The expeditionary force began to dominate Southeast Asia by recruiting defeated soldiers

Chapter 293 What is Petroleum? It’s Synthetic Fiber! It’s Engineering Plastic!

"Has the uncle of the emperor sent someone to buy oil again?"

In response to Zhang Chi's question, Zhang Guangsong nodded: "Our refined oil prices are a little lower than those of the White Eagles. The White Party can make a higher profit from reselling them, so..."

Zhang Chi waved his hand, signaling Zhang Guangsong to stop talking. Didn't he know what kind of people the White Party was like?

The most hardworking drivers in the transport team are basically underground party members. They spend half of their time transporting goods for the White Party front line, and their performance is much higher than that of other teams.

In fact, during the War of Resistance Against Japanese Aggression, the White Party owned several oil fields, including the Yumen Oilfield. If they were managed carefully, it would be no problem to produce tens of thousands of barrels per year.

Unfortunately, if the White Party wants to seriously develop the oil industry, the first to oppose it will be the White Eagle’s oil capital.

The latter believed that if the White Party's refining capacity was further enhanced, their own oil export business would shrink, so they worked together with the comprador group within the White Party, mainly composed of the four major families, to disrupt the oil construction.

After all, if it is produced domestically instead of imported, how can these rats in the oil tank interfere?

However, their behavior actually benefited Zhang Chi.

On the one hand, after the White Party’s oil construction failed, a large number of outstanding oil industry practitioners saw through the White Party’s true face. So, in order to put their knowledge into practice, they came directly to Pegu to help Zhang Chi build Pegu’s oil extraction and refining industry from scratch.

With the synth Yegorov in control of the Texas New Century Oil Company controlled by White Eagle, Zhang Chi was not hindered in importing oil industry equipment from White Eagle.

You have to know that the second largest shareholder of Texas New Century Oil Company is named Rockefeller, and no one would dare to interfere.

On the other hand, the cost of the finished fuel that Zhang Chi bought from the system by exchanging silver lion coins for ocean dollars was only one-tenth of the market price in the Republic of China. He simply lowered the price a little and directly squeezed out the oil exporters of White Eagle.

The compradors headed by the four major families would of course buy from whoever was cheaper, so Zhang Chi, under the name of the Allied Forces and Texas New Century Oil Company, frantically dumped oil into the Republic of China, which in turn squeezed out the market share of the White Eagle oil merchants.

Although the latter was extremely angry, in the context of World War II, he really did not dare to attack Zhang Chi, an ally with nearly 50 soldiers in the navy, army and air force.

After all, they were not yet the United States deep state that would later invade the Mesopotamian region for oil. They could only negotiate business, gritting their teeth and engaging in a price war with Zhang Chi.

Zhang Chi naturally took advantage of this opportunity and used the funds earned from the sale of refined oil and imported equipment to focus on building the South China Petroleum Group in Myitkyina and Mandalay.

Under the overall planning of Bai Hongsheng, who is responsible for the three-year plan, the first phase of the Nanhua No. 1 Refinery in Mandalay is a huge project with an estimated annual refining capacity of 2 million tons and an oil storage capacity of 500,000 tons.

In the white paper of the next five-year plan submitted by Bai Hongsheng, it was stated that after the end of World War II, the second phase of the Nanhua No. 1 Refinery would be directly expanded to become Asia's largest refinery with an annual refining capacity of 5 million tons and an oil storage capacity of 1 million tons.

(The combined refining capacity of the Japanese in their homeland and the pseudo-Anzhou State was only one million tons. Before the war, they mainly relied on importing refined oil from White Eagle.)

Although the second phase of the next five-year plan looks very ambitious, Zhang Chi is still not satisfied.

As a time traveler, he knew very well that the oil refining industry would usher in rapid development after World War II.

With the rapid advancement of technologies for refining petroleum into chemical fibers and cracking petroleum into plastics, petroleum will not only be a fuel to drive engines, but will become an indispensable raw material in industrial systems.

For example, the M-14 and AR-15 designs by Stoner, a fledgling firearms designer, still used aircraft aluminum alloys for weight reduction. Further weight reduction for fully automatic assault rifles required the use of engineering plastics.

In view of this, Zhang Chi explained to Bai Hongsheng, "We have sufficient funds and access to imported equipment. We can expand the second phase of the project. With so many oil fields in Nanyang, I think a refining capacity of 1000 million tons would be appropriate."

"But what about oil talent? Our current rapid expansion relies on talent from the Republic of China and those returning from overseas. These talents are limited, right?"

As the person in charge of the three-year construction plan, Bai Hongsheng is always cautious and tries to complete the project as fully as possible while saving money.

"If there are not enough talents, then we can cultivate them. We can build a petroleum college, or even a petroleum university? If one is not enough, then we can build two!" With the system in hand, Zhang Chi is very optimistic about the future development.

"This..." Bai Hongsheng hesitated to speak.

Is he also responsible for the Petroleum University? Then the power he is involved in has become too great, right?

Zhang Chi looked at the young man in front of him who was about the same age as him and suddenly smiled.

In Zhang Chi's view, although he has a vision that is nearly 100 years ahead of his time, and he has been active in forums, Zhihu, and novel websites in his previous life, and has a basic understanding of many economic theories, if he wants to truly implement them, he undoubtedly still needs practical talents like Bai Hongsheng who graduated from the School of Economics at the University of Birmingham.

The latter is to him what the imperial engineer Speer is to the mustache Hill, and the chief economic secretary Kim Jae-ik is to the young general Jeon, both of them are talents like his right arm.

"Alright, I know some people are complaining about you being too involved, so I'll give you the title of Chief Economic Secretary, just under Zhang Guangsong's Chief Personal Secretary. You'll have the authority to report to me in person at any time. Is that all right?"

"I..." Feeling Zhang Chi's deep trust in him, Bai Hongsheng's eyes turned red.

"Do your best." Zhang Chi patted Bai Hongsheng's shoulder affectionately, "I will always support you from behind!"

-----

Back to the present, facing Zhang Guangsong who asked him questions, Zhang Chi directly signed the transaction documents.

"You can also use business channels to ask Wei Junru, Li Bai of the Guangxi clique, General Long of the Yunnan clique, and others if they still need the arms."

Zhang Chisan gave Zhang Guangsong a cigarette and said:

"The 300 or so M5A1 Stuarts that were retired after we switched to the M24 Chaffee light tanks are just sitting there rusting away. Why not sell them to them and earn some hard currency? Isn't that right?"

"That's right. Let's strengthen the bodies of these powerful people and find something for the people in Shancheng to do, so that they don't have to keep an eye on us." Zhang Guangsong respectfully took the cigarette and agreed.

"It was mainly General Wei. He led the expeditionary force to the Changheng front. Facing hundreds of thousands of Japanese devils, they were in need of heavy weapons." Zhang Chi took out a lighter and threw it to Zhang Guangsong, and continued.

"I won't charge him for shipping either. As long as he pays in full, I'll fly his tanks directly to the front lines in Hunan Province!"

Zhang Chi was not stingy in supporting the troops that truly fought against the Japanese.

However, when he was speaking excitedly, there was a knock on the door and interrupted him.

"Enter."

A security officer wearing a blue peaked cap walked in. Zhang Guangsong immediately put away the documents and left the office.

Facing the office door that had closed again, Zhang Chi slapped his head in regret:

"Damn it, this is a gold and jade lighter that I customized!"