American: Native Empire

Even after the establishment of the World Union, Joseon’s modernization did not stop. 

No, rather, it accelerated even more.

It had already started modernization faster than any other neighboring country, so it had been quite industrialized before.

But there were no problems.

“We lack resources. Sigh, I really envy the empire’s land.”

At that time, the resources in Joseon’s territory were not enough to sustain proper industrialization.

One of the most important resources for industrialization was coal. 

And among these coals, anthracite was very important.

It was because anthracite was needed to build modern steel mills.

Of course, there was plenty of coal in the Korean Peninsula, but most of it was lignite. 

Lignite was good for making domestic briquettes, but it was a rather disappointing coal for industrial use.

Steel is the rice of industry. 

How can one eat well when it is hard to make this rice?

However, a great change came to this situation.

Joseon occupied the vast land in the north, Manchuria and Siberia.

“Wouldn’t there be a lot of resources buried in this vast land?”

People who had experienced the lack of resources in the Korean Peninsula for a long time began to take an interest in the resources buried in the north.

Therefore, as soon as the rapid conquest of the north was completed and the International Conference ended, the first thing that happened was resource exploration.

First of all, resource exploration was carried out mainly in Manchuria. 

Since Joseon’s own level of geological survey was low, they invited experts from the empire and conducted it.

And as time passed, the results came out one after another.

“Isn’t that amazing?”

The hard pickaxe, who was invited as a geological expert from the empire, stuck out his tongue as he confirmed the amount of Manchuria’s reserves.

Even though there were still many places to investigate.

“Is there that much?”

“…Hmm. I’ve surveyed many areas in the empire, but there are few places that are as rich in resources as this.”

“Really? Is it that much?”

“Yes. I want to investigate other areas more.”

After finishing his speech, the investigation continued. 

And as time passed, this tendency became stronger.

And finally, after the first exploration was over, the hard pickaxe returned to the capital and reported this.

“As a result of the investigation, the northern land can be said to be a very blessed land.”

“Tell me more.”

The face of Lee Ho who spoke was very relieved. 

He looked like he had lost a toothache.

He thought he could solve the situation that had been lacking for a long time, so Lee Ho was very happy. 

This was also the same for all the ministers.

“The most needed thing for industrialization is coal, especially anthracite. In the investigated area, there is a lot of anthracite buried. It’s hard to estimate. It’s rare to find such an area even if you search the world.”

“Is that so?”

“Yes, Your Majesty.”

Manchuria is now Joseon’s land. 

It was great news that there was so much anthracite in this land.

The hard pickaxe’s words continued.

“In addition, most of these anthracites have very good economic value. Most of them are near the coast or near iron ore or rivers. Especially near the river mines, there is high-quality coke coal. And most of these coals are near the surface or even open-pit mines. This means that they can be produced at a very low cost.”

It was a series of praises. 

It sounded like nothing but a blessed land.

And even more, the hard pickaxe’s words were not over.

“Moreover, the amount of iron ore is also one of the largest in the world. Of course, there seems to be a lot of low-grade iron ore… but it’s just a matter of ratio. There will be quite a lot of high-grade iron as well. There are also many other metals. The details are written in the report. If you have any questions, please refer to it.”

“…If I have any questions, I’ll call you back.”

After the hard pickaxe left.

The mouths of the ministers who had been quiet opened.

“Huh. I didn’t know Manchuria was such a blessed land.”

“Isn’t this because the great spirits have looked after Joseon? We are grateful to you, Your Majesty!”

“I bow to you!”

He mentioned the great spirit openly, but none of the ministers dared to refute his words. 

The spirit worship was deeply rooted in Joseon, and especially the current Joseon government, which was mostly filled with reformists, had this tendency more strongly.

Lee Ho looked at the positive reactions of the ministers with satisfaction, and opened his mouth.

“As you said, this can be considered as a blessing for Joseon. But this is just a prospect. We have to actually mine and use them to make it a real blessing. So we have to find a way to properly use the resources in the north.”

“Your Majesty is right.”

“Keep that in mind. Now that the World Union has been formed, we are not the only ones who receive support from the Empire. Even if we are ahead of other countries now, we must never be complacent. We have to always remember this.”

The ministers agreed with his words. 

They also thought that this was a very important time.

If they started to fall behind here, they would fail to build a strong country that the reformists had long hoped for.

A lot of blood had been shed during the reform process. 

What if the results of the reform were not good in this situation?

Until now, they could at least make an excuse of lack of resources, but since they got their hands on the enormous resources of Manchuria, this was nothing but an excuse.

***

Joseon was one of the regions where tuber crops such as potatoes and sweet potatoes were first cultivated in the world. 

Especially potatoes quickly took root in Joseon land.

There, vaccination was also second after the Empire.

Even at some point, cheap imperial rice and wheat flooded into Joseon, and there was so much food left in Joseon.

It was natural that population would explode when food became abundant in pre-modern society.

In addition, smallpox, which was the most feared infectious disease, lost its place due to vaccination, and treatments for other diseases were also spread, lowering mortality rate, especially infant mortality rate.

This trend became even stronger after penicillin was developed.

Finally, Joseon had benchmarked most of the policies that Wakan Tanka Empire had done in the past.

One of them was a birth encouragement policy.

“Having as many children as possible is good for the country and the family! So let’s all work hard to have many children!”

The court continuously encouraged people to have children. 

And people also accepted this easily.

It would be similar anywhere, but at this time in Joseon, children were also wealth. 

This was an immutable truth that had been passed down for a long time in an agricultural society.

Thanks to this, rather from some point of view, children increased faster than in the past Wakan Tanka Empire.

This led to a rapid population explosion in Joseon over time.

“Let’s go north! The north is a land of opportunity!”

And around this time, full-scale northern development began.

“Uh, go to the cold and barren north?”

“It’s not hard to make a living like before, why do we have to go?”

But people’s reactions were not very good.

To begin with, Joseon people’s perception of the north was not very good.

People living south of the Korean Peninsula or in Hanyang had discriminated against northern people for quite a long time. 

There it was barren so it was an area with a shortage of population.

But they were told to go further north than that. 

It was only natural that people would not agree easily.

So they had been sending criminals and their families to the north for a long time, which was called Samin policy.

No matter how much they said that the north would be developed in the future, people did not want to develop the north with their own hands.

But the court could not sit back and watch this. 

Manchuria development was a top priority.

“This can’t go on. Even if we have to force people to migrate, we have to develop the north.”

“The head of industry is right. Even if we receive a lot of resentment from people, we have to make a decision for Joseon’s future.”

Of course, there were some skeptical opinions from time to time, but the majority were hardliners.

They were almost all reformist figures. 

They were people who did not care about anything for Joseon’s reform.

They had led so much reform while seeing so much blood, and they were not people who would stop even if they saw more blood.

Lee Yi, head of diplomacy also agreed with their opinions to some extent. 

But his thoughts were slightly different.

“In this situation, it is right to force people to pioneer the north, even if it is random.”

“I see that the Minister of Foreign Affairs also thinks so.”

“But I think we have to consider what happens after that.”

“What happens after that…”

Ee continued his words.

“People who are forced to migrate to the north for the sake of pioneering will surely suffer a lot. Then they will have resentment towards the government in their hearts. At the same time, the north will quickly industrialize as time goes by. You know what might happen then, don’t you?”

“What might happen… Do you mean they will harbor rebellious thoughts?”

“Even if they don’t go that far, regional resentment will remain, and it can become a seed of conflict. That’s what I mean.”

“That seems too far-fetched to me.”

“Hmm. I think it makes sense enough. You don’t know well how the people perceive the north.”

“Then do you have any plan, Minister of Foreign Affairs?”

Lee Yi answered with a gleam in his eyes to that question.

“So far, the Wakan Tanka Empire has been Joseon’s teacher, and it will be so in the future. And there was a similar thing in the empire, right?”

“Are you talking about…”

There was no one more pro-empire than the reformists. 

They couldn’t not know the history of the empire.

In fact, something similar to Joseon happened in the empire.

“You probably guessed right. It’s moving the capital to the north, Manchuria.”

“…!”

When the card of moving the capital came out, the faces of the ministers were colored with shock.

And soon a rebuttal burst out.

“That’s absurd! I agree completely that we should take the empire as our teacher, but Joseon and the empire are different in reality, aren’t they?”

“They are different. The emperor of the empire has no influence in Joseon.”

The reason why Wakan Tanka Empire could successfully move its capital to the north was because of Kim Kiwoo’s influence. 

It was because the imperial citizens wanted to live in the city where Kim Kiwoo lived.

“So in Joseon, we have to send people to the north by force, not voluntarily. We may hear a lot of complaints right now, but when the north becomes the center of industry and we move the capital there, these complaints will decrease.”

“Hmm. They might think they got compensated for their past time, so it’s not entirely wrong…”

The ministers had a dubious expression on their faces. Lee Yi’s opinion was that radical.

Lee Yi opened his mouth again to drive a wedge into this atmosphere.

“Even if not, we have to seriously consider moving to Manchuria. As you know, Manchuria has a lot of resources buried there, making industrialization easy, and most importantly, Joseon’s sphere of influence has widened a lot. It means we have grown too big to stay in a small peninsula.”

“That’s true indeed.”

Joseon’s sphere of influence had expanded even after the establishment of the World Union. 

By now, it had incorporated a large part of Siberia into its territory.

At this point, Hanyang on the peninsula was too biased to the bottom. 

It was hard to rule Siberia properly.