Empire Rising: Spain

Although Carlo knew that other countries were also conducting research on smokeless powder, he was even aware that the French would develop smokeless powder this year.

But the initiative of Spain to leak, compared to independent research by other countries, is definitely different. Before other countries succeed in developing smokeless powder, what needs to be kept secret must remain so.

Soon, over a dozen large and small military factories in Spain received a rifle tender notice from the Defense Department.

The Defense Department clarified various requirements for the new rifles in the bid, hoping for faster firing rate, more stability, and greater precision compared to the existing Vitali M1872 Rifle in Spain.

The Defense Department also specifically required that the new rifles designed by each military factory should increase the effective range to between 400 and 600 meters, and maintain a certain level of accuracy within a shooting distance of 400 meters.

This requirement was the most peculiar and troublesome for major military factories.

The previous requirements for faster firing rates and more stability could actually refer to the advantages and disadvantages of the Vitali M1872 Rifle, inheriting the strengths and improving the weaknesses.

Only the shooting distance was not so easy to modify. The shooting distance of the Vitali M1872 Rifle was less than 200 meters, yet the Ministry of Defense’s requirement for the shooting distance of new rifles was 400 to 600 meters, wasn’t this making things difficult?

Who could only rely on changing the rifle design without changing the bullets to improve shooting distance? Moreover, the increase in shooting distance was as high as two or threefold, which was simply not achievable.

Just when some small military factories were about to give up bidding due to the stringent requirements of the Ministry of Defense, the Defense Department issued an explanatory document to these factories.

This explanatory document introduced the improvement in shooting distance brought by the newly developed smokeless powder in Spain, which made the large and small military factories suddenly understand why the Ministry of Defense had such stringent requirements for the shooting distance of new rifles. Apparently, they were well prepared.

Of course, before opening this explanatory document, officials from the Ministry of Defense had clearly informed that anyone who came into contact with this document must sign a confidentiality agreement and agree not to disclose any information within the document, including the newly developed smokeless powder in Spain, for the next five years.

Why five years?

Because after five years, smokeless powder would almost be ubiquitous in Europe. By then, rifles of all European countries would be equipped with smokeless powder ammunition, and there would naturally be no need to keep the information on smokeless powder confidential.

Apart from this confidentiality agreement, these military factories were also informed that if their rifle designs were adopted by the Ministry of Defense, any orders signed with foreign enterprises or countries within the next five years would require approval from the Spanish Government and the Defense Department.

Although most Spaniards are very patriotic, neither Carlo nor the Spanish Government dared to wager on the patriotism of capitalists.

Such a treaty could ensure that Spain’s new rifles wouldn’t be easily acquired by foreign countries and would naturally delay other countries from inventing smokeless powder by a few years.

The same logic applies: five years later, firearms and ammunition related to smokeless powder would already be widespread, and Spain wouldn’t prevent these military factories from selling related rifles and ammunition overseas.

Of course, if the design of these military factories is adopted by the Ministry of Defense, they wouldn’t have to worry about order issues for the next five years.

The Spanish Army would certainly comprehensively replace their rifles with new ones, along with a large number of colonial troops. Even the Royal Military Factory would need to produce for a long time to meet the Spanish Military’s demands.

Not to mention these medium-sized and small military factories, even if they produced at full capacity, they might not be able to complete production within five years.

This is also why these medium-sized and small military factories quickly agreed to the two requirements from the military. Although the two requirements from the military seemed stringent, they didn’t really have much impact on them.

Requiring approval from the Spanish Government and the Defense Department before selling weapons and ammunition abroad seemed like a monopolistic clause, but that depended on whether the production capacity of these medium-sized and small military factories could keep up.

If production capacity couldn’t keep up, they wouldn’t have the ability to sign arms trade orders with foreign countries and naturally wouldn’t violate this weapons export regulation.

With the Defense Department’s explanation, the relieved large and small military factories immediately began to engage in research and development of the new rifles.

The Ministry of Defense’s emphasis on the new rifles was visibly evident. Aside from forming a partnership with the military factory that developed the new rifle, they would also provide additional support funds of approximately 1 million Pesseta to help the military factory expand more quickly to meet the production needs of the Defense Department.

Don’t underestimate this support fund of only 1 million Pesseta.

Currently, except for the Royal Military Factory, only a few military factories established for decades possess an overall value exceeding this amount.

The overall value of the rest of the small-scale military factories, including factory buildings and equipment, didn’t reach the 1 million Pesseta level.

Judging by the scale of Spain’s defense industry, a military factory with a total valuation that could reach 1 million Pesseta could barely be considered a medium-sized factory.

Regrettably, there are only three military factories in Spain that have reached a medium level, plus the sole large military factory, the Royal Military Factory, representing Spain’s defense industry.