Life of Being a Crown Prince in France - Chapter 1510 - 1416: The Navy's Future

As a talented naval commander, Marquis Leesar almost immediately understood the Crown Prince’s intention and nodded repeatedly, saying:

“The Combined Fleet can mobilize at least 25 battleships of Third-class or above, which will greatly distract the attention of the British Navy.”

He promptly added:

“Your Highness, I suggest also formulating an ‘operation plan’ under the Navy Department to raid the British mainland or massively attack the Saint George Strait routes, and then intentionally leak it to the British spies.”

Indeed, although the British fleet has an obvious overall strength advantage, the French Navy also has a unique strength, which is ‘comparative leisure’.

England relies heavily on maritime trade and also needs to maintain global maritime dominance. This causes every ship in the British Navy to be extremely busy.

If the Combined Fleet of France and Spain now shows an intention to ‘make a big move’, the British will definitely send out a similarly sized fleet for ‘close surveillance’.

This would further reduce the number of battleships the British Navy can deploy to blockade French and Spanish ports.

Combined with Joseph’s plan to distribute shipping across more than 30 ports, it can be foreseen that many ports will have only a few British escort ships patrolling outside.

This scale of blockade cannot even contend with armed merchant ships traveling together.

Joseph secretly sighed, thinking that people of this era just hadn’t opened up their minds yet; otherwise, they would be as ‘insidious’ as military experts of later generations.

He first affirmed the Navy Minister’s plan and then remembered the most concerned matter: “By the way, how is the construction progress of the ‘Decisive’?”

Marquis Leesar used to have a strained face when hearing this question, but this time he surprisingly appeared relaxed, saying, “Your Highness, after using the steam forging machine, the shipyard has solved most of the core issues. According to Mr. Woklair’s report, the first trial sail is expected to be at the end of August.”

Jean-Bernard de Woklair succeeded Blondo as the director of the Brest Shipyard, the latter having passed away in his office at the end of last year.

“Good,” Joseph’s eyes were filled with joy, “Please tell Mr. Woklair that I will personally attend the maiden voyage ceremony.”

“It is the honor of all Brest people, Your Highness.”

It is no wonder Joseph places such importance on it, as the “Decisive” is the first steam-powered Fourth-level battleship in France.

Originally, he thought that after solving the high-power steam engine issue, with the previous experience of steam frigate construction, this ship should be completed quickly.

However, due to utilizing advanced technology such as iron keels, the “Decisive” has been under construction for 1 year and 9 months since finishing the design drawings two years ago, encountering numerous problems.

Problems like large iron components often had poor precision and severe deformation. More than 70% of those seven or eight-meter-high ship ribs could not be properly installed on the keel.

Moreover, the rough riveting process led to rivets loosening and missing, and the overall structural strength of the skeleton could not meet standards.

It was not until the shipyard acquired the steam forging machine from His Majesty the King that the manufacturing precision issue of large metal components was resolved.

On the other hand, the shipyard learned from other industrial sectors’ standardization experience – given its technological isolation, it was almost the last industrial category nationwide to complete standardization – under Woklair’s push, formulated a complete set of production technology standards for rivet hole drilling, pressing iron, riveting molds, and even artisan hammering methods, finally meeting the riveting strength requirements.

As for issues like difficulty in accurately hoisting and positioning super-large metal pieces, the problem of iron frameworks raising the ship’s center of gravity, and the compass being affected by magnetic fields generated by steel frameworks after forging, these seem not so difficult.

In short, up to now, this ship has spawned over 70 patents.

Fortunately, all problems have been solved, and the “Decisive” is about to be launched.

Actually, Joseph quite enjoys these technical challenges, as it means even if the British learn France’s new battleship concept through spies, and even get some design drawings, they cannot replicate it quickly.

Not to mention, at least they don’t have the steam forging machine.

Using the old water-powered forging machine, well, the Brest Shipyard has already answered with less than a 30% final product rate.

After the “Decisive” achieves technological breakthroughs, the subsequent mass construction speed will be much faster–

At Joseph’s request, the shipyard had prepared enough wood, steel, rigging, and other raw materials to build 15 ships of the same grade a year earlier, as well as excess shipyards and shipbuilding craftsmen.

Of course, even so, the original three-year plan to build 40 “Decisive-class” battleships will have to be delayed by 1 to 1.5 years.

Marquis Leesar recalled something with some concerns:

“Your Highness, according to the intelligence we received, the British are likely building a high-performance Third-class battleship on a large scale.

“Reportedly, this ship has greatly improved maneuverability and speed compared to existing Third-class ships, using new gun mounts, increasing firepower intensity by nearly a quarter.

“In the discussions among British Navy Department personnel, it is referred to as a battleship ‘to regain control of the Mediterranean Sea.”

Joseph frowned: “Is it driven by a steam engine?”

“It seems not, Your Highness,” said the Navy Minister, “The British have not yet managed to make a steam engine exceeding 50 horsepower.”

Joseph breathed a sigh of relief: “Then there’s no need to worry too much. You must have confidence in my… ah, in our designers.”

As someone who understands nineteenth-century naval warfare, Joseph is acutely aware that sail-powered battleships almost only take a beating in front of steam-engine-driven ships.

Moreover, the “Decisive-class” not only has steam engines but also uses iron ribs and other revolutionary technology. Additionally, it compensates for the shortcomings of non-coppering hulls and lacks heavy short-barrel artillery.

Joseph is convinced that the fate of the French Navy’s historical defeat in the Battle of Trafalgar, which led to a complete loss of ocean discourse power, will be rewritten by this revolutionary new battleship!

Nevertheless, Marquis Leesar, for safety’s sake, dared not place all hope on the “Decisive-class”, still suggesting: “Your Highness, since the new ships use iron keels, our warehouse is now filled with sufficient quality oak.

“Perhaps they can be used to build a batch of traditional battleships.”

He refers to oak used for making sail warship keels. This wood is extremely rare, with strict requirements on age and straightness of the trunk, even without a single blemish.

Basically, out of every 3,000 oak trees growing over 90 years, only one fit keel can be selected.