Roque had a plan to open a cannery before, but before he could implement it, he was preempted by Xiao Si.

Speaking of which, Rhodesia has the advantages that neither Johannesburg nor Nyasaland has, the farms in Johannesburg and Nyasaland are in the process of development, except for potatoes, there is no spare capacity to provide surplus food supply, Rhodesia is different, although Rhodesia under Cecil Rhodes has not been able to further develop and grow, but Rhodesia's farms are still very good, and Rhodesia has the ability to supply Nyasaland before, Now Xiao Si is just processing the food originally used to supply Nyasaland into canned food for sale.

Rhodesia now has several canning factories, luncheon meat is just one of the products of Rhodesia canning factory, in addition to luncheon meat, Rhodesia also sells canned soybeans, canned fruits, and canned fish, with the relationship with Roque, Xiao Si is even ready to set up a canning factory next to Lake Niasa to process aquatic products in Lake Niasa into canned food for sale.

If you want to talk about external expansion, Xiao Si is indeed not good, but in business, Xiao Si still has a hand, and Cecil Rhodes is not blind to Xiao Si for so many years of training.

Nyasaland is the largest dumping ground for canned food in Rhodesia, including luncheon meat that is disliked by the Nyasaland militia group, all canned products in Nyasaland are actually selling well, Xiao Si is still quite interesting, the price to Nyasaland is not high, because the canning factory uses a large number of Zulu people, so in general, it is cheaper than Roque to directly set up a factory for production, so Roque no longer tossed, leaving this industry to Xiao Si.

"Canned food is just a small business, it doesn't make much money, Xiao Si is willing to do it, let him do it, let's still focus on heavy industry, steel mills, engines, shipyards and tractor factories, as well as our arsenal, whichever one is done well, it is much more profitable than canned food." Roque can think that Nyasaland eats meat, and he always wants Rhodesia to drink soup, otherwise the brothers will not have to do it in the future.

"Everything else is easy to say, mainly the arsenal, this whole is a money-losing goods, we can only produce Martini Henry rifles and Mauser pistols now, and the Yao people have no money to buy them, and if they produce one, they will lose one, if they want to make money, it is difficult!" Duncan is very worried, in fact, now that the arsenal is in a state of semi-shutdown, the Yao people's ability to pay is not good, they don't give money when they buy things, and they always lose money.

In the past, the Nyasaland Arsenal could only produce Martini Henry rifles, but after the end of the war in Portuguese East Africa, the Yao people's demand for weapons was greatly reduced, and Nyasaland could not hang themselves from a tree, so the Nyasaland Arsenal purchased the patent of the Ruger P08 pistol from the German Arms and Ammunition Arsenal to produce the Luger P08 as a police standard equipment, as well as the defense pistol of the soldiers of the army.

Compared with the Mauser pistol and the Kimberley revolver, the Luger P08 pistol has many disadvantages such as extremely high production process requirements, complex structure, more parts, higher cost, and so on.

The reason why Roque still chose the Ruger P08 pistol as the first standard pistol in Nyasaland was mainly to train more skilled workers and provide the technical level of workers through the production of the Ruger P08 pistol, so as to prepare for the next expansion of the arsenal.

Of course, it is also for this reason that the cost of the Ruger P08 pistol produced by the Nyasaland Arsenal is extremely high, and now the monthly production of the Ruger P08 pistol is still very low, and it is still far from the degree of external sales.

"Don't focus on this little thing, the arsenal would rather lose money than stop production, in order to train more qualified workers, and now at this stage, you don't have to worry about losing money." Roque is not afraid of losing money, as long as more skilled workers are trained now, the money lost now will be earned back tenfold and hundredfold in the future.

Since Roque has said this, Duncan has no reason to object, the arsenal is actually not losing money all the time, although the Martini Henry produced by the arsenal cannot be sold, but the explosives produced by the arsenal are still very good, after all, there are many mines in the Transvaal and Nyasaland, and there is a great demand for explosives, and now the Nyasaland Arsenal has sold explosives to the Transvaal, and the sales are still good.

"Let Stanley Warren work hard, it's best to make the big eight as soon as possible, with the big eight, our arsenal can be considered on the right track." Rock can't even look down on Lee Enfield, even if he can't make an AK47 now, at least he has to make the big eight, so that the Nyasaland Arsenal can be regarded as a real fist product.

"Big Eight" is the famous M1 Garand, another time and space, M1 Garand will not appear until 1932, this time and space will not be so long, when Roque bought the Luger P08 patent from the German Arms and Ammunition Arsenal in Germany, he dug up several engineers, Stanley Warren is one of the best.

When it comes to designing guns, it's not really complicated, it's a matter of concept change, and now the objective technical level is already very good, Roque just introduced the development trend of future pistols and rifles to Stanley Warren, and then the specific design was handed over to professionals, I believe Stanley Warren can give Roque a satisfactory answer.

"Stanley has made a sample gun, but now the sample gun is very controversial, our distribution of Lee Enfield is still using a magazine divider, but the big eight is a burst weapon, the speed of firing bullets is faster, and the cost is higher, now many people are wondering, whether we need to equip the big eight this kind of repeating rifle." Duncan asks a very real question.

As far as the current world is concerned, the emergence of the Big Eight is too advanced.

In the Boer War, the British army had just been equipped with Lee Enfield with a ten-round ammunition capacity, which was considered a waste by many people, and even the military top brass thought so, so the British troops were equipped with such a nondescript thing as a magazine divider, and forcibly turned Lee Enfield into a single-shot rifle.

As soon as Roque got Lee Enfield, he threw Lee Enfield's magazine divider in the trash, which was absolutely anti-human and Roque hated it.

Roque thinks so, it does not mean that others think the same way, especially under the premise that the troops are already equipped with Makqin heavy machine guns, whether it is necessary to increase the firepower of the soldiers has become the focus of debate.

A very important argument for opponents is that the more automatic weapons the troops are equipped with, the greater the pressure on logistics, and now the Nyasaland troops are equipped with more Makqin heavy machine guns than other countries in the world, and if they are increasing their individual firepower, it will be an absolute disaster for logistics.

"Made a sample gun? Why didn't you say it earlier! Roque immediately wanted to get up and look, with the big eight, no matter how big the logistical pressure is, Roque has to fully redress the troops, others don't know the value of the big eight, Roque knows too much.

In World War II, the U.S. military units that used the big eight grains killed all sides, and on the battlefield, two large eight grains could suppress a squad of enemies, and the bolt-action rifle was scum in front of the semi-automatic large eight grains.

Oh, not the Yao one.

"It's not finalized yet, it's just a prototype gun, the failure rate is too high, and Stanley still needs to improve." Duncan explained why he hadn't reported the news to Roque.

"Very good, we must continue to improve, don't listen to those who oppose nonsense, the troops are equipped with big eight grains, and the firepower can be reached to a new level, now our troops can't do without Maxim Qin wherever they go, this situation must be changed, so it's not just the big eight grains, the automatic rifle used by the squad should also be studied as soon as possible, we have too few Nyasaland people to afford it on the battlefield and the enemy, then we have to use our industrial capacity to bury the enemy." Roque resolutely promotes the supremacy of firepower, and what can be done with money, Roque will definitely not use people.

If Xiao Si was here, Xiao Si would definitely roll his eyes now.

Nyasaland, which has the backing of the Chinese, is still understaffed, so what about Rhodesia and the Transvaal, which can't be asked for by people to emigrate?

"Speaking of industrial capacity, when will our arsenal be able to produce artillery?" Anton was more demanding, and he was obsessed with artillery.

Now the enemy in Nyasaland is fine, and he is not too strong, although the Nyasaland army does not have artillery, but the enemy in Nyasaland does not have artillery, so it is okay to fight.

Although Anton does not know what Roque's ultimate goal is, as Roque's most trusted person, Anton knows that Roque's ideal is definitely not only Africa, so Nyasaland's future enemies will definitely have strong firepower, and in this regard, Nyasaland must also hurry up.

Hearing Anton's words, Duncan rolled his eyes directly, he hadn't even figured out the rifle yet, but Anton wanted artillery, even if he forced Stanley Warren to death, Stanley Warren couldn't get artillery now.

Compared with individual weapons, the structure of artillery is too complex, designing a cannon is not a task that two people can complete, it requires the precise cooperation of a team in order to gain something in artillery, many famous gunsmiths in history have designed individual weapons, and few people can leave their names in this aspect of artillery.

"Don't worry, artillery, we still need time, let's get the individual weapon done first." Roque has a spectrum in his heart, if he wants Nyasaland to develop conventional artillery, it is indeed difficult to compete with European countries, but Roque also has a backhand, and it is not possible to develop conventional artillery, Roque still has a trump card in his hand, that is, mortars.

Compared with conventional artillery, the structure of the mortar is much simpler, or in other words, the difficulty of the mortar is mainly in the shell, and the mortar itself has no technical difficulty.

Calculating the time, the Russo-Japanese War is about to begin, so Roque has to hurry up, maybe in time for the Russo-Japanese War, Nyasaland can still make a fortune.

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