The four years of Tongzhi were a good year for Guoxinga, with a bumper grain harvest in North Manchuria, the flood was driven away, and even the central finances, which had been tight for five years, had a bit of surplus. However, the supporters of Songun politics, Guo Xing'a and Pi Runmin, were not prepared to use this surplus money to improve people's livelihood. They are ready to let the peasants suffer for a few more years, and they will develop and produce more weapons.

The Army, which has always been the top priority of North Manchuria's investment, has now achieved brilliant results, except for the lack of tank and aircraft support, and has basically reached the level of equipment during the First World War. The high-precision weapons of individual elite units have even reached the level of the early stage of World War II, such as the artillery unit's Zhenguo artifact of 32 times and 15 grenades. And there are still a lot of resources pouring in every day, so there is no need for additional investment on the part of the army.

There is no need for other particularly high-tech fields, because at the beginning of the founding of the country, Guoxinga made a hundred projects related to the fortunes of the country. One hundred important scientific research projects in the memories of Goxinga were included in this project. These projects are all known to Guo Xing'a, but he can't do it alone. Therefore, he gathered all the senior scientific research personnel of North Manchuria, and invested 20 percent of the financial revenue every year to carry out special public relations. Radios, generators, 32 times 15 grenades, carburizing steel, and so on, are all the results of this project. Moreover, with the increasing number of fields involved, the content of Guoxinga's recollection has become more and more extensive, and the actual number of projects in 100 projects has exceeded 300, and it is gradually increasing. This project has already occupied a large number of high-tech talents and funds in North Manchuria, so naturally there is no need for additional investment. What Guo Xing'a and Pi Runmin wanted to do was to use the new results of the 100 projects to improve the existing military strength of North Manchuria, and their goal was the navy.

North Manchuria now has more than 60 warships of various types, and there are 12 ironclad battleships, which can be regarded as the world's most important maritime power. But Goxinga and Pi Runmin are still not satisfied with the navy, because the navy has too many problems with its ships. None of the most bluffing battleships were built by North Manchurian itself, either procured from Britain or stolen from the United States. Most of these ships are products of Britain and the United States more than ten years ago, although they are also steam-powered, but because they are all early products of steam warships, they are not satisfactory in design and practicality. After the transformation of North Manchuria, although it is known as an ironclad ship, it is also mixed with water, and the so-called ironclad is just a wooden shell clad armor, which is far from the real steel battleship. Moreover, the armor and heavy weapon system caused the original design of the battleship to be disrupted, making these majestic battleships very slow, and the big and small problems never stopped. The same is true of the other, slightly smaller foreign trade warships, all with similar problems.

The cruisers and destroyers produced in North Manchuria, on the other hand, are worse than foreign trade warships, and they are completely disposable consumables like convenient chopsticks. Because there was no independent design in the early stage, these warships were designed by foreigners, and North Manchuria loaded a lot of its own private goods on them, so some of the problems of foreign trade warships were all local warships. And for emergency use, the wood used in these native warships is not particularly passable, so it is common for these warships to leak, and even a little more serious trauma can cause them to disintegrate. When the First Rapid Reaction Fleet was engaged in a battle with the Federal Navy, the few battleships that sank, most of which were not fatally wounded, were all scattered by themselves. That is to say, the naval officers from the inland river faction are relatively rough, and if they change to the foreign faction, they will not be able to drive these god ships at all.

The combination of these shortcomings causes the North Manchurian Navy to look very bluffing, but once the actual combat is launched, the effect will definitely be very sad. Guoxinga once deduced that once a large-scale naval battle began, the only thing that the North Manchurian Navy could maneuver to fight was a group of small ships that would break up at any time. Battleships and armored cruisers could only stop in place and fight with others, like sea batteries. Now relying on their own artillery superiority, ordinary shells can't gnaw through the iron armor, and they can mix for a while, as long as other people's shells develop a little in the future, the navy of North Manchukuo will have to stop eating as a whole.

At present, North Manchuria already has basic strength, Guo Xing'a and Pi Runmin have begun to plan a war against Russia to recover their homeland, and the navy is also an important branch of the army to participate in the war. A fleet full of problems will definitely not be able to withstand it, in case Lao Maozi gets the European navy over, Guoxing Ake will be in trouble. Therefore, the navy must use this surplus money in the hands of the government to comprehensively upgrade its ships.

Although Goxinga once drew drawings of high-tech battleships such as the Yamato, Iowa, and Bismarck, those big guys were not suitable for the current Manchurian Navy. One is that the tonnage of these big guys is too large, and there are too many things that need to be matched, even if the resources of the major shipyards are invested in it, the working hours will be very long. Second, this kind of giant is too ahead of the times, and there is no opponent at the moment, so there is no need for Guoxinga to get a chainsaw in order to kill chickens. The money to build a Yamato is enough for Guoxinga to build a small fleet, and the money can't be spent too wastefully.

What kind of warships to produce, Guo Xinga thinks that he should still listen to the opinion of the navy. If the Liuyang faction led by Botun was in Dalian, they would definitely ask Guoxinga to build battleships and seize sea supremacy with absolute tonnage and firepower superiority, but unfortunately Botun was far away in the South Seas. And even if Botun was in Dalian, his opinion could not play a decisive role, because he and all the people of the Liuyang faction had not yet fought a real naval battle. Bian Changdi, who has been running transportation between Vladivostok and the United States all the year round, has more say than Botun, he not only has rich sailing experience, but also has really fought wars, and once had a proud record of smashing the Yankees.

Now the North Sea Fleet in charge of Bian Changdi also has five battleships, but Bian Changdi still doesn't like them, and the run-in over the years has not made Bian Changdi discover the advantages of battleships, but feels that these big guys are useless burdens. There is almost no agreement between the views of the Inland River faction and the Liuyang faction, the Liuyang faction advocates the cannon and the giant ship, while the Inland River faction is more rapid and ruthless, and fast is particularly important.

The dominant idea of the river naval warfare was to overwhelm the enemy with a huge number of clippers and fast guns. In naval warfare, ships must have an absolute speed advantage, and while reducing their own bombed area, they can avoid enemy artillery fire with extremely high speed, and at the same time, they can also strategically achieve the purpose of surprise attack and outflanking. As for armor and the like, it's just a shell for cowards to comfort themselves. While the ship is fast, the cannon must also be fast, covering the enemy with strong firepower and suppressing the enemy's firepower output. Even if the caliber of the gun is sacrificed for the rate of fire, it can add up to the final lethal fire output. As for the battleships, because of their slow speed, they could not keep up with the pace of the high-speed fleet at all, and there was no point at all except for the suppression of fire on shore targets.

Botun of Nanyang also learned of Goxinga's inquiry about the discovery of the development of naval vessels, and immediately sent back a long telegram, demanding that Goxinga follow international practice to develop the idea of large ships and huge artillery. However, Goxinga thought for a while, and threw Botun's opinion into the garbage heap, because he thought of the First Sino-Japanese Naval Battle.

The naval battle in the Yellow Sea between the Beiyang Fleet and the Combined Fleet against the Congo shows that Bian Changdi was right. At that time, although the overall strength of the combined fleet was superior, it was not able to match the cannon giants of Zhenyuan and Dingyuan, and according to the idea of the cannon giants, the Beiyang Navy would have won a decisive victory, but unfortunately the result was not like this. Relying on its superior speed and rapid-fire guns, the Combined Fleet inflicted heavy damage on the Beiyang Navy and almost wiped out all the weak ships outside Zhenyuan and Dingyuan. The final battlefield situation was that the wolves fought the tigers, and it turned into a combined fleet besieging Zhenyuan and Dingyuan.

The results of the Battle of the Yellow Sea fully show that at least before the birth of dreadnoughts, high-speed small and medium-sized warships were also relatively king. Moreover, the combined fleet was also subject to artillery and shells, and the Manchurian Navy had no problem with this, not only could the current artillery penetrate any thickness of armor, but Goxinga could always make weapons such as quilts*. Even if the North Manchurian Navy is small and large, Guoxinga has a way to let the other party enter the soul with one shot. Combined with the current strength of North Manchurian in all aspects, Goxinga decided to abandon the bluffing battleships and locked the future main ships of the North Manchurian Navy on armored cruisers and steel destroyers.

The technology of the three-expansion steam engine in the world is still developing, but the gods who led the hundred projects with their golden fingers developed it first. Each battleship was equipped with this three-expansion steam engine as a power system in the early stage, but because the technology was not mature at that time, the improvement of several battleships was not large, but now the technology has been basically perfected and can be put into use with confidence. With this surging little motor, the high speed that Bian Changdi has been shouting about must be no problem. The hydraulic control device was completed by Guo Xing'a himself, and there were no problems either, and the biggest problem restricting the rate of fire had been solved. The Harbin Arsenal has been researching large-caliber artillery for a long time, but the artillery that meets the range and power requirements are all too heavy, so the army has not been equipped. However, naval guns are not afraid of weight, and the weight of more than a dozen tons is just a small meaning on a warship, so accurate rapid-fire artillery has also landed again.

The rest is the design of the ship, this brand-new weapon, North Manchuria's own scientific researchers can't handle it, and it has to be Goxinga to open the golden finger. However, because of the success of the oxygen* project in the 100 projects, Guo Xing'a was the first to start designing not the cruiser that Bian Changdi was most looking forward to, but a destroyer in the real sense.

A destroyer in the modern sense refers to a small ship with * as its main weapon and capable of carrying out lightning strikes against large enemy ships. Originally, there was also a term for destroyers in the North Manchurian Navy, but it usually referred to cruisers with smaller tonnage, and even some small gunboats were called destroyers. These warships are not really destroyers, they are just the customary name of Gohinga. Because he knew that battleships and cruisers would withdraw from the stage of history sooner or later, and destroyers would be the royal road for the development of future generations, Goxinga was particularly concerned about the development of destroyers. For the time being, Goxinga can't make a high-end cargo like a * destroyer, but according to the definition of normal history, Goxinga can still make the first destroyer.

The Hull structure of the Seawolf-class destroyer designed by Goxinga is modeled after the American Fletcher-class destroyer he learned from the puzzle model of his previous life, and the whole ship is made of steel as the main material. In terms of power system, because there is no steam turbine, two three-expansion reciprocating steam engines can only be used as the main power output for the time being, and twin-shaft and double-propeller propulsion are adopted. No matter how fierce the three-expansion reciprocating steam engine is, it can't compare to the steam turbine, so the speed of the Seawolf class still can't break through 30 knots, and the maximum speed is only 28 knots. Of course, this is already the fastest object in the world at present, and the speed of the world's fastest ship at sea was only fifteen knots. However, because the tonnage of the Seawolf class has reached 2,100 tons, and the tonnage of the full load is close to 3,000 tons, it has excellent seaworthiness and can go out to the ocean to fight. But the destroyer can only be called by the closed door of North Manchuria, because when foreigners see a ship of this tonnage, they will still call it a cruiser.

In terms of weapon systems, Goxinga gave up the prevention and control system of the Fletcher-class destroyers, after all, there are no aircraft yet, and they can only shoot birds if they are equipped with prevention and control guns. The guns were all used as offensive weapons, and a twin 158-mm gun was installed in the bow, four single-barreled 127-mm guns were installed in the secondary gun, and two sets of six-pack 120-mm rocket launchers were installed. The effective range of the above main firepower is more than 7,800 meters, and in terms of firepower alone, it can already crush the vast majority of heavy cruisers in the world. In addition, the Seawolf-class destroyers are equipped with two 527-mm five-pack* launch tubes, two twin 37-mm machine guns, and twelve 12.7-mm heavy machine guns.

It can be said that Goxinga has installed all the good things he can get on the Seawolf-class destroyer, and has also made full use of all the space, although it has almost no armor, but with its own steel hull can also resist a certain amount of artillery fire. The Seawolf-class destroyer is already the top-level destroyer that North Manchurian can produce at present, and unless it encounters a thick-skinned armored battleship, the Seawolf-class battleship is almost invincible.

In terms of the cruiser that Bian Changdi was looking forward to, there were not many materials to choose from in Goxinga's memory. Guo Xinga remembered the parameters of the Zhiyuan ship, but the tonnage of the Zhiyuan ship was only 2,300 tons, which was only a little larger than the Seawolf-class destroyer, and there was no need to start construction alone. But fortunately, Guo Xing'a still remembers the old enemy of the Zhiyuan ship, the Yoshino's parameters. The Yoshino has a displacement of 4,100 tons, which is a suitable option for the North Manchurian Navy, and the level of the Yoshino is just in line with the current industrial technology level of North Manchuria, and there will be no problem with small horses and carts like the Seawolf class.

The cruiser modified from the Yoshino was named the Sea Lion-class dome cruiser, and the hull structure and main parameters were exactly copied from the Yoshino. The standard displacement of the Sea Lion-class cruiser is also 4,150 tons, the length of the ship is 110 meters, the width is 15 meters, the draft is 5.2 meters, the armor deck of the inclined part is 115 mm thick, the flat part is 45 mm, and the gun shield is 115 mm thick; The standard coal carrying capacity is 400 tons, the maximum coal carrying capacity is 1,000 tons, the main engine propulsion power is 15,000 horsepower, two-shaft propulsion, the speed is 23 knots, the endurance is 4,000 nautical miles/10 knots, and the establishment is 360 people. The weapon system consists of four twin 158-mm naval guns, eight 127-mm naval guns, four sets of six-mounted 120-mm rocket launchers, five 527-mm five-pack* launchers, 16 twin-mounted 37-mm machine guns, and 12 12.7-mm heavy machine guns. Aside from the frantic enhancement of the weapon system, this is pretty much the Yoshino, and there is no difference except for the color.

The five battleships of the North Sea Fleet will also enter the port and be reshaped, but after the modification, they will be incorporated into the Bohai Fleet, and the rest of the warships will be taken over by Ma San's United Non-staple Food Firm. Bian Changdi's North Sea Fleet will still retain the establishment of 36 capital ships, but the new fleet will consist of 12 Sea Lion-class dome cruisers and 24 Seawolf-class destroyers. In order to complete the formation of the fleet before the war against Russia, the shipyards in Vladivostok, Dalian, Lushun, Changxing Island and other places are all working overtime and busy.