() Chapter 175 is quite seized

"Seeing that you are so excited, I know that the navy must have captured a lot of warships this time, can you tell me?" Huo Shan looked at Huo Feng's excited expression and couldn't help but ask with a smile. Since joining the army, along with the change of status, the xìng style and habits of these old courtiers of the Huo family have also undergone subtle changes! Compared with Huo Long and Huo Shibian, who are in charge of the military department and the general staff, they are becoming more and more stable, Huo Hu and Huo Feng, who are in charge of the army department and the navy, are a bit like the troops they lead, they are as enthusiastic as fire, and they feel full of strength!

In addition to the 103 passenger and cargo ships of the Netherlands and Portugal that were captured intact, we captured all of the eight ironclad ships of the two countries, 10 of the 15 ironclad cruisers, and 21 of the 32 gunboats! A total of 39 battleships! The damage to these warships is not too serious, and as long as they are repaired and refitted for half a year, they can all join the active naval service of our Huo Jiajun! When the time comes, together with our nine Admiral-class destroyers, eight Seahawk-class frigates and three coast guards, and seventeen small frigates, our total number of warships will reach seventy-seven warships, with a total tonnage of more than 100,000 tons..."

Looking at his excited expression, Huo Shan couldn't help but secretly shook his head! "Huo Feng, wait a minute, it's really good to be able to have so many warships! Moreover, our vast sea area really needs more warships to guard! But let me ask you, we are going there now to find so many qualified naval personnel to pilot these warships! Of course, if you are willing to give up the second batch of eight Admiral-class destroyers and eight Seahawk-class frigates that are still on the slipway, I will agree with your naval expansion plan!"

After listening to the young master's words, Huo Feng was stunned for a moment! He only considered that the more warships in the navy, the better, and indeed did not take into account at all that Huo Jiajun's current two naval academies did not have so many qualified naval cadets at all! Although on the basis of inheriting the Mawei Ship Administration School, Huo Jiajun's two naval academies have been developed for more than two years and have already had three classes of more than 12,000 cadets, but the 6,000 people who have just entered the school this year have basically only been in contact with the navy for less than three months, and they have not even completed the basic military supplies! If you want them to become a qualified navy, you will have to wait at least another year or more!

Thinking of this, Huo Feng's originally excited face couldn't help but droop, although there are many warships, but the lack of qualified navy is a fact that cannot be changed in a short period of time! Of course, it is simply impossible for him to give up the sixteen advanced warships built by Huo Jiajun! However, thinking of the thirty-nine two-** ships that were captured, I am a little unwilling to want him to give up! This is an excellent opportunity to supplement the lack of warships in his navy and quickly increase the strength of his navy! Especially the Seven Provinces Alliance and Queen Maria, these two large-tonnage ironclad battleships of more than 5,000 tons, Huo Feng had already stared at them and drooled!

Looking at the pleading gaze he threw at him, Huo Shan couldn't help but sigh secretly! In fact, he was also a fanatical big navy, and if it weren't for the lack of personnel in his own navy, he wouldn't want to cut off even a single battleship! But the reality of Huo Jiajun's situation was there, but he couldn't help but make a choice!

"I took a look just now, and of the ten Iron Association cruisers we captured the Netherlands and Portugal, only seven of them exceeded 2,000 tons! Although the remaining three were not too damaged, they were limited to their own tonnage, and the space for their modification was not very large, so these three warships, plus our Haixun No. 2 and Haixun No. 3, a total of five warships, were all withdrawn from the active service of the Huojia Army Navy and handed over to the Naval Ship Academy and the Naval Officer Academy, which we had just established, as training ships! In addition, the 21 small-tonnage gunboats captured this time will be refurbished after all of them have been refitted! All the 17 frigates in service within our navy have been retired and handed over to the coast guard to be used as patrol ships! As for the remaining warships to join the navy after the refit is completed, I believe that the navy will basically have enough personnel by then!"

Ignoring the surprise on everyone's faces mixed with the look of surprise, after Huo Shan finished speaking in one breath, he picked up the teacup on the table and took a sip comfortably!

"What's wrong?"

Huang Sheng was a little shocked and looked up and down the face of his apprentice a lot! He really wondered if Huo Shan had been stimulated by something! He had already frantically expanded the army and built warships, but in less than a week after the end of the war against the Netherlands and Portugal, he had already made the decision to disarm 70,000 warships! This time he cut 43 warships in a row! This is really unreasonable!

"Young Master, will there be too many! Without so many warships, the strength of our navy has dropped greatly! Do you think you can leave a few more?" Huo Feng asked with a cautious look and a hint of sneer.

Glancing at him with slanted eyes, Huo Shan knew this guy's spleen very well, as long as he let go, Huo Feng would kick his nose and face, and then ask for a few more warships!

If it weren't for the fact that our navy really lacked warships, I wouldn't want to search for those iron cooperation ships!" He said what he thought in his heart, even if these old men were improved, they would be limited to the structure and materials of the hull, and they would not be as fast as the steel warships designed and built by Huo Jiajun himself in terms of speed and protection! Keeping them would not only occupy the navy's limited personnel and funds, but would also have to be overhauled every six months or even three months! In Huo Shan's opinion, it was really too wasteful!

Listening to the young master's words, Huo Long couldn't help but sigh secretly in his heart, he knew that this naval cut had already been decided! Fortunately, the eight ironclad ships and seven large-tonnage ironclad ships captured in this naval battle against the Netherlands and Portugal were all retained! The strength of the navy was also greatly increased compared to the station front! Although this result was not as good as expected, it was already good! Therefore, after seeing that Huo Feng's request was vetoed by the young master, he didn't say anything more!

"After returning to Taiwan, let the designers of the shipyard draw all the structures of the ironclad battleships of the Seven Provinces Alliance and the Queen Maria! The level of shipbuilding in the Netherlands and Portugal is still good! In addition, let Wei Han and Zheng Qinglian and their naval ship design departments collectively come up with a refit plan! After they are done, they will be handed over to me! "He is still very attentive to these two ironclad battleships of more than 5,000 tons! After all, in this era when 10,000-ton ironclad ships are still very rare! Ironclad ships of 6 or 7,000 tons are already supergiants on the sea! Otherwise, at the beginning of the construction of the Dingzhen Second Ship, it would not have the title of 'the first-class ironclad ship on the earth'!

"We understand, young master!" Huo Long replied respectfully.

"Hey, there's really a lot of weapons and equipment seized?"

"Hehe, 100,000 Snyder Enfield single-shot rifles, 5 million rounds of ammunition! 150 75mm field guns and mountain artillery, 48 105mm howitzers and cannons, 12 152mm howitzers! Plus 500,000 shells of various calibers, the Dutch and Portuguese suffered heavy losses this time!" Speaking of these, Huo Long was also happy in his heart, even if these rifles were not available to the Huo family, but these artillery pieces were good things, enough to arm four army divisions! You must know that although the arsenal of the Huo Jiajun is also capable of producing artillery, almost all of the large-caliber artillery pieces are used as shore artillery! There are less than 30 medium-caliber infantry guns replenished to the Huojia Army every month! There is not a single heavy artillery piece!

Seeing that Huo Long was interested in the gods, Huo Shan also understood his thoughts, after all, for the sake of the navy, the army did sacrifice a little bigger! But these are all necessary to defend the islands in the South Sea and the Pacific Ocean when the navy strength is still very weak!

After reading it for a while and reading all the reports, Huo Shan also had a general understanding of this naval battle!

"The Dutch guilders and Portuguese escudos worth five million taels of silver captured in this naval battle will be directly handed over to the Bank of Zōngyāng! In addition, one hundred and three transport ships, except for 26 transport ships of 10,000 tons and 35 transport ships of more than 5,000 tons, will be sold to the Huo family at market prices, and the rest will be auctioned and sold!" The reason why so many large-tonnage transport ships are left behind is because the Huo family's Pacific shipping is still responsible for transporting immigrants, and there has always been a shortage of ships, and I believe that with the replenishment of so many passenger and cargo ships! This situation will also be greatly alleviated! Moreover, the auction of the remaining ships can also promote the development of the shipping industry within the Huo family's army!

After listening to his words, Huang Sheng quite agreed with this opinion, with the gradual unsealing of the various islands within the Huo Jiajun, the speed of commercial development has exceeded the imagination of everyone before! Moreover, the construction of infrastructure for the expansion of the Huo Jiajun also requires a large number of transport ships to transport all kinds of building materials! And the shortage of ships and the lack of transportation capacity have indeed always been a bottleneck restricting the development of the Huo Jiajun! Now with the addition of so many ships, it has been able to meet the development needs of the Huo Jiajun at this stage!

They didn't care much about these Huo Long and Huo Feng! After all, they were military commanders, and they didn't care much about political and economic matters!