Hidden Dragon in Qing Dynasty

He forced open the iron door of the basement. It was a 30-square-meter room. It was the place where the guards were supposed to be on duty, but it was empty.

At the end of the room, there was a heavy oak door with iron hoops. There were a series of six large locks hanging on the door. It was estimated that all six keys were kept separately, which was also a way to guard against burglars.

"Prepare the explosives, shatter him …" With the order given, some soldiers who were proficient in blasting naturally started to lay down the explosives with detonators. Not long later, a loud explosion could be heard from the basement. Smoke and dust were sprayed out of the door for a good five minutes before dispersing.

After the smoke dissipated, Qiu Wei led the marines into the vault, but he was shocked on the spot.

"Oh my god! Had the French killed all the elephants in Africa? Why are there so many tusks? "

"Sir, look, there's a box full of gems here. Is this a diamond?" "This is ruby …"

"Gold coins …" Gold Ingots... Look, these big chests are all full of gold, they are all gold coins and ingots that have been forged! "

He was rich. He was definitely rich. The treasury was over 90 square meters and there were shelves made of hard wood everywhere that were lined with all sorts of special items from Africa.

Ivory, rhinoceros horn, diamond, ruby, sapphire... There were also all sorts of special ores that were unknown. There were even naturally formed dog-head gold.

At the bottom of the shelf was a huge wooden box. After opening it, there were all kinds of gold inside. There were at least 50,000 to 60,000 ounces of gold. This was almost 1500 kg of gold!

Qiu Wei swallowed hard and said, "Oh my god, how can these Frenchmen be so rich?" Just the treasury of a Dakar has so much gold? "

A Prussian soldier at the side answered, "It's not only the Dakar's gold. The Dakar is the most important port where France rules over West Africa, and all the wealth in Senegal can only be transferred to Paris if they are gathered here …"

"One of the two black slaves that we interrogated just now could actually read, and was even a supervisor amongst the black slaves in General Governor's Mansion. According to his testimony, the entire General Governor's Mansion has a year's worth of taxes, as well as ten years of financial surpluses …"

"Why didn't you get to Paris in time?" Qiu Wei asked.

"Because of the railways, the Dakar is preparing to build a railway heading north. This money should be enough to fund the railway construction …"

Qiu Wei laughed. "The railway?" Hahaha … Our Prime Minister also wants to build railways, the Tanggu's railways at Kaiping and Luanzhou have already begun to be investigated on the spot, and now is the right time to do so! "

"Go!" "Catch a group of slaves and bring them over. Whatever can be moved away from here, take away …"

Not long after, the marines captured hundreds of strong men from the street, and under the pressure of the bayonets, none of them dared to resist. In addition, the black slaves had been enslaved for three or four hundred years.

As long as they could survive, they would not consider resisting, not to mention the water ghost s had promised them ten gold coins as a gift.

Smoke began to rise from the kitchen of General Governor's Mansion. The marines had already started a fire, and the black slaves were moving the gold, precious stones and ivory. Under the threat of the bayonets, no one dared to move their brains.

All the documents in General Governor's Mansion were swept clean, so Qiu Wei did not have time to read them all. He prepared to take them all to the Zhiyuan Warship, and then find a chance to contact the Prussian intelligence agents and give all these Frenchmen's secrets to Prussia.

Within the firelight, there were hundreds of French soldiers trying to attack the General Governor's Mansion, but under the accurate attacks of the snipers, the command system of the two companies quickly collapsed.

It was not only the snipers who had made a huge dent in the French army, but also the Mauser who had made an unprecedented dent in the fore-mounted MLE1857 Mini Bullet Rifle.

Mauser had already fired four to five rounds of the Stable Bullet, while the MLE1857 on the other side could only fire one shot! How could this battle be fought? In less than ten minutes, the two French companies had already collapsed.

Qiu Wei looked at the retreating French army that was like water and did not give the order to give chase. Instead, he turned his head back and looked at the black slaves that kept lifting the gold and sighed, "Colonialism is so good!" The feeling of being bullied, why does it feel so good! "

It was only now that Qiu Wei and his group of foreign students finally understood the importance of colonization to European civilization. This kind of plundering of global resources finally made European civilization absolutely powerful.

In Senegal, West Africa alone, one could amass so much wealth. France was now the second largest colony after Britain, and it was evident how much wealth could be amassed every year.

There were some things that Xiao Letian did not tell his subordinates before. In his previous life, Xiao Letian clearly remembered that after the Franco-Prussian War ended, Prussia had finally unified the Germany. At that time, Bismark had asked the French lion for 5 billion as compensation for the war.

This was the first time in Bismark's life that he made a strategic mistake. He thought that the 5 billion Gold franc was already an extremely large number and that the Government of France's treasury was already empty. He couldn't even take out a single gold coin.

The 5 billion Gold franc, according to their comparison of silver prices at that time, amounted to more than 700 million silver taels. Furthermore, throughout the entire history of the Qing Dynasty, during the period of the most prosperous dryad, the highest value of the treasury was more than 80 million silver taels.

Bismark's plan was really good. He wanted to make France unable to pay in the short term, which would result in a situation where France would be suppressed for a few decades. Since the money would not be repaid, there was no reason for Arthas and the Lorraine region to return it.

The German language education alone could change the demographic and cultural structure of the land in a time frame of a generation.

It could even be said that he underestimated the true foundation of the colonial economy. After all, Prussia had never experienced the feeling of owning a colony and making a fortune.

Bismark had definitely wrongly judged the wealth of the French people, and he had also misjudged the powerful nationalist spirit of the French people that had been baptized by the Great Revolution.

In order to pay off the war reparations as soon as possible, the new government began to issue large amounts of government bonds to the people in order to redeem the land occupied by Prussia in the north.

A scene that stunned Bismark appeared. The defeated France Government, a new government that had not even established its credit to begin with, had actually consecutively sent out three 5 billion Gold franc s worth of treasury bonds.

The 15 billion national debt was instantly sold out, and the total sum of the subscribed amount actually reached the stupefied 45 billion Gold franc, which was exactly nine times the amount Bismark had offered.

At this point, Bismark's wishful thinking was completely shattered, and the future Lenin even gave France a special nickname, called usury imperialism.