When he heard the word “expert,” Alberti frowned. Heaven knows, silencing people wasn’t his expertise. His actual job was catching criminals. He wanted to argue, but considering how critical the situation was, he didn’t bother with the minor details. Alberti shook his head and replied, “Count, the scrutiny is extremely high right now, and there are just too many people involved. It would be very difficult to silence them all without drawing attention from the outside.” That was inevitable. If one or two prisoners had accidents, it might be brushed off. But if dozens of them met an “accident” at the same time, everyone would know something was wrong. Killing them wasn’t the hard part. The real issue was how to handle the government’s follow-up investigations. Any trace of a clue could bring them all crashing down. After hearing this, the atmosphere in the room grew even heavier. Someone lit a cigar, and soon the secret chamber was clouded with smoke. Sensing the tension, Sir Ledes made a suggestion: “I’ve been to the Taro Prison in the Alps. The conditions there are terrible. Every year, a number of prisoners have accidents. If we can coordinate with the guards and stage an accident, as long as it’s cleanly done, it shouldn’t be a big problem.” Alberti shook his head and argued, “You haven’t worked in law enforcement, so you don’t understand how things work. There are a lot of things that, if we want to investigate, we will uncover. No matter how clean the job looks, it always leaves a trace. Staging an accident is easy. What’s difficult is making sure we take out everyone we want in one go. What if someone slips through the cracks? If even one person survives, everything will be exposed. We can’t expect the prison guards themselves to go in and finish the job, can we? Even if the silencing succeeds, that’s not the end of the matter. These Jewish capitalists aren’t simple people. I don’t believe they haven’t prepared some kind of contingency. If we silence them now, and someone shows up the next day with evidence to expose us, we’ll be in even deeper trouble.” It was precisely because he understood that Alberti knew just how unreliable large-scale silencing really was. Bribing the prison guards wasn’t impossible, but in such high-risk situations, at most they would pretend not to see anything. Expecting them to risk their lives and go all in was simply unrealistic. The biggest problem was that silencing people would only be the beginning, not the end. They might use family members as leverage, but that was mostly for show. For criminals of this level, their families were already being detained and interrogated. If they were going to make any moves, it would be after everything had already settled. Normally, even when people sought revenge, they wouldn’t act directly. More often, they would use their power to “arrange” a convenient fate for the other side. Something like exile to dig in the Alaskan mines, or being sent to the desert to build railroads. With the proposal for silencing rejected, Count Witters sighed and said slowly, “If we can’t silence them, then we can only survive by cutting off the tail. We haven’t personally taken money from the Jews, so they shouldn’t have direct evidence against us. The only real risk lies with those businesses that had financial dealings with them. If everyone is willing, I suggest we sell off those assets and sever any links between us and them.” Everyone’s expressions changed drastically. These assets weren’t just small investments. Aside from the benefits exchanged, a portion of the capital was their own money. If they were truly forced to give them up, it wouldn’t just hurt the people in the room. The families behind them would suffer serious losses as well. Alberti quickly objected, “No way. Abandoning those businesses would be a massive loss, but more importantly, would that really get us off the hook? Over the years, everyone here has used those businesses to gain all kinds of benefits. If the investigation team decides to dig deeper, they’ll eventually reach us. Maybe what they find won’t be enough to convict us, but it would definitely be enough to end our political careers. Let’s not overthink this. What we need to do right now is keep those capitalists calm, buy ourselves some time. Next, everyone needs to use their own influence to quickly sell off those businesses, including any affiliated ones. We’ve never shown our faces, so if we cut the chain of interest and send the involved personnel abroad, half the problem is solved. We also need to mobilize our networks to push for death sentences for those Jewish capitalists, and ideally, have them executed immediately. As long as we act quickly enough, once the verdicts are handed down, we take action right away and they won’t have a chance to speak.” It was still a matter of cutting losses, but the latter approach was clearly more sophisticated, especially with the final silencing operation, which showed a high level of calculated professionalism. No one cares about the fate of a condemned prisoner. Whether they die a day earlier or later makes little difference. In a populous country like Austria, executions happen every day. Generally, those sentenced to immediate execution are put to death within three to seven days after sentencing. The time in between is typically left for family farewells, but that’s more of an unwritten rule than a formal one. Technically, once the verdict is issued, the execution can happen at any time. Even if the process moves a little faster and catches the attention of those who are paying close attention, the issue can be pinned on the “anti-Jewish” campaign. Hearing this suggestion, Count Witters’ eyes lit up, and he exclaimed with delight, “That’s a great idea. Alberti, you’re a genius.” “Sir Ledes, the task of keeping those scumbags calm is up to you now. No matter what methods you use, you need to keep them in line for now. If necessary, you can resort to extreme measures, but use them with caution. If this blows up and draws unwanted attention, we won’t be able to contain it. From this moment on, we’re the vanguard of the anti-Jewish campaign. We must ensure these evil Jewish capitalists receive the punishment they deserve from justice!” … The rising tide of anti-Jewish sentiment no longer held Franz’s attention. He was currently busy taking stock of the gains and figuring out how to allocate this unexpected windfall. Minister of Economy Reinhardt Haldergen handed over a document and reported, “Your Majesty, this is the redevelopment plan for the old industrial cities. The Ministry of Economy mainly has two viewpoints: the first is to select a new site and build an entirely new city. The second is to renovate the existing areas, following the British example of constructing subways to improve urban transportation. Each of these two plans has its pros and cons. The advantage of building a new city is that, after a complete redesign and planning, population and traffic capacity would increase significantly, and we wouldn’t have to worry about these issues for a long time. The downside is that it requires a huge investment and has a long construction period. By comparison, renovating the old city yields quicker results and requires significantly less funding in the short term. However, many streets in the old city are poorly planned and can no longer meet current needs. Renovations would only be a temporary fix, and reconstruction would still be needed in the future.” Land availability was not a concern. If Austria had anything in abundance, it was land—an advantage in urban planning. After thinking it over briefly, Franz made his decision: “We have too much to do and cannot devote all our resources to urban development. Begin with the renovation of the old city for now. We’ll consider building new cities in the future.” Funding was only one aspect of the problem. More crucially, in this era, there weren’t many machines available. Construction work relied primarily on manual labor, with most tasks done by carrying materials on shoulders and backs. Naturally, construction progress was slow. Unlike the Near East Development Plan, where the population was limited and city planning only required a blueprint for now, further construction could wait until population growth caught up. What needed rebuilding now were major industrial cities, each with populations in the hundreds of thousands or even millions. Constructing new cities required enormous amounts of work, and without at least ten to twenty years, it would be impossible to finish. Such a long period meant the opportunity would pass. With international affairs constantly changing, Austria couldn’t afford to dive headfirst into infrastructure building. If a sudden crisis emerged, it would be a huge problem. As for future reconstruction, that was inevitable. With the economy developing rapidly, even if new cities were built now, similar problems would arise again a few decades later. The development of social productivity meant that urban construction could never be completed all at once. Constant renewal and replacement were simply part of the natural course of societal progress. “Yes, Your Majesty!” Reinhardt Haldergen didn’t continue to argue. While building new cities was important, Austria had many other priorities that were even more pressing. One of those was transportation. As the number of automobiles continued to increase, the existing roads could no longer meet the demands of reality. Upgrading the road system had already become a trend for future development. In remote and impoverished areas, where there were hardly any vehicles, improvements could be delayed. But around major cities, road reconstruction was already an urgent need. Take Vienna as an example. The number of private cars in the city has already exceeded 8,000, and there are over 10,000 trucks and tractors. The inner city is still manageable, as the roads were built quite wide during earlier urban renovations, so traffic congestion isn’t an immediate concern. But the main roads in the surrounding areas are a different story. Roads designed for horse-drawn carriages and those for automobiles are fundamentally different. A road that can fit four carriages side by side can only accommodate two trucks at most. If there’s even a minor accident, traffic can come to a complete standstill. Currently, the number of vehicles isn’t too high, so congestion is still tolerable, usually just a delay of ten or so minutes. But the real issue is that dirt roads, which worked fine for horse-drawn vehicles, are ill-suited for automobiles. Rainy days are especially problematic, as muddy roads are a nightmare for cars. To change this situation, the Vienna city government began constructing cement roads as early as two years ago. Many other cities wanted to follow suit, but not every city had the financial means. Most had no choice but to seek help from the central government. However, with so many hands reaching out for funds, the central government couldn’t meet all the demands, and the plan was temporarily shelved. There was no way around it. Improving transportation definitely benefits economic development, but investing in road construction is a money-losing business. Even with tolls, the revenue barely makes a dent. The Ministry of Economy has already conducted an assessment. Based on the current number of vehicles in Austria, even with an annual growth rate of 20%, it would still be difficult to achieve a break-even point through toll fees within the next twenty years. And that’s only talking about covering operating and maintenance costs, not recouping the initial investment or making a profit. Even this is just theoretical. In reality, there are very few roads that last twenty years. Aside from a few exceptions, most highways are already deteriorating before their construction costs have been recovered. In fact, most projects are still running at a loss by the time the roads are deemed unusable. If there were real profits to be made, capitalists would not be sitting on their hands. They would have already poured in their money. To put it bluntly, it is simply too early. If this were twenty to thirty years later, there would be plenty of investors lining up to fund these projects. Right now, even building a route as busy as the one from Vienna to Prague would likely end in a massive financial loss. The reason is simple. Austria’s railway industry is extremely well developed, and rail transport is cheaper than road transport. In many areas, there is also competition from water transport, which has even lower operational costs. As a result, long-distance freight simply does not rely on roads. Without long-distance freight, trying to recover costs through tolls on private cars alone is unrealistic, at least until automobiles become truly widespread among the general population. *** https://postimg.cc/gallery/PwXsBkC (Maps of the current territories of the countries in this novel made by ScH)
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