The separatist situation in the Netherlands is getting worse and worse!

Zheng Yong lived in Amsterdam and The Hague for several years and was worried about the dispute between the Republicans and the Oranges that have spread across the country. Whether it is the third-level parliament or the provincial parliament, or the city council, except for Zeland, where the Republicans have absolute advantage, Friesland and Groningen, the other areas such as the Netherlands, Utrecht, Utrecht, Utrecht, Gerderland, and Drente, there are Oranges and Republican parliamentarians who are arguing everywhere. This debate is so fierce that it has spread to society. Just like the theological sectarian dispute over the dominance of the Flanderick family more than a hundred years ago, the society of the United Provinces was deeply divided!

The core of the debate lies in the foreign policy of the United Province, that is, whether it is pro-French or pro-British. The Orange faction advocates a comprehensive reconciliation with the United Kingdom and aligned with France, which is increasingly ambitious to expand. The Republican faction has always advocated that England is the strongest competitor of the United Province, the business kingdom, and must be suppressed as the primary opponent. For this reason, even if it sacrifices some interests, it will be willing to form an alliance with France.

Of course, no one can convince anyone. This has led to countless minor meetings of the third-level parliamentary meetings, but no substantial agreement has been reached. The foreign policy of the United Province is still vague, and it feels like crossing the river by feeling the stones. This is undoubtedly very unfavorable, because neither England nor France will not do anything because of the mediocre work of the United Province. France will still be full of interest in the lowlands, and England will still unswervingly try to break the commercial hegemony of the United Province. Even when Britain and France join forces to deal with the United Province, the commercial republic will face the most embarrassing and dangerous situation.

Many times, Zheng Yong had to lament the Dutch's spirit of constantly fighting, splitting, and committing death. No matter how rich his family property is, he can't withstand such repeated and continuous tossing! Fortunately, the third-level parliament of The Hague is now increasingly aware of the importance of the East Coast Republic of China far away in the New World. This country exports a large amount of goods to Amsterdam, giving Dutch wholesalers who have the advantage of channel a lot of money, which has won the favor of many republican parliamentarians; and recently, he

We opened up Peru, and some tobacco trade in the New Spain market was to the Dutch, which brought the Dutch tobacco industry, which had just fallen into a desperate situation, and some tobacco workshops in Amsterdam, Friesland and other places have resurrected the dead, which undoubtedly pleased some Orange businessmen. Therefore, improving relations between the two countries - such as opening the Strait of Malacca to immigrant ships on the East Coast and deepening trade cooperation in the Far East - has barely received the majority of the consent of the two sects of parliamentarians. It is really not easy!

"Mr. Matthias, it's too difficult to meet you in The Hague. How's your business recently?" Zheng Yong has been in The Hague for the past two days and wants to meet Speaker Devet, but the Speaker seems to be very busy, especially after marrying Elizabeth of the Bickel family, he has been involved in the front line of the struggle between the two factions of Congress. He is busy with political struggle all day long, and has forgotten what he should do in the ruling status of the United Provinces - to manage the country well - but is addicted to one verbal battle after another in the parliament. Now, Zheng Yong wants to discuss the peace negotiations between Western France with the Speaker, but was repeatedly rejected by the Speaker. This made Zheng Yong very depressed, and he secretly guessed in his heart that the reason why Devet avoided him was also because the United Provinces themselves did not come up with opinions?

However, without seeing Speaker Devite, Zheng Yong unexpectedly met Matthias Deher, the in-laws of the Tripp family, and the person in charge of the Deher family who operates iron and copper mining and processing in the Netherlands.

"The competition among the English is too fierce, and there are also some competition among hamburger merchants. The Swedish royal family also hopes to see iron and bronzes produced by more countries or individuals, rather than being monopolized by the Tripp or DeHell family." Matthias did not hide at all about this. Recently, the Dutch have suffered too much setbacks in the Baltic Sea. Many traditional advantageous industries - not only metallurgy - have been strongly snatched by English merchants, and the total profits have begun to decline, and it seems that this seems to be a long-term trend and cannot be reversed.

"We have to admit that our neglect in the metallurgical industry over the years has finally caused bad results. We do not attach as much importance to technological progress as the English people, unlike them who invested a lot of money to improve. This has led to our productivity being less efficient than others, and both the United Provinces and Sweden are far more expensive than England, so our disadvantage in competition is too obvious." Speaking of this, Matthias couldn't help but smile bitterly: "To be honest, my dear Zheng, we last year

In all iron ore, copper ore, and iron smelting workshops in Sweden, the combined profits of no more than one million rupiahs are no more than one million rupiahs, but the profits of our family by reselling steel bars, agricultural tools, hardware tools, mechanical knives and even flintlock rifles from your country have exceeded 400,000 rupiahs, and this number is still growing steadily. It is only a matter of time before our family's self-operated business income exceeds our family. Under the impact of England's commodities, commodities produced from the East Coast are more competitive..."

The DeHell family has reached this point today, although the gradual rise of English industry, but more of it is their own. When the United Provinces monopolized most of the trade in the Baltic Sea, the Tripp family and the DeHell family entered Sweden in a large number of high-quality iron ore and copper ore in their country. At the same time, they also set up iron smelting workshops to produce iron and various iron products.

There is no doubt that under monopoly, the profits of the Dehair family are rich, because no matter how the product quality or price, the Dehair family, which has mastered channel advantages, can always sell it. In addition, these wealthy families are obsessed with making excess profits through credit - such as lending to the Swedish royal family - and then they have no intention of investing in technology. Therefore, after the failure of the British-Dutch Naval Battle, the Baltic countries opened their doors to the UK, the Dehair family's weak competitiveness suddenly became prominent. Although they have a well-connected channel network in various places, a stable customer group, and a superior relationship network that has been operated for decades or even hundreds of years, and have very convenient and cheap financing advantages, under the impact of British goods, the market still began to be lost bit by bit. Although this process seems slow, it is almost irreversible, which makes Mathias feel a little panic.

In order to maintain the total profit of the family industry, almost with the unanimous opinions of family members, the Dehair family began to gradually reduce its production capacity and at the same time increased the shipment of East Coast steel products to compete with industrial capital from England and Germany - East Coast goods were calculated in Shanghai freight, insurance premium, import and export tariffs and necessary sales costs (the Dehair family still had to reserve a part of their own profit), but the price alone was actually not very competitive, but the advantage was that the product quality was good and durable, and it had established a certain reputation in the Baltic Sea, so there was still a considerable market. This is undoubtedly the reason why the Dehair family continued to increase the supply of East Coast goods, and it was all for profit!

"Matias, United Province is a friend of the East Coast. The Dehair family and the Tripp family are the same. Don't worry, we will openly supply all kinds of goods to the family, not only steel products, but if the family intends to develop in other industries, we will also fully support this. Please be sure to rest assured." Zheng Yong was also very happy to hear Mattias' words, because this means that the former industrial capital of the Dehair family, inevitably began to transform into commercial capital and usury capital, which is beneficial to the East Coast!

However, Zheng Yong has also collected a lot of data recently and studied the industrial production situation of the United Provinces throughout the 17th century. Although there is no precise data, there is no doubt that the trend of de-industrialization of most industries in the past sixty years is very obvious. Especially after the failure of the First Anglo-Dutch Naval Battle, with the loss of some overseas markets and raw material production areas, the trend of de-industrialization of United Provinces has been greatly accelerated, such as Amsterdam's once flourishing tobacco processing (during the peak of the throne, dozens of tobacco processing enterprises employed more than 3,500 workers), tannese, sugar and other industries.

If these industries are not very important, then the trend of de-industrialization of the military industry in the past few years is also very unsettling. Let’s not talk about the military industry. The Tripp family, which once provided a fleet of military equipment for the Netherlands, turned into arms dealers many years ago. All the arms needed by the United Provinces were imported from England, France and Germany. For example, on the eve of the First Battle of the United Kingdom and the Netherlands, they were still importing muskets and cannons from Birmingham, England. There is almost no military industry in the entire United Provinces.

The arms industry is like this, and shipbuilding is very similar. Although the Dutch shipbuilding industry is booming and developed, the famous Saldan Shipyard is the best in Europe, but the upstream and downstream industrial chains related to shipbuilding have been increasingly occupied by foreign suppliers. For example, United Province imports a large number of ship rigs from England, a major ship rig production country every year. At best, they only build a hull by themselves. All other supporting facilities have to be imported, which has many constraints and is extremely hidden dangers.

Can such a gradually sinking coalition province really compete with England, which has an increasingly solid industrial foundation? Zheng Yong was a little suspicious and uneasy. The coalition province is the most powerful quasi-ally on the European continent and a strategic fulcrum. Is it really appropriate to be so strong on the outside and work in the middle? Once they broke out with the British, the British could quickly repair damaged ships with their superior industrial production capacity. Can the coalition province do it? Zheng Yong shook his head, and the answer was naturally no, which made him feel a little uneasy because it was inconsistent with the interests of the East Coast.

"Mr. Matthias, how many artillery did you produce in the iron smelting workshop in Sweden last year? I have no other meaning, I just want to know it." Zheng Yong said. As a once extremely important weapon supplier in United Province, the Tripp family often purchases weapons from their in-laws DeHell family. The military production capacity of the DeHell family is a number worthy of attention, because this can intuitively understand the current weapons production capacity of the United Province.

"Most of them were exported to the Swedish army." Now, there is nothing to hide. Relying on Sweden's rich copper and iron resources, the Dehair family's iron smelting workshop not only smels iron, but also casts artillery and various iron tools. In other words, the products it produces are mostly for both military and civilians. The output of less than fifty guns a year, and it is also stimulated by war factors. Such a report card handed over by the Dehair family is indeed unqualified for a military-industrial enterprise that once had a large scale, and is far inferior to the booming military industry in Birmingham!

"Mr. Matthias, please be honest, if the United Province does not find a way to increase its artillery production, it will probably suffer a great loss if it gets into evil with the enemy country in the future. In fact, I don't need to say more. During the fierce naval battle with the British a few years ago, your country was already very troubled by the serious shortage of artillery numbers, right? In the war, it is not enough to just buy temporarily! This is equivalent to handing over the noose into the hands of others, and life and death are controlled by others. At that time, Flann was at the time.

The prices of various artillery cast by the Westerners, Germans and Portuguese have soared, and some have even tripled. In this way, your country may not buy them, resulting in the inability to repair and fight in time in ports. Is this lesson rare and not worthy of being wary of?" Zheng Yong said bluntly, "As a sincere friend of the United Provinces, we definitely do not want you to fall at a disadvantage in the battle with any enemy, because this is not in the interests of our East Coast Republic of China."

"Sheffield's sword manufacturing industry and Birmingham's hardware and weapons manufacturing industry have developed very quickly over the years. As an insider, I certainly know this fact. But what can I do? Leaving Sweden and opening the iron smelting workshop to United Provinces? That's even worse, because there is a lack of deposits underground in United Province, we can't do anything. So, what else can we do? We cannot leave Sweden, because once we give up here, the British will quickly fill the gap. You must know that they have a high-quality iron ore in Sweden. Although Britain did not lack iron in this era, they will also import a large amount of high-quality iron ore from Sweden and Germany - copper ore. The artillery technology produced by our iron smelting workshop is backward, the cost is high, and the quality is suspicious. Even the Tripp family is not willing to import our weapons now, but what can we do?" Matthias DeHell asked with a wry smile.

Zheng Yong was silent when he heard this. Yes, what can the Dehaier family do? Invest in huge amounts of money to research new technologies? Transfer iron smelting workshops to countries with lower labor costs? Persuading the Tripp family to import inferior artillery with low quality and low price? None of them is difficult to achieve! Moreover, the Dehaier family is not allowed to do this, because it will obviously affect the family's income - when they can make profits by selling East Coast iron products, when they can maintain a certain profit through monopoly, and when they can make excess profits through lending, who will have the intention to do something else?
Chapter completed!