Chapter 173 Steel and Copper Circle

"There is good news!" Zhou Bai took the express newspaper and caught up with Meng Xiang who was wandering around the base. The guards had expanded the surrounding alert range to prevent idle people from waiting.

"What good news?" Meng Xiang was also happy. Weixian harvested 30,000 tons of grain and delayed the grain shortage for more than half a month, which made him relax some of his mind.

"Laiwu Xie Jiarong and the others discovered a large iron ore!" Zhou Bai said excitedly, waving the telegram in his hand.

"How big?" Meng Xiang naturally knew that there was a large iron ore there. There was no reason why Laigang was there in later generations.

"Mineral veins have been found in their Gengyu, Jinniu Mountain and Tietonggou, and it is estimated that there are at least tens of millions of tons." Zhou Bai handed the telegram to Meng Xiang.

Meng Xiang's result telegram smiled in his heart. Xie Jiarong and his team only explored a shallow point. They dare not say too much before detailed exploration. According to a relative of Meng Xiang who worked in Laigang in later generations, the iron ore reserves in Laiwu increased by at least 50 times on this basis, and the reserves of 550 million tons in later generations were just a conservative value.

The reason why Meng Xiang placed the sub-base there was also because of the iron ore resources here.

The reason why China was in a shortage of iron ore in later generations was not that it had few iron ore. At that time, it was found that the reserves were more than 60 billion tons, and the undiscovered ones were more than 200 billion tons. The total number was quite large, but most of them were poor ore, with rich ore accounting for only 5%. In order to minimize costs, enterprises naturally made use of rich ore to the maximum extent, which led to the import of rich ore iron ore from abroad being stuck.

The base does not choose from poor ore rich ore, only the recycling price is divided into high ore. The price of rich ore is higher and the price of poor ore is lower. The base truck can directly absorb poor ore and leave rich ore for future construction.

"No, the resources here are really good!" He saw Zhou Bai opening his mouth with a hint of hesitation, and knew what he wanted to say. He couldn't help but smile and said, "We have already made our place there, and the Japanese can't get through!" A brigade there was stalemate with the vanguard army for a while. After hearing that the 11th Regiment was completely wiped out, he slowly retreated and retreated across the Yingwen River.

The Second Battalion of the First Regiment of the Mountain Brigade took the opportunity to attack and continued to confront the Japanese across the river.

"What about the future? Will the Japanese take it again?" Zhou Bai asked.

"There is no future, as long as there is a vanguard army, they will never be able to occupy it! It will be ours in the future!"

"Then I'm relieved! A large amount of coal mine resources have been found near Laiwu. It is possible to build a steel plant there. If the steel plant near Qidu and Jinan is added, the annual output of 20,000 tons will be fine." Zhou Bai kept pointing his fingers in vain, drawing a beautiful blueprint for Meng Xiang.

"Ah?!" Meng Xiang almost laughed out loud. Three steel plants only produced 20,000 tons of steel. There were more small steel plants that were closed in later generations than this one!

Zhou Bai also noticed that Meng Xiang's expression was a little weird. He brushed his face and said, "If steel machinery is not developed, it can only be imported. How long can this last? If a foreign company cuts off our weapons, what will we rely on to fight? China wants to prosper, steel is the first to prosper, machinery is the first to prosper, and heavy industry is the first to prosper! Only with heavy industry can there be the cornerstone of industry and rise in all aspects!"

He sank and then said: "I know that steel mills cannot be effective within one or two years, and the investment is particularly large, but for long-term anti-Japanese resistance, steel mills must be obtained. Without money, domestic private financing, as long as the government does not interfere, collects taxes randomly, and causes trouble, this steel mill is enough to build! If it is faster, steel can be produced in less than three years, and provides us with steel support! It turns out that the number of steel produced by more than 400,000 tons in the 25th year of the Republic of China was mostly included in the output of Japanese steel mills. Now the central government and Shanxi steel enterprises have fallen into the hands of Japanese steel mills. This year, the central government only has Wuhan and Chongqing, and the total production will not exceed 50,000 tons! Without steel, how can we defeat the Japanese steel mills with just the flesh and blood of the soldiers?"

Meng Xiang was originally thinking about Zhou Bai in his heart and wanted to build a huge steel plant with huge investments, but after hearing Zhou Bai's words, he said in awe: "I know that a steel plant is indispensable, and I support the construction of a steel plant! I just felt that the output of this steel plant was too small, and at least 100,000 tons!"

This statement surprised Zhou Bai, 100,000 tons. You should know that the maximum output of Hanyang Iron and Steel Plant was only 50,000 tons, and the national steel production in 1934 was only 50,000 tons. He originally thought it was difficult to achieve the 20,000 tons in the blueprint, but Meng Xiang's opening was shocked.

He hesitated and said, "I know Yan Enqin. He is a steel expert. At this time, he is leading a group of people to study metallurgy in Germany. He heard about the domestic situation and planned to come back early. If we build a steel mill, as long as the annual output of the three steel mills can reach 10,000 tons, I will be sure to call him! And I can also attract more talents!"

When the Spring Festival approached, he passed the news with Yan Enqi. He originally planned to restore Qicheng Steel Plant, he asked him to provide several talents. However, as Laiwu discovered the huge reserves of coal and iron, Zhou Bai's mind suddenly became eager. When he was an official of the central government, he had a fight with his boss because of Song Ziwen's statement that he was so cold to develop light industry and was cold in heavy industry. He had traveled around Europe and the United States and knew the importance of heavy industry to a country, so he had his proposal to Meng Xiang. Unexpectedly, Meng Xiang spoke even louder.

"I have seen the machinery and equipment. With the help of existing machinery and equipment and resources in Jinan, Qidu and other places, after integration, it is still OK to have an annual output of 10,000 tons within two years!" Zhou Bai said cautiously, trying to dispel Meng Xiang's 100,000 tons Haikou. However, he didn't know how many times Meng Xiang had doubled this output.

"Let's make the five-year plan for the time being! In the end, it will develop to one million tons!" Meng Xiang thought about it himself. As the base continues to produce weapons and various equipment, a steel plant also needs to cover it. "It's still a lot worse than a company in later generations who came to 30 million tons!"

He had heard Zhou Bai talk about it some time ago that due to the Japanese army's blockade, steel products flowing in from the outside were greatly reduced. The prices of kitchen knives, iron pots, and agricultural tools among the people have increased, and there has been a shortage of situations. Several machinery factories are facing the problem of insufficient steel. No wonder Zhou Bai first considers the problem of restoring the steel factory in Qidu area.

"There's another thing!" Meng Xiang was about to turn around, but Zhou Baiyou called him.

"What's wrong?"

"The first batch of copper coins are coming out!" Zhou Bai's smiling eyes raised.

"Is this our military coin?" Meng Xiang kept looking around with the copper coin in his hand, but he was filled with joy.

When Zhou Bai's idea of ​​military tickets and metal copper coins was merged into Meng Xiang's compromise, the birth of this metal military ticket was actually the same as currency, but the orthodox central currency is still legal currency, and it is impossible to appear in the form of currency. The situation of military tickets mentioned by Zhou Bai opened up a way for him.

Since paper currency was not easy to promote during the war, metal currency was not a big problem. Its value was there. China has always lacked copper, so Zhou Bai did not expect to issue metal currency on a large scale. But Meng Xiang suddenly thought of the large number of bullet shells.

The bullet shells recovered on the battlefield were originally recycled by the base. Later, Meng Xiang calculated that the bullet shells made of brass were far inferior to the copper price outside the world, so he stopped this recycling and was planning to set up a copper metal smelting plant. When Zhou Bai talked about metal currency, he thought of those bullet shells. The Pioneer Army consumed more and more bullet shells every day, and the bullet shells and shell shells recovered from the battlefield were also more and more. This was equivalent to opening a stable copper mine. There was no problem in the smelting and manufacturing of metal currency.

There are three metal military tickets, one cent, one cent and one yuan.

One yuan is still a silver dollar, much smaller than Yuan Datou, and has a silver content of 95%.

Since the Laiwu branch base began to be unveiled, Meng Xiang has consciously reduced the number of Zhaoyuan gold and silver release bases, and instead purified the spot gold and silver through the refining workshop. Since gold and silver in another time and space are also valuable, it means that gold and silver are hard currency. When there is a large amount of iron ore resources to replace it, it is better to save gold and silver a little.

Especially when he found a large reserve silver mine in Shilibao with a vague impression, the source of silver dollars was also solved.

At one corner is a large copper circle, made of brass with a full amount of material, shining with golden light.

One-cent small copper, the same brass material as the big copper coins. The nine small copper coins are about the same as a large copper circle, but they are exchanged ten to one.

Each metal currency has the same pattern.

On the front is a three-legged treasure tripod with various textures, with the face value marked on the body of the tripod. Below are four small characters of Taiping Bank. On the back are the five stars, four small stars surround a big star in the middle, and a half-circle pattern of the Great Wall below. Needless to say, others also know that this is the symbol of the Pioneer Army.

Each currency has serrated teeth on the edges to prevent it from being stolen.

These are Meng Xiang’s creativity. After seeing such topics on the Internet in later generations, they couldn’t help but become this new currency.

"As the war further intensifies, the price of copper metal continues to rise. At that time, I am afraid that the value of copper circles will be greatly exceeded the face value, and I am afraid that someone will melt coins to get copper!" Yao Qingsan next to me said with some concern.

Since he received Zhou Bai's recommendation, Yao Qingsan, who agreed, was pulled over by Meng Xiang directly on a plane within one day.

Although he was a little unwilling to do this kind of act of disrupting the financial order, the war of resistance required, and metal currency sometimes played a role in stabilizing prices. So he temporarily retained his opinion.

As soon as he came, he pointed out the issue of pricing metal military tickets. After several calculations, and Meng Xiang was already ensuring that there was no shortage of copper metal, the positioning of metal currency was biased towards the value of copper.

"It doesn't matter. The more valuable the copper is, the more valuable our military tickets are!"
Chapter completed!