According to the Navy's five-year development plan, the core of its strategy is to build a powerful navy capable of controlling the empire's thousands of miles of sea frontiers and controlling the South China Sea and the coast of Japan and other western Pacific waters.

The navy's activities are mainly in the western Pacific waters, but it also sends a small number of warships to the Central Pacific, that is, near Hawaii.

In the future, I want to be able to control the entire Pacific Ocean!

And if you want to control the Pacific, the enemies you face are naturally those great powers, especially the traditional maritime powers, such as Britain and France.

At the same time, Spain and the Netherlands, two declining powers, were also potential enemies of the Imperial Navy.

As for the United States, most of the imperial admirals have not taken them seriously, and only Lin Zhe is worried about taking precautions, but even if everything goes smoothly in the United States, it is estimated that it will be twenty or thirty years before it will begin to build a huge navy in order to compete for hegemony in the two oceans.

And Russia, although the Russo-Japanese War broke out between the Russians and the Japanese in history, and the Battle of Tsushima caused a sensation all over the world, but now, Russia's foothold on the Pacific coast has almost been uprooted by China, and the North Sea Fleet of the Imperial Navy has almost completely controlled a large area of sea from the Sea of Japan in the south to the Arctic Ocean in the north, and also penetrated deep into the Heilongjiang River basin.

If nothing happens, it is estimated that the Russian Pacific Fleet will not appear again, because the Russians will certainly not send fleets to fight in the Pacific again, as they have done in history.

Also disappearing is the Japanese navy, and now the Japanese civil war is still fighting, with the intervention of the empire, and it is extremely difficult for the Japanese to reunify. And even if the imperial intervention failed, Japan was reunited and the Industrial Revolution began. But with Lin Zhe here, I don't expect to be able to develop steadily. Then challenge the Empire's hegemony in Asia.

In the future, if the Japanese are unified, at least it shows a slight sign of building a huge navy, then Lin Zhe will not hesitate to preemptively sink the Japanese navy first, in short, Lin Zhe has made up his mind, and will definitely not give the Japanese a chance to develop slowly, and then build a huge navy.

From this point of view, it will be found that the main enemies of the Imperial Navy are now the British and French navies. Spain and the Netherlands are also counted, but Spain and the Netherlands are already in ruins, and the possibility of challenging the Imperial Navy is very small, and if the Empire does not take the initiative to fight them, they will have to snicker.

Based on this, in the development strategy of the Imperial Navy, its first imaginary enemy is the British Royal Navy!

Of course, the Admirals of the Imperial Navy were not arrogant enough to challenge the entire Royal Navy, but a part of it. The East India Fleet, to be exact.

According to the assumption of the Imperial Navy, once another war broke out with the British, the British would definitely not send only a small number of warships as they did last time, and would inevitably send capital ships from the Mediterranean Sea and the mainland to reinforce the East Indies Fleet. But reinforcements are also limited.

At the outbreak of war, the Imperial Navy expected that the East India Fleet would be likely to concentrate about a quarter to a third of the strength of the British Royal Navy.

And it's only a third, which is pretty scary. At least at the current size of the Imperial Navy, it is impossible to cope.

In order to face this threat, it was necessary for the Imperial Navy to build more. Bigger ships!

The Navy conservatively estimates that at least four ironclad ships of more than 10,000 tons are needed. Combined with small and medium-sized ironclad ships, it can maintain a minimum of undefeated.

In order to gain tactical superiority and win the war, then at least six or more 10,000-ton ironclad ships and more than 10 medium and large ironclad ships are needed.

This is also the main reason why the Imperial Navy is ready to order four more 10,000-ton ironclad ships!

However, ordering does not mean that construction will start now, because in several major shipyards in the empire, there are now two docks of more than 10,000 tons, and more 10,000-ton ironclad ships will be started, at least the existing docks.

In order to meet the needs of the Imperial Navy, the Shanghai shipyard had built a branch in Baoshan, including two 15,000-ton docks, the first of which was expected to be completed by the end of 1867, that is, by the end of this year, and the second by 1868.

In addition, the Guangzhou shipyard also began to invest in the construction of a large dock, and their ambition was greater, the first was a 20,000-ton dock, but the dock construction is large, so the construction progress will be slower, and now it is only beginning to raise funds, and it is expected to be completed until 1870.

In other words, the order of these four 10,000-ton ironclad ships of the Imperial Navy may start construction of one this year and one next year.

The remaining two ships will have to wait until the Chiyou completes the hull construction, and then wait until the No. 4 dock of the Qingdao Naval Shipyard or the 20,000-ton dock of the Guangzhou Shipyard completes the construction.

According to this specification, the overall follow-up will maintain the speed of starting one 10,000-ton ironclad ship a year!

Don't think this speed is fast, in fact, it is very slow compared to Britain and France, and the British basically serve several large ironclad ships every year.

At the same time, the technological progress of this era is too rapid, and the replacement of warships is very frequent, and it is impossible to have the same service life as the warships of later generations.

Basically, many warships have been declared obsolete when they are still on the slipway, and after five years of service, they will open up a level with the newest warships and begin to take a back seat, and after ten years, they will basically be reduced to the fate of training ships.

This can be seen from the existing warships of the Imperial Navy, the Pangu class and the Yandi class are both new warships that have just been commissioned in the past few years, but compared with the new warships that the Empire started construction in 1866, it is a whole era behind.

After a few years, the Pangu-class and Yandi-class warships will take a back seat.

As far as the decisive battle fleet in the late nineteenth century is concerned, in order to maintain its technological leadership, the safest way is to change the fleet in five years, and if the strength is not good, it is necessary to change the batch in ten years or carry out partial modification and upgrading, at least more than ten or even fifteen years, then there is no need to fight at all.

Although the Imperial Navy does not impose a mandatory regulation on the service life of the main warship, it can be roughly seen from the shipbuilding plan that the capital ship is basically one ship a year. At this rate, if the service life of the battleship in the front-line fleet is kept at ten years. Then it will be possible to maintain a decisive battle fleet of ten capital ships.

The capital ships were scheduled to start construction at a rate of one a year from 1867, while the second-class warships did not have so many regulations. Because the tonnage of other warships is relatively small, many shipyards in the empire have docks of thousands of tons, Shanghai Shipyard, Qingdao Naval Shipyard, Guangzhou Shipyard, and Tianjin Shipyard all have docks of thousands of tons.

On the one hand, the technological progress is very fast, and at the same time, the existing capital ships of the Imperial Navy are all ironclad ships of thousands of tons, and it will be a waste to build too many in the future. In other words, it will squeeze the funds for infrastructure construction such as 10,000-ton ironclad ships and ports.

So far, the Imperial Navy has five Pangu-class ironclad ships and three Yandi-class ironclad ships, the former with a tonnage of 2,400 tons and the latter with 4,000 tons.

Although looking at it with the technology of the next few years. These two warships are already quite backward, why? Because after 1866, the Imperial Navy began to build the main warships, including an offshore ironclad ship. All of them are 250 mm naval guns as the main guns, but the tonnage is different and the number of attachments is different. At the same time, the armor thickness has also been upgraded.

But these eight ironclad ships are placed here, and naturally it is impossible to throw them away in just a few years. Not to mention the third ship of the Yandi class, the Yellow Emperor, which had just undergone sea trials in January 1857. This will not be officially on active duty yet.

Then there are two more ships under construction, namely Tianwu and Kuafu.

In this way, there are as many as ten ironclad ships between 2,000 tons and 6,000 tons, which is not a small number.

If the number of 10,000-ton ironclad ships does not increase in the future, it will not be meaningful for the number of these ironclad ships of several thousand tons to increase, and the number of the two must be matched in a proportion, and the use of them can play the greatest role.

In addition to the problem of quantity, the navy also has differences about the design and use of some of these thousands of tons of ironclad ships, some people want to have more firepower and armor, and the tonnage limit can be larger, for example, about 7,000 tons, and when the time comes, they will directly participate in the fleet decisive battle with the 10,000-ton ironclad ships, even if the number is smaller, even if the ocean-going seaworthiness is poor.

However, this point of view has also been opposed by many people, and the price of building this kind of small one-sized decisive ironclad ship must start at least 1.5 million yuan, and this price is not as good as adding hundreds of thousands of ironclad ships to build more than 10,000 tons.

There are also those who believe that it should be built with a moderate tonnage, that is, about 3,000 tons, but emphasizing ocean-going seaworthiness and cruising range, mainly for operations in the open sea and safeguarding the overseas interests of the empire.

There are also people who believe that if we want to build an offshore ironclad ship with a larger tonnage, it does not matter if the sailing speed is slower and the seaworthiness is poorer, the firepower must be fierce enough, the armor must be thick enough, and the small boat will be able to resist the artillery, and if there is another naval battle at the mouth of the Pearl River when the time comes, it will be able to occupy a greater tactical advantage.

There are also people who think that it is good to maintain the existing ironclad ships of five or six thousand tons, although they seem to be relatively mediocre in all aspects, but they can do anything, and the fleet can barely fight a decisive battle, and the seaworthiness and endurance are also barely possible, although the price is slightly expensive, but it is only half of the 10,000-ton ironclad ship.

If it is said that the 10,000-ton ironclad ships and those 1,000-ton fast reconnaissance ships have been unanimously approved by the navy, then there are many differences within the navy about those medium- and large-sized ironclad ships between 2,000 and 8,000 tons; therefore, after the five-year plan was adopted, the plan to order the third 10,000-ton ironclad ship was decided, the plan to add two more fast reconnaissance ships was decided, and a number of inland rivers were added.

For these controversies within the navy, Lin Zhe often does not directly intervene in the handling, how to say, he did not study the development of the modern navy in his previous life, in addition to knowing a battleship, his understanding of the early ironclad ship is quite limited, and it is difficult for him to determine for a while, so in addition to giving some of his own opinions on the 10,000-ton ironclad ship, he is more of a guide in other aspects.

He wasn't much involved in the specifics.

The navy itself wants to continue the discussion, so Lin Zhe will not urge, the four-nation treaty has just been signed for half a year. The empire will not be able to fight with the British for a while, and there will be time for the navy to discuss it slowly.

Discussion of the design of naval warships and tactics. The development of the army is much simpler, and the army is not as complex as the navy. There are two kinds of weapons, guns and cannons.

As for guns, the Army has long been in service with the 1864 Linde rifle, a rear-loading rifled firing rifle rifle with metal bullets.

It is also the world's first rear-loading rifled rifle in mass service to fire metal bullets.

In addition, the army had long experimented with the Gatling gun, but the early Gatling gun had many problems, and the technical problems were solved for the past two years, until 1866. Only then began to enter service in small batches.

The first to be equipped with machine guns was not the Royal Army, but the Guards, Lin Zhe specially set up a machine gun battalion in the First Guards Division, with 16 Gatlings, when Lin Zhe went to observe the exercise, the 16 Gatling machine guns of this machine gun battalion were fired together, and a group of naval and land generals who accompanied the inspection were scared enough, these 16 machine guns were fired at a firepower strength comparable to an infantry regiment.

And the exercises have just ended. The army did not find it, but the navy people did find it, and then they wanted to equip the battleship with this machine gun.

Beyond the guns is artillery, and the artillery of the army is not much to say. Front-loading rifled guns have been used for so many years, and the next step is naturally to develop rear-loading rifled guns.

The technical difficulty of the breech-loading rifled gun is quite large, and at present, the army has not found a way to use the breech-loading rifled gun cheaply and in large quantities. So it can only be delayed again and again.

In the development of the army, the only bright spot worthy of Lin Zhe's attention in recent years is the development of horses.

After ten years of cultivation. The Army is bred through cross-breeding of Arabian horses, British thoroughbreds, and domestic Mongolian horses. It has been preliminarily bred to adapt to the Chinese climate and be of good quality in all aspects.

The breeding of horses is mainly carried out by the three major horse farms.

The earliest establishment, the largest is the Jurong Horse Farm in the south of the Yangtze River, the horses it bred are mainly by the British thoroughbred horse and the Arabian crossbred horse breed, and there is no blood relationship with the Inner Mongolia horse, the horses bred are called 'Jurong Horse', characterized by tall stature, beautiful body shape, its shoulder height can generally reach 1.53 meters, the average weight reaches 450 kilograms.

Although its shoulder height and weight are above the average for contemporary military horses, the most important thing for China is that after many generations of breeding, the Jurong horse has retained the body shape characteristics of the original stallion while also adapting to the Chinese climate, which is the most important thing.

Jurong horses are the best horses that can be bred in contemporary China, but the number of existing stallions is relatively small, and at the same time, this kind of horse is also relatively delicate, not to mention the trouble of serving, and the cost is relatively large, and a day does not eat carefully adjusted feed has to be adjusted.

Therefore, for the time being, the Jurong horse was not used as the main cavalry force of the whole army, but as the mount of senior officers and the mount of the herald.

In the whole army, there is only one cavalry unit with Jurong horses, that is, the cavalry regiment of the 1st Guards Division, that is, the 1st Guards Cavalry Regiment.

From the above, it can also be seen that the current Jurong horse is mainly used to see within the empire, not to fight.

However, the cavalry of the empire did not give up the Jurong horse, but crossed the Jurong horse with the Mongolian horse. It was bred by the first horse farm of the army established in Mongolia, that is, the Mongolian Yihe Hippo, and the unique Yihe hippo was bred, and its pedigree was quite complex, mainly Jurong horses and Mongolian horses, but with the addition of some Kazakh horses and other Central Asian horses, the bloodline of the Yihe hippo was quite complicated.

The average shoulder height of Yi hippo is one meter four or five, and the weight is about 400 kilograms, although its physical fitness is not as good as that of Jurong horses, but its endurance is better, and it can not only be used for riding, but also can be used to carry goods, and it is not as delicate as Jurong horses that need to be carefully raised.

Therefore, in terms of practicality, the Yi Hip Horse is more suitable for the use of light cavalry than the Jurong Horse!

And this kind of Yi hippo is also a horse that the Imperial Army has high hopes for and is ready to popularize in an all-round way, and even in order to promote this Yi hippo horse, it is not only bred within the army, but also helps local herders to breed it to ensure that the number of this army horse is satisfied.

In just a few years, the number of Yi hippos has exceeded 5,000, although these horses are still mostly young horses, but with this foundation, and then through some years of large-scale breeding, it is not impossible to breed hundreds of thousands of Yi hippos.

At that time, the cavalry units of the empire will be able to completely abandon the short and frail Mongolian horses and truly incarnate the modern cavalry troops, rather than a group of ancient cavalry riding alpacas. (To be continued.) )

PS: 2-in-1 chapter