African Entrepreneurship Records 2

Chapter 1326 Ambition
The fact that the Third Fleet can locate its headquarters in Fujairah is very telling. Fujairah is located on the land of the Arabian Peninsula, and Phuket, where the Fourth Fleet is located, is only separated from the Indochina Peninsula by a narrow strait.

Among the seven fleets in East Africa, only the Seventh Fleet's headquarters is located in Kalimantan Island. However, Kalimantan Island is not only home to East Africa, but also to British colonies in the north. This is one of the reasons why the Seventh Fleet is preparing to move to Belitung Island.

The Seventh Fleet is under the jurisdiction of the Pacific Fleet, which has many locations to choose from, which is unmatched by the other two major fleets in East Africa.

So from this perspective, Qatar, as a small peninsula, has a more advantageous location than most naval bases in East Africa.

"Qatar!" said Lomachi. "This is a good choice. Qatar's port conditions are much better than the several military ports we have now, and Qatar has many excellent ports. Of course, the most important thing is that Qatar has a natural deep-water port that the Beibu Gulf Territory does not have. If we can occupy Qatar, we can build a large military port based on Qatar for battleships and other large warships to berth."

The Third Fleet is naturally very familiar with the countries in the region, so the commanders of the Third Fleet, such as Lomage, are well aware of Qatar's natural conditions.

Prato said: "The only thing we need to worry about is whether our military presence in Qatar will cause fear among the British and lead to unnecessary diplomatic and military conflicts."

Romage denied it and said, "It shouldn't happen. Although Qatar is a British protectorate, it is actually a very poor place. If it weren't for maintaining the stability and order in Qatar, the British probably wouldn't want to bother with this place."

Qatar was so poor in the early 20th century that it is no exaggeration to say that the living standards of Qataris were not as good as those of the natives on the African grasslands.

Qatar's economic pillars mainly have three aspects. The first is the pitifully small-scale nomadic industry, the second is the very important fishing industry, and the last is Qatar's most important economic income pearling industry.

Nomadism is the Arabs' main business. In most Arab countries, the land is barren and there are no abundant and stable pastures. Therefore, in order to maintain the growth of livestock, they can only constantly look for sparse grasslands to develop grazing breeding during the migration process.

There are a small number of oases in Qatar, which was the basic guarantee for the early survival of Qataris. However, Qatar is not large in area, and these oases are not enough to support its development and growth. Even with the cooperation of the fishing industry, they can only sustain the survival of a small population.

According to intelligence data from East Africa, the total population of Qatar is only about 20,000. As we all know, Islam is a religion that encourages fertility. Looking at the population of Qatar, we can understand the cruel living environment faced by Qataris.

In fact, according to Qatar’s current population size, this is already a lot. If it only relies on nomadic life and fishing, Qatar’s population can only be maintained at a maximum of 10,000 people.

The reason why Qatar's population has reached 20,000 is mainly due to two things, namely pearl mining and robbery.

Pearling is one of the important industries along the Persian Gulf coast. In the past, pearls could basically only be obtained through collection. In Qatar, thousands of people make a living by collecting pearls. By collecting pearls, they trade with surrounding areas in exchange for essential survival supplies.

Robbery is even simpler. It is the piracy that is prevalent in the Persian Gulf. It is also one of the traditional industries of the Arabs. The Beibu Gulf territory in East Africa was once known as the Pirate Coast. It is not surprising that neighboring countries such as Qatar and Bahrain are also involved.

Before the 1970s, piracy was a very promising job for Arabs along the coast of the Arabian Peninsula.

At that time, it was still the era of sailing wooden ships. Even the warships of the European naval powers were not very advanced, and commercial ships were even more fragile, which made piracy very prevalent throughout the world.

Especially in the Arab region, where the living conditions are harsh and there is a certain level of navigation technology, it is most likely to produce pirates, and Qatari pirates are one of them. Relying on the pirate business, Qatar's population has grown to its current size, but this is already Qatar's limit. After all, even in the sail era, Qatar's shipbuilding industry could not be very developed, after all, they themselves lack the raw materials needed for shipbuilding.

Before the 1970s, Qatari pirates could still operate in the Persian Gulf in small boats. However, when the era of ironclad ships arrived, this trick no longer worked.

"The reason why the British made Qatar their protectorate was to suppress the development of piracy in Qatar, maintain the stability of the Qatari regime, and thus reduce the breeding ground for piracy," said Lomage.

"In the last century, pirates along the Persian Gulf coast were able to cause damage to shipping operations in the Persian Gulf under British control."

"However, times have changed. Even ordinary merchant ships are getting faster and faster. If Qatari pirates want to continue to develop, they must make breakthroughs in the shipbuilding industry."

"But Qatar has no way to do this. Most of Qatar is desert. It cannot even be self-sufficient in wood for producing large ships. It is also very poor and cannot afford to import slightly advanced ships from countries such as the Ottoman Empire or Oman."

"Even if they can really do this, the development of the navies of various countries has exceeded their imagination. The price of a large ship is not cheap. If it is sunk by the escorting navy of other countries, it will be more trouble than gain."

"Qatar, which has lost its pirate business, is already facing major problems in its survival, not to mention that its most important source of income, the pearling industry, is also under great threat."

The pearling industry was threatened by the emergence of artificial breeding and cultivation of pearls in the early 20th century, which caused the price of natural pearls to plummet.

Just like the price of natural diamonds plummeted after the emergence of the artificial diamond industry, of course, some people may say that the price of diamonds in the 21st century, especially in the jewelry industry, was still very high, but this was mainly due to the financial attributes that international capital forcibly gave to diamonds.

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Just like real estate in the previous life, a pile of reinforced concrete was hyped up to an extremely high price, but in fact, the more houses are produced, the cheaper the price should be. After all, according to normal thinking, most commodities are "scarce and valuable". The more houses are built, the price does not decrease but increases, until there is a complete oversupply. This process is obviously the result of artificial manipulation.

If this process is "reasonable", then there should be no economic crisis in the world today. From the establishment of East Africa to the present, the world has gone through multiple rounds of economic crises, which are caused by the unlimited and blind expansion of production capacity by industrial countries such as European countries, the United States and East Africa.

This is also one of the reasons why this round of European war is more intense and bloody than in previous history. East Africa has become a world industrial power, further intensifying the internal circulation of the world capital groups.

However, no one would use pearl diving, the main source of income for Qataris, as a financial product to drive up the price. Therefore, after the birth of the artificial pearl cultivation industry, Qatar's pearl diving industry was doomed to fail.

"From all angles, it may be easier to take Qatar than we thought," Lomage said. "The British themselves do not attach importance to Qatar, so even if Qatar is a British protectorate, we do not need to care too much about it. Moreover, Britain does not have the leisure to take care of Qatar's security now."

"It's not just the UK. Throughout the entire Persian Gulf coast, no one will speak up for a backward small country like Qatar, so it is completely feasible for us to acquire Qatar. With Qatar as a base, we can build two or three military ports, which will reserve space for the expansion of the Third Fleet in the future."

(End of this chapter)