ps: Thank you for rewarding and voting for the students, the second semester of the third year is almost over, and the free time is limited, because there is something that cannot be stably updated, please forgive me.

Xinjing Shipyard and Xinghe Shipyard are located in Xinjing and Xinghe County (Ruoinvia) respectively.

The two shipyards were originally imported from Prussia for shipbuilding equipment, and were founded in early 1869 as two civilian shipyards.

In February 1872, two shipyards were upgraded to military shipyards, and one shipyard was relocated from Xinjing to Xinghe County.

In April 1873, with the help of the technology of Dalman and other French shipbuilders, the Xinjing Shipyard successfully built a gunboat with a displacement of 760 tons, and three months later, the Xinghe Shipyard also built a gunboat based on the experience of the Xinjing Shipyard.

The two shipyards of Xinjing and Xinghe share shipbuilding technology and build warships of the same class in a unified manner.

The research and construction of gunboats and small ironclad ships were carried out simultaneously, and gunboats with a displacement of less than 1,000 tons had lower technical requirements and could be built in a relatively short time, while small ironclad ships with a displacement of more than 1,000 tons had relatively high technical requirements, and it took six years to build them successfully within the scope of Li Mingyuan's acceptance.

The technical monitoring of the first self-built small ironclad ship reached the standard, and the number of ironclad ships of the Han Navy is about to reach six, and the strength will return to the level before the second operation against the Brazilian Navy.

Among the six ironclad ships, excluding a self-built small ironclad ship with a displacement of 1,350 tons, two ironclad ships with a displacement of 3,200 tons are still in the French Mediterranean shipyard and need to be received by the Han Navy, leaving three warships, one is a large ironclad ship with a displacement of 6,270 tons captured from the Brazilian Navy, and the other two are medium-sized ironclad ships with a displacement of 3,500 tons customized from Britain in the early days.

Drawing on the classification of warships in Western countries, Li Mingyuan initially divided the warships of the Han Navy into four classes: battleships, cruisers, light cruisers, and gunboats.

Warships with a displacement of more than 5000 tons are battleships,

Cruisers in the range of 2,500 to 5,000 tons, light cruisers from 1,000 to 2,500 tons, and gunboats under 1,000 tons.

According to the class of warships divided by displacement, the Han navy had a total of one battleship, four cruisers, one self-built light cruiser, seven self-built gunboats, nine gunboats, as well as twenty-five auxiliary ships and thirty wooden steam troop carriers with a displacement of more than 1,000 tons.

The tonnage of gunboats is smaller than that of gunboats, with a displacement of about 200 tons, and they are mainly used for inland river and coastal patrols, and have a limited role in large-scale naval battles.

After the construction of the first gunboat at the Xinjing Shipyard, the navy gradually replaced the gunboats with gunboats with larger tonnage and better performance, and most of the eliminated gunboats were arranged in the Natuna Islands, Songkhla, Kismayo, Mtwara and other transit points near the migration routes, except for some of the remaining gunboats.

Later, with the increasing number of Chinese immigrants, it was difficult for Britain and France to set up trading bases along the African coast to provide sufficient supplies for the fleet, so from April 1872, the immigration fleet first looked for suitable ports on the east coast of Africa, and then used muskets, tea and other commodities to buy the selected land from the local chiefs as a supply base for the migrant fleet.

Small gunboats have lost their usefulness in South America, but in the coastal areas of Africa, the Chinese sailors stationed in the staging posts relied on gunboats to play a significant role.

Personally waiting for the ironclad ship to inspect it, when Li Mingyuan was observing a row of gunboats docked in the harbor, Li Han opened his mouth and introduced, "Your Highness, the last nine gunboats are planned to be retired from active service after four months of service, and the head of the strongholds in Kismayo and Mtwara has applied to the navy to obtain six of the nine gunboats to support them against the local black pirates. ”

"Didn't they report that they had wiped out five small groups of black pirates six months ago, why are there new pirates there?"

Li Mingyuan asked.

"Most of the pirates in the waters near the two places were cleaned up in the crackdown half a year ago.

However, a new group of pirates appeared in the Kismayo waters a few months ago, and their number was much larger than the number of pirates who had been encircled and suppressed, and the head of the Kismayo stronghold reported that the new pirates were more advanced in weaponry than the local pirates, and they had not only muskets, small artillery, but also a small gunboat.

The person in charge of the Kismayo stronghold believes that this group of pirates is likely to be pirates active in the waters of Djibouti, who escaped the encirclement and suppression of Djiboutian pirates launched by the French some time ago and dispersed to the waters of Kismayo. ”

"The speculation of the person in charge of the Kismayo stronghold is very reasonable, after the opening of the Suez Canal, pirates from the areas around the east coast of Africa have flocked to the Red Sea, and in recent years, more than a dozen merchant ships from various countries have been hijacked by pirates in the Red Sea every year."

The Suez Canal is the most important artificial canal in the 19th century, which is 5,500-8,009 kilometers shorter from the countries bordering the Atlantic coast of Europe to the Indian Ocean than the Cape of Good Hope in Africa. 8,000-10,000 kilometers from the Mediterranean countries to the Indian Ocean; For the Black Sea coast, it was shortened by 12,000 km.

Due to its important strategic position and the economic benefits of greatly shortening the distance of ocean-going ships, the Suez Canal has caused competition between the two European powers of Britain and France before its construction has begun.

In 1859, the Suez Canal was initially excavated by the French company, and later the British government used its strong national power to force the French government to share the management of the canal with the British.

In order to maintain its expanding overseas interests and restore France's position as a great power in Europe, the French government, after competing with Britain for the management of the Suez Canal was at a disadvantage, turned to control the Red Sea and deployed military forces in key areas such as Djibouti to hold Britain's control of the Suez Canal hostage.

Under the guidance of this strategy, France first included Djibouti in its sphere of influence, not allowing other countries to get involved, and then regularly eliminated piracy in the waters around Djibouti to strengthen France's maritime control over the Red Sea and the Gulf of Aden.

The French crackdown on piracy did not hurt Han interests on the east coast of Africa, but as the French government strengthened its presence in places such as the Red Sea and the Gulf of Aden, the imminent Italian colonial power posed a great threat to Kismayo.

Although the Western powers have not clearly defined their respective spheres of influence in Africa, according to the tacit understanding between the countries, in Somalia and the Red Sea estuary area, Eritrea belongs to Italy's sphere of influence, Djibouti in western Somalia belongs to France's sphere of influence, and Somaliland in the north belongs to Britain's sphere of influence.

In 1876, the Italian colonists of the Marca stronghold did not recognize the Han occupation of Kismayo on the grounds that they did not recognize the Han occupation of Kismayo, and dispatched 400 Italian soldiers to attack the Kismayo stronghold, the real battle of Kismayo lasted less than a day, the Italian army stormed the stronghold during the day without success, and was defeated by the Chinese soldiers who attacked out of the city at night, and the 400 Italian troops who went out of the expedition were killed 21 people, 45 wounded, and more than 300 prisoners.

The Battle of Kismayo was the first battle between the Han and Western countries, and the Chinese soldiers in the Kismayo stronghold showed their due combat effectiveness, while the Italian army performed poorly.

After the battle of Kismayo, the Chinese troops in the stronghold took advantage of the lack of troops in Marca and occupied the Italian stronghold overnight by boat, and then in the ensuing negotiations, the Han State obtained the recognition of the Han occupation of Kismayo by the Italian government on the condition of returning the captured soldiers and withdrawing from Malca.

Although a formal agreement was signed with the Italians, Li Mingyuan has not relaxed his vigilance against the Italians because he is aware of the characteristics of the Italians in World War I and World War II, and the current Han government is not capable of occupying large tracts of land in Africa, but several transit points near the migration route are very important for the significance of the migration action, and Li Mingyuan will not easily give up the strongholds that the Han State has established.

Thinking of the threat posed by Italy from the issue of piracy in Africa, Li Mingyuan felt the need to strengthen the military strength of the Han State in Kismayo and Mtwara.

"Don't wait for four months from now, six gunboats can be deployed to them now, and in three months, Kismayo will be supported by two gunboats and a hundred soldiers, you remind them on my behalf that the encirclement and suppression of pirates cannot be relaxed, I don't want a single migrant ship to be sunk by pirates, and let them pay attention to the actions of the Italians, and they must not let the Italians take advantage of the loopholes and infiltrate the Kismayo area."

"Your Highness."

Li Han replied.