Rise of the Argentine Empire

The power of the Blanca City Hall expanded along with its economic influence, and its administrative authority also began to grow.

Saint-Hesse also slowly consolidated his own power.

The Investment Promotion Department no longer needed to operate outside the City Hall.

He officially designated the Investment Promotion Department as the 9th department of Blanca City, while he continued to serve as the Minister of the Investment Promotion Department.

At the same time, he appointed two deputy ministers to primarily oversee the work of the Investment Promotion Department.

Through this issuance of municipal bonds, Saint-Hesse now controlled a huge sum of 8 million US dollars, plus a loan of 4 million US dollars from Baron Bank.

Blanca City suddenly had 12 million US dollars of disposable funds, which, if considered as a city, was more than any other city in the country except for the capital.

After all, the normal fiscal revenue and expenditure of many Argentine cities are basically balanced.

This 12 million US dollars was completely and directly available for use.

This huge amount of funds could add a powerful engine to the development of the Blanca City government.

In order to make good use of this huge amount of funds, he soon used a series of complex methods to establish a new department in the Blanca City Hall.

The new department was officially named the Blanca City State-Owned Assets Committee, becoming the 10th administrative department of Blanca City, and was a department with real power.

He temporarily served as the first chairman of the committee. This State-Owned Assets Committee was somewhat similar to the Maria Committee he established during his time in Maria Town, but it was completely different.

The Blanca City State-Owned Assets Committee was a specially established regular department, subordinate to the City Hall.

It was specifically responsible for the management and supervision of these two and several upcoming state-owned companies.

The Blanca City State-Owned Assets Committee temporarily established five bureaus, namely the Personnel Bureau, Finance Bureau, Audit Bureau, Administration Bureau, and Enterprise Management Bureau.

On March 31, Saint-Hesse transferred 10 people from the City Hall and another 10 people from the Radical Party to form this small department.

At the founding meeting, the heads of the council and the two state-owned enterprises also attended the meeting, totaling more than 30 people.

"Regarding why our city is establishing a State-Owned Assets Committee, which is the first time in our country to build it at the city level, I think the advantages are great and the disadvantages are small."

"Currently, the development of state-owned enterprises in our country is very problematic. Many people who don't understand enterprise development, people who only know how to engage in labor movements, have become managers of state-owned enterprises. They don't know how to run a factory or a company well, which has led to the Argentine National Railway Company and the Argentine Telephone Company falling into frequent losses."

"This is very problematic. I think we need to reform and develop our state-owned enterprises so that we can better promote the economic development of our city. State-owned enterprises are an important force in the national economy and should not continue to lose money like this."

"You should know that currently, state-owned enterprises in countries like the United Kingdom, Germany, Japan, and France are developing very well. Last year, 40% of Germany's economic growth came from the growth of the state-owned economy, and in the United Kingdom, it was 55%."

Under the pressure of the Soviets, Western Europe and Japan also established a large number of state-owned companies. The government's economic power expanded unprecedentedly, and state monopoly capitalism achieved extraordinary achievements.

"The first goal of this committee is to make the state-owned enterprises in our city grow and become stronger. I think this is a huge challenge. I will select talents from the City Hall civil servants and conduct internal recruitment throughout the city."

"And those who have served as factory directors and company heads of state-owned enterprises can continue to develop in the City Hall. We need some officials who understand economic development."

"We must overcome difficulties and strive for a fundamental improvement in the financial and economic situation. This is far from enough. If we want to build Blanca City into an economically powerful city, we need a series of new development measures."

"I think the future development situation of state-owned enterprises is very good. Many Western powers are developing state-owned enterprises. We must learn from them. This is conducive to the development of our city. The goal of this new department is to promote the establishment of a strong state-owned economy in our city."

"This is an economic reform of the city. Blanca City's industrial base is at a disadvantage in Argentina, especially the underdeveloped heavy industry and manufacturing industry. In the future, we will also develop raw material industries and equipment manufacturing industries such as petrochemicals, steel, automobiles, and shipbuilding to carry out industrial upgrading."

Saint-Hesse finally concluded, saying that after the first batch of new state-owned companies are developed, the focus will still be on heavy industry and machinery manufacturing.

Compared with private capital's greater emphasis on profits, state-owned capital can make longer-term plans in this regard.

This is also the reason why he now wants to establish the State-Owned Assets Committee. This is a new attempt.

Saint-Hesse gave them loans in installments to purchase and update a large number of new equipment.

Mainly submachine guns and pistols, both of which were replaced with new products from Rhein Military Industries.

Rhein Military Industries has made very large profits from exports in recent years. In addition to investing in research and development of new equipment and introducing new technologies, there is still a lot of surplus.

And buying guns on credit in installments is also a first, after all, Blanca City has not yet developed, and its fiscal revenue is too low.

Submachine guns can already completely suppress pistols in terms of firepower. If you encounter other more troublesome rifles, it will be troublesome. Saint-Hesse is conducting crazy arms sales in order to get as many as possible.

While the world has not yet developed new types of rifles, submachine guns, and pistols, Saint-Hesse quickly made a fortune.

Next is the research and development of infantry fighting vehicles, tanks, naval guns, torpedoes, as well as more advanced rockets and more excellent guns.

Saint-Hesse specially equipped the Blanca City SWAT team with the MG-52 improved assault rifle.

If it weren't for the fact that assault rifles are for military use only, he would have wanted the entire police department to use them.

It's just that using rifles is easy to be seen as wanting to rebel.

The construction speed of the Second Shipyard of Sanhai Shipbuilding has accelerated, helping Beijun Port's 10 ordinary warships to carry out the first maintenance and modification.

Rhein Military Industries' artillery experts began to use tank gun technology to modify cruisers.

In order to transform these warships in Beijun Port, Sanhai Shipbuilding is preparing to seek cruiser manufacturing technology and torpedo technology from Western Europe or the United States.

After World War II, the powerful power of aircraft carriers in Western Europe and the United States made the development of these cruisers suffer a cold reception. This may be an important opportunity for Sanhai Shipbuilding to obtain cruiser technology.

Even if the current cruisers are ordinary cruisers, they are far from future missile cruisers.

As long as Sanhai Shipbuilding can thoroughly understand this cruiser technology, the warship plan can be taken to a higher level.

Currently, the Soviets are the most active in developing cruisers, but now they are building steam turbine cruisers, and the future is the era of nuclear-powered missile cruisers.

The Soviets will still need several years to develop missile cruisers in order to deal with American aircraft carriers.

Before manufacturing and purchasing aircraft carriers, cruisers can completely serve as the main force of the Argentine Navy.

Don't look at Argentina as a "big" naval power in the world, with a total tonnage of hundreds of thousands of tons of warships, but they are all old second-hand goods. I don't know how many years have passed since the last new warship entered service.

Developing cruisers of about 15,000 tons and destroyers of about 8,000 tons, plus a bunch of frigates and conventional submarines, is enough to ensure Argentina's maritime security.

If these warships and submarines are equipped with nuclear power and missile technology, then even if a British aircraft carrier comes to fight, Saint-Hesse will not be afraid at all.

It's just that now talking about nuclear technology and missile technology is tantamount to Arabian Nights for Argentina.

This year, the world's first nuclear-powered submarine, the American "Nautilus", was born.

"Nautilus", this name comes from the famous French writer Jules Verne's 1870 publication "Twenty Thousand Leagues Under the Sea", the mount of Captain Nemo, the protagonist.

The American nuclear-powered aircraft carrier is also about to be launched.

If nuclear weapons cannot be delivered remotely, they are just a large bomb.

Not to mention that Argentina cannot even produce an atomic bomb at present.

The most crazy arms race after World War II has already begun.

Modern naval construction has also begun.

The Soviets began their journey to the stars and the blue planet.

The Americans also began their journey to become the world's leading military power.

…

As April arrived, Saint-Hesse became busy again, establishing four new state-owned enterprises through the Blanca City State-owned Assets Supervision and Administration Commission.

On April 1st, the Blanca City Textile Company was established to develop the textile industry. This investment was relatively small and construction was relatively easy. It would primarily focus on wool textiles, especially the wool spinning industry, to provide a large amount of raw materials for Blue Cloud Clothing.

On April 2nd, the Blanca City Electric Power Company was established. This was the largest investment and a key project of this national debt issuance. 90% of the funds would be used to build at least three thermal power plants. This was of utmost importance. A reservoir would also be built to develop small-scale hydropower, while large-scale hydropower was not yet in the plan.

On April 3rd, the Blanca City Municipal Engineering Company was established, with a relatively small investment, mainly for the construction of a water supply system.

This was a municipal engineering project, primarily responsible for external bidding and construction.

It only needed to cooperate with the reservoir construction, with a short-term plan to supply water to 300,000 urban residents.

This was not a very large investment. With existing lines already in place, the existing network could be renovated and upgraded.

On April 4th, the Blanca City Agricultural and Pastoral Reclamation Company was established, specifically responsible for developing the surrounding wasteland and undertaking grain, agricultural, and pastoral reclamation work. It acquired a batch of farms and farmland from Future Agriculture.

Too many farmers near Blanca City had gone bankrupt, making it a good opportunity for some acquisitions.

In addition, the Blanca City Import and Export Trading Company also began operations, with its first task being to purchase cotton from Brazil and wool from Patagonia.

The Blanca City Real Estate Company was also expanded and restructured. It was still too early to develop real estate; construction was the priority.

Saint-Hesse restructured the Blanca City Real Estate Company into the Blanca City Construction Engineering Company, changing the original approach. After all, there was not much potential for real estate development at the moment, and the construction industry was more in need.

He acquired a large construction team from the Cohen Construction Company at a symbolic low price and expanded the construction team based on it.

By this point, the Blanca City State-owned Assets Supervision and Administration Commission already had six companies and had begun a construction plan with a high starting point.

Of course, Saint-Hesse's plan was actually quite conservative. This was determined by the conditions of Blanca City itself and the specific situation in Argentina at the time.

…

On April 5th, Saint-Hesse woke up early, despite being very busy in the previous days, leaving early and returning late.

After Elena came to Blanca City, he arranged for two professional nannies to take care of her daily life.

As her belly grew larger, Saint-Hesse was also a little nervous.

Saint-Hesse still seemed very energetic. Today, he was going to establish a new university for the people of Blanca City, a three-year vocational school, mainly to address the talent shortage in Blanca City.

In addition, three-year vocational schools would be established in the future, and the six-year secondary school in Blanca City was planned to be split into junior high school and senior high school.

Preparing in advance, after all, he was learning from the experiences of San Martin City.

Blanca City could no longer make many of the mistakes that had already been made.

Like San Martin City, which had experienced a rapid population increase of more than tenfold, Blanca City, although it would not be so exaggerated, was also expected to have a relatively large-scale population increase.

This was the second university belonging to Blanca City, and the first university truly affiliated with Blanca City.

At the press conference, he announced that the Blanca Higher Vocational College would be established based on the National Southern University, with engineering as its initial specialty.

Durant, the president of the National Southern University, and others attended the preparatory ceremony, as well as the Minister of Education of the province and many municipal officials.

Saint-Hesse allocated 1,000 acres of wasteland west of the Lingang Industrial Zone in one go for the construction of the new school campus.

The university would open in February of next year, initially offering six majors, each enrolling 100 students.

It was also planned to recruit 80 teachers starting in June. After Argentine middle school students graduated in November, an examination would be organized to recruit students nationwide.

The six majors were textile, food, mechanical, agricultural management, mineral, and architectural, providing talent for the future development of Blanca City.

Mayor Saint-Hesse appointed Rosquette Leidemann, the second-in-command of the Radical Civic Union's Blanca City branch, as the principal of the new school.

And allocated 800,000 US dollars in financial funds in one go for the construction of the new school.

"Today is a day worth celebrating for the people of Blanca City. We will establish a new school, which will bring some new changes to our Blanca City. No matter how poor we are, we cannot be poor in education. Our city hall will fully support the construction of the Blanca Higher Vocational College."

Saint-Hesse gave a wonderful speech under the spotlights.

This higher vocational college was approved by the Ministry of Education and established through self-raised funds and social donations.

Saint-Hesse's several factories located in Blanca City each donated 50,000 US dollars, raising 600,000 US dollars that day.

In addition to these new companies, Saint-Hesse was most concerned about the construction of the Industrial Higher Vocational College, handling it with special attention, decisively and efficiently, and quickly advancing the project.

It was proposed on the same day, approved on the same day, and the construction process began on the same day.

This was also due to the fact that the administrative efficiency of Blanca City had been greatly improved.

The original official system in Blanca City was relatively bloated, with civil servants accounting for almost 20% of the total employed population of Blanca City, and the national figure was only higher.

Because Perón had created a large civil servant group in order to expand his power and his base.

There were too many civil servants, with nothing to do, which created a large financial gap. This was a considerable financial expenditure.

Streamlining administration was the first thing he wanted to do after taking office.

But the resistance was too great, and he didn't want to go against the entire civil servant system.

So he began to seek a roundabout solution, finding things for the civil servants in the city hall to do.

That was to transfer some young people with ability but no way out to the investment promotion department, the State-owned Assets Supervision and Administration Commission, and the future Higher Vocational College.

So that they could guarantee their income while also stimulating their potential.

In the future, after the population of Blanca City continues to increase, the number of positions will be gradually frozen, and the number of positions will no longer be expanded, so as to achieve the goal of streamlining administration.

The civil servant system in Argentina is currently too large and extremely bloated.

Many talents are sucked in, and after a few years, people are wasted.

This is not very good for the current economic development of Argentina.

Because Argentina simply doesn't have so many things for people to do. The Argentine civil servant system has become an important burden for Argentina, especially when facing financial difficulties.

Saint-Hesse wants to divert these people out. If they want to enter the civil servant system in the future, they must take the civil service selection examination.

The next day, Saint-Hesse began to plan the campus. On the planning map, buildings began to be slowly planned on paper.

The school's large library, new dormitory buildings, cafeteria, playground, and artificial lake were all being built according to a scale of 5,000 people per class, with the goal of building it into a four-year university in the future.

From the beginning of its establishment, Saint-Hesse set the goal for this higher vocational college to develop into Blanca University in the future.

The school's construction contractor was designated as the newly established Blanca City Real Estate Construction Company.

The number of construction projects in Blanca City is currently soaring, and the demand is also high.

It is necessary to build schools, hospitals, sewers, roads, houses, ports, and a large number of new factories.

Even if Saint-Hesse introduces all four major construction companies from San Martin City, it is still not enough to build, because he has once again updated the development plan of Blanca City.

Moreover, Cohen Construction itself was developing relatively poorly, and the construction scale of the construction company also needed to be expanded.

The construction of some factories also needs to be carried out.

After Blanca City merged and established the new three districts, it already had sufficient land for expansion.