African Entrepreneurship Record

After more than a year of construction, the first new battleship in East Africa was officially launched, making East Africa the second country in the world to own a dreadnought.

Although East Africa built dreadnoughts earlier than Britain, Britain's strong shipbuilding industry and rich shipbuilding experience allowed the British dreadnoughts to be completed three months earlier than East Africa, so East Africa still failed to grab the title of dreadnoughts.

Bagamoyo Port.

The "Perseverance", like a steel behemoth, was lying in the port area. The East African Navy officially took over the battleship. This made Bruce, the commander-in-chief of the East African Navy, and other major naval generals very excited.

Bruce sighed: "The overall idea of ​​the British Dreadnought is basically the same as that of the Perseverance. However, compared with our country, the British shipbuilding technology has a deeper accumulation and more skilled workers. In addition, the British Royal Navy has a century-old foundation, so the Dreadnought Construction started later than Perseverance, but was completed earlier. Although it is a pity, our country is also the second country to own this type of battleship after the United Kingdom. "

Helwain, staff officer of the Navy's Indian Ocean Fleet, said: "The Royal Navy has been the flag of the world's navies for nearly a hundred years. Even if our country's Perseverance is launched earlier than the British Dreadnought, it may not be able to achieve the same momentum as the Dreadnought. Now, Except for us in East Africa, other countries are re-formulating their naval plans with the Dreadnought as the standard. It is conceivable that the Dreadnought will be an epoch-making warship. In future naval competitions, all countries will use the Dreadnought as the standard. "

Even if the Perseverance in East Africa is completed and launched earlier than the Fearless, it is unlikely to attract the attention of other countries, because in the past, the East African Navy could only be considered a satisfactory level among navies around the world.

The Dreadnought is different. The British Royal Navy is the weathervane of all navies and has led the development of the world's navies for almost hundreds of years. Therefore, any changes in the Royal Navy will be closely watched by all countries. In addition, the Dreadnought is inherently epoch-making. The work also has the previous naval battle between Japan and Russia as a reference, so it can easily trigger a new round of naval competition.

Of course, although Perseverance was launched later than Intrepid, it does not mean that no other countries are paying attention.

The Austro-Hungarian Navy sent people to watch the launching ceremony of the East African battleship Perseverance. The in-depth cooperation between the two countries in the naval field also made Austria-Hungary the most familiar with the development of the East African navy.

Austrian Vice Admiral Erich looked at the battleship Perseverance in East Africa with a complex expression, and said to Bruce: "I really envy you. Although the Perseverance was launched a little later than the Dreadnought, the performance of this battleship is comparable to that of the Dreadnought. I'm afraid it's not too much of a concession. After all, the standard displacement of the dreadnought is less than 20,000 tons. The standard displacement of your country's Perseverance alone is more than 20,000 tons. And I heard that you also have the Bagamoyo, which has a lot of technology. It has been applied in advance, and I think this battleship Perseverance should have made great progress based on this.”

"Back then, the East African Navy was established with the help of our country, but now it has surpassed our navy by so much, which is really embarrassing."

The more this happens, the more the Austrian Navy feels sad. The East African Navy can be said to be the apprentice of the Austrian Navy. Now that the teacher has stagnated and is surpassed by his apprentice, no one will feel too good.

Bruce patted Erich on the shoulder and said: "The East African Navy's current achievements have a lot to do with Austria's help, and the unsatisfactory development of the Austrian Navy in recent years is not the fault of your naval department. In the final analysis It’s all about money. The same was true for our East African Navy before. Without funding from the top, it would be difficult to maintain the original size of the navy, let alone the Perseverance.”

Bruce's consolation had no effect. What he said only aroused Erich's anger even more: "It's all the Hungarian guys who are holding us back. If the Hungarian Parliament hadn't agreed to increase the naval military budget, the Imperial Navy would have walked out of Admiralty long ago. Sea of ​​​​Eria, but now it is suppressed by Britain and France. "

In the previous life, the main enemy the Austro-Hungarian Navy dealt with was the unified Italy. A unified Italy was naturally the naval power in Europe. At least there was no problem in suppressing the land-power country of Austria-Hungary.

In this time and space, only half of Italy is left, so it is naturally unable to participate in the naval competition, nor can it pose a threat to the Austro-Hungarian Empire like in previous lives. This is obviously good news for the Austro-Hungarian Empire.

However, without the threat of Italy, the development of the Austro-Hungarian Navy was more suppressed by Hungary. Therefore, it was naturally difficult for the Austro-Hungarian Navy to develop, and it sat on the bench like the previous East African Navy.

As for the British and French navies in the Mediterranean, they are already naval powers. The Austro-Hungarian Empire has absolutely no "confidence" in the face of such a competitor. If it were an evenly matched opponent like Italy, perhaps the Austro-Hungarian Navy would not be able to defeat them. So decadent.

This is also easy to understand. After the reunification of Italy, Italy was definitely the enemy of the Austro-Hungarian Empire. It is not an exaggeration to say that the relationship between Britain and France and the Austro-Hungarian Empire was "collaborative" in history. Although there was competition, there was also a lot of cooperation. And because of the distance, the relationship between Austria-Hungary and the two countries is not as rigid as Germany.

Bruce: "The Austro-Hungarian Empire is one of the important power leaders in Europe. The development of your country's navy does not keep up with the current progress of the naval competition."

In the 1990s, the East African Navy seemed to be sitting on the bench just like the Austro-Hungarian Navy. In fact, the core of the development of the two navies was completely different.

On the surface, East Africa’s navy no longer expands on a large scale, but it strongly supports the development of its own shipbuilding and military shipbuilding industries. The expansion of the East African navy is slow, but the naval ships have been successfully replaced, so the East African navy has been in development, while the Austro-Hungarian navy is truly stagnant.

Especially in the field of shipbuilding, East Africa carried out "localization" integration of its own shipbuilding industry in the 1990s, which made the localization rate of East African shipbuilding industry reach 70%, and the military shipbuilding industry has achieved complete localization.

On the other hand, although the Austro-Hungarian Empire also has the ability to manufacture pre-dreadnoughts, many key equipment needs to be imported from the United Kingdom or other countries. If it is in peacetime, there is naturally no big problem, but if the foreign trade between the Austro-Hungarian Empire and Germany is cut off by the Allies like in the previous World War I, this is definitely a huge blow to the Austro-Hungarian Empire’s shipbuilding industry.

Of course, the development of the Austro-Hungarian Empire's shipbuilding industry is closely related to the national conditions of the Austro-Hungarian Empire itself. Although it is one of the most powerful countries in the world, the Austro-Hungarian Empire has never been a naval power in the traditional sense. At least in terms of national development, it focuses more on the army.

At the same time, as one of the industrial powers in Europe, the Austro-Hungarian Empire is actually only a semi-industrialized country like East Africa. Its land area is relatively large in Europe, but its resource situation is not necessarily much better than that of Germany.

Take the Austro-Hungarian Empire's industry as an example. It is concentrated in Bohemia, which is Czechoslovakia in the past. It is also a helpless move.

After all, Bohemia is on the edge of the Austro-Hungarian Empire, and the political core of the Austro-Hungarian Empire, Austria and Hungary, are relatively scarce in terms of resources. On the other hand, Germany, in addition to the Ruhr area, also has the Silesia Industrial Zone in the east and the Saarland Industrial Zone in the west.

The Bohemian Industrial Zone concentrates nearly 70% of the Austro-Hungarian Empire's industry. If the Bohemian Industrial Zone falls, it will definitely be a heavy disaster for the Austro-Hungarian Empire.

From the perspective of the distribution of industrial areas, East Africa and Germany are much more resistant to war than the Austro-Hungarian Empire. That is to say, the Bohemian region in the north of the Austro-Hungarian Empire was integrated into Germany relatively early. In addition to the Czechs, there were also a large number of Germans. Otherwise, Bohemia might have become independent like Hungary.