Saint Petersburg
Nicholas II was fretting over funding for the coming war. By this point, the war had not only bled the Russian Empire dry, but also exhausted the wealth accumulated by the Tsarist family over centuries.
Even the nobles and officials who supported him had seen their assets reduced to nothing but real estate. To raise funds, Nicholas II had put up for sale everything that could be sold.
For example: state-owned enterprises in Saint Petersburg, confiscated property from the opposition, mines...
All these fixed assets were being sold at discounted prices. Things that had once been priceless were now worth next to nothing.
Food and mineral exports had originally been the Russian Empire's greatest source of revenue, but they no longer existed.
Years of war had driven their grain output to a historic low. If Russian territory had not been vast and fertile enough, they would already have become a food-importing nation.
Mineral resource extraction was the same. Under the effects of war, output could not be guaranteed, and they had gradually lost the international market. Now, only this single buyer remained.
Yet after the World War ended, Bulgaria had expanded too aggressively. Its vast colonies could also provide most of the resources, and as those colonies were continuously developed, its imports of mineral resources from Russia kept declining.
The most obvious case was oil exports. Before the World War, Bulgaria had been Russia's largest oil importer, and half the countries on the European continent imported oil from the Russians.
The Baku Oil Field had become the Tsarist Government's largest source of foreign exchange. After the civil war broke out, Tsar Nicholas II had even stationed heavy forces in the Baku region, fearing Bulgaria might set its sights on it.
He was soon disappointed. As new oil fields