I Became a Plutocrat in World War I: Starting with Saving France-Chapter 212: The Puzzled French Navy

Shire once again played hide and seek with the citizens of Paris. When he went home the next day for a holiday, he avoided the crowd and snuck out through the back door.

Returning to Davaz Town, he saw a large group of people blocking the front of the town from afar. As expected, it was another triumph ceremony organized by the neighbors.

Shire had no choice but to take another route with Major Laurent, circling around to approach his home from a different direction.

However, when he arrived home, he found that someone had arrived before him. A young officer with the rank of lieutenant general was sitting on the cheap sofa in the living room, chatting with Dejoka.

Shire assumed he was sent by Gallieni, so he adjusted his military cap that he had just taken off, saluted, and called out, "General!"

The young lieutenant general was startled. He quickly put down the coffee cup in his hand, stood up, and warmly shook hands with Shire, excitedly saying, "You, you must be Shire. It’s an honor to meet you. My name is Tijani."

Shire felt that the name sounded familiar, as if he had heard it somewhere before.

Tijani explained, "I am the commander of the 2nd Specialized Artillery Division, Tijani."

Shire responded with an "oh", recognizing the name from command operations, though he had only known it as a code name back then.

Dejoka, smiling, looked at Shire and said, "General Tijani is here to thank you for saving them."

Camille came out of the kitchen, saying, "The General is very kind; he also brought gifts!"

"It’s only right!" Tijani responded respectfully, "You have a very excellent son, Mr. Dejoka, Madam Bernard!"

Camille, proud and smiling, enjoyed hearing others praise Shire, especially when the praise came from a lieutenant general.

Camille warmly invited Tijani to sit at the dining table and served pizza to both of them.

Dejoka mentioned that he had already eaten, leaving the dining table to Shire and Tijani.

Shire knew that Dejoka hadn’t eaten; he understood that he should excuse himself at this moment, otherwise, he would inevitably overhear some military secrets.

Tijani did not hesitate; he seized a piece like a starving man, chewing while loudly praising, "The taste is great, Madam Bernard. I think I’ll eat it all!"

"You shouldn’t be used to it, General!" Shire despised such blatant flattery.

He remembered Tijani’s identity, the only son of Wells, always living in luxury, how could he have such great interest in a piece of pizza.

"No, Major!" Tijani smiled slightly, continuing to chew his food, "I’m not what you think."

"Indeed," Shire responded bluntly, "For example, your family owns half of the French Navy, yet you joined the army and became a lieutenant general!"

Shire’s tone carried a touch of sarcasm, implying: You pampered scion should mess up the navy, not come and trouble the army!

Tijani was not foolish; he certainly understood the subtext of Shire’s words, but he did not get angry.

He responded indistinctly, "Major, do you think the French Navy has a future?"

"That’s none of my business!" Shire replied straightforwardly, "I’m army, I don’t understand the navy."

Tijani responded with an "mm": "I don’t understand either. I’ll tell you what I know. In terms of warships, they are divided into two factions: one advocating the so-called Green Water Navy, and the other the traditional navy."

"Green Water Navy?" Shire was stunned.

He was unaware of it; neither the First nor the Second World War did the navy have much presence, the most famous act being the collective scuttling to avoid capture by the enemy.

"Yes!" Tijani continued eating voraciously as he explained: "The idea of the Green Water Navy is to use small tonnage fast boats armed with torpedoes in combat. They believe this can solve all problems."

Shire responded with an "oh", understanding it as seeking to achieve great results with small means.

This was indeed very tempting, as even a mighty battleship could be taken down by a single torpedo. Despite the low hit rate of torpedoes at this time, if a large number of torpedo boats were developed to fire volleys at a target...

(The image above shows early torpedo boats, first invented by Britain, but the French Navy, lagging behind, saw it as a way to catch up, leading to the emergence of the Green Water Navy faction and the mass construction of such boats)

"We now have at least 200 torpedo boats." Tijani said, "The Green Water Navy faction believes this is the future trend of the navy until they saw the emergence of the dreadnought from Britain and realized they were already behind."

The dreadnought was the naval overlord of this era, its concept being to unify the various calibers of battleship guns as much as possible, having one or two calibers of main guns.

The advantage of this approach is obvious—main guns of the same caliber and model would have similar ballistic trajectories. During wartime, calculating one set of firing solutions could determine the impact point range of a dozen or even dozens of main guns.

It could even use a trial shooting method: after calculating the firing solution, fire one gun, observe the impact point, then calculate the deviation and correct the solution, then trial shoot again... once within range, the remaining guns could fire simultaneously.

On the contrary, if the opposing battleship did not have unified gun calibers, multiple firing solutions would be needed, each of which could be wrong, placing it at a disadvantage in actual combat.

"We now have only three dreadnoughts." Tijani shook his head with a smile, "While Britain already has over twenty, Germany has more than ten. Once the second most powerful navy, we have been left far behind. Yet, despite this, they still waver between the Green Water Navy and the traditional navy. Today they build torpedo boats, tomorrow a new dreadnought plan appears."

Shire’s expressionless response was a mere "mm", development directions were uncertain, and they were in a state of confusion.

Tijani continued, "Submarines are the same. There are even three factions—some believe submarines should use steam engines, some believe they should use diesel engines, and others believe submarines should be equipped with naval guns so they can have a fighting chance against enemy warships!"

(Note: The image above shows a submarine equipped with naval guns, the Surcouf, which France began building in 1927, referred to by France as a cruiser submarine)

Tijani took a sip of milk, frustrated: "We were the world’s first country to realize mechanically powered submarines, the first to realize electrically powered submarines, and the first to put torpedoes on submarines, but now what?"

Tijani then concluded, "We no longer have a navy. They can do nothing!"

"Isn’t the army the same?" Shire retorted.

Shire referred to the same unclear direction and repeated wavering; the army was not much better off, a situation decided by the political system of the French Third Republic.

"I used to think they were indeed not much different." Tijani paused, looking at Shire: "But now, I find the army and navy are two different things!"

(The image above shows a World War I torpedo, short-ranged and with low accuracy, but even at 150 meters, it could miss. However, when it hit, it could still deliver a fatal blow)

The source of this c𝐨ntent is freewe(b)nov𝒆l