Chapter 869: Politicians, Gangsters, People

The professor had heard from those who had been on the battlefield that when artillery shells flew over their heads, they could hear a whistling sound like a whistle.

Some scientists claimed that this was because the artillery shells tore through the air rapidly during flight, causing air vibration and emitting a sharp whistling sound.

Previously, the professor and more people didn't have an intuitive concept of this. They hadn't really been on the battlefield, so it was difficult to verify whether this statement was true or false.

But at this moment, they believed that this must be true!

This was the tourist pier. Almost everyone who came to Jincheng, or needed to take a boat to leave Jincheng, stayed here.

He watched a group of people running toward this side, maybe fifty or sixty people, or maybe seventy or eighty people, anyway, a large group of people.

Some of them were carrying suitcases, some didn't even want their suitcases, and some were pulling their families, running with all their might.

But the next second, an artillery shell fell among them. In just such an instant, a cool breeze with a fishy sweetness blew toward his face, and there were some red spots on his face, and those people had all lain down.

The professor wanted to pee a little. "Quick, quick to the room!", he pointed to the coffee house next to him, pushing them to get in quickly.

The whistling sound came again in his ears, this time it seemed closer!

He didn't dare to look back anymore, only heard a boom, accompanied by a huge force pushing heavily on his body. As the professor tilted to one side, he saw a palm-sized fragment shoot through the waist and abdomen of a student.

The edges of this palm-sized fragment were very irregular, and it couldn't be regular. It directly shaved off a large amount of flesh and blood from the student's waist and abdomen.

That student walked a few steps and then fell directly to the ground. He looked at the professor in disbelief, and then looked at the internal organs that flowed out. He didn't believe that his great life had just begun, and it ended here!

But war was like this. There were not so many whys, only sadness and pain!

Other students screamed and rushed into the house, while that female student squatted in place, hugging her head and screaming.

The professor's brain was a bit on fire. He stood up again. "Quick to the house, quick!"

He kicked the female student hard, pulled her arm, pushed her, and pushed her in.

But in the next second, the ear-piercing whistling sound rang again. This time, it was clearer than the previous time.

He stood blankly at the door of the building, seven or eight steps away from the gate. He looked back at the sky, and a small black dot was falling straight toward him!

"Motherfucker, bitch-raised..."

As a university professor, at this moment, he couldn't help but curse in his heart.

In the next second, the explosion sounded, and the shrapnel flying around tore apart several people who were observing what happened outside through the window, full of curiosity.

Watching their heads exposed outside the window being directly shaved off by more than half, the entire coffee shop was full of screams, and the smell of urine!

Several students crawled on the ground inside the coffee shop. They looked at the outside world a bit blankly, because the professor was gone, completely gone.

Perhaps the last thing he left in the world was a pair of glasses not far from them, the professor's glasses.

Until this moment, the students' minds still echoed with the last words the professor said to them—

The probability of shelling Jincheng is less than five percent!

This is the so-called five percent?

A car on the side of the road was directly hit by an artillery shell and exploded at the same time. The entire car turned into the sickle of the God of Death in an instant, harvesting people on both sides of the street.

And some fragments were directly embedded in the wall. Within twenty or thirty meters around the car, there were no living things that could stand.

Such a scene happened anywhere in the city. Although they didn't explicitly state that they wanted to attack civilians, retaliate for the Federation shelling their port, and killing their civilians.

But it looked like they were doing exactly that at this moment.

The artillery shells that kept falling in the city made people completely unaware of what place was safe and what place was not.

The city was crying, and the people were wailing!

A gentleman dressed very low-key and very exquisitely walked quickly toward the room deep in the corridor.

He looked like he was walking very fast, but he didn't run, just maintained a fast walking pace forward.

There was only the sound of his shoe heels stepping on the ground in the quiet corridor.

No iron heel. Poor people needed to inlay iron heels on the heels of their shoes to protect places like shoe heels that were easy to wear.

But for rich people, if the shoes were broken, then change a pair.

They wouldn't put iron heels on the soles of their shoes. That would make a clanging sound when walking, which wasn't polite at all and showed no cultivation.

Ten seconds, or maybe longer, he walked to the end of the corridor, then pushed open the door of the room.

Inside the door was a small lounge-like place with many sofas and chairs, which surrounded a core.

There were more than a dozen gentlemen here, sitting or standing. It could be seen that they should have been chatting before the door opened.

Some people's hands stayed in mid-air, some people were holding wine glasses. They seemed to have been pressed the pause button the moment the door opened, and then everyone looked at the person who walked in from outside the door.

Mr. Cleveland was chatting with them, and at this time he also closed his mouth.

The gentleman who came in from outside the door lowered his head slightly. "Jincheng was shelled."

The expressions of the gentlemen in the room had some subtle changes, but it didn't become bad, but became subtle.

After the person who brought the news left, the door was closed tightly again, and the gentlemen inside finally revealed a reserved smile!

Although they guessed it was these few days, as long as they didn't open fire, they would always be very worried.

This was like a kind of waiting, waiting for the moment the other party made a move, and then they could justify self-defense, and always defend excessively!

The Dantela people didn't make a move, so they couldn't let the Federation go all out. Fortunately, they didn't live up to the expectations of the gentlemen in this room and completed an important attack plan!

The Speaker of the Senate lit a cigarette, took a deep breath, and his body leaning on the sofa completely stretched out because of this smoking action.

After he exhaled this smoke, he couldn't help but laugh twice. "Where did we just discuss?"

Senator Cleveland replied on the side, "About the interest rate hike issue."

The Speaker of the Senate nodded. "Yes, I remember, interest rate hike."

"We have already talked to the bank side. The interest rate will be further increased at any time, but there will be some problems in this."

The Speaker of the Senate looked down at the ashtray on the coffee table and flicked the ash of the cigarette in his hand. "We can indeed attract international wealth and capital, but it may also reduce the circulation rate of currency in the domestic market."

He looked up at the others. "The interest rate of saving in the bank is too high, which will definitely make the public more willing to save money in the bank instead of taking it out for use."

"This has played a reverse role in the domestic market economy."

"We need a plan that can stimulate consumption."

Another senator, "Can issue consumption vouchers."

Everyone's eyes were focused on him. "Consumption vouchers, regardless of the face value, can only be offset by one-third."

"That is, if we issue thirty dollars of consumption vouchers to them, if they want to use them all up, they must buy one hundred dollars of things."

"As for the production of consumption vouchers, part of it comes from subsidies from the capital side, and on the other hand, we can continue to raise the basic tax rate, take a part from it, and then issue it to the public in the form of tax rebates."

For an income of six hundred dollars a year, according to the tiered tax rate currently promoted by the federal government, ordinary people need to pay about two hundred dollars in taxes.

But if they bought national bonds, their tax rate would be adjusted to a certain extent according to the quantity they bought, and only about one hundred seventy or eighty would be collected.

"Once we absorb more funds and wealth from the international community, we don't need to rely on obtaining war funds from ordinary people, and we can also stabilize the domestic inflation situation."

"There is a lot of money internationally now that has no place to go, and choosing us is their most reliable choice."

"We can formulate dual standards for the inflow of international funds. Their funds can flow in, but they must buy national bonds according to the proportion."

"We can adjust the interest rate in this regard..."

Since they had decided to play a big one, the things they considered would naturally be more comprehensive.

Once the international community discovered that depositing money in federal banks was not only safe but also could obtain more interest, capital would soon flow in.

A large inflow of capital would also produce a series of social changes. These rich people might consume here, they might buy real estate, buy goods, and might also open factories and establish companies.

In this way, they needed to hire more employees, which again added a large number of job opportunities to society and provided huge help for stabilizing society.

They discussed these things with full concentration, as if they really put the interests of the public in their hearts, but it didn't seem to be true.

If they really cared about the public, they could clearly prevent all tragedies from happening, but they not only didn't prevent it, but also let everything happen like this.

For them, Jincheng, the people of Jincheng who were shelled, the citizens who died in the shelling, their deaths were meaningful, not in vain. This was the honor of ordinary people!

Because the federal government would use their deaths to promote the arrival of a great era. They died in their place!

Although there wouldn't be anyone to ask those corpses in the shelling if they also thought so, and they couldn't express their views.

The shelling didn't last too long. The entire battle only lasted fifty-five minutes. Around two o'clock in the afternoon, the Dantela Navy withdrew from federal waters and disappeared.

When the sound of cannons stopped, the people who were hiding in the city and shivering also gradually walked out of the house. They looked at the surroundings a bit blankly.

It seemed that this was still the street block they were familiar with, but it was not so familiar.

Occasionally collapsed houses, neighbors struggling to ask for help in the ruins on the side of the road, children standing on the side of the road covered in blood and at a loss.

The entire city seemed to have fallen into sadness!

The President announced to the world for the first time that the federal government would mobilize again and escalate the war!

The President called this an "inhumane" attack. The Dantela fleet focused its main target on attacking and damaging the residential areas of civilians, causing a large number of houses to collapse and civilians to die.

The behavior of the Dantela Republic had successfully enraged the peace-loving federal government and federal people. The President announced that from this moment, the Federation entered a red war state and would declare war on Dantela comprehensively!

At the same time, officials of the Ministry of Defense pointed out that the Xiang Yalan area might have played an inglorious role in this attack. They didn't report the traces of the Dantela fleet to the federal government truthfully, leading to the tragedy.

If the regime in the Xiang Yalan area could discover the Dantela fleet early and pass the news back, then such a tragedy wouldn't have happened.

The Ministry of Defense and the military decided that in order to avoid similar things from happening again, they would station troops in the Xiang Yalan area as the first line of defense against the Dantela fleet invasion!

As for whether the Xiang Yalan people agreed?

Did they still dare not to agree?

At four o'clock in the afternoon, Congress released news that after urgent consultation, the federal benchmark interest rate would be increased by 2.5 percentage points, and the savings interest of major banks would be increased to 6.3 percent to 7.8 percent.

All banks would also open the registration, account opening, and all cash businesses for international accounts.

Of course, there were still many details in this, and the news wouldn't report it for the time being. Only those who were willing to send funds to the Federation for savings would know.

For example, if they wanted to save a large amount, they must buy national bonds, and some even needed to invest in the Federation to be qualified to buy in.

An annual interest rate of up to 7.8 percent, in this turbulent war era, was already an amazing return!

Even if they needed to buy federal national bonds, even if the interest rate of national bonds wasn't very high, this was absolutely a place for them to safely spend the winter!

The first time the news was issued, the world financial circle appeared to be shaken, and soon there was a phenomenon of a large inflow of funds to the Federation.

At the same time, the recovering market in the Federation was also stimulating these investors. Perhaps their money could not only safely spend the winter in the Federation but also might have continuous and powerful growth.

Subsequently, there was news that the United Fleet of the Dantela Republic began to approach the main maritime transportation routes between the Federation and Slader.

Now the Slader Military Alliance was very nervous. Once the route was threatened, various materials from the Federation might not be delivered on time, and the price would also increase.

The Slader Ambassador to the Federation requested to see the Secretary of State for the first time to discuss matters related to opening new routes and jointly protecting the routes.

It was not yet known how the talks went and what the result would be.

However, there was gossip that the Secretary of State indicated in the first round of talks that the federal government was currently powerless about the safety of the routes.

The Second Fleet needed to guard the sea area where the Federation was located on the East Ocean, ensuring the safety of New Jincheng and Jinzhou, as well as the entire coast. They didn't have more troops for support.

In fact, there were some things behind this. The federal government tried to obtain more initiative and higher status in the Slader Military Alliance, and the progress of the negotiations was not smooth.

These countries didn't want the Federation to point fingers at them. Even if the Federation played a key role in the war, they only thought they should be equal to the Federation, not a subordinate relationship, which made some of the federal government's plans fall through.

So this "being attacked" was also, from a side perspective, to let these people understand that they needed the Federation more than the Federation needed them!

Half a year was the deadline given by the Secretary of State. They needed to take care of the routes themselves for half a year. After half a year, two mixed fleets could be launched, and then they would consider the issue of supporting the routes.

However, these things were too far away from ordinary people. They could only pay attention to what was happening around them now, not the future.

Lanse returned to Jincheng with people the day after the shelling.

The Jincheng pier and the New Port pier basically stopped working, but the damage wasn't too serious.

The buildings of the two piers under the water surface were all good. They only needed to ensure that there was no structural internal problem, then rebuild the water part, clean up the ships that sank into the water, and they could soon resume operations.

The shelling suffered by the naval base was relatively serious, and most of the artillery shells were poured into the naval base.

Lanse, who returned to Jincheng, began to organize the members of the Lanse family to carry out disaster relief for the first time. The Lanse family also had some losses. Twenty or so unlucky ones had the houses they were hiding in directly named by artillery shells.

The house collapsed, crushing many people to death.

Under the shelling of this scale, it truly achieved the realm that people had been saying, wanting to do, but couldn't do—everyone is equal!

The originally prosperous city was also covered with a layer of "dust" after the shelling.

It was all dilapidated scenery. Fortunately, their shelling only lasted for more than forty minutes, otherwise, it was hard to say whether Jincheng would be completely scrapped.

The neon lights of various colors that used to flicker over the city were now replaced by flickering police lights, fire lights, and ambulance lights.

Accompanied by the members of the Lanse family starting to clean up the streets, some lucky wounded were rescued, but some people remained in the ruins forever.

The falling heavy objects turned them into rag bags, just like they had no bones, and the whole person was soft.

Even people who often saw dead people would have some psychological discomfort when seeing the appearance of these people.

One corpse after another was piled up on the side of the road at will. The federal people finally truly felt the pain brought by the war this time.

And... hatred!

The live news photos of Jincheng being shelled were spread to all parts of the Federation for the first time. The federal people who saw such a miserable situation for the first time were unprecedentedly angry!

They held up slogans of "blood for blood" and started parades and demonstrations. They demanded that the federal government increase investment in the war, and they demanded that the Dantela people pay the price for everything they did!

(End of chapter) ===== CHAPTER 870 =====