Chapter 832 Weapons Reserve Plan

After the funeral of Princess Louise, Arthur felt very heavy.

But at this time, there were obviously more important things that Arthur needed to do, and the busy state affairs did not allow Arthur to indulge in his personal grief.

Arthur's planned trip to Douglas Aircraft Company and Boeing was postponed for several months because of the funeral of his mother, Princess Louise.

Originally we could see Australasia's latest transport aircraft at the beginning of the year, but now we can only wait until March.

Before the arrival of March, Arthur held a cabinet meeting and formally determined the main direction of the development of the Australasian Empire in 1935, which was to continuously expand the number of weapons, equipment and strategic supplies.

At the end of February, Arthur agreed to the Ministry of Defense's request, and the military factory began full-scale production of weapons and equipment.

In the strategic reserve of weapons and equipment, Arthur specifically made requirements for the weapons warehouse of the Ministry of National Defense. So far, the weapons warehouse has a total of 1.557 million rifles, 14,000 machine guns, 12,000 artillery pieces of various types, 750 million rounds of ammunition, and 25 million rounds of artillery shells.

In addition, in terms of heavy weapons, the weapons warehouse has 420 tanks, 780 aircraft and matching weapons and ammunition.

The reserves of these weapons and ammunition are completely sufficient for peacetime, and can even support a medium-sized war.

But for now, the reserves of these weapons and equipment are far from enough. In response to Arthur's request, the Ministry of Defense submitted a request to the Cabinet Government to significantly increase the stockpile of all weapons.

According to the plan, the Ministry of National Defense will increase the number of small arms to at least 5 million rifles, 100,000 machine guns, 50,000 artillery pieces of various types, 3 billion rounds of ammunition and 75 million rounds of artillery shells within two years.

The cabinet was originally hesitant. After all, in order to achieve such a huge weapons reserve, not only the major military factories across the country must enter full production, but even work overtime.

Even the government's finances are going to be in a tight spot for this, and they even have to think of ways to raise funds to purchase weapons and equipment.

But Arthur wouldn't give the government a chance to say no. It is very important to reserve weapons and equipment in advance, even if it puts the government's finances into crisis, it is something that must be done.

The good news is that because the Australasian government's finances have been in good shape, it will be relatively easy to get the money together.

What's more, with Arthur's high reputation among the people, as long as the government issues relevant national debt, a large number of people will subscribe to these national debt, which can create a huge source of funds for the government in a short period of time.

According to government estimates, the more than 40 million people in Australasia can subscribe for at least more than 2 billion Australian dollars in national debt, which is already about five times the government's annual fiscal revenue.

In addition to the reserves of light weapons, Arthur also has certain requirements for the number of tanks and aircraft reserves.

Within two years, the Ministry of Defense's weapons depot must have at least 2,250 Cromwell I light tanks, 1,550 T-31 medium tanks and 750 T-31A heavy tanks.

The reserve of tanks alone adds up to 4,550 tanks, enough to arm more than a dozen tank divisions.

According to budget statistics provided by the defense department, it will cost at least 1 billion Australian dollars to complete the manufacturing of these weapons and equipment.

Although it is only the government's fiscal revenue for two years, investing large sums of money in weapons and equipment at this time is also very risky for the government.

If the war did not break out after two years, it would be a huge loss for Arthur's behavior of hoarding weapons in advance.

But Arthur knew that war was not far away. Arthur even felt that war would definitely break out within the next two years.

If it weren't for the purpose of appeasing the people and not alerting the enemy, Arthur would have even wanted to directly transform the country into a military state and enter maximum military production.

You must know that the performance of various countries' military weapons production in World War II was far more exaggerated than the weapons reserve plan currently formulated by Australasia.

Historically, the United States produced more than 108,000 tanks and self-propelled artillery between 1941 and 1945, as well as 2,382,300 military vehicles of various types, and 372,000 artillery pieces.

It only takes five years to complete the calculation. This also means that Americans must produce at least 20,000 tanks, 400,000 military vehicles of various types and 70,000 artillery pieces every year on average.

Although this was caused by the excessive and abnormal industrial scale of the United States, the weapons output displayed by various industrial powers during the same period was not much inferior.

The British produced a total of 47,800 tanks and self-propelled artillery, more than 460,000 military vehicles and 125,000 artillery pieces during World War II.

The Germans produced more than 50,000 tanks, 340,000 military vehicles and nearly 160,000 artillery pieces.

Even the islanders, who have the weakest industrial foundation, produced nearly 5,000 tanks, 60,000 cars and 13,000 artillery pieces during World War II.

To put it bluntly, the competition in World War II was actually the industrial strength and comprehensive national strength of each country. Industrial strength represents the speed at which countries produce weapons, which plays a vital role in the advantage of frontline battlefields.

Comprehensive national strength includes economy, population and a series of other factors. Only a sufficiently prosperous economy and a large population can sustain the consumption caused by such exaggerated weapons production.

This is also the reason why powerful countries perform far better than weak countries in super wars. The weapons and industrial output of the island countries may be able to barely catch up with the European powers, but their fragile economies are destined to be unable to survive the war for too long.

From this point alone, we can also see the current industrial gap between Australasia and island countries.

After all, it is a purely Western country. Australia was able to receive strong support from European powers in the early stage. Coupled with the country's rich mineral resources, the scale and level of industry are not comparable to that of a small island country.

Since 1932, Arthur has gradually relaxed restrictions on industry. Especially with the completion of the Broken Hill Industrial Base, Australasia's industrial scale has ushered in a new round of growth.

In 1932, the total annual steel production in Australasia reached 5.9732 million tons and 10.5721 million tons respectively.

After two years of development, Australasia's total annual steel production has exceeded 20 million tons, reaching a total annual steel production of 6.924 million tons and a total pig iron production of 13.2546 million tons.

As for the islanders, their total steel production has not increased much compared to two years ago.

This also has to be mentioned as the reason why Arthur exported a large number of weapons, which to a certain extent slowed down the expansion of the island country.

In 1934, the island nation's total annual steel production reached 3.198 million tons, less than half of Australasia's.

But this is no wonder the island country. Australasia's total steel production has reached the fourth place in the world, second only to the powerful British Empire, Germany, which still has industrial strength, and the Great Lakes Republic, which inherited most of the American industry.

Of course, in terms of total steel production, France and Australasia are still very close. If it weren't for the industrial growth caused by Arthur's permission for arms expansion in the past two years, I'm afraid it would still be unknown whether the industrial scale of France and Australasia was larger or smaller.

The result of the industrial gap is that Australasia has completely led the island countries in terms of weapons production.

The islanders produced only 5,000 tanks and 13,300 artillery pieces in World War II. For Australasia, this figure can be achieved in just one year.

Even while completing the production of these weapons, Australasia can produce more weapons and equipment, reaching a gap of several times.

Although the amount of weapons and equipment does not directly determine the outcome of a war, it has a great impact on the outcome of the war.

Moreover, with more advanced and more numerous weapons and equipment, the Australasian army will suffer lower casualties in the war, while also causing greater casualties to the enemy.

Under the ebb and flow of one another, Australasia's advantage will become greater and greater. This is the real reason why Arthur is confident that he can defeat the island country.

To be honest, since the demise of the United States, Arthur has no longer worried about the threat from the islanders.

The combat effectiveness of the island nation's military may be at a certain level, but it is no longer able to pose much of a threat to Australasia.

After all, the island country is just a country with a small land area and lack of mineral resources. Not to mention the economic burden of a long-term war, even if it is just a simple competition for resource consumption, the island country will never be Australasia's opponent.

What's more, once the island country goes to war with Australasia, it is equivalent to fighting the entire Pacific Alliance.

Although these countries in the Pacific Alliance are small countries without much say, if there are too many ants, they can kill an elephant, let alone these small and medium-sized countries with certain strength.

During the war, Australasia can still have four major markets: the Philippines, Kalimantan, the United Kingdom of the West Coast and the Kingdom of California. It can even expand its influence to South America on the other side of the Pacific. I don’t know if the war potential is greater than that of the island countries. How many.

Faced with such a war that was impossible to lose, Arthur's goal from the beginning was the current more chaotic situation in Europe.

After signing this weapons and equipment manufacturing plan, Arthur became even more eager to quickly build a finished sixth-generation military aircraft.

Of course, there is also the new generation of transport aircraft reported by Douglas and Boeing, which Arthur also wants to see very much.

Although the weapons and equipment reserve plan is comprehensive, it does not expand much in terms of aircraft. The main reason is that both military aircraft and transport aircraft will usher in the next generation of new models.

Arthur still understands the principle of buying new rather than old, not to mention the fact that any bit of performance may determine the victory of the war.

Moreover, the previous generation product of Douglas Aircraft Company was the DC-2 transport aircraft. Arthur is looking forward to it very much. Is their so-called new generation product the famous DC-3 transport aircraft in history?

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