Empire of the Ring

Several days after the official launch of the Kazakh Kingdom, the National Assembly was also launched.

The senate was made up of 14 members, one for each state, and the House of Representatives was made up of 60 members, one for 300,000 people. The nine minority representatives were promoted as senators.

The bicameral system should, in principle, establish a balance of power—but in Kazakhstan, the Senate was given many advantages in terms of authority and serving time compared to the House. It was to keep the House in check because young and inexperienced representatives could make rash judgments and tended to fall into corruption. National Assembly prioritized adopting the anti-corruption law and droving out the remnants of socialism.

Civil organizations needed to change mostly. Strict working hours were basic, and the government introduced a system of responsibility of work to revise the practice of late handling of civil documents. Civil servants used to be lazy to process submitted documents with lame reasons such as; officials not in their seats during office hours, inadequate supportive documents, and etc.

The government was trying to get rid of the chronic socialist ills.

Officials who neglect their duties would be referred to the disciplinary committee regardless of their position.

As the new system was adopted, the culture of officials that took a long time to process things asking for unnecessary documents and asked money from civil petitioners slowly disappeared. It was only possible because officials started getting paid properly by the government. Of course, it was only quickly adopted because corrupt officials were removed from their posts before the National Assembly opened.

Youngho was having hectic days with follow-up work.

He had to appoint a prime minister to succeed in the government, and other tasks were piled up as well. But, he could not find someone that deserved to be the prime minister of the country.

“Eriksson, is there any person you’d recommend for the first prime minister?”

“I’m thinking about General Kasim.”

“I don’t know if a soldier can exercise political power very well.”

“Since you are behind him, there won’t be much problem if the government is managed well. The members of the National Assembly are all beginning politicians. They’re bound to follow you. Now in Kazakhstan, politics needs someone to pursue a strong reform after a revolutionary government rather than having strong political power.”

“Kasim is packing to go back to the military. I’m afraid he won’t agree.”

“The only person who is recognized by the people now is General Kasim. We must persuade him.”

“I’m not sure if his simple personality will make it on the international political stage.”

“It can be an advantage because he’s very simple and not greedy. Isn’t it the international community’s atmosphere these days to be blunt without the need for a diplomatic investigation?”

Eriksson believed that Kasim would push ahead with any plan because he was full in his military spirit. When people confront the ministers of the great powers, some would be intimidated and were unable to show their strength, but the former soldiers would not be intimidated at all.

Since Eriksson used to work in the international community, his remarks were reliable. Kasim was a person who said what he wanted to say without concealing his mind, so it could be a good match.

When Youngho was agonizing over how to persuade General Kasim, Park Jong-il knocked on the door of his office.

“Greetings, Duke.”

“No one is here. Please don’t do that. You have a tendency to make fun of me secretly.”

“Oh, what should I call Duke if I don’t can’t call Duke, Duke?”

“Hey, stop it.”

“You think I’m doing this because I like to do so? I can’t help it because I have eyes watching me. Man, I cringe whenever I say it.”

“What’s the reaction of the people?”

“I heard everyone likes the change. It’s not just that civil servants that have changed, but people like that police officers are not seen so often since they’re at the Russian border area right now.”

“Are the combat police officers working fine at the border area?”

“They have no choice but to work hard unless they want to lose their job.”

“We’ve doubled the number of soldiers because of them. We’d be able to train them for tanks or armored vehicles.”

“To be honest, we don’t have enough people to cover the entire Russian border. We need at least 200,000 people to roughly block that long border.”

“The Russian border should be blocked with the eloquent tongue. If we develop our Air Force properly, we’ll only need a few police officers on the border.”

“So let’s rush the import of the fighter jets. Let’s get rid of the former president’s slush fund and strengthen the Air Force first.”

“Don’t worry. It’s going well. Look forward to seeing the new helicopter and fighter jet assembly plants operate in the royal territory next month.”

Kazakhstan shared borders with five countries. The Russian border was 6,845 kilometers long, the border with China was 1,533 kilometers long, the Turkmenistan’s was 379 kilometers long, the Kyrgyzstan’s was 1,224 kilometers long, and the Uzbekistan’s was 2,203 kilometers long.

In a way, it was impossible to protect the borders that were about 12.185 kilometers long combined. Since the situation was like this, the Russian border, which was the longest, should be blocked through political negotiations. However, the Chinese border should be protected no matter what. Although the Chinese border was 1.533 kilometers long, most of it was blocked by the Tian Shan Mountains, so if only some areas were blocked, China’s way to Central Asia would be easily blocked. There was a mountainous path that was connected to Kyrgyzstan but it was extremely rough. The Pamir Plateau under it was also harsh. So, Xinjiang Uygur was China’s limit.

Youngho planned to stir up Xinjiang Uyghur so that China would not dare to come near Central Asia. If it crossed the border anyway somehow, it would be hard to have a battle in a place where it was semi-deserted. Even before he crossed the mountain range, the special force of the autonomous state which was the royal bodyguards would take care of it.

***

“General Kasim, how can you not understand your wish to go back to the military? But you have to do something more important than that. Let’s leave the military to junior officers and how about working on the international stage together?”

“The only foreign country I’ve been to is Russia for studying abroad. My English is poor, so I’m not suitable for the international stage. Why don’t you put advisor Eriksson for that job? He has a Ph.D. and a lot of experience in the world, doesn’t he?”

“How can we put a non-Kazakh citizen in the Prime Minister’s seat? And he’s not fit for the position because he already belongs to another institution.”

“I don’t know if I can do it well.”

“There will be no problem if you keep doing what you’ve been doing. You’ll make a good prime minister who will be remembered for generations.”

“I just hope that I don’t make mistakes.”

“Governments of Europe such as Sweden, Denmark, and Britain will be able to help us, and the U.S. will be a strong background for us. The only countries we have to care about are Russia and China.”

Youngho had to visit Russia immediately to put out an immediate fire. This was because he promised that he would visit Russia when the coronation took place. It was desirable for Kazakhstan to maintain a pleasant relationship with Russia as much as possible.

“Dealing with Russia and China will be our priority. On the diplomatic stage, words are like a bullet on the battlefield.”

“I’ve been a soldier my entire life. I’m worried that I mess up because as a soldier, sometimes my actions are faster than words. I should meet Putin soon. I don’t know what to talk to him.”

“Don’t worry about Putin, I have a connection in Russia. He will be our middleman.”

“He must not be a political figure.”

“No. He’s a mob boss of southern Russia.”

“…”

“Oh, my explanation was too short. He used to be a mafia boss, but now He’s a big business entrepreneur.”

“I can’t believe you are close to the mafia. It sounds like you know all sorts of people.”

“When you’re in business, you meet all sorts of people. He is just one of those people.”

***

Kazakhstan’s oil reserves were the world’s 12th largest with 30 billion barrels, and natural gas was the world’s 15th largest. Moreover, all kinds of important mineral resources were stored in the country. This was why Kazakhstan was called a resource-rich country. Especially, wheat and other agricultural products from Kazakhstan were more than enough to feed the whole of Azerbaijan or Turkey.

Youngho, who had been looking at various statistics, looked up.

On his opposite side, someone was staring at him.

It was Suh Min-seok.

“Duke, you didn’t know Kazakhstan was a country like this?”

“You still didn’t know I was a believer in statistics? I already knew about this since I decided to settle here.”

“But you had no idea about rare-earth elements. It had not been discovered until recently.”

Suh Min-seok’s face looked proud like a kid. Youngho did not know about the discovery of the rare-earths. Only China and some countries were known to have rare-earths. It was good news that Kazakhstan also had it since it was a rare mineral that was used to make high-tech products.

“Are you that happy that we found the rare mineral in Kazakhstan?”

“Of course, I am proud that we’ve got a tremendous amount of resources.”

“Even though other countries are trying to get us because of that?”

“Well, we’ve got nothing to fear since we’ve got you and our royal territory will soon have armored vehicle and fighter jet assembly plants.”

“You’ve become bold since you’ve been following me.”

“I’ve risked my life following you to revolutionize.”

If someone heard him, he would think that he had joined the revolution with his own gun.

Min-seok was reluctant to leave the office even though his work was done. So, Youngho asked why.

“What is it? What do you want to say?”

“You told me that I can have a wedding when the revolution was finished.”

“No one’s stopping you. What’s wrong?”

“I just don’t know what to do because In-hwa is the secretary of the Queen.”

“There’s no one that says the Queen’s secretary shouldn’t get married.”

“She is afraid that her wedding will interrupt her work. Also, she doesn’t want to stay apart right after getting married. She’d rather have the wedding later.”

“I see. She wants to get married, but she doesn’t want to affect the work. Then, why don’t you go to the Arirang Autonomous State for a few years? Commissioner Kim needs someone to assist him anyway.”

“May I?”

“There’s a condition in place of that. Don’t think about returning here until you have more than two children.”

“What? That’s not something I can do on my own.”

“Resources are not enough to develop Kazakhstan. People are priority.”