Chapter 1132: Final Preparations

  Chapter 1111: Final Preparations
The world was cruel, and in the midst of fierce international competition, there was even less room for half a bit of warmth.

For the sake of their own interests, the tsarist government decisively chose to abandon the European countries, a time Madrid is the wind.

No matter how much decline, as the gatekeeper of the Great Powers of Spain, is a continental power, the influence of Europe can not be underestimated.

As the world’s oldest three Russians refused to come forward, naturally deferred to the head of the oldest four Spain.

Although Spain’s fourth power of the name, some of the name is not true, but can not afford to competitors do not give strength.

Pick the tall one inside the short one, once bullish Spanish kingdom, still more recognized by the outside world than never bullish Japan and the United States.

Not only the European countries are encouraging Spain to come out to lead the “non-siding movement”, even Britain, the United States and other countries are also knocking on the back.

Overnight, the Spaniards seemed to have returned to the time of their destiny, and became the trendsetters of the times.

Unlike the Russian Empire, which was deeply tied economically, the penetration of the Shiloh into Spain was relatively limited, far from being able to influence the government’s decision-making.

Along with the international situation, the British have changed their strategy, from pulling people on board to agitating for countries to remain neutral.

The one that wanted them to take sides now was actually the Holy Roman Empire. Theoretically, as long as the pressure from the government in Vienna was resisted, the No Standing Campaign was a success.

If the Spanish government was ambitious, now was the best opportunity. As long as it operated well, it was entirely possible for Spain to become the fourth pole of Europe with the support of various countries.

As a big country, ambition is definitely there. Unfortunately, ambition needs strength to support, Spain does not have the strength to become the fourth pole, even with the support of all countries.

As a matter of fact, the Spanish government can’t even keep its head above water. The European countries were encouraging them to lead the “Neutrality Movement” on the surface, but secretly they were constantly colluding with the Vienna government.

Other countries aside, Sardinia, Belgium, Tuscany …… these God Luo a hand up the little brother also ran to participate in the “neutrality movement”, sure is not over to make trouble?
In case their own side just out of the head, the following gang of little brother ran to stand in line, is not a tragedy.

This kind of thing is not impossible, don’t look at the current “neutrality movement” sound and powerful, in fact, sincere participation is not a few.

Many countries that do not have a choice and must take sides are just following blindly and making a fuss.

Now jump out to make a fuss, mainly to brush up the sense of presence, enhance their own impression in the eyes of the boss, in order to sell a good price.

The only countries that really want to be “neutral” are the Netherlands, the Nordic countries, and some other countries on the North Sea that are worried about turning their own homes into battlefields.

For many other countries, the war between Shinra and Britannia will not have a great impact on them.

Although the overseas import and export trade will be affected, but they themselves are not a big country in the sea trade, the impact is quite limited.

The most crucial thing was the geographical location, from the very beginning it was decided that they had to take sides, even who they supported was chosen for them in advance.

Once the direction of standing in line has been determined, what kind of position should be taken to stand in line is likewise a question worthy of deep thought.

Along with the windy international situation, the diplomatic game is still continuing, but this is no longer the focus of Franz’s concern.

The struggle for hegemony between Britain and Austria, in the final analysis, is still the competition of comprehensive national strength. If not for the gap between the two sides’ national strengths, Shinra would not have launched a challenge at this time.

Vienna Palace, from Franz’s serious expression can be seen, the documents in his hands must be unusual.

After a long time of work, Emperor Franz, who had carefully read the document, slowly opened his mouth and said: ”Since the third generation of large merchant ships has been completed, it will be delivered to the shipping company for use as soon as possible.

The situation is now tense and war is imminent. We must strive to grab as much strategic materials as possible to the colonies before the war breaks out.

The six empty ship platforms, all mount super battleships. Wait for these supplies to arrive at the colonies before announcing the news to the public.

Also, the submarine formation is ready to depart. Although we don’t know when the war will break out, it’s always right to prepare in advance.”

There was no doubt that the “third generation large merchant ships” here were definitely not large merchant ships in the true sense of the word.

If it was just a pure merchant ship, even if it had superior performance, it wouldn’t have made Emperor Franz so nervous.

Especially at such a critical moment in the arms race, it would be even more unusual for merchant ships to be able to grab docks with battleships.

It’s not normal, but on the surface, these big guys are indeed merchant ships. If you don’t believe me, these merchant ships are still pulling goods out.

Not to mention the intelligence officers can not figure out the situation, even the Vienna government in many people are puzzled.

“Strategic fraud”, obviously not right ah! Have reached such a point now, do not go all out to build warships, in case of a real fight, that is to suffer great losses.

If you can’t figure it out, you can’t figure it out. Anyway, Franz couldn’t possibly explain it. In order to keep it a secret, the matter of the carrier disguised as a merchant ship was known to only a limited number of people in total.

Even the cabinet members were not all aware of it, not to mention the others.

From the very beginning of the project, the route of ordering merchant ships by state-owned enterprises was taken, and there was no financial allocation at all, not to mention that it had nothing to do with military spending.

Until the construction was completed, the shipyard engineers did not know that they had built an aircraft carrier, at most, they only thought that the design of this merchant ship was a little different.

In the history of the shipbuilding industry, there have been so many alternative oddball designs that people don’t care to add another one.

As a matter of fact, the history of the development of aircraft carriers in the Holy Roman Empire also had some years of history. Only it had never become mainstream.

Prior to this, the carriers built were mainly used to carry airplanes for scouting and intelligence, and were not considered for combat at all.

There are many reasons for this, mainly two major aspects. On the one hand, the performance of aircraft these days can not keep up with the bombing of moving targets when the hit rate is touching; on the other hand is the sea wind and waves, carrying the aircraft is easy to collision.

Along with the progress of science and technology, the airplane has overcome the technical difficulties of dive bombing, the hit rate has been greatly improved, the actual combat attack power greatly increased.

The problem of aircraft carrier resistance to wind and waves has not been completely solved, but there is also a great improvement. A dozen levels of wind and waves can not top, but in the face of eight or nine levels of wind and waves at least will not sink.

If the technology can reach this point, it already has full combat value. The bad weather of gales and waves is always rare, and if you really meet it, you can only recognize your own bad luck.

Most of the time, aircraft carriers are able to play combat. As long as you don’t go to the windy and rough seas, the combat power of the carrier and battleship combination is absolutely not to be underestimated.

In contrast, the secrecy of submarines was not as high. The whole world knows that Shen Luo has a submarine fleet, but no one knows the exact size.

To this killer hidden in the deep sea, the outside world actually doesn’t think much of it, and can even be said to be ignoring it.

On the one hand, because of the submarine’s limited range, it was difficult to participate in the main naval duel; on the other hand, the undersea situation was complex and inherently intimidating.

In the past years, it was mainly France and Austria who spent a lot of money on the development of submarines. Along with the defeat of France, all of these technologies fell into the hands of Shinra.

Based on the principle of low-profile and prudence, for a long time Shen Luo’s submarine force seldom showed up, leaving the outside world with the impression of being mysterious all the time.

If not in recent years power system technology breakthroughs, the submarine’s range has increased dramatically, it is estimated that this mysterious force will continue to be mysterious.

Water range since needless to say, will not be worse than ordinary warships, the key is still underwater range.

At present, the Shen Luo Navy is equipped with the Sea Wolf, underwater range has been close to one hundred nautical miles, able to lurk underwater for three days.

This kind of data, compared to the later generations of nearly unlimited range, only affected by the officers and men’s heart factors of the nuclear submarine, naturally, is not worth mentioning.

But now, it is a qualitative breakthrough. Already has a practical role, especially for attacking merchant ships is no disadvantage.

“Alright, I’ll implement it when I turn around.”

After a pause, Frederick asked, “It’s just father, are these preparations of ours really useful?”

It was no wonder Frederick had doubts, the aircraft carriers and submarines that Franz was now spending huge amounts of money on were different from the mainstream of contemporary navies.

There is no way, the combat power of the aircraft carriers and submarines have not been proven militarily, on the contrary, the battleships have been running across the oceans for many years.

If the money spent on developing aircraft carriers and submarines were to be smashed into battleships, the Divine Law Navy’s would be able to add another dozen or so mainstay ships.

Franz shook his head and said, “I don’t know! But it’s better to be prepared than unprepared. The Royal Navy’s advantage is so great, how can we surpass it without some new gadgets?

It’s not like you don’t know how closely the British are watching us, it can be said that every additional main ship will cause a storm.”

It wasn’t a complete lie, Franz really didn’t know if these preparations would work.

If the Shinra Navy was lucky enough to dry out in a duel all at once with the

Royal Navy, all these preparations would be useless.

Only if the Armageddon was lost could these preparations come into play. By striking the British maritime trade lines, they weakened Britain’s war potential.

Of course, these words fell on Frederick’s ears and were interpreted differently.

After all, not being a traveler, no one can accurately judge the future direction of naval development. Carriers and submarines that have not proven themselves in naval battles naturally do not give enough confidence.

……

London.
Despite the early preparation, the atmosphere of the British government was tense when the news of the Tsarist government’s decision to side with Shinra came.

At this moment, Prime Minister Campbell’s mood is the same as the weather in London – “look out of the window, all the fog”.

Since ascending to the throne of the Prime Minister, – Campbell sighed more times than the sum of the past decades combined.

“If you are not in charge, you don’t know how expensive it is; if you are not prime minister, you don’t know how rotten the British Empire is.”

In the eyes of the outside world, the British Empire is in the ascendant, in Campbell’s eyes, there is only “rotten”.

There is no way, too many people care about the merits of Britain; as Prime Minister Campbell, can only care about the defects of this country.

It is not that Campbell is biased, it is mainly because of his duty. “Identifying problems and then solving them” is the function of the government itself.

The main reason for thinking Britain “sucks” is that Campbell has identified the problems but has been unable to solve them.

In order to avoid further deterioration of the situation, in order to preserve Britain’s world hegemony, now he can only take the most extreme measures – war.

For a politician to make such a choice was undoubtedly a failure. But reality was in front of him, and there was no room for -Campbell to hesitate.

The curtain of the arms race had already been drawn, and the longer it dragged on, the more unfavorable it would be for Britain.

“The situation in Europe is already clear, and along with the Russians taking sides, the neutrality movement that we have pounded up will soon break down.

We can only accelerate our pace next, or we’ll have to confront the entire continent when Vienna has squared off the European countries.

How far has the Foreign Office operation progressed, and which countries will support us once war breaks out?”

The heavy voice spoke of the unrest within -Campbell.

The topic of war was just too heavy, especially a war with a big country, no one dared to take it lightly.

Adam, who was the foreign minister, was even more depressed at the moment.

The Russians siding with Shinra was an expected thing, after all, they were only halfway through their division strategy and hadn’t yet had time to disassociate themselves from Russia and Austria.

Even if they were to be held accountable, it was logical that they should be held accountable for their predecessors, or former predecessors. It was because of their inaction that the Russo-Austrian alliance was perpetuated.

However, politics is cruel. Whether it was the predecessor, or the former predecessor, or the former former predecessor who had landed safely, he was sure to take the blame.

If it was just this one bite, it would have been fine, the problem was that the Russians’ stand brought about a chain reaction that directly affected the stand of the countries.

So many pots together smashed down, put on the body of anyone can not afford to carry, Adam only feel his life “future is not bright”.

At this point, Britain still has the hope of winning the war, but as Britain’s foreign minister, Adam absolutely no room to turn around.

Accidentally became the British Empire’s worst foreign minister, Adam is now left with regret.

Obviously the resignation letter has long been submitted up, but unfortunately the parliament does not approve, hard to press him to take the blame. If he had known that it would come so soon, he would have used extraordinary means.

Look at the previous Secretary of State for War, because a few days ago in the inspection of the barracks when the horse fell injured, is now a deputy to the top of the post.

No matter how miserable one may be deep down, the work still has to be carried out. Even for the sake of a secure life for the rest of his life, Adam had to let go and take credit for clearing his name.

After adjusting his emotions, Adam slowly said, “The Ministry of Foreign Affairs has signed secret treaties with eight countries including Japan, the United States of America, the Republic of Colombia, and Chile …….

If needed, we can form a nine-nation allied army to deal with the Austrians.

On top of that, we have contacts with the Russian Empire, Spain, Holland, and the Nordic Federation.

Although we weren’t able to bring them together, we were able to divorce the countries’ feelings with the Holy Roman Empire. At least it can be guaranteed that when war breaks out, the countries will not fully support the enemy.”

Such a result was obviously not able to satisfy the crowd. But being able to make it this far, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs had really tried their best.

No matter what you say, when countries make strategic choices, they will always prioritize “interests” and “strength”.

As Britain has the advantage of sea power, it is natural that it can do no harm in overseas diplomatic operations. However, there are also conflicts between countries overseas, and once you have one, you can’t have another.

Otherwise, even if an alliance is formed, it will be an alliance of contradictions, and will be busy with internal conflicts every day.

In Europe, not to mention, not to mention their limited voice on the continent, and Britain and have a grudge is everywhere.

Pulling an enemy to fight another enemy, such a god operation, really not ordinary people can accomplish.

Especially now facing an enemy that is also a diplomatic powerhouse with rich experience in pulling allies, it would be even more difficult to maneuver.

As a person in the know, Campbell naturally would not intentionally make things difficult at this time, destroying the unity of the leadership team.

Opening his mouth to ease the atmosphere, he said: ”The work of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs is still good, and it is enough to be able to make it this far.

The next step is to look at the performance on the battlefield, as long as the Navy is able to fight in the early stages of the war, I believe that the European countries will be re-selected.

The Holy Roman Empire’s unrighteous behavior of relying on the threat of force and strong-arming countries will eventually be punished by God ……”

“Ding ding ding ……”

Without waiting for Campbell to finish his sentence, the phone rang suddenly, and all eyes were attracted to it.

You have to know that the cabinet meeting is strictly confidential, and any idle people are prohibited from disturbing it during the meeting.

Unless there was a particularly important matter that needed to be contacted, it could be done by the staff outside by dialing the dedicated phone line on the desktop.

Undoubtedly, such a coincidence rarely happened, and even if there was an emergency, it wasn’t as if it couldn’t wait for an hour or so.

So this dedicated phone is pretty much just a decoration, and it doesn’t necessarily ring once a year.

It was precisely because this phone rarely rang, so every time it rang, it was accompanied by an earth-shaking event.

Casually picking up the phone, Campbell’s cold voice rang out, “This is Campbell, what’s the matter say it.”

“Your Excellency Prime Minister, something has happened in the African region ……”

(End of chapter)