ps: Watch the exclusive story behind "The Double Eagle Flag" and listen to your more suggestions for the novel. Follow the official account (add friends on WeChat - add official account - enter dd), and tell me quietly!

As time entered 1936, the Washington Treaty on the Restriction of Naval Arms Race expired. As Japan announced its withdrawal from the renewal negotiations, the Austro-Hungarian Empire also announced its withdrawal from the treaty. The world naval holiday after the European War ended.

Since the end of the European War, Austro-Hungary sold the four unfinished French Cardinal class battleships to China after the end of the European War. After the Japanese Navy withdrew from the treaty, it began the construction plan of a new first-class battleship in order to completely suppress the Chinese Navy.

As early as 1932, after Tanaka Yoshika took office, Japan formulated a new naval development plan with the German and Austrian navy as the imaginary enemy. In order to ensure the policy of aggression against China, the Japanese Navy clearly proposed a strategy to win the decisive victory in the Far East with the German and Austrian ship formations. Since Japan could not compete with the German and Austrian navy in terms of the number of naval battleships, the Japanese Navy proposed to build super battleships and use the power of a single ship to offset the number of German and Austrian fleets. The design mission of the new type of battleship began in 1933, and then formulated the "Fleet No. 01 Supplementary Construction Plan" in 1935, and determined to build four Yamato-class battleships with a standard displacement of 60,000 tons.

In May 1936, the first ship of Japan's "Fleet No. 01 Supplementary Construction Plan" "Yamato" began construction at the Wu Haijun Shipyard in Hiroshima. For this reason, the Japanese Navy formulated a strict confidentiality management system, adding fences to places where the shipyard can be overlooked. The shipyard itself also enforces strict confidentiality controls on technicians and workers.

However, shortly after the construction of the Yamato, a report suddenly appeared in the Vienna Observer newspaper about Japan's construction of two Yamato-class battleships equipped with 460 mm main guns. As the reports became more and more detailed, European and American newspapers continued to reprint, and the whole world's attention attracted Japan.

This matter immediately attracted the attention of the United Kingdom, the United States and Germany, and issued a note to Japan as soon as possible, requiring Japan to disclose the data of the new battleships being built and allow the United Kingdom, the United States and Germany to send personnel to conduct verification. On the one hand, the Japanese Ministry of Foreign Affairs constantly denied the data of the new battleships, claiming that the displacement of the new battleships of the Japanese Navy shall not exceed the 35,000 tons stipulated in the Washington Navy Treaty. On the other hand, Europe and the United States shall not be allowed to send military personnel to conduct verification on the grounds that it has withdrawn from the Navy Treaty and conservative military secrets.

On the other hand, an emergency "spy removal" operation was carried out in Japan, and all relevant personnel who could not prove their innocence were sent to prison or executed. During this round of "cleaning", a total of 53 people in Wu Haijun's shipyard were implicated, of which 8 were secretly executed as "traitors".

Since Japan has been refusing to send personnel to various countries to conduct verification, countries have basically begun to determine the authenticity of this news. The Austro-Hungarian Empire was not to be outdone and expressed its serious concerns about the matter. It then announced that it plans to start construction of six super battleships with a full load displacement of 60,000 tons and equip 10 410mm main guns from 1937 to 1939.

Germany was naturally unwilling to fall behind, and then announced that it would start construction of six super battleships with a displacement of 65,000 tons in 1937-1938, and were equipped with 10 410 mm super battleships, just like Austro-Hungary.

Following this is a series of chain reactions.

The naval system of the Washington-London Treaty that the British had worked hard to build was broken. After Germany announced that it would prepare to build super battleships, the United States also announced plans to build six super battleships. The British had no choice but to maintain their naval power, they gritted their teeth and announced that they would also start the construction of five latest super battleships.

Subsequently, France and Italy also announced their new battleship construction plans, and the balance was broken. The whole world was re-entered into a new round of naval arms race craze.

This world is not very peaceful.

After Mussolini ascended the throne of Italian Prime Minister, he turned to Germany and Austria in full and joined the German-Austrian alliance. With the indulgence of Germany and Austria, Mussolini's ambitions gradually expanded. However, the entire Eastern Mediterranean had almost become the inner lake of the Austro-Hungarian Empire. Mussolini did not dare to provoke Austro-Hungarian, so he turned his attention to Africa. Abyssia, the only surviving African country, became the target he wanted to hunt.

Abyssinia is located in the northeast of Africa, with an area of ​​about 1.22 million square kilometers. Among them, the plateau area accounts for 2/3 of the total area of ​​the country. It is known as the "roof of Africa". The terrain in the west gradually declines. It is obliquely facing the Sudan Plain. Abyssinia is an ancient Judaism with a history of 3,000 years. Due to its tropics, cash crops are relatively developed and coffee, cotton and tobacco are abundant. Abyssinia is one of the major coffee producers and exporters in the world. The animal husbandry industry is relatively developed. The main livestock include cattle, sheep, horses, camels, etc. Leather is another important export material in Abyssinia and its mineral resources are also rich. Those have been found include platinum, gold, manganese, copper, oil, etc. However, due to the backward economy and the inability to exploit, people live extremely poorly.

Abyssinia was close to Eritrea, a colony of Italy on the Red Sea coast. Most of its exports had to pass through ports of Italian Eritrea. In 1890, Italy declared Abyssinia to become its "protective country". From 1895 to 1896, Italy invaded Abyssinia, but the Italian invading army was defeated in the Battle of Aduva.

This was the first time that the Western powers suffered a crushing defeat in the war of aggression. The Italians had to sign a peace treaty between Menelik III, and its invasion became a joke.

After Mussolini came to power, he was determined to slap the "Shame of Aduva". In 1935, Italy sent troops to invade Abyssinia. With the support of planes, cannons, tanks and even gas bombs, the Italians finally conquered the entire Abyssinia.

Now Germany, Austria and Italy have extended their hands to Spain and decided to interfere with the Spanish civil war.

As early as early as 1930, a bourgeois revolution broke out in Spain, and King Alfonso was overthrown and established a republic. At that time, the overlord of the Mediterranean region, the Austro-Hungarian Empire, had no intention of interfering in Spain's internal affairs. Although King Alfonso had Habsburg in his surname, he was a descendant of the French Bourbon dynasty, so the Habsburg dynasty had no intention of making a name for the Bourbon family.

But Spain fell into chaos after the republic, which was very similar to that after the French Revolution. In China, this chaos actually occurred, but Yuan Shikai gradually stabilized the situation later, but in Spain, there was no such person.

Not all countries are suitable for implementing a system like the United States. In traditional times, emperors or kings have the supreme authority of the country. Although most of their power has been transferred to parliament and government in the constitutional era, it still plays an important role in maintaining the stability of the country.

The so-called "democratic country" actually reduces the role played by the government in economic development to a very low level, and the market automatically regulates and responds to crises. This may be useful for countries like the United States that have unique natural resources and an unthreatened security environment, but when countries are threatened by war, their response and response are much slower than centralized countries. The United States has actually maintained a very low military expenditure for most of the time.

But when the surrounding areas are facing threats, other countries cannot do this at all.

Even if Napoleon III was thrown into the United States, he might become a great emperor and unify America.

Not many people can realize the special geographical location of the United States, but just blindly want to learn from the "advanced system" of the United States, which has caused chaos in Spain today. In fact, in China, if it weren't for Lee Haydn's intervention, they would have fallen into civil strife very early. Now they have basically passed the dangerous period and the regime has entered a relatively stable stage.

China's economy has actually maintained a rapid development speed, but the problem is that their military industry and related heavy industries are developing relatively slowly. Today, China has become a major producer of textile and light industry in the world. However, compared with this, the defense industry with larger investment is relatively backward. This is the characteristic of the market economy. Only when capital accumulation reaches a certain stage will heavy industry and related metallurgy, machinery, chemical, automobile, shipbuilding and other industries enter a stage of rapid development.

In later generations, China took 30 years to finally become the world's second largest economy. However, now, the Beiyang government has just experienced fifteen years of development and is facing threats from both Japan and Russia.

Whenever China is in a critical period of development, the Japanese always jump out impatiently, which is also the result of competition between these countries. The two geopolitical countries in the development stage will inevitably fight for the sake of the competition for markets and spheres of influence, unless one of them gives up the fight for regional leadership.
Chapter completed!