Chapter 476: South American Naval Arms Race

European countries generally regarded the time when Spain's Dreadnought battleship served as the time node for the birth of the Dreadnought, and this time node was only 7 years ago.

In these 7 years, European countries were crazily building Dreadnoughts, among which Britain and Spain had the most exaggerated construction speed.

Although Spain was the first country in the world to possess Dreadnoughts, judging from the surface data of the navies of various governments at present, Britain had already surpassed Spain in Dreadnoughts, possessing a full 11 Dreadnoughts.

And Spain only possessed 10 Dreadnoughts; whether it was the number of Dreadnoughts or the total naval tonnage, it had to lag behind Britain.

But this did not mean that the Spanish government was slack. On the contrary, Spain's speed in building Dreadnoughts was actually not weaker than the British, but it was just that several Dreadnoughts had been sold to France and Italy back and forth, which also led to Spain only possessing 10 Dreadnoughts on the surface.

But in reality, the construction of Spain's new-generation Dreadnought, the Victory-class battleship, was currently proceeding quite smoothly.

The Victory and Peace battleships had successively completed construction work; the former was expected to formally serve early next year, and the latter could join the ranks of the Spanish Navy around the middle of next year.

In other words, Spain would possess 12 Dreadnoughts in a year, among which 2 were super Dreadnoughts, and the naval strength was not weaker than the British, even if Britain's total naval tonnage was twice that of Spain.

Under the leadership of Spain and Britain, Europe was conducting a grand naval arms race. Almost all Great Powers were building Dreadnoughts, and even some countries whose strength was not that powerful had ideas about Dreadnoughts, this kind of warship with quite fierce combat effectiveness.

This had to mention the country with the largest land area in South America, Brazil, which once belonged to a Portuguese colony.

Although Brazil's comprehensive strength did not look like much in the whole world, in the region of South America, Brazil could still be counted as a regional power.

The Brazilian government originally ordered battleships from the British government a few years ago, which were pre-Dreadnought battleships. But when they learned that Britain already possessed mature Dreadnought construction ability, they immediately changed their minds, informing the British government that they hoped to change the pre-Dreadnought battleships originally agreed to be built into Dreadnoughts.

Brazil was far away in South America; even if they mastered Dreadnoughts, it would have no impact on the British Empire. More importantly, changing the pre-Dreadnought battleships ordered by Brazil into Dreadnoughts was also of positive significance for the British Navy department.

If the modification of Brazil's warships could achieve relatively great success, then Britain could also modify the existing pre-Dreadnought battleships later, letting them possess the firepower and power of the Dreadnought level, so that when facing the enemy's Dreadnoughts, they would not be without any ability to resist.

Such modifications naturally had defects; increasing the caliber of artillery and power units without increasing the tonnage of the warship resulted in the warship appearing somewhat neither fish nor fowl, and the armor protection ability was certainly not comparable to that of a legitimate Dreadnought.

However, in terms of firepower and speed, they could still reach the level of Dreadnoughts; saying these modified warships were Dreadnoughts was actually no problem at all.

It was precisely because of this that Brazil suddenly obtained two Minas Gerais-class battleships this year, and its naval strength suddenly jumped to the top ten in the world.

Of course, Brazil's top ten in the navy was more accurately said to be the world's tenth. It could not touch the countries ahead, but crushing the countries behind was no problem.

Suddenly obtaining two Dreadnoughts was naturally a piece of good news for Brazil, but for other countries in South America, especially for Chile and Argentina, which were Brazil's main opponents, it was not a good thing.

Upon learning that Brazil obtained two Dreadnoughts, the Chilean parliament quickly passed

The main content of this warship construction order consisted of two dreadnoughts with a tonnage as high as 28,000 tons, six destroyers, and two submarines.

There is no need to overthink it; Chile's purpose in building a navy was to keep Brazil in check. Two 28,000-ton dreadnoughts would be enough to surpass the Minas Geraes-class battleships possessed by Brazil; after all, the latter were merely products modified from pre-dreadnought foundations and still possessed certain differences from true dreadnoughts.

In order to obtain powerful dreadnoughts to counter Brazil, the Chilean government conducted a large-scale tender, inviting famous naval shipyards from various European countries to provide rough designs, and selecting the most satisfactory design to be handed over to a shipyard for construction.

As one of the top two shipbuilding nations in terms of dreadnoughts at present, Spain naturally also received an invitation from the Chilean naval department.

Regarding Chile's requirements, Spain's major shipyards were quite interested. Even though Chile required the construction of battleships with a tonnage as high as 28,000 tons, they did not have overly excessive demands for the warships' armor protection, artillery caliber, or power units, only requiring them to reach the standard level of a dreadnought.

If a Spanish shipyard could secure this order, it could earn at least 1 million pounds in net profit. This was no small figure; even for a Spanish shipyard, such a massive sum of capital would be tempting.

Currently, Spain's Royal Guarnizo Shipyard and the Valencia United Shipyard both possessed the capability to design and build dreadnoughts. Both shipyards participated in the Chilean naval tender, and ultimately, Spain's Royal Guarnizo Shipyard won the bid and secured the order from the Chilean naval department.

Although the Valencia United Shipyard also had a certain interest in this order, the shipyard was currently building Victor-class battleships for the Spanish Navy, and in terms of both the delivery time of the warships and the level of detail in the warship designs, it could not compare to the available Royal Guarnizo Shipyard.

The Royal Guarnizo Shipyard provided the Chilean Navy with a naval warship design that they could not refuse. These two battleships, named by the Chilean government as the Admiral Latorre and the Admiral Cochrane respectively, had their main bodies referenced from Spain's Dreadnought-class battleships, but the overall design of the warships was lengthened and widened, and they were equipped with 343mm main guns of the same caliber as Spain's Victor-class battleships.

Although the firepower was at the same level as Spain's Victor-class battleships, in terms of armor protection and power, it was not as exaggerated as the Victor-class battleships.

After all, since they were building warships for Chile, there was no need for the Spanish shipyard to empty out all their secrets; they still had to hide some of their more advanced technologies.

In terms of armor protection, the armor on Chile's two dreadnoughts was thinner, which was also to accommodate the speed of the dreadnoughts.

This improved battleship, which had been designed with increased length and width, already had a standard displacement exceeding 25,000 tons and a full-load displacement approaching 30,000 tons; it was a proper super-giant ship.

But because it was improved from Spain's Dreadnought-class battleships, there were not many improvements in terms of power equipment.

If they did not try their best to make the armor thinner, the speed of this battleship might not have met the requirements for a dreadnought.

Of course, even if the armor was thinner, it was still better than those two pseudo-dreadnoughts Brazil had modified from pre-dreadnoughts.