The Austrians had a very affordable choice, which was to move between the superpowers, using Britain to expand into the Mediterranean on the one hand, and China on the other hand to develop their own economy, that is, not to express their position publicly.

But this caused the contradictions between Austria and France to rise rapidly, and the French have not been idle in recent years. Taking advantage of the war between Britain and China, Spain fell into disintegration. Although he was unable to gain hegemony in the Western Mediterranean, he greatly expanded his sphere of influence there.

Mainly in North Africa, the French quickly occupied the Algerian coastal plain, compared with the inland desert terrain, the Algerian coastal area, is a Mediterranean climate, the rainfall is acceptable, the development of agricultural conditions is excellent, can be used as arable land more than 100 million acres, the French quickly immigrated here, established a colonial government here.

It also infiltrated southward, and clashed with Egypt in Tunisia, relying on the support of Britain, Egypt firmly controlled Tunisia, but French commercial capital infiltrated Tunisia in large quantities, and obtained a large number of privileges through coercion and other means.

It also penetrated into the hinterland of Northwest Africa through the Senegal River, establishing a huge French West African colony, and some countries that had originally established gold mining colonies in Mali were defeated, Prussia and Austria gave up the gold mining colonies here to France because of the partition of Poland, and the gold mines have been exhausted, but the land around the gold mines has been developed.

Through its expansion in Northwest Africa, France rebuilt its colonial system, and France has been relatively quiet for several years. King Louis Philippe's political IQ was obviously much higher than that of Napoleon, not only won the support of the aristocracy, but also won the support of the urban middle class through various pro-people behaviors.

At least among the big countries, France's industrial revolution was the largest, second only to Britain in industrial production, but far higher than that of Prussia, Austria and other countries.

Politically, it has always adhered to the policy of uniting China and squeezing out Britain, with the aim of re-establishing hegemony in the Mediterranean, and after the war, it is no longer realistic to dominate the entire Mediterranean, but after communicating with China, the two sides have established a sphere of influence, and China has expressed its respect for France's special interests in the western Mediterranean, and China will not seek to establish military bases in the western Mediterranean region unless France understands.

After the war, France was very active in the design and manufacture of ironclad ships, but now that wooden sailing ships are outdated, everyone is on the same starting line, and the French are more confident in rebuilding hegemony in the Western Mediterranean.

However, due to the lack of experience and cost considerations, everyone experimented on the basis of renovating old ships, such as changing the sail battleship to steam power, and then installing iron armor on the outside of the ship, conducting artillery tests, and so on. In the end, armor with both hardness and toughness was invented through a multi-layer composite of cork and pig iron, and the armor was riveted to the battleship.

However, after such a transformation, the draft of the old warship has increased greatly, which not only affects the speed, but also affects the range, and the military value has greatly decreased.

There were also all kinds of strange experiments, and all kinds of strange-looking warships were created, some of which were mobile turrets, but in the end they found the right way.

It was found that new hulls must be adopted, such as the iron-ribbed wood-hulled merchant ships that have begun to be popularized in civilian merchant ships, such merchant ships have gotten rid of the dependence on wooden keels, and are more flexible in design, adding China's watertight compartment design, with a greatly increased carrying capacity, which is more suitable for steam-powered ship applications.

As a result, the three countries successively built an iron-ribbed wood-hulled battleship, each with a tonnage of more than 5,000 tons. After that, the French could not wait to design a second one, and after it worked well, two more were built in one go, equipped with a total of four wooden-hulled ironclad ships.

Britain and China have renovated a large number of old warships while also fulfilling their own ironclad standards. Having found themselves lagging behind France, the British were even more radical and decided to build ironclad ships directly, abandoning iron-ribbed wood-hull technology. This is also based on the well-developed metallurgical and mechanical industries in Britain, where excellent railway and bridge engineers have built 3,000-ton iron-hulled cruise ships.

The chief engineer of the Great Western Railway in the United Kingdom, Brunel used his experience in the construction of railway bridges to build ships, the first one was named the Great West, only 1300 tons, oak hull, but in order to make the hull more adaptable to steam power, he used a large amount of steel to reinforce the hull, which is the iron rib wood hull technology.

On April 7, 1838, the Great Western steamship sailed from the British port to New York with seven passengers, sailing at an average speed of 14.8 kilometers per hour, and arrived in New York on April 23, taking only 16 days, setting a record for crossing the Atlantic, half the time compared to sailing across the Atlantic by wind.

This was not the first steamship in Britain, but it was the first steamer to be built for commercial purposes, and when it was built, it quickly achieved commercial success with excellent performance and speed, and other steamship companies in Britain followed suit and began to build pure steamships on a large scale.

It's just that at this time, it's still mainly a paddle wheel. Brynel innovated once again, following with the construction of a second steam cruise ship, which used iron as the hull material, which was not the first of its kind, but it was the first bold attempt in commerce. And Brunel abandoned the paddle wheel and adopted the propeller. This iron propeller cruise ship was named the Britannia. On July 19, 1843, the Britannia was launched, with a displacement of 3,000 tons, making it the largest and most luxurious cruise ship in the world.

After the commercial success of both ships, Brunell wanted to build a more ambitious ship, which he designed to carry 4,000 passengers, be able to carry 50,000 tons of coal at a time, and be powered by more than 200 coal burners working around the clock, with four steam engines producing more than 8,000 horsepower. The length of the ship is 211 meters, the beam is 36 meters, the maximum draft is 9.2 meters, and the displacement is 27,700 tons.

It is worth mentioning that this Brunell is actually a Frenchman, and his father was an engineer who fled France during the French Revolution. Born in Portsmouth, England, he grew up and returned to France to be educated, before returning to England to work with his father. Father and son designed and built a large number of bridges and tunnels, most notably the invention of shield technology and the construction of the Thames Tunnel in England.

At a young age, Brunell achieved high social status in England, becoming a member of the Royal Academy of Sciences at the age of 24.

This is also one of the many geniuses that emerged in Britain during the Industrial Revolution. Sometimes it is not the British who produces geniuses, because he is a Frenchman, and his education is in France, but the British business system, and the ambitious and enterprising business leaders in England, can provide a platform for these geniuses to use their talents. Whether it was the businessman who financed Watt's development of the steam engine or the businessman who helped Stephenson advance the construction of the railroad, they were the unsung heroes who drove Britain's development.

It was on the basis of the pioneering of a large number of talented civilian technicians that the British Navy decided to build a real ironclad battleship.

And by this time, it was already 1845, five years after the end of the last world war. The era of ironclads is ten years ahead of history.

The French are temporarily ahead of the curve, which also gives them greater confidence.

In the face of Austrian provocations, the French decided to respond forcefully, sending ironclad ships to blockade the territorial waters of the Duchy of Modena.

The British and Austrian navies rushed to confront each other, and the French did not budge, they had a geographical advantage, the British had to go a long way from Gibraltar and the Austrians from Venice to here, and the port of Marseille was on the shore of the Ligurian Sea. Moreover, France is bent on establishing hegemony in the Mediterranean, and if it does not even dare to respond to provocations at its doorstep, what kind of hegemony can it talk about.

This led to a crisis of confrontation between the great powers of Western Europe, with France pitting against Britain and Austria.

British and Austrian diplomats quickly negotiated what measures should be taken in the event of war.

The people of the two countries were also excited, and even the British people began to forget the pain of the war, and were extremely wary of French ambitions, calling Louis Philippe Napoleon, but the name Napoleon is a derogatory term in England, but it is a positive term in France.

At this time, the mood of the Austrians was also very angry, they Austrian built railways, hindering what was going on in France, so domineering. Historically, the two peoples had constant grievances, national enmities, and a growing national consciousness, which made the Austrians begin to call for all German-speaking peoples to unite against France.

The French are not stupid, on the one hand, Britain supports Austria, on the other hand, Austria is uniting and wooing the North German Confederation, at present Austria is not divided with the entire northern Germany, the German Confederation that Metternich advocated the establishment of is still playing a role, the German Confederation Conference was held, at the meeting except for Prussia did not express its position, almost all the states agreed to support Austria, obviously Napoleon brought harm to the German nation, so that this nation is particularly united in the face of the French, on the other hand, It also shows that Austria still has the greatest influence in the German region. Although they did not join the Prussian-dominated Customs Union, the Habsburgs still had a stronger appeal to the German nation than the Hohenzollerns.

The French were not stupid, the Orleans dynasty was much more flexible than the Napoleonic Empire, and immediately approached China for negotiations. The place of the talks was very particular, in Athens.

On the one hand, the king of Greece is the son-in-law of the king of France, and on the other hand, the king of Greece is the prince of China, and such a connection is very intriguing.

China has expressed support for France, even claiming that in the event of war, the Chinese navy will join forces with France against the British navy, but has expressed caution about sending an army. Greece, for its part, said it was willing to form an alliance with France, hoping to get the Ionian Islands, which were Greek territory that had been taken from the Ottoman Empire by Britain before becoming independent and then transferred to the Austrian Empire.

Both sides were united, it seemed that a war was inevitable, at this time Belgium jumped out again, Belgian king Leopold quickly went back and forth between Britain and France, Belgium's independence was supported by Britain and France, France even sent an army to defeat the Dutch army, only to force the Dutch to agree to Belgian independence. But Leopold's nephew is Queen Victoria's husband, and the Belgian Industrial Revolution is now the best in Europe, and has even basically completed industrialization, and the capital is invested by Britain, and British capital is the largest capital power in Belgium.

Through his ties with Britain and France, Leopold facilitated peace talks between Britain and France.

The negotiations were not destined to go well, because it would be difficult for both sides to make concessions, and if the contradictions were so easy to reconcile, there would not be so many wars in Europe.