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Homer shook his head. “With that many men, we’d wind up in a pitched battle with Abd-el-Kader’s clan and all the rest of the Chaambra to boot. We’ll play it by ear. Question around until we find where his encampment is, then decide what to do. It might entail nothing more than snaking into his camp early some morning and rescuing Elmer and getting the hell out without a shot being fired.”

Bey chuckled quietly at that.

After a drawn-out silence, Kenny said, “What was this bit about the Swedes advancing us ten million in gold-backed kronor? I didn’t even know the Swedes were on the gold standard.”

Homer laughed lowly and said, “They’re not, and tried to give us an argument. But we held fast. Ifriqiyah. is going to accept no paper money, as such. There hasn’t been a really stable paper money since the Second World War. The United States got going early in the trend. Following the war, they had most of the gold in the world buried at Fort Knox. Against it, they started printing billions of dollars in paper money, supposedly backed by the gold. They’d soon printed several times as much paper as they had gold. With it, they bought up most of what was valuable in Canada and one hell of a lot of Europe. The gold in Fort Knox began to melt away, as some foreign countries demanded it for the paper they had accumulated. Nothing was backing fifty dollars or so in paper money but the word of Uncle Sam, and after awhile they reneged on that and refused to cover their paper with any gold at all. Obviously, inflation then set in with a vengeance. Everybody seemed surprised that the dollar would buy only a fraction of what it used to. The other countries got wise after a time and began doing the same thing; that is, printing paper money to pay off their debts. So the inflation became world wide. No currency was backed by anything more than the smell of stale urine.”

Kenny said, “What’s all that got to do with the Swedish kronor?”

Homer said, “Like I said, Ifriqiyah isn’t going to accept paper for its raw materials. It might not necessarily be backed by gold; alternative valid commodities are acceptable, such as silver, platinum, uranium and other precious metals. We’d even accept one of the strangest backings of currency I’ve ever heard of. The Bulgarians are the biggest producers of attar of roses in the world. Invaluable as a base for perfumes, of course. They stash large amounts of it in bank vaults and buy commodities abroad backed by the attar.”

Cliff said worriedly, “Trouble is, Homer, we’d soon have on hand all the gold, silver, and platinum in the world. These industrialized nations have to have copper, iron, bauxite, lead, zinc, just as badly as they have to have oil.”

And Homer said, “Don’t worry. We’ll be spending it as fast as we get it. We’ll maintain a balanced budget. We’ll expend each year on imports all that we take in on exports. We want no aid, particularly no military aid, and we want no long term credits. We’ll pay our way as we go. We’ll have temporary credits, working both ways, of course, since it would be difficult to handle international business otherwise.”

Bey said, “The way those trade delegations were beginning to swarm into the vicinity of Tamanrasset, even before we’d taken the town, we’re going to have to spend like crazy to keep up with them. What’ll we be buying?”

“One hell of a lot of things,” Homer told him, statisfaction in his voice. “Road making equipment, oil drilling and refining machinery, mining equipment from prospecting instruments to the most modern mining machinery.”

Kenny growled, “Why don’t we make our own?”

“Because the highly developed industrial nations can do it better and cheaper, they have the technology and the highly skilled engineers, technicians and workers. Later, as we get more settled in, we’ll import refining plants, smelting plants, so that instead of exporting crude oil, we’ll export gasoline and petrochemical products, and ingots of iron and aluminum, rather than iron ore and bauxite.”

Kenny was still in argument. “Why not put up plants to process the aluminum ingots? We could manufacture the products from it that are now being made in Common Europe, Japan and America.”

“Same answer,” Homer said. “Because they’re too far ahead of us already and there’s more than enough manufacturing capacity in the world; in fact, too much.”

Cliff said, “Once we get going, how about aid from us to the other developing countries?”

Homer said slowly, “I’d say, let’s see about that when the time comes but my first reaction is to hang back. Except in extreme cases, such as famine, I don’t believe in it. It doesn’t work, certainly not to the profit of the country getting the aid. The best example is the race between India and China. India, which hadn’t even been devastated by war, the way China was, got its independence about the same time China threw out Chiang Kai-Chek. India received billions from a dozen countries, particularly the United States and the Soviet Complex, in everything from outright grants to long term loans. At the end of thirty years, she was worse off than when she started and up to her ass in debt. China received practically no aid, except a little from Russia in the early years before she split with them. Instead, she put her people to work and at the end of thirty years China was a respected world power. She was no longer threatened with famine and flood. There was a network of railroads, roads and airlines linking the country. The warlords were a thing of the past and China was a single entity for the first time since Kubla Khan and the Mongols. No, I’m inclined to think that every time a developed country offers so-called aid to a developing one, they have some ulterior motive in the background. Backward countries need ‘aid’ from the rapacious advanced ones like they need an extra hole in the head.”

Bey said, “You know, talking about gold, it occurs to me that there’s possibly quite a bit of it in the realm-to-be of El Hassan. Since Carthaginian days the caravans from Timbuktu carried gold across the Sahara. Where did it come from? Where were the mines that the ancients drew their gold from in North Africa? Look at all the gold the Pharaohs had. Where’d it come from?”

Kenny said, “When we get back, we’ll send Cliff looking for it. He’s Vizier of the Treasury.”

Cliff ignored him and said to Homer, “We’ve been talking pretty fast and free about all these raw materials we are going to sell. But how about the companies that currently own them?”

Homer shook his head. “They’ve long since been nationalized, Cliff. When these pseudo-socialist governments took over, or the military dictatorships, the first thing they did was to confiscate national resources. When our people take over, in turn, from them, they remain the property of the state. And at this stage of the game, at least, we’re the state.”

A few miles to the west of Crawford and his hoverlorry a small convoy was approaching. It consisted of a hoverjeep and two desert lorries, with their outsized wheels, suitable for travel over the roughest reg and to some extent through the erg.

Sean Ryan and his company of mercenaries had picked the vehicles up in Adrar, one of the last oases of any size, as they headed down into the complete wastes. Uniforms and weapons, carefully hidden away, with the vehicles, in a small native warehouse, had also awaited them. The uniforms for the three officers were quite acceptable and typical of desert wear. Those of the men differed radically, and no two were exactly alike. For instance, pants ranged from the short-shorts affected by Israeli troops, to the below-knee length type the British customarily utilized in hot climates, to full length khaki or denim trousers usually seen on Americans. It was all part of the cover. They were supposedly a more or less unorganized group of mercenaries who had banded together to offer themselves as bodyguards to El Hassan.