With the approval of the Imperial Parliament to form a government department for the management of the colony and the beginning of preparations for the scientific expedition and exploration team, many industrial giants that have developed in the empire are full of interest, and when they learned of the "sponsorship" of the enclosure by His Royal Highness the Imperial Grandson, they couldn't help but sigh that His Royal Highness also had wonderful ideas in business. Therefore, they have also expressed their willingness to sponsor the scientific exploration team, although they cannot directly enclose the land like Jochen, but they can have the right to have priority to obtain intelligence and priority development, which is definitely a small venture investment with a high return value for these giants. With a considerable amount of sponsorship, the Empire also decided to increase the number of expeditions and exploration teams, and of course the number of troops accompanying them to protect them skyrocketed, and these troops would also be subordinate to the colonial armed forces in the future.

In the name of sponsoring the expedition and protecting their army, Jochen took the opportunity to launch a new product for the company, a videographer's vest, which was a convenient vest with plenty of pockets for those who were out and about, and as the German expeditioners ran around, this vest would be accepted by other personnel of a similar nature. What's more, this vest can be turned into a tactical vest for the military with a slight modification. In addition, a full set of military uniforms suitable for use in desert areas has been launched, using the US military's three-color desert camouflage (referred to as Sansha), including DCU training uniforms, M65 windbreakers, pennies, Arabic scarves and shorts. Pants. In addition, the previously developed Type 1884 individual carrying equipment, backpack and military boots have also been specially developed in a sand-colored version (previously all olive green). The zipper that I developed earlier is just in use, too. In addition, the military uniform has also been improved accordingly, first of all, there is no Velcro, only buttons can be used, the material is still made of canvas instead of nylon, and the Gen2 combat uniform integrates elbow pads and knee pads in the joint part (Note 1). If these people are satisfied with their use, it will naturally extend to the entire colonial army. And the derived version can also get orders for domestic equipment. And like military boots, these derivatives of military uniforms can also be aimed at some special working people.

Since the demand was not high, HK soon completed the production work. The product is new and convenient, and the War Department said that if the exploration team responds well in Africa, it will procure and ration it to the colonial corps in the future. That's what Jochen was waiting for. However, some people have suggested that it is unsightly to make spots on clothes. So Jochen decided to make them understand the importance of concealment: "Gentlemen, don't think of the uniform as a piece of clothing that a soldier wears on his body, the uniform is also a soldier's equipment, an integral part of combat effectiveness!" In the era of gun formations, everyone did not care so much about concealment because they had to fight face-to-face, and brightly colored military uniforms were conducive to improving the morale of the troops. But now advances in guns have allowed our soldiers to no longer wear fancy uniforms and march to the beat of the drum. Conspicuous uniforms will only become targets for the enemy.

In December 1864, British officer Harry Banat Ramstine organized the 'British Army Scout', an irregular army in Peshawar, Pakistan. When making the military uniforms of the reconnaissance team, Ramstin selected the khaki military uniforms in view of the characteristics of the local loess with a lot of bare soil and heavy wind and sand, in order to facilitate camouflage. In later combat operations, this military uniform played a better camouflage effect.

But this is not enough, even if you choose to be close to the environment, but a single color will still make the overall outline of the person wearing the military uniform very obvious, so in order to better improve the concealment of the soldier, so a variety of color blocks used for similar environments destroy the overall outline of the human body, so as to greatly improve the concealment of the military uniform! And the contours of the body are disrupted, but what about the head? There are two ways to do this, one is to paint some color on the face to break the contours of the face, and the other is to cover one's face with a scarf with colored blocks. Gentlemen, wars are always the advantage of the side that can be taken by surprise. So don't think of military uniforms as a simple piece of clothing, they are equipment that can increase the concealment of soldiers and increase the possibility of surprise! Therefore, different environments use different camouflage, so that our soldiers in different environments hide like ghosts, with this concealment, we can better ambush, sneak attack, and protect ourselves, which will be transformed into our military advantage! ”

Fortunately, not all members of the War Department's officer corps were old and stubborn, and after realizing the possible advantages of camouflage, Quartermaster Waldzer asked if there was camouflage suitable for use in Europe. Jochen immediately stated that HK had plans to develop tri-color camouflage suitable for European environments and snow camouflage for use in winter. Waldzer immediately said that if the new military uniform is good in Africa, it will be equipped in the country, so he asked HK to speed up the plan for the new camouflage.

Soon after Yoheng returned to school, the Jiyuan was tested on the Guò voyage, and because the Sino-French War had just ended, the Qing government, which was worried about the safety of the Jiyuan, decided to let the German sailors operate the ship and return to the Qing country under the flag of German merchant ships. At this time, Li Fengbao's term as German minister had expired on April 28, 1884, and he went to France as an envoy, and then negotiated with France for the Sino-French war. After the signing of the Sino-French New Treaty, he returned to China. Therefore, he was unable to attend the sailing ceremony of the Jiyuan. And the one who came to see him off was Xu Jingcheng, the new minister to Germany.

The fiasco of the Fujian Naval Division and the Nanyang Naval Division in the Sino-French War, as well as the great victory of the Beiyang Naval Division, stimulated the Qing State to set off a new round of ship purchase. Because the three ships of Dingzhen were all ordered in Germany, and the second ship of Dingzhen was perfect in the Sino-French War. Therefore, Li Hongzhang was even more determined to continue to order warships from Germany. However, Hurd, who had been bypassed by Li Hongzhang and Li Fengbao when ordering the Jiyuan, was already dissatisfied, and was furious when he learned the news. Therefore, Hurd decided to teach Li Hongzhang a lesson.

Li Hongzhang, as the governor of Zhili and the minister of Beiyang, is naturally not to be shaken, but Li Fengbao, who is his confidant, is easy to clean him up in Hurd's opinion. Li Fengbao was not an official from the right path, he was a technician, but he served as a foreign minister for a long time, and people who were dissatisfied with him abound in the Qing court, so he was also repeatedly criticized and impeached. Some people rumored that he was a peddler and a sponsor of the camp. In foreign countries, they do not abide by customization and travel with prostitutes. At this time, Li Fengbao was invited by Li Hongzhang to go to Beiyang to handle military affairs and manage the Sailor School. If he can be brought down, it can be regarded as a stab in Li Hongzhang's heart.

Hurd immediately spread rumors, saying that the Jiyuan was shoddy, inferior in performance, and high in price, and that Li Fengbao must have colluded with the foreign translator Jin Kaili during his stay in Germany and embezzled a huge amount of money. And people who were dissatisfied with Li Fengbao saw that this time was a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity, so they wrote books one after another, and for a while, the impeachment of Li Fengbao came one after another. And various rumors such as "millions of huge sums of money are spent by one person, and it is difficult to guarantee that there will be no bonuses and other drawbacks"; "Buy three ironclad ships at a price of four million taels, at a discount of 20%, embezzle 800,000 gold to enrich your own pocket. I also heard that the shipyard was repaired at a huge cost of hundreds of thousands of taels, and the quality of the ship in the future is unknown, and the staff has already filled the box"; "From the noisy rumors of the sea, until the capital, everyone is shocked, and it is said that Li Fengbao is not Li Fengbao colluding with foreigners to erode and fatten himself, and the quality of the ship and the price of the ship will not be reversed to this extreme. For a few days, people have been talking for no reason? ”。 All kinds of rumors were rampant for a while. The second ship of Dingzhen is the pillar of optimus in the Sino-French naval battle, and no one dares to point fingers at it. Therefore, the Jiyuan, which set off to return to China, was pointed out by Qianfu. Hurd added fuel to the fire, inviting William Henry White, the designer of the Armstrong shipyard and the future great, to help the Far. White said that the Jiyuan has a total of eight shortcomings, such as weak firepower, slow speed, and insufficient endurance, and finally came to the conclusion that it is not worth mentioning compared with the Esmeralda. As a result, the Qing Liu, who did not even know Arabic numerals, listened to Hurd's words, and for a time turned into naval experts to violently slander the Jiyuan, saying, "The name of the ship is called the Dome Clipper, but in fact the speed is not fast, the Dome armor is not perfect, and the firepower is insufficient. ”。

And the matter was so big that even Li Hongzhang could not cope with it for a while, and the matter of ordering warships from Germany was also blocked. Li Fengbao was blamed, although he was not punished, but the Qing court ordered that "if he is sent and commissioned, he will still be inspected at any time, and if he is not effective, he will be withdrawn", and he fell into a situation where he was embattled.

At this time, the Volkeng shipyard that got the news was in a hurry, and its own efforts were wronged, and future orders may also be lost. Cutting off people's wealth is like killing parents, uncles can endure it, and aunts can't bear it! Immediately, he contacted the Admiralty to find Xu Jingcheng, the minister in Germany, to discuss the explanation. In the face of the menacing Germans, Xu Jingcheng had no choice but to report to the country that the Germans were indignant when they heard that the Jiyuan was accused, and demanded justice for themselves. And Li Hongzhang learned that the telegram was really timely, and he could push the matter to the British and German sides to fight in the ring, and he could withdraw from it, and Li Fengbao could also be quiet for the time being. When the limelight passes, it will not be a problem to keep him by yourself.

So the Volkeng shipyard completely pinched with the Armstrong shipyard, and the Volkeng shipyard accused White of "nonsense" against Jiyuan, accusing the 254 mm cannon of the bow and stern of the Esmeralda of having no caliber, useless, slow rate of fire and huge weight, while the bow and stern of the Jiyuan can put in two 150 mm naval guns, although the caliber is slightly smaller, but the rate of fire is extremely fast, far better than a single 254 mm naval gun in actual combat. And although the firepower put into the side is indeed slightly inferior to that of the Egyptian ship, but due to the rate of fire of the ship's guns, the gap is not obvious, and the side Jiyuan only needs two gun emplacements in the front and rear, plus one ear mount to put in 5 150 mm naval guns, while the Egyptian ship needs two main guns in the front and rear plus 3 ear mounts to put in 5 naval guns, which is inefficient. Moreover, Jiyuan's protection is far superior, saying that the Egyptian ship's dome armor is weak, and Jiyuan's 150 mm naval guns can also penetrate it, but Jiyuan's dome armor is solid, and the Egyptian ship's secondary guns are powerless at all, so the gap in firepower is Jiyuan has the upper hand in the comparison between the two ships. Moreover, the dome armor of the Egyptian ship is lower than the water surface, and once the side penetrates, the water will flood the dome and the hull of the guide zhì will sink, while the Jiyuan dome armor is higher than the water surface, and the side will be penetrated and the water will rarely enter the water.

And the white who was called to the door by Volkeng Shipyard was angry with one Buddha out of the body and two Buddhas ascended to heaven. A scolding battle ensued between the two sides, and when the scolding war was in full swing, the German Admiralty, seeing that the matter was difficult to end, decided to seek out His Royal Highness the Imperial Grandson, one of the designers of the Jiyuan, to see what he had in mind. Jochen, who learned of this, was so crying and laughing that he finally had to write a short message, asking the Admiralty to send it to Qing Guo in the form of a telegram, which read as follows: Qing Guo ordered warships from the German Volkeng shipyard as a normal business practice. In the process of the transaction, the Qing and German sides established a good relationship of cooperation and trust, and the Dingzhen No. 2 ship in the Sino-French War was even more outstanding, which is the best proof that Volkeng Shipyard did its best to build warships for the Qing State. The Jiyuan is also a meticulous masterpiece of the Volkeng shipyard, but it is really unwise for the Qing government to suspect the good trust relationship between the Qing and German sides just by listening to the other party's words. As for the performance of the Jiyuan ship, we should wait for the return of Jiyuan and the use of your navy before drawing conclusions. Otherwise, it will not only destroy the good friendship between Qing and Germany. It is also unfair to the Volkeng shipyard that built the second ship of Dingzhen for the Qing government. Moreover, to think that the Volkeng shipyard was bribed to get the minister in Germany to choose to buy ships from him is not only to doubt the moral character of your officials, but also to slander the business ethics of the Germans. It is hoped that the Qing government will thoroughly investigate those who spread rumors.

Later, Jochen wrote another telegram and asked it to be sent to Hurd, accusing that the British and German shipyards were competing for the Qing order, which was a commercial behavior, and the superior prevailed over the inferior, but it was unwarranted slander and ungentlemanly manners. And that William White, as a technician, is not realistic, just to win orders to confuse the public, no matter how talented he is, as a designer is also a loss of professional ethics. And if you want to win the Qing order, then let that William White come up with a better design, instead of belittling the design of Volkeng's shipyard, the design of the Jiyuan himself was also involved, and slandering the German shipyard is also slandering me. You can eat things indiscriminately, but you can't talk nonsense. If this mentality is not corrected, beware of me writing to my grandmother (Note 2) to sue you for slander!

Note 1: See technical related pictures for pictures: U.S. troops wearing Sansha DCU with a Penny cap; Stallone in an M65 trench coat; Sansha camouflage shorts version; Armor for the Gen2 suit

Note 2: Jochen's maternal grandmother was Queen Victoria of England