Germans are a very special group in Russia. Perhaps in the eyes of Western European countries, the German states are not developed places, but compared with the barbaric Russia, they are definitely advanced countries.
What's more, strictly speaking, today's tsar and royal family are also of German descent, so Germans have been very popular in Russia since Catherine the Great. To put it simply, Nicholas I's Prime Minister Neserrodie is a serious German.
Even the five consecutive finance ministers were of German descent.
To put it bluntly, Germans are very powerful in Russia and are a powerful political force.
Especially since Neserrode became Prime Minister, he has appointed a large number of Germans, which has further expanded the power of the Germans.
It’s just that, with the loss of power in Hedong and Hexi in the thirty years of Hedong and thirty years of Hexi, the Germans occupying the core position of the Russian court will definitely no longer exist.
It's just that the Germans naturally don't want to surrender and surrender, so they have been doing everything they can to help Neserrodie maintain its precarious position.
For Finance Minister Bungi, financial constraints are the best excuse to attack Russia's local forces. As the saying goes, a clever woman can't make a meal without rice. As long as the financial throat is blocked, even if Alexander II dislikes Neserrodie, he can't easily push him away.
Removal from office.
As long as we survive this period of time, as this storm passes, maybe Neserroddie's position will be saved?
To put it bluntly, even if they cannot retain the position of prime minister, they can still buy precious time for the German party. This can consolidate their power and prevent them from being taken away by the local party, right?
So Bongi always talks about financial constraints whenever he gets a chance. Even normal allocations have to be stuck for a period of time. The purpose is to let the Native Party and Alexander II know that they are not easy to mess with!
However, Duke Alexander suddenly attacked him and opened fire on him, which caught him somewhat off guard.
He felt that Duke Alexander should not be so aggressive. What do you mean by asking this question? Do you want to reveal my background? That's too rude.
Bunge was naturally a little unhappy, but Duke Alexander's status was there. As the second-ranking figure in the cabinet under the Prime Minister, the Foreign Secretary's status was quite aloof, half a head higher than his third-ranking position in the cabinet.
He could ignore others, but he really couldn't do this to Prince Alexander.
After a moment of thought, he said coldly: "You don't understand financial matters, and you don't understand those boring data. How can you help? What's more, the work of reducing expenditures is the job of our Ministry of Finance.
The key point is that a large number of elites have tried their best to come up with no good solution..."
His words were full of contempt, and the implication was that Duke Alexander did not understand finance at all and was not qualified to make irresponsible remarks on financial matters!
This is Hong Guoguo’s contempt! Not to mention Duke Alexander, even Prince Mikhail and other local factions find it harsh!
Immediately, the local faction headed by Prince Mikhail wanted to give Bunge some color, but Duke Alexander stopped them. He said first: "Although I don't understand finance as well as you and your elites, but the most basic thing is
The income and expenses are still clear. You just need to tell us where the major expenses are!"
Bunge frowned, and Duke Alexander's cool reply made him feel a little uncomfortable. He was really not afraid of quarreling with the local faction, and it didn't matter even if they quarreled, it just muddied the matter.
But Duke Alexander didn't take the bait at all. He insisted on asking about income and expenses. He couldn't say that he had forgotten it, right?
But if he answered honestly, although he felt that his accounts were done perfectly and he was not afraid of others checking, seeing Duke Alexander's confident look, he felt a little guilty in his heart!
Seeing that Bunji was silent, Duke Alexander smiled and said: "Have you forgotten these data? It doesn't matter, it's the same as asking your finance department to send someone familiar with the data to introduce it to us!"
Bunji couldn't hold himself any longer. If he didn't answer, wouldn't it mean that he couldn't even remember some of the most basic data and was a waste?
He snorted and replied with a straight face: "These data are quite boring. I'm worried that you, Your Excellency, won't be able to listen... Since you must listen, I'll explain it..."
For the next ten minutes or so, Bunji talked eloquently about piles of boring data. It was indeed quite boring to talk, and some veterans began to doze off while listening.
This made Bunji secretly proud and said to himself: As expected, you guys don't understand shit.
"Okay, Your Excellency Duke, I have explained the recent expenditure clearly. Do you have any advice on this?"
His tone was very proud, and he really didn't think that Duke Alexander could put forward any opinions. Anyway, it was his turn to fight back and let Duke Alexander know that he, the Minister of Finance, was not someone to be trifled with!
But Bunge was wrong. Duke Alexander might not be a professional accountant, but his set of professional-looking data made Duke Alexander really understand something.
Duke Alexander said calmly: "According to the data you gave, the majority of expenditures in the past three months have been military expenditures, accounting for almost 60% of expenditures. In addition, there are salaries of officials at all levels, and there are also some large investments.
,Right?"
Bunji was stunned. He was really surprised that Duke Alexander actually listened. But so what if he understood it. He did the accounting perfectly. Even if he sent ten or eight accountants, he might not be able to find out clearly, let alone Duke Alexander.
.
He replied proudly: "Yes, these account for 90% of expenditures! Especially military expenditures are astonishing. If we continue to expand the scale of counter-insurgency, our finances will inevitably collapse!"
Listening to his words and increasing investment in counter-insurgency would be a dead end, but Duke Alexander was not intimidated by him, and said calmly: "Really? If I remember correctly, a year ago, that is, we fought with the British, French and Turkish coalition forces in Croatia.
When there was a stalemate between Lymea and Wallachia, military expenditure accounted for 75% of the total expenditure. Now, we have abolished nearly 300,000 troops and no longer have huge arms expenditure. Why has the proportion of military expenditure only decreased?
15%, is this normal?”
Bunge was stunned. He really didn't expect that Duke Alexander would pull out the data from a year ago for comparison. From such a comparison, the disarmament and reduction of military expenditures in the past year have only reduced expenditures by 15%. It is obviously a failure, okay?