Chapter 587 East America’s “Westward Expansion Movement”
Sigmaringen is a good deal, and East Africa is also a good deal. East Africa itself is not high in terms of material and labor costs. When building the railway before, a large part of it was used for the global excess steel production capacity during the economic crisis of 1873.
Now that large and small steel plants in East Africa are put into operation, it is no longer a problem to meet their own needs. As for the labor cost, the construction of this railway is completely insignificant compared with the current construction of water conservancy projects.
East Africa used the decade of the 1970s to complete the relevant layout of steel, railway and other related industries. In these two fields, it should be said that it is on the same level as Russia. The quantity is sufficient, but the quality is relatively rough.
To get things done in East Africa, money is one thing, and material deployment is another. With an annual steel production capacity of one million tons, East Africa's state-owned enterprises, East Africa Steel and East Africa Railways, have become trust companies in various fields.
At the same time, the steel output of Britain and the United States was more than 1.3 million tons. This level was not as good as before the economic crisis. The economic crisis in 1873 caused at least one-third of the steel companies in the two countries to go bankrupt. Now the economy continues to be depressed.
East Africa, on the other hand, experienced barbaric economic development throughout the 1970s, acquiring a large number of bankrupt steel companies and production machines in Europe and the United States. Through the national system and Ernst's understanding of East Africa's mineral resources, the entire East African steel industry grew rapidly. and occupy an important share in the world.
The most intuitive beneficiaries are the military and railway enterprises in East Africa. As for the demand for steel in other fields, the demand for steel is also extremely strong. A typical example is that in the 1970s, agricultural equipment in East Africa reached a new level in terms of materials and quality. It has promoted the further release of agricultural productivity in East Africa and laid the foundation for various projects in East Africa.
As the East African railway industry got back on track at the end of the 1970s, the actual demand for steel weakened, and more steel production capacity further entered other fields and could even be exported to the international market.
Therefore, compared with other countries, the current steel production in East Africa is actually in excess. If East Africa was a free market country, the East African steel industry would definitely go bankrupt and reorganized on a large scale. However, East Africa has always practiced a planned economy, resulting in the fact that the overall state of East Africa is still the same. It is a deflationary state.
In fact, in 1880, the westward movement of the United States had basically ended, while East Africa was completing its own westward movement, and the interior was being developed. It was expected that by 1890, the central region of East Africa, mainly Matabele Province, and Hohenso The provinces of London and Swabia can reach the current development level of the eastern region.
The westward expansion movement in East Africa is very different from that in the United States. First of all, in terms of industry, the westward expansion movement in the United States is mainly focused on agricultural development, while East Africa focuses more on industry.
As mentioned earlier, most of East Africa’s mineral resources are distributed in the central region, so most of East Africa’s industrial investments in recent years have been inland, the most prominent of which are metallurgical industries such as steel, railways, and copper mines.
The United States is completely different. The resources in the western United States are obviously not comparable to those in the northeastern United States. Therefore, the most iconic products of the United States' westward expansion are cowboys and farms. Of course, the same is true for the crazy railway construction. Before, the United States built all at once. There are five railways between the Atlantic and the Pacific. At the same time, there was only one central railway in East Africa, which was considered half of the two-ocean railway (because the connection to the Atlantic Ocean was not completed due to Portuguese Angola).
Of course, the construction of the East African railway was a little later than the construction of the American railway, and the economic crisis of 1873 was the dividing line. Although the United States seemed to be in a mess after the economic crisis, it was still not a small sum after the economic shrinkage. In other words In other words, the economic data is seriously falsified, and the stock market and investment market have raised the value of railways to a position where it should not be.
On the contrary, East Africa’s railway output value is more objective and real, because the East African government does not need to increase the value of railways.
On the contrary, the industry in eastern East Africa was not developed before, and an important reason for the rise of coastal industrial cities such as Dar es Salaam and Mombasa was the momentum of the westward expansion movement.
Before this, Dar es Salaam and Mombasa were still cities, but their development was not focused on industry, but rather as national commodity distribution centers and service industry centers. After the completion of the construction of the Central Railway and the Northern Railway, rich industrial assets were left to the two cities, such as the railway locomotive manufacturing center, which remained in the east, because this is the starting point of the two major railways in East Africa.
But this is only the industrial investment that East Africa must make in the early stage. After the completion of the two major railways, the focus of East Africa's industrial investment immediately shifted to the central region. The improvement of transportation conditions provided conditions for the industrial development of the three central provinces.
The industrial layout of this era is still oriented to the origin of raw materials, rather than the market of later generations, especially in steel and other industrial and mining industries.
This is also an important reason why East Africa and Japan started their industries at the same time, but East Africa was able to quickly widen the gap with Japan, so much so that Japan could not even see the back of East Africa. Japan's local mineral resources are poor, and it is difficult for a clever woman to make a meal without rice.
Secondly, the East African version of the westward expansion movement was completely led by the East African government, while in the United States' westward expansion movement, the government only played a guiding role and basically did not intervene in the follow-up.
Hence, the inland development of East Africa is purposeful, planned, planned, and step-by-step, while the development path of the United States is barbaric, disorderly, chaotic, and fiercely competitive.
In contrast, the East African government troops cleared out inland threats, the government guided and arranged immigration in an orderly manner, and rationally arranged industries, with almost no twists and turns.
The western United States faced a lack of police force from the beginning, armed groups attacked each other, wantonly massacred Indians, frequent robberies and feuds, and other chaotic scenes. It was quite a scene of gangsters ruling the country.
However, this development model in the United States naturally has disadvantages and advantages. There are many disadvantages and many advantages. The government basically does not need to invest in the early stage. The United States is a typical small government. Even taxation is difficult. The funds on hand are not abundant, so it can only rely on the private sector. strength.
After all, the history of armed taxation in the United States is less than twenty years old. The National Taxation Bureau was only established in 1862 to raise war funds during the Civil War, and was quickly abandoned after the war.
Furthermore, the fierce competition in the westward expansion movement of the United States also represents opportunities, especially for ordinary people. Being ruthless can accumulate huge amounts of wealth in a short period of time and create a large number of first-rich groups. There are many such groups, large and small. Small bank and train robberies have created countless wealthy Americans.
Comparatively speaking, East Africa is very small. The East African government has made great efforts, but naturally it has also taken away a lot of wealth and income, and only meets the basic food and clothing needs of immigrants.
The East African government is a typical powerful state machine. Under the violent armed forces such as the army and police, it is difficult for crime to exist in East Africa, and the people of East Africa are also selected as typical small farmers and small working class people who are easy to rule.
There are two development paths, benevolent people have different opinions and wise people have different opinions. However, different paths lead to the same goal. Both the United States and the west of East Africa have been effectively developed. However, the United States' westward expansion lasted for hundreds of years, while East Africa only lasted less than ten years.
Although East Africa's westward expansion movement focused on the industrial field, the overall degree of industrialization in East Africa was not high, and agricultural investment still occupied a dominant position.
(End of this chapter)