"My Lord Yan, why are you as sad as Tang Shaoyi? Lee Kwang Sao and the council have already approved a special naval allocation for two battleships for you, so you should always show a smile, right? ”

On the bright sands of Honolulu, Li Mo walked on the beach with his bare feet in his pants, he couldn't remember how long he hadn't enjoyed the beach and sunshine, at this time he understood the difference between "dream and reality" "Bubble girl, drink tea, idle to guide the good years of the country seems to have no chance for the time being, maybe this is the price God sent him back." (Full text reading, all in. (.i. Want. Wen. Learning Network)

Li Mo's ridicule made the face of the head of the Ministry of Defense bitter, "The budget of two all-battleships is indeed overjoyed, but the problem is that it will take at least two years for the budget to become a battleship that can be seen and touched!"

Although he, the minister of national defense, belongs to the ranks of civilian officials and does not hold real power in the army, he is also a core member of the General Staff Headquarters, so he naturally knows what kind of difficult environment the young Chinese army will face after this war.

Great Britain, France, United States, Russia.

The born Hua almost offended the major powers, "and has not yet reached the expected Sino-German alliance, which makes Hua have to continue to face the four major powers alone, although there are contradictions between these powers, but at least everyone belongs to the same white world."

Although from the current point of view, Hua has won or drawn against these four major countries", but the bottom of the family is not comparable to that of the young Hua.

Taking advantage of the lack of attention paid by the great powers in the past few years and stepping on the shoulders of others to develop, Li Mo and everyone finally drummed up a small but capable equipment manufacturing force, and even achieved a leading position in technology, but it was far inferior in scale and efficiency.

Hua still can't afford it, both officials and generals at all levels know this very well, otherwise Ji Weishan would not choose to send the heavy patrol formation out and not participate in the decisive battle, "What I am afraid of is attrition, and I dare not devote all my strength to fighting to the death."

On the contrary, although the economic and manufacturing thrones of the opponent this time have been surpassed by the United States, France, Germany and other countries, "but the bottom line is that almost every shipyard and every dock can build capital ships, and it is extremely dangerous to fight with this kind of opponent, so from the very beginning, the General Staff formulated a combat policy of fighting to promote peace, and then Li Enfu even persuaded the navy not to continue to expand the retaliation at the cost of the budget of two battleships, and the fear was that Britain would pour the country into the war."

After all, Britain is still the world's number one naval power, although it was dragged by Boer, but the county was mainly dragged down by the army, from the perspective of the navy, Britain still has the ability to fight another war, so he was worried that he would not be able to achieve his goal, but attracted the British navy's full revenge.

And Li Mo also knows very well that it seems that the British Far East Fleet has lost three battleships and three first-class armored cruisers, which has greatly damaged the strength of the fleet, but if you look at this loss from the perspective of the entire British Navy, it is simply a drop in the bucket.

After entering the age of steel and steam, in terms of the total number of ships alone, "the size of the British navy has dropped significantly from its heyday, but its fleet size is still larger than the combined size of the navy of the last few ships, and the three major ships are considered to be the third."

The Far Eastern Fleet was the weakest of the three fleets, the Mediterranean Fleet and the Home Fleet were the core forces of the British Navy, especially the Difeng Sea Fleet, which was undoubtedly formidable, with as many as thirteen former dreadnought battleships, six of which were of the good Maje class, "but qualitatively even surpassed the sum of the French Navy, the second largest in the world!" If we add the seven Sovereign-class ships stationed in Egypt and India, we will be able to form an absolute military superiority over China. 【 I want: super fast update 】

However, Li Mo was not as worried as Yan Fu, because Britain was not without worries, and the war with the Boers did not show signs of victory, but was getting bigger and bigger, and the European countries led by Germany and France were trying their best to provide weapons to the Boers, and Britain was fighting against the whole of Europe! So the Home Fleet and the West Indies Fleet, as well as the Pacific Fleet, were transferred there to blockade the open sea to support operations.

As long as they don't push Britain to a dead end, they have no reason to fight with all their national strength, because if he really brings in the Mediterranean Fleet, he will face the danger of a power vacuum in Europe!

Of course they can also transfer the home fleet back, but that! The corners of Limer's mouth hooked, unless Salisbury went crazy, otherwise the entire European arms ships would pounce on South Africa!

Therefore, he very much agreed with Li Enfu's strict order at the end of the day, "because as long as the skin is not torn and the Far East Fleet is trapped in Hong Kong and cannot move, the British will have to consider the safety of tens of thousands of Far East garrisons and more than a dozen capital ships, and you must know that once the Chinese Army breaks through the fragile Kowloon defense line", Jing Xiaoterman will only have one way to scuttle the ship and sink itself!

In the final analysis, in fact, he also has enough hole cards in his hand to play, although he may eventually fail, but he is definitely capable of biting the British Empire to only half a breath, even if he loses all the overseas land that has been finally well down, as long as he keeps the Chinese mainland, there is still hope for a resurgence, but the process is too difficult.

Of course, being able to fight back does not mean that you can be arrogant to the end" because this is still an extremely dangerous tightrope walk!

Speaking from the heart, if it weren't for the unwillingness of the British to give up their southeastern interests, he would definitely not be willing to go to war with the British, and even as long as they were willing to withdraw from China, "he would rather give the Chinese ship technology to the British."

But he didn't expect that the Chinese ship actually did not let Britain give in, "so he had to make up his mind to fight this battle on the way out, because if he waited for another two years, after Britain broke through the technical barriers, people would not take care of themselves, and at that time, Britain without South Africa's containment could completely free up its hands to let go, which forced itself to wait until the beginning of World War I to be able to do it."

In this way, he will have to deal with the torrent with half of China, although his confidence will not be reduced, but the chances of victory will undoubtedly be a few points less, because it is a big change that needs to be handled by the strength of the whole country!

He will never tolerate being forced to watch the great powers re-divide the world's resources as he did today because he is unable to concentrate the country's efforts to deal with it.

Now that they have fallen, the Far Eastern Fleet has been trapped in Hong Kong and cannot move, and the next thing is to see whether Britain fights to the death or solves the problem through negotiations!

"Your Majesty, emergency electricity!"

Du Dazhuang panted and rushed to the beach with a telegram, and shouted before he even had time to salute: "Listen to the report of the Wind, four Sovereign-class battleships entered the Indian Ocean through the Red Sea this morning!" ”

Li Mo and Yan Fu's faces sank suddenly, could it be that Britain is really going to fight to the death?

"That's right." Du Dazhuang scratched his head and took out another telegram as if he were playing a trick: "German call, yesterday afternoon, after inspecting Wilhelm Shipyard, Wilhelm II announced that four ships would be built at once

When Du Dazhuang held the telegram and scratched his head as if he was wondering if the name of the ship was so awkward, Zimmer's eyes suddenly lit up and interjected: "It's announcing the construction of four Nassau-class battleships, right!" ”

"Your Majesty——, how do you know?"

"Guess!" Li Mo almost shouted a few times to express his inner happiness, although Britain and France were not tempted by the Chinese ship, but Germany was unwilling to continue to be a second-rate navy after all, and finally sacrificed the treasure of the Nassau class!

Du Dazhuang's face darkened, "Scratching his head vigorously, can you guess such an awkward name?" He is worthy of the emperor! And Yan Fu next to him was also in a heartbeat, secretly guessing how many unknown secrets the emperor still has!

Li Mo didn't pay attention to Da Zhuang, his face was full of surprise, he took the telegram from his hand, and after looking at it twice, he finally breathed a long sigh of relief, and scolded with a smile: "Da Zhuang, remember to say good news next time!" ”

"Good news? Is there any good news about German man-made warships? Du Dazhuang didn't know what to do, "touching his head and asking Yan Fu for help", and his humble appearance immediately attracted a burst of laughter from the latter: "It's good news." ”

"Inform everyone, and leave for China in three hours.

Holding the telegram, Li Mo's eyes were full of hope.

When Li Mo set off from Honolulu, the whole of Europe was in chaos!

No one believed that anyone would really dare to challenge the mighty British Navy" The news that went viral in the streets and alleys was surprising, second only to the British Home Fleet and the Mediterranean Fleet, and his British Far East Fleet, known as the "Iron Arm of the Far East", had lost "at the hands of the fleet of the Far Eastern arsonists who had visited Europe not long ago!"

Although Philettman also inflicted heavy damage on the Chinese Pacific Fleet (external number, internal First Fleet) "caused the loss of three capital ships of the other side, which directly led to the reduction of nearly one-fifth of the Chinese naval forces, but the problem is that Hong Kong, which is known as the best cobalt land in the Far East, is actually surrounded by people, and the remaining dozen warships can't even leave Victoria Bay!"

God, what happened to them?! Everyone is speculating that "they are all waiting for the next move of the United Kingdom, because if a full-scale war breaks out between these two countries" will be enough to affect the current world pattern!

Europe began to gear up, Germany, France, Italy, Austria and even Russia "began to make small calculations", which included both the ridicule of the Germans, the secret rejoicing of the French, the increasing coveting of North Africa by the Italians, and even the half-breathed Ottoman Empire was wondering if it was time to take Egypt back when the battleship that was ordered returned.

A naval battle that is half a world away and not large-scale" has made the whole of Europe strange and unpredictable, which may not have been expected by Li Mo.

In the face of this upheaval and the attack on Parliament, Prime Minister Salisbury could no longer sit still and "brought Prince Badenberg, First Minister of the Navy, and Fisher, Third Minister of the Navy, together."

One of them was the prince who had been in charge of the navy for twenty years, and the other was a pioneer in naval technology, and he was now recognized as a British expert in naval gunnery, but at this moment, they were all at the same time worried.

In fact, although the Chinese navy fought well in the face of Philettman, this was not enough to worry the British, and what really made them feel palpitations was that "the dozen or so remaining warships in Philettman's hands were blocked in Hong Kong by a mysterious weapon and could not leave!"

As the core of naval technology," Fisher immediately remembered the emerging submarines in European countries, "only that kind of thing can make the Far Eastern Fleet unaware of what to do, but the problem is that France is currently in the world with good technology is far from reaching the level of actual combat", why can China do it?

In that Li Mo's hands, how many technologies do he still have enough to affect the navy!

Fisher clenched his fists, it was too early to talk about this, the current focus was to take Philettman and the Far East Fleet out of Hong Kong, because the Chinese Army had already landed in Guangzhou Bay and was "marching towards Kowloon in a steady stream, if they captured Kowloon, occupied Hong Kong and captured the warships, it would be a catastrophe for the Far East Fleet and Britain!"

The three Sovereign-class ships sent to support the Far East Fleet have temporarily entered Gapo, and four ships of the same type stationed in Egypt have also departed, and they will form a fleet with the former to rescue the Far East Fleet, but the question is whether "if they enter the South China Sea" will anger China and finally launch an attack and bury the Far East Fleet and tens of thousands of soldiers?

You must know that judging from the telegram sent back by Filitman before, Li Mo was already merciful to the Far East Fleet, otherwise he would not have sunk three capital ships and turned to deal with those small warships that were originally consumables, if they had fired all their torpedoes at the unsuspecting capital ships, then Britain might no longer need to think about rescue at all.

The Chinese deliberately gave the Far East Fleet a glimmer of life, but they constantly exerted pressure from the sea and land" As an excellent politician, he is actually very clear about this kind of diplomatic language, Li Mo wants to use nearly 10,000 naval officers and dozens of warships of the Far East Fleet to force Britain to compromise and give up the interests of the Far East!

Salisbury rubbed his swollen temples, and there was a multiple-choice question in front of him: "Either continue to fight, but in doing so, you will sacrifice the entire Far East Fleet, and you will also give up tens of thousands of army officers and men in Shanghai and Hong Kong, which are currently surrounded." If there is a compromise, there is no doubt that Britain will lose all its interests in China and lose all British face, which is intolerable to all Britons.

"Your Majesty, if you allow it, I am ready to send the Mediterranean Fleet to the Far East!" Prince Badenberg's eyes flashed, "Like an immortal veteran, he exuded the aura of bravery."

"Send the Mediterranean Fleet!" Prime Minister Salisbury and Fisher were stunned, but by the time they stood up, Kimberley had already slammed the door open.

"No, the Mediterranean Fleet must not leave!"

"Why? Why! Tens of thousands of naval officers of the Philippe Republic are waiting for us to come to the rescue, why can't we let the Mediterranean Fleet go? Prince Badenberg suddenly got up and looked at Kimberley angrily.

"Because of this!" Kimberley raised the information in his hand and handed it to Prince Badenberg, who looked at him twice and suddenly lost all the blood on his face, and slumped into his chair.

"Your Majesty, France has announced the withdrawal of all its troops from China, and Germany has also announced this morning that it will build four Nassau-class battleships!" Kimberley took a deep breath: "In addition, Hua has already sent someone to bring news, they are willing to hand over the battleship technology they have mastered to us, they only need to ——。 ”

Kimberley glanced at a few people and said heavily: "Let's evacuate the border of China!" ”