"Then you're not planning to do anything? They're taking a bite out of your cake right now!"
Miss Arnstein asked curiously.
"I'm already doing something."
Franz's reply was utterly calm.
In truth, over the years Franz had already carved out a deep moat for the Austrian Empire. It was not something the Prussians could breach simply by gritting their teeth and making up their minds.
If it were not for the sheer abundance of talent in Prussia in this era, and if Franz had not deliberately refrained from interfering too much with the comings and goings of those scientists, Franz was fully confident that he could lock down the technological development of all Central Europe. At the very least, every important invention and discovery that should have emerged would have been thrown entirely off course.
But that would have been no small loss for Austria, or even for the whole of Germany.
Even though the scientific world of Germany was glittering with stars at this time, the gap between the two sides was still widening at a rate visible to the naked eye.
Magazines such as Nature and Science had not been established for nothing. Over the years, the Austrian Empire had indeed gathered a great many talented people, and it was more than willing to spend money.
The membership of Vienna's Royal Scientific Society had increased more than tenfold. Including its peripheral members, over half the scientists in all of Germany were working for the Austrian Empire.
Moreover, compared with the widespread self-funded, self-directed research of the nineteenth century, the Austrian Empire's whole-of-nation system was clearly more effective. Even the far-sighted major corporations of other countries could not possibly contend with an entire empire and the Austrian imperial family.
At the same time, the Austrian Empire's supporting institutions were