Chapter 211, Sweeping Across the Eastern Provinces

After the Central Army Group got a vacation and replenished the losses caused by the previous battle in the Qinggu area from the new recruits, they set out for the Eastern Provinces.

Their actions were very smooth.

The Eastern Provinces are closely connected with the Central Three Provinces and Fuxing City.

The situation there is completely different from that in the Qinggu area.

The food production capacity of the Eastern Provinces is very weak, even worse than that of the Central Three Provinces.

That is mainly because the Eastern Provinces were the core urban areas on the main continent of the Angry Owl Star in the pre-war era, especially the coastal areas. The only urban relic in the Central Three Provinces, the "Tower Ruins", is everywhere in the Eastern Provinces.

Although there is still a certain amount of flat field soil that can be used for agricultural production, the overall amount is not enough.

The main food supply of the five or six million people living in the Eastern Provinces actually depends on the Qinggu area.

After the unrest in the Qinggu area, the Eastern Provinces also experienced a widespread famine, which led to unrest.

The Alliance is still kind.

Gu Hang has always attached great importance to population. He does not want the eastern provinces to be in chaos, starving a lot of people to death, and then fighting each other to kill a lot of people for food.

Severe famine may even be more terrible than the population reduction caused by war.

In this case, under Gu Hang's instruction, Bradford, who is actually the head of the Alliance Commerce Department, continued to supply food to the eastern provinces according to the governor's idea.

At the beginning, according to Bradford's merchant characteristics, he wanted to take this opportunity to sell food at a high price, which would definitely make a lot of money.

But this merchant instinct was criticized by Prime Minister Ossena.

Amid the criticism, Bradford finally remembered that he was not a businessman now. It is true that he manages the Ministry of Commerce, but he is a politician and he has to act according to political logic rather than business logic.

For a long time in the past, the food supply to the eastern provinces was maintained by large orders imported from the Western Desert; recently, there has been more food imports from the Northern Qinggu Province.

The Qinggu region had its autumn harvest a few months ago. Although the output is still somewhat lower than that of previous years, it is at least not a big problem to feed the 14 million people in the alliance.

And a large number of cleared jungles and trees; the deformed monsters that were killed in large numbers in the previous wars were all put into the synthetic starch factory.

The alliance mastered the self-developed technology of synthetic starch almost half a year ago. For each set of related industrial lines produced, one set was sent to Beiqinggu.

At present, many large and small synthetic starch factories have been put into production in Beiqinggu.

The output of these synthetic starches is getting bigger and bigger.

Counting these things that don’t taste good but are definitely not starving to death, the food that can be exported from the Qinggu region may be more than in the previous bumper years.

That’s enough.

The various types of food exported from the alliance to the eastern provinces are mainly exchanged for various industrial raw materials in business.

Industrial raw materials are the most important basic output of the eastern provinces, and they are traditional outputs.

To put it bluntly, it is similar to the production mechanism in the ruins of the tower, relying on picking up garbage.

Exporting food at a fair price in exchange for industrial raw materials is a basic business, not making money, or just making normal money.

But since it has been said that this matter has political considerations, it is essentially a political business.

The political goal of this matter, in addition to maintaining the millions of people in the eastern provinces from uncontrollable large-scale famine and war, the excess profits not earned from the business must also be earned back from other aspects.

Through increased trade actions, the alliance has established a very deep influence in many settlements in the eastern provinces.

The only one who can provide sufficient food supply is the alliance. This forces many settlements to sell raw materials to the alliance at normal prices. Of course, this is not strictly forced, after all, the food is not sold at a high price, and the raw materials are not sold at a low price. It is a reasonable transaction.

But some attached conditions, such as promoting the alliance system and reaffirming that their own settlements are members of the alliance, are necessary.

Don't underestimate these, people's hearts will change.

In my own settlement, I don’t have enough food or warm clothes. I have to pick up garbage every day, face mutant beasts in the wasteland, and worry about looters. In the Alliance, as long as I go there, I become a citizen of the Alliance, and have a job level, at least I will have no worries about food and clothing. As for work, how can it be harder than picking up garbage? Not to mention, in the Alliance’s propaganda, all levels have basic medical insurance and vacations...

Compare them, and you will know which is better and which is worse.

And with the second propaganda, my own settlement is also a member of the Alliance.

Then won’t the lower-level or even middle-level residents think: Why are they all members of the Alliance, but our lives are not so good?

Then if one day the Alliance comes and says that it wants to bring the entire settlement under the direct management of the Alliance. Then, how much resistance can the entire settlement have?

Let alone resistance, I’m afraid there will be guides everywhere.

In addition to the minimum requirement to allow the Alliance’s merchants to promote the Alliance, there are some other deeper cooperation.

For example, they gradually began to accept the "guidance" of some expatriate officials from various ministries of the alliance. In name, they were to help these settlements build their homes and bring the advanced experience of the alliance. Expatriate officials will not directly lead and manage the settlements, but will be consultants, providing reasonable advice to the leaders of the settlements.

That's what they said, but in fact...

In fact, it is true.

But in this process, the influence of the alliance was naturally further strengthened.

What strategies will the rulers of the settlements who constantly listen to the advice of the expatriate officials of the alliance and yearn for the alliance system adopt when the alliance's army arrives?

In other words, the alliance's long-standing food trade strategy and value output have brought about a strong expansion of political influence. In the past six months, a good situation has been established in the eastern provinces.

In fact, if it weren't for the urgent urging of Governor Gu Hang, the alliance might not need military action. As long as they fanned the flames at a certain time in the future, a revolutionary wave sweeping across the eastern provinces would be able to safely take over this area with millions of square kilometers and a population of six million.

Military action is a double-edged sword.

Of course, this can speed up the process of incorporating the entire eastern provinces into the alliance's rule, without having to wait for the so-called "time is ripe". But correspondingly, some of the objects that might have been fought for may now stand on the opposite side of the alliance.

It's harmless.

At present, the new troops planned by the alliance army have not been reorganized, and the corresponding weapons and equipment are still in production. The Central Army Group that is now on the move has only seven divisions and more than 70,000 people.

But they still have frequent good news.

The land of the eastern provinces is too large, and because many city ruins stand on the wasteland, the terrain is very different, and it is difficult for each settlement to form a joint force. In addition, many places do not have a strong will to resist.

Therefore, when facing the actions of the Central Army Group, many places simply surrendered directly.

The Alliance also has corresponding policies for this.

Those who do not resist are not considered enemies, and everyone from the people to the original ruling class will receive relatively good treatment.

As for those who resist...

That is like trying to stop a chariot with a mantis arm.

To put it bluntly, even if the six million people in the eastern provinces were gathered together, they could only form an army of several hundred thousand at most. With their rubbish weapons and rubbish logistics, and the fact that more than half of them would starve to death if the Alliance cut off their food supply, they would not be able to resist.

Not to mention, they could not unite.

Yan Fangxu's army made rapid progress in the east.

Often every few hours, they would claim to have captured one or two settlements.

Later, Yan Fangxu himself felt embarrassed when he received the good news.

What is there to report? Just send a regiment to stand next to a settlement without firing a single shot, and they will surrender in three minutes; if they are tougher, pull out the regiment's artillery to fire a few shots, and the infantry fires a few shots for intimidation rather than attack, and they will surrender in fifteen minutes.

If there are those who really resist to the end, then kill them.

Eliminate all the resistance forces, arrest all the leaders, and do not need to escort them back to Fuxing City, but sentence them on the spot. The local people will be divided into other camps according to the situation.

It can be regarded as a thundering measure.

After the whole battle, even if only one regiment was sent out, it often takes less than a day to get it done.

In short, no matter what the situation, there are corresponding and mature ways to deal with it.

This set of things was left over when they recovered the two million people in the Central Province, and it was nothing more than doing it again in the larger and more dispersed eastern provinces.

This kind of victory report really has no intention of passing it on.

Later, Yan Fangxu only made a summary report every week and considered it done.

...

Gu Hang was too lazy to read Yan Fangxu's various reports.

It was nothing more than taking down a city today and a town tomorrow. It was meaningless.

To be honest, he had no doubt that the Central Army Group could easily wipe out the entire eastern provinces.

The only thing to worry about was that no more monsters would appear in the east.

It was just the local survivors, which did not pose any threat.

He was still struggling with the remaining grace points in his hand.

The new blood of the Phoenix, the construction of the 10th Special Operations Brigade, the expansion of the Alliance Army... In these aspects, Gu Hang spent about 5,500 grace points in total.

He still had more than 12,000 points left.

And he planned to invest all these grace points in the construction of the territory at once.

This was divided into two parts: technology and architecture.

Let's talk about architecture first.

After the war in the Qinggu area was settled, Gu Hang found that three new buildings appeared in the [Architecture] interface.

They were [Farm I], [Ecclesiarchy], and [Trial].

Gu Hang estimated that the [Farm] building was because after he took over the Qinggu area, the area of ​​land used for agricultural production increased significantly, reaching a certain goal built into the system, thus achieving the achievement of unlocking the [Farm] building.

[Farm I] buildings are the same as [Civilian Factory I] and [Military Factory I] that Gu Hang had unlocked before. Spend 100 points of grace and load them onto a farm that has already been built and put into production, which can increase production to a certain extent.

Before, there were no extra grace points to use for these production-increasing buildings, but now he has quite a lot of grace points, so he can use them.

After thinking about it, he did not exchange any farm buildings.

There is no need.

According to a rough report recently sent back by Beiqinggu Province, the production plan for the next year is mentioned.

According to optimistic estimates, the food production in the Beiqinggu area, from agricultural products and synthetic starch, can reach a total value of about 6 million tax coins for the whole year next year.

In addition to the imports from the Western Desert and some grain output from the three central provinces, there will be about 3 million tax coins worth of food.

This batch of food is enough to feed more than 18 million people at the standard of a well-off society, that is, the standard of the Alliance E9 food supply; if we pay a little attention to food rationing and supply, and use the standard of food and clothing, that is, the Alliance E5 standard, it can feed more than 27 million people; if we are more demanding, and use the standard of not starving people to death, that is, the Alliance E3 standard, it is enough to feed 45 million people.

Even if the six million people in the entire eastern provinces are included, the total population of the Alliance is only about 20 million.

It is enough anyway.

On the contrary, industrial production is always insufficient.

Especially military industry.

The production of civilian factories is mainly on various consumer goods. These things are used to pay taxes, and the empire also recognizes them; if they go out for interstellar trade, others also want them. But in general, the demand is relatively small. If they can't sell them at a high price in trade, they can deduct taxes from the empire, and the tax amount assessed is generally lower than their actual production value.

On the contrary, arms are hard currency in the interstellar world and a hot commodity in trade. The Empire will give enough tax coins for paying taxes.

In this case, Gu Hang exchanged 16 military factories and 4 civilian factories in one go.

The former were all added to the various military industries in Weixing City.

The latter will also be put into the metal smelting industry of basic heavy industries such as ceramic steel and plastic steel, as well as the metal processing industry.

Let alone, the monthly output of the Alliance has risen to ten.

After exchanging these twenty factory bonus cards, it is estimated that the annual industrial output value of Weixing City has increased by about 400,000 tax coins.

And the price is only 2,000 gift points.

He still has 10,000 points.

And Gu Hang did not use these 10,000 points of gift for other purposes, but used them all to draw technology cards!

It's the exciting moment of the lottery again, and Gu Hang is ready to go!