Chapter 411: Naval Construction National Debt

Because Gao Da did not participate in this cabinet meeting, the final decision was still made by Prime Minister Baron Olcah.

Although Prime Minister Angelo Olcah was not from the military, he was Gao Da's confidant in the true sense, and he was clear about Gao Da's ideas.

Although it was not explicitly stated, many high-level officials in Spain knew that there would sooner or later be a war between Spain and Britain.

Because the great King of Spain had mentioned the matter of recovering Gibraltar many times, and the current Gibraltar was in the hands of the British.

If one wanted to recover Gibraltar from the hands of the British, war was inevitable. And the British were powerful because of their navy, which was also one of the reasons why the Navy Department proposed this ten-year shipbuilding plan, precisely to counter the threat from Britain in terms of maritime power.

Since Prime Minister Angelo Olcah was clear about Gao Da's ambition, he naturally understood that the shipbuilding plan proposed by the military was supported by the King.

Although it was not explicitly stated, the shipbuilding plan would not have too much impact on Spain's industrial development. For Prime Minister Olcah, he had no reason to stop the Navy's warship construction plan.

It could be seen that the Ministry of National Defense had made quite sufficient preparations for this naval construction plan. They not only formulated a relatively reasonable warship construction plan but also found sufficient reasons for Spain's warship construction.

When the inquiries of other cabinet ministers were answered one by one by the Minister of National Defense, Qiao Di, the cabinet meeting entered a short discussion stage.

Everyone spent a long time without discussing a result, and Prime Minister Olcah also understood that it was time for him to express his attitude.

The Prime Minister did not need to express his attitude at the beginning of the meeting; doing so would only destroy the discussion atmosphere of the cabinet meeting and force the cabinet ministers to cater to his own point of view.

Prime Minister Olcah was promoted step by step. Although becoming Prime Minister was a bit sudden, he was currently in his second term as Prime Minister, and he was relatively clear about some political means.

Only when the cabinet meeting reached a stalemate stage was it time for the Prime Minister to express his attitude. After all, as the initiator and host of the meeting, all discussions in the final meeting still had to be decided by the Prime Minister.

"Everyone, I think it is very necessary to vigorously develop the navy at this time." Prime Minister Olcah first expressed his attitude, and then he gave a detailed explanation: "

We possess colonies all over the world, and a powerful navy can guarantee the safety of our homeland and colonies. Although our navy currently ranks third in the world, we still have a certain gap with the British and French navies, and Germany, Russia, and even Italy are launching a chase towards us."

"If we don't attach importance to naval development, perhaps we will soon become the sixth-largest naval power in the world."

"The warship construction cost of 150 million pesetas per year is not too huge an expenditure for the government's finance, and it is completely acceptable for us."

"Given our good financial situation, I think there is no need to compress the financial budgets of various departments; we can completely issue naval construction national debt to the public and strive for the support of the Spanish people."

"If we can successfully complete this naval construction plan without affecting the financial budgets of various departments, this will be great news for us."

"Our goal is not to be third in the world; our goal is to surpass Britain and develop our navy into the world's number one, washing away the shame of being defeated by Britain before."

Mentioning the conflicts between Britain and other countries, the first to be mentioned was the Anglo-French conflict with a long history of historical grudges and the currently quite fierce Anglo-Russian competition.

But what many people didn't know was that there was also a long-standing hatred between Spain and Britain.

The landmark event of the decline of Spain's maritime power was precisely the British Royal Fleet defeating Spain's Invincible Armada.

And Britain took advantage of the War of the Spanish Succession to occupy Gibraltar, which also made the two countries have hundreds of years of grudges and disputes around Gibraltar.

Spain launched a great siege of Gibraltar in the 4 years from 1779 to 1783. Unfortunately, Spain tried every possible way at that time but failed to recover Gibraltar, but this also intensified the hatred between Spain and Britain.

After this, Britain vigorously supported Portugal to fight against Spain and prevented Spain's colonization of Morocco in the 19th century.

Although the hatred between Britain and Spain was not as fierce as the Anglo-French hatred, for most Spaniards, recovering Gibraltar and washing away the shame of the Invincible Armada being defeated by the British Navy had always been their long-cherished wish and goal.

All private interests had to give way to national interests. For Spain, recovering Gibraltar and defeating the British in a naval battle was definitely more important than the financial budgets of various departments.

Not to mention that Prime Minister Olcah's plan did not sacrifice the financial budgets of various departments, which could be counted as a win-win for various Spanish departments and the Navy Department.

Although issuing national debt would make the Spanish government bear a debt of hundreds of millions or even more than a billion pesetas, for the financial situation of the Spanish government, this little debt could be paid off in just a few years.

After all, last year, the Spanish government's total annual financial revenue had reached a new high of 1.5678 billion pesetas, and the total cost of building warships in the next ten years was actually only equivalent to Spain's total financial revenue for one year.

And Spain's total annual financial revenue was also constantly growing; for the government, bearing a certain amount of debt was not a bad thing.

After all, having enough debt also represented that the government had enough funds for the country's development; as long as the economy developed, repaying these debts was also very easy.

Thirty years ago, Spain only bore a debt of hundreds of millions of pesetas, which made Gao Da and the Spanish government at that time breathless.

And these debts for the current Spanish government, if they were a little more frugal, could even be paid off in one year.

It was precisely because the Spanish government at that time raised enough funds for development that it effectively promoted the reforms of various industries in Spain, allowing Spain's industry and economy to have a golden period of development.

If the Spanish government at that time had not obtained enough funds through borrowing, I am afraid that Spain's reforms and development would not have been so smooth.

With Prime Minister Angelo Olcah's speech, the discussion of the cabinet meeting basically ended.

The Minister of Finance, Aoer Akosta, had no objections to this, because for Spain's finance, taking 1.5 billion pesetas in warship construction costs over ten years was indeed not a difficult task.

The cabinet government's actions were still very fast.

Don't look at the fierce arguments during the meeting discussion; once the cabinet government made a certain decision, the relevant government decrees would soon be issued to governments at all levels and implemented rapidly throughout Spain in a short period of time.

In order not to squeeze the financial budgets of various departments, the cabinet government could only choose to issue naval construction national debt to the public. The good news was that after more than 30 years of development, the per capita annual income of Spaniards had achieved huge improvement.

Although it did not make everyone live a wealthy life, many families still had some savings.

Under these circumstances, the government issuing naval construction national debt to the public could effectively raise a part of the private funds.

After all, the government's national debt was endorsed by the country's credibility; as long as the cabinet ministers did not want their reputation to stink, they had to try every possible way to maintain the government's credibility and repay the national debt purchased by the public in full within the specified time.

Speaking of which, this was the first time since Gao Da became the King of Spain that he issued national debt to the public.

This issuance of national debt was still very lively. As soon as the government announced the news of issuing naval construction national debt, it immediately attracted the attention of many people.

For most Spanish people, they were still willing to purchase the national debt issued by the government. Although the interest rates of these national debts were not as high as the interest rates offered by those private banks, fortunately, they were endorsed by the government's credibility, so the people did not need to worry about bad debts.

Purchasing the bonds issued by those private banks, some bonds indeed had high interest rates. But these private banks had the risk of bankruptcy; unless they were bonds issued by Spain's two official banks, Spanish people were not very willing to purchase bonds issued by private banks. ===== CHAPTER 412 =====