Chapter 278: Umberto’s Ambitions
Although the new-style warship submitted by the Royal Gualnizo Shipyard looks very powerful, building four capital ships at once also caused an intense quarrel in the cabinet government.
Investing over 100 million pesetas in the navy also means that the fiscal budgets of other government departments will be reduced by a total of over 100 million pesetas in funds.
The reason that caused various departments to quarrel is precisely this; no one wants their fiscal budget to be cut too much, thereby affecting the department’s development plan.
In the end, Carlo directly made the decision and approved the defense department’s construction plan for four ironclad ships.
Building four ironclad ships requires 8 million pesetas in funds, of which the cabinet government provides 55 million pesetas, and the defense department itself raises the remaining 8 million pesetas.
Because Spain plans to launch a war against the Ashanti Federation next, this has caused the defense department’s military budget to increase by nearly 20% compared to usual.
Squeezing out 8 million pesetas is still not a problem, not to mention that this money does not need to be paid all at once.
Spain’s shipyards, after years of development, have long escaped the embarrassing situation when Carlo had just become King of Spain, where no shipyard had the capability to build ironclad ships.
In addition to the current largest Royal Gualnizo Shipyard in Spain, the shipyards in Spain capable of building ironclad ships also include the Valencia United Shipyard, the El Ferrol Royal Naval Shipyard, and the Cartagena Shipyard, three in total.
However, these three shipyards are all under government management and operation; except for the Valencia United Shipyard where the royal family holds nearly half the shares, the royal family does not have many shares in the other two shipyards.
This includes the El Ferrol Royal Naval Shipyard. Although the shipyard’s name includes Royal Navy, it actually has little relation to the royal family or the navy.
The largest shareholder of the El Ferrol Royal Naval Shipyard is the Spanish Government, the second largest shareholder is the El Ferrol municipal government, and the Spanish Royal Navy holds less than 10% of the shares.
The reason it is named the Royal Naval Shipyard is that El Ferrol’s rise was entirely due to Spain establishing a naval base here, and the earliest shipyard belonged to the navy; however, with the navy’s decline, most of the shipyard’s shares have long been sold off.
All shipyards in Spain capable of building ironclad ships are official in identity; private shipyards temporarily do not have the capability to build ironclad ships.
Ironclad ships are the most advanced warships of this era, and private shipyards cannot easily build ironclad ships.
The largest warships that Spain’s current largest private shipyards can build are only light cruisers, with tonnage generally not exceeding 3,000 tons, belonging to medium and small warships.
In addition to taking on small-scale orders from the military, private shipyards mainly make money from orders for civilian ships.
Although civilian ships generally have small tonnage, building small civilian ships does not take much time. As long as there are enough orders, these private shipyards can still make money.
As Spain’s colonies increase, with some colonies growing larger in scale, the maritime transportation industry is also developing more prosperously.
This has also led to a golden period in the development of Spanish shipyards, especially under government support; Spain’s shipbuilding industry has achieved modest success and ranks among the forefront in Europe.
Along with the shipbuilding plan being confirmed, the class naming for this brand-new warship design was also determined.
The previous generation of ironclad ships was named the Revival Class, and this generation of ironclad ships was named the Matador-class ironclad by the Spanish Government.
The code names of the four Matador-class ironclad ships are respectively Matador, Warrior, Courage, and Indomitable.
From the naming of the ironclad ships, it can also be seen how hard the Spanish Government is working to shape the national spirit.
Carlo’s expectations for the Spanish navy and army are just like the naming of these ironclad ships. The comprehensive combat effectiveness of the Spanish navy and army can be weaker than those superpowers, but they must possess the courage to be unafraid of death.
Sometimes courage is more important than equipment; if the equipment is the same, then the side with more tenacious courage can exert even stronger combat effectiveness.
As the saying goes, when two brave warriors meet on a narrow path, the braver one wins; Carlo does not want the army he has painstakingly trained at great cost to ultimately become cowardly surrenderers.
Spain’s population is inferior to the European powers, so it can only improve the combat effectiveness of the navy and army in this way to make up for the gap with other great power countries.
For the construction plan of these four ironclad ships, the Spanish Government still does not plan to keep it secret.
Even adding these four ironclad ships, the strength of the Spanish Fleet is still insufficient to shake the British. Not to mention shaking the British, there is still a considerable distance from the British Royal Fleet.
Britain controls India, which brings massive fiscal revenue to the British Government every year. This also leads to the British Government investing an exaggerated astronomical figure in naval construction; in just the last two years, they have built a full three ironclad ships.
Don’t think that building three ironclad ships in two years is not a big investment; the problem is that the British construction progress almost never stops.
Spain has only 5 ironclad ships in total so far, and the British can build the entire number of ironclad ships owned by the Spanish Navy in just four years.
This is also why Carlo does not plan to keep it secret; even if the British know that the four ironclad ships Spain is building are all first-class combat power, they do not need to worry that the Spanish Navy will threaten the Royal Fleet.
Unless Spain builds ten or more ironclad ships at once, but such an investment would be too much even for the British Empire, let alone Spain with fewer colonies.
Although Spain has four shipyards capable of building ironclad ships, for the construction of these four ironclad ships, the government does not plan to carry them out simultaneously.
After the funds arrive, the Royal Gualnizo Shipyard will first build two ironclad ships. As Spain’s largest shipyard, the Royal Gualnizo Shipyard can accommodate up to three ironclad ships under construction at the same time.
However, the number of shipyard employees is limited, and with other restrictions, the more warships started simultaneously, the longer the construction time needed for each warship.
If only one ironclad ship is started, the fastest can be launched within a year, the slowest will not exceed two years, with an average speed of about one and a half years.
But if three ironclad ships are started simultaneously, the launch time for each ironclad ship will be delayed to more than two years, and it is even very likely to reach a slower level of two and a half years.
Even if only two ironclad ships are started simultaneously, achieving an average speed of one and a half years is impossible. This also means that for Spain’s brand-new warships to be launched, the fastest will have to wait until the second half of
Warship sea trials also require a long time, and for the Matador-class ironclad ships to be formally incorporated into the Spanish Navy fleet, the fastest will be around
To save time as much as possible, the first two ironclad ships will be built at the Royal Gualnizo Shipyard, while the latter two warships will be built respectively at the Valencia United Shipyard and the El Ferrol Royal Naval Shipyard.
Although the scale of these two shipyards is much smaller compared to the Royal Gualnizo Shipyard, because they are only building one each, the final progress can still barely keep up with the Royal Gualnizo Shipyard.
It is expected that in 1885 to 1886, Spain will usher in the commissioning of four ironclad ships at once.
This also means that Spain can maintain its naval status until the pre-dreadnought period, then climb the technology tree rapidly in the pre-dreadnought period to seek to surpass the naval powers ahead of it.
Just as the emergence of dreadnoughts turns all pre-dreadnoughts into defective products, the emergence of pre-dreadnoughts instantly turns all ironclad ships into riddled junk.
As long as Spain can seize the important opportunity when pre-dreadnoughts replace ironclad ships, not to mention surpassing the Royal Fleet of the British Empire in naval strength, at least it can maintain the world fourth place after Britain, France, and Germany, and seek to surpass France and Germany.
Germany’s emphasis on the navy will also increase higher, but at this time, they are not yet ready to challenge the naval status of the British Empire.
This also means that current Germany has no intention of vigorously developing the navy; Germany’s goal is only to build the navy to a level commensurate with Germany’s status.
France goes without saying. France has industrial and research capabilities, but due to insufficient investment in military expenses, France’s navy will ultimately be surpassed by Germany; Spain also has hope of surpassing the French Navy in the pre-dreadnought era.
Of course, even if it cannot surpass France in the pre-dreadnought era, Spain still has one more chance in the dreadnought era.
Precisely because of the emphasis on pre-dreadnoughts, after the Matador-class ironclad ships, Spain does not plan to build ironclad ships anymore.
These four Matador-class ironclad ships are sufficient to ensure that Spain’s naval strength remains in the world’s top five; the subsequent pre-dreadnoughts are the capital ships that Spain will vigorously build.
This is also why the Spanish Government plans to publicize this shipbuilding plan. If this shipbuilding plan is not publicized, Spain’s next large-scale construction of capital ships will have to wait until the pre-dreadnought era.
Revealing some plans for building capital ships can effectively strengthen national confidence, which is still very necessary for current Spain.
As expected, when the Spanish Government released the news that it will build four ironclad ships in the next few years, it immediately caused a sensation among the Spanish people.
The former Spanish Empire on which the sun never sets relied on Spain’s powerful navy plus vast colonies; currently, Spain has already built colonies of considerable scale, and if it can also build a powerful navy, wouldn’t that barely revive the former Spanish Empire on which the sun never sets?
Thinking carefully, Spain’s current colonies are distributed in America, Africa, and Asia; calling it an empire on which the sun never sets is actually not wrong.
It’s just that most of Spain’s colonies are relatively small in scale, making this so-called empire on which the sun never sets seem somewhat undeserving of the name.
Although somewhat undeserving of the name, compared to many European countries, Spain’s colonial situation is already much better.
Even the powerful German Empire currently has no decent colonies. Not to mention weaker great powers like Austria and Italy, which can be said to have no colonies.
What Carlo did not expect was that the news released by the Spanish official not only caused a sensation among the Spaniards, but also caused a sensation in the Italian Government.
As Spain’s ally, the Italian Government is naturally aware of the specific data related to Spain’s Revival-class ironclad ships.
The former Revival-class ironclad ships were also among the top warship designs in Europe at the time. Although not the most powerful, their comprehensive combat effectiveness was definitely in the forefront.
Although the Spanish Government has not announced the data for the latest class of ironclad ships, considering Spain’s excellent performance with the Revival-class ironclad ships, this brand-new ironclad ship design must be a product with even better performance.
Seeing that his younger brother Carlo’s Spain is already strengthening naval construction, Umberto I is extremely envious.
After Italy’s unification, it merged the navies of the original Kingdom of Sardinia and other Italian states to establish the Italian Royal Navy, and in one fell swoop became a naval power in the world’s top eight.
At that time, the Italian Navy ranked in the world’s top five in total tonnage, with very good paper strength.
But Umberto I, as the crown prince then and king now, naturally understands that Italy’s current naval strength is bloated.
Before Italy’s unification, it was split into several states; although these states were all developed, a small state does not have the strength to build advanced ironclad ships.
Even if they have the technology to build them, they lack sufficient funds for maintenance. Moreover, a single ironclad ship cannot protect its coastline; a large fleet composed of several ironclad ships is needed to ensure coastal security.
This also leads to most of Italy’s existing naval tonnage being composed of medium and small warships, and a considerable portion of these warships are coastal defense ships, which are essentially near-shore warships incapable of ocean operations.
More importantly, most of the warships composing the Italian Navy are warships built ten or twenty years ago; the various designs of the warships are already outdated, and the naval guns they carry are even more backward muzzle-loaders, far behind the current mainstream breech-loading guns of various countries in terms of shell loading speed, shell range, and power.
Seeing his younger brother vigorously carrying out Spain’s construction, this also ignited Umberto I’s own ambitions.
He has no jealousy toward Carlo, but wanting to emulate Carlo and build a powerful army and navy for Italy is his true intention.
Originally, Umberto I’s plan was to rely on Italy’s own efforts to build a powerful ironclad ship, then use the ironclad ship to arm Italy’s fleet.
Since Spain already has the latest ironclad ship design, Umberto I changed his mind and hopes to purchase 1 to 2 ironclad ships from Spain to more effectively expand Italy’s naval strength.
