Horizon and Empire

To be honest, after the peace agreement was reached, at the request of the France, Britain began a comprehensive reform of its domestic political and economic system. The first step was to rectify the chaotic domestic financial order.

Clearly, the British pound sterling has completely lost its credibility. It cannot be exchanged for gold. In the era of the gold standard, a currency that cannot be exchanged for gold is nothing but worthless paper.

Therefore, the first major task in reforming Britain's financial order was to reform the pound sterling. To exchange paper pounds for gold coins at a one-to-one ratio? How could that be possible? Not only did the Britain not have that much gold, but the France, and even the whole of Europe, didn't have that much gold. Besides, if such an exchange were implemented, who would be the victor?

So the France proposed a plan. According to this plan, the Britain government would deposit all its gold reserves into the Roman Bank and entrust the Roman Bank to issue new pounds. The new pounds would be exchanged for pound banknotes at a ratio of one to one hundred thousand. At the same time, the old pounds, including old pound gold coins, would be gradually withdrawn from circulation.

To ensure the value of the new pound sterling, it will be pegged to the Swiss franc, not gold. The new pound sterling cannot be directly exchanged for gold, but it can be exchanged for francs at a fixed rate (with a fee, of course). Then, holders of the francs can exchange them for the corresponding amount of gold at the Roman Bank.

Why wasn't the new pound directly exchanged for gold, but instead went through the franc instead? This was, of course, to avoid a massive run on gold.

First of all, you need to know that the Roman Bank is quite different from ordinary banks. Its main clients are not ordinary people or even ordinary businesses, but major commercial banks from various countries.

This resulted in the Roman Bank having very few branches in various countries. In addition, because of the limited number of branches, exchanging francs for gold required advance booking and queuing. This limited the amount that could be exchanged.

On the other hand, the franc cannot be used directly within the Britain (although many Britain companies do accept franc banknotes directly). Although the franc has a high credit rating, it is still not very convenient to use. Moreover, there are exchange fees, and they are not low. (Of course, if you go to France to exchange it yourself, there are no fees, but that still incurs travel expenses, right?) Since it can be exchanged at any time, and it's all banknotes to banknotes, the general public's willingness to exchange it decreases.

The new pound sterling's peg to the franc can also boost Britain confidence in the new pound.

Of course, the Roman Bank wasn't a charity; acquiring the right to issue the new pound sterling brought considerable profits. Furthermore, depositing Britain's gold reserves in its vaults offered numerous advantages. Although Britain's gold reserves were actually quite low after the war, the credit benefits gained alone were substantial.

With the issuance of the new pound sterling, Britain's financial order began to recover. However, the situation of the Britain underwent a strange change.

Firstly, due to the complete opening of capital and markets, Britain businesses were generally severely impacted. In particular, some small and medium-sized enterprises, which were already struggling during the war, faced direct impact from Europe industry after the war, resulting in widespread bankruptcies.

Compared to small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs), large enterprises are more resilient to shocks. However, large enterprises are also a priority target for the France, especially heavy industrial companies, which often have close ties with the Britain military. With the Britain military undergoing a major downsizing, their future is equally uncertain. Fortunately, most of these companies still have value to be exploited, so they can be reborn through capital restructuring. Of course, the result of capital restructuring is often that the company retains its old name, but the owner may have changed to a France. Or the company may still have the same name and the same owner managing it, but the major shareholder has become France, and the nominal owner may now only hold a few percent of the shares. This is similar to how, after the Southeast Asian financial crisis, the Lighthouse Country used the International Monetary Fund and the World Bank to exploit large corporations in other countries.

Logically, such a shock would surely lead to widespread starvation among Britain's working class—factories would go bankrupt or close down. In economic life, the risks borne by workers and capitalists are quite different. When the economy is bad, workers risk starvation; capitalists, on the other hand, risk financial loss. Moreover, the more capital a capitalist has, the smaller their losses will actually be. They might even make a considerable profit, which is why Morgan said, "In times of crisis, truly valuable stocks return to their rightful owners."

Of course, capitalists bear a greater risk in comparison, since workers only lose their lives, while capitalists lose their money.

However, in Britain, the situation changed somewhat, as Britain workers found another way to earn money: going abroad to work for the France.

Today, capital and people move freely between Britain and France. Britain workers can easily work in France. Compared to their Germany counterparts, Britain workers are more trained, more efficient, and have lower wage expectations. Therefore, the France are happy to hire them. And it's not just the France; business owners in other Europe Britain Britain. As a result of this market optimization, struggling Britain companies suddenly find Britain facing a labor shortage; they can't find enough workers.

This situation was almost devastating for Britain industry. In fact, it was the same for all of Europe. Workers were drawn to France, which was more industrialized, and capital, regardless of the country, also flowed to France automatically. As a result, the two pillars supporting industrialization, labor and capital, began to leave Britain.

In Britain, the old medieval way of life seems to be reviving. The hustle and bustle of capital and industry are beginning to recede from them, and cities and countryside are becoming simple and peaceful again. Perhaps the Lake Poets would prefer this Britain.

The only slight drawback is the scarcity of young people in Britain, especially in the villages where you'll hardly see one. There are only elderly people, and sometimes underage children, whose parents are nowhere to be found. For these children, their parents are like Santa Claus, appearing suddenly around Christmas time to bring them small gifts, and then disappearing once Christmas is over.

Of course, perhaps one day their parents will suddenly appear before them and tell them, "We're moving, moving to a faraway place to live a better life." Then the whole family will leave the village, board a ship, and leave Europe.

Most of the Britain did not go to North America. The France did not want to send more Britain to North America. Over the years, Napoleon had implemented pro-natalist policies in his homeland, one important objective of which was to ensure that in Louisiana, the number of France -speaking people was greater than that of German- France people.

Therefore, the majority of Britain immigrants migrated to India, Africa, or South America.

"India is a great place. Especially the culture there, it's wonderful," Joseph said when talking about India.

"Really?" Napoleon knew little about India culture.

"Nonsense! Don't you know what Joseph is capable of saying?" Lucien remarked that Napoleon was far too young and naive.

"India culture naturally divides people into many classes, and they have a magical invention to explain all the inequalities in the world," Joseph continued. "Napoleon, how did the Catholicism deal with the problem of inequality in the world?"

Napoleon thought for a moment and replied, "First, he said that all people are equal in spirit, and that as long as they are devout, they can go to heaven, to appease people; then he said that humans have original sin, so suffering is deserved; then he said that earthly life is not the purpose of life, but going to heaven, so that people would no longer focus on the suffering of reality; finally, he beautified suffering, giving the argument that the poor are more likely to go to heaven, as long as they devoutly endure suffering. I think the reason why Catholicism was able to replace Roman Polytheism is because Roman Polytheism made people too focused on the gains and losses of reality—which is disadvantageous to those in power."

"On this issue, the India have gone a step further," Joseph laughed. "The India have replaced heaven and original sin with reincarnation. They believe that after a person dies, their soul is reincarnated into a newborn child or a newborn animal. And what you are treated in this new life depends on your behavior in the previous cycle. Hmm, what a brilliant invention. So, if someone complains, 'Why do I work so hard from morning till night and still not have enough to eat, while those who do nothing live luxurious lives?'"

Napoleon, you know, in France, if someone asked such a question, revolution was imminent. But it's different in India. If an India asks this question, others will tell him it's because he did too many bad things in his past life, so he has to pay for his sins in this life. So—what happened in the past life cannot be proven or disproven, but with this kind of explanation, it can be used to justify all inequalities in the world, even all evils.

India have embraced this ideology, and thus they are able to endure all sorts of oppression and bullying that seem unbelievable and intolerable to us. That's why I say India culture is truly wonderful for those in positions of power.

However, this culture also brings a small problem: it easily breeds a lack of ambition. Because in their view, one's current situation is determined by good or bad deeds done in a past life, those in lower positions don't think about resistance and naturally have little desire to improve. And those in higher positions, well, since life is easy and there are no threats, they naturally become as lazy as they want. That's why India is always so easily conquered."

"You describe India so wonderfully, I'd love to go and become a king India," Napoleon said, not without sarcasm.

"If there were no other countries in the world, being a local king in India would be a very good thing," Lucien said, half-seriously.

"India is a place that can turn people into good-for-nothings. So although we can now plunder India, I don't want the France to immigrate there in large numbers; that would only create a bunch of useless people," Joseph said.

"So you think that even if you send all the Britain over there, you don't have to worry about them creating a new Britain?" Napoleon said.

"In North America, if we don't get involved, the United States might actually become a new Britain. But in India, they will quickly discover the benefits of India and then all become new Kshatriyas."

"So they sent all the Britain to India, only to have them become useless?"

"Yes, anyway, once they're ready to immigrate, they won't be working for us anymore," Joseph replied. "But we still need to intervene in India. We need to urge all countries to respect India's traditions, especially the traditions of its numerous princely states, and avoid unifying it. We don't want it to eventually become a nation-state, instead of a geographical and cultural concept."

"Yes, that means the Britain are no longer a threat to us," Napoleon said. "Now, looking across Europe, no power can challenge France. We can finally say that France is invincible! Moreover, the lands under France control now cover the entire earth, and as the sun sets in one of our spheres of influence, it rises simultaneously in another. A new, invincible, eternally rising empire has appeared on the horizon..."

Napoleon was expressing his feelings when he suddenly saw Joseph unable to suppress a smile.

"What's wrong, Joseph? Did I say something wrong?" Napoleon asked.

"Ah, Napoleon, I'd like to ask, what does 'horizon' mean?" Joseph replied, suppressing a laugh.

"You don't even know what that word means? The horizon is a line that you can never reach no matter how you walk." Lucien laughed heartily.