Debt-funded development is the foundation of Third Five-Year Plan and the New Economic Policy in East Africa, and European War is one of the important ways to solve the debt problem.
The main reason for the emergence of this pattern is that the first two five-year plans in East Africa greatly consumed the primitive accumulation of capital in East Africa over the past thirty years.
In the first thirty years, East Africa accumulated a large amount of social wealth through various means such as squeezing its own cheap labor force and free access to Africa's land resources and mineral resources. After all, colonization itself is about making big gains with small things. If the military expenditure required for colonization is excluded, it is almost a profitable business.
It's just that East Africa, like United States, turned the colonies into "since ancient times" land. For the development of East Africa, the interests of nearly 40 million black indigenous people were sacrificed.
However, colonization cannot solve all problems. After all, East Africa cannot just plunder, but it must also be responsible for construction issues. In the 19th century, agricultural reclamation, large-scale infrastructure, and the construction of a defense industrial system in East Africa required huge expenditures.
Therefore, East Africa in the 19th century looked glamorous, but it did not make much money. This is the main reason why after entering the 20th century, the scale of East Africa's first two five-year plans was far smaller than that of the Soviet Union in the previous generation.
The development model of the 19th century could not be maintained forever. After all, by the beginning of the 20th century, the number of black slaves in East Africa had been almost exhausted.
Looking back at the economic development process of East Africa in the first fifty years, it can be roughly summarized in four stages: the land expansion period (colonial expansion), the great immigration era, the agricultural construction era, and the industrial system construction era.
In 1914, East Africa had basically completed the construction of its own industrial system, forming a huge industrial system covering the three major industrial fields of defense industry, heavy industry and light industry.
Therefore, Ernst said, "Our country has made brilliant achievements in its development in the past fifty years, but this has also led to a new bottleneck in our country's development today. If we can successfully overcome European War, then our country will undoubtedly go one step further and become one of the makers of the future international order. Otherwise, it may stagnate and reproduce the passive situation of Germany today."
Nowadays, East Africa is indeed very beautiful, but it lacks foundation and corresponding international influence. This is also the dilemma United States faced after the First World War in its previous life.
After the war in the previous life, American economy was so dazzling, but at the post-war meeting, Britain and France was still able to control United States. It can be said that at that time, United States's international status did not match its economic strength at all.
Now East Africa has become the world's largest industrial country, so East Africa is also a latecomer country and will inevitably compete with the two established empires of Britain and France after the war.
Therefore, East Africa is not completely worry-free. If a late-developing country cannot make further progress, even if it develops like a fish in water in the early stage, it will be extremely dangerous.
For example, in Germany in 1914, Soviet Union in 1991, they were stuck in the last step. The former chose war as a last-ditch effort, while the latter simply chose to die.
There were many more cases like this in the 21st century. Many countries that failed to cross the "middle-income trap" ended up with unsightly results. Their economic miracles ended up in a mess, and they could only continue to be harvested leeks under the Western discourse.
This is exactly what Ernst is worried about. He went on to say, "When European War is over and the winner frees up time and energy, it will inevitably launch a counterattack against latecomers like us, thereby continuing to maintain its status as the top predator in the international order."
"So taking advantage of the European War gap to build an economic moat with the local area as the core is the main direction of our country's economy, military, politics and diplomacy at this stage."
"The so-called economic moat is the international trade system centered around East Africa, which further consolidates my country's advantages in Southeast Asia and South America and serves as two wings to support my country's future development."
This is actually equivalent to East Africa treating many countries and regions in the Southern Hemisphere as its own sphere of influence. After all, geographically speaking, East Africa's territory and economy are still dominated by the Southern Hemisphere.
With East Africa as the core, South Pacific countries have innate maritime transportation advantages over South America and the east coast of the Indian Ocean, making it easy for East Africa to dominate the southern hemisphere economy.
After Ernst thought for a while, he also said bluntly, "In the entire Southern Hemisphere, as well as some Northern Hemisphere areas near the equator, we in East Africa are the most powerful economic entity."
"So establishing a Southern Hemisphere economic system with East Africa as its core is destiny for us in East Africa, so that we can transform from a regional power to a true world power."
Southern Hemisphere economic system sounds very grand. After all, it involves three continents: Africa, South America and Oceania. From this point of view alone, it occupies a small half of the world.
The introduction of this concept has actually meant East Africa or Ernst's initial idea of reshaping the international order, similar to United States's "Monroe Doctrine", or Far East Empire's "One Belt, One Road" in the 21st century. This is a step that any world power must take.
Going one step further, there are ideological concepts, such as "democratic system" of United States, "Cold War thinking", etc., "communism" of the Soviet Union, and "Community of Shared Future for Mankind" of the Far East Empire.
Regarding the latter, Ernst has no idea at the moment. After all, if an imperial country like East Africa engages in ideological competition, it is like King Wei of Qi in Tian Ji's Horse Racing, with no chance of winning.
On the contrary, the vague ideological plan of the Far East Empire's "community of destiny" is worth learning from in East Africa in the future.
This can be regarded as Ernst being self-aware. No one understands the weird imperialism in East Africa today better than Ernst. Speaking of which, this is still very similar to the Far East Empire in the previous life. After all, after the combination of planning and market, Far East Empire has become completely different and cannot please both sides.
But in the final analysis, it is still a competition of strength. When strength is strong, other countries will naturally move closer to you, and black ones can also be blown into white. After East African industry fully develops and reaches the leading level, in the future, some people will naturally be willing to bring their own dog food to boast that the industrial waste gas in East Africa is "sweet".
With the introduction of concepts such as Ernst, East African government officials are also as excited as chicken blood.
Today's world hegemony is definitely a delusion, but Southern Hemisphere hegemony is much easier, and by controlling Southern Hemisphere's economy, trade, culture, politics, and military, East Africa can build a huge regional market.
In this way, even if one day East Africa is excluded from the world market by some countries, it can still live a prosperous life relying on this small system. After all, the lower limit of this Southern Hemisphere economic system is much higher than that of the previous Warsaw Pact system.
The economy between Warsaw Pact countries relies on land transportation, and the cost is far less than that of Southern Hemisphere economic system. After all, East Africa is a two-ocean country. If you include overseas territories, it is a three-ocean country, with significant advantages in maritime transportation.
The size of Southern Hemisphere economic system described by Ernst is obviously not comparable to that of the Warsaw Pact, and the upper limit is much higher. After all, Brazil alone has a land area of more than eight million square kilometers. Others such as Australia, Argentina, and Peru are not small countries in Europe.
Of course, the economic strength of these regions today is definitely not comparable to that of European countries, but this is also beneficial to East African operations.
If they do not fall behind, East Africa will have no chance to bring these countries together, and when they develop, they will compete for regional voice and become East Africa's rivals.
Therefore, for Southern Hemisphere countries, East Africa should learn from United States and use coercion and inducement to forcibly drag them onto the economic chariot of East Africa.
America in the early 20th century, compared to other simple and crude colonists, is the "light of civilization", but in fact United States is just one of the crows of the great powers that does not look so black.