Chapter 131 Battleship construction begins——

On the fifth day after Xu Jie arrived in Italy, Beiyang officially signed a contract with the Italian Navy and the shipyard on the ship purchase plan. At the same time, on the eighth day, two improved **-class light armored cruisers were installed in Italy.

Put down on the slipway of Doshal Shipyard

The first keel. This ship purchase plan, which has long been known to all countries, did not cause much shock. It was just that the British Armstrong Shipyard and the German Vulcan Shipyard expressed their displeasure with Beiyang, an old customer, to abandon the two and choose the Italian shipyard.

Regret. Among them,

Lord Watts of Armstrong Shipyard said that Armstrong Shipyard will use facts to prove that the new Armstrong-type two-level dome-armored cruiser will surpass the two warships being built at Andoshal Shipyard. And the fear that is most concerned about this is that

Is Japanese, one

On the one hand, they are going all out to promote Beiyang's new warships in the country in order to obtain more funding. On the other hand, Japanese diplomats, represented by Ambassador Aoki Shuzo to the United Kingdom, frequently visit the Armstrong Shipyard in order to order new models that can suppress Beiyang's new warships.

Ship cruiser.

But this is just a small shock to the world in the Italian shipbuilding industry. What is really enough to make the European powers take notice is that the Italian Navy decided to officially start construction of a new armored cruiser with a displacement of nearly 9,000 tons in three months! Equipped with a brand new twin

The combined 10-inch turret main gun uses new Italian hardened armor. Water tube boilers were also ordered from France. It can be said that the Italians did their best to purchase them from abroad.

It purchased equipment that it could not produce. And the Italian Navy Minister Mr. Breen even publicly declared: The Italian Navy and the Androsal Shipyard will do their best to turn this new armored cruiser into the most advanced warship in the world!! And

The Italians also gave this new battleship a resounding name. They named this new battleship after Garibaldi, the national hero in the Italian Unification War, which the Italian government and industry have high hopes for.

The first to react was France. As one of the three naval giants in the Mediterranean, the French (Britain, France, Italy, the three strongest forces in the Mediterranean, as for Austria-Hungary, just ignore it) used a wave against the Italians.

I despise the fact that the displacement of a battleship is only equipped with a 10-inch gun and the armor is less than 10 inches, but the speed is astonishingly fast. If you participate in the decisive battle of the fleet,

The 10-inch gun is not lethal enough (after all, the French do not know the data of the British new 10-inch, 40l gun). The thickness of the armor is not enough to withstand the bombardment of the 12-inch gun. If it is used for cruise combat, the endurance is limited, and the French

People think that the Italians only need to wander around the Mediterranean and there is no need to go to the ocean to break diplomatic relations. Therefore, this battleship seems nondescript.

The other is the Russians. The Russians are interested in the speed of the new warships. In the Russians' view, if they want to break out of the Baltic Sea and sail on the Atlantic and Pacific Oceans, they must face the British Royal Navy, although it is impossible in terms of strength.

No match for the British. So the Russians decided to take another route,

Didn't the Dutch and British privateer fleets make the Spanish miserable? Today, the Russians can also learn from it, so the Russians decided to study this battleship carefully and said that the Russian Navy will build similar ones that can sail in the ocean for a long time.

New armored cruiser and deploy it in the Far East!!

The Russian actions directly aroused dissatisfaction among the British. Maritime lines of communication are the lifeblood of the British Empire. The French-made clippers and small-gun cruisers are enough to cause headaches for the British, and now the Russians have to put large cruisers into

On the ocean, this

Doesn’t it cost the lives of the British? The British answer is simple. If some country wants to build a 10,000-ton cruiser and put it on the ocean, then the British will build a 13,000-ton cruiser.

British warships will compete in speed, firepower, defense

The Royal Navy has an absolute advantage, yes, and will also have an advantage in numbers. In a word, the British Royal Navy is not afraid of you. (Historically, after the Russians built the more than 10,000-ton Rurik armored cruiser, the British Navy attacked William

White said the price

It’s not a problem, you can just build it! Then William White did not hesitate and directly built a first-class dome-armored cruiser with a displacement of 14,200 tons, the Qiangsheng class, also called powerful. This cargo tonnage is similar to that of a battleship, and its size is larger.

It was a battleship that completely surpassed the battleships of the time. It was actually 164 meters long, 21.6 meters wide, and had a draft of 7.32 meters! It had a super-large coal bunker that could hold 3,000 tons. It was equipped with 48 boilers and 4 vertical steam engines, and its power was as powerful as a ghost.

25,000 horsepower! The maximum speed is 22 knots. It is equipped with 234 guns, two 6-inch guns and 12 guns, which were later increased to 16! In terms of armor protection, all artillery of medium caliber and above have armor protection of more than 100mm, and dome armor

also

It is enough to ensure that the core compartment will not be penetrated by 8-inch artillery. Compared with Rurik, it can be beaten, outrun, and consumed~~. However, the cost of this ship is also quite astonishing, actually reaching 70

+10,000 pounds. 48 boilers are burning.

It’s not just coal, it’s money! As a result, this battleship, which was commissioned in 1897, went into reserve after 1904, and the landlords didn’t have any spare money~~ So this obviously big and useless battleship got an alias

, white elephant!!)

"Xu, it seems that the construction of Garibaldi-class armored cruisers will cause a wave of waves in the European naval community." Looking at the newspaper in his hand, Vittorio said with a smile. "The British even stated that they would suppress all indicators.

Any country’s ocean-going cruiser.”

"The British will do this." Xu Jie smiled slightly. "The British's sensitivity to the navy is definitely beyond the imagination of outsiders. The British will not allow anyone to touch the sea lines of communication."

"Actually, I think the Garibaldi class is no longer a cruiser in the traditional sense. It has weakened its range and speed, and strengthened its armor and firepower. It is actually a product between a cruiser and a battleship. It can be used to a certain extent.

It can conduct breaking operations within a certain range and can also participate in fleet decisive battles. Relatively speaking, I think the Garibaldi class is more like a smaller battleship." Vittorio expressed his thoughts.

"Second-class battleship?" Xu Jie secretly gave a thumbs up. His design was very similar to the second-class battleship Centurion later built by the British. Vittorio was indeed a master, and his positioning of the battleship was indeed

Very accurate.

"Yes, it is a second-class battleship. This can be applied to the classification of battleships in the age of sail." Vittorio said excitedly.

"What actions did the Japanese take?" Xu Jie was not interested in entangled with Vittorio in these aspects. He was more concerned about what actions the Japanese took.

"Then we can only wait for the telegram from your British friend." Vittorio said helplessly.

"Are the Japanese impatient to order new warships?" Xu Jie said to himself.
Chapter completed!