"What makes me difficult to understand is that, as the core of the German Empire, the Prussian Kingdom, one of the most powerful kingdoms in the world, has a far less sense of smell in the field of forward-looking advanced technology than the Bavarian Kingdom in the south. Prince Ruprecht was very friendly and shared with me all the new aviation technology, but what surprised me was that I searched all the departments of the Prussian military and could not find a department that was specifically related to aviation! The only department with tools to fly into the sky was the meteorological department!" Xiao Moltke wrote in his diary with heartache to vent his resentment and dissatisfaction!

In fact, this cannot be blamed on Moltke, because during this period, when the Wright brothers' planes had not yet entered the sky, countries around the world had not paid much attention to the aviation industry. Except for Prince Ruprecht, a pioneer in time travel, there were very few people who really paid attention to it.

General Moltke, who discovered the New World, immediately decided to borrow balloons from the meteorological department and look for all the people in the army who had had relationships with balloons! He even decided to use "civilians" to enrich the future Prussian aviation force. Even the Earl Zeppelin, who was born with an opposing relationship with the plane. As the saying goes, the emperor pays off. After a period of hard work, Moltke really found a few people.

"This is Major Augusta von Pasegel. He once studied a special balloon with stable wings with his subordinates, Lieutenant Hans Higgsfield, and August Ridinger. Their balloons are in the lead because these slender balloons are a very good aerial observation platform with stable wings." An adjutant introduced to Moltke.

According to the instructions of Moltke, as long as the personnel who had been exposed to flying and had winged aircraft were concentrated. These three military personnel who developed the new hot air balloon in 1892 were naturally summoned. There is indeed no special aviation department in the Prussian army. This is true. The army balloon team, which was once established in the Franco-Prussian War, was disbanded because it was considered to have little effect. However, you can't say that the Prussian army did not have balloons, that's wrong.

Indeed, when the outbreak of World War 1, the eight armies of Prussia had a balloon team, and there were 17 fortress balloon teams. Before the outbreak of the war, Prussia and Bavaria each had a balloon battalion. After the outbreak of the war, eight Prussian Army balloon teams and two Bavarian Army balloon teams were formed one after another. (It can be seen from this aspect that the independence of the Bavarian army is...)

"Tell me about your airline team's current situation." Xiao Moltke asked straight to the point.

"We are just a balloon observation team at the moment, and we definitely can't talk about aviation, because we can hardly control the direction of flight in the air. Our autonomy is not even as good as *******." Major Augusta said modestly.

"Our air team has 10 officers, 270 soldiers, 194 mules and horses, 35 carriages and 2 balloons. Our main task is to let observers take balloons to observe the other party's whereabouts in the air. We use **********, a balloon made of cotton on the outside and rubber airbags inside. If we can fill 600 cubic meters of hydrogen, the balloon can rise to an altitude of 800 meters. But in fact, we rarely rise to more than 500 meters." The major introduced.

"Why? The observation effect of 800 meters is better." Xiao Moltke said with a frown.

"Because our balloons are soft balloons, unlike Mr. Zeppelin's hard airship, the higher the height, the smaller the air density, the smaller the buoyancy provided by the balloon. If we want to reach a higher height, we will not repair and reduce the weight. We have canceled the hanging basket, carried the observer with a saddle-like seat, and tied the observer with the balloon together with steel cables, but this will be very unstable and will cause the observer to vomit and dizziness..." The major said embarrassingly. (The above is the real situation of the balloon team organization and description, and the German balloon troops are still very interesting.)

"Uh, it's very good..." After listening to the other party's description, Moltke felt that his professionalism was extremely unfavorable, but there was no way, Prussia did not have specialized talents!

"That's great. I have a top-secret document here. You must keep it strictly confidential according to the confidentiality terms." After saying that, Xiao Moltke handed over some of the information given by the prince to the other party.

"This is a revolutionary aircraft! From a reconnaissance perspective, this can be operated effectively and is better than a balloon using a simple aircraft!" Major Augusta exclaimed.

"They can also be equipped with weapons and strike ground facilities. The combat cost of these new aircraft is much lower than that of airships. I am very interested in this. I hope you and your team can help us create our own Prussian aircraft!" said Xiao Moltke.

"This, we need professional ******* designers to assist us in our work. Judging from the structure of the aircraft submitted by the other party, it is not a big problem to copy this aircraft, but how to innovate on this basis is difficult to create a better aircraft, because we have no idea and just a simple copy." Second Lieutenant Hans, who is specialized in technology, said after analyzing the design of the aircraft himself.

"And we cannot install any weapons on the plane at present. Although I have never done a powered one, I have operated it. It is extremely unrealistic for a pilot to turn the machine gun to strafuse while operating the plane." Hans added.

"This issue is put aside and copy this aircraft first. I will give your balloon team a separate organization, and the personnel can be drawn from any part of the grassroots level or recruited from the people. You will be the first powered ******* flight team under the Prussian army. You will be equipped with an independent logistics support unit, and you will receive sufficient funds, provided that you achieve results!" Xiao Maoqi said.

"I hope you can create a fleet with 4 aircraft and 6 pilots within one year. You can get the drawings from us, but I hope you will not stick to the drawings and design a Prussian aircraft better than this aircraft!" Little Moltke looked at the plane in the photo again and emphasized the words Prussian!

"We will do our best, but we need an engine with the largest power possible. Now Germany's best gasoline engine may be the product produced by the Bavarian Southern Industrial Group. If possible, I hope Prussia can produce the engine itself." Reedinger emphasized without saying anything.
Chapter completed!