Chapter 342: African Railway

In just one month of the German-Austrian-Russian war, Spain sold more than 20,000 rifles and 100 artillery pieces to the Austro-Hungarian Empire, which is great news for Spain's military industry.

Although this huge arms trade was because of the weapon gap caused by the Austro-Hungarian Empire's large expansion, as the war continues in the future, as the strategic materials hoarded within the Austro-Hungarian Empire are consumed, the materials the Austro-Hungarian Empire purchases from Spain will only be more and more.

Thanks to this big client, the Austro-Hungarian Empire, Spain's military factories will not lack orders in the next few months, which effectively promoted the growth of Spain's military industry.

Although the military industry is booming because of this war, for Gao Da, the good news of the military industry is no longer that important at this moment.

The reason is none other than that after several years of hard construction, Spain's development of African colonies has finally made some progress.

The biggest progress is that the large railway line known in Spain as the "African Railway" has achieved full-line traffic, which also represents that Spain's control over African colonies has been highly strengthened.

The so-called African Railway is actually the railway line from the westernmost part of the former Gold Coast to the southernmost part of the Congo territory.

Why is this railway called the African Railway? First of all, it is the total length of this railway, which reached an exaggerated 4,500 kilometers.

Such railway mileage is close to the total length of railways in Spain before Gao Da became King of Spain; from this aspect, one can also see that Spain's development of Africa is not weak.

More importantly, this railway successively passed through the former Ashanti Empire, Togo, the Kingdom of Dahomey, the Sokoto Caliphate, the Kingdom of Benin, the Kingdom of Niger, the Aro Confederacy, and the Kingdom of Bamum, and then entered the land controlled by the Baka and Bantu people.

Its significance is not just connecting these former native areas, but also allowing Spain's colonial army to easily reach the areas where these natives gather.

In the future, no matter where a rebellion or other crisis breaks out, the Spanish army can arrive in the shortest time, which greatly strengthens the stability of Spain's colonies.

It is a pity that the West African colony is not connected to the African Railway.

After all, the West African colony is still separated from the Guinea colony and the Congo territory by France's colonies, and the railway cannot be built on the French land.

But for the railway construction within the West African colony, the Colonial Affairs Department is still quite attentive. Currently, the West African colony has also built nearly 1,000 kilometers of railways, connecting several important grain production areas within the colony.

Every grain harvest season, a large amount of grain is transported by train to the port, and then transported to the Spanish mainland by transport ships.

These grains will be transferred on the Spanish mainland, either transported to the grain storage warehouses on the Spanish mainland and enter the Spanish mainland's grain market.

Or they will be further packaged and then sent to other European countries for sale.

Among the grain exported by Spain to Europe every year, nearly one-third of the grain comes from the West African colony, which is already a quite exaggerated scale.

If it weren't for the fact that the mainland also has a shortage of grain, I am afraid that the scale of grain that the West African colony could export to the outside world would be even more.

Grain export represents foreign exchange income, which is extremely important to Spain and is also a quite important part of the Spanish government's tax revenue.

The full-line traffic of the African Railway is a relatively important milestone for Spain.

However, Gao Da does not intend to personally go to Africa to participate in the railway's completion ceremony, but the Spanish Colonial Affairs Minister will go.

Also participating in the railway's completion ceremony are the governors of the Guinea colony and the Congo territory; these two were also personally appointed by Gao Da and are Gao Da's confidants.

One has to admit that after nearly 20 years of development, Gao Da also has a force that cannot be underestimated in his hands.

First of all, for several important colonies in Spain, the governors are basically appointed by Gao Da. Although some colonial governors were promoted from the nobility, most of them were just going to the colonies to be gilded.

But no one can deny that Gao Da has completely taken back the power to appoint governors, which also means that Gao Da's influence in the colonies is extremely high.

One must know that each colony has a considerable scale of garrison. This actually also means that the military power in Gao Da's hands is not just the Imperial Guard; hundreds of thousands of colonial troops can also listen to Gao Da's mobilization orders.

The armies he holds in his hands are the confidence for Gao Da to continuously carry out reforms. With the support of these armies, no one in Spain can disobey Gao Da's orders.

Taking advantage of this African Railway completion opportunity, Gao Da also carried out a large-scale commendation for the colonial army in Africa and promoted many young officers.

For Spain, this war against African natives can also be considered a large-scale war.

Just this war alone promoted dozens of school-level officers, and there were also several high-level officers with relatively excellent performance who successfully promoted from Colonel rank to Brigadier General.

Along with the promotion of military rank, there were also various rewards including land, property, and funds.

Of course, most of the land rewarded was land in the colonies, and there was very little land on

After all, the colonies conquered by Spain possess vast tracts of fertile land, while the fertile land in Spain itself has basically been carved up and exhausted.

Although the soldiers in these colonial armies are composed of indigenous people, they can naturally obtain Spanish citizenship after fighting for Spain.

Of course, these soldiers are certainly settled in the colonies as a priority. Gao Da even specially transported a large number of indigenous women from other colonies to help these colonial soldiers start families and settle down in the colonies once and for all.

However, whether it is the colonial soldiers or the transported indigenous women, there is no trace of black people among them.

Gao Da knows well the staining ability of black people; even in Spain's own colonies, Gao Da is unwilling to let black people set foot.

Currently, in Spain's colonies, there is a relatively strict system of racial segregation between black and non-black groups.

There are no black people in Spanish colonial cities and strongholds, while black indigenous people are concentrated in the indigenous states within the colonies.

The two sides basically do not interfere with each other; except for necessary activities such as paying taxes or transporting supplies, neither side will enter the other's territory under other circumstances.

In order to prevent these black people from finding loopholes to obtain Spanish citizenship through various means, the colonial affairs department and various colonial governments also have relevant regulations.

Regardless of whether they are male black people or the descendants of female black people, they are all regarded as black people and must be driven to the indigenous spheres of influence to survive.

Spanish colonies can only support non-black descendants; doing this is also to put an end to the idea of some black people wanting their descendants to change their status.

Even if a black woman can marry a Spaniard or other non-black indigenous person, their descendants still cannot obtain Spanish citizenship.

Intermarriage with black people will also violate the colonial government's crime of illegal marriage; this crime faces a minimum fine of several hundred pesetas, and at most even imprisonment for several years to over ten years.

Of course, the colonial government will not really imprison them. Imprisonment means having to provide food, and it is impossible for the colonial government to support them for nothing.

For those criminals who break the law, their final destination is to go to plantations or mines to labor. Of course, if European immigrants commit crimes, the punishment will be reduced at discretion. They will not be forcibly sent to plantations or mines to labor, but will actually serve their sentences in colonial prisons.

There will be some less strenuous work in the prison for them to do; as long as they can complete the work tasks on time, they can also have their sentences reduced.

Such situations exist almost simultaneously in the colonies of various countries; the methods of dealing with domestic immigrants, European immigrants, and other local indigenous people are completely different.

Especially between European immigrants and local indigenous people, there is a world of difference in the attitude toward the two.

Take India, Britain's most important colony, as an example. If the British commit a crime in the Indian colony, there is a high probability that nothing too serious will happen.

But if Indians commit a crime, especially against the British, then they will inevitably face death.

Even without committing a crime, if a slightly powerful British person finds a certain Indian unpleasant, they have all kinds of means to kill this Indian.

This is also the status quo of the colonies of various countries in this era; the indigenous people at the bottom of the colonies have no right to speak at all, and they even have to rely on local European immigrants for the right to survive.

It is worth mentioning that with the outbreak of the war between Germany, Austria, and Russia, the number of European immigrants obtained by Spain is also constantly increasing.

Especially immigrants from the Austro-Hungarian Empire and Russia; just in the first month after the outbreak of the war, the number of immigrants nearly doubled compared to the same period last year.

In fact, thinking about it, it is normal; war and famine are almost the main reasons for the increase in immigration.

Only these two reasons will make people unable to live in their own countries. At other times, most people still hold the idea of persisting if they can.

After all, immigration means leaving one's hometown and heading to a very strange foreign land. Not everyone can endure the feeling of leaving their familiar environment and familiar relatives; this is also the reason why the number of immigrants in various countries in this era is not that exaggerated.

Coupled with the fact that the transportation tools of this era are too simple, basically the mainstream transportation tools are only trains and steamships.

The speed of these two types of transportation is too slow; once one needs to go to a farther place, the time required is often calculated in weeks.

Even from Spain to the African colonies, a faster warship takes one or two weeks. If taking a slower steamship, the time will be extended to two to three weeks.

Just such a long journey is enough to make many people give up the idea of immigrating abroad, not to mention that the tickets for ocean voyages in this era are also very expensive, and many people simply cannot afford them.

Actually, come to think of it, this situation is about the same in later generations.

International air tickets in later generations are also quite expensive, and taking a steamship also requires a long time.

This has led to the fact that in the later generations where the economy and industry are relatively developed, there are still countless people who have never been abroad and have never taken international flights or cruise ships.

For these surging numbers of immigrants, Spain chose to transfer them all to the African colonies.

Compared to the previous relatively even distribution to various colonies, the Spanish government has now changed its strategy for handing over these immigrants.

The main destinations for these European immigrants are the West African colony or the South Morocco colony; after all, one of these two colonies is an important agricultural development zone, and the other is a region Spain plans to localize.

As for the Guinea colony and the Congo territory, they can only be selected from the immigrants that the first two colonies cannot accommodate.

Although they are eating leftovers, the Guinea colony and the Congo territory are both super-large colonies with areas of hundreds or even thousands of square kilometers; because they are very short of population, they are not picky.

Facts have proven that these immigrants who came from afar from Russia are really good at farming.

Spain's colonies do not have so much oppression; after they come to the colonies, they have the same status as other immigrants.

This also means that as long as they pay enough taxes, the remaining food and other income belong to themselves.

Under these circumstances, Russian immigrants have also erupted with extremely strong motivation. They are even more active in agricultural labor than the Spaniards, and have now become an important agricultural group in the West African colony.

Even among these Russian immigrants, several large landowners have been born, possessing hundreds of acres of land at every turn.

As for how to work this land of hundreds of acres, it is actually quite simple. Most of the time, it is the local indigenous population that engages in farm work.

These immigrants from Europe only need to manage these indigenous people and let them go to reclaim and plant.

Although some European immigrants will also engage in agricultural work, farm owners and plantation owners will also pay them sufficient wages.

The work income and meals of European immigrants are vastly different from those of these indigenous people. For the indigenous people on these plantations and farms, let alone eating meat, whether they can have enough to eat is a problem.

And for those European immigrants working on plantations and farms, not only can they obtain quite generous income, but the farm owners will also provide them with meat supplies twice a week.

Where does this meat come from? Of course, it comes from the livestock farms in the West African colony, as well as the wild grasslands and forests.

In addition to the fact that Spanish colonies will raise various animals to provide meat, local indigenous people will also hand over animals obtained from hunting to Spain.

The colonial government will purchase various animals from the indigenous people at a certain price; this is also the reason why the people in the colonies can obtain sufficient meat supplies.

If transported from Spain, just this one or two weeks of transportation time would be enough for meat products to rot and stink during the journey.

Moreover, Spain itself is not a major livestock country; it is already quite good that the meat and dairy products produced domestically can meet the needs of the local people.

This has led to the fact that the West African colony, in addition to planting agricultural products, also needs to develop animal husbandry.

Several of Spain's colonies will also organize hunting activities from time to time, the purpose of which is to reduce the local wild carnivorous animals and let herbivorous animals breed faster.

When the herbivorous animals breed to a certain scale, organize hunting activities against herbivorous animals again to harvest more meat at one time.

It is precisely because of the construction of animal husbandry and the prevalence of hunting activities that Spain's colonies can ensure that the supply of food and meat will not be affected while the population is increasing rapidly.

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(End of this chapter)