Rise of the Argentine Empire

Saint Herse followed Mayor Cavour to the location of the dynamite factory, taking another road from Maria Town.

Mayor Cavour drove a large American pickup truck, wearing a cowboy hat.

Saint Herse drove the rented pickup truck closely behind, wearing a steel helmet.

This road wasn't a concrete road, just an ordinary dirt road, a bit bumpy, with dust flying everywhere, similar to the dirt road at the Falcon Team's training ground.

After driving slowly along the mountain road for about half an hour, they finally arrived at a huge valley. In the distance, there was a row of one-story bungalows in front and a small mine in the back. They parked the vehicles.

Mayor Cavour went to the factory area to find someone first, telling Saint Herse to stay put. Saint Herse got out to get some fresh air. The air was filled with a slight smell of sulfur. The mountains here were bare, and most of the trees had been cut down.

Ten minutes later, Mayor Cavour came out, bringing someone with him.

"Hello, Sean Todd, currently the technical engineer and production supervisor of the Maria Dynamite Factory," he said, extending his left hand to shake Saint Herse's hand.

"Hello, Saint Herse Cohen, starting today, the owner of the Maria Rain Dynamite Factory."

Before him was a middle-aged white man with a ponytail, a slightly bulging belly, a wedding ring on his rough left hand, a rustic hairstyle, wearing thick glasses, with a stubbly beard and heavy dark circles under his eyes, seemingly exuding a smell of saltpeter.

"Hello, Cohen, let me introduce our factory. Our factory covers one hundred acres, with a sulfur mine covering 200 acres behind it, and another 500 acres of surrounding land also belonging to our factory. We currently have 37 workers, most of whom live in Maria Town. We mainly use Swedish technology to produce mixed explosives."

Sean's voice was a bit hoarse, and he seemed to have some difficulty speaking, as if he wasn't very good at communicating.

Led by Sean, the two came to a factory workshop.

Saint Herse saw a group of workers, mostly middle-aged women and men, wearing all kinds of clothes.

They were quietly sitting on the assembly line in the workshop, skillfully producing dynamite. The atmosphere was somewhat dull, the air didn't circulate well, and there wasn't even a fan running, just occasional natural breezes.

"Cohen, this is our factory's assembly workshop."

"The dynamite produced by our factory is mainly in cooperation with domestic mines, such as the Zexia Mine in San Juan Province… but we haven't been paid for more than two months. Each person is owed 4,000 pesos per month, which is nearly 160,000 pesos in salary expenses." Sean paused for a long time, his Adam's apple bobbing, his eyes a little red, and finally he said it.

"Many of our old workers are also owed about 300,000 pesos in wages and have switched to the Maria Plastics Chemical Factory, where they get 5,500 pesos a month and are never in arrears. Actually, I've also thought about going there, but there aren't any suitable positions, and I didn't pass the interview…"

Saint Herse didn't answer. Sean's mentality also calmed down, and once the floodgates opened, he dared to say anything.

It would be strange if he passed the interview looking like this, speaking so bluntly and directly. Saint Herse couldn't bear to tell him that he was the boss of the plastics factory. Good heavens, he was digging his own grave, but the man was not bad.

"That's no problem. The arrears in wages will be paid up immediately today, and then starting next month, everyone will get a 500 peso raise," Saint Herse nodded, thought for a moment, and said.

400,000 US dollars have already been spent, so this one or two thousand US dollars in salary expenses doesn't matter. Actually, the dynamite factory isn't worth that much, but the ore in this mountain is valuable, with a tenfold profit.

"Boss, you're not going to lie to us, are you, fooling kids? My salary is 6,000 pesos a month!" Sean's face was a little suspicious, and then he saw Mayor Cavour nodding in the back, and only then did he confirm the news.

Mayor Cavour had already mentioned this situation before coming, and Saint Herse had specially prepared 400,000 pesos in cash, but he didn't expect it to be not enough.

So he was one of the masterminds behind the collapse of the dynamite factory, Saint Herse thought speechlessly.

"Why would I lie to you? Shouldn't you be excited to get paid?" Saint Herse was a little speechless. Did he think he was a liar because he was young?

"Call everyone over, I'll announce it in a moment. First, pay the factory's workers their wages, and notify the old employees tonight after work," Saint Herse looked at the production line and then turned to Sean and said.

"Yes, Boss!" Sean didn't care about anything else and immediately ran to the production line.

"The new boss is paying wages! Go over there now, stop work safely!" he shouted loudly. The originally somewhat calm production line suddenly exploded like a pot, fortunately it wasn't a real explosion.

The workers stopped their work in unison and all stood up, ready to come over. Sean saw that something was wrong and immediately roared.

"Safety first, safety first! Turn off the machines, are you looking for death, Horne Trevor! I'm talking to you!"

Saint Herse was also a little startled. These people were too excited, it would be troublesome if they exploded later. His small body couldn't withstand these powerful explosives.

Dozens of people lined up messily in front of Saint Herse.

"Hello everyone, I am your new boss. Today, I will first pay the wages that were originally owed. Sean, go get the wage bill and distribute it after verification."

"Boss, actually, our skilled workers haven't run away, it's just some young people who have left," Sean's expression was no longer as dejected as before, his face was rosy, as if he had taken a tonic.

In addition to the production workshop, Saint Herse also visited the synthetic ammonia workshop, but it was not large in scale, mainly synthesizing some raw materials.

"Boss, this is our warehouse, with an area of 6,000 square meters. This is the detonator area…" Sean kept talking…

As the three walked, they came to a huge underground warehouse. The warehouse door wasn't even closed. As soon as they entered the warehouse, the temperature dropped a few degrees.

Boxes of blasting explosives, detonators, etc. were scattered and piled on the ground. Saint Herse broke out in a cold sweat looking at it. Fortunately, it didn't explode, otherwise it would have gone to heaven. It was too dangerous.

"Boss, this is roughly half a year's output, with 474 tons. The current selling price of one ton of dynamite from our factory is 9,000 pesos, which is worth about 4 million pesos…"

Good heavens, Saint Hesser calculated that the inventory of explosives here alone was worth over 80,000 US dollars, a huge profit.

"Are there any other difficulties in the factory at the moment?" Saint Hesser could only interrupt.

"Currently, we need a factory director as a manager, and our inventory cannot be sold," Sean tilted his head and thought for a long time, then suddenly slapped his head, finally thinking of something.

"Isn't there a suitable candidate in the factory?"

"Yes, none of them are suitable. They don't even know how to sell these things. Originally, our former factory director intended to use these products to offset wages… but unfortunately, everyone dislikes them, even the potatoes grown in the factory are better than them…" Saint Hesser was almost startled by this sentence.

Sean then took Saint Hesser to the laboratory and other places, which were already covered with spider webs.

Sean scratched his head, a little embarrassed.

"Now I am the only chemical engineer in the factory, everyone else ran away and left this sad place," Sean continued bluntly.

"Okay, I will send a factory director over later, you cooperate, and our laboratory will be reopened. You will come back to be the director of the laboratory then."

"Really?" What Sean likes most is actually doing formulations, inventing and researching. Production is too painful. He feels that he has lost several circles of weight.

"It's true. I'll give you an extra 500 pesos a month in salary. If you have suitable people, introduce them back. I want to develop other new products," Saint Hesser added.

"Boss, you are so awesome, I will work hard in the future!" Sean was very excited and gave a stiff flattery.

Fireworks and firecrackers are very marketable. Saint Hesser kept communicating with Sean, finally making Sean understand.

Maria Town has its own paper mill, which is very convenient for making those firework tubes for firecrackers.

When the raw materials of paper are bought, a machine can be used to produce them. As for the yellow mud problem, it is easy to solve.

Saint Hesser also visited the mine. The mine has been shut down for several months. Saint Hesser looked at the raw material warehouse again. A huge amount of ore can be seen everywhere, self-sufficient.

Saint Hesser has new weapons, and Saint Hesser has already planned to carry out reverse engineering once, but there are no suitable people yet. It is best to go to the weapons factory to poach people.

After a tour, these hundreds of thousands of dollars are well spent. Just need to send a new factory director and a few people who are good at clinging to relationships, and then the situation can be opened up.

Fireworks and firecrackers directly provide the civilian market, which should be enough for the gunpowder factory to continue to survive.

The rest is to open up the mining market. Argentina is not good at mining. Brazil, Australia, and South Africa are now developing on a large scale. Either go mining yourself, which requires cooperation with local forces, or go for international exports, so that explosives can blossom in Australia, South Africa, and Brazil.

In fact, Bolivia also has many minerals, and the people there are relatively poor. If there is a chance, we must go there to mine. Brazil's power is still relatively strong. After they moved their capital, the development of the Brazilian Highlands accelerated, and now it is also a window period.

Saint Hesser knows something about the mines developed by Vale, after all, this name can often be seen in the news in later generations. New China is the first country in the entire blue star and the only country in human history to break through 1 billion tons of steel production.

Argentina lacks at least two important minerals in the development of the steel industry, one is industrial grain, coal, and the second is iron ore. These are very serious problems to be overcome in the future. Whether to import coking coal or develop in neighboring countries is a question that needs to be carefully considered.

South Africa is still a colony of the British. Most of Africa is still a colonial country. The Soviet Union and the United States are preparing to completely dismember the old colonial countries. India's independence a few years ago dealt a heavy blow to the British Empire.

France, under the leadership of de Gaulle, is revitalizing and trying to deepen its rule over Vietnam, and is still fighting in Vietnam.

Australia is still working hard to integrate the country, but Brazil is now embarking on the road to vigorous development of a great power.

In the newspaper news, Saint Hesser has already seen that Brazil has successively established large state-owned enterprises such as Vale, Redonda Steel Plant, and Petrobras.

And Brazil is far ahead of Argentina in this respect on the road of centralization, especially when the capital was moved to Brasilia, it seems to be in the 1960s and 1970s.

This is the only country among the major powers after World War II to move its capital. Now that I think about it, Brazilians do have some stuff. That big plane is still impressive, and Brazil's aircraft industry has already begun to take off.

Saint Hesser had already forgotten the specific time of Brazil's capital relocation. The current capital is still Rio de Janeiro. There is no news of any capital relocation in Brazilian newspapers. I don't know if history has changed.

Like Brazil, keenly aware that Argentina now has a huge window of opportunity for development, it depends on whether Saint Hesser can seize it, but it is still very short of money.

The good news is that Sain sent a message that the US stock market, in which Saint Hesser invested heavily, has begun to surge. Saint Hesser followed the impression of major US companies in later generations, as well as the investment philosophy that military industry and gold will rise in troubled times.

Not only invested in General Motors, but also invested in a large number of military industries such as Boeing, and futures stock assets in US dollar gold. Driven by the war, they began to rise crazily, and those that did not rise were held still.

…

After solving the problem of developing mineral deposits, Saint Hesser turned his attention to the explosives factory.

Saint Hesser also has greater ambitions to develop his own light weapons, but he lacks people.

Now Argentina's Domingo-Mat Light Weapons Factory has not yet mass-produced too many of its own automatic rifles, which will be a good opportunity.

When Cross held a plastic bottle press conference in the United States last time, he had contact with people from the Soviet KGB. This is an important breakthrough.

Saint Hesser has long coveted the AK47 automatic rifle. If it can be before the Mat Light Weapons Factory, that is, in 1954.

Introducing and mass-producing this world-famous gun for Argentina, and mass-producing it at the same time, even under the leadership of Little Thompson, can earn Saint Hesser an important political capital.

Of course, the Maria Factory, as a civilian explosives factory, makes Saint Hesser very interested in another civilian product, fireworks and firecrackers. Civilian blasting is not very practical, and the mining industry uses more, but fireworks and other things can at least break some situations.

Saint Hesser has already planned in his heart that this time the explosives factory will be divided into two parts, one part will study the mass production of military equipment, and the other part will study civilian use, but light weapons and military equipment cannot be located in this valley. Maria Town will be better.