Chapter 154 Baghdad Railway

In view of Greece's own coal dilemma, Constantine had previously suggested to Costeburu to let the Athens shipyard develop kerosene mixed-fired boilers, preferably heavy oil boilers, to change Greece's current dilemma of importing all thermal coal from Britain.

However, Costebrew excused himself on the grounds that Greece had no oil and heavy oil still needed to be imported, so there was no need to mess around.

As the shipping business became increasingly busy, the tonnage of ships owned by the Greek Congo Corporation increased rapidly. Later, it simply invested in the Athens Shipyard and became the largest shareholder of the shipyard.

Heavy oil, a by-product of petroleum refining, can be used as fuel for ships. This is why Constantine was so eager to let the Nobel family join the Greek Petroleum Company.

"I will notify the Athens Shipyard and ask them to immediately cooperate with the University of Athens to improve the boiler to adapt to heavy oil as fuel," Costebrew said.

“If Greece had some hard coal mines, it wouldn’t have to go through so much trouble,” lamented Costebrew.

The fact is so ridiculous. Greece is rich in lignite resources, but there is no hard coal. It is all immature lean coal.

So far, Greece's industrial development plans have been going smoothly, but coal has become a hidden worry for Greece.

At present, the several industrialized countries in the world are not resource-poor countries. On the contrary, all countries that have completed industrialization have good hardware resources.

The so-called developed countries in Europe are resource-poor countries that need to import large amounts of raw materials. This view was actually formed in time and space after World War II.

If we move the time forward to the end of the 19th century and the beginning of the 20th century, this view does not hold true.

For example, the United Kingdom is rich in coal and iron resources, especially coal mines, which can supply large amounts of coal to European countries.

The Industrial Revolution happened in Britain, which seems to be a coincidence, but it is inevitable.

The first industrial revolution was the steam engine revolution. Coal and iron were enough. What else was needed?

German industry was able to develop rapidly, and the coal mines in the Ruhr area also played a major role.

The quality of Ruhr coal is almost all above that of hard coal, with reserves reaching tens of billions of tons, making it a world-class coal mine.

Coupled with the iron mines in Alsace and Lorraine, post-unification Germany also had coal and iron, and its industrial development was advancing at a rapid pace.

Before the Second Industrial Revolution, when electricity and the internal combustion engine revolution played an important role in social production, European countries like Britain, France and Germany could not really be said to be resource-poor countries.

After all, even in the second industrial revolution, coal can still be used for thermal power generation.

The traditional industrial countries in Europe need to import raw materials from overseas on a large scale. In fact, in the middle and late stages of World War I, oil became more and more important.

There really are no oil reserves in Western Europe! (The North Sea oil field happened later)

Speaking of which, from the perspective of industrial development, Italy is in the same situation as Greece.

Almost all coal and iron ore need to be imported. In terms of coal mines, Italy may not be as good as Greece. At least Greece still has good lignite reserves, which can be used to generate electricity.

Of course, Italy also has its own advantages compared to Greece.

The Po River plain in northern Italy may not be comparable to all the arable land in Greece combined.

"At any rate, there is Italy in a similar situation to us," Costebrew joked.

Why does Italy give people the impression that it is afraid of the British? Even when it joined the Allied Powers of Germany, it specifically stated that if the enemies of the Allied Powers included Britain, Italy would have discretionary power.

Perhaps a clue can be seen from Italy's coal imports.

Like Greece, Italy relies heavily on Britain for its coal.

"By the way, speaking of railways, I recently heard the news that the Germans are planning to build a III-B railway," Little Nobel said suddenly.

The Nobel family's petroleum products also have their own customers in Germany, so they naturally have information channels.

"Three B railway?" Karl asked doubtfully.

Seeing Karl asking the question, everyone realized that Karl was a German.

"The planned railway runs from Berlin to Baghdad via Byzantium. The first letter of the Latin alphabet of the three cities is B, so it is called the triple B railway," Nobel Jr. explained.

"After the construction of this railway, Baku's oil can be easily transported to countries along the railway, such as Bulgaria, Serbia, the Austro-Hungarian Empire, and Germany, so we oil businessmen are very concerned about it."

In order to transport Baku's oil, the Russians specially built a railway from Baku to Batumi. Starting from the port of Batumi, Baku's oil can be shipped to all parts of the world after being loaded on ships.

If this railway can be built, Baku's oil will not have to pass through the Bosporus at all, and can be loaded directly from the Black Sea coast and shipped to Europe.

Moreover, along this railway line, many areas that were previously unable to sell Baku kerosene due to inconvenient transportation and high transportation costs have now opened their doors.

This is indeed good news for the Nobel family, which is involved in the oil business in Baku.

"I heard that recently, German Emperor Wilhelm II will come to Constantinople to visit the Ottoman Empire and meet with the Sultan specifically regarding the Baghdad Railway issue."

Since the last Greek-Ottoman War, at the London Conference, the Germans helped the Ottomans to negotiate and regain the important port city of Thessaloniki on the Aegean coast from Greece. The relationship between the two countries has further developed.

Constantine once guessed that the reason why the Germans were so enthusiastic was that they had reached some kind of py deal with the Ottomans.

This railway may be good news for the Nobel family, but it is indeed a terrible thing for Greece.

After Greece and the Ottomans signed the London Agreement, the Ottomans were forced to cancel their trade discrimination policy. Soon, Greece relied on its geographical advantage to make the Ottomans the largest market for Greek goods again.

Once the Baghdad Railway built by the Germans was really successful, it is conceivable that German goods would flock in along this railway, squeezing Greece's market share.

After all, the reason why the Germans were so enthusiastic with the Ottomans and spent a high cost not to build such a railway was that they had the consideration of selling German goods to the Ottomans and purchasing minerals and other agricultural and animal husbandry products from the Ottomans.

After losing its cost advantage, Greek industrial products are definitely not able to compete with German products. At present, a considerable part of the production machinery in Greece is purchased from the Germans.

This is only the economic level.

With the help of the Germans, the Ottomans built railways on a large scale in the country to control their own territory, just like the Russians built the Trans-Siberian Railway at all costs. If it really succeeded, I am afraid that it would be even worse for Greece from a political and military perspective.