On October 11, 1862, the first ironclad ship of the Kingdom of Prussia, the Frederick, was put on trial, and Wilhelm I personally presided over the ceremony to show his determination to develop the navy.

They really made up their minds, and seeing the Austrian aristocracy next door make a fortune in the overseas colonization movement, the Junker aristocracy couldn't help it.

Many young people, in particular, have long been dissatisfied with the government's conservatism. You must know that less than ten years after Austria opened up its overseas colonies, it had five or six times the size of its own territory.

Many people are optimistic that only by joining the colonial movement will they soon be able to make a fortune and become knighted to the pinnacle of life.

"The future of the world is in the ocean", who first said this sentence is no longer verifiable, anyway, it has now been widely recognized by European society.

In the early days of the overseas colonies, Franz also promoted this theory, which is now widely spread in Germany.

Ironclad ships are recognized as a revolution in naval technology, and in just a few years, naval powers such as Britain, France, the United States, Spain, Portugal, and the Netherlands have built their own ironclad ships.

Now that the Kingdom of Prussia finally has its own ironclad ships, many people are celebrating. Only the top of the government is clear about the gap between their ironclads and the naval powers.

After all, it is a landlubber, and the Prussian Navy has been a dispensable existence for a long time, and more often it has played the role of a coast guard, and even Denmark next door is not comparable.

The fanfare of the ironclad ship is still to inspire people. After all, the development of the Kingdom of Prussia in recent years has not been going well, and the people need good news.

Wilhelm I asked with concern: "How is the training of the navy, and when can we open up overseas colonies?" ”

Ron, who was the Minister of War and the Minister of the Navy, changed his face and replied with a wry smile: "Your Majesty, our navy foundation is too thin.

Before the expansion, the navy had only more than 1,300 officers and men, including civilian personnel from all levels of the navy.

It will take at least two to three years to form combat effectiveness. Of course, if the enemy is only native, none of this is a problem. ”

The fact that the Minister of War is still the Minister of the Navy is also the result of a compromise between the parties. Despite the Junker aristocracy's coveted interest in opening up overseas colonies, they were reluctant to relinquish their dominance over the military.

There is nothing wrong with the army leading the navy, and in any case, the officers and men of the navy are directly transferred from the army's active duty units. Even the Marines are saved, they are definitely the strongest navy in land warfare, there is no one.

Ron, who had been leading the reform of the army, tragically discovered that he was going to lead the construction of the Prussian navy again. In other countries, at most, the layman leads the layman, and he directly leads the layman here.

Anyway, before the Prussian Navy, it was the coast guard of the Kingdom of Prussia, and its usual business was to crack down on smuggling activities.

Now that the thousands of troops that have been added in are even more amateurs, they are all amateurs from top to bottom, and Ron is naturally under a lot of pressure.

The Navy is not an army and you can go to war after a few months of training. Even ordinary soldiers spend years training.

Obviously, this was discovered by Ron after in-depth understanding, and the upper echelons of the Prussian government or the army ideology, including William I, did not distinguish the difference between the army and the navy, otherwise he would not have asked such a question.

Wilhelm I was surprised and asked: "How did the Austrians expand their navy after such a long time, or did they not have to train their officers and men at all?" ”

Indeed, in recent years, the Austrian navy has expanded somewhat drastically, and from 1850 to the present, the tonnage of the Austrian navy has increased several times, and it has become the third naval power in the world.

Ron explained: "Your Majesty, the Austrian Navy has been operating in the Mediterranean Sea before, and its popularity is somewhat low, but in fact their naval heritage is very thick, and the Venetian region is a traditional naval power.

They have a complete naval technology inheritance and talent training system. The lack of attention to naval development in the Metternich era made the Austrian Navy fade in everyone's impression, and now that the Vienna government has paid attention to it, it will naturally catch up quickly. ”

In fact, the rapid development of the Austrian Navy was also lucky. In the era of sail warships, naval technology has reached a bottleneck, and even the technology of the British is not advanced to other countries.

After the advent of the era of ironclad ships, the sail warships were directly eliminated, and the previous experience and technology have fallen behind, and they will start to reshuffle again.

In a way, this is the time when countries are most likely to catch up with the British. After all, ironclad technology has only just developed, and this gap has not yet reached the point of despair.

Listening to this explanation, William I sighed, originally he thought that the hundred-year-old navy was blown out by the British, but he did not expect it to be true.

If you don't have the foundation, building a strong navy from scratch will take you even if it doesn't take a hundred years, but a few decades.

"Not long ago, the Austrians proposed to us to jointly develop the South Seas region. This is a rare opportunity.

If the cooperation goes well, we can directly use the Austrians' overseas colonial strongholds to obtain supplies, and obtain the first colony in the South Seas. ”

logistical supply, which is also an obstacle set up by the colonial empire for those who come after it. Everyone just welcomes merchant ships from all over the world to go to replenish, and warships must communicate in advance if they want to get supplies.

If it's just a trip abroad, then it's easy to do it, and everyone is willing to do this business. If you want to open up overseas colonies, you need to communicate at a deeper level.

In short, don't want to get everyone's help without enough cost.

This is quite discordant for the latecomers, and it is impossible to open up overseas colonies to ship everything from the country, and purchasing nearby is the best way to reduce costs.

In order to obtain logistical supplies, Austria signed agreements with Spain, Portugal and the Netherlands, promising not to seek their colonies in any way, and it was only by obtaining everyone's understanding that they had been satisfied.

Franz had fulfilled these promises, and in overseas colonization activities, Austria had not seized any country's colonies, and had taken terra nullius.

Now the Kingdom of Prussia is facing the same problem, and if the logistical supply problem cannot be solved, the cost of colonization can directly make anyone desperate.

Sign a similar agreement? Don't dream, the political influence of the Kingdom of Prussia is getting worse, why should everyone give face?

In this world where the fists speak, with the strength of the Prussian Navy, the countries simply do not care. Even the Portuguese could wipe out the Prussian naval regiment two or three times.

In particular, the direct transformation of the army into the navy has become a laughing stock in Europe. There was no idea that the Kingdom of Prussia was developing its navy, and many newspapers directly ridiculed the Prussian navy as an army fleet.

Ron asked with concern, "Your Majesty, what do we need to give?" ”

There will be no pie in the sky, and if it does, it can also kill people. Ron didn't think that Austria would help Prussia for free, and it would certainly be hard to pick up this big bargain.

Wilhelm I sneered and said, "They still regard themselves as the bosses of the German region, and they are ready to pull our little brother over as a thug."

The countries in the Nanyang region are full of forces, and the Austrians have spread too much in recent years, and their strength to invest in the Nanyang region is limited.

In order to ensure their interests in the South Seas, the Vienna government invited us and the Federal Reich of Germany to join us.

Of course, they also have the intention of wooing our domestic aristocracy. That little boy Franz talks about the unification of Germany every day, as if he is afraid that others will not know. ”

This is a conspiracy, even if he knows that the bait may be poisonous, William I will swallow it.

You can't stop opening up overseas colonies because there may be hidden dangers, right?

Austria has not won the hearts and minds of the people in Prussia once or twice. Over the years, more than 150,000 Prussian immigrants entered the Austrian colonies alone.

Many of the overseas colonists in the Kingdom of Prussia were now under the banner of the Austrians, and if they had not fallen to Austria, the Vienna government would have sheltered them unless they had gone mad.

Wilhelm I had a sense of crisis, he was very worried about continuing like this, and he didn't know when he would be sold by his subordinates, which can be referred to the Kingdom of Bavaria.

After joining Austria. The Kingdom of Bavaria is doing well. The traditional textile center of the German region has once again been given a second spring.

In order to solve the problem of industrial raw material supply, the Vienna government opened cotton plantations in West Africa.

In contrast, Baden, which remained in the Federal Reich of Germany, was tragic. The center of the cotton spinning industry, which is also in Germany, is now in decline due to the lack of raw material supply.

With the power of example, William I had no confidence in those under him. Even the Junker aristocracy, he couldn't believe it.

After all, if you change the boss and nobles or nobles, capitalists or capitalists, everyone's core interests will not be damaged, and it is even possible to get more.

In order to avoid the worst, Wilhelm I had to find a way to open a new way, otherwise sooner or later the Kingdom of Prussia would be annexed by Austria.

Wilhelm I was reluctant to play politics with the Habsburgs, which was not his strong point.