Rise of Empires: Spain.

Chapter 474 Synthesis of Ammonia

While other European countries were frantically expanding their military in preparation for war, Spain remained relatively calm.

Apart from the ongoing naval construction, the Spanish army has no plans to expand. After all, it had only recently increased its army size to 42.4. With the addition of colonial troops and the Janissaries, the total number of Spanish troops has actually reached as many as 75.

Carlo was busy getting close to a foreign scientist and had high expectations for him.

The scientist's name is quite famous: Fritz Haber, an outstanding scientist with both a good reputation and a bad one.

Regarding his fame, in 1909, Fritz Haber became the world's first scientist to produce ammonia from the air, thus ushering in the era of synthetic ammonia and freeing humanity from the passive situation of relying solely on natural nitrogen fertilizers, accelerating the development of world agriculture.

The importance of synthetic ammonia extends beyond agriculture; it can also replace saltpeter in the production of gunpowder. Before the advent of synthetic ammonia, both fertilizer and gunpowder production required large quantities of saltpeter ore.

Unfortunately, the world's nitrate mines are limited. The largest nitrate mines currently come from the Pampas Desert in Chile, and this mining area is firmly controlled by the British.

Because the British controlled Chile's nitrate mines, the importance of synthetic ammonia was inadvertently increased. For Spain, synthetic ammonia could not only be used to make gunpowder, but also to produce fertilizer, increasing grain yields on Spanish farmland and accelerating the development of Spanish agriculture.

These two points alone demonstrate the importance of ammonia synthesis, which is why Carlo attaches such importance to Fritz Haber, the world's first scientist to synthesize ammonia from the air.

Fritz Haber's infamy is actually related to World War I.

As a German chemist, Fritz Haber was highly valued by the German government during World War I, serving as the director of a German chemical weapons factory, responsible for the research and production of poison gases, including highly lethal chemical weapons such as chlorine and mustard gas.

The poison gas produced by Fritz Haber's chemical weapons factory was used by the German government during World War I. These chemical weapons caused nearly a million casualties, and such actions were condemned by scientists around the world.

As the main person in charge of developing and producing the poison gas, Fritz Haber's reputation was naturally not good; at times, his infamy even outweighed his good reputation.

For Carlo, Fritz Haber's infamy was naturally not that important. After all, Haber had not yet manufactured chemical weapons for Germany, and now that he had come to Spain, it was naturally impossible for him to manufacture chemical weapons for Germany anymore.

Regarding chemical weapons, Carlo adheres to the principle that they can be used but not be absent, and still hopes that Spain will conduct relevant research and development.

Spain will not proactively use chemical weapons in war, but if the enemy uses chemical weapons, Spain must retaliate in kind to prevent its soldiers from suffering innocent casualties.

At the same time, developing chemical weapons can also better defend against enemy chemical weapons. Although it is not enough to completely change the situation of soldiers on the battlefield, it can at least enable some soldiers to more calmly think of ways to survive when facing enemy chemical weapon attacks.

Of course, at least for now, what Carlo values ​​most about Fritz Haber is actually his ammonia synthesis technology.

Spain is definitely one of the countries in Europe that needs synthetic ammonia the most, because the land in Spain is too barren, and due to drought, the grain yield per acre is among the lowest in Europe.

If Spain hadn't developed vast tracts of land in West Africa for food cultivation, its domestic food production alone probably wouldn't have been enough to feed its current population.

Although Spain has mined large quantities of phosphate deposits in Morocco and the Western Sahara, and used these phosphate deposits to produce large amounts of phosphate fertilizer to increase domestic food production.

However, these phosphate fertilizers and nitrogen fertilizers made from synthetic ammonia do not conflict, and Spain can certainly use both types of fertilizers to further increase its domestic food production.

As a fairly patriotic German, Fritz Haber was initially uninterested in coming to Spain. However, when the Spanish side offered him a salary he couldn't refuse, Fritz Haber ultimately gave up Germany and chose to take up the post in Spain.

There was no way around it; the terms Carlo offered were simply too tempting.

Carlo promised to build a large chemical laboratory for Fritz Haber, with a total investment of no less than 1500 million pesetas, and to provide Haber with at least 500 million pesetas in research funding each year, without interfering with any of Haber's scientific research.

Based on this, Carlo will also establish a chemical plant specifically for the production of synthetic ammonia and the subsequent manufacturing of gunpowder and fertilizers.

The Spanish royal family, represented by Carlo, will hold a 90% stake in the chemical plant, while Fritz Haber will contribute his technology and hold a 10% stake.

Carlo promised that the investment in the chemical plant would not be less than 5000 million pesetas, and even if Fritz Haber only had a 10% stake, it would still be worth at least 500 million pesetas.

Faced with Carlo's almost blatant offer of money, Fritz Haber simply couldn't refuse. Besides the obvious financial gain, Carlo also personally promised Haber that if the fertilizer made from synthetic ammonia effectively increased Spain's grain production, he would personally bestow upon Haber a title based on his future contributions.

For Fritz Haber, this was already a double win in terms of fame and fortune. The only sacrifice he made was immigrating from Germany to Spain, which was perfectly acceptable to Haber.

After all, Spain is a European country, and at that time, Spain was very powerful and its economy was very prosperous.

For Haber, it was simply a change of environment. Owning his own large chemical laboratory and a 10% stake in a large company was enough to ensure that he and his family would be financially secure for the rest of their lives.

Fritz Haber didn't hesitate much; he quickly accepted Carlo's invitation and, after a series of transfers, finally arrived in Spain.

After being personally received by Carlo, Fritz Haber finally believed that this was not a fantasy, that King Carlo of Spain truly valued him highly, and that all the conditions he had previously offered were genuine.

Since all these conditions were true, Haber naturally had no other ideas. He couldn't wait to immigrate to Spain, shuttling between his villa and his large chemical laboratory, focusing entirely on his experiments.

Carlo naturally valued Haber, a scientist with exceptional talent in chemistry. To expedite Haber's chemical research, Carlo allowed him to choose any chemistry laboratory at any university in Spain as a temporary alternative. His own large chemistry laboratory was already under construction on the day of Haber's arrival and was expected to be fully completed within a year.

To make Haber feel valued, Carlo arranged a villa for Haber that was very close to the laboratory, provided him with several reasonably capable research assistants, and even gave him the laboratory's first year's research funding directly in the form of a check.

This is a check for a whopping 500 million pesetas, which is simply handed to Haber, demonstrating Carlo's high regard for and support of Haber.

Since Carlo valued him so much, Haber naturally had nothing to say and began scientific research on his second day in Spain.

It can't really be considered scientific research; it's actually a replication of his process of synthesizing ammonia in the air, and also a way to prove his abilities to Carlo and Spain.

It turned out that Fritz Haber did indeed have the ability to synthesize ammonia in the air, and by this time he was able to replicate the experimental process quite skillfully, which meant that Spain had the potential to produce synthetic ammonia on a large scale.

When Carlo learned that Haber had replicated the ammonia synthesis process in the laboratory, he did not hesitate at all and immediately ordered the construction of the ammonia synthesis plant to begin.

The synthesis of ammonia plays two crucial roles for Spain. The nitrogen fertilizer produced from ammonia significantly increases Spain's grain production, while the gunpowder produced strengthens its military industry.

With the availability of synthetic ammonia, Spain was able to profit even more from the war effort during World War I. As large quantities of synthetic ammonia were used to produce gunpowder, Spain's weapons and ammunition production could be significantly accelerated.

These weapons and equipment would be sold to belligerent countries during the war, and the revenue earned would be used to expand the size of the Spanish army before it joined the war at a more opportune time.

This was the perfect plan for Spain, allowing them to make a fortune and win the war—a win-win situation for Spain.

To expedite the large-scale production of synthetic ammonia, Carlo also invited Fritz Haber to serve as an honorary professor of chemistry at several of Spain's top universities, aiming to cultivate outstanding chemistry talent for Spain.

Fritz Haber didn't mind taking on a few students, since his chemistry experiments required assistants, and he could only trust the abilities of students he personally taught.

The construction of an ammonia synthesis plant takes time, and perfecting the ammonia synthesis production process will require even more time. According to Fritz Haber's estimate, it will take at least two years to officially begin large-scale ammonia synthesis production.

The good news is that it wasn't too late. Even if it took two years to achieve large-scale production of synthetic ammonia, Spain could have obtained a large quantity of synthetic ammonia by around 1911.

Even if a world war broke out during this period, Spain would still have plenty of time to respond. After all, Spain wouldn't join the war early on. Regardless of who won or lost the world war, Carlos hoped to wear down the European powers and reduce their threat to Spain after the war.

In addition to the construction of the ammonia synthesis plant, a chemical plant, or rather a poison gas plant, was also being built at the same time in a very secretive location.

Although Fritz Haber had historically manufactured poison gas bombs for Germany, Carlo did not intend to include Haber in Spain's poison gas development program in the near future.

The reason is simple: it is currently uncertain whether Haber is one of their own or not, and whether he can keep Spain's secrets and prevent the development of poison gas from damaging Spain's reputation.

Although Spain developed poison gas bombs to defend against enemy poison gas bombs, rather than intending to actively use poison gas bombs to attack the enemy.

However, other countries will not believe such a thing. Once European countries learn that Spain is developing poison gas, in addition to condemning the Spanish government, they will also develop poison gas even more frantically.

This would have made World War I even more brutal and added much uncertainty. More importantly, as the first country to develop poison gas, Spain would certainly have faced the most criticism and slander.

To avoid becoming the most criticized and slandered country, Spain had to keep the process of developing poison gas strictly secret. Ideally, before using poison gas, other countries should believe that Spain had no research in this area at all.

To achieve this goal, all chemists involved in the development of poison gas bombs must be reliable members of their own team.

The requirements are simple: either be a native-born Spanish citizen, or immigrate to Spain and have lived there for at least 20 years and have children.

Only by meeting these two requirements, coupled with outstanding chemical research capabilities, can one hope to join Spain's poison gas bomb development project.

Of course, the Spanish government certainly used a code name to conceal its poison gas development project. The project was codenamed "Air Purification," ostensibly a research group established to address air pollution caused by industrial pollution, but in reality, it was developing poison gas.

To maintain secrecy, the air purification research team will be divided into two parts. On the surface, the research team will indeed be conducting research on air purification, and they are not required to produce any results; simply conducting research is sufficient.

The secret research organization was conducting research on poison gas bombs and secretly producing a batch of them as a precaution.

It would have been ideal if the enemy hadn't used poison gas against the Spanish army during World War I. Spain wouldn't have proactively used such a forbidden weapon either; after all, such chemical weapons are far too cruel, and aside from utterly depraved beasts, no country would likely have used them willingly.

If Spain's enemies had chosen to use chemical weapons against its army during a world war, Spain would have had no choice but to retaliate forcefully.

As Carlo often mentioned in his war mobilization, the Spanish army could bear a lot of casualties, but only if they could inflict even more casualties on the enemy.

Spanish soldiers could be sacrificed, but the sacrifice had to be meaningful and must result in even greater sacrifices for the enemy.

(End of this chapter)