Chapter 777 Naval Arms Race

As time entered mid-March 1931, the great powers faced a difficult choice, that is, whether to renew the naval limitation treaty.

We have to admit that naval limitation treaties are still very helpful for world peace.

Under the constraints of the naval limitation treaty, countries' military investment has been reduced by at least 30%, and competition between countries due to naval expansion has been avoided.

But the problem is that this so-called naval limitation treaty is not equally fair to every country.

The ratio of navies of each country agreed at that time was 60:55:35:35:30:17.5.

After the demise of the United States, the restrictions on the size of the U.S. navy will no longer take effect on the small countries that broke away from the United States.

After all, those small countries are not large enough, and their economy cannot support a huge fleet.

In this way, this naval restriction treaty has become a restriction on the currently more powerful countries, namely Britain, France, Australasia, island countries and Italy.

The British, who had the largest share, and almost the second and third combined, would naturally have no objection to this treaty.

But this may not be the case in other countries.

First is France. After the demise of the United States, the French secured their second place in the world, driven by Australasia.

No matter what other countries think, the French believe in this statement and from time to time regard themselves as the second most powerful country in the world.

For the French, as the second most powerful country in the world, it is acceptable for their naval share to lag behind that of the British, but it is unacceptable for them to be only a little more than half that of the British.

However, the French did not intend to tear up the treaty. Instead, they took advantage of the renewal of the treaty to increase the size of their navy.

Normally, such requests are actually nothing. At most, Britain and France would argue with each other, and finally reach a compromise with each other.

But the French happened to encounter the islanders who wanted to tear up the treaty.

The island nation's navy is limited to 300,000 tons, 50,000 tons behind France and Australasia.

Although it is currently ranked fourth in the world, for the ambitious islanders, such a navy is too small.

The ambition of the islanders can be seen from the battleships built by the islanders. Their largest battleship has exceeded 40,000 tons, and their 300,000-ton navy is even less than the tonnage of eight battleships.

Compared with the French who only want to increase the size limit of their navy, the islanders want to directly tear up this treaty and develop their own navy unscrupulously.

In normal times, the islanders would not have the guts to do so under the supervision of Britain and France.

But now it’s not just island countries that have ideas about this treaty. The French's request to amend the treaty was like opening Pandora's box, which directly brought the renewal of the naval limitation treaty into a stalemate.

After the French expressed their demands, the island country and Italy also expressed that there were many problems with the previously signed treaties.

The French asked to increase the size limit of their navy to 450,000 tons, and the islanders also asked to keep the size of their navy at the same level as the French, which is about 450,000 tons.

Italy requested to double the size of its navy to the same level as Australasia, about 350,000 tons.

This also means that the naval limitation treaty must undergo major changes to satisfy the ideas of these countries.

The question is, will the British agree? Would Australasia agree?

Obviously not. The French request would greatly narrow the gap in the size of the British and French navies, which the British did not want to see.

For Australasia, the naval scale of France and island countries has leapt ahead of itself. Even countries like Italy can maintain the same level as themselves. This is simply unacceptable.

In addition, Arthur originally wanted to refuse to renew the naval limitation treaty, which basically caused the renewal of the naval limitation treaty to fail.

On March 21, 1931, as the third renewal negotiation on the Naval Limitation Treaty failed, all countries had to announce a temporary suspension of negotiations on the Naval Limitation Treaty.

Since the negotiations have been unable to produce a result, the best result is for all countries to reach a compromise privately and then re-sign a naval limitation treaty within a range acceptable to everyone.

But things are not as easy as imagined.

The Naval Limitation Treaty was signed in 1921, has a statute of limitations of 10 years, and is valid until 1931.

Until all countries renew this treaty, the Naval Limitation Treaty theoretically has no restrictions on countries' shipbuilding plans after 1931.

With this idea in mind, the islanders decided to take advantage of the loophole and build themselves two super large battleships before the new treaty was signed.

But what the islanders didn't expect was that their every move had already been closely monitored by Australasia.

Arthur's purpose is simple. One is to let the island nation be the first country to break the treaty.

Although many countries may have ideas, the country that takes action first will definitely be targeted by the British.

For Arthur, it would definitely be good for him to let the islanders be the country that takes the lead.

Secondly, it would also be a good thing for Australasia to let islanders muddy the waters.

The naval arms race often also represents the army arms race. This also means that once the water is muddied, countries will begin to invest heavily in armaments.

If Britain and France were stronger, they would have more advantages when facing Germany in the future.

Excessive investment can also consume the potential of Britain and France, ensuring that both Britain and France will suffer losses in the war with Germany.

As soon as the news of the island country secretly building super-large battleships was exposed, it immediately attracted the attention of countries around the world.

What the countries did not expect was that the first country to break the treaty was not France, which ranked second in the world, but the island country which ranked fourth in the world.

But it doesn’t matter who breaks the naval limitation treaty first. As soon as the island country's super-dreadnought plan was leaked, the French immediately stated that they would change the 1932 shipbuilding plan and add two super-dreadnoughts to it.

Naturally, the British would not accept the actions of the island nation and France. In order to ensure its naval superiority, Britain has also revised its shipbuilding plans.

Coupled with the fact that Italy is fishing in troubled waters, the water has indeed been muddied by Arthur.

Seeing that his actions could no longer be concealed, the island nation stopped pretending. On March 27, 1931, the island nation announced its shipbuilding plan to begin in 1932.

This round of shipbuilding plan is still relatively large. The island country will build three super dreadnoughts, two aircraft carriers, four battlecruisers as main warships, and dozens of small and medium-sized warships in five years, greatly expanding the island country's navy. scale.

In fact, it can be seen from the island country's shipbuilding plan that the imaginary enemy of the island country's navy has become Australasia.

If the islanders can complete their shipbuilding plan, their navy will slightly exceed that of Australasia, making them the most powerful navy on the Pacific coast.

This is very helpful for the island countries to dominate the Pacific. Their ambition is to defeat Australasia and become the new Pacific hegemon.

In order to fulfill this ambition, the island country has invested a lot in its navy. For this country with a narrow land area and poor mineral resources, such a large investment is a heavy burden for the country.

The islanders' shipbuilding plan stirred up waves, causing European powers to change their shipbuilding plans in response.

What people didn't expect was that the people who reacted the most were not the British, but the French.

The French always insist on their second position in the world and believe that the island country cannot surpass itself in terms of naval tonnage.

In order to maintain their own face, the French also announced a five-year shipbuilding plan starting in 1932.

Among them, France plans to build two super-dreadnoughts, one aircraft carrier, three battlecruisers and 24 submarines.

This naval construction plan can make France firmly rank second in the world in terms of the number of main warships. Whether from the perspective of strength or face, it is more in line with the expectations of the French.

Although the British did not intend to participate in the naval arms competition at the beginning, the crazy attitude of the island countries and France in building warships still made the British feel a crisis.

Although the British navy currently has an advantage, the advantage will sooner or later be made up by the island countries and France.

To maintain the strength of the Royal Navy, continued investment in the navy is essential.

After all kinds of thinking, the British also announced their shipbuilding plan starting in 1932.

Compared with the small fight between France and the island countries, the British shipbuilding plan is even more crazy.

The British plan to build five super-dreadnoughts, two aircraft carriers, four battlecruisers, 12 submarines and dozens of small and medium-sized warships within five years.

In terms of the number of main battleships to be built, the number that the British want to build is almost the sum of the island countries and France combined, which also proves the British's firm attitude in wanting to maintain naval superiority.

In fact, the British are still very confident in this regard. After all, the British controlled the most elite area of ​​the United States, the East Coast of the United States.

With the income that the east coast of the United States brings to the United Kingdom every year, this naval investment is just water for the British.

As countries have joined the naval arms race, the situation in Europe has become increasingly chaotic.

As mentioned before, the naval arms race often also symbolizes the army arms race.

as expected. After various countries entered the naval arms race, Italy was the first to announce the expansion of its army.

In fact, Italy's army has been expanded many times since Mussolini's rule.

At present, the size of Italy's army has exceeded 500,000, making it the largest army in continental Europe after Russia and France.

But it is obvious that an army of 500,000 cannot satisfy Mussolini's ambitions at all. Especially after being stimulated by the naval arms race, Mussolini directly announced that he would expand the size of the Italian army to 700,000, and also came up with a naval construction plan.

Italy, which had just annexed the Abyssinian Empire, was very confident in its military investment at this time.

After all, the addition of a huge colony would mean an additional cornucopia of income for Italy.

It is worth mentioning that after the arms race began, one country was very envious of the investment in military expenditures by other countries.

This country is Germany.

Compared with countries that can decide on their own military expenditures, Germany is more uncomfortable in this regard.

The size of the army is strictly limited to 150,000 people, and the navy is not allowed to own large warships. This means that it is impossible for Germany's military expenditure to rise to a higher level.

But this was not a problem for the clever Hitler.

Since the German army cannot expand on the surface, the best way is to expand its own private army, which is the stormtroopers that have been renamed the SS.

Germany's official army currently numbers 150,000, of which the German Empire's Army has less than 70,000.

In contrast, Hitler's SS has expanded to 200,000 people, and each of them is a private army loyal to Hitler.

It is no exaggeration to say that if Hitler wanted, his private army could control the entire country at any time.

Including the 80,000 troops controlled by various states, it is impossible to be the opponent of Hitler's private army.

After all, there is already a huge gap in quantity, and there are huge limitations in weapons and equipment, which also determines that the current combat effectiveness of the German army is limited.

If the army can still achieve alternative expansion by expanding the SS, then in the navy, Hitler has no choice for the time being.

Britain and France still have relatively strict restrictions on the German navy. No matter what methods Hitler used, he could not hide the fact that Britain and France were building their own navy.

Moreover, Germany's current financial situation does not support Hitler's massive naval construction.

If a large amount of assets and currencies had not been seized for the government through various oil drain operations (not a typo), I am afraid that the German government would have declared bankruptcy long ago.

If you have to choose a country that has not yet emerged from the economic crisis, it must be Germany, whose economy is in a state of collapse.

The good news is that Germany's economy improved after Hitler took office.

While the collapse of the German economy is not entirely to blame, the Jews are definitely responsible.

A large number of Jews who had issued loan sharks were eradicated. Part of the seized funds was returned to the victimized Germans, and part was directly transferred to the government's finances, which alleviated the financial pressure on the German government.

This has to admire the wealth of the Jews. Although the life of the German people has not been very good since World War I, most of the German people do not even have the right to eat.

But this does not mean that German Jews are not wealthy. Although the oil discharge operation has only been carried out for half a year, the fiscal revenue generated for the German government is no worse than that of some major projects.

Hitler's private army was able to expand to 200,000 people. In addition to the great trust of the German people in Hitler, a large amount of property from the Jews was also very important.

It is worth mentioning that Hitler used the assets captured from the Yaotai people to greatly expand his army, and then used his own army to massacre and exploit the Yaotai people. It can only be said to be tit for tat, and the Jews are not as innocent as they imagined.

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