"Your solution is a loan?"

When Wang Chenhao said this, Li Hongzhang and Ding Ruchang immediately rolled their eyes. I thought that Wang Chenhao had some tricks to make money, but in the end it was just a loan.

Li Hongzhang has done this loan more than once, as early as the pacification of the Taiping Heavenly Kingdom, Li Hongzhang borrowed money from the great powers many times, and he also did not take out loans to set up foreign affairs. This time to purchase warships for the Beiyang Naval Division, Li Hongzhang had already borrowed money in his heart.

"This old man has already laid the score, and in a few days the Marquis of Stregen, the chairman of the British [***] Committee, will arrive in Tianjin, and he will be followed by several British commercial banks and arms dealers in Shanghai, and the loan and arms purchase will be carried out together."

Wang Chenhao's words are actually not finished, he is ready to use foreigners' loans to set up foreign affairs first, open a few more companies and then cash out with the bank in turn, this is a typical empty glove white wolf tactic, which can accumulate a large amount of funds in a short time.

But Li Hongzhang interrupted his words, and Wang Chenhao didn't say more, but he suddenly had an idea in his heart, that is, even if he controlled the new army, this military expenditure was still in Li Hongzhang's hands. Thinking of Li Hongzhang's words, Wang Chenhao was afraid that one day he would turn his face with Li Hongzhang, and this hard work would be in vain.

In this case, Wang Chenhao felt that in addition to the shogunate with reading power, he also had to have a reading treasury, and he couldn't rely too much on Li Hongzhang.

On May 5, the Marquis of Stregen, chairman of the British Affairs Committee, arrived in Tianjin for an unofficial visit to the Qing Dynasty of China for half a month.

Tianjin Zhili Governor's Palace, the main purpose of Sterrigan's trip was to visit two people, one was the emperor Guangxu, and the other was Li Hongzhang, the governor of Zhili. Of course, the former is just a face-saving job, and Li Hongzhang is the most important object of Strrigan's visit.

The day before, the British Conservative Party came to power, and the third Marquess of Salisbury succeeded him as Prime Minister of the United Kingdom.

Previously, in order to push Britain to abandon its isolation policy and find new allies around the world to fight against the Allies and the Franco-Russian alliance, the Liberal Party Roseberry signed the "British Insurance Treaty" with the British Union, the purpose of which was to break the deadlock of the British non-alignment policy.

What followed was that Germany, France, and Russia intervened in the Far East to return Liao, get involved in the Yangtze River, and carve up Korea in order to deal with Britain, and in this case, Britain was powerless to deal with the three countries.

For this reason, in order not to provoke Germany, France, and Russia and to relieve all kinds of pressures in the Far East, the newly inaugurated Conservative Party announced that it would continue to maintain the glorious policy of non-alignment and isolation after forming a cabinet, and at the same time abolish the "Anglo-British Insurance Treaty" and obtain the understanding of Germany, France, and Russia in the form of non-alignment.

Britain and Russia competed for hegemony in the Far East, with Russia having the upper hand and Britain having the upper hand, but Britain was not willing to lose. On the one hand, Britain's New Deal actively made overtures to France and Germany, preventing them from moving closer to Russia and preventing the three countries from forming an alliance. On the other hand, we should actively improve relations with China and prevent the Qing government from completely falling in favor of Russia.

The important purpose of Strrigan's trip was to divide and disintegrate Germany, France and Russia, so that they could not form an alliance in the Far East, and at the same time to draw China against Russia.

After meeting with Li Hongzhang, Strrigan spoke positively of the positive role that Li Hongzhang had played in the development of Sino-British relations in the past half century, and after gaining Li Hongzhang's favor, he euphemistically pointed out that both sides were responsible for the flag removal incident a few years ago, hoping to restore relations.

The flag-pulling incident of that year brought a huge blow to the Beiyang Navy Division and the Westernization Movement, just like a piece of good iron that burned red and was about to be built, it was suddenly poured a basin of cold water, and the loss was not only money but also time. At that time, it was the most critical moment in the race for modernization and reform, and the two countries were running as fast as they were sprinting, but China's Westernization reform suddenly stopped cramping, and the Meiji Restoration was completed.

Although Li Hongzhang was still a little dissatisfied, he still had to deal with the British, and begged them to borrow money to help build the ship, so Lao Li chose to accept the British apology.

After solving the impact of the flag-pulling incident, Li Hongzhang expressed to Strrigan that the Beiyang Naval Division hoped to order new warships from Britain and get a preferential price.

Sterrigan knew about this, and said that the British Ship Administration had decided to help build the Dengyun-class battleships at the best price, and the total cost of the two ships of this class was reduced to 20 million taels of silver, and the down payment was reduced to 8 million taels, and the balance was paid at the time of outfitting and official delivery.

For the requirements of technical institutions at the cloud level, this price is already very fair.

Li Hongzhang expressed his gratitude, but he still didn't have that much money, so he offered to borrow money to build a ship.

Strrigan also knew that China's finances were not rich, and another purpose of his trip was to find a way to get the Qing government axe to continue to take out loans, so that they would have an excuse to continue to control the Chinese customs.

It's just that Li Hongzhang borrowed money as the governor of Zhili, not on behalf of the Qing political axe, and Sterrigan's plan fell through.

However, it is always good for Britain to borrow money, and Sterrigan is eager to borrow money so that he can earn more benefits.

As a witness, Sterrigan accompanied Li Hongzhang to borrow 3 million pounds from the British HSBC Bank with an interest of 4 yen, which was repaid in five years.

Immediately after the loan contract was finalized, the construction of the Dengyun-class battleships began in Britain.

On May 17, 1895, the headquarters of the British HSBC Bank directly allocated funds to the Vickers shipyard in Barrow Inverness to build two Dengyun-class battleships for the Chinese Beiyang Naval Division.

Vickers Shipyard immediately procured materials for the ship, and after a month of preparation, the first ship, Dengyun, laid the keel at Dock 5 of Vickers Shipyard on June 12. Three days later, the construction of the No. 2 ship, Tayun, began at the No. 6 dock.

The two Dengyun-class battleships were expected to be built in 26 months, to be completed around August 1897, and the entire construction process was to be supervised by the Minister to England.

The parameters of the Dengyun-class battleship have been finalized, and the comprehensive design is carried out by Sir White, a top British naval engineer, and the main parameters are based on the majestic class, and substantial improvements have been made for the Fuji-class battleship.

The main gun has been upgraded from 35 times the diameter to 40 times the diameter, which increases the power of the 305 main gun; displacement from 12,500 tons to 16,000 tons; Removing the Harvey armor and replacing it with a stronger Krupp armor, the resistance of non-lethal piercing hits has been increased by one percent, which is much more resistant to beatings than Fuji-class; At a speed of only 17 knots, it is one section slower than the Fuji class, but the seaworthiness surname is more than twice as strong, and the second and third broadside secondary guns can still fire steadily in rough sea conditions, while the Fuji class can only fire a limited amount.

In terms of torpedo weapons, Wang Chenhao believed that loading a battleship with torpedoes was a waste in itself, which took up space and brought loopholes to the battleship's own defense. Successive naval battles have shown that it is redundant to install torpedo systems on battleships, especially since the battleships of various countries are equipped with more than five torpedo tubes, and the bow, amidships, and stern of the ships are everywhere, which brings huge safety risks to the battleships, and if they are hit in the torpedo compartment, the consequences will be catastrophic.

For this reason, Wang Chenhao persuaded Li Hongzhang to finally cancel the originally designed five torpedo launch compartments on the Dengyun-class battleship, and the space vacated was changed to a watertight compartment, which greatly enhanced the survivability of the warship.

In addition, at Wang Chenhao's strong request, the Dengyun class will install a telephone system and a radio system, which is the first in the history of the world's navy, and even the British Royal Navy has no plans to install such an expensive communication system.

However, Wang's far-sighted vision was strongly praised by British Field Marshal Lord Johnhay, who, along with Lord Fisher, demanded that the British Navy install such a communications system on the Majestic-class battleships as well.

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The construction of China's first battleship began, and the BB party voted for it~~