African Entrepreneurship Records 2

Chapter 1125 Breaking the Limits of Naval Development
"At present, the penetration rate of armored and motorized forces in our army is as high as 40 percent, but we still retain a large number of traditional infantry and cavalry, which saves a lot of expenses for our army," Merkel said.

Without defense pressure, it would be difficult for East Africa to carry out a comprehensive reform of its military. After all, relying on the traditional military form, East Africa can suppress the surrounding small countries or colonies.

The military operations carried out by East Africa in the Persian Gulf two years ago were carried out by relying on traditional troops, and the Arabs in the Beibu Gulf territory were even short of rifles and bullets. Therefore, unless facing a military power like Germany, East Africa would need to use its most advanced troops to deal with it.

"Our army is currently equipped with about 4,300 artillery pieces, covering a variety of calibers and uses. In the world, it is second only to Germany and Russia, and is equal to France, and more than the Austro-Hungarian Empire. Among them, 75mm artillery is the main one, accounting for about 47%."

The East African army was once equipped with 20mm artillery on a large scale, and this situation continued until the end of the last century. The main reason was that this artillery had excellent performance and was easy to move. After entering the th century, with the development of the East African automobile industry, the mm artillery was still favored by the army. As a light field gun, the mm artillery was of moderate weight and was also convenient to tow by car.

Of course, compared with the French army's superstition about 75mm artillery, East Africa is still far behind. France's main artillery is almost all 75mm artillery, and the number of artillery with a larger caliber than 75mm is less than 300, while East Africa is equipped with more than 1,400 large-caliber artillery.

With the implementation of the first two five-year plans, East Africa's defense industry has achieved a qualitative improvement. The difficulty of manufacturing larger caliber artillery has been greatly reduced, and artillery research and development has also reached a higher level. In addition, as a major metal mineral country, East Africa can obtain many rare metals that are lacking in Europe. This has provided excellent conditions for East African artillery research and development.

If we only look at the penetration rate of artillery in East African troops, East Africa is even higher than European countries. Take Germany for example. The number of German artillery is second only to Russia, with nearly 7,000 pieces. However, the number of German troops is more than 100,000 more than that of East Africa. In addition, East Africa also has armored forces. East Africa's tanks are actually a kind of mobile artillery support force, but they are not counted as East African artillery.

Overall, the penetration rate of artillery in East Africa is comparable to that of Germany and greater than that of other countries. Although Russia has the largest number of artillery, its penetration rate and artillery quality are far behind those of Germany and East Africa, and are even inferior to those of France and the Austro-Hungarian Empire.

"The number of our artillery pieces is in the second tier in the world, and the quality is between Germany and France. The concepts adopted by our artillery also combine the characteristics of Germany, France and the Austro-Hungarian Empire to cope with the two combat concepts of traditional warfare and trench warfare."

In the world's artillery power, Europe as a whole ranks first in the world, and among them, Germany, France and Austria-Hungary are the most prominent. The armies of other countries generally use the artillery of these three countries as a reference standard. This is also the main reason why the East African Army is equipped with a large number of 75mm artillery and a large number of large-caliber heavy artillery.

Because East Africa took two combat modes into consideration when it first built its artillery force. During the South African War, both sides had already switched to more primitive trench warfare. But this does not mean that the 75mm artillery, which is aimed at line infantry, has no place in East Africa. After all, Egypt has the strongest military strength among the neighboring countries of East Africa. Using large-caliber heavy artillery to deal with a country like Egypt feels like overkill.

As for other countries and colonies, there is no need to say more. Cannons are considered rare. For example, there are only more than 20 cannons in the entire Abyssinian Empire.

Merkel went on to say: "Our army, especially the non-armored forces, implements the concept of firepower superiority, which enables our basic infantry to be equipped with a large number of easy-to-carry mortars and grenade launchers. The entire army has formed a multi-level artillery strike coverage force that can adapt to various battlefield situations."

"In addition to artillery, we also have a large number of other light weapons such as rifles, machine guns, grenades, mines, etc."

"In addition to weapons, another highlight of the army's construction is informatization. We are currently actively promoting the popularization of radio equipment throughout the army, while promoting the miniaturization of radio equipment. Telephones and wired telegraphs have also made great progress in recent years, forming a powerful information communication network in our country to serve the army."

Sometimes wars are fought for intelligence, so the armies of all countries attach great importance to information collection. East Africa, with its advantage as a world power in the field of electricity, is also a top player in this regard. In particular, the popularization of radio has brought the world's armies, including East Africa, to a new height. "At the naval level, the total tonnage of our navy has reached 680,000 tons, which is a great development. In the past three years, it has increased by more than 100,000 tons."

The total tonnage of the East African Navy still exceeds the minimum standard of 650,000 tons agreed upon with the United Kingdom, and now exceeds 30,000 tons.

Of course, this is also in line with the agreement between the two countries. After all, the East African Navy is based on the French Navy, and France has never stopped the naval military competition. Now the total tonnage of the French Navy is close to 900,000 tons. Therefore, according to the agreement reached between East Africa and the United Kingdom, East Africa can naturally increase the corresponding naval size.

In addition, there is another unstable factor that interferes with the construction of the East African Navy, that is, the Japanese Navy. The original agreement between East Africa and Britain clearly stated that the Japanese Navy could not surpass the East African Navy, otherwise the East African Navy had the right to change its plans on its own.

Today, the total tonnage of the Japanese Navy has reached more than 600,000 tons, so there is no reason for Britain to interfere with the expansion of the East African Navy, unless Britain can deal with Japan and persuade the Japanese Navy not to expand.

However, Japan is no longer a weakling. If it was before the Russo-Japanese War, Japan might have obeyed Britain due to the gap in strength. But now Japan has become one of the world's recognized powers, replacing Spain as the goalkeeper of the powers, so naturally it will not be obedient.

In fact, if we only consider the military level, Japan should be above Spain. Even from the economic perspective, Japan and Spain are on par with each other. In fact, because of its population advantage, Japan is slightly better than Spain now. Therefore, saying that Japan is the goalkeeper of the great powers is a bit of an underestimation of Japan as a country.

However, this is the view of most Western countries. As an Asian country, it is already very rare for Japan to be regarded as an equal by the great powers. It is even more difficult to get them to further recognize Japan's international status.

Today's Japan has defined itself as the boss of East Asia, so it does not obey the orders of its former master, Britain. If Britain declines further, Japan is likely to try every means to kick Britain out of East Asia. After all, committing insubordination is a traditional skill of Japan. In fact, Japan did the same in its previous life and taught Britain a severe lesson in Southeast Asia.

Therefore, Britain asked the Japanese government to stop its naval expansion, but the Japanese government completely adopted an attitude of lip service.

Since Japan did not stop the naval military competition, East Africa naturally did not want to fall behind. Therefore, although East Africa's naval development stagnated for a period of time due to the influence of the Anglo-Eastern Reconciliation Treaty, it is now catching up again.

This was actually the trap that Ernst had set at the beginning. Based on his understanding of Japan, Ernst had long known that Japan would not act according to Britain's instructions, so he included the total tonnage of the Japanese Navy as a condition in the treaty.

Even if Britain is unhappy now, there is nothing it can do. It can only transfer this hatred to the "disobedient" Japanese government. East Africa, with the help of Japan's ambitions, avoided the naval development restrictions of the Anglo-Eastern Reconciliation Treaty.

(End of this chapter)