Vol 4 Chapter 9: , Join the arms race?

In addition to the industrial plan, the most important thing is transportation. According to the requirements of the "Three-Five-Year Plan", in the next five years, Bulgaria's total railway mileage will reach 39,000 kilometers, completing comprehensive coverage of all important towns in Bulgaria!
We must know that in 1901, the total length of railways in Bulgaria was less than 13,000 kilometers. By 1907, the total length of railways in the country reached 27,000 kilometers. You know how much Ferdinand attaches importance to railways!
Next is the road network. "Village to every village" is the slogan of this plan. To achieve this strategic goal, the total length of roads in Bulgaria will reach an astonishing 120,000 kilometers by then!
Well, don’t be picky about highways in this era. Asphalt roads are all myths. Concrete pavements are the treatment of strategic roads. It can be used in other places. What road class should you consider?
Even the maintenance of highways is done by the local government organizing the people and volunteering for free, otherwise the maintenance cost alone will cause Ferdinand to collapse!
What was the total mileage of roads in Bulgaria in 1901? There are only more than 20,000 kilometers! By 1907, the total mileage of roads in Bulgaria reached 68,000 kilometers, and it will reach 120,000 kilometers in five years!
No way, this was forced out by the World War! After all, in the mountainous areas, the railway construction is really difficult. Some sections of the current technology, God knows that the year of the monkey can only be opened to traffic, which can only be compensated by roads!
The experience of the previous life has taught Ferdinand that as long as there are enough manpower, it is really not difficult to build roads. As long as you are willing to invest, people can do it!
Besides, Bulgaria is also an industrial country at any rate. There is nothing else, but the standard equipment of excavators, bulldozers, and road rollers commonly used in later generations is not lacking!
Although the performance is still very poor, it is still much stronger than manpower! Otherwise, it is impossible for Ferdinand to ask the transportation department to build more than 10,000 kilometers every year! If you rely solely on manpower, that would be too crazy!
Well, the Bulgarian transportation department said that there is no pressure. Their road construction experience can be said to be the richest in the world. From 1887 to the present, they have been building roads for more than 20 years!
Due to their economic development in Europe and the United States, most of their transportation is based on personal investment, and there are not many government-led transportation projects!
But Bulgaria is different. Before the domestic economy was not good, road construction was a loss-making business, especially roads!
Now that the main arterial roads are all repaired, the rest are remote areas or branch lines. Obviously, there is no economic benefit. There is no consortium that will stupidly do this loss-making business!
This allowed the Ministry of Communications to train a group of road-building madmen. In their words, as long as there is money, road-building is not a problem at all!
...
"Mr. Chekov, tell me about the plan of the Ministry of Education!" After hearing the return from the Ministry of Transportation, Ferdinand continued.
"Yes!" Chekov replied
"This time the Ministry of Education’s plan is divided into three parts: higher education, compulsory education, and literacy education.
1. Newly build two comprehensive universities. After completion, our four comprehensive universities can accommodate more than 30,000 college students at the same time, which can basically solve the talent gap in the future!
Since the number of our higher technical colleges has reached 36, which can basically meet the demand, there is no need to continue to expand.
However, according to the actual situation, we will continue to expand the recruitment, and plan to train 200,000 engineers within five years to solve the shortage of domestic grassroots technical talents!
2. Promote the nine-year compulsory education nationwide. All citizens of Bulgarian nationality between 7 and 15 years old must receive compulsory education!
3. Continue..."
"What about the funding?" Ferdinand asked lightly
Education is not the same as industry and transportation. After all, investment in industry and transportation will pay off in the short term. After three to five years, it will always be fed back to the economy and increase overall national strength in the short term!
However, investing in compulsory education is a long-term work. There will be no benefits for a long time in the future, and the overall national strength will not increase in the short term!
"It's mainly financial appropriations, as well as private donations. Of course, tuition can also be collected!" Chekov said naturally.
"How much financial allocation do you need for the Ministry of Education?" The Minister of Finance asked very concerned.
"In five years, a total of 1.8 billion lev is needed for financial allocations, and this goal can basically be achieved!" Chekov said lightly.
Chancellor of the Exchequer Kennedy rolled his eyes and said straightforwardly: "Impossible! It may be possible at other times, but not now! The situation in Europe is about to start, and we must invest a lot of money in military spending!"
After two quarrels, Ferdinand said: "Well, education is related to our future, but now the situation in Europe is very serious!
Whether we invest in industry or transportation, we can see a return in a short period of time, but the return period of education is much longer!
Therefore, I hope you can reduce the compulsory education time to five years! "
That's right, Ferdinand only compressed the time, but did not ask the Ministry of Education to reduce the content of the course, then it means that the students in Bulgaria will have to use five years to complete nine years of learning content!
This is obviously impossible! Then only part of the less important course content can be reduced! For example, art and music will disappear from the elementary school classroom!
Fortunately, this is the beginning of the 20th century, and the knowledge of many subjects is still very small. It is more difficult to reduce the difficulty, basically enough!
Chekov nodded his head with a wry smile. Does Bulgaria value education? It can be said that it is very important. The annual financial allocation of Bulgarian University is now as high as 50 million lev!
In the terms of the Ministry of the Admiralty, the expenditure of one university in one year is equivalent to the military expenditure of a fleet, and the expenditure of two universities is equivalent to the military expenditure of the Bulgarian Navy!
This is really not a joke, there is no way who calls the army the son? The Bulgarian Navy has always been treated as a stepmother!
In other countries, the salary of their navy officers is estimated to be n times higher than that of the army, but in Bulgaria, except for the slightly better food, the salary difference is really not that big compared to the main force!
No way, the Bulgarian army has arrogant capital, but the navy has not come up with impressive achievements since its establishment! Can you still be tough if you speak without merit?
And the high expenditure of Bulgarian universities is a sequelae of digging people. If scientists are digging over, can scientific research funds be reduced? If you don't give people money, how can you get any results?
The key is that the investment in scientific research has already seen the rewards. At least the current level of scientific research in Bulgaria can finally be used to meet people!
At least now Ferdinand is not afraid of the technical blockade of the powers! Oh, it seems that the technology is already in hand, and there is nothing to block!
But what about the navy? If it weren't for the age of sea power, their sense of existence would be even lower!
This is also the reason why Petrov is keen to promote the colonial plan. UU reading www.uukanshu.com should let the Chinese people look at it. The navy is also useful!
Now that the arms race in European countries has started, can Bulgaria back down?
There is no doubt that Bulgaria must follow up! But after looking at the military expenditures of European powers in 1907, Ferdinand knew what to do!
British Empire £58.92 million
£45.5 million for the French Republic
£53.28 million in the Russian Empire
£54.89 million in the German Empire
Austro-Hungarian Empire £22.13 million
Italy 18.57 million pounds
And what about Bulgaria? The total military expenditure in 1907 was: 15.86 million pounds, of which 10.86 million pounds were for the army and only 5 million pounds for the navy!
This also includes the cost of building this dreadnought ship, otherwise the navy can have a military budget of 3 million pounds, which is not bad!
Not to mention in 1908. The British had already competed with the Germans for dumplings. Would Bulgaria dare to follow?
In this era, the construction cost of a dreadnought ship is 1,600,700,000 pounds at the cheapest; two or three million pounds, which are more expensive, can be spent!
With the strength of Britain and Germany, it is really not a big deal to have ten and eight ships, but for Bulgaria, if you dare to play like this, what about the expenses of other places?
The result is self-evident, the navy still has to continue to fight soy sauce, the army joins the arms race! This is also a helpless move. Who told the army to be cheaper?
At the same time, it is not impossible to take both land and sea into consideration. The premise is to have money. Obviously this is not something that Bulgaria can afford!
Warships are not just built, and the cost of personnel maintenance is astronomical!
Geographically speaking, the main threat of World War I came from the Austro-Hungarian Empire, and it is still Bulgaria's national policy to give priority to the development of the army!