The Rise Of Australasia - Chapter 306

Chapter 306: Chapter 270: The Development of Industry and Airplanes

The industrial development of Australasia has always been smooth, especially under the dual aid of Germany and the United Kingdom, the construction of industry has always been on the rise.

Up to now, Australia’s annual total steel output has reached slightly over 3.1 million tons, of which the annual output of iron is 1.7971 million tons, and the annual output of steel is 1.3142 million tons.

Although the number of steel output looks a lot, it currently just slightly surpasses the level of the last of the great powers, Italy, and is less than half of that of Russia and France in the same period, and slightly more than one-fifth of that of Britain.

Even though it has surpassed a traditional European power like Italy, Arthur still doesn’t feel the least bit joyful.

Although Italy is said to be one of the European powers, it only sounds impressive. Its actual status is definitely at the bottom of the European powers – it’s perhaps only slightly better than the current island nation.

Moreover, it is only the steel output that has surpassed Italy, and there is indeed nothing to be happy about. To truly equal or surpass European powers, Australasia still has a long way to go. Perhaps, it will only be relying on the two wars to take a shortcut.

The good news is that the various industrial constructions in Australasia are approaching perfection. In addition to the top-ranking steel industry, various chemical industries, civil industries, machinery factories, glass factories, fertilizer factories, cement factories, etc., are all in a flourishing state.

Particularly the James Machinery Factory funded by the royal financial group, it has now developed into the largest in Victoria State and the second largest in Australasia, becoming a leader among many private enterprises.

As for the largest machinery factory, it is naturally the Royal Machinery Factory, which is controlled itself by the royal financial group. The Royal Machinery Factory has orders from car factories, engine factories, various military factories, and other various factories. The annual production of machinery equipment occupies 60% of the Australasia market, and it has more than 20,000 workers.

All factories and enterprises under the royal financial group have more than 400,000 employees, who are spread across from various industries and fields in Australasia and is an absolutely giant in Australasian businesses.

The taxes the royal financial group pays to the government each year amount to tens of millions of Australian dollars, and its own net profit has exceeded 50 million Australian dollars.

However, the people of Australasia welcome the various enterprises owned by the royal financial group, which not only provides them with jobs but also; any factory or business belonging to the royal financial group offers the best benefits and policies in Australasia.

This is why when Australasians are looking for jobs, the royal financial group’s businesses and factories are their first choice.

There is a piece of very good news, after nearly two years of construction, the initial construction of the Leonora Industrial Base is officially complete.

The Ministry of Industry is currently discussing the specific list of companies to settle in the Linnora Industrial Zone, and these companies are undoubtedly the giants of various industries in Australasia.

Since the construction purpose of the Leonora Industrial Base is to create a large integrated industrial cluster, this enterprise invitation will definitely take into account more types and fields of industries.

For example, the chemical industry, the agricultural industry, the machinery factories, etc., that the government has vigorously developed in the past, will be the main target of this industrial base invitation.

To demonstrate the emphasis on the industrial base, after discussing with the government, Arthur decided to divide the entire Leonora Industrial Base into a city-level direct-administrated area, directly under the management of the Ministry of Industry.

The person in charge of the Leonora Industrial Base, the rank is directly equivalent to the rank of the mayor of a provincial capital city in Australasia.

The person in charge of the Industrial Base is appointed by the Ministry of Industry, with a term of four years.

This also represents Arthur’s stance. Except for the Cabinet Government, no one has the right to intervene in the Leonora Industrial Base.

Starting from January 1910, the preliminarily completed Leonora Industrial Base officially began to invite companies to settle in.

The initial goal is to invite thirty large enterprises and hundreds of small enterprises, and ten super large storage areas have been prepared for these companies.

As early as the start of the industrial zone’s construction, the railway and highway connecting the industrial zone had begun construction, and it had been completed even before the completion of the industrial zone.

The current Leonora Industrial Base not only connects with Australasia’s industrial railway, but also connects with the strategic highway network, which can quickly reach both the east and west coasts of Australia.

A conservative estimate is, even if only the first phase of the Leonora Industrial Base is constructed, it will be able to create more than 50,000 jobs and produce at least 20 million Australian dollars in annual output value for Australasia.

All companies within the industrial zone are conservatively estimated to create tax revenue of millions of Australian dollars for the government annually. If development is slightly better, making two to three million will not be too difficult.

And if the entire industrial base is completed? Create 200,000 jobs? Generate annual production value of 100 million Australian dollars? Create annual tax revenue of 10 million Australian dollars?

Although these numbers are somewhat unimaginable, many people in the Cabinet Government have a vague feeling that they can be achieved and they even support the construction of the Leonora industrial base more.

Of course, regardless of the attitudes of others, Arthur attaches great importance to the Leonora industrial base and even instructed Minister of Industry Pierre to inspect the industrial base often unless he is really busy. He must ensure that the construction of the industrial base is completed with quality and on schedule.

Pierre, being the Minister of Industry, took Arthur’s instructions seriously. He visits the Leonora industrial base approximately every half a month, for fear that any unexpected events in the construction of the industrial base would cause him to endure Arthur’s anger.

For Industry Secretary Pierre, who has already sat at the Industry Secretary position for three terms, if he wants to continue to stay in the Cabinet Government, he can only advance further in a Cabinet Minister position.

However, cabinet ministers like Minister Pierre Peile are not few in number, and there’s even fiercer competition for further cabinet positions, with two of them having already served as prime ministers. The pressure cannot be understated.

If they could win Arthur’s favor and support, it would be a decisive help for their further advancement.

Of course, Arthur knew nothing of all this, and even if he did, he wouldn’t care.

For Arthur, it was just a word that could allow anyone to rise to power, but why would he say that word?

At this moment, Arthur had arrived at the Aerospace Laboratory, with all his attention on the new aircraft in the laboratory.

After over four years of effort, the aerospace lab’s military aircraft had successfully advanced to the third generation, with huge improvements in performance over the second generation planes.

When it comes to the manufacturing and technology of current planes and military aircraft, Australasia is unquestionably the world leader, even far outperforming the second in the world.

If it’s said that the second-generation military planes could barely be used in combat, barely reaching the level of World War I, then the third generation military planes have not only achieved but even surpassed the level of military planes during the late stages of World War I, and even if Australasia were to stop developing planes now, it would probably take other countries five to six years to catch up.

But would they stop developing planes? Absolutely not.

Arthur’s focus on the development of aircraft is increasing, with funding for the aerospace laboratory also steadily rising.

However, the Aerospace Laboratory is Arthur’s private property, so it doesn’t eat into government funds, and is instead financed and controlled by the Royal financial group.

The aerospace laboratory costs Arthur at least half a million Australian dollars each year, so naturally, the planes researched and produced at such great expense overperform the ones privately researched in other countries by the same era by a great margin.

Not to exaggerate, but Australasia has already lured at least two-fifths of global aviation talent and this proportion is still growing steadily.

If other countries want to overtake Australasia in aviation and aircraft manufacturing, they would have to take control of all the remaining three-fifths of the aviation talent and they would also have to spend a great amount of resources, possibly within several years.

Would that be realistic? The remaining three-fifths of aviation talent are distributed across Europe and the United States and are more or less valued by local governments and even some countries.

In addition, amongst these talents are also many patriots which even Australasia can’t attract despite offering much compensation, and Arthur doesn’t believe that any country could control all the remaining talent.

Moving on to the current third-generation military aircraft.

First is the Eagle-3 Reconnaissance Aircraft, which is currently the fastest and longest-range aircraft in Australasia’s arsenal.

Like the second-generation aircraft, the Eagle-3 reconnaissance aircraft still adopts the design approach of having two seats, one in the front and one in the back, but compared to the previous generation of reconnaissance aircraft, its size is somewhat reduced.

Of course, factoring in the additional two auxiliary fuel tanks, the size of the Eagle-3 reconnaissance aircraft is even larger than the previous generation’s.

The maximum range of the Eagle-3 reconnaissance aircraft, without the auxiliary fuel tanks, is 700 kilometers, and with two auxiliary fuel tanks, the maximum range can even reach 1,100 kilometers.

That’s not all, the Eagle-3 reconnaissance aircraft employs a aircraft engine specially developed by Disel for it, which allows it to fly at an average speed of 215 kilometers per hour, with a maximum speed of 240 kilometers per hour.

The average flight speed of the Eagle-3 reconnaissance aircraft alone surpasses the maximum flying speed of the previous generation’s reconnaissance aircraft, demonstrating how significantly the performance of the engine has improved.

Of course, in order to accommodate speed and range, the weapons equipped on the reconnaissance aircraft are relatively simple, only a MA-107 Maxim machine gun.

But given the terrifying flight speed and range of the Eagle-3 reconnaissance aircraft, even when encountering reconnaissance aircraft or fighter aircraft of other countries, it would have no issues fleeing if it couldn’t win the fight.

Looking at this brand new Eagle-3 reconnaissance aircraft, Arthur couldn’t help but wonder whether the most advanced military aircraft of other countries would be able to beat this reconnaissance aircraft of Australasia, which is merely used for intelligence reconnaissance.

Even if it’s only equipped with a single heavy machine gun, this is still one of the latest products researched and developed by Arthur’s Arms Factory after more than ten years, since the last heavy machine gun, and its performance is undoubtedly top-tier among heavy machine guns.

In the original history, most of the military aircraft in World War I were only equipped with heavy machine guns or other weapons. The weapon systems were rather crude and far from being as advanced or powerful as the planes of World War II.

Thinking about the potential future of Australasia’s reconnaissance aircraft massacring other countries’ fighter jets and bombers, Arthur couldn’t help but think of it amusing, but he ultimately withheld his laughter.

Because showing inappropriate behavior before a large crowd could hurt the dignity of the king.

Anyway, a scene like this would only be a good thing for Australasia. So when it happens, just let those countries be surprised!