The sunset is like a fire, sprinkling the brilliant afterglow on every part of the land of Central Europe.

In a garden at the Imperial Palace in Berlin, Qingying and Wilhelm are walking on a bluestone path full of fallen leaves, their leather boots rustling over the gray and yellow dead leaves. A gust of evening wind blew, cold to the bone, and William, who was nearly fifty years old, couldn't help but wrap his heavy clothes tightly; His expression was slightly solemn, and he said: "According to the news sent back by Prime Minister Bilow, the British insist on limiting the ratio of the number of capital ships of the two sides to 60% of the British before signing a neutrality agreement with us, which is far from the 85% share proposed by Bilow. At present, the negotiations between the two sides have reached an impasse. Ettel, do you say that Britain will come to this agreement with me and Germany this time? ”

Qingying looked at the tall and generous gray back in front of him, and said softly: "As long as Prime Minister Bilow does not make concessions to the British on the issue of the fleet, and insists on expanding the fleet at a high speed, then Britain will definitely accept the existence of a large proportion of the capital ships of the German Navy in the total number of the Royal Navy, and reach a compromise agreement with us to maintain neutrality in the European war." ”

Hearing this, William turned around, his eyes full of a little hesitation and incomprehension. Seeing this, Qingying explained her considerations to him in detail.

"It is true that our insistence on enlarging the fleet will indeed arouse strong anger and hostility among British public opinion against our Germany; And under the urging of the envy of the envy brewing for many years of imperial production, the anti-German wave in Britain will also rise and fall. These factors would have the opposite effect on the understanding between Britain and Germany. However, the current status quo does not change by the subjective whims of these Britons. ”

"Because of Germany's precedence in all-heavy artillery warships, the Imperial Navy has an absolute advantage in this competition in which the strength of the navy is determined by the number of dreadnoughts; The most dangerous period of accumulation in the theory of the fleet of risk 'could be carried out by a superior country to launch a preventive war to strangle a potential threat in its infancy'. It has been greatly shortened by the revolutionary breakthrough of naval technology! The Imperial Navy currently has 5 active dreadnoughts. This dangerous period has been successfully navigated. It has become an existence with which the Royal Navy does not dare to declare war easily! And with the passage of time, the High Seas Fleet, backed by strong industrial strength and economic aggregates, will also be able to maintain the current situation of strength and strength against Britain for a long time: that is, the great risk that Britain will not be able to defeat it easily, or else it will completely lose its maritime superiority. ”

Qingying's mind turned, and he explained simply: "If the British government allows this negotiation to break down, then they will only be greeted by a vigorous naval arms race; And in this contest determined by the total economic volume and the scale of industry, Britain, by virtue of its own strength, could no longer gain the disparity advantage they expected over Germany, which had seized the opportunity and had accumulated a large number of capital ships in advance. So, in this case. No matter how much the British public was dissatisfied with Germany, no matter how much they could not accept the number of German all-heavy artillery warships approaching the Royal Navy; The British government, after an initial struggle to adapt, had to accept the harsh reality for them. I can almost conclude that it will not be long before the British media, at the behest of the government, will change their stance on Germany and try to calm the agitated mood of the people, thus creating a basis for public opinion for an agreement between Britain and Germany. ”

William suddenly said, "I understand. If the British do not choose to compromise with the Empire, they will not only fail to achieve the expected balance of naval power in the shipbuilding race, but will also be burdened with extremely heavy financial burdens in this naval arms race. And if Britain had signed a naval pact with us, they would at least be able to slow or even halt the race, though they were equally powerless to guarantee maritime superiority over us when the rise of the Imperial Navy was an inevitable end. Get respite for their overwhelmed finances. In addition to this, Britain's conditional neutrality will also tie our hands and feet to a certain extent. This led us to abandon the option of attacking France on our own initiative because we were too concerned about the attitude of the British. ”

Qingying nodded: "Exactly." Britain had nothing to lose in this treaty, and their declared neutrality in the war against Germany waged by France did not conflict with the treaty of defensive alliance they had signed with France; Once Germany takes the initiative to start a war against France, they can still stand by the side of France without any scruples. What they get through this agreement is the lifting of the financial burden and the re-calming of the situation in Europe, and the creation of time for Russia to regain its power and contain us again on the Eastern Front – a business that the British will not refuse without paying any effort. ”

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William's trench coat was tightly wrapped, and his eyes showed undisguised disgust, and he said: "From Salisbury in the early days to Bannerman today, all the British are more cunning and shameless than jackals, but fortunately we have found a weapon against these guys, that is, a shining armor and an iron fist wrapped in thick armor. When my high seas fleet is completely built, the British will not only remain neutral in the war against Germany provoked by France, but will also choose to sit on the sidelines when Germany takes the initiative to attack France! Speaking of this, he looked at the tall young man standing respectfully in front of him, and the negative emotions in his eyes gradually faded, and finally showed a look of relief: "The reason why the Imperial Navy was able to seize the opportunity in this revolutionary leap is that Alfred and you, who admired the all-heavy artillery battleship, made great contributions. Without this early lead in the naval field, the empire would have suffered a series of unbearable consequences: not only would the strength of the fleet be inferior to the British with the starting pistols in hand, but the gap in its navy would also affect the final choice at the national strategic level. If Britain is to be forced to compromise on our strategic relationship, it will take at least 5 to 8 years of additional struggle; It is highly likely that the Russian army will have recovered from the defeat in the war against Japan and will regain its prominence in Eastern Europe and the Balkans. Under these circumstances, it is still unknown whether the British will accept our terms! ”

"This is a bold attempt made by the Navy in the context of the rapid fire of the capital ships of the great powers to be used against armored cruisers, based on the original relatively high rate of fire of the Imperial 283 mm main gun, but the result has been an unpredictable success. I just saw this astonishing result and generalized it, not comparable to General Tirpitz's exploits. Qingying smiled slightly. In this area of the concept of full heavy artillery, it was true that he did not give a direct conclusion, as usual, but by clever stepped guidance, the dreadnought was presented in front of the German naval hierarchy in a natural way. Through this process of proposing ideas and then demonstrating, German designers have acquired a quality of independent thinking that has not been found in history; Now their design ideas have become self-contained, and they will no longer follow the British ass as they did in history, and create a handsome defective product that makes people feel extremely painful!

William looked at the handsome young man in front of him with a smile on the corner of his mouth, as if he was absolutely satisfied with this exquisite work of art created by himself. He patted Qingying on the shoulder and said, "Next, what are you going to do after we reach a naval agreement with the British?" ”

"The signing of the Anglo-German naval agreement not only saved the British government's finances from the heavy pressure of bankruptcy, but also relieved the pressure on our German finances. After all, the speed of starting construction of five capital ships per year is also a rather heavy burden on the German finances, which have to take into account the first army in the world; What's more, the army is still purchasing a large number of machine guns, artillery and zeppelin air boats, and the cost of equipment production has risen by leaps and bounds compared with previous years. Taking advantage of this opportunity, we have also slowed down the current pace for the time being, and made further moves according to the naval plans of France and Russia, and devoted more energy to the innovation of technology and the research and development of new equipment. When we are ready for war, we can consider a preventive war against France. Qing Ying groaned slightly, and then replied. Although the national strength of Germany in this plane has been greatly improved compared with the same period in history, it also has a lot more money to spend than in history: airships, flying girls, submarines, army equipment, and even water tanks in the research and development stage are all gold-swallowing monsters; An appropriate reduction in the Navy's expenditures will certainly give a considerable boost to the enhancement of combat capability in these areas.

"After more than a year of getting along, the Krupp R&D team that went to the Skoda military factory has learned all the essence of the use of the new Austro-Hungarian naval gun. In the coming period, I was going to have them begin work on the Krupp 350 mm naval gun to deal with the 305 mm L50 main gun, which was more powerful than the Dreadnought, which the British had adopted on the St. Vincent-class battleships. We cannot buy three or four of these large machines from the United States for every capital ship we build, and Germany must be fully capable of independently developing and building cutting-edge capital ships. But beyond that, there is another area that we need to pay attention to. ”

William raised his eyebrows and said, "What else?" ”

Qing Ying glanced at the slowly sinking sunset with ulterior motives, and said with a smile: "This time, under the tough attitude of my Germany, the British have failed to achieve their goal of blackmailing us, but with their character, they will never give up. They will certainly contain the strength of the Imperial Navy elsewhere, so that we cannot use all our main forces against the Royal Navy's home fleet assembled in the Atlantic. And there is only one way to achieve this goal, and that is to rebuild Russia's maritime power in the Baltic! (To be continued......)

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