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Essen, Ruhr area, Germany.

Essen is one of the largest cities in the Ruhr area, Germany's center of heavy industry, and the stronghold and birthplace of the Krupp family. The Ames Valley to the west of the city is an industrial area, the north of the city is a coal mining area, and to the south there are high-end residential villas. To the south of the city, on the shores of Lake Baltna, there is a recreation area and a sports ground, where the Krupp family lived.

This four-storey villa does not have the slightest extravagance and luxury from the outside, not even a bit of beauty and art. A cold pragmatist style that matches the Krupp family's business very well. The third floor of the villa belongs to Gustav. In Krupp's private living room, a number of important figures from German industry, military and politics gathered here. These big people, who usually come in and out, are quietly entering this building through the back door today. But looking at their current expressions, they all seem to be a little excited, as if they are making history.

“…… Gentlemen, remember this great moment! The revival of the German Empire begins now, and you are all the architects of this great miracle, and the Empire is about to rise from humiliation and painful defeat in our hands...... I and the whole German people have waited for this day for too long, and the Treaty of Versailles is like a heavy shackle, firmly locking our empire under an endless abyss, allowing it to slowly move towards its death. And today we will begin to smash this chain of sin that locks Germany with sins! We're going to smash the Treaty of Versailles, and then we're going to settle scores with our insidious enemies...... A new empire of the future will be born in our hands! That would be an empire that thrived for a thousand years! ”

The one who could utter such exciting nonsense, of course, was the future Führer, uh, Hitler. Today he was also invited to the Krupp family's villa for this secret meeting. Although the Führer did not know what was going on, it was a ...... to think that so many important people of the first rank in Germany would have to meet him Good thing, right? I guess those bigwigs think that he is the great savior who can save the German Empire and the Aryan nation, right? So as soon as the meeting began, Hitler stood up feeling good about himself and gave a long and stirring speech.

Gustav. Krupp frowned slightly. This Hitler...... Indeed, he is a very capable and passionate demagogue, and maybe in the future he can lead and unite the German people to smash the damned "Treaty of Versailles", right? But it's okay to fool the masses who don't know the truth, and what to say in front of us cool-headed and rational imperial elites?

And from his personal point of view, he is still inclined to restore the Hohenzollern dynasty. Like most of the upper echelons of Germany, Gustav. Krupp was also a staunch royalist. As for this somewhat crazy Hitler, it is better to be the chancellor of the Reich than to put the whole Reich in his hands.

"Mr. Hitler, we are here today to discuss a plan for cooperation with China to lay a solid foundation for the future revival of the Reich." Gustav. Krupp smiled and raised his hand at Hitler, motioning for him to sit down. Today's meeting Hitler is not the protagonist, but ...... A student. The giants of the Empire's industrial and military circles wanted to teach him some common sense of managing the Empire.

China? What is there to work with them? Hitler smiled and nodded, with a look of humility, but in his heart he must have slandered the eyes of these great German men.

Gustav. Krupp smiled and continued to speak: "Gentlemen, you should know that China's ancient empire is also undergoing some very critical changes now, and my Krupp company happens to be involved. Now the south of the country, half the size of Western Europe, and nearly 300 million people, have been completely controlled by a party called the Chinese Kuomintang. They established a regime called the 'National Axe' to rule the land, and had more than half a million troops equipped with the equivalent of the European Army of World War I. Such force is enough to ensure that cooperation between us will not be undermined by certain unfriendly forces.

Steel mills and arsenals were also built, and now there are even more ambitious plans for heavy industry. Of course, these heavy industries seem to us to be very rudimentary, but they control some of the resources necessary for the revival of the empire. These include important non-ferrous metals such as tungsten, manganese, molybdenum, aluminum, antimony, tin, magnesium, zinc, as well as some natural rubber (on Hainan Island) and other important resources. In recent years, our company's technicians have discovered all the above-mentioned resource deposits in the area under their control, and the reserves are very rich......

In addition to resources, cooperation with the Chinese Nationalist Axe could also find an ideal secret research and development base for the Empire's military industry. Now our homeland is under the close surveillance of Britain and France, such as aircraft, submarines, warships, tanks and even machine guns, which cannot be openly studied, but can only be carried out in secret. This has brought great difficulties to our research, after all, a lot of R&D work cannot be carried out solely on laboratory data, and more tests are needed, even actual combat tests, which China can provide. And we can also let them bear half of the R&D expenses in the name of joint development. In this way, you can do twice the work for the same amount of money......

The price we have to pay for Sino-German cooperation is actually very small, and we only need to help them build a sound system of heavy industry and military industry. It's just a matter of providing some technology that is not up to date, but not too backward, selling them some heavy industrial equipment, and allowing them to take a part of the account on credit, and then slowly pay for it with resources...... And we can also build a joint venture on Chinese soil to build for Germany a large number of military equipment that we cannot build on our own soil, such as submarines, airplanes, and warships, which will be temporarily stored in China until the eve of the official smashing of the Treaty of Versailles and then secretly shipped back to the armed forces at home. In this way, we will have a military force sufficient to protect ourselves at the beginning of rearmament.

In addition, it is necessary to help them train the army, mainly the air force and navy. However, it also allows our officers to gain experience in helping them train their troops, and it also allows our air and navy personnel to train on their turf to evade British and French surveillance. This will enable us to have enough good officers, especially in the Air Force and Navy, when we rearm.

Finally, I would like to remind gentlemen. China is very far away from us, so far away that it is only suitable to be friends between the two countries. But they were very close to the Soviet Union and the colonies of Britain and France! The first thing a strong China should do is to restore its former glory and traditional sphere of influence. So they will be our natural allies, and by helping them, we are helping ourselves. ”