1935 - 1938
The first months of 1935 passed fast without any event worth mentioning. It was not until the 2nd of September of 1935 that, thanks to the completion of the Naval and Commercial shipyard the Senate was called again in session by the Chancellor. Her plan included motions for a new production schedule and an expansion of all the Shipyards of the Republic. Motions were then drafted for the expansion of the newly produced Naval and Commercial Shipyards to the respective standard displacements of 6,000 and 50,000 tons. Both motions were approved by large majorities.
The Chancellor then moved the discussion over the existing shipyards. With the new ones replacing the capability of the current setup, it was proposed to extend the existing Naval and Commercial Shipyards to the respective new displacements of 9,000 and 75,000 tons. The Senate this time objected on the Naval Shipyard expansion was not that urgent and the increase in the capability of the newly built was already enough military spending. Eventually, only the expansion of the Commercial was approved while the Naval was rejected by a vast majority of senators.
Unfortunately, the new plan put a lot of pressure on the already fragile economic system. The Chancellor proposed to increase the number of financial centres on Earth in an attempt of reinvigorating the economy. The talks with the Party representatives went on for weeks as it was never clear where everybody was standing. While some wanted more controlled spending others were more open to a capitalistic approach. The effects of the Great Depression of 29 were still an open scar in many’s hearts and the fear of the same events repeating themselves was high. If it wasn’t for the boost of TN minerals discovery and the unification after the war, the people could have lost everything without the opportunity of bouncing back for decades.
The Chancellor could not wait any longer and decided to risk the vote that could have defined her Chancellorship forever. She could have been a saviour or a doomer in the eyes of many in the electorate. Eventually, by only 2 votes, Iaraina obtained the green light in expanding the financial centres on Earth by 100 units. The final count was 139 in favour against 137 contrary to the motion.
Meanwhile, the 5 new freighters were ready to be deployed and 5 more were to be ordered. The Senate approved the motion to construct the DKM Kikutsuki CRG, DKM Tsuga CRG, DKM Yugumo CRG, DKM Yugure CRG, and the DKM Haruna CRG.
With the new year approaching it was time to renew the requests for the expansion of the guard, the colonization efforts to continue on Luna and to start it on Mars. Still shaken by the economic crisis, on the 1st of January 1936, the Senate approved only the continuation of the efforts on Luna while rejecting the other 2 motions. The Chancellor could not tolerate any longer the approach of the Senate. The Earth-Mars line was ready for more than a year now and further delays would have compromised all expansion plans made by her administration. It was then that she decided to spend some of her political credit saved till then to put a veto on the motion and unilaterally decide to start colonization efforts on Mars.
On the 2nd of February 1936, to thank him for his advice, Chancellor Konovalova promoted Fabian Jentzsch to the rank of Brigadegeneral and assigned him to Earth’s Academy as Headmaster. A few days later, on the 4th a mineral shortage crisis hit hard on Earth. Maintenance facilities were shut due to a lack of minerals with stock levels sitting at the worrying number of 1,119 MSP. Many productions were paused or delayed especially the new freighters construction and all shipyard expansion operations. With the new economic plan just started the treasury was still in the red. Production was then focused on the new Financial centres with the rest of the activities halted.
The biggest fear of the Senate became true and the economy had to be rethought to avoid further damages. Eventually, fuel refineries were shut with fuel in storage counting 5.7 million litres. The situation was made worse by not much luck with the first year of geological survey. So far, there was no trace of TN minerals on Luna, Mars (including its moons), and Mercury. A few deposits were discovered on Venus: Duranium 23,800,032 Acc 0.8 Corbomite 33,055,600 Acc 0.1 Sorium 32,964 Acc 0.1. Due to its similar size to Earth, Venus could have hosted a maximum of 117 mines between manned and automated. On Callisto, a big Mercassium deposit counting 5,692,519 tons with an Acc of 0.8 would have been a good long term source. However, Callisto could have hosted only 30 mines between manned and automated and the idea of using manned mines along with LG infrastructure was being considered.
The 30th of August 1936 was perhaps the hardest day for the Chancellor. Unrest was increasing on Mars and several incidents were reported on many cities of the red planet. The situation become desperate when a few children died while going to school after being caught in a crossfire with the protesters and the local civilian militia. It was time to put some order and Chancellor Konovalova had to pass through the Senate to deploy 1 Urban Battalion urgently to keep the population quiet. With surprise and concern, she saw her motion denied by 246 Senators. Only 30 loyal representatives decided to support her. She moved then into a request to at least provide urgently extra infrastructure to fix the overcrowding issues at the base of the protest but that was rejected as well with the closest result of 123 in favour versus 153 against.
Apparently, the Senate was still upset because they did not want the colony in the first place. However, too many issues on Earth along with the mineral and economic crisis were the formal excuse to dismiss her requests. The reality? That was just payback. The Chancellor was then forced to use another veto thinning a lot of her political credit to counter the humanitarian crisis on Mars. While the Senate could have been seen as beaten, the reality was that with so little political credit left, the Chancellor would have been easier to control and manipulate from that day onwards, and she knew it.
It was not until the 25th of September 1936 that all new infrastructures were installed and order on Mars could be reestablished.
On the 10th of November 1936, news on new minerals discovered on Titan arrived: Duranium 8,282,776 Acc 0.8 Neutronium 859,997 Acc 0.1 Corbomite 191,774 Acc 0.1 Uridium 2,978,800 Acc 0.7. Titan could have hosted 67 mines between manned and automated and a similar strategy to Callisto was considered and drafted.
With all projects halted by the mineral crisis on the 1st of January 1937, the Chancellor asked the Senate only to renew all colonization efforts and to include the new potential colonies of Titan and Callisto. All motions were to go ahead except for Callisto. Without the means to force the hand of the Senate, Chancellor Konovalova thanked the Senators for their understanding and retired into her office.
Finally, on the 21st of April 1937, the economic crisis was being countered by the new centres opened with the treasury finally making progress into partially repaying the debt collected. Still, the lacking of minerals could not allow restarting many of the activities, including refineries. The MSP supply dried out and factories were restarted to allow a small production. The Republican coalition, unhappy with the situation decided that for the next election only one between Jentzsch and Von Prugner would have been allowed to run to do not pick votes from the same nationalist republican pool. The Trade Party had the right to choose its candidate as 2nd majority force in the Republic
The new candidate was Kevin Selig, Administrator of the Industrial Operations Command of the Deutsche Marine. The war enthusiast man, born in the Southern German regions had a surname meaning of a person with a cheerful disposition, from Middle High German selig ‘happy’, ‘fortunate’, or a variant of Salge Jewish: from the Yiddish male personal name Zelik ‘fortunate’, ‘blessed’. This clashed entirely with his arrogant and combative personality. Rumours on his substance abuse issues have not been able to get in the way of his appointment and, on the contrary, his will of making drugs legal as his own personal legislation choice was the reason for his popularity amongst many young voters.
1938 was the Election year. The construction of maintenance facilities resumed helping clear the queue of outstanding jobs along with increasing production of MSP. The expected completion was in February. Colonization efforts were still ongoing only for Titan, with all other colonies stopped by Senate including a new outpost on Callisto. Scarce TN minerals on all bodies in the Sol System was confirmed. Now, the only chance was to have interesting findings in the asteroid belts or some of the comets.
On the 14th of April 1938, the same revolts that happened on Mars were now happening on Titan. Again, the Chancellor asked for extra infrastructures to be dropped on all colonies to prevent issues. However, as a further slap in the face, the Senate approved only new infrastructures for Mars. Iaraina was then forced to use her remaining political credit to approve also the Titan ones and on the 6th of June, the crisis was averted by the drop and installation of all the new low gravity infrastructures from Earth.
To avoid a passive in the government budget, on the 6th of August 1938, the Chancellor halted all projects in the attempt to refill the very low amount of cash and minerals available. Eventually, she also needed to start campaigning for reelection and could not spend more time in the Senate unless extremely urgent.
A few days later the TN Shuttle project was finally ready, however, the general scarcity of resources halted the upgrade of the fleet. Konovalova decided then that also a New Armour technology would have been extremely useful and asked for support for the development after having again raised the problem with TN minerals availability that could be mitigated by a more efficient mining technology. The Senate approved both resolutions quickly.
The current mineral survey mission could not find any Tritanium in the Sol System yet. As the mineral was used mostly as part of missiles and ordnance factories it did not represent a big deal. However, its usage in the production of MSP would have required finding another reliable source soon as the amount on Earth would have been depleted in less than 62 years at the current rate and potentially sooner once the new mining technology would have been developed.
On the 9th of December 1938, the first Civilian Mining company was established. The civilian mining companies would have helped the government with the mining efforts in the Sol System while a plan to get the outposts up to speed was still being developed. Currently, though, the lack of cash did not allow for any of the TN to be purchased. The Company decided then to release the first productions to the free market to generate profits that would have still helped the government with an increase in tax revenue.