The Rise of the Empire

In fact, as early as the early 1880s, in terms of fleet size alone, Germany once reached the fourth level in the world in terms of tonnage! It is second only to Britain, France, and Russia, and the tonnage of ironclad ships is the third in the world, even stronger than Russia. However, with the efforts of other countries, the status of the German navy continued to decline. In 1885, the tonnage of Italian armored ships surpassed that of Germany. In 1886, the total tonnage of the Italian naval fleet surpassed that of Germany. By 1892, the tonnage of Russian armored ships surpassed that of Germany. In terms of the combat effectiveness of iron-clad ships, Germany was stronger than Austria-Hungary among European powers. Some! This is totally unbearable!

In addition, with the launch of new warships by the great powers, the quality of Germany's existing fleet has shrunk rapidly, and many warships have reached the end of their service. These old things have even had many accidents. So even if this plane Bismarck is still in power, he has decided to prepare the empire's navy! There shouldn't be any problems with the federal parliament, and all the states are waiting to get a share of this big construction. What if the Imperial Parliament fails? It doesn't matter, I don't know if it will be dissolved and a new parliament will be elected before passing it.

However, there is a very serious problem now, that is, how to build the navy! The initial development of the German Navy was very chaotic. For their own safety, the Germans needed a strong coastal defense ironclad fleet to ensure that the coastline was not violated. There were colonies overseas that needed to be protected. Or bully European natives or something. So he needed a cruiser formation, and this unlucky kid in Germany was later influenced by the French Green Water School and built a lot of torpedo boats!

It can be said that the ecological structure of the German fleet is very chaotic, influenced by various trends of thought, and there are too many useless and unusable things. There are too few available now! The ironclad ships are backward and cannot match the new warships of various countries, and the cruisers are broken. Let alone the combat effectiveness, the attendance rate is not good enough. The torpedo boats proved not to be as good as the French boasted. So now the question is, where is the German navy? It cannot be said that there is no road in the world, but if there are more people walking, it will become a road!

Now the German navy and high-level leaders are also very entangled. Although they have decided to build a large building, the money that can be spent is still relatively small. Even after William II came to power in history, with the support of His Majesty the Emperor, and Tirpitz running around on horseback, the approval of the budget for the four Brandenburg-class battleships was relatively difficult. But now, the naval fanatic William has not yet come to power, and subjectively, the current board of directors and chief executive officer of Germany are not so determined, so the appropriation will naturally be relatively small. On the other hand, the reinsurance treaty still exists. In the foreseeable future, the relationship between Germany and Russia is not bad. The pressure on naval offshore defense is not great. Therefore, the four Brandenburg-class battleships in history will never appear now, let alone whether there is money, at least there is no need!

Not only Bismarck is relatively amateurish in the navy, but German admirals are also vague in terms of strategy, but they all noticed a problem, that is, Germany's overseas interests need to be protected, and the German cruiser fleet can be described as dilapidated. A pile of 2,000 Tons of wooden cruisers have already been overwhelmed. So far, Germany and the United States are still engaged in a confrontation in Samoa, and they almost fought in the past few years. The colonial Nagada was also not stable. Sometimes it is necessary to communicate with the colonial fleets of certain countries.

Therefore, the prime minister thinks that the cruiser fleet should be updated first. The Imperial Navy Department, which has just been rectified, has expressed support for the Prime Minister’s idea. On the one hand, the German’s overseas fleet needs indeed overwhelm the local security needs. The Russians and the British are friends. Facing the French, Germany’s use of the army will The problem can be solved. Therefore, it is correct to ensure the choice of colonial and offshore interests. On the other hand, because the steel plate incident has just passed, the remaining bigwigs of the Ministry of the Navy are still silent, how can they have the courage to confront the prime minister who has power for a while? Tired of living?

The tone of building cruisers first has been set.

Then the latter problem is even more headache! What kind of cruiser do you build? Is it a patrol cruiser or a protective cruiser? Is it a first-class cruiser with a displacement of nearly 10,000 tons or a second-class cruiser with a displacement of about 4,000 tons? How to set the performance of the cruiser? What about firepower and defense? What is the speed? Well, these things really have to be handed over to the designer, but you always have to set the tone, right? It's like when you go out to buy something, and you haven't said what you want to buy, how can the merchant introduce it to you?

The Navy is holding a lot of banknotes and is still very confused. Discussions were held in full swing, but there was really no result in a short period of time. The folks are also very lively. Under the help of a certain historical celebrity, the atmosphere of the German Empire Navy is much stronger. From the perspective of the traversers, it is even stronger than the navy enthusiasm of later generations. After all, in history There was an emperor aerial battleship in Germany, and later generations have heard of any country's leaders playing SPS...

Originally, this matter had nothing to do with the traversers. Our Prince Ruprecht watched all this with a spectator mood. After all, it is only 1889, and there will be no war in the next 20 years. The ship you are building now Well, it's useless by then. Besides, the talent I want to find hasn't come yet, and the work of setting up a design bureau has just come to a head, what are you busy with? Anyway, Germany's new warship armor steel is provided by itself. First, build the factory and increase production capacity. Anything else, what the heck? Obviously not doing business properly?

However, when our prince picked up a newspaper one day and saw a warship overhead, the feeling of blaming Fang Qiu in the forums and post bar battles came back! For nothing else, this overhead design is well done! Although it does not reach the world's top level, it also represents the development direction of historical advanced productive forces! Nice guy, I like you very much!

The newspaper used a lot of space to introduce a protected cruiser! This is how an author who goes by the name Black Hawk King describes his envisioned warship. With a displacement of 4,500 tons, the sides of the dome are as thick as 100MM. The horizontal part is 50MM. And it has certain defense against artillery, all artillery has 50MM to 100MM armor protection. Equipped with 8 150MM naval guns, among which the bow and stern are double 150MM guns. Another four 150MM guns are arranged at the four corners of the battleship. At the same time, it is also equipped with six 105MM naval guns and a large number of 50MM naval guns to deal with torpedo boats or other small targets, with a maximum output of 12,000 horsepower. The speed is above 20 knots.

"This ship is very good. It has the feeling of a second-class cruiser produced by the later Armstrong. If this ship is pulled out, the later Yoshino may not be able to beat this product. If you want to stabilize the pressure, I am afraid that you will need the Argentine. A 4,900-ton buenosaires is enough. To be able to produce this thing in this era, at least the direction is correct, and it is worth encouraging!" The traverser nodded to express his appreciation!

But as the saying goes, if someone supports it, then someone must oppose it. Someone's design was quickly criticized by a large number of people. Everyone thinks that someone's design is simply ignorance of the shipbuilding industry! And it is claimed that such a battleship will not be sunk at all, because after being launched, the cargo sank into the sea due to its own weight! The sarcasm in the words made the traversers feel very dissatisfied.

"This is a suppression of future designers. What can those old-fashioned guys in Germany come up with? For example, the Queen Caesar Augusta, which will start construction next year in history, has a displacement of 6,218 tons and only four 150-gun guns, 8 There are 105 guns and 4 88 guns! Such a large tonnage coupled with such weak firepower will make the great powers laugh? The Yoshino said that it is not afraid of you. The American Olympic said that it will teach you how to be a man every minute! Said these designers There is nothing wrong with wronging the country and the army!" Prince Ruprecht was very angry and said that he should help the designer!

So, after experiencing the baptism of Internet chatter in the 21st century, and thinking that he is at least an expert in the field of oral ballistics, His Royal Highness personally dictated an article, and then handed it over to a special person to polish it and then posted it to the newspaper! As a result, a war of words quietly kicked off!

Thank you book friends for your reward~~~. A new week has begun, and the author is going to sign a contract this week~~~. Can you guys give me some support? ?