary expenses cannot be less than one-third of its gross profit."

Mrs. May: "Of course, Mr. Zheng's provisions on labor protection are quite scientific. We fully agree that the establishment of Israel is also to enable the suffering Jews to live a good life."

Zheng Yi: "Madam Mei, you are so kind-hearted. It turns out that we are on the same side."

Of course, whether he believes it or not is another matter.

The Jews are actually very particular about hierarchy in culture. The culture of this nation is actually elitism. The entire nation has the ideological and cultural foundation of sacrificing the middle and lower classes to create the elite. Even within the nation, the chain of contempt is much clearer than that of other nations.

In later generations, Tel Aviv was one of the regions with the highest prices in the world, especially real estate prices. Simply put, it is the PLUS version of Hong Kong Island. National wealth is highly concentrated at the top, and these top assets are often in the United States. The welfare of the people is also at the bottom among all developed countries in the world.

Despite being called a developed country, it lives a life worse than many developing countries, and its national bad qualities were fully revealed decades later.

However, Zheng Yi formed an alliance with them because he only cared about the elite upper class among them, and even the friendship of American Jews, so it didn't matter to him.

It was just a kind reminder: "Since Israel is determined to make the petrochemical industry its main business, it must maintain good relations with the surrounding Arab countries. You must find a way to resolve the relationship with the Palestinians."

Mrs. May: "Of course, I understand. But to be honest, this is the first time we have established a nation in Israel. We don't have much experience. There are some specific things that we still need Mr. Zheng and the Chinese in Southeast Asia to guide us."

After that, Mrs. May simply talked with Zheng Yi about many things about Haifa and Israel's construction, and even proposed to invite some SAARC consultants to directly enter the Israeli government, under the pretext of learning from SAARC.

"Haifa and Tel Aviv will all undergo large-scale construction in the coming years. Even with relatively complete blueprints, we're afraid we wouldn't be able to do a good job. You guys at SAARC are quite experienced in urban construction. If you don't mind, how about we hand over the entire project to you guys?"

Zheng Yi: "Let SAARC do it? Urban construction? Two billion? Using SAARC engineering companies and workers?"

Even Zheng Yi couldn't bear it any longer and couldn't help swallowing.

The Middle East has nothing. The surrounding Middle Eastern countries have no industrial base. The closer European region is now in a post-war depression and has insufficient production capacity. Therefore, the cost of building a city here will indeed be at least several times more expensive than rebuilding Singapore in Southeast Asia.

But even so, 2 billion US dollars is a figure that Zheng Yi had never dared to think about before. Even the so-called powerful countries in Europe probably cannot come up with so much money.

Mrs May: "Haifa is two billion, and if we include Tel Aviv, our budget is three billion."

"Of course, we should use Jews wherever possible. Recently, more and more Jews have arrived from all over the world. But you know, most of them have no experience as construction workers or anything related to that, so they need to be taught by SAARC."

Zheng Yi: "For such a large project, why don't you turn to the Americans? Even if you were to borrow so much money from the bank all at once, the interest rate would probably be quite high."

Mrs May said: "Fortunately, if I didn't have this oil field, I would still hesitate to lend it to them. And even if they are compatriots, with such a large amount, they will inevitably worry that we can't pay it back, which would be putting them in a difficult position."

"But now that we have this oil field, Israel is well-positioned for petrochemicals, and we have the help of Mr. Zheng and the South Asian Association for Regional Cooperation. We even have shares in the oil field itself. With collateral, it will be much easier to get a loan."

As he spoke, he smiled and said, "We Jews are all stingy misers. The cost of American labor has risen too fast since the end of World War II. If I were to use American words, I'm afraid that three billion dollars wouldn't be enough.

Furthermore, Haifa's industrial structure and urban layout all draw heavily on Penang and Alor Setar. Tel Aviv's construction and layout are also centered around Haifa. Naturally, you, the SAARC, know best how to design and build a city."

Zheng Yi thought about it and felt that she was right. Building a city was indeed not something that the Jews should do on their own.

They just have money. Apart from money, they seem to lack experience and are not very good in other aspects.

Especially most of the Jews in Eastern Europe and the Soviet Union would undoubtedly value the land allocated to them for free and the large farms built collectively here more than in the city.

Most of the Jews in the city are not actually skilled workers. Most of them are not qualified to work in factories or construction sites and need training. Even for workers and technicians, it is difficult to find professional jobs in the current impoverished Israel.

Most Jews have certainly never worked in a chemical plant, and in terms of urban construction, I am afraid that the Southern Association is currently the best at it.

Both Penang and Singapore underwent massive construction in a very short period of time, with sufficient experienced workers and sufficient construction equipment.

Zheng Yi: "Were Tel Aviv and Haifa built at the same time?"

Mrs May: "Yes, that includes municipal buildings, factories, roads, water and electricity, as well as some essential residential areas and public service facilities."

Zheng Yi: "This project is so big, I have to collect a deposit."

"I'll give you 500 million as a deposit, another 500 million after the project is more than halfway completed, and 1 billion after acceptance. If there's any need to increase the budget during the process, that's easy to negotiate."

Even though Zheng Yi tried his best to act cunning, he couldn't help but feel a little impatient at this moment. He was so happy that he couldn't hold it in anymore and didn't seem to be cunning anymore.

The 2 billion are all project funds, not for investment. If the 2 billion are all distributed to the Nanyang Chinese construction companies, the gross profit can be at least 1 billion in two or three years at most, and Penang can collect tens of millions in taxes alone.

US dollars.

The US dollars of this era are real gold, not printed green paper.

Rich and wealthy.

He had a feeling that it was easier for Mrs. Mei to get a loan from the bank than for others to withdraw their deposits from the bank.

Mrs. Mei suddenly said, "Mr. Zheng, you should be well aware of the Marshall Plan that the United States is currently negotiating with Europe."

Zheng Yi nodded: "Of course."

Mrs. Mei: "Is Mr. Zheng interested in getting some money out of this?"

"Ok?"

Zheng Yi was slightly stunned.

No wonder they took down such a big order so quickly. Are they acting as lobbyists? Or are they exploring new opportunities?

"Isn't the Marshall Plan a support program for Europe? Does Asia also have a share?"

"What's with Europe and Asia? For the United States, the South Asian Association for Regional Cooperation is probably much closer than Europe. How can we favor one over the other?"

Zheng Yi: "But I heard that Marshall's loans are all conditional loans, and they are all sugar-coated bullets. SAARC is not a state actor, so how much money can it lend?"

Mrs May: "That depends on how much money you want. You are a friend of the United States and a friend of us Jews. If you really want to give, it can't be lower than France. It must be at least tens of billions."

Zheng Yi: "Ah? French-grade?"

Zheng Yi couldn't remember clearly, but France should be the country that received US dollars second only to Britain in the Marshall Plan, which was indeed at least in the tens of billions.

The United States' lavish spending is indeed terrifying.

The entire city of Penang is not worth 10 billion US dollars now.

Of course, there is a high probability that asset prices will rise and a round of global inflation will occur later, which can be regarded as a relatively primitive means of harvesting other countries.

"With such a large sugar coating... this cannonball must be quite large. What are the conditions?"

"The Federal Reserve joined the South Asian Association for Regional Cooperation (SAARC) and invested in Penang Bank, Bank of Singapore, and Nanyang Bank, but did not seek a controlling stake. At the same time, it also established a SAARC sub-alliance in North America, creating a package deal that would include Ford, Coca-Cola, Alcoa, General Motors, and IBM."

Zheng Yi: "Should the branch join the Southern Alliance, or..."

Mrs. May: "North America already has SAARC. Is there any point in splitting up and listing these companies?"

"Oh~"

To put it bluntly, it is to further dilute his dominance over the SAARC.

His personal shares in SAARC are already small, and if they are diluted further, these American companies will all be giants.

In addition, his SAARC had previously absorbed the Seven Sisters of Oil, but to be more precise, it only absorbed their SAARC branches, and their main bodies are still listed in the United States.

If the United States also had the South Asian Association for Regional Cooperation (SAARC), then the seven sisters would definitely have squeezed in.

The company merged too quickly, and eventually it merged itself into nothingness...

If a giant like the United States were to cram all, or even just half of, its multinational corporations into SAARC, then SAARC would probably be immediately controlled by the United States.

By then, I’m afraid that his personal shares in the Southern Alliance will not even be 2%.

It is just a part-time job.

Sugar-coated shells.

It’s not easy to answer.

"Let me think about it."

(End of this chapter)