Rise of the Argentine Empire

In August, the sun's direct angle slowly moved back towards the Tropic of Capricorn, signaling that Argentina's winter was coming to an end and spring was approaching.

Under the influence of the warm Atlantic winds, the temperature in the city of Bahía Blanca was also slowly rising.

San Jose, representing various industry associations in Bahía Blanca, along with representatives from 11 autonomous municipalities in the Province of Buenos Aires, 4 autonomous municipalities in the Province of La Pampa, 5 autonomous municipalities in the Province of Río Negro, 3 autonomous municipalities in the Province of Formosa, 4 autonomous municipalities in the Province of Salta, 2 autonomous municipalities in the Province of Jujuy, and the Municipality of San Martín in the Province of Córdoba, signed a comprehensive agricultural development agreement.

The agreement included a guaranteed purchase agreement for soybeans from the Bahía Blanca State-owned Feed Factory and Plarri Foods, a wheat purchase agreement for the Bahía Blanca Grain Reserve Company, and a rice cultivation promotion agreement, among others.

It involved agricultural production in newly cultivated agricultural areas covering 70,000 square kilometers, approximately 7 million hectares of land, demonstrating Bahía Blanca's significant influence.

The cooperation was led by Bahía Blanca Sunshine Agricultural Seed Company providing improved seeds, Maya Chemical providing fertilizers, Philip Industries providing tractors and agricultural tricycles, and Balun Bank providing agricultural loans, for joint and unified development, helping to establish specialized agricultural cooperatives.

Under San Jose's influence, officials in Bahía Blanca also hoped to obtain greater benefits, taking a long-term perspective, so that not only banks and finance, but all enterprises could make longer-term decisions, building a stronger economy for future generations.

On August 28th, the Bahía Blanca Commercial Bank, initiated by the Bahía Blanca Ministry of Finance, was established, with 12 companies participating in the subscription, obtaining a total of 28% of the shares, Balun Bank obtaining 10% of the shares, and the Bahía Blanca Ministry of Finance holding 62% of the shares and management rights.

Among the 12 participating companies, 3 were from the three old established families, as well as Hans Steel, Maya Chemical, Raytheon Motors, Sunshine Agriculture, Blue Cloud Textile, and some emerging enterprises.

The main purpose of establishing the commercial bank was to absorb deposits, provide various development loans to more regions, and add a boost to the development of Bahía Blanca.

San Jose also hoped that Balun Bank could develop more internationally, while also adding some pressure to Balun Bank.

This state-owned bank also had the backing of public credibility.

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With the assistance of a large number of engineers from the Fiat Group, Raytheon Motors' assembly line also entered a stage of rapid development.

In the past 50 years, railways have made Argentina a unified market, and the future will be the era of highways.

In addition to cars, San Jose still couldn't forget about trucks.

After contacting several European truck companies, San Jose finally gave up the idea of acquiring a truck production line, while the Rhein Tank Factory technically fully met Argentina's advanced technical standards, and Horst himself attached particular importance to the development of Rhein Military.

The tank factory could produce tank chassis, and even had engineering personnel for tank chassis production lines, with considerable technical strength, and could even volunteer for the Raytheon Tractor Factory, but the continuous lack of output made San Jose somewhat anxious. Continuing to invest was a bottomless pit, and he had to find a way to generate revenue for the tank factory, which could also accumulate more capital.

Moreover, now the firearms factory and artillery factory could not get orders either. In less than half a year, Rhein Military fell into a development dilemma.

The situation was changing rapidly, and the world was changing too fast.

Compared to the booming tractor factory and motorcycle factory of the brother companies, even the newly established Raytheon Motors had better development expectations than Rhein Military.

The tank factory supported a large number of designers and engineers.

The diesel engine factory was also developing well, also producing a large number of diesel engines, supplying shipyards and tractor factories, generating a lot of revenue every month, and research and development also absorbed foreign technology.

The tank factory had engineers and other experts, and also had its own machine tools, as well as a casting workshop, used to produce artillery barrels. Horst had inspected many Italian arms companies and now felt very anxious.

The tank factory brought together the most outstanding designers and engineers of Rhein Military, but limited by Argentina's current processing and material problems, it had not been well utilized, and he also had great doubts about whether future tanks could be sold.

When he was in Italy, he visited the tank factory, and the technical level was much stronger than Rhein Tank, but it also couldn't continue. The Italian Defense Forces were not purchasing tanks, and a large amount of production capacity was idle.

For Horst, switching production was actually a difficult decision, and it was also a question of the future development of Rhein Military. The research and development and explosion of firearms, unless new growth points were found, would face huge losses.

Especially in the international market, there were more excellent Soviet light and heavy weapons and American weapons. Although one of the five great benefactors was still working hard on the first five-year plan, and one was still suppressing the "uprising" in Algeria in a chaotic manner, the armaments of Britain, the Soviet Union, and the United States had filled every corner of the world.

In fact, in the past two or three years, the development of Rhein Military has been more about relying on its old capital. Without the backing of the state, Rhein Military has been severely suppressed, and smuggling routes have also been cracked down on, resulting in heavy losses.

Many of the arms orders taken by these major powers are purchased on a national basis, and Argentine weapons can only drink some soup, such as smuggling.

It is likely that even the soup will not be affordable in the future.

The cruel facts prove that even the current African warlords do not dare to purchase these Argentine weapons of unknown origin. Now the Nanyang market is shrinking, the Indians have already hooked up with the Soviets, and in the blink of an eye, these old German-made weapons in Argentina have reached the end of their lives.

Moreover, several major firearms are also more about relying on the old capital, and the newly developed rocket launchers have no prospects.

Moreover, Rhein Military has not received new orders for two months, and the current orders are all maintained by some old orders.

Without the support of the Argentine state, Rhein Military will not be able to pay the salaries of these 300 engineers and 3,000 workers in a few months.

But the development of small-caliber rifles could indeed be considered to be on the right track.

It's just that this path was somewhat narrow. On the other hand, the Blanca City Atomic Energy Research Institute, a special institution, was developing at a relatively fast pace. With the help of American Encor Electric, it had made some progress in uranium extraction, and the number of personnel had also increased significantly.

Horst was also envious of the development of other sister companies, which was helping Rheinmetall Motors produce and process parts.

"Boss, what I mean is that our Rheinmetall Military's production capacity has declined, but the capacity of these machine tools and casting workshops cannot be wasted. So, I'm wondering if some parts can be handed over to Rheinmetall Military. Our military factory's machining level is basically first-class."

Horst was unwilling to let these workers be laid off. These old employees, who had accumulated three years of experience, had been painstakingly gathered one by one. However, continuing to fully develop military manufacturing was a dead end.

This military-industrial group, from the Fletz Bicycle Factory to its current development into the de facto largest military factory in the country, had taken countless efforts.

However, facts have proven that without a strong country as a backing, even if it integrates advanced German technology and engineers, it is difficult to seize orders.

Argentina is not Germany, nor is it France, let alone Italy or Spain. It cannot obtain more orders, and even the current ones cannot be maintained.

"Boss, Rheinmetall Military is facing huge difficulties and must find a new way out. Is it possible to produce parts for Rheinmetall Motors, Rheinmetall Tractors, and Rheinmetall Motorcycles?"

"Oh? Tell me more."

Saint-Hesse was quite troubled by the problems of Rheinmetall Military. He had considered buying a truck production line for Rheinmetall Military, but the cash flow was insufficient, and it was indeed very expensive, even the cheapest Austrian Steyr truck was almost the same price as a Fiat car.

Such a price was very uneconomical.

"Boss, this is what I think. I have some understanding of the Fiat car project. There are hundreds of parts suppliers in the Turin area, which is the essence of Fiat's development."

"Well, continue."

Saint-Hesse straightened his body and continued when he saw Horst pause.

"Even if we get the production line now, many parts still have to be imported from Italy, which will make the price much more expensive."

"This is exactly the problem that is giving me a headache."

Saint-Hesse nodded.

"Our Rheinmetall Arms Factory, Artillery Factory, and Tank Factory have many advanced machine tools that can help process parts, and we have experience in assembly line production. We have produced so many guns, and the quality can be guaranteed."

"Moreover, if we want to expand the production of our car production line, we must increase the supply of parts. In addition to the car chassis, engine, and gearbox, everything else requires the cooperation of other factories."

"That makes sense. Actually, I'm also troubled by this."

Developing a complete car company from scratch is too difficult.

Although Fiat has promised to help solve the parts problem, it only entrusts the production of some key parts to Fiat suppliers.

Saint-Hesse himself was unwilling to import all the parts from Italy, as the risk would be too great. However, there were not many domestic factories capable of undertaking these parts orders.

That's why Saint-Hesse asked Sean Glass and Blue Cloud Textile to organize personnel to establish professional parts factories. However, in this way, the cost of Fiat's 600 would skyrocket.

Moreover, the technical conditions could not be met, and Saint-Hesse did not have that much money to purchase machine tools. Extreme cash flow is not that easy to play with.

American Sequoia would not be able to support an Argentine company to purchase European machine tools indefinitely.

So many companies also need a certain amount of cash flow to ensure operation. The main reason is that these two projects cost a little too much money, and there is no energy to take care of Rheinmetall Military. It would be good enough if they didn't take money from Rheinmetall Military.

"Then try it. If you can sell this inventory, I won't take it, and I will support Rheinmetall Military in producing parts for these three companies as an OEM. In the future, Rheinmetall Military will develop independently, and I won't extract too much profit."

What Saint-Hesse was referring to was the weapons with a cost of more than 12 million US dollars piled up in the Rheinmetall Military warehouse. It would not be easy to find buyers for them.

The profit he extracted from Rheinmetall Military was also very large. Now that Rheinmetall Military has its own ideas and solves the problem of military orders, it is not impossible to consider.

"OEM? Oh, okay, thank you, boss. By the way, boss, can we go to Germany to collect parts talents? Maybe we still need to pre-pay a sum of money, about 5 million US dollars would be enough. I want to buy some shares in German auto parts companies."

Even if Horst was confident in the development of Rheinmetall Military, auto parts were still very different after all.

Transformation is not that simple.

"Okay, go ahead, pay attention to safety, I will have someone handle it with you."

Saint-Hesse also knew that you can't catch wolves without putting out bait.

Horst also strengthened his ideas. Rheinmetall Military must achieve self-sufficiency. Peace is the mainstream of world development, and both military and civilian use must be taken.

He could see from Saint-Hesse's vigorous development of various factories that the boss had great ambitions. However, like installing naval guns on warships for the Ministry of the Navy, the entire order was only 1.5 million US dollars, and the cost was 1 million US dollars, not including the money to buy Italian technology, which was a one-off deal.

Producing parts for car factories, on the other hand, can be done every month, which is enough to ensure the factory continues to operate.

"The current goal has become to survive well."

The days of several Argentine ordnance factories are not very good now, unless a war breaks out. Even the most powerful American ordnance factories are not having a good time, and they are grabbing orders everywhere in the world, which is also one of the reasons why Rheinmetall Military cannot sell its products.

In his opinion, it is not a big problem to consume the inventory, after all, the quality of these weapons is still quite good, but it is difficult to guarantee profits like before, and it is just making some processing fees.