1855 United States Tycoon

Scrooge didn't think much about what the British would do. Because the general trend is already obvious. In Europe, the Allied Powers and Allied Powers have been established. Although they all claim that the own military alliance organization is to defend the world’s love and peace or something, this is like the Big Big Wolf saying it. To protect the safety of Yangcun, no one with normal IQ in the world would believe it.

In recent years, the Germans have increased their horsepower to build new battleships. Tirpitz persuaded the lame emperor and convinced him that the German navy did not need to be really strong enough to defeat the British navy. Tirpitz knew that if he said to build a large fleet capable of defeating the British navy head-on, it would scare the emperor back immediately. Moreover, at any time, in any country, because of the issue of the division of military expenditures, the red deer of the army always look at the navy not pleasing to the eye. The world of the Second German Empire was even more conquered by the army. It is true that the Navy asked to build a fleet that would overwhelm the British Navy, and the army would probably not be able to stand it. Therefore, Tirpitz used a set of risk fleet theory to convince the emperor.

The basic idea of ​​his theory is this: The level of the German fleet does not need to be able to overwhelm the British fleet, it only needs to be able to deal a heavy blow to the British fleet. Because the meaning of the fleet to Germany and the United Kingdom is completely different, for Germany, the fleet is just the icing on the cake, even if the fleet is completely destroyed, Germany will not be shaken at all. But for Britain, the fleet is even Britain itself. Everything in the UK, whether it is the British pound or the 35 million square kilometers of land, is based on an invincible fleet and is maintained by powerful maritime power. If the Royal Navy suffered heavy losses, the chain that maintained the entire empire would break.

The British occupy the most colonies in the world, which has made countless countries jealous. These colonies digested at least one-third of Britain’s industrial products, which made the British suffer less than others when almost every large-scale economic crisis hit. Because they can starve to death the Indians, Burmese, and Irish instead of starving the English. Once the backbone of this empire is maintained, the Royal Navy will be severely weakened, the colonies will become restless, and other countries (especially the United States) will also be encouraged. At that time, it can be said that a frenzy to carve up the British Empire will rise. . Therefore, Germany does not need to be able to defeat the British fleet all the time. As for a fleet that can inflict heavy losses on the Royal Navy in exchange-like consumption, the risk of confrontation between Britain and Germany can be ascending to the point that they are unacceptable. , Then, in many cases, especially when overseas interests are involved, the British have to compromise with Germany.

Of course the British would not sit back and watch Germany get that fleet out. As a famous European cudgel, the British began to take advantage of the French's revenge mentality to encourage France to strengthen its army and contain Germany. Finally, they simply abandoned the so-called "glorious isolation" of non-alignment and directly joined the French military alliance.

In today's situation, the British cannot invest much in Asia. Their rule in Asia and the restrictions on United States are largely enforced by Japan. And because of the chaos of a traverser like Scrooge, the speed of industrialization of the entire world is much faster than in the original history. As far as the arms race is concerned, the level of the arms race is now higher than in the original history. few. A higher level of arms race will of course also bring greater pressure to countries. In the original history, the two major military blocs did not officially start fighting until 1914. But with the intensity of the arms race today, Scrooge is not sure whether they will be able to persist until 1914. Of course, in Scrooge's view, the later the fight is, the better, because the more fully prepared, the greater the scale and destruction of the war, and the more benefits it can bring.

"In the original history, if it weren't for the Serb, maybe the arms race could continue for a few more years. Should I send someone to protect that Ferdinand in the future?" Scrooge is doing Heavenly Horse. Sora was thinking about it, and suddenly there was a soft knock on the door.

"Come in." Scrooge said.

Incoming was Edmund Diablo, Scrooge's secretary. Now that Scrooge's business is getting bigger and bigger, a secretary is no longer enough, even if the secretary is capable. Therefore, Scrooge now has a huge secretary group, which is divided into several groups according to different categories. Each group has a secretary in charge and a large group of other secretaries.

Scrooge's secretary group mainly has the following categories:

The first group responsible for arms production matters, and its secretary in charge is Edmund Diablo. The second group responsible for intelligence and mercenary operations, its secretary in charge is Jean Barr. The third group is responsible for scientific research. Its secretary in charge is Bill Mephisto. The fourth group is in charge of media affairs, and its secretary in charge is Fernan Bellier. Responsible for the fifth group of finance, its secretary in charge is Pandemaninan Mamen. These aspects are still under the direct control of Scrooge. Of course, Grey Stone has already begun to take over many of these things, but the final decision on many things is still in the hands of Scrooge.

Now that Edmund Diablo came in, it was of course something related to military industry.

"Edmond, what's the matter?" Scrooge asked as he put together a piece of information in his hand. It was a copy from Bill Mephisto of the third group about low cost. Information on the progress of steam turbines.

"Mr. MacDonald, this is the contract for the civilian transport submarine that the Germans purchased from us. You need to sign it." Edmund Diablo said while taking out a document.

"Ah, put it here. I'll take a look first." Scrooge replied.

The so-called civilian transport submarine is a joke in terms of transportation, because its transportation volume is too sorry for its cost. If a Morgan-Macdonald civilian transport submarine, the world's largest, is used to transport people, excluding sailors, there will be no more than a hundred people at a time. It is used to transport goods and the total weight will not exceed 700 tons. On the other hand, a surface vessel of the same cost is used to transport people, and the continuous transportation volume is at least ten times that of it, and the comfort level is far more than it; if it is used to transport goods, the transportation volume is even more than thirty times more than it. Moreover, the surface speed of this so-called civilian transport submarine is only a mere nine knots. If it dives underwater, the speed will drop to about four knots. In this era, the speed of a general cargo ship is about 14 knots. That is to say, if the so-called civil transport submarine uses surface navigation, it will make one trip, and an ordinary transport ship of the same construction cost can make 1.7 trips. If it wants to use its characteristics and adopt the submarine method, then it will make one trip. An ordinary transport ship can make more than three trips. Moreover, the maintenance cost of large submarines far exceeds that of ordinary transport ships. It seems that this thing is really useless except for transporting gold.

However, for the Germans, this large civilian transport submarine is very useful. Of course, the Germans did not intend to use it to transport gold. The Germans did not have such a need, at least not yet. Of course, the Germans will not use it as a general transport ship. The Germans are not so rich and have a fever. The Germans bought it for only one purpose, and that was to use it to provide supplies such as fuel, artillery shells, torpedoes, and food to those submarines and raid ships operating in the Atlantic Ocean after the war broke out.

Due to technology reasons, the Germans in this era could not create a pressure shell with a large enough diameter. Therefore, the maximum underwater displacement of their submarine is no more than 800 tons. If it is used to transport fuel, the maximum is only about 200 tons, which is completely insufficient. But Morgan McDonald Shipbuilding claims that they can build giant civilian transport submarines with an underwater displacement of more than two thousand tons, which of course attracted the attention of the Germans.

According to the Germans, if Morgan Macdonald can really build a submarine with an underwater displacement of more than 2,000 tons and can transport 700 tons of fuel at a time, it probably means that they are compared with Germany in terms of pressure vessel manufacturing. Overwhelming technology advantages. This will not only be reflected in the manufacturing of submarines, but also in the production of synthetic ammonia. Considering that in the international market, the price of chemical fertilizers in United States is obviously more competitive than that of German chemical fertilizers. The Germans believe that their inference should be correct.

But in fact, in the manufacturing of large pressure vessels, the technology in the hands of the McDonald Consortium is not more advanced than that of the Germans. The price advantage of synthetic ammonia is actually mainly due to more efficient catalysts. MacDonald has always protected the secrets of the iron catalyst technology like his own eyes, thus ensuring the world's leading position in synthetic ammonia.

As for why McDonald's civilian transport submarine can be built so large, it is actually just an innovation in ship design that originated from later generations.

In the later Cold War period, the Soviets produced the largest typhoon-class ballistic missile nuclear submarine in human history. This terrifying behemoth has an underwater displacement of up to 30,000 tons, almost twice that of the Ohio class, the largest ballistic missile nuclear submarine in United States. In theory, such a huge nuclear submarine needs a much larger pressure hull than the Ohio-class nuclear submarine of the United States. This also made the United States once believed that the Soviets were already far from the manufacturing technology of large-diameter pressure vessels. Surpassed myself. However, there was a significant gap between the Soviet Union's technology level in this Realm and the United States at that time, and this gap was not narrowed even until the Soviet Union disintegrated. The reason why the typhoon class can be so huge is because in its huge body, there is not only one pressure shell, but three pressure shells arranged in an inverted shape. Scrooge's so-called world's largest "civil transport submarine" actually uses the same methods.

The Germans originally planned to buy one or two products first. After the trial, if it works well, then continue to buy. (The Germans never thought that the secret of this thing was like this) But Scrooge knew that this kind of design trick, as long as the Germans stare at the submarine, they will be pregnant when they return. When you are pregnant, you can quickly "give out" a group of similar things by yourself. Therefore, Macdonald insisted that the Chinese must order more than ten at a time, and only after paying a sufficient deposit, can they enter the vestibule. Such harsh conditions, coupled with the high price of almost three ordinary submarines, made this negotiation very protracted. Until recently, no agreement was reached.

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