If the world war that broke out in 1914 shattered the world economic order and destroyed the European continent; Then 1913 will be the last carnival before the destruction!

There is no doubt that the theme of 1913 was still the arms race, and if the Entente were still thinking about financial affordability, the Allies would have gone mad!

Germany's fiscal deficit has even exceeded its fiscal revenue, and Ferdinand is terrified, and Austria-Hungary and Italy are not far behind, and the fiscal deficits have broken through historical records.

Well, in fact, the Entente countries are not much better, at least Bulgaria's fiscal deficit is as high as 50% of fiscal revenues, and at this time, it is no longer time to think about fiscal affordability.

After investing at any cost, the military strength of all countries has been greatly improved, first the Germans started the construction of six battleships and four battlecruisers in one go, and the British started the construction of eight battleships and six battlecruisers in a-for-tat manner.

Oh, now the British have not even held the ratio of 3:2, and it can be seen that the Germans have gone crazy, and the bottom line of the British is getting lower and lower.

This was followed by the French who started construction of four battleships and six battlecruisers in one go, and there was no way to tell the French to react slowly?

When the era of dreadnoughts came, France did not keep up with it for the first time, and in 1912 the French started to build 2 dreadnoughts, and in the face of the aggressive Italian Navy to keep the Mediterranean, it is not possible to do it!

However, the Italians showed enough toughness this time, probably because of the sequelae of Ferdinand's butterfly effect, Britain and France did not offer a price that satisfied them, and there was a great intention of following the Allies all the way to black.

The main thing is that the French should have given loans to the Italians, but they were cut off by Ferdinand. Against the backdrop of French nationalism, it takes courage to dare to lend money to the Allies, especially with Ferdinand watching!

As soon as the negotiations between the two sides began, the radical groups in France would receive the news that the capitalists would not dare to come forward in an era when the whole people were clamoring for revenge.

No way, the funds of the French are not unlimited, and if Bulgaria wants to take more, someone must take less! And vice versa, in order to get more loans and pay less, Ferdinand had to take out some of his competitors first.

Without the loans of the Entente and the promised benefits not large enough, Italy would certainly not have jumped back so easily!

In 1913, the Italians started to build 3 dreadnoughts and 2 battle cruisers, and they had to complete the five-year shipbuilding plan at once, plus they had already started construction of two dreadnoughts before, and there would be five dreadnoughts after completion!

The two dreadnoughts announced by Austria-Hungary in 1912 have now been launched and were expected to be in service by the beginning of 1914.

This time, the Vienna government once again decided to increase investment, and began to build two dreadnoughts and two battle cruisers, which seemed to have the intention of turning Austria-Hungary into a naval power!

And the two dreadnoughts ordered by the Ottomans from Germany are about to be completed and are expected to be delivered by the end of this year.

What did Ferdinand do in this context?

At present, the Bulgarian Navy has only one dreadnought in service, and in the arms race of 1912, two dreadnoughts were also built in accordance with the times, which should be completed by the end of the year.

But it was clear that in the era of a large expansion of the army together, this was clearly not enough, and in order to save money, even the plan for the battle cruiser Ferdinand was cut.

The current Bulgarian Navy is still a conservative navy, and its requirements for ocean-going decisive battles are not high, and even the planned combat range is only a big bathhouse in the Mediterranean.

Navy Minister Petrov said anxiously: "Your Majesty, now all countries are building ships, and if we don't follow up immediately, we will be very disadvantageous in the future!"

If we let it go, the naval superiority of the Entente in the Mediterranean will gradually be lost in the future, and then we will be in danger!

By 1915, we only had three dreadnoughts, and even if we added the six French, there were only nine, while the Allied Ottomans had 2 ships, the Italians had 5 ships, and the Austro-Hungarian Empire had 4 ships, and the gap between the two sides was very obvious! ”

Ferdinand nodded, he knew all of this. What's more critical is the geographical location of Bulgaria, which is sandwiched between the Ottoman Empire, Austria-Hungary, Romania, the Kingdom of Montenegro, and Italy, and once the war breaks out, it will be a real enemy on all sides!

Oh, Romania is negligible, as soon as the war breaks out, Romania will first have to learn the power of the Russians' gray cattle, and probably nothing will happen to them!

For the sake of strategic security, it was better for Bulgaria to land on the peninsula of Asia Minor as soon as possible and not give the Ottomans any chance.

At the same time, it was necessary to blockade the Strait of Otranto and prevent the Austro-Hungarian navy from coming out in order to guarantee the Allies' superiority in the Mediterranean region.

Create an opportunity for the French to attack Italy, and once France defeats the Italian navy, the Italians will most likely turn against each other, and then the Mediterranean theater of the Entente will be completely alive.

Can the blockade of the Strait of Otranto be done? Ferdinand didn't know this either, after all, the Italians in this plane had fallen to the Allies, and the combat effectiveness of the Air Force remained to be tested!

In Ferdinand's opinion, the best thing to do was to land directly in Italy under the cover of the navy and air force. Anyway, it's only about 40 nautical miles, and it is the safest way to deploy shore artillery on both sides of the strait, drop more torpedoes, and deploy more air forces!

Of course, in reality this is very difficult to do, and the Italians are not stupid, how can they be stupid enough to fight the French navy?

Before defeating the Italian Navy, let the Bulgarian Army launch a landing war, this is a very crazy thing, if the Italian Navy rushes directly regardless of losses, and the Austro-Crarian Navy kills again, the Bulgarian Army will feed the sharks!

Unless the entire Entente fleet in the Mediterranean is concentrated, it is possible! After all, the combat effectiveness of aircraft in this era is not as sharp as that of later generations.

At present, the Bulgarian Air Force can only carry light torpedoes to attack, and it is okay to deal with cruisers, but it is enough to deal with battleships, and eight out of ten may not be able to be blown up and sunk, and the hit rate of torpedoes in real combat is still very low!

No matter how cheap the planes were, Ferdinand couldn't use hundreds of planes against a single battleship, right? So against a fleet, wouldn't it take a thousand planes?

Ferdinand thought for a while and said: "Communicate with the French, our strength is limited, and we will start construction of two more dreadnoughts this year, and the rest is their problem!" ”

Of course, Ferdinand did not want the French to expand their naval shipbuilding program, mainly to urge the progress of the French, in fact, as early as 1912, the French government had already formulated a plan for the construction of 12 super dreadnoughts, which had just begun!

Bulgaria will definitely not be able to participate in the naval arms race without restrictions, this is not a matter of one or two dreadnoughts, each battleship must have a series of supporting ships, and the combined cost is not much lower than that of battleships!

As things stand, Bulgaria's military spending in 1913 exceeded £30 million.

Now Ferdinand understood why a world war must break out, the arms race is so expensive that as long as someone can't hold on, then it can only be fought!

Bulgaria has come to this point, it can only be said that the loans of the great powers are not so easy to get, and Bulgaria has relied on the support of the French to get to the present, and naturally it has to pay a price.

Of course, even if there is no military loan, Ferdinand will expand his army, and he will not dare to coax him in this regard!

Bulgaria still got a low-interest military loan of 1.8 billion leva from Britain and France, and Ferdinand is now feeling the pressure, let alone the Allies.

Since it was a two-front war, Austria-Hungary's military spending had to far exceed that of the same period in history, and the Germans could not help them in this regard, after all, the Germans were not rich now.

Everyone is preparing for war with the money of the domestic capitalists, after all, for them, the main purpose of this war is to seize resources and markets for domestic industry and commerce!

Profit is always the best motivation!

In this naval arms race, the major European powers are very crazy, and even the Russians are now ambitious to start construction of three dreadnoughts, but Ferdinand is not optimistic about them.

The main thing is that the efficiency of the tsarist government was too low, and from 1909 the Russians were preparing to build their own dreadnoughts, which were delayed until 1913, and Ferdinand doubted that Nicholas II would have a chance to receive news of the completion of the warship!

For Ferdinand, none of this was a problem, and the Entente had an advantage in the Mediterranean for a short time anyway.

Although the number of dreadnoughts of the Entente in the Mediterranean is not enough, the quality is not enough to make up the quantity!

Although the French dreadnoughts are not yet finished, they still have a dozen old warships, and they can also pile up their opponents with their numbers!

No, none of the Allied dreadnoughts have yet to enter service, and only the Bulgarian Sofia is currently hanging around in the Mediterranean, but the first dreadnought of the Italians will be commissioned at the end of this year.

By 1914, another dreadnought of the Italians would also be commissioned, along with two Austro-Hungarian dreadnoughts, plus the two dreadnoughts purchased by the Ottoman Empire from Germany, and the Allies would have six dreadnoughts in the Mediterranean.

As for the Entente, the French had two dreadnoughts to serve in the second half of this year, and the Bulgarians had two dreadnoughts to serve in May or June 1914, and the remaining warships would not be completed until the end of 1914 or early 1915 at the earliest.

During this period, there was at least a gap of at least half a year, and the number of dreadnoughts of the Allies would be twice as many as those of the Allies, and to some extent this period was the weakest time for the Allies' navy in the Mediterranean.

If the Allies had been ruthless enough to concentrate their forces in the first half of 1914 to attack the main force of the French navy, what would the future hold?

Thinking of this, Ferdinand was taken aback, this situation is really possible, as long as the main force of the French navy is severely damaged, the naval superiority of the Entente in the Mediterranean will no longer exist.

So are the British going to divide their forces in the Mediterranean? If the forces were divided, would the British still be able to continue to suppress the German high seas fleet?

If the forces are not divided, will the Entente be able to support it without the Mediterranean route?

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