Chapter 513 Canada

Churchill was speechless, only one eye revealed anger. Yannick talked to himself for most of the day and felt bored, so he stood up and said goodbye.

Leaving Churchill Manor, the convoy headed for the next destination, the Bank of England.

The Bank of England is the central bank of the United Kingdom. Before the establishment of the Bank of England, the British royal family tried every means to borrow money from the rich and noble feudal lords in London. At that time, the royal family had a treasury mint, where the rich would deposit gold and silver. One of the bad deeds of the royal family was that they refused to redeem the gold coins that people deposited there, which was actually misappropriation of customer deposits.

During the "Nine Years' War" between Britain and France, the king's lord chancellor printed government bonds and sold them directly to merchants, promising to pay interest and allowing merchants to use such fiscal bonds to pay taxes. However, the term of these loans was very short. After the lord chancellor failed to fulfill his promise to pay interest several times, merchants were no longer willing to pay for fiscal bonds. In this way, the king, who had lost the power to raise taxes freely, was at his wits' end.

By the end of the 17th century, merchants were planning to establish a bank similar to the Dutch institution. The government's predicament provided them with an excellent opportunity. They were unwilling to lend money to the royal family separately, but wanted to bank the government's direct lending function. The Bank of England's proposal was quickly approved by Parliament, and the king granted a charter, allowing the bank to break the legal provisions of the time, provided that the money was lent to the government for a long time.

The establishment of the Bank of England was not groundbreaking. Its imitation object was mainly the joint-stock Amsterdam Bank established in the Netherlands in 1609. However, the Amsterdam Bank was not established for the royal family or war, and its service object was the emerging international trade.

Although it was an imitation in terms of institutional establishment and business, the Bank of England surpassed its predecessors and became a milestone in the history of banks. This was first of all because it developed a powerful new customer - the British royal family and government, and it would never go bankrupt.

The predecessor of the currency issued by the Bank of England (i.e., the pound) was banknotes, which were actually receipts for gold coins deposited by depositors with goldsmiths. Because it was very inconvenient to carry a large number of gold coins, people began to trade with receipts for gold coins, and then exchanged them for corresponding gold coins from goldsmiths. As time went by, people felt that it was unnecessary to always go to the goldsmith to deposit and withdraw gold coins, and later these receipts gradually became pounds.

The convoy arrived at the Bank of England, which had long been controlled by the Guards, and they were greeted by a colonel of the Guards.

Yannick asked as he walked up the stairs. "Colonel, is there anything good in there?"

The colonel of the Guards said with some annoyance. "Your Highness, when we came, the bank vault was already empty. There was not even a gram of gold, and there was not a single security."

This was expected, and Yannick turned his head to look at Deputy Prime Minister Clement who was accompanying him. "Mr. Clement, as far as I know, your country has a 'Torpedo Operation', right? How much gold and securities were shipped to Canada?"

Even knowing this top-secret plan? Deputy Prime Minister Clement was sweating and could only answer truthfully. "About $2.5 billion in gold and $4.5 billion in securities."

When the German army swept across Europe and was eyeing the British mainland, facing such a severe situation, Prime Minister Churchill made a decision: after the German invasion of Britain, if Britain could not resist, the royal family and government leaders would be immediately transferred to Canada, where a new resistance government would be established to continue leading the war in the British mainland.

It is impossible to continue the war overseas without national reserves. The British shipped about $2.5 billion worth of gold and $4.5 billion worth of securities to Canada by ship like ants moving houses.

This batch of gold reserves was guarded by 120 staff members of the Bank of Canada, while the cash and securities stored in the "Sunshine Life Building" were protected by the Royal Canadian Mounted Police. Due to the excellent confidentiality work, even the 5,000 people in the building were unaware of this wealth.

In addition to personnel protection, they also used some high-tech. Inside the building, workers specially built a vault for the storage facility with railway steel. At the same time, microphones were installed on the ceiling to detect any possible intruders. The vault door requires two different operators to enter two passwords at the same time, and it is also ensured that each person only knows one password.

The most amazing thing is that hundreds of people participated in this operation, but no information was leaked, and no gold or securities were lost until the end of the war.

"Not bad." Yannick nodded. "When will it be returned?"

Clement wiped the sweat from his face. "We are actively communicating with Canada."

"Communication?" Yannick raised his eyebrows slightly. "This word is quite interesting. Could it be that Canada is unwilling to return this batch of gold?" Seeing that Clement's expression became more embarrassed, Yannick had guessed it. "Then your fleet in Canada was also detained?"

This is a real case of a tiger in a flat land being bullied by a dog.

In the impression of many people, Canada is almost negligible in World War II. Only in some important battles participated by Britain can you occasionally see the fighting figures of Maple Leaf soldiers.

Despite this, Canada has played an absolute role in the field of military logistics. During the entire World War II, Canada produced more than 800,000 trucks alone, more than the total number of trucks produced by Germany, Japan and Italy. In terms of combat weapons, Canada produced about 40,000 land, marine and anti-aircraft artillery, 50,000 tanks and nearly 1.7 million various firearms. In terms of ships, Canada built 348 cargo ships of more than 10,000 tons alone, and also built many additional small combat ships for North Atlantic escort warfare.

The revitalization of the Royal Air Force of the United Kingdom also depends on Canada's support. By the end of the war, Canada's aviation manufacturing industry could produce 4,000 military aircraft of various types each year. But when the Allies overwhelmed the elite pilots of Germany and Japan in the sea of ​​aircraft manufacturing, Canada also contributed 16,000 aircraft and provided 8,000 pilots for the Royal Air Force. Using aviation training institutions located in Canada, the Allies trained more than 50,000 aviation personnel, and the Canadian government spent $1.5 billion on this. This plan laid a strong human resource foundation for winning the air battle in World War II.

While fully assisting the Allies, Canada did not delay the development and growth of its own armed forces. With a population of only 11 million, 10% of Canadians eventually joined the army, with a total of more than 1.1 million people. The Canadian Army grew to 500,000 people, the Navy grew to 92,000 people, and the Air Force had 48 squadrons.

The Army was equipped with 80,000 vehicles of various types, with almost one motor vehicle for every three people. This ratio has exceeded that of the US Army, making it the most mechanized field army in the world at that time. The Navy had more than 900 ships, including 2 aircraft carriers.

But Yannick found it a bit strange that Canada turned its back on its own so quickly and disobeyed its sovereign.

Was it a self-directed and self-acted drama by these guys or was the United States playing tricks in the middle?