Chapter Fourteen: Riding a Motorcycle to Herd Cows

  Liu Mou watched as these countries repeatedly stirred up trouble in Taiwan, feeling both happy and worried. This submarine ambush tactic had been used four times already, with an incredible effect, but the side effects were also huge. If discovered by other countries, he would not be able to bear the guilt of killing all the people who fell into the water. At that time, all European and American countries would unite in their condemnation, taking concrete actions to punish this murderer and executioner.

  "I'm really helpless, Taiwan is such a small place, it's really impossible to hide you foreign sailors. Since you can come to someone else's country and act like masters, you should have the awareness that you will eventually have to pay for it. Amitabha... Rest in peace."

  Liu Mou felt helpless about ordering the killing of all witnesses too, Taiwan didn't have a place to hide so many prisoners of war without being discovered. As for throwing them into the black coal mine to fend for themselves, Liu Mou thought it was better to give them a quick and humane death instead.

  The French fleet incident continued to make waves until July, when it gradually subsided. While Britain and France were busy dispatching warships to patrol the seas, Liu Yifei was not idle in Taiwan either. He planned an airport in a wasteland between Keelung and Tamsui.

  At that time, people didn't know what an airplane was. They could only follow Liu's requirements to flatten all the ground, then pave half a meter thick concrete, with two runways and several taxiways and aprons, as well as semi-buried hangars, underground oil depots, pilot dormitories and command towers.

  This project is not too large, but the quality requirements are very high, and a lot of cement and steel bars are used. It is estimated that it will take about 2 years to basically complete. Liu Mou does not have high requirements for the construction period, but emphasizes that the quality must be solid, and uniformly claims to be a test track.

  Actually, this plane is not what Liu Ye needs at the moment. However, an engineer from the institute happened to see Liu Ye playing with a toy model airplane on a fishing boat and insisted on borrowing it for research. It's said that he had manufactured airships in Europe and has an instinctive love for anything that can fly.

  Liu Yuzhuo deliberated for half a day and felt that the aircraft project would have to be developed sooner or later, so he might as well let him study it first. However, this research must be kept confidential. Therefore, Liu Yuzhuo planned to build the airport first, then separate the aircraft research from the institute and move it to the airport to establish an aircraft research institute. Although the airport would take two years to complete, building a separate underground research institute wouldn't take several months. As for the wind tunnel, Liu Yuzhuo didn't know how to do it, so he continued to let the researchers use model airplanes in the mountains. It didn't matter if they were models or not; as long as they could fly, it was much better than starting from scratch.

  Here is the translation:

  In Taiwan, Liu Ye finally managed to narrowly escape disaster. In the US, however, the "Daqing Petroleum Company" was sailing smoothly. Since striking the first self-drilling well in Waco, good fortune had been continuous, and soon over 10 oil and gas wells were drilled one after another on the Gobi Desert west of Waco. Not only did Waco yield a large oil field, but also the Pecos exploration team to the west drilled several oil and gas wells, which were relatively scattered, indicating that the Pecos area had higher petroleum reserves than the Waco area, possibly even a giant oil and gas field.

  The oil and gas fields in the Pecos area are actually the famous " Yates" oil field, which is one of the top three super-large oil and gas fields in the United States. This large oil field with a reserve of 3 billion tons was not discovered until the 1920s.

  Although oil was struck, it did not necessarily mean success. This part of West Texas was a wilderness with no highways and no railroads. However, David soon introduced Schneider to John D. Rockefeller, the president of Standard Oil Company, in the second week after striking oil. At that time, Standard Oil's main oil reserves were in Nevada, Oklahoma, and New Jersey, but due to years of exploitation, these places had significantly reduced their oil reserves, and new oil fields in the United States were scarce. As a result, "Standard Oil" and "Big Spring Oil Company" quickly reached an agreement, with Standard Oil investing in building a refinery in Houston and constructing two pipelines from Pecos and Waco to transport crude oil directly to Houston for processing. 20% of the finished products produced were shipped by Houston to Taiwan, while the remaining 80% was split equally between the two companies.

  Someone asked, why not build the refinery and pipeline by ourselves, but instead give a share of the profits to others? This is mainly because Liu Ye didn't want to spend too much time and experience on this. The petroleum industry is a labor-intensive industry, requiring not only large drilling teams and refineries, but also even larger transportation tools and sales networks. These are all difficult for "Daqing Petroleum Company" which has just entered the petroleum industry to achieve in the short term. Moreover, as a new company occupying such a large area of high-yielding oil fields, it's hard to guarantee that the American oil tycoons won't come looking for trouble, and possibly even the US government will get involved.

  But taking "Standard Oil Company" along, although a large part of the interests were lost, it also eliminated most of the troubles. At that time in the United States, "Standard Oil Company" was a giant beast, and even after being forcibly split by the government, it did not weaken at all, but became a group of giant beasts.

  In October 1899, after settling the cooperation with Standard Oil Company, Schneider also had some leisure time. Since the oil pipeline and refinery were still under construction, the oil field could only be exploited on a small scale, and then the crude oil was put into storage tanks for preservation. Except for doing some preparation work such as purchasing equipment and recruiting workers, there wasn't much to do.

  Schneider reported the situation on this side to Liu Yi and asked if there were any more maps. He was preparing to go explore a few more areas, and this game of asking the earth for wealth was one that Schneider enjoyed. Liu Yi quickly replied, saying that there were plenty of maps, but he wanted Schneider to do something for him first. If it was done well, the map would be his reward; if not, he wouldn't even get a hair.

  What Liu Yifei said is to set up gas stations across the United States. Although there are not many cars now, and gas stations are not needed yet, Liu Yifei is ready to add fuel to the automobile industry, which has been endured for many years. He is ready to launch the Changjiang 750 motorcycle on the market, and temporarily endure the car for a few more years.

  The gas station project was given to Schneider, and the motorcycle project couldn't be separated from him either. After all, the first Changjiang 750 motorcycle was also made by this Mr. Besides Liu Fei, he is the most familiar with motorcycles, and he is a mechanical manufacturing expert, his specialty!

  However, he was too busy to handle so many things on his own. Liu's plan was to let David join the company and help Schneider set up a gas station, after all, he had Sundiro Electric Company sales points all over the United States, and setting up a gas station would be similar. Meanwhile, Schneider was fully engaged in building a motorcycle manufacturing plant and production line, striving to put it into operation within 1 year.

  Mr. David W. Wuerth is now extremely depressed, when Liu Yue let Schneider bring the map to find him, the shares given were 20%, but he himself was not brave enough and only invested 10%. Watching the oil come out like tap water in Liu's backyard, making him jealous like a rabbit.

  David, who has lived in the United States for nearly ten years, is well aware of the potential of this new energy source. As long as you drill in the right place, it's a well that spouts dollars, and many American farmers have become overnight millionaires thanks to the oil found on their land. Although David is not short of money, the more money one has, the more sensitive they are to it. This time, his own investment mistake resulted in a loss of 10% of his profits, which wasn't just 10% of $1 million or $10 million, but rather 10% of tens or even hundreds of billions.

  After David struck oil, he had sent a telegram to Liu, tactfully saying that he wanted the 10% stake back. However, Liu replied that a noble British aristocrat could not ask for a gift back after giving it away. David didn't care about his own reputation, but he couldn't do something that would damage his friend's reputation. Upon hearing this, David was speechless, who made him not believe in Liu, the favorite of God, at first?

  Although Liu Mo did not return David's 10% stake, he still gave him additional compensation. When Schneider brought the motorcycle factory project to him, David invested 40% of the shares without hesitation. In fact, he wanted to invest more and even hoped to build a fully-funded factory. However, Liu Mo was not so foolish and only gave him a maximum investment quota of 40%. David thought about his refrigerator again and looked at this updated, more practical motorcycle. He had no doubts about future sales and even imagined that in the future, cowboys on the vast plains of Texas would no longer ride horses but instead ride motorcycles to herd cattle, with a trail of black smoke behind each herd.