Chương 123: Headstrong Serbia
War is coming after Bulgaria's ultimatum, which completely shatters Serbia's illusions!
Aleksandar I panicked. The war came too suddenly! From September, the tensions between Serbia and Bulgaria began to intensify, and now it is only a short month, now Serbia is simply too late to prepare!
"Prime Minister, how are our war readiness going?" Aleksandar I asked anxiously.
Only Prime Minister Radoman Bovic said with a bitter smile, "Your Majesty, time is too short for us to make preparations!
So far, the national mobilization has barely been completed, with a total of more than 500,000 young people mobilized, still scattered throughout the country! It is still too late to organize training, from which the selection of qualified soldiers has just begun. At least another half a month to complete!
The material supplies reserve is even worse due to the lack of funds. Our purchases are not going well. The gap is huge!"
The Minister of War added: "Due to our lack of weaponry, most of the available weapons were collected from civilians, and many served with their own weapons!
Weaponry is a mess, and so far, our gun and ammo counts are not even close to complete!
The types of firearms are even more diverse. Basically, all kinds of guns that exist around the world, which we now have, and the number of all kinds of guns is unknown!
It all takes time. The mobilized army has no combat power for at least the next half month! It will take at least two to three months of short-term training before the initial formation of combat power!
It's a shame we all have amateur military skills, or we would have found the actual situation much worse than stated! The wide variety of weaponry also means that there are different calibers, which makes it very difficult to resupply! It's possible that many people go to war with guns and can't find the bullets to fire!
Hearing the Prime Minister's words, Aleksandar I angrily questioned: "What is wrong with the Minister of Finance? Why are the funds still not available by now? Do we still want to fight the war? Don't forget that it is already the moment of life and death for Serbia, and you still want to fight with each other?"
The Minister of Finance looked confused. Honestly, he did his best to raise funds this time but still could not fund the army, which swallowed the money! Now in the face of Aleksandar I's questioning, he did not have the courage of his heart to say back.
"Your Majesty, please control yourself! We in the Ministry of Finance have done our best, don't forget that the military just fought a war to quell the rebellion, with tens of thousands of casualties. The pension alone is an astronomical amount!
And now, with national mobilization again, domestic tax revenues are almost negligible; there are limited gains from international loans, bonds, and bankers who don't think we can win this war!
The money we use is already using the gold reserves of gold-issued currency. It must not use up too many resources. Otherwise, our currency may now collapse at any time!"
As soon as the Minister of Finance finished his words, the faces of the crowd changed greatly. The standard gold era, using the currency reserves, which will blow up if the operation is a disaster!
And now Alexander I, not caring about the Minister of Finance's rebuke, sighed and said: "There is no need to worry about that! Let's take it out first and get through this! If you win, everything will be fine, and all the losses can be made up in Bulgaria; if you lose, you don't have to care about the currency collapse!"
The Minister of Finance thought about it, and it is also the truth. If you win, everything is good, if you lose the war, someone has to take the blame, and the cabinet can not run away either. It is better to leave the mess to the next term!
He said reluctantly: "Okay! But we don't have much gold in reserve, so you should save it! If we spend it all before the war is over, we won't have a single dinar in the treasury!"
The Minister of War said bitterly, "Don't worry, if it comes to that, I won't want the dinar even if you have it, it's not much different from blank paper!"
Aleksandar I glared at the Minister of War and asked again, "Prime Minister, what is the attitude of Austria-Hungary now? Will it be on our side? If possible, it would be better to buy some time for us!"
Prime Minister Radoman Bovic said with difficulty: "Austria-Hungary has made it clear that they will be on our side. But they are worried that if they intervene directly and the Russian Empire intervenes, the situation will be even more complicated then!
So they made a deal with the Russian Empire that neither would interfere directly in this war now! In this war, we can only rely on ourselves!"
After knowing the attitude of Austria-Hungary, Aleksandar I instantly had a feeling of being betrayed! Are Both sides still allies? Nine years ago, they helped, but now they are on the outside looking in!
Angrily, he said, "Just let it go. Let's pretend we don't have that ally! Now it's up to us, Minister of War. This time you must fight for Serbia, or else ~ ~ ~."
...
Niš is the largest city in southern Serbia, situated on the banks of the Nišava River, a branch of the South Morava River. Now this formerly bustling city is in a state of shambles!
Novak Djokovic, a native of the city, is now in his sixties, which is considered a high life expectancy in the 19th century.
It may be strange to say that he was not an ordinary man, and when he was young, he participated in the war against the Ottomans. He also founded a textile factory in Niš and has more than a hundred workers, a proper capitalist, but now his life is not easy!
After the economic crisis, it was dumped by the international capitalists, and Djokovic's textile factory never made a profit and was forced to close its doors!
After selling the factory, at least there was a sum of money left to retire. But the Bulgarian war was about to start, and the dinar began to devalue like crazy!
It could not hide the fact that the government had used its reserve gold from the shrewd capitalists, who decisively chose to sell the dinar, which then began to depreciate wildly.
The aged Djokovic reacted one step slower, and by the time he did, the dinar had changed from the original: 1 dinar = 0.29 grams of gold to the current 1 dinar = 0.01 grams of gold.
It destroyed the assets shrunk by dozens of times instantly, and years of savings!
"Pentridge, has the price of flour gone up again? It's just that you can't make the decision, it must be ordered by that old fucker Krašić, bring me a ton of flour and load it to my house!" Djokovic said with a headache.
"Mr. Djokovic, that much?" The salesman Pentridge asked in surprise.
"The war is about to start, how can we not stock up on food?" Djokovic said calmly.
"Mr. Djokovic, the government has announced a price parity, the market will soon return to normal, it's not cost effective to buy so much now!" said Pentridge.
"Silly boy, the moment the war starts Niš will be the front line, who cares about that!" Djokovic glared at him and left without looking back.
Niš is too close to the front line when the last Bulgarian war hit, and now it is not expected to be much better!
Djokovic didn't hesitate to purchase the living necessities and then started moving back home. He intended to go to his old home in the mountains to escape the disaster!
Djokovic is not one alone, the rich people on the Serbian border are starting to move to avoid the disaster, and it is clear that they are not looking forward to this war!
...
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