"Alexander III is dead? Why did he die suddenly? ”

In the imperial study, Li Weiguo asked with a little surprise after learning the news.

Zhang Peilun wanted to say that of course he was angry with you, but it was rude, so he said euphemistically: "Because we couldn't get the two battleships we built for the Tsarist Russian Empire for a long time, I heard that I was so angry that I died without coming up in one breath!" ”

Li Weiguo suddenly realized that he was angry with him.

From the very beginning, Li Weiguo did not plan to really build battleships for the French Empire and the Tsarist Russian Empire, anyway, they would be enemies sooner or later, and of course they would be severely pitted.

At the beginning, Li Weiguo nodded and agreed to build advanced dreadnought battleships for the French Empire and the Tsarist Russian Empire, considering that the construction time of a battleship was at least three years, and at most five or six years, and during this period, as long as France and Tsarist Russia made any troubles and made decisions that were unfavorable to the Chinese Empire, then the project would be immediately frozen.

In fact, even if France and Russia did not join the Entente bloc, Li Weiguo would deliberately let the military delay the delivery of the battleships of the two countries indefinitely.

This is political deception, and this is how the United States in later generations deceived China.

Now Li Weiguo is living and learning, and in turn he is pitting France and Russia.

However, after the pit, diplomatic disputes are inevitable, and I am afraid that war will break out in the end.

Of course, for the time being, France and Russia are not yet capable of winning the Chinese Empire, and even the entire Entente bloc is not sure of victory, at least for the time being, the maritime military forces of the Entente are not ready to fight.

Li Weiguo had nothing to fear, France and Russia were properly condemned, and they had no other way but to fight a war of words with the Chinese Empire.

But in the future, it is uncertain that one day war will inevitably break out when the military strength of the Entente bloc is strong enough.

Thinking of this, Li Weiguo smiled slightly, and said to Zhang Peilun: "The Tsarist Russian Empire will soon join the Entente bloc, and our German allies will face greater military pressure. ”

"Yes!" Zhang Peilun received the order, and the next thing was a military meeting, Zhang Peilun couldn't interject, so he retired.

This military meeting was very important, and Li Weiguo systematically expounded his views on the world war that would break out between the Entente and the Allies in the future, analyzed the international situation, and asked the military to make preparations for relevant wars.

Previously, the Chinese Empire adopted a policy of strategic deception, successfully deceiving Western powers such as Britain, France, the United States, Japan, and Russia, inflicting astronomical losses on them.

But the most important thing is that it has pitted Britain, France, the United States, Japan, Russia and other countries of precious strategic time.

The Chinese Empire began to build the first dreadnought-class battleship from 3975 (1875), to the end of 3988, 4 Fengyun-class battlecruisers were put into service, and in the past ten years, the Chinese Empire built and owned 13 dreadnought-class battleships and 4 dreadnought-class battlecruisers.

In the past ten years, the Western powers have built more than 80 copycat versions of dreadnought battleships, which are really miserable. Because the speed is too slow, once it encounters the genuine dreadnought battleships of the Chinese Empire, it is a group of live targets.

Countries spent hundreds of millions, and as a result, they made a pile of scrap iron, which was quite depressing.

But what is frustrating is that in the past ten years, they have been unable to compete with the Chinese Imperial Navy and have lost the right to speak at sea.

The British Empire was the most miserable, the overseas colonies were robbed by the Chinese Empire, but they could only adopt a policy of non-resistance, and the fundamental reason was that they lacked real dreadnought battleships to fight against the Chinese Empire, and they did not have the right to control the sea, so they could not keep their overseas colonies at all.

"Your Majesty, the Imperial Navy's Pacific Fleet now has complete control over the entire Pacific Ocean. The Ceylon base in the Indian Ocean is under rapid construction and is expected to open in two years' time, when the Imperial Navy's Indian Ocean Fleet will be expanded. In addition, there is the Mediterranean Fleet and the Caribbean Fleet, these two fleets are deep in the hinterland of Europe and the United States, and in the event of war, they will be fiercely attacked by the Entente bloc, and there is an urgent need to strengthen their forces. ”

Lin Jiyun said that the spittle stars flew around, and after summing up, it can actually be summed up in two words, that is, expanding the army.

Prime Minister and Chancellor of the Exchequer Ong Hoi Tai immediately retorted: "What does it mean to have complete control of the Pacific? Is the Imperial Japanese Navy an ornament? When will the Japanese Empire be leveled, let's talk about going out of the Pacific Ocean and dominating the world! ”

What does it mean to put the Japanese Empire in order first?

Obviously, Wang Kaitai guessed that Lin Jiyun wanted money to build warships, so the Japanese Empire came to the scene and broke Lin Jiyun's dream of expanding the army.

"Just a small Japan, as long as Your Majesty gives an order, the minister will immediately lead the naval fleet to destroy Japan!" Lin Jiyun said with an oath.

"If you go to war against Japan, you are going to war with the Entente? While I firmly believe that the Empire will prevail in the end, it is clear that there is a huge price to pay, and it is not worth it! Military means to solve the problem are the lowest level of choice, we should make good use of Prince Nohisa of Japan, if he comes to power, the Japanese Empire will choose to submit to the Empire. ”

Wang Kaitai casually provoked an excuse and put aside the topic of Lin Jiyun asking for funds.

Lin Jiyun was dumbfounded, and glared at Wang Kaitai fiercely, this girl is an iron rooster, and she will never let you pluck its hair.

It's just that Wang Kaitai usually has no problem doing this, because Li Weiguo also knows that only by focusing on economic construction can the Chinese Empire be truly strong, and it is not right to use military force.

But today is different, the Entente was established, France and Russia were pitted by Li Weiguo, and in the next period of time, the Entente bloc will inevitably expand its army on a large scale, so it is necessary to increase national defense construction spending.

Of course, Li Weiguo knew that although the Entente and the Central Powers in history were confrontational, they would not clash in a short period of time, but would engage in a large-scale arms race. Historically, the British Empire did not want to fight with the German Empire, so whenever the German Navy built a battleship, the British Empire built two or even three battleships of the same class to deter the German Empire from starting a war.

Unfortunately, the British Empire in history was finally dragged down by the endless arms race, and negotiated with the German Empire to stop the arms race, but the German Empire did not agree, so the British Empire could not bear it, and only took advantage of the fact that it was not dragged down by the economy, and fought to the death with Germany, triggering the First World War.

The situation of the Chinese Empire today is similar to that of the British Empire in history, except that the economic strength of the Entente camp is very strong, because the United States of America joined the Entente ahead of schedule.

In this way, in the face of the strong economic aggregate and industrial strength of the Entente countries, Li Weiguo had to think of another way. If you go to war directly with the Entente, even if you win the war, the economic losses will probably be astronomical. But if there is an arms race that drags down the economies of the Entente countries first, it will be much easier to start a fight.

The point is in the United States, and now it is the Grant dictatorship, and the power of the dictatorship will bring out all the potential of the United States, turning it into a powerful war machine.

Li Weiguo is not afraid of the British Empire, and only needs to carry out three months of unrestricted submarine warfare and breaking engagements, then he can crush the British Empire.

The real opponent is the United States, and if you want to defeat the opponent, you have to drag down the United States first, just like the historical model of the United States and the Soviet Union.

Li Weiguo's decision to stimulate the U.S. Navy led the Grant administration to increase its investment in the Navy.

This requires the creation of the Caribbean Fleet, which will stir up trouble on the doorstep of the United States every day and force the American Navy to engage in a large-scale arms race with the Imperial Chinese Navy.

At the same time, we should not underestimate the overall heritage of the British Empire, the French Empire, and the Tsarist Russian Empire, so it is also necessary to deploy the Mediterranean Fleet in the Mediterranean, the Black Sea Fleet, and the Atlantic Fleet in the Atlantic.

To deploy these fleets, we must first improve our strength, and a new round of large-scale shipbuilding plans is imminent.

Therefore, Li Weiguo's attitude this time leaned towards Lin Jiyun.

"Once war breaks out, we will face a five-nation alliance of Britain, the United States, Japan, France, and Russia, or even more. The Imperial German Navy was in the Baltic Sea, not to mention whether it could break through the blockade of the British and French navies, and even if it did, it was difficult to say whether it could help us. Therefore, we cannot put the rise and fall of the empire on the German Empire, we must have sufficient military strength and cannot rely on other countries. ”

"After the outbreak of a full-scale war, the main battlefield cannot only be the Pacific Ocean, other such as the Indian Ocean, the Atlantic Ocean, the Mediterranean, and the Caribbean Sea may become battlefields, the empire's territory has expanded, and there are more sea areas to defend, so the comprehensive strengthening of the Indian Ocean Fleet, the Mediterranean Fleet, and the Caribbean Fleet will become the main task of the Navy in the next few years!"

"Your Majesty is wise!" Lin Jiyun was immediately happy, thinking that this time there was a waste of saliva, but unexpectedly received strong support from Li Weiguo.

Wang Kaitai and some other ministers who were not willing to allocate funds to the military were suddenly dumbfounded, because Li Weiguo agreed to expand the navy, this matter was basically a certainty, and they naturally did not need to embarrass the military anymore.

However, Wang Kaitai and other ministers still had to cut naval expenses as much as possible.

"Your Majesty, the defense budget submitted by the Navy this time is as high as 30 million yuan, and the Du Zhi Division can only allocate 10 million at most, and any more will affect next year's economic construction."

Li Weiguo suddenly guessed Wang Kaitai's intentions, and said with a smile: "Then 10 million per year, anyway, it's a budget, and it's not a one-time payment, it's three or five years, how can it be completed." ”

"It's not...... Your Majesty, the minister means ......"

"Alright, that's it! Lin Jiyun, you immediately submit the Navy's defense budget for the next three to five years to the Congress, and strive to pass it as soon as possible. ”

"Obey the order!" Lin Jiyun hurriedly replied, happy in his heart.

Wang Kaitai clearly planned to allocate a total of 10 million yuan to the navy in the next few years, but Li Weiguo secretly changed the concept and turned it into 10 million a year; according to the warship construction cycle, the average time for small ships is one or two years, and for large warships is three to five years, 10 million a year, and the total budget can be several times exceeded.

Wang Kaitai suddenly smiled bitterly, knowing that this was Li Weiguo's attitude, and he didn't want to say anything. For him, the Prime Minister and Minister of Finance, it hurts to spend so much money!

Next is the Army and Air Force, both of which need additional defense budgets. However, compared to the navy, the army and air force have much less allocation.

Especially for the army, the main appropriation is the dragoon regiment, which has long been approved. All that remains is the stockpiling of armaments, which is included in the Chinese Empire's annual fixed defense budget.

Over the past few years, the army has stockpiled countless strategic materials, including as many as 1,000 large-scale strategic material reserve bases in China alone, hoarding large quantities of guns, artillery, ammunition, oil, grain, and so on, and they are still under construction.

This is also the result of years of hard work, the army builds a number of warehouses every year, reserves a batch of materials, and accumulates a lot to form today's huge strategic reserve warehouse scale. If you wait for the outbreak of war to stockpile supplies, it will be too late, or the cost will become higher.

As for the Air Force, it mainly focuses on training and operating airships, and there will not be many old-fashioned airships, because airships are updated too quickly, and the air combat capability in the real sense is limited, at most reconnaissance, troop transportation, airdrop materials, and so on.

Li Weiguo's requirements for the Air Force are still that training is the main thing, and research and development is important. Aerofluid mechanics has developed significantly in recent years, and the Imperial Academy of Sciences is already developing propeller aircraft, but it is highly classified and known only to Li Weiguo and a few high-ranking military personnel.

The Chinese Empire was preparing for the First World War, and at the same time, the countries of the Entente camp were also making military preparations. It's just that they haven't realized the scale of the war that will break out in the future, and the preparations are naturally not as adequate as the Chinese Empire.

Britain, the United States, Japan, France, and Russia convened the first armaments conference after the establishment of the Entente.

In view of the existing 12 dreadnought battleships of the Chinese Empire (not counting the training ship Dreadnought of the Imperial Chinese Naval Ship Academy) and 4 Dreadnought battlecruisers, the five countries re-assigned their strategic assignments.

Previously, Britain, the United States, and Japan had assigned strategic preparation tasks for the capital ships of the Chinese Empire, but as a result, a bunch of copycat dreadnoughts were built, which could only be used for coastal defense, and could not go to the far sea to fight the Chinese Imperial Fleet, so the tasks needed to be reassigned.

The five countries finally made a distribution according to the defense tasks of their respective navies and the strength of their national forces.

In the Pacific direction, the Pacific Fleet, the most powerful main fleet of the Chinese Empire, the American Navy and the Imperial Japanese Navy are under the greatest pressure and have the heaviest defense tasks.

However, the Japanese Empire was too weak to build too many large capital ships, so the large capital ships could only be borne by the American Navy, and the British Empire had to bear part of the military pressure if it wanted to take revenge.

As a result, the U.S. Navy is responsible for building 8 dreadnought-class battleships and 4 battlecruisers, 6 Virginia-class battleships and 4 Lexington-class battlecruisers that are already being refitted, and in the next three years, the U.S. Navy will build 2 more battleships to complete the task.

The British Empire is refitting 4 Queen Victoria-class battleships, and will build 4 more battleships and 6 battlecruisers in the next three years, of which 4 battleships and 2 battlecruisers will be deployed in the Indian Ocean Fleet, ready to cooperate with the American Navy and the Japanese Navy to jointly suppress the Imperial Chinese Navy. Another 4 battleships and 4 battlecruisers were used to suppress the Imperial German Navy.

The French Imperial Navy and the Tsarist Imperial Navy, because they were pitted by the Chinese Empire, lost 6 battleships, due to the shortage of financial resources in a short period of time, in the next three years, the French Navy built up to 4 battleships on its own, and the Tsarist Imperial Navy built 2 battleships, which were used to fight against the Austro-Hungarian Navy and the Ottoman Navy.

As for the Imperial German Navy, it was completely handed over to the British Imperial Navy.

This is only the allocation of capital ships, as well as auxiliary cruisers, frigates, submarines, etc., which are built according to their respective national defense needs, and in line with the principle that more is better, the total tonnage requirements can overwhelm the Allied bloc.

It's just that when the meeting of Britain, the United States, Japan, France, and Russia just ended, there was news that the Chinese Imperial Navy was building a new **** scale of ships.

An additional 10 million yuan a year for naval shipbuilding was immediately dumbfounded by the five countries of Britain, the United States, Japan, France, and Russia. (To be continued.) )