In March of the first year of Tongzhi, the Regent King Yixin asked an order to order Li Weiguo, Zeng Guofan and Li Hongzhang to send troops to suppress the Taiping Army from all sides, and to vow not to give up until the Taiping Heavenly Kingdom is destroyed.↗,

The two empress dowagers ruled the country from behind the curtain. In order to establish their prestige, they needed a large-scale victory to consolidate their rule. So they agreed to Yixin's request to report and a clear order to inform the world.

Li Weiguo dealt with the Beijing Peace Treaty with Britain, France, the United States and Russia. The Russian army in the north had completely left China's territory. Li Weiguo spent 5 million taels of silver to buy Alaska. Not only were the countries around the world laughing at Li Weiguo's stupid people and spent 5 million taels of silver to buy a barren land covered with ice and snow all year round. Even in the Qing Dynasty, no matter the government and the country, they secretly laughed at Li Weiguo for having a problem with his brain.

Li Weiguo did not explain this. He hoped that everyone would laugh at him and despise him. In this way, when one day they were really stupid, they would let them slap their mouths.

The second town of the Shanghai Army stopped its attack on the Russian army, but was not recalled by Li Weiguo, but was stationed in Vladivostok on the spot. According to Li Weiguo's order, the second town began to build Vladivostok fortress in Vladivostok to prevent Russian threats from the north.

On the other hand, Li Weiguo formed the Alaska Construction Corps in Zhili, with a population of about 10,000. As the first Chinese to go to Alaska to start a business. Most of these people were poor, and the solitary and unemployed people who died in the Yabi War. Li Weiguo gave them the opportunity to go to Alaska to find gold mines and start the colonization process of Alaska.

The First and Fifth Towns of the Shanghai Army continued to be stationed in Zhili area, with the First Towns in Tianjin and the Fifth Towns in Baoding, forming a pincer attack on Beijing to the north, and threatening Shandong and Henan provinces to the south.

All the Han landlords in the Zhili area were adapted. They first existed as the Zhili Security Corps. After more than half a year of rigorous training, they were temporarily organized into the 17th and 18th towns of the Shanghai Army. Elite officers and soldiers were drawn from the 1st and 5th towns to supplement them, so that the 17th and 18th towns quickly formed combat effectiveness.

In this way, there are four towns and Shanghai troops in Zhili area, which is enough to deter all forces.

Li Weiguo arranged the affairs of Zhili and ordered Zhang Xiaoliu and Chen Jingnan to stay behind, while he took Su Sanniang back to Shanghai.

At this time, the imperial decree had been issued. The Shanghai Army, Hunan Army, and Huai Army jointly attacked the Taiping Army and launched the final battle to destroy the Taiping Heavenly Kingdom. Li Weiguo planned for this matter for a long time. Since Zeng Guofan and Li Hongzhang had given up the idea of ​​rebellion, they were Li Weiguo's enemies. During this battle to destroy the Taiping Heavenly Kingdom, the Shanghai Army would be prepared to go to war with the Hunan Army and the Huai Army at the same time, which required Li Weiguo to take charge of command.

In addition, Britain, France, the United States and Russia established cooperative relations with Li Weiguo respectively. Russia sold Alaska to Li Weiguo for 5 million taels of silver, abandoned all occupied territory, and returned to the era of the Treaty of Nibchu in the Qing Dynasty.

Russia's Far East ambition was strangled in the cradle by Li Weiguo. The German Federation was engaging in a war of unity, which made Russia feel the personal security threat and forced it to refocus its focus back on Europe.

Russia will not be a threat within decades. On the contrary, Russia must be wary of Li Weiguo's possible military invasion of the far East and West Siberia at any time.

However, Li Weiguo is not interested in invading the Siberian region for the time being. After all, it is a barren land and is useless to obtain it. Instead, it will stimulate Russia's military policy to tilt towards Asia, which is not conducive to the country and the people.

Therefore, Li Weiguo will not send troops to Siberia for the time being, and he does not have the energy. In the next ten years, Li Weiguo's enemy will be Britain, who will compete with Britain for the power to control the sea and consolidate China's Asian hegemony.

Since Russia is also the enemy of Britain. Therefore, according to the principle that the enemy's enemy is a friend, Li Weiguo would not invade Russia, but would instead win over Russia to fight against Britain.

Therefore, after purchasing Alaska, Li Weiguo approved the first preferential loan from the Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank to Russia.

The total loan is RMB 5 million. It is paid to Russia in three years and three periods, with interest of 3% and 1,000. As a condition, the two sides secretly signed the Sino-Russia Shanghai Treaty to Ensure Non-aggression in Shanghai, stipulating that if one party fights a third country (except China's dependent state), the other party should maintain good faith neutrality and do its best to localize the war to avoid being involved in the war. China recognizes the legitimacy of Russia's military existence along the Mediterranean coast and Central Asia, and supports Russia's territorial claims from Turkey. Russia recognizes China's sovereignty over its neighboring dependent states and shall not interfere in its internal affairs without China's permission.

This secret treaty is valid for ten years and is called an insurance treaty between China and Russia, to avoid military conflicts between China and Russia.

Russia is carrying out serfdom reforms, and the Crimean War exhausted all the Russian treasury. Therefore, Li Weiguo's 5 million yuan loan was undoubtedly a timely help. The Russian Tsar was very happy and had no objection to the Sino-Russian insurance treaty. The two sides quickly signed the treaty to make it officially take effect.

At this time, the RMB had become the national currency of the Qing Empire. At the suggestion of Li Weiguo, the Regent and the Empress Dowager of the Two Palaces approved the establishment of the Qing Empire Bank. All personnel were selected by Li Weiguo from the Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank and supervised by officials from the Ministry of Personnel and the Ministry of Revenue. Since June of the first year of rule, RMB has been issued nationwide. All provinces have stopped printing copper coins, and the citizens have to take all the gold, silver and copper coins in their hands to the Imperial Bank or the Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank to exchange corresponding RMB banknotes and coins within one year.

In this way, the RMB finally ruled the Qing Empire. Although the Qing Empire Bank was nominally the court, in fact, only Li Weiguo said that the Imperial Bank had only one headquarters in Beijing, and there were no branches in each province. All the AIIB were executed on their behalf. The right to issue currencies was still implemented within the AIIB, which means that Li Weiguo had mastered the financial lifeline of the Qing Empire.

Russia borrowed 5 million yuan from the Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank, and basically only could purchase various materials in the Qing Dynasty. Because Europe does not accept RMB for the time being, relevant negotiations between Li Weiguo and Britain and France are still in progress. However, the Beijing Peace Treaty stipulates that China's coastal areas and rivers are fully open to the outside world, and European goods can be purchased domestically, so Russians can use RMB to buy the goods they need.

Putting aside Russia, after Britain and France signed the Beijing Peace Treaty with the Qing Dynasty, ports along the coast of the Qing Dynasty were opened to the outside world, allowing the goods of Britain and France to enter the Qing Dynasty with low tariffs. This made the merchants of Britain and France very happy, and the trauma caused by the Second Yafan War to heal quickly. Large-scale commercial exchanges caused a short honeymoon period between China, Britain, China and France.

Although Britain and France still regard the Qing Dynasty as their enemies, at least in a short period of time, Britain and France will no longer go to war with the Qing Dynasty. They are afraid of Li Weiguo's military strength. They will never go to war with Li Weiguo until they fully understand the new weapons and equipment of the Shanghai army.

At the same time, Britain and France are both focused on the American Civil War, so before the end of the American Civil War, neither Britain nor France's attitude towards China will change much.

Li Weiguo needed this short honeymoon period. Europe still has a large number of advanced technologies to learn and introduce, the most representative of which are the steam engine boiler systems and transmission devices used in large warships between Britain and France. In the era of ironclad ships, these two technologies were very important. Although Jiangnan Shipyard has also imitated the steam engines and transmission devices used in large warships, it has very low thermal efficiency and insufficient power.

On the one hand, Li Weiguo sent overseas students to the United Kingdom and France in Europe on a large scale. He learned various advanced technologies and management experiences in Europe, and also introduced them on a large scale, rapidly improving the technology and experience in related fields in China and shortening the gap with the West.

However, the British and French governments were very annoyed by the defeat in the Yamoji War, and it was inevitable that the technology transfer and export of China would be difficult to set up a card. Therefore, Li Weiguo could only use the same technology to exchange with Britain and France for advanced technology transactions in some countries' powerful weapons.

For example, the steam engine system and transmission device used for large warships were exchanged for Li Weiguo's technology transfer using Weiguo rifles and Type 59 infantry cannons.

Li Weiguo is developing naval industry on a large scale. During the Second Yabo War, several large British steam battleships commanded by White were grounded in the Yangtze River and were later salvaged out of the water by the Shanghai army. They were sent back to the Jiangnan Shipyard for dismantling and imitation.

A year later, when Li Weiguo's official ship arrived in Shanghai, it happened to be the time when Xu Shou and Hua Hengfang tested the newly developed ironclad ship and launched the water test.

After disembarking, Li Weiguo boarded the ironclad ship in person to visit and asked Xu Shou and Hua Hengfang about various details.

Although this ironclad ship was built by Xu Shou and Hua Hengfang, the designer was designed by Swedish ship designer John Eriksen.

Eriksen was one of the fourth batch of experts hired by SHIELD from Europe at the beginning. Li Weiguo had no impression of him. It was not until Xu Shou and Hua Hengfang told him the overall situation of the ironclad ship that he remembered who Eriksen was.

The Monit ironclad ship built by the US Northern Army in history was made by Eriksen. However, history has changed now. Just when Eriksen was dissatisfied with the treatment of the Royal Swedish Navy and was about to try his luck in the United States, the agents of SHIELD from China came to him and hired him to the Jiangnan Shipyard with high salaries to assist Xu Shou and Hua Hengfang in the design and development of the ironclad ship.

After nine months of design and development, the first ironclad ship in modern Chinese history was born. Its freeboard is extremely low, and the main part of the entire hull is completely below the waterline. The hull body is only exposed 1 meter on the water surface. This hull structure is only suitable for shallow water offshore, because when it reaches the deep sea, such a low freeboard can easily be overturned by huge waves.

But this is also a coincidence. When Li Weiguo called Xu Shou and Hua Hengfang to tell them to develop ironclad ships, he once told them that the current important task of the East China Sea Fleet is to go from sail warships to ironclad warships. The primary goal of the entire fleet in the next five years is to achieve the renewal of ironclad ships.

Li Weiguo made clear regulations that the rice should be eaten at a bite and the road should be taken step by step. The East China Sea Fleet's goal in the next five years is to compete with the British Navy for the sea control power in the offshore waters around China. That is, once a war breaks out again between China and the UK, the East China Sea Fleet must ensure absolute sea control power in the offshore waters. As for seizing the sea control power in Asia, it will be the predetermined goal of the next five-year plan.

Since the East China Sea Fleet's goal in the next five years is to seize China's offshore sea control power, the requirement for ironclad ships is naturally to be near-shore defense. Erikson visited the French ironclad ships during the Crimean War and was inspired by the French Navy's shallow-water turret ironclad ships. So when Xu Shou and Hua Hengfang proposed the offshore defense mission with him, Erikson designed this shallow-water turret ironclad ship without hesitation.

Since modern naval artillery fire is almost the same as cannons, the ballistics during naval warfare are mainly direct attacks, so in order to protect the hull from being easily hit by enemy artillery fire, reducing the ship's side can reduce the probability of being hit. Sinking the main body of the ship below the waterline can reduce the probability of being hit to a greater extent.

Therefore, this series of subjective and considerable reasons have created this somewhat strange shallow water turret ironclad ship.

For Li Weiguo, it is just practical.

Undoubtedly, the shallow-water turret ironclad ship in front of you is very practical. Except for the low freeboard and is not suitable for deep-sea navigation, all aspects are satisfactory.

First of all, as an iron armor ship, it is naturally armored. Powerful armor is the hard truth. This iron armor ship was installed with 20 layers of 10mm thick steel plates by Xu Shou, which can withstand the direct kinetic energy impact of solid bullets fired from 1,000 meters away by standard 12-inch borebore guns. It is simply an invincible bunker at sea, because few warships are equipped with naval guns of 12-inch caliber or above. Even for the powerful British Royal Navy, only the Warrior iron armor ship is equipped with 110-pound cannons. The largest caliber guns of other battleships are only 68-pound cannons, which cannot penetrate 200mm thick armor.

With such powerful armor protection, the firepower is also very strong. Although there is only one turret, it is a fully protected rotary turret designed according to Li Weiguo's proposal. There are 2 12-inch rear-mounted rifled guns installed in the turret. Due to technical problems, the barrel life is only 100 rounds, and after 100 rounds, it can only be used as a smoothbore gun.

The only regret is that the tonnage of this ironclad ship has reached 3,130 tons due to the installation of a large amount of armor, which is a serious challenge to the current steam engine manufacturing capacity of the Jiangnan Shipyard. The maximum power is only 800 horsepower, which barely makes the speed of this ironclad ship reach eight knots.

But this is not a problem, Li Weiguo is already very satisfied.

"It's done well and we need to continue our efforts. Within five years, we must first achieve the offshore defense goals. If the British come again, we will make them unable to even get up the coast."

Xu Shou asked, "Master, will the British go to war with us again?"

Li Weiguo snorted coldly and said, "If we want to rise, we will inevitably challenge the British world hegemony. Wars in the future are inevitable, but there should be no problem within five years, because the British have to be busy helping the United States fight a civil war."

Xu Shou nodded and said, "The king has always been far-sighted in planning and vision. His subordinates will never let the king down. Within five years, the East China Sea Fleet will be able to complete the ironclad ship replacement and have the power to fight with the British Navy."

"very good!"
Chapter completed!